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John had been hinting at it for weeks.
The boy liked to think of himself as brooding and mysterious, a lone wolf delinquent clad in a leather jacket and dark holey jeans. The “bad boy” in every 80s chick flick Eliza had made Arthur sit through when they were dating.
John thought of himself as subtle, all vague, meaningless touches and charming, hidden smiles from across the clubhouse. Arthur had seen through the act completely. He’d always been able to read John like a book.
The first time had happened in a drunken spur and John had found him at the right time. Drunk and wallowing in his own self-hatred the night after Mary left him, John sought Arthur out in the cigarette smoke fog, his face illuminated in a cold, bluish hue from the neon beer sign that hung above the clubhouse bar.
Another vague, meaningless touch so warm and tender against Arthur’s shoulder, disrupting him from staring into his glass of off-brand whiskey. Arthur didn’t remember John saying much, or if he said anything at all, just this look in his eyes that seemed to radiate sympathy to what Arthur was feeling. Sympathy because he, still young and still early on the path of making mistakes, didn’t know what it was like to have his heart broken twice.
Maybe the fact that John was willing to forget about his brand new wife and their baby boy had broken Arthur’s heart for a third time. Maybe the fact that Arthur found himself willing to forget, too. A mistake Arthur wished he would’ve stopped John from making. A mistake that the sheer, raw heartbreak Arthur felt encouraged himself to make.
John had led him to one of the spare rooms of the clubhouse, ones provided for instances such as this specifically, and Arthur hated himself for following. John had let Arthur fuck him that night, pressed face down into the bare mattress that inhabited the room with Arthur’s hand tangled in his hair. John had let Arthur get up after it was over, grabbing for his clothes in a still-drunken haze, mumbling about how this had all been a mistake.
A mistake that, over a year later, was threatening to happen again.
They’re all seated in the meeting area, leaned back against old worn out leather sofas, beer bottles and ashtrays littering the tables around them. Dutch is standing, Hosea leaned against the wall off to his side, making some big speech about picking another fight with the O’Driscolls at a chance to make some money.
John is sitting beside Arthur, both leaned forward in a mirrored fashion. John’s sitting a bit close considering the room he has on the other side of him, where Micah is sitting. Arthur can’t really suppose he blames John for the distance, and the thought is enough to leave Arthur smirking at the concrete floor below him.
John lets his knee knock into Arthur’s and Arthur looks up and over at John, who has an extra cigarette offered out between his fingers. Arthur glances down at the cigarette and then up at the steady, intense gaze John’s holding that any fool could see is suggesting more than a generous smoke.
Eyebrows raised like a proposition, expression like he’s silently screaming something for Arthur to understand. His jaw clenched, hungry. And John thinks of himself as subtle. Nothing about the boy is subtle.
Arthur takes the cigarette, and John lights it for him. Yet his hand is steady around his cheap black lighter, Arthur reaches up and grabs John’s wrist, wraps his fingers around the inside and feels his pulse. John’s hand is perfectly still compared to his heartbeat, which is racing underneath Arthur’s touch. A one-up on John at his own game.
Arthur lets go of John, puffs on the cigarette before taking it away from his lips with a nod of gratitude. John keeps his knee pressed against Arthur’s throughout the remainder of Dutch’s speech, and maybe Arthur’s starting to think too much.
Maybe he’s thinking that the cigarette was some sort of symbolism to the arrangement he just accepted, maybe it’s some sort of hope he just planted in John’s mind. Weeks of being doe-eyed at by the boy and he just folds without any sort of hesitation.
Begrudgingly, Arthur wants to think of him accepting it as nothing more than a tease, something he can accuse John of overthinking if brought up later.
Arthur still smokes the cigarette, regardless. One of the expensive menthol brands John’s always bought. Arthur smokes it down to the filter and puts it out in the ashtray on the table beside him, and it’s one of the best damn cigarettes Arthur’s ever had.
- - -
It takes him about three days longer than Arthur expected, but John eventually finds him, unwarranted and uninvited. He finds Arthur in the middle of the night at his small, one-bedroomed apartment that he moved into after he and Eliza got divorced, all sheepish and small smiles.
John should be at home, with his wife and kid, not standing here on Arthur’s doorstep. Arthur opens his mouth to remind John of that, but John cuts him off.
“Mind if I come in?” John gestures to the way Arthur is standing in between the small space between the door and its' frame that he’s blocking off. Like an old friend just passing through.
“I might,” Arthur says. “What d’you want?”
“Nothing,” John lies, they both know it’s a damn lie. Arthur gives him a look that has John sighing, defeated, and he’s backpedaling. “Abigail’s mad, again. Says she hates me-”
“I don’t blame her,” Arthur interjects, cuts John off from another one of his self-pity spiels.
John huffs out another breath, shoulders rising and falling with it dramatically like Arthur’s the one being unsensible. “C’mon, Arthur, she kicked me out,” he says, almost persistently. “I’ll order us a pizza.”
“Maybe you should’ve brought one to begin with and I would’ve considered letting you in,” Arthur can’t help but get John riled up, especially in instances as foolish such as this. It’s always so easy.
John scoffs like he really can’t believe Arthur isn’t willing to let him spend the night at his apartment, showing up unannounced nearly close to midnight. He lets his hands fall against his side from where they were raised in his little disbelieving gesture, and he turns, starts to head back for the stairs. Gives up.
This surprises Arthur. Maybe John knows how to rile him, too.
“Okay, c’mon,” Arthur says and John turns around, his play-acting surprise not thick enough to hide the fact that he knew Arthur would eventually give in. “but you’re sleeping on the couch, and in the morning, you’re going to apologize to Abigail.”
Arthur moves aside to let John in the apartment, and John walks past him with a “Yessir,” and throws himself on the couch immediately.
- - -
John, true to his word for the most part, orders a pizza, and the mood seems less tense. John orders Arthur’s favorite, supreme, and picks all the toppings off his own slices except the pepperoni without a single complaint. John surprises Arthur for a second time that night.
“Why have you been starin’ at me so much these last couple a’ weeks?” Arthur asks, despite knowing the answer, and the question comes out more like a joke. Light and airy.
John’s leaned back on the other side of the couch, bare feet propped up on Arthur’s coffee table. He takes a bite of pizza, makes a face like he doesn’t know what Arthur’s talking about, and sets the slice back down on the paper towel in his lap. “Why have you been starin’ at me so much?” His question is jokingly accusatory, a mock retort of Arthur’s question.
Arthur laughs, because he should’ve seen that coming. There’s never any direct answers when it comes to something like this with John. The boy’s a born natural at beating around the bush.
“Lotta people stare at you, Arthur,” John says after Arthur doesn’t reply, and his voice sounds odd. Like he’s trying to make light of it but can’t. “You’re pretty easy on the eyes.”
“Shit,” Arthur almost snorts, rejecting the compliment. “I think you’re just tryin’ to get outta sleepin’ on the couch tonight.”
John hums as he takes another bite of pizza, looks somewhere between guilty and considering. “Maybe.”
Arthur knows, he knows what John’s getting at. He knows this game of his because he’s played it before, and yet he doesn’t stop the yarn from spinning. He’d like to say it’s due to the general curiosity of seeing how far John will go. Maybe because he wants to see how far John will go, and maybe even push him a little further.
John drops the subject, goes silent for a little bit as the two of them turn their attention back to the TV. Arthur hopes the silence is from John giving up, but he knows it's just from John thinking about how to play this out even more. How many more cheesy lines and compliments can he throw Arthur’s way before Arthur’s fucking him into the mattress again.
Half an hour later, after they’ve finished off the pizza, John glances over at Arthur and says, “D’you remember that night when you an’ Mary broke up?”
Damn it.
Arthur’s got his arm slung over the couch, feet propped up alongside John’s, and he glances over at him for a brief second before turning his attention back to the TV. He huffs out a breath, breaking the casual demeanor he was trying to maintain. “I wish I didn’t.”
John momentarily looks hurt by this. “You don’t mean that, d’you?”
“I don’t know,” Arthur answers too quickly, shifts his position like he’s uncomfortable.
“I want that again,” John says, selfish. Foolish. He’s sitting up straight now, feet off the table and looking like maybe he’s thinking about inching closer to Arthur. “It don’t have to mean anythin’,”
That's it.
Arthur jerks his feet off the table and plants them down on the carpet. Frustrated. “Damn it, John, it does mean somethin’,” He says, voice loud in comparison to John’s. “What about Abigail? You don’t think this would mean somethin’ to her?”
“Abigail left me, Arthur-”
“She’s left you before,” Arthur pries his gaze off of John, dismissing the excuse with a wave of his hand. “that still don’t make this right.”
“No, it’s for real this time,” John stresses, moves even closer to Arthur on the couch. His voice is so different compared to Arthur’s, two different tones stuck in a quick back and forth argument. “Told me she wanted a divorce-”
“So that makes it okay for you to come here and try to get into my bed-”
“No, fuck, I don’t know,” John seems to take a breath for the first time in what seems to be forever. He drops his gaze from Arthur long enough to run his hands over his face like he’s just now realizing how ridiculous this banter between the two of them is. He speaks again, quieter, “I thought you’d understand, you know what it’s like.”
“Oh, so you’re wantin’ a sympathy fuck, is that it?” Arthur has lowered his voice as well, the words leaving his mouth in a hiss.
“Call it whatever you want, sure,” John shrugs, and the two of them meet each others’ eyes for a brief second. “If you don’t want it to mean nothin, it doesn’t have to.”
This isn’t justifiable, the way John sounds like he’s practically pleading. It won’t help anything, and it won’t aid any of whatever John’s feeling about Abigail. There’s something so broken about how he looks right now, leaned forward on Arthur’s couch with his arms against his thighs.
Arthur knows what it feels like, wanting someone that you have no right to have. And maybe it’s a different feeling completely to know that John’s here, right now, wanting him. The way he looks at Arthur practically screams it, and maybe Arthur did lead him on, setting himself up by playing John’s game.
Maybe he did it because he wants John, too. Maybe he’s wanted him all along.
“D’you want it to mean somethin’, Arthur?” John looks at him, right into his eyes, right into his fucking soul when he asks this, and it’s not a game anymore.
Arthur wishes he was a well-balanced man, that his heart and his brain could just align and agree for at least one second. But, he never has been that kind of man, and perhaps he never will be.
Arthur’s tired of fighting, tired of wrestling with every unjust emotion and feeling. So he gives up. He curses under his breath, at himself, at John, at the whole situation entirely, and he practically lunges at John where he sits only a few feet away.
He knocks John back against the arm of the couch, hands fisted in the front of John’s t-shirt, and he gives up. If Arthur’s honest with himself, he’s been wanting all night to kiss John until he can’t breathe, and so he does.
Arthur catches the brief look of surprise on John’s face before he crashes their lips together, needy and bruising and rough. The look does nothing if not spur Arthur on even more, it’s an encouragement of sorts, the idea of keeping John on his toes.
Both of them probably knew what would end up happening tonight, and maybe that little last chance hopelessness act John was resorting to only a few moments prior was fake, but the way John just kinda sinks into the kiss lets Arthur know he didn’t entirely expect it now.
It takes John a moment to catch up, still caught off guard by the way Arthur knocks their teeth together, the way he runs a hand through John’s tangled black hair and pulls. When he does, however, Arthur’s gotta say, he’s pretty evenly matched.
John’s lips are chapped from where he’s constantly picking or chewing at them, and one of his hands is in Arthur’s hair, the other moving up along his back. John kisses Arthur twice as hard, like he’s got something to prove, like it’s a competition. Like this is nothing more than the two of them racing on their motorcycles, or arm wrestling. John’s always been the competitive type, but then again, so is Arthur. Sore losers and even lousier winners.
Arthur shifts, planting one foot on the floor for leverage because they’re about to fall off the fucking couch and John surges up against Arthur, chasing him, like he’s wanting them to fall.
Arthur’s still got John’s hair wrapped around his fist and he pulls again, enough to yank John’s head back against the arm of the couch, and Arthur’s mouth is on the exposed skin of John’s neck. He assaults John’s neck much in the same way he did John’s mouth, biting and sucking, drawing noises from John that Arthur hadn’t heard from him in over a year.
“Ain’t you got someplace better to do this, Morgan?” He hears John mumble, his voice even more gravelly, almost husky sounding like he’s just woken up from a deep sleep. It suits him.
Arthur wants to make a comment about John’s initial intentions of claiming the bed over the couch, but anything he could bring himself to say now would just come out sounding stupid, so Arthur says nothing. He just pulls off John, pushes himself up and on his feet, and pulls John up off the couch by his arm, and John goes so willingly he almost feels feather-light.
Arthur twirls the two of them around, so John’s where he used to be and gives him a little shove. “Lead the way.”
And John’s walking fucking backward to Arthur’s room, like he’s been there a million times before, his eyes not leaving Arthur like he’s a grizzly about to attack. The look he’s wearing is nothing short of gloating, smug in every sense of the word. Mouth swollen and open in a breathless grin, hair and clothes disheveled like he’s been in a fight.
Arthur follows, eyes glancing between John and the surroundings behind John to make sure the clumsy bastard doesn’t trip over anything in this weird power stance he’s taken up. John makes it to the open door of Arthur’s bedroom and lets Arthur catch up, and when he does, his hands are fisted in John’s shirt again.
John’s hands hang limply at his sides like he knows he won’t be in this position for long as Arthur walks him to the bed, pushing John back onto it. John falls back willingly, scoots himself higher up on the bed, and now Arthur’s back in control.
Arthur takes his time, crawls on the bed and straddles John, pushes him flat on his back again from where John has raised slightly on his elbows. John’s giving him a look that Arthur’s seen him wear when Dutch takes them out to the strip clubs, watching him with such a mind-numbing intensity that Arthur can practically hear the filthy thoughts running through his head.
John reaches up, hands settling on Arthur’s hips and shoves him down against him. John’s hard, and so is Arthur, but if John thinks it’s gonna be that easy then he’s got another thing coming.
“No,” Arthur’s voice is stern as he reaches down and pries John’s hands off of him, pinning them against the mattress above John’s head. He picks himself up back on his knees, so he’s just hovering over John’s body. “That ain’t the way this is gonna go.”
John’s still wearing that look, mouth open and eyes hooded, and Arthur’s not even sure if John’s listening but when he lets go of John’s hands, John keeps them there. Surprisingly obedient.
Arthur straightens up slightly, letting a hand fall down to grasp at John’s jaw, almost caressing it. It’s here that Arthur allows himself to get a good look at John, in the light faltering in from the living room through the open door and the glow from the streetlamp outside Arthur’s bedroom window, pooling in through closed curtains.
It’s not enough, however, and Arthur reaches over to turn on the lamp sitting on his bedside table, his other hand never leaving John’s jaw. John blinks at the added light, eyes going back to watch Arthur as he settles himself again. Hovering. Looming.
Arthur takes in the mess of John’s hair splayed around his head. Takes in the scar running up along the side of his cheek and over the bridge of his nose, another one running across his eyebrow, making a slit there. Tokens he earned in a back alley knife fight years ago.
Arthur’s eyes sweep down and then up from John’s three-day-old stubble to the tattoos adorned on his arms, incomplete sleeves. The treeline tattoo on the inside of his right wrist, the snake that wraps around his left. Arthur’s eyes move back to meet John’s stare and he tilts John’s jaw up, exposing his neck, now sparsely adorned with Arthur’s teeth marks.
He’s gotta admit, the thought of John waking up tomorrow and looking at the mouth shaped bruises dotted along his neck, it turns him on.
“Is this what you wanted, Marston?” Arthur finds his voice. The words low and almost mocking.
Arthur moves his hand to settle around John’s throat, no pressure, just touching barely enough that he can feel John’s pulse beneath his fingertips. The second time in the past three days Arthur has felt John’s heartbeat racing underneath his touch.
“Is this what you came crawling to my doorstep for?” Arthur’s words turn sharper, harsher, and he adds pressure around John’s throat. Definitely not enough to do any damage, or even really cut off any airflow, just enough for John to feel the weight of it.
The way John immediately swallows, eyes widening and darting over Arthur’s face, lets him know he does.
“Yes,” John answers through a whine of breath, and Arthur removes his hand, replaces it with his mouth. John’s got that same winded tone to his voice that he has when he’s drunk, despite only having a couple of beers with their pizza earlier. Arthur only had a couple of beers, as well, and the realization that he’s stone-cold sober settles in the pit of his stomach.
There’s no excuse to fall back on for carrying on like this with John, and yet, the realization doesn’t make him stop, either. He wants this, just as badly as John wants this.
John makes a sound when Arthur drags his teeth along his collarbone, something like a bitten-off moan that cuts off into a whimper. Arthur would’ve never believed the sound came from a man so previously cocky and smug if he hadn’t heard with his own ears, and he drags his teeth along the same spot, just to get John to make the sound again.
John must’ve lifted his hands from where Arthur had them pinned, because Arthur feels them moving down along his back again, up underneath Arthur’s shirt. John apparently gets bored with this small amount of skin contact, though, because it’s not long till his hands are grabbing ahold of Arthur’s shirt and pulling it over his head.
Arthur sits up enough to allow it, lets John toss the shirt off to the side somewhere, and he surges up against Arthur, kissing him before Arthur can have time to react. Arthur can hear the sound of the TV still playing in the living room, just faintly enough that it can be ignored. He can hear the sound of his alarm clock ticking on the bedside table beside him, the sound of John groaning into his mouth, the sound of John unbuckling his own belt.
Arthur pulls back, hand jerking down to still John’s, and John opens his eyes to meet Arthur’s head-on. He’s still got this dazed look in his eyes, but the furrow of his brows is enough to express the frustration there. His face hovering only inches away from John’s, Arthur grins at him, teasing.
He sits back up on his knees, and John’s eyes follow him before glancing down at where Arthur’s got his hand pinned in place. John draws his gaze back up to meet Arthur’s, rolls his eyes like Arthur’s being absolutely ridiculous right now.
“C’mon.” The word’s soft but John drags it out, almost practically begging.
“No,” Arthur says again, pushes John’s hand aside and starts unbuckling John’s belt himself, breaking eye contact just long enough to glance down at what he’s doing. “I told you how this was gonna go.”
John lifts his hips so Arthur can slide the belt out from his jeans, Arthur lets his hand linger there, against the tight fabric strained against John’s erection before moving them up underneath the hem of John’s baggy t-shirt, pushing the fabric up.
“Now, I’m gonna be honest with you,” Arthur says, lazily, as if he’s just making conversation. He pushes John’s shirt up to his armpits, John watching him all the while, and lets Arthur pull it up over his head. “I don’t remember a whole lot from the last time we did this.”
John groans when Arthur moves his hands back down, unbuttoning his jeans. “However, this time?” Arthur’s impressed with John’s self-control, considering his lack of it in other circumstances. John only grinds his hips up once or twice when Arthur palms at the bulge of John’s cock, grinding the heel of his hand down in a way that has John hissing. “I’m aimin’ to remember this perfectly .”
Arthur likes the way John’s looking at him now, eyes still half-lidded and mouth open. Wishes he could see John looking at him like that more often.
Arthur hooks his fingers into the waist of John’s jeans and pulls them down, along with his underwear, eyes taking in the newly exposed skin as he does. John’s legs don’t seem as spindly like this, and it’s strange, because Arthur’s definitely seen John naked before.
He wasn’t lying when he said he didn’t remember much from the last time he fucked John, but he’s known the man for years. He’s walked in on him taking a shower in a few shared hotel bathrooms, spent enough drunken celebrations with him in which John was hammered enough to convince himself to go without clothing. Hell, Arthur’s even walked in on John with Abigail before, because the clubhouse only has so much privacy and it’s not like any of the fucking doors lock anyway.
“You asked me for this,” Arthur’s hand curls around John’s cock in a firm grip, and John almost jerks back at the contact. Arthur readjusts to the movement, stroking his hand up and then down in smooth movements, causing John to go even more slack-jawed in the process. “if you wanted a quick fuck, maybe you should’ve gone elsewhere.”
“Goddamn,” John practically pants the word out, eyes tearing away from Arthur’s hand around his dick to roll upwards towards the ceiling. “Don’t you ever shut the fuck up?”
Arthur stills at this, hand still wrapped around the base of John’s cock, staring at the other man as if maybe he didn’t hear him right. John’s still gazing up at the ceiling until Arthur jerks his hand away completely.
“Alright, then,” Arthur says, like he’s just lost an argument, and he slips off the bed.
John’s head snaps up at this, hips moving as if to make up for the lost contact. He watches as Arthur walks from the foot of the bed over to the bedside table. Arthur doesn’t dare meet his gaze, and feels a bit childish like he’s ignoring him but the way he feels John just gaping at him does nothing but spur the act on even further.
Arthur jerks open the drawer of the table, and he notices that John relaxes a little when Arthur pull out some lube.
“What d’you normally use that for?” The smugness is back in John’s voice as Arthur takes his place back at the foot of the bed, raising a hand to prop up the back of his head.
Arthur, however, doesn’t answer, dropping the lube on the bed and moving his hands to get his own pants off.
“What? You ain’t talkin’ to me, now?” John’s smugness is replaced with the sheer aggravation of being ignored, always eager to get his way. Arthur isn’t surprised John’s like this, especially in this setting.
They’re both fully naked now, and Arthur meets John’s gaze innocently as he crawls back onto the bed. “I wasn’t aware you wanted me to.”
It’s almost laughable how the two of them can get up underneath each other’s skin no matter the situation, how they’re both stubborn enough to try.
“Shit,” John breaths out, the word breaking off into a chuckle. He moves the hand not propped up behind his head to run through his own hair, because obviously Arthur's the one being difficult here. “Yes, I want you to talk, Arthur, just - hurry up an’ fuck me already.”
Arthur half expects a comment from John about how Arthur enjoys the sound of his own voice, and honestly, maybe he does in situations like this. Arthur’s always talked his way through sex, even with Eliza and Mary - Mary having the most distaste for it. Most of the things that came out of his mouth during sex were just stupid spoken thoughts but it made him feel more comfortable, more present.
Arthur wants to comment on John’s impatience, but seeing as his own is getting to him, too, he says nothing, and grabs for the lube he dropped on the bed earlier. John’s legs are already spread wide enough to accommodate Arthur between them, and Arthur grabs ahold of one of them, pushing John’s thigh back as far as it’ll go. John’s pretty flexible, which Arthur is almost positive he already knew.
Arthur pours the lube out over his fingers generously and John’s groaning out again after the first touch of Arthur’s fingers. Arthur glances up at John and John’s still watching him, just as intently as before, teeth grazing at his lower lip.
“You okay?” Arthur checks, just to be sure, and John’s nodding.
“Never better.” The words come out breathless, like John’s drunk again. The dopey, lopsided grin he’s giving Arthur does nothing but add to the illusion.
John opens right up for Arthur after a moment, and he’s making it so easy, hips rolled upwards to shift his weight on his lower back and head thrown back against the bed as he pries his gaze off Arthur to look up at nothing.
Arthur slides a second finger in along with the first, and then after a few moments, a third. He can hear the sound of his own breathing, deep and heavily through his nose, and he’s not talking anymore because he can’t quite find any words to say but his mind is running a mile a minute.
Thinking, thinking.
Thinking about how, momentarily, he’ll be fucking John. Thinking about the sounds John’ll be making for him, the already winded moans escaping from his mouth leaving little to the imagination.
Arthur’s so far in his head that he almost doesn’t hear John when he mumbles out. “Go ahead, c’mon. Get on with it, already.”
Arthur does it as he’s told, pulling his fingers away and smearing more lube over himself. He takes John’s other leg and presses it back along with the other one, so both of them are nearly pinned back against his chest. John’s eyes are back on him, watching him as Arthur lines himself up.
John chokes out a strangled noise when Arthur finally, finally pushes into him. Arthur takes in the sight of John like this, arms stretched out above his head, stomach muscles tense as Arthur pulls out of him, steadily gaining rhythm. Arthur moves his hands from where they’re grasping at John’s hipbones to steady himself, leans down back over John, and plants his palms into the mattress around his torso.
John lets his legs fall to the side, mumbling out bitten off curses, eyes clenched shut until Arthur lowers himself almost fully, and he can feel John’s words ghost across his lips. John opens his eyes and looks right into Arthur’s, for the umpteenth time that night, dark and clouded.
The slow, steady, push and pull of their hips is still enough to have John taking short, gaspy little intakes of breath and Arthur is close enough to John now that he can see the texture of his almost golden-brown irises. See the chapped surface of his lips, nearly bleeding from the abuse John and Arthur, himself, has put upon them.
“Arthur,” his name leaves John’s mouth in the form of a gasp, almost like he’s about to laugh, but the sound is bitten off into another groan when Arthur picks up speed.
Arthur dips his head down and kisses John, softer than before, but mostly because looking at him like this, hearing John say his name in a way before that Arthur’s never heard his name being said. It’s too much.
John will never be his, and it’s a whole other form of wrong entirely that John is here now, as if he were his. It’s a harsh reminder that their time together is limited, like a bucket of ice water being dumped over Arthur’s head, and if routine serves anything, John will return to Abigail tomorrow as if nothing ever happened.
Abigail will take him back, because like Arthur, maybe she gives in a little too easily when it comes to John.
John has a family, a home, people who love him. Arthur has a small, cramped apartment, a divorce settlement in which he gets to see his son, Issac, every weekend, and a bunch of lonely souls such as himself down at the clubhouse in which Arthur calls friends.
John would be a fool to give up the life he lives now to be a part of Arthur’s.
“Quit thinkin’ so much,” John mumbles against Arthur’s lips. “‘can practically hear it.”
“Yeah?” Arthur could laugh at John’s timing, and the word comes out with more humor laced behind it than he originally intended. John’s good at providing distractions. “What am I thinkin’ about, then?”
Arthur moves a hand from where it’s planted against the mattress and snakes it down between the two of them, gripping at John’s cock. He moves his hand along in rhythm with his thrusts, maybe a bit faster, rubbing pre-come along his and John’s stomachs.
John makes a sound at this, a panting little groan of breath before opening his eyes to look at Arthur once again. Half-hooded and heavy. “I dunno,” he admits, almost meekly. “It ain’t about me, though.”
This, Arthur could definitely laugh at, because John has no idea how wrong he is. Arthur wants to tell him that John’s all and everything he’s been thinking about since this whole thing started, but he doesn’t. Instead, he just lets a grin break out across his lips, sharp and daunting. Mocking, maybe, because that seems to be what John’s into when it comes to this.
Arthur moves to mouth at the side of John’s neck, all teeth and rough kisses, and it’s enough to coax John into making those incredible little sounds again, and it’s the only sound in the room. John’s hands on Arthur’s hips, nails digging into the flesh, guiding his movements and the air is so heavy around them.
The sound John makes when he comes almost vibrates in Arthur’s ears, and Arthur’s still got his hand wrapped around John’s dick and his teeth biting into the skin of John’s neck. Arthur hears his own breathing hitch when he feels the warm wetness between them, and he shifts, driving in a few more thrusts until he’s coming, too.
Arthur stays like that for a few seconds, his arm threatening to buckle with the weight of holding himself up and he breathes into the skin of John’s neck. He eases himself out of out John, and falls off to the side, leaving his arm still thrown over John’s torso.
John’s breathing is still labored as he turns his head to the side to look at Arthur, who’s already got half his face buried into the sheets. It’s hard not to miss the smug smile forming right back in place on John’s features. “Even better than last time. Next time should be-”
“That was the last time,” Arthur mumbles out, mind foggy, but he tries his best to make his voice sound stern. Like Dutch’s when he’s putting an end to an argument.
It seems to have no effect on John, however, because the fool’s still got that dumb, lopsided grin on his face like Arthur’s bluffing. “Yeah, yeah,” He waves off Arthur’s words, sitting up and swinging his legs off the bed. “We’ll see.”
“I mean it, Marston,” Arthur says, half-muffled from the position of his face, and John only glances over his shoulder at him, still smiling, before disappearing out the hall and into the bathroom to get cleaned up.
- - -
A little over a week later, John’s sitting at Arthur’s kitchen table, picking at a to-go container of takeout food that Arthur went and got for dinner. Arthur’s sitting across from him, eating from a similar container, glancing over at the boxes filled with some of John’s belongings sitting by the front door.
Abigail had surprised Arthur, staying true to her word and having John move out. John had shown up earlier that day on Arthur’s doorstep again, arms full of boxes, and told Arthur that Abigail and served him papers on their divorce. Seemed like her mind was made up.
Arthur had taken the self-destructive fool in with an arm around his shoulder and a few comforting condolences. Because, well, Arthur had been in his shoes, once.
John was upset, understandably so, his emotions derived more out of disbelief and self-hating pity, and the hard to swallow mourning of what was his and Abigail’s relationship.
They’d only been married a few years, right before Jack was born, and their love had dissipated into something not the most ideal, but it was there, once, and that was hard for anyone to ignore.
“She said she’d met some lady cop at work,” John explains, after a few hours of saying mostly nothing.
Arthur looks up from his food. “A cop? At the hospital?”
John’s nodding, not quite meeting Arthur’s gaze. “Apparently Abigail had been her nurse, she’d taken a few bullets on the job, I dunno.”
“Shit,” Arthur breaths out, because he doesn’t really know what to do with this information, but he’s trying his best to be supportive. “‘M sorry, John,”
John dismisses the condolences with a fluid gesture of his hand, his mouth bunching up in the corner. “Don’t be, it’s - I’m alright,”
The two of them go back to eating in silence a few moments before John breaks it again. “I told her that I wished her the best, if this woman could love her more than I did, then I’d be happy for her.”
Arthur’s impressed by this, giving John a comforting, small glimpse of a grin. “That’s all you can do, John.”
Within the next few months, John and Abigail’s divorce was final, and John moved in with Arthur, just long enough for him to get back on his feet and find his own place. Abigail had got their home off in the Great Plains, and John got joint custody, getting to see Jack every other week.
Sometimes, their custody schedules lined up so Arthur had Issac and John had Jack at the same time, and while spending time with a four-year-old wasn’t exactly every barely teenage boy’s dream, Isaac seemed to enjoy having someone around that looked up to him as much as Jack did.
It was better than Isaac sitting around Arthur’s apartment on his phone all day long, and when Isaac brought his Playstation over, he and John would play videogames together, leaving Arthur and Jack off to the side to watch.
Their life wasn’t perfect, but, then again, nobody’s was, and it seemed to be just about the happiest “normal” Arthur’d ever experienced.