WARNING: Although this mentions real people, this is in NO WAY a real situation or an inferred situation. This never happened, never will happen, and is not to imply that it even could happen. For entertainment purposes ONLY.

“Fuck, it gets totally crazy out there. You’re lucky they didn’t see *you*,” I look at him, then drop my eyes. I can’t believe he’s here. That he came to see the show. That he heard me sing and saw me dance and God, I feel somehow embarrassed and incredibly proud at the same time.

Gale.

I’ve been pushing him out of my head since the last day of filming in the spring. Haven’t seen him for four months, haven’t thought about him in… well… I haven’t seen him for four months. How much I think about him is really irrelevant.

He laughs a little through his nose. “Yeah, that would be good for the rumours,” he grins, then slings his arm over my shoulder as we walk quickly down the street.

I fight the urge not to shrug off his arm. He shouldn’t be doing that. He has no right to do that. I can’t let him do that.

But somehow I let him anyway, my legs brushing against his as we walk down the street, him pulling me along, his arm wrapped firmly across my shoulders. His hand is pressing against my arm, and the squeak of his leather jacket rubbing across my bare arm echoes in my ears.

“I thought I’d take you for a drink,” he grins at me, keeps pulling me along, my legs moving faster than comfortable to keep up with his long strides. “You were fuckin’ great, Randy, I had no idea.”

He pulls me closer and I get a whiff of cigarettes and that cologne he wears. Not too strong, just musky and spicy and I don’t know what the fuck it is, and could never, would never, ask. Even though I spent an hour at Bloomingdale’s sniffing tester bottles to see if I could find it.

Not that I’d do anything with it even if I could find it.

He squeezes my shoulder again and I stare at him for a second, blowing my bangs out of my face. I try to not to show him anything, to let him know that I wanted him to come, to let him know that I’ve missed him, to let him know that maybe I’ve tried to forget what happened, that I’ve forgiven him, that maybe I want him, and that maybe things are different, and can be different and I can forget about it, because now we have to go back to work and see each other and fake fuck and…

My thoughts fade away and I see he’s got that look. His eyes dancing, glinting hazel and green and gray all at the same time. Grinning at me with that too-wide smile that stretches his face apart. Dark whiskers on his jaw, too long to be stubble, too short to be a beard and all I want is to feel it against my face, my chest, my thighs as he goes down on me…

God.

I turn away quickly as I feel the blush come to my cheeks and forehead. “Thanks,” I mumble, and catch my breath. I should be angry at him. I am angry at him.

“What, you embarrassed?” he snickers at me, and that’s it, I start to pull away, grabbing his fingers in my hand and twisting out of his grip, but his fingers close in on mine, like he’s holding my hand and he pulls me to him, into his embrace and hugs me.

I wanted to pull away, but I couldn’t. I tried to pull his arm off my shoulder and ended up with both his arms wrapped tight around me, my hands pinned between us, balled up into fists.

I let myself have this. One heartbeat. Two heartbeats. Three heartbeats.

Push him away. Hard.

“Not here,” I whisper harshly and stalk off down the street quickly, wondering if he’ll follow me, not knowing where I should go or what I should do.

“Hey,” his hand grips the back of my neck and I jerk suddenly and stop, my heart leaping into my throat.

I gasp in a breath then pull away from him again.

“Why’d you take off?” he looks at me, his eyebrows scrunched up, and surely, I mean for fuck’s sakes, he’s got to know. He *has* to know.

“Gale… fuck,” I push my palms against my eyes and scrub at my face, wishing that I could make him go away. I don’t need this. I don’t fucking want it. I don’t.

His fingers touch my arm, and I jerk out of his grip again.

“You’re still pissed,” he says it quietly.

I drop my hands, taking a step back from him. “I don’t think I want to talk about this on a fucking street corner in New York,” I mumble and push my hands into my pockets.

“Then come back to my hotel. Or we’ll go to your place. Or a bar. I don’t care,” he says and I can see him start to reach out for me, then his hand drops away.

I sigh loudly. Am I stupid enough to go to his hotel room? No. And I don’t want to go to a fucking bar, where there could be people staring and then those stupid rumours will start up again and I don’t want to deal with all that shit.

I nod. “My place. C’mon,” I step out into the street to hail a cab and he follows me closely behind.

We ride in silence, and he stares out the window, one hand pulling at the hairs on his chin and the other resting in his crotch. I let myself stare at him, look at him, wonder about him.

“Why are you here, anyway?” I ask him suddenly, and he jumps a little, breaking out of his thoughts.

“To see your play, of course,” he gives me a shit-eating grin and I reluctantly give him a small smile back.

“Shut up. Why are you *really* here,” I lean back against the door, and pull my messenger bag into my lap.

“Jennifer’s signed me up for a new movie, so I’m meeting with her this week,” he speaks softly and it’s my turn to grin.

“Ahhhh, of course. Jennifer,” I raise my eyebrows. Knew he was in town for her. He told me these sordid tales of fucking her when he was working on the first movie. I pretended I was interested at the time.

“It’s not like that,” he says and looks out the window again. “Not this time.” He says it to his reflection in the window as much as me. Something about the catch in his voice makes me not say anything else.

The cab pulls up to my place and Gale throws some money at the driver before I can get my wallet out, and I let him. Whatever. He owes me a cab ride at least, I guess.

We climb the two flights to my loft and he grumbles about fucking New York apartments and how there’s no fucking elevator to save your goddamn life but shuts up when we get inside.

I realize too late that there’s shit strewn everywhere and I kick scripts and CDs across the hardwood and under the couch, try to pick up books and make sure there’s nothing incriminating lying around.

He glances around the apartment, taking in the brick walls and hardwood floors, nods approvingly and eyes the piano in the corner.

“Cool, you play?” he points to it.

“A little. It’s mostly for practicing. Singing,” I dump an armload of books onto the dining room table and drop my bag.

“Hm,” he says, lips pressed together, pulled into his mouth.

“Want a drink?” I ask him, kicking off my shoes, watching as he scans my bookshelf, staring at photos of me, my friends, my family. There’s one of the cast there as well, and he stops at that one, taking a long look.

“You really were good, you know,” he says, without looking at me. “You can sing like a motherfucker.”

I grimace. “Is that a compliment?”

He laughs a little. “Well, you know.” He pulls off his jacket, tossing it on a chair in the living room.

“You don’t *do* musical theatre, that I know,” I lean against the doorway to the kitchen, remembering a drunken night spent listening to Gale’s tirade against anything Andrew Lloyd Webber.

He shrugs and sits down on the couch. “I’d love a beer,” he smiles at me, and starts to toe his shoes off.

I turn away and go into the kitchen, reluctant to leave him alone in my living room, and quickly grab two beers from the fridge, pulling the tops off. I come back to find him with his bare feet up on my coffee table, scanning one of the scripts my friend wrote. He tosses it back to the floor, and I pass him his drink, climbing up onto the sofa, sitting cross-legged at the end, my back pressed against the armrest, facing him.

He sips, I sip.

He glances up at me, I glance up at him.

The silence sits there between us until it gets beyond uncomfortable. He sighs and shifts on the couch, and looks up at me again, then lets his eyes settle on my face. He tries to smile, but it fades quickly as he sees I’m not gonna smile back anymore. I’m done playing let's-pretend-it-didn’t-happen.

He picks at the label on his beer bottle. “I get why you’re pissed,” he says finally, mumbling a bit.

“I don’t think you do,” I stare at the side of his face, pushing myself back into the couch, away from him. It was a fucking mistake to let him come here. Christ.

“We shouldn’t have… no… I shouldn’t have…” he fumbles for words, then puts the bottle down on the table.

“We fucked, you promised you wouldn’t be an asshole, and you were,” I spell it out for him and watch him wince.

“I didn’t…” I wait for him to finish, but I know he’s not going to.

“You said you were ready, and I fucking *told* you that you weren’t, and you didn’t listen to me,” I put my bottle on the table, a little harder than I mean to. I remember him that night, the night I finally gave in, the night I was maybe too drunk or too high to let common sense rule me. I remember the feeling, that excitement of doing something I knew I shouldn’t be doing, and I remember how good it felt. How much I’d wanted it.

Remembered not caring about anything anymore and just knowing that the kisses were real.

“I was ready to fuck. It’s just--” he says, and I scoff at him, cutting off his words.

“Yeah, of course you were ready to fuck. You’d wanted to get your dick in my ass since the first day we met, I know that,” I pull my knees to my chest. “I know that you wanted it because you thought you’d be someone different than you were. Because you thought it’d make it more real. It’d make *you* more real. You’d do anything for your fucking ‘craft’,” I lay heavy sarcasm on these last words.

“You don’t know that,” he stares at his hands in his lap, picks at his nails.

“You’re right. I don’t know anything. I’m a stupid little faggot with a crush on his straight co-star who’s a *fucking asshole*,” I spit it out, and push my back into the armrest, curling my toes up on the couch cushion. I didn’t mean to say all that, but then what the fuck. It’s the truth.

He shakes his head slowly but doesn’t say anything.

“Go back to your straight world and fuck some pussy. I’ll see you in Toronto in the fall, and then I’ll pretend that nothing happened, because I’ll be paid to do it,” I raise my voice. I can’t look at him, can’t see him, can’t fucking smell him sitting here in *my* place, surrounded by my things, in my world.

I start to slide off the couch, dropping my foot to the floor, but he reaches out and grips my ankle, hard.

“Stop,” he says, quietly. Just one word to my one hundred.

I stop, but don’t look at him. I hate him and I want him.

He sucks in a deep breath then lets it out slowly, sliding his thumb up my ankle, pushing down my sock to touch my skin.

It’s like electricity, his fingers wrapped around my ankle – burning and on fire, and all I can focus on is his touch, that feeling of his skin against mine. Suddenly I remember it, remember everything, all of it… him coming home with me that night, too drunk to drive, too belligerent to take a cab to his place… how he’d filled my little Toronto apartment, and made it seem different and like home for that one night.

He’d pushed against me hard, practically dragged me to the bedroom… I’d fallen back onto the bed, the room spinning, a grin busting off my face, my cock hard and leaking in my jeans. I’d wanted him, really wanted him, didn’t know if he’d wanted me, and then he’d kissed me, started it, started everything, and I knew instantly that he’d wanted me forever.

I remember that… remember how his hands shook, how his breath came so heavy… the awkwardness of his movements, fumbling with the condom, pushing his fingers inside me roughly, too fast, too hard, and I pulled him back… remembered how he’d apologized and I’d laughed and kissed him, easing his fingers back inside me… how he’d run his hands up my back, over my shoulders… how he’d kissed my ass and licked my crack and touched my hole with his tongue and told me how he’d always wanted to really do that, just to see how I’d react… that my deep sigh and moan were what he’d expected and he’d licked me again, tentatively, brushing his tongue against my ass until I’d turned around and whispered to him, till I asked him, begged him, to fuck me.

I’d pulled open my ass cheeks, face pressed hard to the sheets… waited as I felt that brush against my hole, then the first push in… too slow, too tentative, and I’d leaned back on him, pushing down hard inside and taking his cock all at once. He’d groaned and shuddered and I thought he was gonna cum right there, but he didn’t... just slipped into an easy rhythm and I’d pressed back and panted for more.

We’d fucked all night, and we’d kissed all night, and when I woke up, hung over and cramped and sticky with last night’s cum, I knew something had changed. That maybe everything had changed.

It wasn’t the fuck. It was what he’d done. He’d crawled out of bed, my bed, without a word. Left me there. Didn’t say anything, didn’t call, and then pretended like it’d never happened.

It happened. It really happened. And I knew it meant something. That we meant something. That it deserved not to be forgotten or pushed aside like.

That I deserved not to be forgotten or pushed aside.

I saw him once after that, we’d had a quick scene together, and I didn’t talk to him except read the lines that were given to me. I’d pretended I didn’t see him and it wasn’t hard, because he was pretending he didn’t see me either.

He’d been a friend – a really good friend – different than Bobby or Peter, different because of the things we’d done, the things we’d shared, the things we’d had to do… and it seemed like one night of making it real was all it took to fuck everything up.

If he’d at least stayed… I mean, we could’ve talked about it…

But he left. And ignored me. And I didn’t like the way that made me feel.

So I left Toronto, and came home to New York and my friends and my life, my real life, of theatre and acting and singing and having a fucking amazing time on Broadway. Focused on that, and tried to forget Toronto and Gale-fucking-Harold. Tried to forget that empty feeling and the way it actually hurt that he’d left me like that. Feeling like I’d lost a friend and feeling like I should’ve known that this would happen. That it would all come down to this.

Fucker.

He thinks he can just show up here and put his hand on my ankle. Wrap his warm fingers around my skin, and glide his thumb across…

I pull my ankle out of his grip quickly.

“Fuck you, Gale,” I fold my knee back up against my chest and stare at him, green eyes and dark brown hair falling into his face.

His hand stays between us, lies curled up and empty, fingers gripping nothing now. He sighs a little and breaks my gaze. Looks down at my feet, my toes curled up tight. I suck in a breath quickly and wait.

Nothing happens.

“You should just get out of here,” I mean to sound strong and defensive, but my voice comes out in a cracked whisper. I rest my chin on my knees, trying to will away the butterflies in my stomach.

He breathes beside me. I feel him shift closer. “You don’t mean that,” his words wash over me and I squeeze my eyes shut and push my hands to the side of my face. I don’t want to see him. I can’t do this again. I can’t.

I know he’s moving closer, can feel the cushions fold under his weight, feel the warmth of his body so close, can feel his breath on my hands covering my face. His thigh nudges my toes and I try to curl them in tighter so we don’t touch, but it’s impossible.

And then he pulls my hands away from my face and I open my eyes and see him, his face right in mine… and…

I know I’m fucked.

“What do you want from me?” I whisper out, staring at his lips, red and full… his tongue comes out to swipe across them, then he pushes towards me, putting my hands on the back of his neck, and I mean to let go, try to let go, but somehow my fingers get caught up in the downy soft hairs and I’m helpless.

“Nothing,” he barely whispers, and presses in closer, his lips brushing across mine. “Everything,” he says again, then kisses me hard, pushing me backwards into the arm of the couch, sliding my back against the rough fabric, letting my shirt ride up around my spine.

And I know this isn’t acting. This isn’t pretend. This isn’t Justin and Brian, this is Randy and Gale and I don’t want to feel like this. This isn’t Toronto on the set with lights and people staring. This is New York and my apartment and the streetlights shining on the hardwood and no one else here but him.

I don’t want to feel so lost, so fucking turned on, so needy. I don’t want to feel how good this is, how much I want this, how my hands pull him closer to me, how my legs wrap around his waist and press him against my body. Don’t want my cock to be so hard, my breath to be so shallow, my face to be so flushed.

I don’t want any of this, but it’s here and to be honest, I wouldn’t fucking give this up for anything right now.

Sex is messy and not like on TV. There’s fumbling and grunts and awkward positions, there’s lube and sticky pre-cum and spit and that smell of condoms, that way they make your fingers feel after you touch them. There’s him trying to find your hole and pushing down and getting ready and feeling that pinch when he first tries to push inside and biting on your lip when it hurts and scrunching up your face and trying not to cum too fast when it feels so fucking good and you get lost. There’s holding on and letting go and finding rhythm and losing it and finding it again, there’s cocks slipping out of holes and being roughly pushed back in, there’s elbows in the face and knees in the groin and slippery, sweaty balls and the smell of sex and all of that.

It’s not like on TV, but then we’re not on TV right now. This isn’t orchestrated or set up or walked through or talked about. I don’t *know* what he’s going to do and he doesn’t know what I’m going to do.

I just know that I don’t think I’m the person he thinks I am, just know that maybe he’ll like the person I really am more, just know that I want to find out who he really is because I suspect there’s more to him than I ever imagined.

I arch my back against the couch and grip the fabric, pushing back my fingernails. Think of fucking and being fucked here on this old couch I’ve dragged across the city more times than I’d like to count, and know that this is the only fuck I’ll ever really remember here.

I say his name over and over and over like a mantra, and he kisses me like he needs me to breathe. Lips searing across my skin again and again till my neck and face are raw from his beard. My skin burns and I swear loudly when I cum, it’s too much and over too soon.

He’s silent save for a gasp. A final hard push inside me and he scrunches his face up tight, fingers clambering in my hair and pulling tight. His eyes close and he kisses me again, pressing his face to mine as he cums, breath after breath whooshing past my ear and making the side of my face hot.

And when it’s over, I feel shaky and a little scared, and like I want him to fuck me again. Like I want to have him, be part of him, have more than just this fucked up friendship with him.

I wrap my arms around his back and cross my ankles over his thighs, pressing his body against mine, our shirts shoved up our chests, my cum sticky between us.

Heartbeats against heartbeats, our chests thump together, gasping for breath, and I’m not letting him go. Not yet. This feels too good, too real, too much like what I’ve wanted. Feels wrong in some ways but right in all the others. I know he’s not queer, not into guys, but for some reason he’s into me and that’s something I’ve always known. There’s something about us, about this, that’s different and fantastic and amazing and I know I won’t ever find it anywhere else, and neither will he.

I have to stop thinking about this so much and just feel it.

I press him harder to my chest, and he reaches up and grabs my hands in his, sliding his fingers between mine, squeezing our palms together. He sighs deeply and I suddenly get this sense like he doesn’t know what to *do* with me, with these feelings he’s having. Like he doesn’t know what to say or do, and as much as I don’t want to make it any harder for him, my instinct for self-preservation is stronger.

“Promise me you won’t fuck me around again,” I whisper it into his hair, stale cigarettes and shampoo.

He presses his hands into mine and nods against my chest, the scritch of his not-stubble, not-beard scratching against my skin, and I try to remember this and try to find something bad in this, try to find something I don’t like, something that isn’t perfect, isn’t good, right, isn’t the way it is, the way I’ve wanted to feel. I try to find that so when he does fuck up I won’t feel so bad. I try to find something, anything to hold onto. To think of.

But there’s nothing. There’s everything, but there’s nothing, really.

I don’t know why I bother saying it, why I ask him not to hurt me, not to fuck with me.

I don’t think he can help but do it anyway.