15. Chapter 15
Chapter fifteen
Roman
The darkness is heavy, still clinging to every corner of the room.
If it’s morning, this is the earliest I’ve woken in up in probably a decade.
I roll over to check the time, bumping into a warm body.
On a good day, my brain will barely be functioning by eight in the morning, so it takes a second for reality to come back to me.
Lance.
Warmth immediately floods my body. The last few weeks have flown by.
Lance and I have been drowning in each other, and now the days that he isn’t in my bed feel empty.
He belongs in my space in a way that I never imagined another person would.
Everything about the two of us together works, and I’m afraid that I’m starting to get far too attached to him.
I do my best not to think about that though, so I push the idea away like I do every time it pops into my brain.
I let out a relieved sigh as I wrap my arm around his back and pull him closer. He nuzzles his head beneath my chin, his unruly hair tickling my nose. I turn my face to itch it on my shoulder, causing him to stir beneath me.
“Sorry,” he whispers. “I should probably get it cut soon.”
“Mmm,“ I hum. “Good morning, pretty boy. No haircut. I like your hair.” I reply as I reach up and run my fingers through it. It’s clumpy from sweat, and the reason why it’s sweaty makes my dick stir to life.
Memories of last night replay like an erotic cinema movie in my head, and it’s one hell of an out of body experience.
Lance on his knees, his body drenched in sweat as his limbs quivered with pent up frustration.
Tears lined his impossibly blue eyes, and his lips were swollen and pouty.
The quiet pleads for release as his cock weeped for me.
I pushed every button he had, tortured him within an inch of his life.
He was nearly to the point of passing out from exhaustion before I let him come, and I didn’t even have to help him. Now,
I regret not participating in the finale, because my dick is begging for some fun.
Fun that he’s probably not ready for yet.
That’s the problem with putting all my focus on him; When I’m not getting mine, it’s an excruciating blend of edging and pleasure that I fucking live for.
The need I have for him, the itch, it’s bone deep, and since that was definitely not a part of this plan, I do my best to ignore that too.
I prop myself up, trying to see what time it is. The clock on the nightstand is blinding, but I manage to catch a glimpse of the number four before plopping my head back against the pillow dramatically. Whyyyyy am I awake so fucking early?
Lance stirs again, forcing himself closer to my warmth. “I don’t have to work today. Jett said he was going to stay with Everest.”
For some reason, that makes me smile. It’s too dark for him to see it, thankfully, but I still know it happened.
This shit is getting out of hand, and I can’t let him catch on to that little fact.
If he knew just how obsessed with him I actually am, there’s no way that he’d want to keep fooling around.
He’s made it blatantly clear, on multiple occasions, that he’s not a relationship person.
Every time he mentions it, the sting gets a little worse.
What we’re doing, it’s starting to look more and more like a relationship, and I don’t even think he realizes it yet, but I do. Often.
We’re always together. We eat together. We sleep together. We laze around and watch television shows, cook, goof off. He even hangs out here when I’m working. There’s not a lot of things that we don’t do together, except one, very important, thing.
Going outside of this apartment.
“Do you want to go grab a coffee?” I ask as I roll back on my side to face him.
There’s a long string of silence that hangs between us. It’s quiet for so long that I start to worry that I’ve finally crossed the line, and he’s realized what I’m doing.
“If you actually believe that I have the energy to move right now, I think you underestimate how out of shape I am.” He admits before letting out a deep yawn that makes his body quiver.
I let out a sigh as a huge wave of relief washes over me.
If I’m not more cautious, he’s going to see right through me.
He’s going to realize that I’m asking for more than we agreed to, and unfortunately, I know exactly how he’s going to react.
I know our arrangement, and everything we said it would entail, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting more from him.
He swears that he’s not a relationship person, but he is.
I know he is. He’s absolutely perfect, and as much as that irritates me, I think the fact that he doesn’t see how amazing he is has started to grate on my nerves far more.
I used to think that Lance was confident with a generous splash of humility.
That beneath his mask, he knew how fucking flawless he was, because how could he not, and that he just did his best not to rub it into everyone else’s face.
I’ve quickly learned that isn’t the case though, because it seems like Lance actually hates everything about himself.
Every compliment I give is met with a snappy retort or sarcasm that borders on self-depreciation.
It’s been kind of strange to witness considering the fact that before we started this arrangement, anytime I said anything rude, he’d always bite back with a snippy comment about how he was the best at everything.
It’s almost like he was using everything that other people love about him as an armor, even when he doesn’t believe that they’re good qualities.
Though I’m slightly disappointed that I didn’t manage to get him out of the apartment with me today, I’m satisfied that his reasoning seems honest, at least. I lean up, pulling my arm out from underneath him, so that I can get out of bed.
My movement is met with a groan of displeasure, which makes me chuckle.
“I’m gonna go grab us some breakfast.” I explain as I crawl out of bed and head toward the bathroom.
He rolls over to face to me as I walk around the bed, his eyes trailing along my body shamelessly.
Lance doesn’t offer up his blatant interest very often, so it causes me to pause.
His attention immediately snaps to my face, and I can tell that there’s something lingering on his mind that he’s left unsaid.
“What?” I ask curiously.
“I was just wondering why you never actually take your clothes off…” He explains before his eyes start to wander again. “Even when we showered. I never get to see you.”
I nearly rear back in shock, because that’s not something I expected him to ask about, or even notice, for that matter.
I mean, he’s seen my dick, so I didn’t think that it would be a problem.
People even sleep fully clothed, so that shouldn’t raise any red flags either.
Lance notices a lot more than I give him credit for though, and even when I think I’m being careful, he seems to just… know.
“You will,” I reply as I walk into the bathroom and flip the light on. “When the moment calls for it.”
I peer up at him in the mirror as I grab my toothbrush, and he leans up on his elbow to watch me. “So… what? When we finally have sex?”
The truth is… I don’t know when I’ll take that step with him.
Or any more steps than we’ve already taken.
It’s not like I sit around thinking ‘Hmm… when should I take my shirt off in front of Lance?’ or ‘When should I have sex with him?’ That’s just ridiculous.
What’s even more asinine is the fact that I’m not taking my clothes off in front of him.
I’m a dude. It’s okay for me to walk around this whole damn prison without a shirt on, and yet I’m not even doing it in the privacy of my own apartment with someone that’s seeing my dick on the regular.
I’m always leery about taking my shirt off around new people because of my tattoos, especially the macaw, because people always ask questions about them.
That’s a side of me that I don’t share with very many people, and the last thing I want to tell Lance right now is the reason why I got that tattoo.
He’s so love averse that telling him I’ve been hopelessly longing for a partner that will love me for the rest of my life is sitting pretty high up on the list of stupidest things I could ever do.
It might currently be number one on that list, actually.
Don’t even get me started on the fact that Lance isn’t mine.
I have no obligation to do anything I don’t want to, and I’m not required to tell him anything about myself either.
That hasn’t stopped me yet, but when it comes to getting naked with him?
That’s an entirely different story. He strips his clothes off for me carelessly, but it feels…
vulnerable to me. Too vulnerable. He’s giving me bits and pieces of himself, but I can feel his reservation holding him back, and I can’t say that I’m enjoying how obvious it’s been lately.
Despite how well things have been between us, I know he isn’t giving me every part of himself, and that’s the sole reason I’m not diving into things with him headfirst. I’ve let him into my space, where no one else has ever been, and I think that’s vulnerability enough.
If he wants all of me, then he’ll have to level the playing field.
“When the moment calls for it,” I repeat as I squeeze some toothpaste out onto the bristles. I shove the toothbrush into my mouth, hoping to end this conversation sooner rather than later.
“I don’t understand,” he continues as his eyes pin me in the mirror. “Are you hiding something under there?”
I lean over and spit before turning around to address him properly. “If you’re so awake, why don’t you get dressed and come get coffee with me? Hmm?”