for george

[atehimrightup]

There's this swimming hole that Lee found on one of his long walks through the woods. It doesn't seem like many people know about it, hidden within a thick copse of trees. The water seems relatively clean, and Lee has spent more nights there as the weather gets warmer.

Nearby is an old cabin that looks as if it's been abandoned and Lee thinks about breaking a window to get inside, but something always stops him. Peering through the dusty window is like looking into a time capsule. Or a tomb. There's something about the place that sets his lizard brain on edge, like there's something bigger and scarier than a predator like him lurking nearby. Mostly, he leaves the place alone.

It's another balmy night and Lee pulls on a pair of cut off denim shorts and a tee, preparing to head out on his own. As he reaches for the doorknob, he pauses and pulls his phone out of his pocket to send a text to George. He feels a bit territorial over the spot and doesn't necessarily want to share, but George is exempt from that. George seems to be exempt from most of Lee's rules.

Do you want to go somewhere with me? I can be in front of your place in ten minutes.

Comments

[atehimrightup]

"I didn't know you had siblings," Lee replies, and it makes him realize how much they don't know about each other. "I have a younger sister, Kayla. She's a fucking brat but she's the only one who ever--"

He cuts himself off with a sigh, smiling wanly. His sister is the person he loves most in the world, but she isn't like him. Dear old dad didn't pass whatever's wrong with him to her, too. She was spared, and Lee will always be grateful for that. She was spared from so much because Lee threw himself in front of whatever threat came to her, even their own parents. Especially their own parents.

"I miss her," he admits, lowering himself into the water enough to hide his wobbling chin. "I didn't see her a lot even back home. I got out of there as soon as I could. Once my dad wasn't around, I mean. I wouldn't have left her with him."

It's probably the most he's ever said about his upbringing to anyone here, and he blames the weed and the ease that George makes him feel. He can't tell George everything, but he can tell him more than anyone else.

[gallowseyes]

"I'm in the middle of four," says George, drifting closer, matching Lee's posture in the water. "John, me, Kit, and then Susan as the baby." He listens quietly to what Lee tells him, what Lee trusts him with. "My father died before I went to France," he says. "But he beat me enough before he went. My mother never raised a hand to me, but..." He shrugged. "She had her own machinations."

[atehimrightup]

Lee stares at George's face as he speaks, taking it all in, and his eyes widen a bit at the part about his father before his expression hardens. He's angry at this man he could never meet, and he opens his mouth to tell George that he killed his own father. Not the how, but just that he did. He feels like George would understand, but the words get stuck in his throat and he can't seem to get them out.

"My dad is the one who did this," he says instead, lifting a hand from the water to brush his wet fingertips across the scar on his cheek. It's all he can seem to manage for now, and he lets out a shuddering breath.

[gallowseyes]

George comes from a time where people carry scars. There's the one in the bend of his elbow, faint, where James bit him in the dark...another across his ribs where a mock duel got too enthusiastic. He'd never really thought about the scar on Lee's face -- it was as much a part of his face as his nose or his eyes.

"I never asked," he says, softly, drifting a little closer, his hand coming up out of the water and tracing the scar on Lee's skin. "I should have."

[atehimrightup]

“No, it’s okay. I doubt I would have answered,” he admits with a small, self-deprecating smile. George’s hand comes to rest on his cheek and Lee tenses a little, but then shudders and relaxes, eyes falling shut as George’s thumb traces the groove in his cheek.

Lee learned at a very early age that he can’t be soft. He can’t be weak, because that would mean he can’t survive. He doesn’t want to admit to himself how much he’s come to crave the tenderness that George shows him. He doesn’t want to need it. Oh, but he loves it.

“Here’s to our dads rotting in hell,” he says with a low chuckle, reaching out to loop an arm around George’s waist under the water, drawing in close enough that their foreheads brush together. “Mine would be so fuckin’ mad to know I’m out here kissing a boy. Just makes me want to do it more.”

[gallowseyes]

"Just kiss?" says George, teasing, his hand still on Lee's cheek as the tips of their noses smudge together. He wraps his other arm around Lee's neck, keeping him close. "Boring. I'm sure we can piss him off more than that."

[atehimrightup]

"You think kissing me is boring?" Lee jokes, sighing contentedly as he's drawn into George's warm embrace. He shouldn't need it, and he knows that he can't come to depend on it, but maybe he can just let himself have it for a little while. Until it all inevitably blows up in his face. Because George might understand Lee killing his father, but as for what he did after? What he has to do all the time to keep the bloodthirsty monster in him at bay? He isn't sure how anyone could understand that.

"I'm open to suggestions," he murmurs as his hand slides down to grab at George's ample ass under the water, using that grip to bring their hips together, cocks slotting in alongside each other. It's simply delaying the inevitable, but Lee will take all of this that he can get.

[gallowseyes]

"You know I don't," murmurs George, biting his lip over a smirk as Lee fondles his arse, as his cock slides against Lee's under the cool water. As if to prove his point, he shifts, brushing a soft, lingering kiss over Lee's lips.

"I haven't seen you for a few days," he says. "Did you think about me?"

They've texted -- pictures, messages -- but it isn't the same as sharing space.

[atehimrightup]

Lee's brow furrows slightly as George kisses him, because it feels so nice and it's so much more than he deserves. The soft voice, the warm embrace, all of it feels so good and Lee doesn't know what it all means and he knows it won't last, but he never wants it to stop.

"I think about you all the time," Lee admits in a low voice, like the words are being ripped from him. He swallows hard and kisses George again, this time a little more passionately, rocking their hips together under the water. "Did you think about me?"

[gallowseyes]

He'd been teasing, giving Lee an excuse to spout some filth, so he isn't necessarily prepared for something that feels so close to an admission. They kiss, hips moving lazily against each other.

"I did," he murmurs, smudging kisses along Lee's jaw. "Often."

[atehimrightup]

“Fuck. You’re a demon,” Lee says with a breathless laugh, tipping his head back to make room for George’s questing mouth. “Last time I was here, I just thought about how much better it’d be if you were here.”

He lifts finds George’s mouth again, biting softly at his lower lip and then licking away the sting. “How much more fun it would be to fuck you under the stars.”

Lee grabs the back of George’s head and kisses him a little more hungrily, swept up in the sheer force of him. “You look so pretty in the moonlight.”

Most men wouldn’t appreciate that particular word being used to describe them, but he hopes that George understands that Lee means it as only sincere flattery. He isn’t used to anything pretty. Pretty is a luxury. Pretty things are beyond his reach. He isn’t meant for pretty things. But George is the exception. Touching him feels like holding a diamond in his dirty, calloused hands.

[gallowseyes]

It's not the first time that George has been told that he's pretty. It's not even the first time that he's been told that he looks pretty in moonlight. He doesn't bridle at the compliment.

"Here I was, hoping to enjoy that filthy mouth," he murmurs, one hand under the water, squeezing, his fingers straying into the cleft of Lee's arse. "And all you have for me are soft and beautiful things."

[atehimrightup]

Lee goes still for a moment, unsure of how to take that. It feels like he’s being too much, like he’s overstepping, maybe reading too much into all of this. He pulls back to look at George with a vaguely confused expression, swallowing hard as he looks away for a moment, nodding jerkily.

If George wants him to make better use of his mouth, he can do that.

“Well, you’ll have to back up then,” Lee says as he pulls away and puts his hands on George’s shoulders to urge him backward, looking at his chin rather than his eyes. “I can’t breathe underwater.”

[gallowseyes]

Often, Lee guards his feelings -- George recognises it because it's something that he's good at himself -- but he watches hurt confusion play out across Lee's features as clearly as if it was written on a page.

"Don't do that," he says, his voice still soft even though they might as well be alone on the face of the Earth. "I didn't mean it like that. I meant..." He smiles. "I like it when you tell me what you think about doing to me. I like hearing you talk."

[atehimrightup]

“I was talking,” he points out, but maybe he was saying too many of the wrong things. Too many feelings, maybe. “But I get it.”

At least he thinks he does. It brings him back to reality and in a way, he supposes he should be thankful.

“I did think about fucking you,” he amends, grateful for the darkness that disguises the flush on his cheeks when he realizes that he misunderstood George’s earlier question.

[gallowseyes]

Like he's stepped on the wrong stone and slipped, George has the familiar sense of being on unsure ground. He'd felt it a lot with James but, somehow, didn't expect to feel it, here. He'd thought he'd known what was happening here but, for a moment, he feels all at sea.

"Good," he says, finally. "That's... Yes. I think about that too."

[atehimrightup]

Lee closes his eyes for a moment, feeling like an idiot. It's only now that he's realizing how deep he'd gotten, how he'd twisted the situation all up in his head. It was probably a mistake to bring George here. He isn't sure what he was thinking. Truth is, he probably wasn't.

"Okay, let's fuck then," Lee says as he pulls away and heads back toward the blanket on the shore, his back to George as he slowly emerges from the water. "I want you on your hands and knees."

He can fuck George, but he can't look him in the eye. Not right now.

[gallowseyes]

It's like a door slammed in his face, the sudden change in Lee's expression, the way he speaks. For a moment, George stands, still in the water, just watching Lee walk away from him and he's struck, suddenly, by how desperately he doesn't want that to happen.

"Wait," he says, still in the water. "I...I don't..." He frowns. "What did I do wrong?"

Because he has. He did. "Come back?"

[atehimrightup]

Lee stops in ankle deep water, a little surprised by the confusion in George's voice. Lee had thought he was giving George what he wanted, but it seems like maybe he isn't doing anything right. A very big part of him just wants to keep walking and not stop, but he can't very well leave George out here in the woods.

"You didn't do anything wrong," Lee says as he turns around, reaching up to push his wet hair out of his face. "I was confused and you set me straight. We came out here to fuck, right? Not for me to ramble on about-- whatever the fuck I was doing."

Now he's irritated on top of being confused, but mostly he just feels stupid. George is standing there looking like a puppy someone just kicked in the face and Lee has no idea what he wants. He looks genuinely confused and Lee blinks, putting his hands on his hips and deciding that maybe he should just be blunt. "I brought you out here and I thought we were having like, a fucking moment or something but you cut me off to tell me you just wanted to hear me talk dirty. I'm fucking embarrassed, okay?"

[gallowseyes]

A long moment of silence stretches out between them, and George stands there, water lapping around his waist.

"I..." He swallows around the feeling of panic clawing at his throat because he honestly doesn't know what to do, in that moment. Absurdly, he wishes his mother was there. "Firstly, I sincerely thought that you had bought me our here to fuck me." He swallows again. "I didn't...Nobody's ever talked to me the way you talk to me. I'm...a thing. I've been a thing." It's been easier that way, anyway. "I don't know what we're doing here, Lee. I... Thought I knew but I fucking don't and will you please come back here? Please?"

[atehimrightup]

"Obviously I brought you out here to fuck you!" Lee calls out, exasperated. "But it's not the only reason. I can want more than one thing at a time."

His irritation melts away as George continues, and Lee starts shaking his head and splashing back into the water before George is even finished asking him to. He's angry now for an entirely different reason, and he reaches out to grab George by the shoulders and shake him a little, finally looking him in the eye once more.

"You are not a fucking thing," Lee says adamantly, enraged at anyone who has ever made George feel like that is something he can state so plainly. "I'm here, okay? You're not a thing. I don't want to hear you say that shit ever again."

[gallowseyes]

Now it's George's turn to be embarrassed. Never before has he stayed, quite so plainly, how his mother made him feel. He'd gotten used to it and, yes, he'd turned it to his advantage, but it had always been there, in the back of his head. A thing, more than a person. A weapon, at best.

He wraps his arm around Lee's neck and pulls him in close, burying his face in his shoulder for a second. "When I was little more than a child, my mother told me that if she was a man, and looked like me, she'd rule the fucking planet. Not long after that, she sent me off to try to fuck the king."

[atehimrightup]

George pulls him so fiercely that Lee is a little surprised by it, arms hanging at his sides for a moment before he curls them around George’s waist. His brow furrows at the admission and he rolls his lips into his mouth, feeling so fiery with rage that he shakes with it.

“Jesus,” he breathes out, lifting one hand to grip the back of George’s neck, squeezing in a way that he hopes is comforting.

He can see why someone would try to use George as a tool, is the thing. His beauty is astounding, almost ethereal, and could so easily be wielded as a weapon. It doesn’t make it right, though. And for it to be wielded by his own mother, well— Lee knows what it’s like to be betrayed by a parent on a fundamental level.

“Is that what you meant when you said you were trained?” Lee asks in a low voice. At the time, he hadn’t given it too much thought. Now, it’s horrifying.

“Jesus,” he says again, at a loss for words and nearly incandescent with rage. But anger will help nothing right now, so he takes a breath and turns his head to press his mouth to George’s temple.

[gallowseyes]

He'll consider the implications later, but right then, it feels good to cling to Lee, to accept the kisses, the arms around him.

"When I was twenty, she packed me off to France for a year. I learned to dance, to fence, fluent French." A smile twitches the corner of his mouth. "To fuck men. I'd always looked, obviously, but it wasn't until I met Jean that I realised that I was allowed to do more." He shifts, resting his forehead against Lee's again. "And, when I came home, she set her cap at the King. He was well known to...care more for men than women."

[atehimrightup]

For a long time, Lee isn't sure what to say. He does his best to process it all, but it's a hard thing to imagine for a kid who grew up dirt poor in rural Kentucky. It's a different life, a different world entirely, but the fact of the matter is that the people in Geroge's life failed him.

"The first time I fucked you, it was because of how you looked," Lee begins quietly, rubbing a hand up and down George's back. "And hell, probably the second time, too. But it's not why I kept seeking you out."

He pulls back enough to look at George's face, cradling it in his hands. He opens his mouth and closes it again, trying to fight against the instinct telling him to keep everything to himself and not expose his tender underbelly. "I've been with you more times than I've ever been with anyone else in my entire life, George. But it's not your beauty or all your stupid training that makes me keep coming back. It's you, okay? It's just you."