Page 43 of We Were Never Lovers
“Shit, that’s not what I meant to say, I mean—”
“Don’t,” Sean stepped back, looked away. “Don’t fuckin’ pander me, alright?” He was embarrassed. It always humiliated him when he said something and Jack, the guys, looked awkward, looked like they didn’t know what to say because he’d said something he should just know.
Sometimes it was funny, like forgetting a terrible game Jack had played and the way Sean had, playfully according to the rendition, mocked Jack for it the whole flight back to Perth. Other times it wasn’t, like when he snapped at Jack that he couldn’t possibly understand how hard it was to rehab his leg, to feel his body failing him. Even Ben had flinched at that one, and it’d been Ben who took him aside and explained, haltingly, that Jack’s career had almost ended with his ruptured anterior cruciate ligament—a reinjury on the ACL tear he’d gotten first season back with the team. That he’d had multiple surgeries, contracted osteomyelitis in hospital and been subjected to a terrifying few months where they didn’t think they’d be able to turn it around. That it’d been Sean who’d got him through the multiple rounds of IV antibiotics and another surgery to clean up the mess from the first surgery.
“I’m not,” Jack said softly, chastised. And here they fell into the same chasm, the space between them they couldn’t cross, Jack on one side looking stricken, Sean on the other trying not to fume at Jack when he was angry with himself.
“I should go to bed,” Jack said, resigned, a hand rubbing over his face, exhausted. It was two in the morning and he’d played a full game of football in the wet, of course he was exhausted. But as his hand fell away from his face, it wasn’t just the lines of the game, and the flight, tracking down his skin. It was this too, it was Sean—his patient, his charge for the past six months,a roommate he had to tiptoe around like a ticking time bomb while Sean watched him carefully manage, and bury under fake cheer, his grief at losing some guy who’d apparently been his best mate. A guy he kept vigil for, kept waiting for him to come back, when everyone else, including Sean, had given up.
“Night,” Jack said and turned away with a tired smile, eyes flicking up to Sean’s hesitantly before he made for the hallway.
Sean followed him, his boot loud on the floorboard. Jack’s shoulders tensed, propelling Sean forward until he was on him, pushing him against the wall outside Jack’s room. Jack let out a whoosh of breath, but didn’t try to shake him off. He dropped his head against the wall and went still except for his breathing and a fine tremble under his taut muscles.
Instinct took over as Sean pushed him harder against the plaster, moulded his body against Jack’s back. He panted, the sound mingling with Jack’s breaths between the wall and his mouth. Certain Jack wasn’t going to move, Sean slid his hands down to Jack’s hips, lined up and tugged him back as he thrust against his ass.
Jack gasped, tension loosening in his body. Sean did it again, leaned up to press his lips to Jack’s throat, caressed the delicate skin at his pulse. He rocked against him until he was fully hard, his dick straining against the confines of his pants. He slid his hands around Jack’s waist and unfastened his belt, unhooked his button, got his zipper down, slipped his hand inside and found Jack’s cock hard.
He let him go to shove his pants down just enough to expose Jack’s glutes, the material bunching at the crease of his ass. Sean spread both palms over each globe and squeezed; his touch was rough, bordering on cruel, but Jack rocked back into it, his breaths sounding wet where they were trapped against the wall.
Sean went for his fly, got himself free and pressed himself between Jack’s crack. Jack made a broken sound and rockedback into the motion, hips rolling down like he was trying to get Sean inside him. Sean gripped his hips to make him still.
“I fuck you bare?” Sean asked roughly.
“Yes,” Jack’s voice cracked.
Sean angled his dick down with his hand and pressed in, teased Jack’s entrance. Jack went rigid, but pushed back for it.
He wanted to shove in just to hear Jack cry out, but he didn’t. It’d hurt him.
“Ya got lube?” he asked and Jack made a sound like a laugh but it was wet. He was unravelling in front of Sean’s eyes—shaking, letting himself go like he wanted to let go, was used to letting go, but was scrambling to hold on as well, like he wasn’t allowed to do it but needed to do it.
Sean pressed his knees against the back of Jack’s legs to get him moving. He held him close and only let go once they were at the bed. Jack toppled down face first, ass exposed, his big chest rising and falling as he sucked in a lungful of air against the sheets.
The lamp cast the room with a soft glow when Sean flicked it on, lighting up the muscles in Jack’s ass where he bunched and released, grinding into the bed.
Sean took his shirt off, dealt with the brace, the sound of ripping Velcro drowning out Jack’s laboured breathing. He shoved his pants down and stood naked over Jack, stroking his dick as he watched him. Jack spread his shaking legs as he waited. Sean fished lube out of the top drawer, straddled Jack’s thighs and ignored the twinge in his thigh.
He tugged Jack’s pants down to mid-thigh, pushed his shirt up until it was bunched under his armpits, pushed further until Jack reached up and Sean tugged it over his head but not off, his arms and hands trapped above his head. Sean breathed out, the feeling heady as he looked at Jack splayed and pinned beneath him.
Jack hissed but stayed where he was when Sean dribbled lube over his crack, spread it down and teased his balls with it, rubbed over his taint, gripped his hip with his other hand to hold him down. When he pushed in with a finger, Jack gasped and tried to get more and to get away at the same time. Sean slid in and out, watched his digit disappearing inside. He pushed in deep, searching, and Jack arched, cried out when Sean found it. Sean laughed, a huff of breath.
As he massaged the spot, watched Jack wriggle under him, he marvelled at how Jack was letting him do it, how easily Jack let himself go into his hands, how he arched for more when Sean added another finger.
He pulled his fingers out. Jack mumbled, “No, Sean, please,” against the sheets, as if he thought Sean was going to leave it at that. As if he could.
Sean slicked his dick up, pressed his hand against Jack’s lower back as he lined himself up with his other hand.
He leaned down and whispered against Jack’s ear, “Gonna fuck you now.”
Jack tried to spread his legs wider.
Sean had enough left in him to chuckle softly before he pushed his cockhead inside. He let go of his dick, gripped Jack’s hip and thrust all the way in. Jack was a tight clench around him and Sean groaned at how good it felt. He looked down, his cock buried to the hilt, Jack’s hole stretched around him, the soft glow from the lamp casting the dip of Jack’s spine and the space under Sean’s cock in shadow. The planes of Jack’s back moved desperately as he breathed and moaned. Sean dragged himself out, leaving only the head inside, and slid back inside slowly, riveted by the sight—he was fucking a man, something he’d only gotten to do twice before, fumbling hook-ups in the dark, men whose names he didn’t care to remember—and now here he was,stroking inside a gorgeous man, a man who was trying to open himself up more for it, trying to press down for more.
But Sean was going to take a minute to fuck him slowly first. To really enjoy this. He felt it when Jack realised this too, gave up and sank into the mattress and let Sean take what he needed.
He looked up and moved in the same motion, planting his hands on either side of Jack’s head; he bracketed himself there as he slid out, rocked back in, listened to the sounds punching out of Jack on each down stroke, the sucking of breath as Sean dragged out again.
He leaned down, some other instinct taking over as he kissed Jack’s shoulder. Jack shuddered beneath him and turned his head to the side. Sean nuzzled against his cheek as his hips sped up.
