a brother can be this (deeply haunted)

tags:

★ quinn | jack | luke | the brothers ever ★ 743 | 4397 | 1243 | 127 | 3697 | 71243 | minnycule ★ wild | faber | kap | boldy | spurge | zucc | jeek | wally ★ short quinn tags: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 ★ tropes/AUs: size difference | abo | bdsm | winner's room

tw/cw:

★ !! general blog cw for whump & bad sex !! ★ other cw are tagged & under the cut ★ please read the ask info section for more ⤵︎

asks info:

★ ask tag ✓ wips, recs, consent stuff, whump, trans stuff X mcd, incest, underage, bodily fluids, gore, mpreg ☆ if you're not sure, send it anyway :) ★ ASK RULES ⤷ please only send one ask at a time ⤷ be patient on answers. i have a real adult life offline. ⤷ i do this for fun. i do not owe you a response. ⤷ asks may be delete w/o notice if i so choose.

my stuff

★ my ao3 ★ current wips: ⤷ tab 1 — the world moves on without you [injury fic] ⤷ tab 2 — pushing it down won't work [abo fic] ⤷ tab 3 — possession, but as a metaphor [haunting fic] ⤷ tab 4 — porch light [outing fic] ⤷ tab 5 — some silhouette [winner's room] ★ art tag ★ yapping tag

my teams

The heat must be getting to him. It’s either that or the Stella slowly turning lukewarm in his hand, because there’s no other rational explanation for why he feels so flushed, laid out on a deck chair in the shade, trying his best to focus on—relaxing. Trying to force some semblance of mellow emptiness into his brain, trying to strong-arm his consciousness onto the other side of an afternoon nap, instead of letting it wander back down to where Brocks hauled himself up onto the dock, leaning back on his hands and dripping lake water. 

The heat is definitely why Quinn's mouth feels so dry, watching him tilt his head back, eyes closed against the sun. He's been looser and more playful here, relaxed in a way Quinn hadn't realized he wasn't, back in Minnesota. It's subtle, and maybe only something Quinn's noticed because he's been—well, looking, admittedly, but that's neither here nor there. It's normal to notice those kinds of details about a guy who's been spending the past two weeks in Quinn's house, eating Quinn's food and hanging out with Quinn’s brothers and generally just kind of being in Quinn’s space. It’s no different than the kind of familiarity involved in sharing a locker room with a bunch of other men, the kind of not-looking that yields just enough information for a chirp or two, but doesn’t linger enough to be dangerous.

Except that, here, camouflaged in the mid-afternoon shadow of the house, Quinn doesn’t have to worry about keeping his gaze to the floor or above chest-level, or counting the seconds to make sure he hasn’t been watching for too long. Half-wrapped in a beach towel, eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses, the surfaces of his skin prickling like the threat of sunburn, he can just look as Brock finally flops fully onto his back.

The movement makes sunlight catch over the twisting flex of his arms and chest, the solid slope of his abdomen, the cut of his hips leading down past the waistband of navy-blue swim trunks, the fucking—all of him that’s just laid out, spread out over the dock without a care in the world, like it’s not making Quinn’s brain turn in tighter and more treacherous circles to stare at the way Brock’s body is literally glistening—

Quinn's just overheated. He should be drinking more water, instead of finishing off his tepid beer and trying to find a place for his eyes to rest that isn't on his teammate's stupidly perfect muscles. In fact, maybe he needs to just give it up and go inside, see if that’s what he needs to actually cool off, because it just has to be the heat messing with his head, making his chest feel heavy and tight. Maybe he’s got heatstroke. Maybe he’s having a heart attack. Maybe he’s going to—

“Enjoying the view?”

—to jump out of his skin and die of a heart attack for real, and the only witness to his last few humiliating moments alive is going to be Matt Boldy, who doesn’t even have the decency to look that sorry about it at all.

“Jesus,” Quinn manages in a rush, feeling his pulse pound in his throat, “Fucking—Christ, dude.”

Matt’s mouth twists into that funny little shape it takes when he’s amused, something that’s not quite a smile but always seems more genuine than the one he shows to cameras. He doesn’t look any less flushed than Quinn feels, but he’s also been letting himself bake in the sun far more than Quinn’s sunscreen-related neuroses will allow. Between his tanned skin and the way that sunlight and lake water have been slowly teasing highlights into his hair, Matt could probably walk his way onto a swimwear photoshoot, no questions asked.

Summer looks good on him. It looks good on both of them.

And from the way Matt’s smile tugs up even further, a hint of sharp canines when Quinn finally forces himself to make eye contact and accept the replacement beer proffered in Matt’s giant hand—he knows it, too. It turns the lingering adrenaline in Quinn's chest towards guilty nerves.

“Thanks,” Quinn mumbles, and does his best not to entirely fold himself back into his towel and disappear, the way he kind of wishes he could. Matt doesn’t comment on it, which is something of a relief, just stretches his unfairly long body out on the deck chair next to Quinn's, taking a pull from his beer and making a quiet noise of satisfaction.

Quinn keeps his eyes very firmly fixed on the bottle in his own hands, reading and rereading and rereading and rereading the surgeon general's warning to make sure his gaze stays where it's supposed to be. He shouldn’t be looking. He shouldn’t even be thinking about looking, really, but the problem is that Quinn is becoming entirely too conscious of Matt’s every minute shift and twitch, and every time his eye catches the movement he catches himself fucking looking again, his traitorous brain cataloguing details Quinn doesn’t want to notice. The light dusting of freckles over Matt’s shoulders, the veins prominent along his forearms, the almost delicate trail of pale hair leading down from his navel. Matt's too far away for it to be true, but it feels like the warmth of his skin could be somehow combining with the ambient heat of the day to make Quinn feel especially dizzied.

He manages to pry his eyes away, taking a sip of his beer and managing not to grimace about the taste. Some bougie lager Brock brought for himself, that up until now, no one else has been drinking—it sort of tastes like soapy bathwater, but Brock really seems to enjoy it, so Quinn’s allowed it to keep taking up space in the fridge. The flavor is a distraction from the flush in his system.

Down on the dock, Brock languidly rolls over onto his front, taking a moment to wave up at the two of them with a goofy little grin before he settles his head against the crook of his elbow, seemingly content to keep basking in the afternoon rays. The acknowledgment is unexpected, and Quinn’s not sure why it makes his cheeks burn even hotter.

“You’re allowed to look, you know.”

If he physically startles, again, Matt’s kind enough not to mention it, though the corner of his mouth pointedly quirks up. Stupid. Quinn should know better than to let his thoughts wander in these kinds of situations—his gaze tends to follow suit, and he’s definitely been staring. At Matt, at Brock, everywhere he shouldn’t be. He’s pretty sure that the guys on the team know he’s—different, in where his eyes can’t help but linger, in how he always brushes off their drunken wingman attempts, in how he never has anything to add to the conversation when it turns those kinds of directions, but that doesn’t mean it’s…okay. There’s a difference between suspecting and knowing, and Quinn needs to stop doing the kind of shit that clarifies where he stands on that divide.

When he doesn’t respond, Matt reaches across with one of his freakishly long legs and prods at Quinn’s thigh. It’s so juvenile, so—Luke, that Quinn’s mouth curves despite himself. 

“Hey,” Matt nudges again, “I know you hear me over there.” Quinn shrugs. There’s not—he’s not sure what Matt wants him to say. I wasn’t, or No, I’m really not, or I can't help it. Any reply he could have would either be a bold-faced lie or a tacit admission, and Matt’s smart enough to sniff out both.

“Quinn.” Another poke. 

“I don’t—” Quinn bites his lip, fumbling for something to say, “I mean, I’m not—” He trails off, because isn’t he, though?

“Not looking, or not interested?” Matt presses, and Quinn's gaze snaps to him. Matt's face is giving away nothing, but the lack of—judgment, disgust, does nothing to stop the anxiety that surges up behind his navel. 

Apparently oblivious to Quinn's inner turmoil, Matt shrugs. “I mean, why not. Look at him.”

Quinn’s trying very hard to not, that’s the whole—that’s the whole thing, but now Matt’s looking at him, and Quinn’s looking back, and when Matt shifts to turn over towards Quinn, the muscles in his abdomen ripple, and maybe Quinn’s sunglasses aren’t as dark as he thought, because Matt makes a thoughtful sound and levers himself fully upright.

Quinn shuts his eyes, half to avoid making more eye contact with any part of Matt that isn't his face, and half to—

The shade around him seems to shift, and then the deck chair gives a little under added weight, and his eyes fly open at the feeling of a knee against his thigh, and there's—there’s Matt, right there, leaning over him with arms braced on either side of Quinn's head, so close that the jittering in Quinn's belly shifts traitorously into a different kind of nerves.

“It's okay. I've been looking, too.”

Quinn balks. “You're—?”

Matt hums and tips his head. “I'm looking. And I'm interested.” But he's not watching Brock anymore. Quinn licks his lips reflexively and Matt's gaze snaps immediately to the movement. Oh.

Quinn really must have sunstroke, or something. There's just no other explanation for it, his head spinning around Matt's words and the span of his skin, close enough to touch.

He's got Quinn trapped, pinned in place with his bright green eyes, and Quinn can't bring himself to look away, and—maybe Matt doesn't want him to. And maybe Quinn's abruptly aware of how tired he is of pretending.