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“Seriously, we don’t have to.”
“Nick!” Charlie laughs, pouting at him from the adjoining pillow. He reaches up to brush Nick’s fringe out of his eyes, holding his gaze. “It’s okay! I want to.”
Nick squirms, fighting the urge to pull the covers up over his head. “It’s weird.”
“It’s not weird, it’s just new. I ask for new stuff all the time, right?”
Nick sighs. “Sure, but you’re always asking for normal stuff–”
“–Allo stuff,” Charlie corrects him with a loving tap on the nose. “My preferences aren’t the default just because they’re statistically more common.”
“Okay but this is–”
“It’s interesting! It sounds nice, and I want to try it with you.” Charlie cups Nick’s jaw in his palm; a warm, tender weight.
“That does feel nice,” Nick admits, a little breathily. He tries to trust the books and the therapy and the year or so of experience – to trust that this simple gesture, however tame, is what he needs right now.
“Yeah?” Charlie’s voice is free from judgement, his mouth quirked into a preceptive smile. “Do you want me to just keep my hand here?” He strokes Nick’s cheek, sending a shower of sparks out over his skin.
“Yeah? I guess? This feels so stupid,” Nick says shakily.
Charlie brings his other hand up and smooshes Nick’s face between his palms. “It’s not stupid, okay? I promise,” he says firmly. “I love making you feel good. If you think this will feel good, I want to try it.”
Nick peeks at him across the pillows. “You’re okay that it’ll just be me?”
“Mhmm.” Charlie nods, moving one of his hands up to play with Nick’s hair.
Nick leans into the touch, letting out a little hum. “And it’s okay if you can’t see me?”
“I can see you just fine,” Charlie says stubbornly.
In spite of himself, Nick feels a shy smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. “You know what I mean. You can’t see–”
“Nick.”
“Char,” he counters, trying and failing to match Charlie’s incredulous tone.
Charlie’s eyes dart between Nick’s for a few seconds, his expression shifting into something more like a smirk.
“Okay, you’re right, we don’t have to do this,” he says abruptly, taking his hands back and tucking them behind his head. “We’ll just stop, yeah? We could go watch a film, or start a new puzzle, if you’d rather. I still need to make a shopping list for the week if you want to help me with that–”
“No, I– I...” Nick balks. He absolutely does not want to stop. He woke up thinking about this. He’s been hard on and off all day, whenever the idea popped into his head unbidden. He got himself all kinds of worked up earlier this afternoon blustering and stammering about it, trying to find the words to ask Charlie for what he wanted, which felt absurd considering how mild it all is. Now they’re here in bed, right on the precipice of it being real, and he’s pretty sure every ounce of blood in his body is pooled between his legs, aching and throbbing in a way he can’t ignore, and god he can’t bear to stop now.
“No? You don’t want to stop?” Charlie snarks.
Nick shakes his head, catching his bottom lip between his teeth.
“Why not?”
“Because I… I really wanna try it,” Nick mumbles. His cheeks are so hot they feel like they’re sunburnt.
“And why do you want to try it?” Charlie prods.
“I…” Nick hesitates. “Because I think it will feel good?” When Charlie’s eyebrows arch up, an unspoken invitation to say more, he adds, “Because… it turns me on?”
“Aaaaand…”
“And… I deserve to do things that turn me on?” Nick says shyly, more question than statement.
“Precisely.” Charlie presses a kiss to Nick’s forehead, then unfolds his arms again, bringing a hand back up to Nick’s cheek. His palm is soft and it fits the shape of his face perfectly, like they were moulded together from the same lump of clay.
This man – his hearth, his home, his safety, his spark. Charlie is the only person in the world Nick would be brave enough to do this with, the only one he trusts to make everything okay again if it goes wrong.
He draws in a slow, deep breath. He clears his throat. “Okay. I’m gonna… start then.”
Charlie nods, waiting for his boyfriend to make the first move.
Nick dips his hand beneath the covers, traversing the familiar landmarks of his own body; wandering through the thicket of fair hair on his chest, over the swell of his stomach, lingering on the subtle curve of his hip. He’s never hated these parts of himself, but for so many years they were foreign to him; paths that someone else had staked out, ways he let grow wild in the absence of anyone else’s touch.
Now he knows them by heart.
“I love you so much,” Charlie murmurs, his eyes crinkling, catching the glow of the string lights hung around the perimeter of their room.
“Love you too.” The words hitch in Nick’s throat, his breath already coming shorter and sharper, that now-familiar sense of urgency building in him. It feels so fucking good, trusting Charlie with this; trusting himself.
It’s the idea of it even more than the act itself: the perfect fantasy of being seen but not watched, touched but not grabbed, cared for but still in control, the centre of attention with no spotlight.
Still holding Charlie’s gaze, lost in the dazzling depths of blue, Nick drags his fingers along the hard line of his erection through his pants and desire ripples up his spine, cool and staticky, like the minty sting of Charlie’s kiss before bed each night.
His eyes flick down to Charlie’s mouth, curled into a soft, supportive smile. It’s the same smile he wore through hours of couples therapy, the one he’s got on whenever Nick comes up with some hare-brained scheme he wants to try at the Haven. It’s the smile that greeted him that first morning, calm and curious and a little amused, quieting the panicked chaos in his brain; the one he’s come home to every night for almost a year now.
It’s Charlie, just Charlie. Looking back at him, stroking his cheek, whispering affection and praise.
It’s Nick, just Nick. Curling his fingers around himself, shifting thin fabric over sensitive skin, moving his hips to meet his hand.
It’s good, so good. His pulse pounds in his temples, in his belly, in his stiff cock, twitching needily against his palm. He lets out a moan as he thumbs over the tip, circling the wet spot where he’s already leaking through.
“I love seeing you like this,” Charlie murmurs. “Just like this.”
It’s hotter than the most explicit video, sexier than any dirty text, safe and secure and exhilarating at the same time.
Nick is here in his body, tethered to the earth by Charlie’s hand on his jaw; he’s flying, floating, suspended, hanging above a well of pleasure, ready to dive down into it.
He’s known and seen and understood like this, without ever having to explain himself, without having to earn that consideration.
His hand works; effortless, instinctual, free.
“I actually really like this,” Charlie says after a few minutes of Nick getting himself up to tempo, watching the muscles of his arm flexing under the blanket.
“You don't have to say that,” Nick huffs, even as the words bloom heat between his legs.
“No, I do. I don't really understand what this is, but–”
“I don't either,” Nick laughs throatily.
“But it’s nice.”
“It's really nice.”
“Kinda cosy?” Charlie offers, grinning a little, just enough to show off Nick’s favourite dimple of the pair.
Nick manages to smile back at him, his expression faltering briefly as a wave of pleasure swells and breaks and recedes. “Yeah, just like… low pressure.”
“Does sex… feel high pressure?” Charlie asks him carefully.
“Sometimes,” Nick answers, furrowing his brow, flicking his tongue out to wet his lips.
“Hey, nevermind.” Charlie shakes his head, waving away the thought so they can ground themselves back here – because he knows how easily Nick gets off track. Because they can always come back to it later. Because Nick can trust that they will come back to it later. “You have some new freckles, y'know.”
"Yeah?” Nick pants, moving his hand faster, gripping himself tighter, breathing into the sensation. “Can't say I've noticed.”
“Right up here,” Charlie says, stretching forward to kiss the new constellation on Nick's temple.
“Char,” Nick exhales, leaning into the gentle touch. His voice is strained, the muscles in his neck starting to pull tight.
“Yeah?” Charlie pulls back and gives him a fond, knowing look, peeking down at what he can’t see. No one else has ever known Nick’s body this well. Probably no one ever will.
Nick nods fervently, the movement under the covers speeding up a little more.
“Y'know, you have the cutest forehead,” Charlie tells him, leaning in again to kiss his way across the sandy stretch of skin. “The whole thing is great.”
“That's so weird, Char,” Nick laughs, but he's beaming, even as his breath comes in ragged, desperate gulps.
“You love it.”
“I love you,” Nick chokes out.
“I love you too.”
Charlie can tell. Of course he can tell. He strokes Nick’s cheek tenderly, tracing every freckle, every wrinkle, every little imperfection and all the perfections.
Nick moans softly, feeling his cock start to throb in his hand, a steady, insistent rhythm, feeling the first notes of the crescendo he’s been leading himself up to.
This is worth having a body for. All the aches and pains, all the uncertainty and moments of discomfort, all the paths he’s had to forge himself instead of following the blazes set for him.
“I love you so much,” Charlie says, sweet and soft. “Not like you don't know that but… god, I love you. I honestly don't know where I'd be, or who I'd be without you.”
“Charlie,” Nick gasps. A low whine rises up in his throat, familiar enough, but somehow totally different than any sound he’s heard himself make before.
Charlie raises his eyebrows in question and Nick nods again.
“I love you,” Charlie repeats, over and over, cradling Nick's face in his hand. “I duck you. I'm so glad — I'm so grateful — that it was you. You're amazing, Nick. You're sweet and kind and thoughtful and strong.” (Somehow, instinctively, he knows not to describe any physical attributes.) “You're so hardworking and determined. You're… kinda pig-headed, honestly, but in a good way.”
Nick’s laugh shudders out of him. “I could say the same about you.”
Charlie wrinkles his nose, but he keeps on. “You're such a grounding, reassuring presence. You make everyone around you feel safe — You make me feel safe, when nothing else can.”
“God, I’m–” Nick gasps. The muscles in his core tighten involuntarily, his breath catching in his throat. There.
“You're my favourite person, you're the love of my life. You're so warm and kind and caring, you're a light in the world–”
And it’s so good. It’s not earth-shattering. It’s not the most intense orgasm Nick’s ever had in his life. He doesn’t reel with it, it doesn’t drag him under. But it’s good. It’s safe. It’s his.
Nick spills over his hand, flooding through the fabric, and it feels like coming home to himself, with Charlie stood right there in the doorway, guiding him over the threshold.
Nick laughs, letting the light of it shine through him, staring into Charlie’s eyes the whole time as his body tenses and releases, as tension tips over into effortless, easy bliss. Charlie laughs too, sharing this moment with him; without taking anything, without any expectations, without claiming anything for himself.
And Nick feels wild and free in his arms.