Work Text:
I’ve come to the realization that I may never get rid of Marla Singer.
It’s a bitter, disgusting thought, one that I’ve tried so desperately to shake off or get rid of. Even for how much time I’ve spent around her, picturing her in Tyler’s shitty house—in OUR shitty house—in her faded dress, leaned up against the headboard in Tyler’s room, leaves a disgusting taste in my mouth.
So now, sitting at the breakfast table with a cup of lukewarm water and a half eaten bowl of dry cereal, I refuse to look up at Tyler when I hear the floorboards creak under him as he enters the kitchen. I didn't sleep a second last night because instead of fighting me, Tyler was screaming his lungs out with Marla fucking Singer right up until maybe five minutes ago.
"Good morning darling," he crows to me, pretending not to notice my very visibly upset mood.
He's wearing his stupid pink bathrobe with the mugs all over it that looks old enough to have come with the house. The belt is done, but loose enough that it looks like it might fall apart if I look at it too hard.
I take a sip of my coffee and set the mug back down on the table. The coffee maker works about as well as anything else in the house, so it tastes mostly like dirty water.
I take three measured steps over to Tyler, until I'm standing directly in front of him.
And I punch him squarely in the face.
He reels back, choking, caught off guard. “What the hell? What pissed you off this early, I just woke up–” I don’t let him finish, I’m on him again with a rough shove to the chest, until he’s backed up against the kitchen counter.
“Bullshit, I heard you up there, you two haven’t been asleep for a while now.” Tyler’s speechless, just rubbing a hand against his face, where a bruise is beginning to form at the bottom of his eye socket where it meets his cheek.
He just looks at me, studying my face with a mix of fascination and exhaustion. “You don’t like it when I have Marla over. Why not?”
I don’t give him a reason. I can’t. I just shake my head and back up, pinching my nose bridge like I’m trying to get rid of a headache. “I don’t care what you and her get up to-“ “Yes, you do. Obviously you do, or you wouldn’t have hit me.”
When I don’t answer him, he invades my space, backing me up against the opposite counter. “Are you jealous?”
"No I'm not jealous," I immediately bite back, "I just can't sleep when you're on the other side of the wall moaning each other's names all night!" Tyler knows I have chronic insomnia. I don't get why it's so hard for him to understand this. "Just because I don't like that you two are screwing doesn't necessarily mean I'm head over heels in love with you, Tyler, I just want to be able to hear myself think without having to walk half a mile from the house.
Tyler's still just smiling at me. "I meant you were jealous of me for getting to screw Marla. Is this something you've thought about, psycho-boy?"
I can feel my face color. "What? No! Of course not."
He's still just staring at me smugly. It pisses me off. I want to hit him.
So I do. I slap him across the face, knocking his smile clean off.
"To be fair, it wouldn't be shocking for me to think about. Even without the visuals you guys don't leave a lot to the imagination."
I see Tyler start to wind up to hit me back, but he changes his mind and opts for teasing instead at the last second. "Well, if it's the visuals you want, you could totally watch. I'm sure Marla wouldn't mind. In fact, I think it gets her going to know you can hear us."
I groan. "No, I don't want to watch you, Jesus Christ."
"What do you want?" He grabs my wrists and pins them above my head, holding them in one of his hands. "And use your words this time, not your hands."
I narrow my eyes at him, still wishing to go for violence instead of a conversation. Moving as quick as I can so he can't block me, I lean forward and sink my teeth into the joint between his neck and shoulder.
He cries out, a sound that is half surprise and half something else that I have been hearing a lot of coming from his room whenever Marla’s over. I pull back and we both stare at each other for a moment.
“What the fuck was that, man?” I exclaim.
He’s avoiding my gaze. “Why would you bite me.” It’s not a question.
“There’s no rule against biting,” I state. “Why did you enjoy that.”
Suddenly I become very aware of the fact he still has my hands bound by the wrists. He pushes me backwards, stepping into my personal space so I am forced to retreat without releasing my arms. “What I choose to do in my own time is none of your concern,” he half-jokes, half-growls.
I stare directly into his eyes. It’s my turn to needle him. “Do you want me to be jealous?”
He opens his mouth to answer. I don’t let him. “Use your words, Tyler,” I taunt, using his own words against him. I take a step closer to him so we’re basically nose-to-nose. “If you really want me to join you, you should just ask.”
He closes his eyes and exhales through his nose. I can feel his breath on my face. “Have you ever been with a guy?”
There’s no point in lying to Tyler. He can always tell. “No,” I admit.
He lets out a small chuckle. “Figures.”
And with that he closes the few inches between us and kisses me.
Tyler kisses me like he’s been waiting for this moment since we met each other on the airplane, or maybe even when we first saw each other at the nude beach in Florida. He kisses me like he needs it to survive. He kisses me with a kind of desperation I’ve never seen from him before.
I feel like he’s about to knock me over. I use his distraction to my advantage and finally free my hands from his (significantly loosened) grip and anchor myself by grabbing onto the front of his bathrobe.
His tongue is in my mouth and suddenly I can’t remember what I feel like without it. I want to crawl inside him through his mouth and stay there until his body is rotted six feet under.
I wrap my arms around his waist and pull him as close into me as I can. I feel like he’s the only thing keeping me standing and the entire reason I’m about to collapse.
Finally he leans back, heaving for breath. I’ve had fights at club that were less tiring. I finally let him go when I feel like my knees can hold my own weight up again.
“Been planning that one for a while?” I mutter, a smile stuck across my face.
“Maybe,” he relents. He means yes, but he would never admit it. With a swish of his bathrobe, he turns around and starts towards the kitchen door.
“And the noise was mostly my fault,” Tyler calls to me over his shoulder. “I like knowing you can hear. You’re not getting an apology.”
With that and a grin, he disappears back into the house.