Work Text:
Randy doesn’t even know how it started. He only knows how it ends.
I. Have you had enough excitement now, more than you ever did?
Randy falls forward, sharply, arms giving out. Everything burns.
But he follows instantly, covering Randy’s body, pressing even deeper inside, just this side of too much.
Randy’s cheek slides on the sofa cushions, again and again, in time with the heavy thrusts. He moans, everything in his body preparing for the detonation. He hears the deep groans behind him, feels them breathed into his shoulder, and feels words bubble up inside him.
He’s been trying to hold them in, he’s been trying desperately, but he can’t help it any longer. “Oh God… Gale…”
And suddenly it’s real.
+
Randy always thought — not that he’d made up scenarios in his mind — that if they ever were in this situation, they would talk it out and do everything to save their friendship. Anything to keep their friendship alive and well. After all, it would only ever be a one-time thing — Randy never had any illusions about that.
But that’s not what happens. They don’t talk, don’t try to save their friendship, and are generally just awkward around each other. So awkward, that people start asking.
Several days after their first fuck, days full of avoidance, Gale corners Randy in a broom closet. He tells him that he was the best sex he’s ever had. That he’s never come so hard before. When Randy turns away, shocked and completely unable to formulate words, Gale presses against his back, hard crotch to his ass, wet breath in his hair. “I need to be inside you again.”
They continue fucking.
+
Randy knows that something isn’t right when Gale doesn’t want to look at him anymore. He has to, in front of the camera, but as soon as Brian is punched out, there’s nothing. Gale does show up at Randy’s door, however. Usually late at night, with a wild look in his eyes. He tells him how much he needs him now, how much he wants to be inside Randy. He moans it into Randy’s neck, but never kisses his lips.
Randy flees into pretense and leads the way to the bedroom every time.
They do it face to face exactly once. Gale is comfortably buzzed from the season wrap party, open and warm, stares into Randy’s eyes and kisses him everywhere. He licks at Randy’s mouth, molds and slides their wet lips together, releases his breath into Randy.
After that, it’s over.
II. You never wanted to be committed to the present, you're too busy believing in the past.
The months of hiatus go by slowly, but Randy is busy with theater, friends and forgetting about his ...whatever it was he had with Gale, anyway.
Gale comes over on his first day back in Toronto after calling ahead.
They talk little, have less eye contact. Gale comments on Randy’s new books, on the weather, and on the summer in Georgia. He looks as tan and relaxed as he always does right after a season break.
“So, Rands, here’s the thing,” Gale starts and Randy looks for open windows, looks where the fucking chill could come from. “I miss the way things were. I miss my best friend.” Gale rubs at his eyes and finally looks at him. “Do you think we could go back to that?”
Randy doesn’t quite know what to do, but he knows that he can’t lose Gale. It’s just not an option.
Just last month he’d given his cousin a lecture on co-dependency and how she should get the fuck away from her asshat boyfriend. The irony doesn’t escape him.
+
They find back into their before routine somehow.
Gale starts talking about his female conquests again, as if it were the most normal thing in the world. As it once was.
Randy contemplates Gale’s face while he talks, nods at the right moments, and thinks that he looks like a sadist from this angle.
When a couple of weeks later, Randy listens to Gale’s contemplation of possibly starting something more with whateverhernameis, he thinks he hears something breaking.
He hopes it was something that can be replaced.
+
One day, when they’re lounging on Gale’s new sofa watching some stupid reality TV show, Randy drops the bomb. He asks why.
“I guess I just needed to… scratch an itch or something, I don’t know.” Gale shrugs and reaches into the Cheetos bag.
Randy burns himself when he grabs the scolding hot tea pot, doesn’t notice it till much later, and feels like a whore.
A whore who fell in love with their abusive pimp.
III. Do you see my smoking guns? They're smoking from shootin'.
Anger finally sets in. Randy’s been awaiting it far too long.
Finally, finally, it’s him who does the cornering. He does it right after Gale is done shooting on Friday evening, pushing him into a requisite room.
“Okay, listen. I don’t know what ridiculous kind of stupor I’ve been in, but it is over now. All of it.”
“W-what…?” Gale blinks.
“You knew you could have everything and you took it. You took it and left me barehanded. I—… I never thought you could be this person; this asshole. Can you believe I actually thought I was in love with you?” Randy breaks off when he hears Gale’s sharp intake of breath and chuckles grimly. “Yeah, I know, pretty stupid. I don’t even know you.”
“You do know me.”
“No, Gale. I really don’t. And I don’t think I want to.”
The hurt and neediness in Gale’s eyes nicks at Randy, but it doesn’t matter. He’s already bled out.
+
Over the course of the weekend, Randy receives five voicemail messages from Gale. He knows Gale hates calling, hates leaving messages even more.
Amidst the pleas to return his calls, Randy thinks he hears an almost-sob in there somewhere. But he isn’t quite back yet to trusting his own judgement.
The sixth time Gale calls, Randy picks up.
Gale asks if he’s alright.
“I’ve never been so hurt or felt so used in my life, but yeah, I’m alright. But that’s not your concern any longer.”
“What? Of course it’s my—”
“You didn’t care then, why would you care now? Just… just leave me alone. For a while, at least.”
“Rands, I am so sorry. I didn’t—… I never meant to hurt you like this.”
“Yeah. I’m hanging up now. Please don’t call again.”
“But I—”
“Goodbye, Gale.”
+
Gale looks honest in his misery — Randy has to give him that.
Two grey weeks go by, before Randy finds a note in his bag. He reads it over linguine with salmon sauce in the break room.
I was horrible, I know that. ‘Sorry’ seems so inadequate, but I really, truly am.
I didn’t know what I wanted, what I needed, but there was always you. There’s been you. I didn’t know how to deal with all that was you, and suddenly you were everything. I was fucking afraid, Randy. You scare the shit out of me.
But I do know that I need you. I can’t fucking function without you. After you, every woman was bullshit. I don’t know how I could ever treat you this badly, when you’re actually the most important thing. I hate my own guts for it.
I’m sorry if I sound like a shitty song, you deserve so much better.
I don’t think I will ever forgive myself if I fucked up things with you for good.
Randy tosses the linguine — no one wants tear-soaked pasta — crumples up the note and leaves it in Gale’s bag on his way out.
IV. Losing out on loving, asking for nothing, running from something that isn't there.
Randy doesn’t know why he agreed to let Gale visit. It was a moment of weakness. Maybe because it’s Christmas soon.
“I’ve done a lot of soul searching over the past weeks, months,” Gale starts. “And I realized that I simply don’t fit into the prominent boxes.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. One of the big things that freaked me out about…us, was that I suddenly didn’t know whether I was gay or straight or bi.”
Randy tries to follow, but his mind is jumping ahead, trying to prepare for conclusions where this could lead. “And…”
“And I figured out that I’m neither. Plus, it’s not just the sexual orientation thing. I realized that I always had trouble defining myself the conventional way. I mean, I’m outgoing and loud when I want to be, but sometimes I prefer being quiet above everything. Sometimes I listen to Van Halen for days, others I’m the biggest fan of Serge Gainsbourg.” Gale taps the sofa cushion for emphasis.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that, if there was an official Randy box, I’d probably fit into that, but everything else… I just, I’ve decided that with everything that isn’t completely obvious or clear, I’m not going to desperately try and label it. I will just do what feels right, no matter what box.” Gale looks up and fixes Randy with his stare. “Like you.”
Randy feels light-headed. “What… what do you want, Gale?”
“I want you. Only you. I want to hang out with you, I want to kiss you, I want to sleep with you. I want all of you.”
Randy estimates that the rock in his throat is about five inches wide. But he can’t let Gale take everything again. He’s still coughing from the last dusty aftermath. “You… you can’t just have all of m—”
“No, Rands. This time, I’m giving you all of me, too.”
+
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Gale mumbles into Randy’s stomach later. He moans as he licks, as he caresses. He moves downwards and Randy starts to shiver. Gale follows the trail down to the dark blond curls, down further, bypassing the leaking cock, only nudges its base with his nose. He starts kissing the heavy balls instead, sucking lightly.
Randy is holding onto the pillows for dear life, but he has to look down. He has to know that Gale is really with him this time, that he means it. When he finally manages to lift his head a bit, his eyes are met by Gale’s, fervent and open. Randy’s heart skips and Gale presses a kiss onto the hard shaft, strokes Randy’s hips, all the while holding his gaze.
When he closes his eyes and turns away, it’s to sigh “So perfect.” into a hip bone. He lowers his mouth around the dick and slips his fingers between Randy’s.
Gale is still tasting of Randy’s come when he moves into his body later. He pants and gasps into Randy’s mouth, sharing the taste of his orgasm, never losing eye contact. Once he’s inside completely, he doesn’t move for a long time.
Randy holds on, dies and comes alive in the closeness, and tries to memorize all the promises that are murmured into his skin.
+
They aren’t perfect, after all, but they’re pretty fabulous.
They have to tell the rest of the cast one day over Italian because Gale can’t stop touching Randy. “It’s not my fault that you paired with linguine is the most beautiful turn-on I’ve ever seen,” Gale whispers into blond hair and rubs his fingers against Randy’s crotch under the table.
Randy almost chokes on his pasta, but then grins and pushes the hand away. Gale can’t resist that grin and leans over. Only when they part do they realize that there’s some explaining to do.
As it turns out, it’s not a big deal.
They take home an extra order of the linguine dish, eat it in bed at 2am, and Gale can touch Randy all he wants.
+
Randy loves his new ending.
He gladly continues to honor Gale’s linguine fetish, he never complains about the touching, and most of all, he doesn’t ever try to fit Gale into a box.
He doesn’t want him creased, after all.