Chapter 107: Chapter 107
Cassian pulled Felix against him, and they stayed there, in the heat and the steam, broken and salvaged, the empty, beautiful flat waiting for them just beyond the door. That was four years ago. The flat hadn’t stayed empty. It held them through promotions, Cassian’s fortieth birthday, the quiet, jarring shift of Sam’s passing, Arthur’s subsequent move into sheltered housing. The second bedroom hadn’t become a nursery in the traditional sense. Instead, on a rainswept Tuesday during Felix’s final year at university, it welcomed Jonah. He was fourteen then, a wary, angry ghost with eyes that held whole burned-down forests. His file said ‘hard to place.’ Felix saw a boy whose very silence screamed for a door that wouldn’t slam.
Integration wasn’t a smooth path; it was a daily, granular negotiation over bathroom schedules, acceptable noise levels, the very air they breathed. The quiet, bruised understanding between Felix and Cassian from their earlier days—the silent hangover pacts, the language of floor-bound sex and kitchen-sink sickness—became a secret language they spoke around this new, fragile entity. Their fights went underground, conducted in hissed whispers after midnight, their reconciliations swift and brutal and wordless, a hand on a back, a shared cigarette on the fire escape. Home became an act of mutual construction, three different blueprints held up to the same light.
Now Jonah was eighteen. He stood in front of the hallway mirror on a Friday afternoon, adjusting the collar of a green corduroy shirt that strained slightly across his shoulders. He had filled out, the softness of childhood solidifying into a sturdy, broad-shouldered frame. His chest was thick, his stomach a gentle curve under the fabric, and his arms carried the undeniable weight of newfound strength. He carried it quietly, without Cassian’s heavy swagger. He saw Tom Weaver twice a week in Advanced Literature. Tom had curly, unmanageable brown hair that fell into his eyes, and a habit of chewing the end of his pen. He wore shirts that were perpetually untucked, revealing the soft roll of his waist against his low-slung jeans. His body wasn’t lean; it was comfortable, generous, his cheeks round and perpetually flushed, and when he smiled, which was rarely in class, his whole face seemed to light up from within.
Jonah knew he was gay. Everyone seemed to know, or at least not question, a fact he attributed entirely to his fathers. The unspoken question was Tom. He’d spotted a faded rainbow pin on Tom’s worn backpack last week. He’d watched his blunt, ink-stained fingers trace lines of poetry. Today, as the final bell’s electric shudder released the school into the weekend’s humid promise, Jonah moved. His heart was a frantic, stupid bird in his throat. He shouldered his bag and cut through the tide of bodies to the bank of dented lockers where Tom was carefully placing a heavy anthology inside.
“Hey,” Jonah said. The word came out cracked.
Tom turned, blinking. His eyes were a startling, clear blue behind his glasses. “Hey. Jonah, right?”
“Right.” Jonah swallowed. “That annotation on the Donne poem last week? The bit about holy profanity? It was… it was really sharp.”
Tom’s flush deepened, spreading down his neck. “Oh.Thanks. I just… it seemed obvious. In a way.”
“Not to anyone else,” Jonah said. He could feel the seconds ticking down, the hallway thinning out. He took a tight breath. “I was going to go to the art supply place on Macready Street. To get some new inks. I know it’s random. But if you’re not… I mean, do you want to… walk with me or something?” He stared at a point just past Tom’s shoulder, at a torn poster for a volleyball try-out.
The silence stretched for three terrifying beats. Tom closed his locker door with a soft metallic click. He adjusted the strap of his bag, his full lower lip caught in his teeth. “Yeah,” he said finally.“Okay. My bus pass is crap anyway. Walking’s good.”
They walked. The afternoon sun was a thick, honeyed substance coating the pavement. Their conversation was a stuttering engine, seizing on school, teachers, the impending dread of university applications, then dying into the hum of traffic and their own loud footsteps. At the art store, they wandered aisles smelling of turpentine and paper. Jonah picked out two bottles of ink—a deep indigo, a burnt sienna. Tom’s fingers, thick and capable, traced the spines of expensive sketchbooks. “Do you draw?” Jonah asked.
“Sometimes,” Tom murmured. “Badly. It’s just… the textures. I like the idea of it.” He glanced up, a shy, sideways look. “You’re lucky. Having parents who get it. Your dads.”
Jonah felt a familiar, complicated warmth.“Yeah. They’re… they’re something else. It’s not all rainbows. It’s real. Sometimes it’s a mess.” He paid for the inks, the coins slick in his palm.
Outside, the air had grown heavier. “I live in the Wellington blocks,” Tom said, gesturing vaguely north. “It’s not far.”
“I’ll walk you,” Jonah said, the statement surprising him with its firmness.
Tom just nodded. They took a different route, past a scabby park where pigeons fought over crusts. The silence between them changed, becoming charged, a tangible thing. They stopped at the concrete stairwell of Tom’s building, a postwar monolith of stained grey brick. “You want to… come up?” Tom asked, the invitation rushed out on a single breath. “My mum’s on a double. She won’t be back ‘til ten.”
The flat was small, overheated, and smelled of fried onions and plug-in air freshener. Tom led him to a bedroom that was a shrine to quiet obsession: books stacked two deep on shelves, a model starship half-painted on a desk by the window, clean laundry piled neatly on a chair. The window was open, the sounds of the city a distant thrum. “It’s a state,” Tom mumbled, shoving the laundry onto the floor.
“It’s not,” Jonah said. He put his bag down. They stood two feet apart in the center of the room. The space hummed. Jonah looked at Tom’s mouth. The air conditioner in the window groaned to life, rattling.
Tom moved first. He stepped forward, closing the gap, and pressed his lips to Jonah’s. It wasn’t tentative. It was firm, warm, a little dry. Jonah inhaled sharply through his nose, his hands coming up to cradle Tom’s face. He could feel the softness of Tom’s cheeks under his palms, the sturdy line of his jaw. The kiss opened, became wetter, deeper. Tom made a small, punched-out sound in the back of his throat, and his hands settled on Jonah’s hips, his fingers digging into the soft flesh there through the corduroy.
They broke apart, breathing hard. Jonah’s cock was already thick and insistent in his jeans. He saw the same urgent bulge straining against Tom’s chinos. “Fuck,” Jonah whispered, leaning his forehead against Tom’s.
“Yeah,” Tom agreed, his voice ragged. He leaned in and kissed Jonah again, harder, his tongue pushing into Jonah’s mouth. They stumbled backward toward the single bed, a narrow thing with a navy blue duvet. Tom fell onto it, pulling Jonah down on top of him. The weight of Jonah’s body pressed Tom into the mattress. They rocked together, denim grinding against chino, the friction a brutal, delicious agony. Jonah kissed Tom’s neck, sucking at the salt-damp skin above his collar, feeling the strong, solid column of his throat. Tom’s hands pushed up under Jonah’s shirt, roving over the hot, smooth expanse of his back, gripping the soft heft of his sides.
“Off,” Tom gasped, tugging at the corduroy. “Get these off.”
They wrestled with clothes, a frantic, graceless shedding. Jonah’s shirt caught on his elbows. Tom kicked his chinos and briefs into a tangled heap on the floor. They were naked. The afternoon light fell across their bodies. Jonah was broader, a solid, heavy shape with a dusting of dark hair across his chest that trailed down his stomach to his thick, hard cock. His belly was a soft mound, a gentle slope. Tom was paler, his skin milky, his own stomach a pronounced, lovely curve that folded slightly when he sat up. His chest was smooth, his hips wider, thighs strong and solid. Their bodies weren’t chiseled; they were real, substantial, breathing.
Jonah looked, and Tom let him. “You’re…” Jonah started, but there were no words. He just lowered himself again, their stomachs pressing together in a soft, hot slide. The full-body contact was electric. Tom wrapped his legs around Jonah’s, his heels digging into Jonah’s calves. They rocked, their cocks trapped between their bellies, sliding together in the slick pre-come that smeared between them.
“Your turn on top,” Jonah grunted, rolling them over. Now Tom straddled him, his weight a perfect, anchoring pressure on Jonah’s hips. Tom braced his hands on Jonah’s chest, his fingers sinking slightly into the flesh. He began to move, a slow, grinding roll of his hips, his cock dragging wetly against Jonah’s abdomen. His head fell back, the cords of his neck standing out. He was breathtaking. Jonah gripped Tom’s thighs, his fingers kneading the dense muscle there, feeling the softness of the inner skin.
“Touch me,” Tom pleaded, his eyes squeezed shut.
Jonah wrapped one hand around both their cocks, squeezing them together. The sensation was almost too much—the hot, velvety hardness, the slick glide. He pumped his fist, his thumb swiping over both heads with each pass. Tom moaned, a raw, unfiltered sound, and his hips began to piston faster, fucking into Jonah’s tight grip. The wet, rhythmic slap of skin filled the room, syncopated by the rattle of the air conditioner.
“I’m gonna come,” Tom choked out, his rhythm disintegrating into frantic bucks. “Jonah, fuck, I’m gonna—”
Jonah tightened his grip, speeding his hand. “Do it. Come on me.”
With a guttural cry, Tom convulsed. His cock jerked in Jonah’s fist, painting thick, hot stripes across Jonah’s stomach and chest, some landing on his own heaving belly. The sight, the feeling of it, the sheer filthy reality, severed Jonah’s last thread of control. He came a second later, his own release mixing with Tom’s, adding to the glistening mess on his skin, a few pulses catching Tom’s thigh.
Tom collapsed forward, boneless, his sweaty, sticky chest plastered to Jonah’s. They lay there, a tangled, spent, sticky mess, breathing in gulps. The smell of sex—musky, salty, sharp—rose between them, overpowering the air freshener. Tom nuzzled his face into Jonah’s neck. “Holy shit,” he whispered, his breath a warm puff.
Jonah laughed, a shaky, incredulous sound. He stroked Tom’s damp back. “Yeah.”
Later, under the lukewarm spray of Tom’s cramped shower, they washed each other off with a utilitarian bar of soap. They didn’t speak much. They didn’t need to. As Jonah dressed, his skin smelling of Tom’s cheap lemony gel, Tom pulled on a fresh t-shirt. “Your dads,” Tom said, leaning against the doorframe. “Will they know?”
“They’ll know something happened,” Jonah said, buttoning his shirt over his clean, quiet skin. “Cassian will give me this look. Like he can smell it on me. Felix will try not to ask, which is worse.” He shouldered his bag. The inks inside clinked softly.
“Tell them I said thanks,” Tom said, his mouth quirking. “I mean it.”
Jonah nodded. He walked home as the streetlights buzzed to life, his body humming with a new, profound calibration. The flat, when he keyed in, was warm. Cassian was at the stove, searing steaks, a beer beside him. Felix was setting the table. They both looked up.
“You’re late,” Cassian said, not turning around. “Everything alright?”
Jonah dropped his bag by the door. The scent of garlic and meat filled the air, covering, for now, any other scent he might have carried. He met Felix’s curious, gentle gaze. “Yeah,” he said, his voice steady. He thought of Tom’s weight, his sounds, the glorious, sticky proof. “Everything’s good. Really good.” Cassian grunted, a sound of acceptance. Felix smiled, a small, knowing thing, and turned back to the forks. Jonah took his place at the table, the newest member of their fragile, constructed, beautiful chaos.
Cassian pulled Felix against him, and they stayed there, in the heat and the steam, broken and salvaged, the empty, beautiful flat waiting for them just beyond the door. They scrubbed the tiles clean as dawn bled grey light through the frosted window, their movements slow and tender with a shared, unspoken remorse for the beauty they had marred. The housewarming had been a baptism of bile and vodka, a fitting start for a home built on the foundation of a drunk’s collapse and a grandfather’s mercy. They slept on the blanket for a week before a donated bed arrived, their bodies learning the new geography of each other in the vast, echoing space.
Four years later, the echoes were gone, replaced by the comfortable clutter of a life fully lived. Books spilled from shelves Cassian had built. Felix’s architectural prints were tacked to the walls. A worn corduroy sofa held the deep impressions of their bodies. The smell was now of garlic frying, of Cassian’s welding leather, of the floral detergent Sam insisted on buying. One bedroom door was decorated with a fading Hubble telescope poster and a sticker that read ‘PLEASE KNOCK (REALLY)’.
Inside that room, Jonah Maxwell-Carter, at eighteen, stared at his reflection. He’d filled out since they’d brought him home at fourteen, a scrawny, silent kid from a group home. Softness had settled over his frame, a comfortable weight that rounded his face and made his sweaters stretch snug across his chest and belly. He ran a hand through his dark, unruly curls, his brown eyes critical. He had his dad Felix’s smile, people said, but right now he was frowning. His phone buzzed on the dresser. A message from Ben, his unofficial uncle: ‘Ask him already! My offer to fake a family emergency still stands.’ Jonah snorted, but his stomach fluttered.
He wasn’t scrawny anymore, but he wasn’t Tom either. Tom Mulligan had a different kind of build. In their art class, Jonah had spent more time studying Tom’s profile than the still-life. Tom’s face was wonderfully round, with cheeks that pushed his eyes into warm crinkles when he smiled. His body was solid, broad-shouldered and soft in equal measure, with thick, strong arms that strained the seams of his t-shirts and a stomach that rounded gently against his desk. He moved with a quiet, deliberate grace, his hands surprisingly delicate when sketching. Yesterday, Jonah had seen him lingering by the bulletin board outside the GSA meeting. It wasn’t proof, but it was a signal flare in the fog of high school.
Downstairs, the front door opened and closed. “I’m home!” Felix’s voice called, followed by the thud of his bag. “And I brought pad thai from the place with the scary basil!”
Cassian grunted from the kitchen, where he was searing steaks. “You’re sabotaging my menu, disaster.”
“My menu now. Your meatloaf is dead to me.” Felix appeared in the kitchen doorway, dropping a kiss on Cassian’s stubbled cheek before spotting Jonah on the stairs. “Hey, bug. You look…constipated.”
“Thanks,” Jonah deadpanned, shuffling into the kitchen. He was built like a younger version of Cassian—solid, with a broad chest and strong legs—but softer around the middle, a gentle curve under his favorite faded hoodie.
“It’s a face. I know my faces.” Felix peered at him. “School stuff? Or is it the Tom thing?”
Jonah shot him a look. Cassian turned from the stove, his sharp blue eyes missing nothing. “The Tom thing?”
“It’s not a ‘thing’,” Jonah mumbled, grabbing a can of soda from the fridge. The cold felt good in his nervous hands. “He’s just… a guy. In my art class.”
“The one who draws those creepy, beautiful moths?” Felix asked, spooning pad thai onto plates. “The one you’ve talked about for three months? That ‘just a guy’?”
Cassian plated the steaks, a small smile playing on his lips. “Just ask him if he wants to get a burger or something. Worst he can say is no. Then you get a burger. It’s a win-win.”
“Your dad’s romantic advice is how I ended up with food poisoning on our first date,” Felix stage-whispered.
“It was food poisoning, not my cooking,” Cassian corrected, bumping Felix with his hip. “And you still came back.”
Jonah watched them, this easy, loving dance that had become the bedrock of his life. Their certainty was a language he was still learning. He took a deep breath. “I saw him by the GSA board yesterday. I’m gonna ask him tomorrow. If he says no, I’m dropping out and becoming a hermit.”
“Excellent plan,” Cassian nodded seriously. “I’ll weld you a cave.”
The next day, Jonah’s heart was a trapped bird in his ribs all through calculus and history. He saw Tom at his locker after fourth period, a solid, comforting presence in a sea of chaos. Tom was wrestling a thick fantasy novel into an overstuffed backpack, his broad back straining the fabric of a dark green hoodie. His jeans hugged his powerful thighs and rounded rear, fading from wear.
Now or never. Jonah’s mouth went dry. He adjusted his own backpack, feeling the soft swell of his stomach press against his t-shirt. He walked over, the cacophony of slamming lockers and shouting students fading into a muffled roar.
“Hey,” Jonah said, his voice cracking slightly. He cleared his throat. “Tom. Hey.”
Tom turned, and his face—that wonderfully round, kind face—brightened with a smile that reached his eyes. “Jonah. What’s up?” He had a small, faded gap between his front teeth.
“Your backpack’s going to rip,” Jonah blurted out, then wanted to vanish.
Tom looked down and laughed, a warm, rolling sound. “Probably. I’m trying to finish this before the library fines bankrupt me.” He hefted the pack. “It’s about a dragon who’s also a librarian.”
“Sounds cool.” Jonah’s mind blanked. The script he’d rehearsed vanished. He just looked at Tom, at the soft curve of his cheek, at the way his dark hair fell over his forehead. “I was wondering… I mean, if you’re not busy… do you maybe want to hang out after school sometime? Not like, as a… just, you know. Get a coffee or something. Or not coffee. Whatever.”
The words hung there, clumsy and bare. Tom’s smile softened, became something more thoughtful. He shifted his weight, and Jonah noticed the way his own body did the same, a subconscious mirroring. They were two planets of similar mass, creating their own quiet gravity in the noisy hallway.
“I’d like that,” Tom said, his voice quieter. He met Jonah’s eyes directly, and there was no mistaking the friendly interest there. “I’m free today, actually. My last period is a study hall.”
“Yeah?” A spark ignited in Jonah’s chest. “Yeah, me too. I mean, I have study hall too. We could… go now? There’s that place with the weird board games. The Nook?”
Tom’s whole face seemed to light up from within. “I love that place. They have that terrible Star Wars monopoly.” He slammed his locker shut. “Let’s go.”
They walked out of the school together, side by side. Their shoulders didn’t quite touch, but the space between them buzzed with a new, fragile energy. Jonah glanced over, taking in the comfortable slope of Tom’s nose, the way his lower lip looked permanently slightly pouted. He wondered, with a thrilling spike of nerves, what it would be like to hold Tom’s hand, to feel those strong, gentle fingers laced with his own.
“So,” Tom said as they pushed through the heavy school doors into the afternoon light. “A dragon librarian. He’s got a crisis because someone checked out an ancient grimoire and didn’t return it.”