#steveandbilly

Jesus knows why — but Billy was not about to be the first one to ask questions when Christmas had come early, the prettiest of packages all wrapped up in babydoll pink and silver sparkling string.

Billy, who had been doing nothing but minding his own business watching the clouds go by, few and far between on a day like today, was now questioning every single decision that had led up to this moment.

Come over Saturday, Steve had said when he’d called, we can go swimming. It’s supposed to be wicked hot. Sure, Billy had agreed, no problemo — because it was part of his summer routine now, going over to Steve’s. Nothing Billy hadn’t seen dozens of times before, in Steve’s pool, at the public one, at the high school.

Billy knew how to control himself.

Mostly.

Or at least he thought he had, but —

No one had prepared him for this.

Or maybe Steve had and Billy hadn’t been listening close enough, too busy daydreaming about the promise of all that golden boy skin to read between the lines.

He hadn’t known Steve had been talking about himself.

For Chrissakes there were lace up ties on his hips.

Motherfucking bows —

Robin makes a noise and turns suddenly on her heel, marching back into the house like she forgot something.

Wait. Had they planned this?

Fresh sweat springs to the base of Billy’s neck, his palms, as Steve tiptoes his way across the deck towards Billy like a goddamn show horse, broad shoulders slinking down to his tiny waist, puppy belly long and lean and taut, the fabric of his bottoms riding that much higher with every step and Billy’s mouth positively waters —

Billy pulls his towel into his lap. Starts to feel the first hint of heatstroke when Steve sits down next to him, blushing pink as his strawberry ice cream suit, his necklaces layered in glittering gold in the sun. A perfect banana split sundae, all for Billy. One that he wouldn’t mind having all over his face.

Billy’s back teeth start to ache at the thought.

What the fuck was he supposed to do —

“Hi,” Steve says softly when all Billy does is stare, fingers twisting on themselves in his lap in a helpless attempt to cover himself. The waves in his hair starting to curl in the humidity, falling into his dark eyes.

God, he’s gorgeous, Billy thinks.

“What the hell are you wearin’?,” is what comes out of Billy’s mouth instead. The other three quarters of his brain still on a slow slide down the smooth brown lines of Steve’s body.

He smells like tanning oil, coconut and vanilla, and Billy’s head has disconnected clean from his mouth, which keeps talking, the heat in his groin getting his tongue loose in the worst way.

“I mean, shit, Harrington, I didn’t know they let the bunnies out on the weekends to play.”

Billy didn’t see a single tan line. Which meant —

Steve gives a weak laugh, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck, turning it as pink as his heated cheeks.

“Shut up. It’s Robin’s, obviously. Her mom got it for her, but she hates it, so I offered to … switch.”

“Uh huh,” Billy trails stupidly, too busy putting this puzzle together to think of something cool, clever. He’s staring, and knows it too. This was Steve’s place, so he must have other swim clothes, which could only mean he wanted to wear it —

Jesus.

This was really — way too much for Billy on a day like today. The raw blue sky above them pushing out almost a hundred degrees of heat and humidity and Billy was feeling thirsty for something no tall glass of water could possibly quench.

A shy smile presses its way into Steve’s cheek like he knew exactly what he was doing to Billy, and still he was … absolutely darling.

Billy was so doomed.

Steve wasn’t even — wet, yet.

Jesus.

“I know it’s a little weird,” Steve says, his hands doing that thing when he was nervous, pulling on the gold hoop that was fit snug in his earlobe. The one Billy had put there himself, thought about too many times to count. Falling asleep with the taste of metal in his mouth.

“But it’s, like, basically a speedo. They wear those in Europe, I think?” Steve is rambling now. “And it’s just pink … and like, guys can wear pink too, right? —”

Billy doesn’t respond. Cannot get two brain cells to connect in any way that matters. His tongue tied to the roof of his mouth.

Steve slows, stops, his dark eyes flicking up at Billy and then down, pink cheeks deep like sunburn with growing nerves and Billy knows that look, the one where Billy’s coming off as an asshole and he’s kicking himself, say something, anything —

Steve swallows hard, long fingers playing with the end of a silver ribbon, twisting it tight until his skin flushes purple, then releasing it.

“Do you, um — do you —”

He’s interrupted by Robin, who Billy had all but forgotten was here in this private sticky slow pink bubble Steve had blown. She hollers for him from the open patio door to come help her, her arms full of wobbling drinks and snacks and the thin film around them breaks with a snap.

Steve leaps to his feet and goes to her like she’s caught fire.

There are rhinestones in the shape of a butterfly on his ass.

———————————————————

The relentlessness of the sun overhead slows the afternoon down to an ooze.

Billy’s kept it as lowkey as he can, playing it cool behind the safety of his sunglasses, listening to them talk, laugh. Not really contributing anything to the conversation, though Steve’s been glancing at him, probably wondering why he’s being so quiet.

He has to be. Because the next thing popping out of Billy’s mouth would either be telling Robin to fuck off or begging Steve to come sit in his lap.

Maybe both. Shooting off like he did.

Billy blows out a breath. He should have known better.

Stayed home.

An hour could have slid by, or maybe three, for all Billy cares. It’s better than anything his hormone addled brain could have whipped up. Making him feel like he was sixteen again, watching Steve eat fruit salad with his fingers. Pull himself up out of the turquoise waters like something out of a magazine, or Billy’s private movie collection, and finally, the cherry on top, working on a rapidly melting vanilla cone, lapping up the creamy white rivers that ran down to his wrist, filling Billy’s head up with way too many ideas.

Billy hadn’t had any of it, too busy eating his fill with his eyes.

He was going to need a cold, cold shower when he got back to his place.

If he even made it that far.

Resist temptation, his dad always told him when he was growing up. Say no to drugs, and other bullshit. So much easier said than done without Steve’s perfect cherry pie ass in his face. Making him want to grab a quarter just to see the arc.

He’s not really sure how many more of these visuals he can take when all hell breaks loose.

They’d retreated to the shade as soon as the refreshments had run out but still the heat in Billy’s head must have risen to dangerous levels because one minute Steve is complaining about not having landed a date in ages, which Billy couldn’t understand for the life of him but was not complaining, and the next Billy hears himself blurt out, “Why would you need a girlfriend when you got me?”

The following silence is oppressive, choking and stifling like the heat crawling its way up Billy’s chest and into his throat. The butterflies that have been living inside him since he’d met Steve eight years back dying between one heartbeat and the next.

Billy stares deep into his lap, wishing for the end. For years and years he’d kept it under wraps and now? He’s too afraid to look when he hears Steve push himself up off his chair where he’d been reclining on his stomach to look back at Billy and Billy can’t even breathe —

He’s even shocked Robin silent, which is a miracle in and of itself, and Billy should have got the fuck out of here an hour ago when Steve had first walked out and Billy still had a chance at making it out alive. Made up some bullshit lie, like he’d forgotten to do something, anything except lose the best friend he’s ever had, like this —

“What did you just say?,” Steve asks as Robin lets out a wild, nervous giggle and Billy’s never hated her so much. He feels his eyes start to burn. All of it coming to a rolling boil. Robin this, Robin that. Steve slipping through his fingers like sand since they’d met.

Sharing a fucking swimsuit, like they were together, even though Steve had sworn up and down they weren’t, that Robin didn’t even play in his league, whatever that meant.

Billy didn’t believe him for one second.

If she hadn’t been here, this whole fucking day never would have happened —

Steve turns to her with a pointed, snippy, “Hey, Rob?”

Billy chokes back a sharp laugh, feels the corners of his mouth lift in a snarl.

Steve doesn’t even have to say, give us a minute?, before she’s standing, pushing her chair back with a loud scrape across the concrete. She’s got her hand held up like, say no more, and makes a run for it, exiting from the conversation with a free pass that Billy would never be so fortunate to get.

Billy takes the opening when he sees it and gets the hell out of there too. Ignoring the sound of Steve calling his name. Only thinking about the solitude of the Camaro in the driveway, locking himself in and driving it out to the highest lookout point within county lines he could find, then straight through the guardrails.

“Billy, wait!” Steve shouts, swearing as his long colt legs get tangled up in his chair, tripping over himself.

It buys Billy a few seconds.

Barefoot, the black pavement of the driveway is hot enough to blister. Billy all but runs to his car, the world around him swimming as he fumbles with his keys. Closes the door behind him and his racing heart, and locks himself in.

The interior of the car is sweltering. The leather scalding where it’s sealing itself to his bare skin.

Billy could just sit here until he passes out. That would work too.

Already it was getting harder to breathe.

But really, he needs to leave.

He puts the key in the ignition and nothing happens. The familiar roar a weak overheated cough.

Whatever control he has left breaks, and he slams his hand down on the steering wheel, roaring out a ragged, “Fuck!”

He looks up just as Steve rounds the corner and groans out loud. His own personal episode of Baywatch, and this wasn’t heaven, or hell, so he must be somewhere in between, with both sides laughing at him.

And then Steve’s at his window, pretty in Billy’s picture frame. Leaning down, hands on his knees to give Billy those fucking puppy eyes.

Billy turns away, presses his forehead hard into the steering wheel, wishing it was the barrel of a gun.

“Why are you running away from me?” Steve asks, his voice muffled through the glass as he tries the handle. Like the answer hasn’t been shown to him time and time again.

Billy lifts his head and flips him off instead of looking at him.

“C’mon, don’t be like that,” Steve says, standing up, putting his hands on his hips. His hands so big his fingertips almost touch in the middle. It makes Billy sick. “Open the door.”

Billy doesn’t respond. Gritting his teeth against that glorious view just in his peripherals, almost close enough to touch. Staring resolutely ahead through the windshield, the hot lick of shame still sweeping over him, making the back of his neck prickle. He might die in here but at least it was safer than out there, where he had to talk, explain —

Steve knocks, tries the handle again, a pleading note entering his voice. “Bills, c’mon, please don’t do this. You’re gonna get sick.”

Billy ignores him, and the bead of sweat trickling down his throat.

“Billy,” Steve says, one last time. Voice getting deeper, sharper, that bitchy tone that always got Billy hot edging in.

Billy swallows hard. It was almost over, he just needed to hold out a little longer.

“I mean it. Stop playing around, it’s way too hot —”

When Billy still doesn’t unlock the door, roll the window down, give Steve any indication he’s coming out any time soon, Billy hears him sigh, swear through the glass. Watches from the corner of his eye as Steve backs up. Retreating, nodding to himself as he runs a hand back through his hair. Like he knew, in a fight, when the bull and the ram go head to head, only one can win.

Something like relief in his veins, and Billy closes his eyes.

———————————————————

Steve and Robin are arguing, loudly, by the time Billy stumbles back into the house. Holding onto the doorframe for support, dizzy from the heat, the shock of the air conditioned house, from standing up too quickly. The soles of his feet sore and throbbing in time with his pulse from the scalding pavement.

He’s going to have blisters the size of golf balls later.

Steve’s back is to Billy, but Robin sees him come in. She’s wide eyed and pale, something like regret twisting in her features as she takes the brunt of Steve’s heat.

“Steve —,” she tries to say, but Steve barrels over her.

“No,” he snarls, his hands everywhere, yanking a shirt on over his head, snapping a pair of shorts into place over his swim bottoms and Billy feels something like grief. “You don’t get it, Robin. He’d rather suffocate himself to death out in his car than talk to me! He won’t even look at me! God, I can’t believe I listened to you! Oh, Billy’s going to lose his mind over you in that, give me a fucking break — him?! What was I thinking?! Letting you talk me into looking like such a — a — fag!”

His voice breaks and Robin flinches. Billy does too, knocking back into the doorframe with his shoulder, the word like a heavy handed slap from his father, taking the air right out of his lungs.

Steve whirls on his heel at the sound.

“Billy,” he breathes, all his anger washing out at the sight of him, replaced with worry that Billy doesn’t deserve. “Oh my God, are you okay?” Those dark fawn eyes scanning him head to toe as he takes a step toward Billy, reaching for him out of habit before freezing, remembering himself.

Steve takes his hand back, “I — come in, please. Sit down, let me get you some water.”

He doesn’t wait for Billy to respond before he’s walking away, pressing a cold glass into Billy’s hands, stiff and swollen from the heat. Watching him with liquid care as he drains it, refilling it without Billy even having to ask. Billy almost feels like crying again, but he’ll be damned before he does it in front of Robin fucking Buckley.

The room lapses into silence when he’s had his fill, only the whir of the AC pushing through the vents. Steve is looking at him expectantly but – they have company. Billy slides his gaze pointedly over to Robin and Steve mirrors him.

“Oh,” Steve says, as if remembering they have an audience. “Hey, Rob? Can you —?”

Robin blinks back at Steve, not getting it.

“Do you, like, mind?” Billy asks, raising an eyebrow, motioning towards the door when she doens’t move.

“Oh!” She says, jolting into action. “Right, sorry!”

Billy fights to not roll his eyes. Steve gives him that look like, be nice and calls, “You can take my bike!” to her retreating back. Then the front door is closing behind her and it’s just the two of them.

Steve sinks down to sit on the couch next to him, butterfly fingers fluttering at the hem of his shirt, his shorts, twisting the fabric into knots. His dark eyes fixed on Billy’s bare chest, where he can probably see his heart beating its bloody way out.

They speak at the same time.

“Are you —”

“You shouldn’t —”

“Sorry, you go —” they blurt out in tandem, again.

Steve gives a weak laugh, pulls at his earring. Getting Billy all liquid inside.

“You go,” Billy repeats, trying to give himself a little more time before this house on fire that he’s spent years building collapses under him.

Steve nods, runs a hand back through his hair, “Are you okay?”

Billy’s heart clenches in his chest, his constant kindness a real thorn in Billy’s side.

“Yeah, I’m uh, I’m good. Thanks.”

They go quiet again, and for all the years that they’ve been friends, after all their arguments, it’s never felt like this. Like pulling teeth with no anesthesia.

Steve looks down at his hands, “What were you going to say?”

“Oh,” Billy says, “Uh — it’s not right, you callin’ yourself that.”

Steve nods but doesn’t respond, watching his own fingers folding the hem of his shorts over and over itself.

“So …” Steve finally says, “About what you said, earlier —”

Billy groans, “Steve, we really don’t have to —”

“Did you mean it?”

He’s staring at Billy’s chest. Billy falters though the answer is obvious. One syllable. Right at the tip of his tongue.

“Did you?” Billy asks.

Steve glances up at him and smiles, just a corner, like he knows all Billy’s tricks and had been expecting this. 

“Did I what?”

“Did you wear that for me?” Billy asks, tilting his chin down to motion at Steve’s lap.

Steve blushes deep. He looks down, then up, locking those brilliant fawn eyes on Billy that have had him falling on repeat, day after day, year after year.

“If I tell you the truth, will you too?”

Always testing him.

Billy nods anyways. 

Steve takes a breath, lets it out, “I did. I told you it was her mom who got it but .. it was Robin’s idea. She saw me eyeing it in the store and convinced me to try it. She .. thought you might like it.”

Billy is struck speechless. No one knew about him. No one. He’d been so careful. And yet, Robin? Had clocked him?

“Was she right?”

Billy finds his faith and tells him what he should have from the start.

“God, yes,” he breathes, “You look gorgeous.”

Steve’s answering smile is soft around the edges, like the rainbow, "Yeah?"

Billy finds his fingers are reaching, curling into the wavy edge of Steve’s tee to get another peek. He lifts it an inch, then two, tracing the backs of his knuckles along the baby soft skin of his belly. Relishing in the way Steve shivers from his touch.

“Can I see it again?” Billy asks softly.

Steve nods, then stands in front of Billy, his eyes dark as he pushes the waistband down, and Billy knows he looks just as hungry.

“This too?” Billy asks, plucking at the hem of his tee.

“You trying to get me naked?” Steve asks as he pulls his shirt over his head, a smirk curling into that perfect pink pout. 

“You started it,” Billy shrugs with a smile, spreading his thighs so Steve can step in close to him. Wanting to get his hands all over him, now.

Steve laughs as he looks down at him, fitting his fingers into his hair, playing with the curls at the base of Billy’s neck, sending chills down his spine. 

“You never answered my question.”

Billy drags his gaze away from the path of his hands as they smooth up miles and miles of unclaimed golden coastline, “Hm?”

“Did you mean it?” Steve murmurs, “That you wanna be with me?”

Billy takes his hand and threads their fingers together, tugging him closer. Steve comes easy, folding his fawn legs down around Billy, settling into his lap, right where he belongs. His skin hot like silk against Billy’s own, the final puzzle piece slotting into place when Billy tangles his fingers in those silver ties, holding fast.