Chapter 4 Vince
Vince
I don’t know why I moved.
My body betrayed me. It was not a thought or a choice; it was a reflex, like it had been waiting all these years for the excuse.
One second, I was swearing I wouldn’t, and the next, I was on my feet, shoving my hand into his ass, my fingers sliding inside his grip, hot and slick and tight.
The shock of it hit me hard, his body clenching, the heat swallowing me down, the sound he made when I gave him more.
It punched through my arm, straight into my chest, and I hated how good it felt.
I knew he was looking at me, through me.
I could feel the pull of his eyes, the way he saw me in that moment, like it was only me.
For a split second, I wanted to let it happen, to show him I felt it too, but I held back.
I kept my gaze fixed anywhere else, muscles strung so tight I thought they might snap, because if I met his eyes, I knew I’d be lost.
And then he broke apart under me.
His head went back, sweat sticking his hair to his forehead, mouth wide and shameless, chest rising and falling like he couldn’t breathe without it. His whole body seized, clamped down on my hand, shuddered like I’d been the one to push him off the cliff.
The sound he made shot through me like lightning. I felt him fall, and for a second, I swore I was falling too.
I hated it.
The room was silent. Trevor’s laugh cut short, George and Lance equally frozen and dazed. No one said a word; they didn’t have to. Their faces told me everything, that it was so hot even I couldn’t resist, and that I had finally given in.
I should’ve pulled back the second I felt him clench around me.
Everything in me screamed to retreat, to let go before it went any further.
But I didn’t. I stayed there a beat too long, caught in the heat of him and in the sound he made; low and broken, almost a cry.
The room was filled with his grunts and gasps.
Trevor gave a strangled laugh, not real amusement, more like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. Lance muttered a sharp, “Holy shit.” All of it was background noise. None of it mattered.
What mattered was that I couldn’t get myself out fast enough, that my hand didn’t want to obey when I told it to move.
I forced myself to pull free. I locked my face down hard, stone, like I’ve trained it to be, with no expression, no weakness.
But Adrian was trying to look at me, dazed, his lips parted. His brown eyes shimmered, glossy and unfocused, yet locked on me as if he couldn’t believe it either. It was like it had only ever been me in the room.
That broke me. I couldn’t stand it.
I left before anyone had the chance to speak.
The hallway outside is too quiet and sterile.
Air-conditioning hums overhead, cold and recycled, carrying the faint tang of chlorine from the pool downstairs.
A cleaning cart sits abandoned by the ice machine, the smell of lemon polish cutting sharply in my nose.
Somewhere down the corridor, an elevator bell chimes, too polite and normal, like the world has not just caved in on me.
My teeth grind so hard my head rings with it, the pressure shooting straight into my temples.
My chest feels raw and scraped open, every breath dragging glass through it.
I keep moving fast, because if I stop, the whole thing will crush me flat.
I almost do not breathe until I swipe my keycard, hear the click of the lock, and shove myself inside my room.
Everything in here is neat. The bed is made tight. My bag is tucked by the dresser, clothes folded and lined. Nothing is out of place or messy, just the way I like it, the way it has to be.
Except me.
I shut the door and stand there, chest rising as if I’ve run ten miles.
My shirt is gone before I realize I pulled it off, my shoes shoved under the desk with a sharp push.
I sit on the edge of the bed with my elbows on my knees, palms grinding hard into my thighs like I could crush the burn out of them.
“What the fuck was that?” My voice cracks in the quiet.
I do not lose control, not on the field and not since that one time I had to punch a teammate because of Adrian. But tonight I lost control, and I cannot take it back.
Adrian.
Goddamn Adrian.
He has not changed, not one bit. He is still the same free-floating firework he was back then, lighting up the whole damn place, making people laugh and like him without even trying.
I saw it in the faces of my friends tonight.
He had barely walked into the room before they leaned toward him, eating out of his hand, their eyes on him as if they had known him forever.
That’s always been Adrian’s gift. Everyone always gravitates toward him.
Back then, it was teachers laughing at his smart-ass answers instead of writing him up, girls hanging off his every word like he was the lead in the play instead of just the guy hammering theater sets.
Even the guys wanted to be near him; he’s so easy to like, so damn easy to need.
He never had to try. People just tilted toward him, like he had his own gravity.
And me? I was no better. I pretended I wasn’t looking, that I didn’t care, but I was orbiting him just the same.
And I hate him for it.
I hate the way he still flushes pink when he’s worked up. I hate that stupid half-smile that sneaks in when he knows people are watching. I hate how easy it is for him, how everyone just lets him in. I hate that he hasn’t grown up, that he can still float through life like it’s all a joke.
I hate how easily I fold like the rest of them, how his laugh still cuts straight through my guard, and how I can’t stop tracking him even when I swear I won’t.
He doesn’t even have to try. He just is, and the whole world bends toward him.
And me, the idiot who should know better, I bend right along with it.
I can’t fucking stand it, that after all these years, one touch and my whole body remembered.
The memory slams into me before I can stop it. Not tonight’s. Older. Buried.
Backstage. The smell of sawdust and paint.
The heavy heat of stage lights warming plywood flats.
We were building props, screwing together frames for a fake damn castle or something.
Adrian had been everywhere at once, sketchbook under his arm, brush behind his ear, hair falling in his face.
Smudges of blue paint streaked across his jaw, another down his wrist. He laughed too loudly at nothing, his voice bouncing in the empty auditorium.
He’d been tall already, lanky as hell, all limbs and no care in the world. His cheeks went pink when he argued with the art teacher about colors, or when he worked too fast and messed up. That flush used to kill me. I’d look away, bury it, pretend it meant nothing.
Until the day I didn’t.
The memories don’t come clean. They bleed in crooked, out of order, snatches of afternoons that had nothing to do with now and everything to do with him.
The way he always stood too close, shoulders brushing mine like it was nothing. I’d been taller, sure, but not enough to matter, not when he carried that careless heat that filled up every inch of air until I couldn’t breathe.
I remember pulling back before the world caught fire. Convincing myself that if I stepped away fast enough, no one would see it and no one would know. I pushed it so far down I nearly believed it never happened. Almost. I pretended I’d imagined it, acted like he wasn’t still in my head.
But he was. He always is, and tonight proved it.
The thing was, back then, I’d heard the comments. The casual cruelty that followed guys like Adrian around like a shadow.
“Theater fags,” Jake Patterson used to sneer in the locker room, loud enough for everyone to hear. “Probably all queers.”
Tommy Wilkins would laugh, nodding along. “Good thing we got real sports. Keeps us straight.”
Back then, it didn’t bother me much. I was eighteen, stupid, and I thought I could handle their shit. I thought their words couldn’t touch me. But now I understand what those comments really meant, the cost of being seen, of being caught wanting the wrong thing.
I drag both hands down my face, pressing hard against my eyes until sparks flare. It doesn’t erase him.
The memories will not quit. Adrian, as he was tonight, sprawled out and flushed, sweat slicking his skin, his voice breaking loose in those raw, unrestrained sounds that ignite something primal in me.
The way his eyes tried to find mine after I touched him, like he never expected me of all people.
And worse than that, the way the others stared, caught in something they were not meant to see, as if they glimpsed the truth I have buried for years.
My body betrays me before I can fight it, blood surging hot, my cock thick and straining against my pants.
Anger rises sharp in my chest as I swear under my breath, pressing my palm down hard against the ache as if pressure alone can choke it out.
But the more I fight it, the more relentless it becomes, until the heat is unbearable and my hand moves on instinct, shoving the pants down, wrapping tight around myself, stroking with a punishing pace.
This is not for pleasure; it is for control, a way to burn him out of me and scrape him from the inside of my skull so I can prove I do not need him.
Every pull becomes an act of defiance, a denial and a prayer that by sheer force I can grind his face, his voice, and the feel of him out of my body.
I tell myself it’s fury, that it’s disgust, a kind of retribution for how he reduces me to this, to nothing but nerve endings and weakness, a man who can only think with his cock.
But my body does not care. Every shudder of it tunes only to him and to the memory I cannot erase.
The memories come like a flood I cannot outrun.
Adrian laughing backstage, paint smeared across his cheek, sawdust in his hair, always too close.
And tonight, Christ, Adrian arching under my hand, flushed and shameless, his voice breaking open when he comes because of me.
That sound claws at me, digs under my skin, leaves me raw.
And then the worst thought hits me, the one I have been running from all night.
Maybe I like watching. Him. With them.
The idea makes me sick, but I can’t deny the way my cock hardened when I saw him like that. I can’t pretend I didn’t feel a vicious satisfaction when I was the one to push him over the edge, to make him come apart while they watched. It was like I’d claimed something, a marked territory.
Christ, what is wrong with me?
My strokes turn vicious, rough and punishing, my fist dragging hard over my cock, every pull a curse I cannot spit loud enough. My breath tears out ragged, hips jerking into my hand as if I hate myself for how much I need it.
“Fuck…fuck,” I mutter, broken and helpless, as my whole body winds tighter, every muscle straining as if I am trying to hold back a freight train.
I grit my teeth so hard my skull hurts, jacking myself faster and harder, knuckles white around my cock.
Heat builds low, brutal and unbearable, until it snaps.
Violent and merciless, my orgasm slams through me like a blindside hit.
I double forward, a guttural groan tearing out of me as I spill hot and messy across my stomach, my fist still pumping even as my cock jerks in my grip, cum slicking my hand, sliding between my fingers.
I cannot stop and let go, not until I wring every last drop out, not until the overstimulation bites so hard it feels like punishment.
When it finally breaks, I sag back against the mattress. My hand trembles, my cock still twitching, aching even in the aftermath.
And then the shame hits, heavy and choking, worse than any tackle or loss.
It’s the shame of giving in, of needing it, of showing with every movement that Adrian Callahan still owns me.
I curse softly and press the back of my arm to my stomach, as if I could erase it, erase him, but it’s too late.
He’s already under my skin, inside my head, and in the mess cooling across me.
I wipe myself clean with the hem of my discarded shirt and toss it aside. My hand shakes when I drag it through my hair. I hate that it feels good, that it’s better because of him, that his voice still echoes in my head and won’t fade.
I swear I’ll tear it down brick by brick until nothing tempts me. I won’t let Adrian crack me open again.
I shove my face into the pillow as if I can smother the thought out of me. But sleep never comes.