Promises

Leonard’s really fucking exhausted, because directing’s a lot more work when you’re trying to act at the same time. Bill, of course, is being an asshole about it, because he’s Bill and because he’s sometimes incapable of understanding that some people have problems that don’t relate directly to him.

“C’mon, Len. You said you were tired last night,” he says with a pout that does not look quite as good on him now as it did ten years ago. There are a lot of things that don’t look as good on Bill as they did ten years ago.

“Shut the fuck up, Bill,” Leonard says and collapses on the hotel bed right next to him. It wouldn’t take much for Leonard to just fall asleep right then and there, just close his eyes and relax. He’d be out like a light.

Bill has other ideas, though. As Leonard’s putting his plan into action, Bill leans over and digs his teeth into Leonard’s neck. It hurts enough that Leonard’s fully awake from it, awake and really fucking pissed off. “C’mon,” Bill says again, dragging out each syllable. He presses his hard dick against Leonard’s hip and nibbles at Leonard’s ears, using more teeth than is strictly necessary. “You know you want to.”

And yeah, Leonard wants to. He wants to flip Bill over and fuck him with his face pressed deep into the mattress. He wants to shove Bill back and suck his dick so that Bill’s reduced to incoherent moans. He wants to tilt Bill’s head to the side and slide his tongue into Bill’s mouth and kiss and kiss and kiss until they fall asleep with Bill’s head tucked into the crook of Leonard’s neck. Leonard grabs a handful Bill’s hair, gives it a tug so that Bill’s not too smug about it, and bites down on the line of Bill’s jaw. “We’re too old for this bullshit,” Leonard mutters.

Bill pretends not to hear him and grins the same grin he used to fuck with Leonard’s head on set, trying to see just how quickly he could give Leonard an inappropriate hard on while Leonard was trying to do his goddamn job. Even though the grin has mellowed a bit over the years, it still kicks off Pavlovian responses in Leonard’s brain. Bill says, “Today, all I could think about was you sitting at that console and how great it would be if I could slide underneath it, lift up your robe, and blow you in front of the whole crew. I’d like to try it some time, just to see if you could get through an entire scene with your dick in my mouth.”

And if Leonard was half-asleep earlier, he’s hard and panting slightly now, but there’s no urgency to it, no nownownow intensity the way it was all the time when they were younger. He tilts his body to the right and kisses Bill to shut him up. Bill’s mouth tastes like toothpaste, like Bill, so familiar it almost hurts.

Leonard rolls his hips forward, so that his cock rubs against Bill’s through their clothes, too tired for more. They move like that for a few moments before Bill reaches between them and wrenches their pants down and their shirts up so that it’s skin on skin. Bill groans a little as their bare cocks meet, just soft enough that Leonard knows it’s not because Bill has secret ambitions to being a porn star.

It builds slowly, the tension, the press of their bodies, until Bill is gasping and shuddering and coming all over Leonard’s hips and cock and balls. Leonard rubs up against Bill one more time before coming himself, all of the day’s stress draining out of him.

Leonard’s in the process of drifting off when Bill uses his shirt to clean the both of them. He throws it into a corner when he’s done. “Leonard,” he says. “I’m glad-- I’m glad you were here, too,” as he tucks his head into the crook of Leonard’s neck. It’s too close to saying something else.

The first -- the very first -- time all those years ago, Bill had said, “I won’t make you any promises,” with one hand fisted in Leonard’s shirt, one hand on the back of Leonard’s neck.

And Leonard had said, “Good, because I wouldn’t take them anyway,” before shoving Bill onto the bed.

Tonight, Leonard just curls an arm around Bill’s rapidly expanding torso and says, “Shut the fuck up, Bill,” and falls into a dreamless sleep.