Chapter Eighteen #2
Charlie’s kissing him slow and deliberate because he knows that’s what Simon likes, or if it’s what Charlie likes too. And
it is Charlie who’s taking the lead here. That’s fine—being with Charlie always makes him feel slightly concussed and, honestly,
he’s not smart enough to navigate a kiss right now. The best he can do is keep up.
Everything slows down even more, syrupy and almost sleepy, and it takes Simon a minute to realize that it’s not because he’s
slipping into some kind of altered state where time doesn’t work right, but because Charlie’s barely kissing him now. Their
lips are only skimming one another’s. They’re just sort of standing there, breathing, Charlie’s hands holding Simon’s face
exactly where he wants it.
“You said you had donuts,” Charlie says, just above a whisper, his voice gravelly enough, and Simon close enough, that he can feel the rumble in Charlie’s chest.
“Your priorities are terrible,” Simon informs him, because somebody has to.
“I don’t think they are.” Charlie punctuates it with a kiss to Simon’s temple. Simon’s face goes hot.
In the kitchen, Charlie sits at a barstool, not even pretending not to watch as Simon puts on the coffee maker and gets out
the bakery box. Simon tries to look like someone who isn’t thinking about Charlie’s priorities, and what that means in the
context of a man flying your dog across the country and kissing you like you’re . . . precious or whatever. There’s only one
way those pieces fit together, and Simon knows it, and it sort of makes him want to lock himself in the bathroom.
Simon brings over the box, but he doesn’t open it, just clutches it to his chest even after Charlie reaches for it. He makes
a belated attempt at normalcy and drops the box on the counter. Charlie opens it, and Simon can’t look at his face, but does
see that instead of taking one of the donuts he picks a blueberry muffin.
Charlie doesn’t say anything about it, because it’s just a muffin and not, like, an encrypted message. This is not a stained-glass
window. This is not a text rich in symbolism. Simon got a food that he knows Charlie likes, and it’s only in the morass of
Simon’s mind that the muffins have any meaning other than that he’s currently at peace with refined sugar and gluten.
Simon takes the other muffin like he’s a person in a play about normal people eating normal foods.
He sits on the stool next to Charlie’s—just following the stage directions—and tries not to think about the gap between Charlie’s thigh and his own, tries not to notice that Charlie has one foot hooked around the leg of the stool while the other taps on the floor, tries not to notice the way Charlie’s folding up the paper muffin liner.
But Simon does notice, because you don’t spend as much time together as he and Charlie have and not pick up on someone’s nervous
tics. The idea that Charlie is nervous is unbearable and, somehow, temporarily shoves Simon’s own thoughts to the side.
“How was your flight?” Simon asks. It’s probably the first normal thing he’s said since Charlie walked through the door.
“Edie wants to file a lawsuit against every person who walked past us without trying to pet her,” Charlie says, correctly
guessing that what Simon’s really asking is how Edie tolerated the flight. “And she’s not a fan of altitude changes. Other
than that, she was fine.”
“Thank you.”
Charlie folds the paper into the narrowest possible isosceles triangle. “You’ve already thanked me.”
“Well, I’m thanking you again and you can just deal with it.”
Charlie doesn’t say anything, not even to make fun of Simon. Instead he takes the triangle of paper and rolls it up like he’s
making a croissant.
Simon presses his palms against the cool marble of the counter. There isn’t any reason for Charlie to be nervous right now.
But there’s rarely any reason for Simon to be nervous and God knows he manages it anyway.
It’s probably standard to be a bit awkward when you see someone after a few weeks, especially if during that time apart you’ve .
. . escalated things. Especially if you don’t know where you stand.
That kiss answered some questions for Simon, and probably the same questions for Charlie, but there are still a host of issues left undecided, starting with where Charlie is sleeping and ending with what all this means.
The coffee maker clicked to a stop a few minutes earlier, so Simon gets up and pours Charlie a cup, adding some white sugar
that he bought at the store that morning. Then he pours some for himself, because even though it’s four in the afternoon,
Simon’s still on California time. No—he’s been sleeping such bizarre hours that he’s no longer affiliated with any time zones.
He’s been liberated from the concept of the twenty-four-hour day, from the earth’s rotation itself, and he can drink as much
coffee as he wants, whenever he pleases.
“Come on,” he says, handing Charlie a mug. “Let’s sit in the living room so I can stare at my dog.”
They watch an episode of Out There, the laptop balanced on Simon’s lap and Charlie leaning close. Their arms are pressed together, their legs touching, but
it’s the same thing they’ve been doing for weeks. It’s just Charlie.
“This is the episode where I started to play it—” Charlie starts but cuts himself off.
In this episode, Alex’s character is stranded on a planet that’s about to get bombed while the rest of the crew tries to rescue
her. It’s one of the get-along shirt episodes—Charlie and Simon are in literally every scene together.
There are fifteen, maybe twenty, episodes with this basic structure.
The threats vary, but in a show that’s about a group of fractious outcasts and weirdos learning to function as a family, coming together to save one another is going to be a pretty core theme.
Simon can’t see that there’s anything about this episode that sets it apart from all the other episodes just like it.
“Started to do what?” Simon asks.
“I figured, if they were going to give me ten romantic lines per episode, then that’s what they were going to get.”
“You started playing it romantic. I fucking knew it.”
“You and the whole internet.”
“Why this episode, though?”
“It started to bother me. Alex and you were out at work, so two-thirds of the main cast is openly queer, and I’m secretly
queer but at that point, like, actively queer for the first time in my life. We’re being given these lines that should land as romantic, and they’re written by a
bunch of people with pride pins on their tote bags. So I figured, I’m going to assume the best of everyone involved.”
“And nobody ever told you to play it straight.”
“No! If Lian got shit from the network, she didn’t say anything to me.”
“So weird.” Simon puts the laptop on the coffee table and crosses his legs under him. “Technically, I have a producer credit
this year.”
“Yeah, they offered me one too.”
“Did you take it?”
“Once I heard you did, yeah. Insisted on it, actually.”
Perversely, Simon likes the reminder that Charlie can be petty and jealous and competitive, that the Charlie who flies dogs
across the country is the same Charlie who spent months doing muffin heists.
“I’d like to know whether I’m producing a show that’s being actively not great about queer stuff or if they deliberately wrote
a seven-year-long will-they-won’t-they arc.”
“What are you thinking of doing?”
Simon wasn’t thinking of doing anything, and he almost certainly won’t do anything, but now that Charlie’s put the idea in his head, he’ll at least feel bad about it.
“It’ll probably be my last season,” he says, and it isn’t exactly connected in his mind with what they were just talking about,
but it isn’t unconnected either.
“Figured.” Charlie looks like he wants to say more, but when he speaks again it’s just, “You mind if I use your shower?”
Simon shows Charlie where the spare towels are, then points out the bath supplies he’s stocked the place with, as if Charlie
needs to be personally walked through Simon’s lineup of shampoos and exfoliants.
While Charlie’s in the shower, Simon washes the coffee mugs and wipes down the counter, then scratches Edie behind the ears
when she wakes up just long enough to find someplace else to nap. Then he doesn’t have anything to do but decide whether he’s
supposed to keep his clothing on.
The water in the bathroom turns off, and Simon sits on the edge of the bed, playing with his phone and trying to look like
someone who has actually had sex before, with this very person, more than once even, and knows how to be normal about it.
Charlie comes out with his towel around his waist, not fully dry, like maybe he was in a hurry, and Simon should probably
stand up but instead he’s glued in place. When Charlie crosses the room, Simon’s still sitting there. And when Charlie reaches
out to tilt Simon’s chin up, Simon’s still clutching his phone.
This is probably a good time for some kind of discussion about what they’re doing here.
He doesn’t know how Charlie even approaches dating or sex or whatever.
Maybe Charlie’s here out of inertia. Maybe he flies everybody’s dogs across the continent.
Maybe he’s here to be polite, like kissing the waiter at Lian’s party.
Simon’s relationships, if you can even call them that, have mostly been casual, but not in a fun, carefree way. They’ve been
brief. Short enough that nobody has time to get tired of him, or to notice that he’s conducting the whole relationship at
arm’s length. Short enough that Simon barely has time to decide whether he’s disappointed not to be feeling whatever he’s
supposed to be feeling.
Well, he’s feeling a whole bunch of things right now, mostly terror, but also something warm and fond and new. He wants to
keep it hidden away where Charlie won’t see it, maybe somewhere he doesn’t have to see it himself.
“Hey.” Charlie holds Simon’s chin so he can’t look away.
Simon’s sure the next words out of Charlie’s mouth are going to be “we don’t have to” and Simon doesn’t think he can handle
that right now, so puts his phone aside and makes himself look up. He’s seen Charlie shirtless so many times—who hasn’t—but
never let himself really look. Late afternoon sunlight slants through the window, making Charlie golden. He runs his hands
over Charlie’s chest.
“You are,” Simon starts, but he has no plan for how to end that sentence, no exit strategy whatsoever. The fact that he nearly
said beautiful and would have meant it is just something he’s going to have to live with. He swallows. “Those sweaty gym selfies you sent
me? I saved them to a special folder on my phone.”
Simon tugs impatiently at Charlie’s towel, letting it fall to the floor.
Then he bends his head to kiss Charlie’s hip, slow and with intent, because he may have plenty of problems but not knowing what to do with Charlie Blake when he’s naked and standing in front of him isn’t one of them.
Charlie makes a sound as soon as Simon’s mouth touches him.
Both his hands land in Simon’s hair, and then there’s nothing to worry about.
He’s lazy about it, mouthing at Charlie’s skin in an aimless sort of way. “I can’t work with this angle,” he says after a
minute. He reaches for one of the bed pillows to throw on the floor. Charlie swears, appreciative, like Simon kneeling on
the floor in the fussiest possible way is more than he can handle.
Simon’s been thinking about this, about how it would feel to have Charlie’s hand in his hair, hear the sounds he makes. He
wants to make it good, wants to pull out all the stops. But as soon as he has Charlie in his mouth, Charlie’s hand slides
to the back of Simon’s neck, and Simon just . . . stops. His operating system undergoes a complete reboot. He lets himself
get lost in it—mechanics, sensation, no decisions to be made.
Charlie’s hand tightens in Simon’s hair, followed immediately by a muttered “sorry” and a tragic slackening of his hand.
Simon rolls his eyes, very deliberately makes what he hopes is a pleased sound, and lets Charlie draw some conclusions.
“Oh, really?” Charlie asks, and Simon should have guessed that he’d be capable of being a smug pain in the ass even now. “Well,
well, well, you’re just full of surprises.”
Simon pulls off and glares up. “You know I could just bite this thing off.”
“Hot.”
Simon cannot believe he has to give a blowjob under these conditions. But when Simon puts his hands on Charlie’s hips and
pulls, Charlie gets the message, does as he’s told, and Simon just—lets it happen.
Charlie swears a little, which is gratifying, but then he starts running his mouth and Simon nearly loses his concentration. It’s the usual Charlie Blake sex monologue—gorgeous, so good, etc.—but Simon isn’t ready for “Aren’t you pretty like this, honey.”
Simon thinks his heart might skip a beat. He glances up at Charlie, meaning to glare but knowing that isn’t what he’s doing.
Charlie looks stricken, like a man who’s run a stop sign and sees flashing lights in the rearview mirror.
Simon doesn’t like that look on Charlie’s face, not ever but especially not now, so he just—makes a sound and unzips his pants.
“You like this,” Charlie says, a little wonderingly, as if the fact that Simon is literally jerking himself off right now
isn’t proof of that. As if the fact that Simon’s even doing this in the first place isn’t proof.
Simon pulls off long enough to say, “I hate you,” but his point is probably undercut when he goes right back to what he was
doing, definitely undercut when he comes a full minute before Charlie does.