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Will comes back from California in a blizzard.
For a second Chuckie thinks he's hallucinating, some kinda snow blindness bullshit, because Will’s been gone for six months and Chuckie’s long past expectin’ him to be around every corner. But there's only so many orange cars with gray doors in the world, and the skinny guy comin’ out of the car in a jacket that's way too fuckin’ thin for a Boston winter, there's only so many of him. Chuckie's at the door before Will makes it up the front steps.
“You dumbass motherfucker,” he says as Will stomps through the snowdrifts Chuckie hasn't shoveled yet. He's wearing the same work boots he used to wear to demo buildings with Chuckie. Chuckie knows for a fact they had holes in ‘em before Will left for California. He doesn't imagine they're in much better shape now. “You fall off the face of the fuckin’ planet and come home in this shit? What's wrong with you?”
Will's standing in front of him, arms wrapped around his middle against the cold and smile threatening to split his face open. “Fuck you,” he says. Chuckie grabs him by the back of the neck and pulls, hard.
Will actually makes a sound when he falls into Chuckie's chest, kind of an “oof,” but his arms go around him quick enough. After a few seconds Will says, “Chuck?” and kinda laughs, all hesitant and shit, and Chuckie steps back.
“Come inside before your dick falls off,” he says. “And leave those fuckin’ boots on the mat, my ma'll kill me if you track shit on her clean floors.” Chuckie's ma lives ten blocks away with her boyfriend. Chuckie's the only one mopping the floors these days.
Will trails behind Chuckie into the kitchen, where Chuckie's already making coffee. He's pretty sure he could make a pot of coffee in his sleep. He’s pretty sure he did make it in his sleep, every morning for him and his ma when he was high school. It's the kind of thing you can do even when your hands are shaking. It's the cold, he figures. Cold as fuck out on that porch.
He presses the button and turns back around, leaning on the counter with his hands braced on either side of him. “So what the fuck?” he asks, and for once in his life he shuts the fuck up.
Will sits in one of Chuckie's ma's chairs and makes eye contact with nothing in particular except it ain't Chuckie. “What the fuck you,” he says. “This that famous Sullivan hospitality I drove three thousand miles for?”
“Fuckin’ hospitality, I’ll give you some fuckin’ hospitality,” Chuckie says. “What are you doin’ here, man?”
Will looks down, looks at Chuckie’s ma’s clean floor, then looks straight up and into Chuckie’s eyes. Chuckie feels it in his gut.
When Will moved to California, Chuckie figured out some shit about himself pretty quick. Mostly he figured out that you don't build a car for someone you're not in love with. He doesn't know how Billy and Morgan didn't figure it out. Or maybe they thought the Nova was just part of how weird he and Will were about each other, which, jesus, how weird were they that the Nova seemed normal? Either way, it took Will leaving to knock some sense into Chuckie's thick Irish skull.
Working on his uncle's demo crew put him outside of anywhere he knew people. He didn't know the guys on the crew, didn't know anyone in fuckin’ Charlestown — it was good. Gave him time and space to think. It was maybe a month after Will left when this skinny kid joined the crew and showed up in Chuckie's face, Chuckie's uncle Mike telling him to show him the ropes. He looked at the kid, blonde and smaller than him but tough-looking, and felt something he’d only ever felt when he looked at Will. Or at least, that’s when he felt it most often. He was beginning to realize that a lot of things he'd ignored his whole life had maybe meant more than he thought they did. And Chuckie figured — fuck, maybe it wasn't just Will. Maybe he should try this thing for real.
Chuckie wasn't looking to get his teeth kicked in, so he didn't do anything at first. He just watched. Mostly he watched himself. He realized he liked how Christian's arms looked when he was working. He caught himself trying to make him laugh, and not the way Chuckie was always tryna make everyone laugh but the way he tried to make a girl laugh when he was anglin’ to get laid. He noted all this but he didn't do a damn thing, so he was honestly surprised when Chris looked at him after work one day over the top of an open beer and, after commenting that it'd taste better with some French fries, said, “So you comin’?”
Chuckie just stared for a second, caught off guard, and Chris said, “There's a bar around the corner from here. Best fries in town. Come on, I'll get you a plate.” But he looked at him for longer than he had to after, and suddenly Chuckie realized exactly what was happening, clear as if there was a five foot neon sign.
It was early still — demo started at 7 and ended at 3, the early bird hours of construction that were the main reason Chuckie ever considered finding something else to do with his life — but Farrell's was comfortingly dark. Chris stopped at the bar and greeted the bartender by name and with a kiss on the cheek, put in two orders of fries, extra ketchup, and led Chuckie to a booth in the back. Once they were seated, a beer in front of each of them, Chuckie looked up to see Chris already looking back. He was kinda staring up through his eyelashes. Holy shit.
And — fuck it. Chuckie smiled the most charming smile he could dig up and said, voice low, “So what are we doin’ here, huh? You tryna get me extra lubricated or somethin’?” He saw Chris’s eyes widen slightly, and only then did Chuckie realize the double meaning of what he’d just said. He tipped his head back against the booth and sighed, laughing at himself. “Fuck.”
Chris was laughing too, but it subsided after a moment. “Nah, Chuck,” he said. “Just makin’ sure we're on the same page.” He slid his foot up next to Chuckie's under the table and pressed in; Chuckie pressed back instinctively.
“Yeah,” he managed. “We're, uh — yeah.”
Afterwards, Chris took Chuckie back to his place, which was maybe two minutes from Farrell's. Chuckie kinda expected Chris to jump him as soon as they got through the door, but instead Chris locked it behind them, leaned up against it, and started taking off his shoes. Then he took off his shirt, and fuck, Chuckie was all the way dialed in. He - this was definitely - fuck.
He clocked back into reality when he realized Chris was laughing at him. “Chuck,” he said, grinning and dropping his shirt into what looked like a hamper in the hall closet. “We’re both fuckin’ gross. I’m gonna get in the shower real quick. Why don’t you leave your boots on the mat and join me in a coupla’ minutes?” Chuckie watched, wide-eyed, as he flicked open the top button on his jeans, then walked past Chuckie and into the bathroom, grinning
The water started running and once Chuckie got his shoes off, he realized he had a couple minutes to kill. So he snooped. Chris’s apartment was small but neat, and it was clear he’d done some upgrades - there was some shelving in the kitchen that Chuckie’d fall over dead if it came with the place, and the windows looked better than he’d have expected. He was honestly kinda impressed - that shit wasn’t easy. He was just about to start messin’ with them, really get a look at what was goin’ on, when he heard, “Sullivan! I’m agin’ in here, come on!” and, well. Chris wet and naked was a lot more interesting than his kitchen windows, when you got right down to it.
The sex was good. Chuckie was obscurely relieved that angels didn't come outta the ceiling singing hallelujah when he nutted, that Chris touching his dick didn't make a light bulb go on over his head. It wasn't so different from the sex he'd had with women, at least once he figured out what to do with Chris's dick. It was sex with someone he was attracted to. It wasn't exactly rocket science. But - okay. He'd done it. It was something he could do now.
He was lying in Chris's bed afterwards, smoking out the window, when it occurred to him to ask. “Hey,” he said. Chris raised his eyebrows, exhaled smoke. “How'd you know?” Chuckie asked. “About me, I mean.”
Chris's eyebrows, if possible, rose even higher. “Chuck,” he said gently, “you been starin’ at me since the day I started. Didn't take a fuckin’ Harvard education to put that one together.”
“Was I?” Chuckie said. “Huh.”
Chris, startled mid-exhale, started coughing. “You tellin’ me you didn't mean to?” he asked.
Chuckie shifted uncomfortably. “Not exactly,” he said. “I never, uh - this is kinda a new thing for me.”
“Jesus,” Chris managed. “Okay, Chuck, you gotta be careful. You - fuck. You really didn't mean to?” He sounded genuinely worried, which was the main reason Chuckie didn't pop him.
Instead, he thought about it a second. “I dunno,” he finally said. “Maybe I did mean it. Worked out anyway.” He quirked an eyebrow and stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray on the sill. Then he rolled over, boxing Chris in with his body. “So you gonna give me another shot?” he asked, grinning, and the rest of the summer pretty much went like that.
But now he's standing in his ma's kitchen with Will Hunting looking at him like he can see the bottom of his soul or somethin’, and the fact that Chuckie now knows his way around someone else's dick means less than nothin’ right now because it ain't sex he wants with Will. Or - he does, he absolutely does, he's jerked himself raw with how much he does, but he's also fantasized about waking up next to him. Cooking him breakfast. Watching the fuckin’ game with his arm tight around Will's shoulders, Will's head on his chest. What Chuckie wants with Will is so much bigger than sex, and it's the scariest shit he's ever felt.
Will licks his lips and says, “I - shit, Chuckie.” He laughs and drops his head, running a hand through his hair. “I practiced this in the car, fuck.” He looks up then, stands, crosses the room until he's right in front of Chuckie. With Chuckie leaning against the sink and Will standing his full height, they're almost eye to eye, and Chuckie's barely breathing.
Will takes another step forward, bringing him past any kind of plausible deniability. “What about it, Chuck?” he says softly. “You gonna let me?”
And that is it, that is absolutely it, Chuckie grabs him by the back of the neck and yanks again, but this time he doesn't pull Will into his chest. He tilts Will's head and bends his own and fuck, fuck, they're kissing and there's the choir of angels singing hallelujah. It wasn't guys they were waiting on. It was Will.
They pull apart eventually, but Chuckie’s still got his hands on Will. He traces his cheekbone with a thumb, other hand tight on the small of his back, and says, grinning, “That what you practiced in the car?”
“Not exactly,” Will says, “I kinda thought I'd be a little smoother.”
“Oh yeah,” Chuckie snorts, “real fuckin’ smooth. Fuckin’ Harvard-ass brain can't find your own dick with two hands and a flashlight smooth, shit - ” But they’re both laughing too hard for him to continue, and he tips his forehead into Will's as they subside.
After a minute, Will leans in again, bringing his mouth to Chuckie’s all on his own this time. It builds from there, kisses getting dirtier and dirtier. “Fuck, Will,” Chuckie manages as Will shoves a hand down the back of his pants, mouth exploring Chuckie's throat. “You know what you're doin’ here?”
Will nips at the hinge of Chuckie's jaw and squeezes his ass. “I'm a fast learner,” he mutters, and holy christ, for the first time maybe in his whole fuckin’ life Chuckie knows more about something than Will.
“Well far be it from me to question your, uh, your classroom ability there,” Chuckie manages as Will's mouth works its way back down his neck, “but I got some actual hands on practical education in this area,” and that brings Will up short.
He looks up and his eyes are burning. “Fuck you talkin’ about?” he asks. The hand on Chuckie's ass has moved north, nails scraping along his bare back under his t-shirt.
“Nothin’,” Chuckie says, “just, maybe after you left I got curious.”
“Oh, you got curious?” Will says, grinning. “What are you, 15? You at a slumber party lettin’ Kathleen Hanrahan paint your nails and stickin’ your other hand up Mary O'Sullivan's pajamas?”
Chuckie's laughing. “Fuck off,” he says. “No, I just…” He trails off, remembering that first time with Chris, and says, “I needed to figure out if it was guys, or just you.”
Will nods. “And?”
Chuckie shrugs. “Turns out if it ain't you, it don't make a difference who's suckin’ my dick.”
Will's eyebrows fly up and he throws his hands in the air, laughing. “Fuck you,” he says, “who said anything about suckin’ your dick? Motherfucker, I should - ” but Chuckie’s already pulling him back in.
“C'mon baby, I didn't mean it, you know I don't just want you for your body,” Chuckie says, laughing into Will's neck, the same line of shit he's fed a million girls, “but hey, if I read this wrong I can always call Chris - ”
“ - oh, his name is Chris? Good, it's good to know the name of the guy whose teeth I'm gonna knock in.”
Chuckie drops his hand to Will's ass, pulls him closer. “Don't be jealous, baby,” he says, rolling his hips forward. He purposely holds back his gasp when his cock connects with Will's; Will does not. Voice at its smarmiest, Chuckie whispers into Will's ear, “He doesn't make me feel like you do.”
So that's their first time. Up against a counter in Chuckie's ma's kitchen, pants only down far enough to get their dicks out and come on each other's chests. Easiest thing in the world.
“How'd you know?” Chuckie asks when they finally make it to bed. He's got the window cracked to exhale the smoke from his cigarette and Will's got the quilt up around his eyeballs, cursin’ Chuckie for lettin’ the cold in. Will's always cold. “About me,” Chuckie clarifies. “I didn't even know about me until you left.”
“How'd I know?” Will repeats, dumbfounded. “Motherfucker, you built me a car!”
Chuckie snorts. “Yeah, that kinda tipped me off too.”
“No fuckin’ shit, Jesus,” Will said. “And then in California … you know, Skylar's a great girl but we ain't… we didn't have stayin’ power,” he says finally. “She got me outta my rut, but that ain’t a relationship.”
Chuckie snorts. “Out of your rut, shit,” he says. “Here you fuckin’ are.”
Will doesn’t say anything back, and when Chuckie looks up he’s starin’ right at him. “Yeah,” he says then. “Here I fuckin’ am.” Then he shifts, one skinny arm emerging from beneath the comforter. “Gimme a drag, will ya?”
Chuckie passes over the cigarette, then says, “You didn't finish your story.”
“Oh yeah,” Will says. “How did I know you were queer for me other than you buildin’ me a fuckin’ car. I dunno, it's California. You meet people. I kinda - ” He stops and actually seems to be thinking about it. “There's this way you look at me,” he finally says.
“A way I look at you,” Chuckie repeats, flat. Where has he heard this before. He takes back his cigarette.
“Yeah, asshole, a way you look at me.” Will's got half a smile on his face. “Like you basically wanna do what we been doin’ for the past couple hours, but I never caught on to it because you're a guy. Then you fuckin’ built me a car, and I met some gay guys, and it all kinda clicked.”
Chuckie stubs out his cigarette in the mug on the sill. “But you didn't fuck ‘em,” he says, rolling over on top of Will. He balances himself on his forearms, one either side of Will's head.
Will’s arms come up and around him. “Nah,” he says. “Had to see about a girl.” And while Chuckie is squawking in indignation, Will flips them over, and then he presses his thigh up and in.
So that's their third and fourth times. Naked in Chuckie's bed, clothes lost somewhere between the first and second time, Will's mouth eager on Chuckie's dick and Chuckie's hands anywhere he can reach. Sex with Will is so fuckin’ easy.
“You got a job, Einstein?” Chuckie asks the next morning. It's Sunday, so he made scrambled eggs and coffee and they're eating at Chuckie's ma's table. Normal except Will's legs are draped across Chuckie's lap and Chuck is eatin’ one-handed because his other hand is up the leg of Will's sweatpants. Normal.
“Nah,” Will says. “I'm gonna call Lambeau, but Chuck, they paid me so much fuckin’ money at that think tank in California. I got savings now.”
“Oh, you got savings, you think that means you eat bonbons and watch the fuckin’ soaps while I put in a hard day's work, that right?” Chuckie asks, fingers exploring the back of Will's calf.
“Uh, yeah, that's about the half of it,” Will says, laughing. Chuckie pinches him; Will kicks him; their fifth time is on the kitchen floor, Will held tight to Chuckie's chest while Chuckie fucks between his thighs and jerks him off. Takes a little more thought, a little more coordination, but still. Easier than anything else Chuckie's ever done.
They fall into a routine the same way they fell into bed. Chuckie goes to work. Will deals with the house stuff. He's a shit cook, which Chuckie actually isn't, but demo in the winter is dog work, so any hot food Chuckie didn't have to make is fine by him. Sometimes they go to the bar after, and if Billy and Morgan notice that neither of them is chasing girls or that Chuckie’s arm more or less lives on the back of Will's chair now, no one says anything. They fuck basically every day. It's great.
So obviously all it takes is a couple weeks for Will to freak the fuck out.
It starts because of Chris, which Chuckie honestly did not expect but what the fuck. He shows up at L Street one night totally out of the blue with some guys from the neighborhood. Cousins, Chuckie thinks; he's pretty sure he remembers Chris sayin’ he had cousins in Southie. Anyway he shows up, and they say hello like two totally normal guys whose dicks and asses aren't acquainted, and Will shakes Chris’s hand and Chuckie, taking a risk, puts his hand low on Will's back in a way he thinks Chris is gonna clock. He does, Chuck sees him do it, and when Chris gives him the eyebrows Chuckie nods back. That's it, that's the whole thing except for a five minute conversation at the bar where Chris clinks his pint glass into Chuckie’s and says, “Cheers to your boy,” jerking his head at the table where Will's sitting with Billy and Morgan, “you look happy,” but Will's moody all night, drinking harder than usual and snapping at Morgan more than even Morgan deserves. He leaves early, and when he does Billy looks at Chuck and says, “What crawled up his ass and died?” Chuckie shrugs and says, “Dunno,” and Morgan says, “Bet you'll hear about it when you get home,” and there's a round of ball-and-chain jokes that make Chuckie wanna crawl out of his own skin because what the fuck would the jokes be if the guys knew the truth.
So he gets home and Will's watching the Bruins on mute, back straight like he’s sittin’ on a broomstick, and Chuckie sits next to him like he always does and Will says, “What.”
Chuckie groans inwardly and says, zero energy to have this fight he doesn’t even know what it’s about, “Fuck you what.”
“Surprised to see you is all,” Will says, and cool, great, this is the fight they're gonna have.
Chuckie turns to look at Will, whose eyes haven't left the game. Chuckie's pretty sure Will couldn't tell him the score for love or money. “What'd you think, I was gonna drag Chris away from his cousins and bend him over the bar?” Chuckie asks. “Go back to fuckin’ Charlestown to get my dick wet?”
Will shrugs. “I dunno what you're gonna fuckin’ do,” he says. “He's hot though. Bet he don't got burn scars anywhere.” He turns to look at Chuckie. “Bet he lets you fuck him.”
Because - okay, maybe in the middle of how fuckin’ easy it is to have sex with Will there's sometimes these little - hiccups. Like maybe Will's slow to take his shirt off, even though Chuckie's seen him without it a thousand times but somethin’ about bein’ in bed together fucks with Will's head. Or maybe one time Chuckie pressed his fingers up behind Will's balls while he was giving him a blow job and Will froze hard, just about the least sexy thing Chuckie's ever seen, and Chuckie pulled his hand away, slow, not trying to spook nobody, and finished the bj with his hands safe on top of Will's thighs. They haven't talked about it, but Chuckie figures they don't gotta. It's fine. Maybe pitching comes more natural to him but he and Chris did a lot of shit, and bottom line is Chuckie's just fine bein’ the catcher. And they ain't even played that much baseball yet, him and Will. So what the fuck.
“Yeah, he let me fuck him,” Chuckie says. He’s fuckin’ exhausted already and it hasn’t even been five minutes. “I spent basically all of August with my dick in his ass and that first time kissing you felt better than hittin’ it raw with Chris. The fuck is the matter with you?”
And Will just kind of collapses, sinking back into the couch cushions but looking like slightly less of a huge fuckin’ weirdo. He grabs the remote and unmutes the game, all without lookin’ at Chuckie. Chuckie takes the opportunity to slide in next to him, tucking himself against Will’s side and slipping an arm around his shoulders. Not like he woulda used to do to pull him close. Like he does now that he and Will are doing this thing. He slides a hand into the soft hair at the base of Will’s skull, scratches gently. “Baby,” he says softly. Nothing funny about it.
Will doesn't say anything but he leans back into Chuckie's hand, and once the Bs have well and truly blown any shot they had at a win he sucks Chuckie’s dick with three fingers up his ass, so Chuckie figures they're good.
Two days later they're on the couch, ice packs Will pulled together from God knows where wrapped around Chuckie’s shoulder in all directions, and Will is busy cursing God, Chuckie, Chuckie’s uncle Mike, whatever dumb asshole was doing demo on the floor above Chuckie, and then Chuckie again for what happened to his shoulder. It always comes back to Chuckie.
“Will,” Chuckie tries, then a little louder, “Will!” Will cuts himself off mid-sentence and looks over at Chuckie, who says, “You done the job yourself. You know how it goes. Shit happens. Ain't no one's fault.” He shifts on the couch, wincing. “You never used to get pissed off like this when I got hurt on the job.”
“Well you didn't used to be my - ” Will stops short. They can't find a word for what they are to each other that they like. All the options piss ‘em off one way or another. “Anyway you didn't used to be and now you are, so excuse me for gettin’ bent outta shape when you're gettin’ fuckin’ showered in debris from the skies.”
Chuckie can’t help himself. “Showered in debris from the skies?” he says incredulously. “That’s one hell of a poetic-ass way to say a fuckin’ cinderblock fell on me.”
“Go to hell,” Will grumbles. “I read poetry. You’re a fuckin’ idiot.” He leans in, kisses Chuckie hard and dirty.
Chuckie’s on his ass for a couple days while his shoulder heals up, and Will's in and out the whole time. He got back in touch with the professor at some point, and Lambeau got Will in at some MIT research institute. “It's fuckin’ irritatin’,” Will grouses one night. “I can long divide better than most of these motherfuckers, but I can't get my foot in the door fuckin’ anywhere without goddamn Lambeau.” He takes a sip of his beer, lets the bottle dangle from his fingers. “And so many a’ those people are assholes,” he continues. “Not all of ‘em, but a lot of ‘em. And the ones who aren't assholes are fuckin’ boring, I swear, the second I try to talk about anything other than the shit we're doing it gets so fuckin’ boring I wanna slit my fuckin’ throat.”
Chuckie's got Will between his legs, back against Chuckie's chest and head on his shoulder. His fingers are playing up and down Will’s chest. It's great. “Don't slit your fuckin’ throat,” he says. “I got plans for it.” Will reaches behind him and smacks Chuckie in the head without looking; Chuckie ducks away laughing. He slips an arm across Will’s chest, pulls him in tight briefly. “You like it, though?” he asks more seriously. “The shit they want you to do?”
Will doesn’t say anything for a sec, then abruptly turns and sets his mouth on Chuckie’s jaw, kissing and sucking gently. “I like you,” he says, straddling Chuckie. And hell, that’s great too.
And it ain’t like Chuckie doesn’t love it, having Will in his arms ready to go seems like every fifteen fuckin’ minutes. It ain’t like he’s in any position to say no when Will starts in on him, mouth and hands everywhere, cock hard just from touchin’ Chuckie. He loves it. He’s never had so much sex in his fuckin’ life and it just keeping getting better, always so goddamn easy. But when he’s laying there with Will afterwards, he’s conscious of the fact that Will never answers his questions.
See, Will’s a genius and everyone knows it, but he’s terrible with people. He’s either quiet, or he’s tearin’ someone a new asshole, or he’s tryna punch someone’s lights out. It’s down to Chuckie that they don’t get in more fights than they do, because Chuckie - he doesn’t understand basically anything Will reads or most of what he talks about, when you can manage to get him going, but he does understand people. He pays attention, listens, can make conversation with just about anybody. He never fakes it anymore - he learned that the hard way at the bar where they met Skylar. And because he’s good with people, he notices shit. Like the fact that Will doesn’t talk about work with him. He talks about his coworkers, his commute, whatever, but he won’t talk about what he’s doing. He will never, ever say that he likes it.
So Chuckie doesn’t know what Will does all day or how he really feels about it, because Will won’t tell him. Instead he sucks Chuckie’s brain out through his dick, finger-fucking him all the way through it. Instead he fucks him so hard he’s gotta hold onto the headboard or risk slammin’ into it. Instead he eats Chuckie out until Chuckie can’t remember anything he wanted to know in the first place. There are lots of other ways they fuck, lots of ways Chuckie makes Will come unraveled, but askin’ Will about work is a one-way ticket to Chuckie on his back gettin’ worked over one way or the other.
And it rips Chuckie up, just a little. When he told Will that he was sittin’ on a winning lottery ticket that time - when he said the thing designed to chase him outta town, which succeeded, fuckin’ hell, ten points to Chuckie - he didn’t mean fuck you. He didn’t mean you fuckin’ freak, you weirdo. He didn’t mean that the thing that makes Will special is bad. He just meant - you’re the best of us, make somethin’ of yourself and bring it home to me. Bring it home to me because I can’t.
Anyway Chuckie’s never been laid this much and it’s incredible but also he wouldn’t fuckin’ mind knowing what the long division problems are actually called, is all he’s sayin’ here.
His shoulder gets better and he goes back to work, but right away shit’s fucked. Mostly he’s done demo of old office parks and parking garages - the Big Dig is an unholy pain in the ass but at least there’s no shortage of jobs for assholes like him - but today it’s a church in Roxbury. And Chuckie gets it when he sees it. The place is in sad shape, water stains all the way down two walls and half the stained glass missing. Still, demo'ing it feels like shit. Chuckie ain’t religious, has barely been to church since his First Communion and even if he wanted to go he’s pretty sure the amount of time he spends in close quarters with Will’s dick means he’d get hit by lightning on the front steps if he tried, but he’s always liked churches. They’re pretty, and quiet, and they usually smell pretty good. He just - he likes ‘em. He doesn’t like tearin’ one down.
He tells Will about it that night, both of ‘em slouched down low with the Celtics on mute. They’re so fuckin’ bad Chuckie’s not even sure why the game’s on, but Will says he missed “decent sports” when he was in California. If the Celtics qualify as decent Chuckie doesn’t even want to know what his options were out there. Anyway Will picks his head up and kinda turns around, eyebrows raised. “I didn’t know you felt that way,” he says. “About churches. Hell, I never seen you in a church in your life.”
Chuckie shrugs, suddenly self-conscious. “I dunno,” he says. “They’re just - nice.” Will nods, but he doesn’t say anything, and he stays where he is, half twisted around in Chuckie’s arms. He’s waitin’ Chuckie out. He always could.
Finally Chuckie can’t take it anymore and he says, “You know before I met you we lived with my aunts.” Chuckie and his ma, after his dad split, they lived with his aunts Maureen and Lori and the nine kids they had between ‘em. Maureen had a decent job as a secretary at the Globe, so she rented a whole falling-apart house, and the thing was fuckin’ bursting with Dohertys. Chuckie and Colleen Sullivan shared a bedroom with Maureen and her youngest kid until Colleen got a job at the T and got them out of there. It was a tough year. “It was just … really loud,” Chuckie tells Will now. He’s stopping and starting. This is so fuckin’ embarrassing. “With my aunts. Church was quiet.”
Will nods. He leans in, kisses Chuckie slow and sweet. Then he turns back around, pulling Chuckie’s arm more securely around him. That seems to be that.
When Chuckie gets home from work a few days later there’s a brochure on the kitchen table where he usually has his after-work coffee. He picks it up, unfolds it, then hollers, “Will!” But he’s greeted by silence. Still at work. Fuckin’ fantastic.
It’s a brochure for a program in preservation construction at some trade school downtown. If Will was home Chuckie could fight with him about it, but he’s not, so Chuckie’s gotta be alone with his fuckin’ thoughts. And - he knows he’d never get in, right, this is all totally theoretical, and it’s way more than they could afford, but when he thinks about it - when he thinks about goin’ somewhere like that church in Roxbury and makin’ it beautiful again - well. It’s a good feeling, that’s all.
Will gets home that night and they don’t talk about it. But Chuckie sees him see that the pamphlet’s been moved, and not into the trash.
They like L Street because there’s no fuckin’ bullshit there. They know everyone, no one’s there to start trouble, and all the bartenders have a firm hand if anyone shows up who is. But Morgan’s been naggin’ them for days that he wants to go to some bar up in Somerville because some girl’s best friend’s cousin works there and her cousin’s best friend swears up and down that she’s hot for Morgan, and he’s so fuckin’ bad with women that it’s worth gettin’ in the fuckin’ car for a real shot with one. So they’re at the bar in Somerville and Morg is makin’ eyes hard at the waitress, who god for-fuckin’-bid seems to be makin’ eyes right back, and they’re halfway through their second pitcher when the guy at the next table over says something that ends in “but it don’t matter, they’re just a pair of faggots anyway,” and before Chuckie can see it coming Will’s on his feet and his chair’s on the floor and he’s standing over the guy sayin’, “Fuckin’ say that again.”
Several things flash through Chuckie’s mind in the half second before he’s gotta be at Will’s shoulder, but the biggest one is total and complete confusion. Will’s actin’ like he’s never heard someone say fag before, like it ain’t a word he’s thrown around like it’s nothin’ his whole life (though not, Chuckie notes, since they started their whole thing). And even if maybe he’s got a point, maybe it’s a shitty word that gets under Chuckie’s skin in ways it didn’t before he got real familiar with the sensation of a dick up his ass, startin’ fights with total strangers in bars in Somerville over their goddamn vocabulary is reckless even for Will, whose picture is in the dictionary next to the word. So Chuckie looks at Billy, who understands the concept of picking your battles better than any of ‘em, and Billy steps in between Will and the fuckin’ mountain of a guy whose face he got in and says, “Listen, we don’t want no trouble,” while Chuckie gets behind Will and gets his hands on him and tries to pull him away before this gets any worse for them.
“Your fuckin’ friend here seems to disagree,” says Man Mountain, and Billy’s fully blockin’ Will with his body while Chuckie rips out every trick in the book, mouth at Will’s ear, “Will, we don’t fuckin’ know nobody here, we gotta go,” and when Will doesn’t settle he gets closer, doesn’t care what it looks like because he cannot have Will getting arrested again and whispers, “Baby you gotta let it ride, please, he ain’t worth it,” and baby works the way it always does even if Will is practically spittin’ nails, and somehow they get outta there with their skin but only just, Morgan frantically scribbling his number on a napkin and throwing Chuckie’s money on the table and runnin’ out the door five seconds behind the rest of ‘em.
They all pile into Chuckie’s car, and he’s good to drive but he notices that his hands are shaking on the wheel. He feels weak and sparky, flooded with adrenaline, and not in the good way. In the “jesus christ who’s driving that 18 wheeler” way. But Morgan’s too stupid to notice how fuckin’ tense everything is, and anyway he didn’t hear what the guy said that got Will about two seconds from having his ass turned inside out, and as Chuckie pulls away he says, “Will, what the fuck was that?! I was doing good for once! She was into me!”
Will doesn’t say anything, he’s practically vibrating with tension, and Billy just says in a tone that allows no disagreement, “Morgan, shut the fuck up,” so he does, muttering to himself the whole way home but not actually sayin’ anything any of ‘em can hear. Will slams on the radio after a minute or two, cranking the volume, and it’s playing Pearl Jam, and Chuckie’ll take it. They drop Morgan at L Street and Billy gets out with him, saying, “I’ll make sure he stays outta trouble,” and Chuckie just nods and gives him a half hug through the open window and takes Will home.
Chuckie doesn’t know what to expect when they get through the front door but it’s not Will shovin’ him into the wall and kissing him like he’ll die if he can’t. It’s not Will grabbing his hips, pulling him forward, gettin’ his hands on Chuckie’s cock by any means necessary. “Jesus, Chuck, get the fuck upstairs,” he says between kisses, “I gotta fuck you,” and Chuckie is starting to get the picture of what’s goin’ on here. But he gets the fuck upstairs. Will manhandles them both outta their clothes, leaves Chuckie to handle his own dick while Will lubes up and starts prepping his ass. It doesn’t take much, they’re having so fuckin’ much sex all the time, and anyway there’s not so much an edge to what they’re doing right now as what they’re doing is all edge, so it doesn’t really make a difference that Chuckie’s not as ready as he could be when Will slams home. They’re face to face, Chuckie’s got his legs over Will's shoulders with Will up on his knees, and Chuckie fuckin’ loves it this way cuz Will can hit his prostate easy as breathing seems like, and he doesn’t know what kinds of noises he’s makin’. Will is just panting, harsh and fierce, harsher with every stroke. Chuckie comes fast, feels Will follow him over a few seconds later. For a second they just stay there breathing before Will pulls out and collapses on the bed next to Chuckie, face down and head turned away.
Chuckie rolls over, slides in next to Will. Lays an arm across his back and slips a hand into his hair, kinda petting his scalp how he knows he loves. “Baby,” he says after a second. Always ‘baby’ when he wants to soften Will up for something. It means too much to him to use it the way he used to with girls, a replacement for their name. With Will it’s only ever ‘I love you.’ “Not that I object to, uh, your approach there, but what the fuck?”
Will doesn’t say anything for a minute, then says, “I talked to the professor today.”
Chuckie’s clueless. “Okay?” he tries. He has no idea where this is going.
Will rolls over, furious. “No,” he says, “I talked to the professor today." He waves a hand back and forth between him and Chuckie. “About us.”
Chuckie - this must be what people mean when they say ‘my blood ran cold.’ He and Will haven’t talked about this. As far as he knew they hadn’t even thought about this. “...Why?” he finally manages.
Will shrugs. “We were havin’ coffee and he said he has this grad student, got her eye on me. Asked if I wanted to go out with her.”
“And you said what? ‘No, I’m engaged in regular sodomy, thanks’?”
Will shifts, face tight with anger. “I said no, I’m good, I’m - in a relationship - ” that part comin’ out rushed and mumbly - “and he says oh is she cute, I should bring her to the next happy hour, and I say she’s real cute but she’s not a she, and he says - ” Will pauses, visibly fighting to keep himself under control, hands flexing and biting his lip. “He gets all quiet and then he says I better not tell anyone else because you never know what people might think, and then he kinda - like, the table’s small, right, we’re at a cafe on campus, and he kinda moves his coffee cup closer to him and gets out a butter knife. We were splittin’ a fuckin muffin.” Will snorts to himself, totally humorless. “And he cuts it in half and kinda pulls his half closer to himself. Like he thinks havin’ coffee with me he’s gonna catch it.”
“Catch what?” Chuckie asks.
“I dunno!” Will snaps. “AIDS? Faggotry? Some fuckin’ third thing?” He sits up in bed, presses the heels of his hands into his eyes. Then he turns and looks at Chuckie, eyes burning. “I just - I am not gonna fuckin’ lie about you, Chuck,” he says. “I’m not sayin’ we walk around in lipstick with our hands in each other’s pockets or some shit, but - if someone asks me direct like that? I can’t do it. Not about you. Not about this.”
Chuckie nods slowly. “Okay,” he says finally. “If that’s how you wanna play it, that’s how we’ll play it.”
Will visibly relaxes.
“But Will,” he says. “Baby,” again, for emphasis. “You can’t go tryna fight strangers just cuz they use a word you don’t like. Maybe here, at home, where we got backup. But that shit? That can’t happen again, you get me?”
Will nods. “Yeah. Yeah, I get you.”
Chuckie’s at the bar a couple nights later with just Billy, Morgan’s home with the flu or some shit and Will’s having dinner with Sean, when Billy says out of nowhere, “Hey, Chuck,” real casual like they weren’t just in the middle of a fuckin’ conversation and he didn’t suddenly drop eye contact with Chuckie, and every alarm system Chuckie has begins to blare all at once. “So Will moved in with you when he moved home, right?”
Chuckie takes a long pull on his beer, tryin’ to cover that what he really wants to do is make like Looney Tunes and bust right through the wall onto the street. Billy’s not even a little bit stupid and Chuckie’s been waitin’ for this since that scene in Somerville. He just says, “Yep.”
“And, uh.” It’s clear Billy’s uncomfortable, for all he's trying to be cool. Good. “Neither of you’s seein’ anyone.”
Chuckie drinks again. “Nope.” The pause while Billy tries to figure out what to say next goes on forever, and finally Chuckie just says, “Bill. Ask me what you wanna ask me.”
Billy looks up then. Says, “I just wanted to make sure you guys’re happy.”
And that's not at all what Chuckie expected to hear. “You wanna know the fucked up part?” he says after a second. “I am. I'm so fuckin’ happy I can't stand myself.”
Billy lifts his beer, clinks it into Chuckie's. “Good,” he says. “Should be.” They sit in much more comfortable silence for a second before Billy says, “Morgan's gonna be fuckin’ impossible.”
Chuckie groans, runs a hand over his face. “God, I know. We gotta tell ‘em, but Jesus.”
“Just gonna wanna know about dicks and asses,” Billy says, and raising his voice into a pretty serviceable imitation of Morgan, “So what, you just grease up and stick it in? How does it even fit?” He takes a sip of his beer. “You might wanna bring some charts. Maybe a diagram.”
They tell Morgan a few days later. They kinda don't mean to, but one thing leads to another. They're at Chuckie and Will's, and while Morgan's in the bathroom, probably bein’ disgusting, Billy turns to Will and says, “Cheers, kid.” He jerks his head at Chuckie. “You both done good.” And Chuck moves his hand from the back of Will’s chair to the back of his neck, stupidly proud to do it where someone he cares about can see, and Will says, “Hey, thanks man. Uh, means a lot,” and clinks the neck of his bottle into Billy’s which means he leans forward and Chuckie's hand slips down his back, so he pulls Will a little closer like he wants to do every second of his life anyway, and Will lets him - even leans in a little, headbutts Chuckie's jaw, it's all stupid and nice and exactly what they'd be doing if Billy wasn't there, and Billy doesn't even look weird about it, and Chuckie remembers then that Billy's got a fag cousin, Ricky, and he's always been decent about him - and just when they're getting comfortable and Chuckie’s thinking, I should probably ask about him, my fuckin’ compatriot in the world of cocksucking, that's when Morgan comes back in the room and says, “The fuck is this?”
Chuckie looks at Morgan, looks at Will who's suddenly tense as hell but hasn't moved from where he's leanin’ into Chuckie, takes a sip of his beer and says, “The fuck does it look like?”
“It looks like the two ‘a you are faggots!” Morgan says, and Chuckie toasts him with his beer and says, “Congrats, Morg, I see you finally passed remedial sex ed.” He pulls Will a little closer, rubs a hand up and down his back. They're fine. They're good. It's Morgan, who's about 13 years old and stupid as shit but means well, and they're gonna be fine.
Morgan's eyes are like pie plates. “You two?!” he asks. “Since when?! Will fuckin’ moved all the way across the country for some girl and now you two are - are - butt buddies?!”
Chuckie closes his eyes, briefly despairing of his life, then opens them and says simply, “Yep, that's about the size of it.”
Morgan pulls a chair up to the table, leaning forward like he's really gotta focus. “So you fuck?” he says. “I mean -” And God help us all, he actually makes a circle with one hand and stabs the fingers of the other hand through it a few times. You know. Fucking.
“Jesus, Morg, if that's how you think sex works it's no wonder women clear out of any room you're in,” Chuckie says.
“Seriously!” Morgan sputters. “You put your dick in his ass?”
Will tenses up again, but before Chuckie can say anything Billy's cuffin’ Morgan across the back of the head. “Ain't none a’ your fuckin’ business whose dick goes where,” he says. “Shut up and drink your beer.”
“I just don't get it!” Morgan says, not deterred at all. “It feels good havin’ a dick up your ass? Maybe gay guys are built different.”
Chuckie pauses, then decides - fuck it. He takes his arm out from behind Will, who sprawls out in the kitchen chair like he's tryna look sexy - and he probably is, fuck, screwin’ with Morgan is so stupid easy - and he leans forward, elbows on the table. “Morg, do me a favor. The next time you're beatin’ off in my mother’s bedroom, I want you to take one finger - ” and Chuckie holds up his index finger, watches Morgan's eyes go wide, watches Billy smother his laughter behind his beer - “I want you to take one finger and after you clean up real good, I want you to stick that finger as far up your ass as it'll go. Okay? You be a little cave diver. And once you get all the way fuckin’ up there I want you to feel around real good, right, see what you see, and if you do it right you're gonna hit a bump. That there's your prostate, you know, the thing the doc makes you spread ‘em and cough? You're gonna find your prostate, and you're gonna rub it while you jerk it. And then you tell me if gay guys are built different or if straight guys just don’t know what they’re missin’.”
Chuckie glances to his right to see Will grinning around the neck of his beer. Billy's faintly pink, but Chuckie's pretty sure it's because he's tryin’ his damnedest not to laugh. Morgan, for once, is dead silent.
Fifteen minutes later he pops up from the table and says outta nowhere, “Ok guys, gotta jet,” and as the front door slams behind him Chuckie yells, “Be a little cave diver, Morg!”
Billy rolls his eyes. “If he falls down and cracks his skull cuz he gets distracted diggin’ for gold, I ain’t visitin’ him at the hospital.”
That night Will’s got Chuckie in bed, spread out on the covers and working him open so fuckin’ slow, one finger at a time without touching his dick, and as he glances over Chuckie’s prostate he croons, “Be a cave diver,” and Chuckie starts laughing so hard that Will has to get his hand out of him real fuckin’ fast or risk mutual injury.
Winter slides into spring, baseball season starts, and Chuckie starts goin’ out with construction crews who are renovating old houses in Southie. He asked his uncle about it, if he knew anyone and could get him on anything without him being in the union, and Mike made a few calls and lo and behold, Chuckie's goin’ out with a guy named Dave and his crew. “Dave'll teach you how to hold a hammer,” Mike says. “See if you like it.” It's just basic shit so far, but when Chuckie sees a house like the one he grew up in looking better instead of worse when he gets through with it… Yeah. He likes it.
One Saturday Dave asks him to come in, just the two of them, so he can teach Chuckie how to hang a door. Chuckie never thought much about doors except that he liked closin’ ‘em, but it turns out there’s like a million steps to hanging a door and each one depends on all the others or your door is fucked. “So I’m standin’ there, right, I got the fuckin’ level in one hand, top jamb in the other and Dave’s shimming the whole fuckin’ frame and I swear to God, Will, all I can think is ‘if I get off this ladder to go piss Dave’s gonna beat me to death with a level and I’m gonna deserve it,’ but also I’m fuckin’ dyin’, man.” He can feel Will laugh against his chest. “Anyway it all worked out, but fuckin’ a, I had no idea it was so complicated.”
Will’s hand is loosely wrapped around Chuckie’s forearm, and he squeezes gently. “You like it though,” he says.
“Yeah,” Chuckie says after a second. “Yeah, it’s kinda fuckin’ great, honestly.”
On the flip side, Will has somehow managed to work at the research institute for months without quitting or punching anyone. He says he even kinda likes one of ‘em, some kid from New York named Ramesh whose parents had professional jobs in India but drive cabs and clean houses in America, and that’s about as close to a dirt poor foster kid from Southie as you get at MIT but both of ‘em feel a hell of a lot more like each other than most everyone else there.
“It ain’t even - they’re honestly not bad, the other guys,” Will says one night. The Sox are well on their way to losing to the fuckin’ Yankees, so there’s no point in payin’ attention to the game. “I know I said they’re assholes and some of ‘em are but most of ‘em, it’s just - ” He pauses, looking for words. “They got no life experience,” he says finally. “They were either the valedictorians of their high school class, or else everyone they went to school with was smart like them, and then they went to college and did math all the time, and now they get paid to do math.” He shrugs. “They just don’t got a lot to say except about math. And I’m better at math than a lot of ‘em, and they really don’t like that.” He finishes his beer, gets up to get another one. When he comes back, one for him and one for Chuckie, he says, “I thought they didn’t like it because - ” and he gestures to himself, like, fuckin’ look at me - “but I seen how they are when one of them is smarter about it, and they don’t like that either.” He shrugs. “Didn’t think you could swing your dick about theoretical mathematics but seems like you can do it about anything.”
Chuckie nods. Then he asks the question that normally gets him his dick sucked, except he’s not gonna put up with that today. “So what kinda shit are you workin’ on? You like it?” And sure as shit Will slides his hands backwards up Chuckie’s thighs, then kinda rolls over so he’s got one knee either side of Chuckie’s hips and says, “You know what’s a lot more interesting than long division is your cock.” But Chuckie’s braced, and also they fucked this morning, so he’s not as immediately, blindingly horny as he usually gets when Will throws himself at him. That means that instead of laying back and taking it like he usually would, he can grab Will’s hips and hold him in place and say, “Hunting, jesus, calm your tits for a second.”
Will looks down at him and hand to God he looks shifty, what the fuck. “What, you don’t want it?” he asks, like a challenge, and Chuckie rolls his eyes hard.
“Of course I want it, dipshit,” he says. “But right now I got a question I need you to fuckin’ answer.”
“And what’s that?” Will says, and Chuckie feels him try to move forward but Chuckie’s holding him in place, and he’s actually really fuckin’ strong when he needs to be, so Will ain’t goin’ nowhere. Chuckie just repeats himself slowly, like he’s talking to a toddler or an idiot. “What kinda shit are you workin’ on? Do you fuckin’ like it?”
Will blows out a heavy breath. “Come on, Chuck,” he tries. “You don’t wanna hear about fuckin’ fancy-ass long division.”
“Fuck you I don’t,” Chuckie says, and now he’s actually kinda mad. “What, you think I’m too stupid for it or somethin’?” His hands flex on Will’s hips. “I ain’t askin’ you to teach it to me, just explain it usin’ something in between two syllable and five dollar words. You gotta be able to do that.” Because the thing is - after Will left, when Chuckie wasn’t fucking Chris or drinking with Billy and Morgan, he actually started hanging out at college bars sometimes. He thought of it as research. He was researchin’ smart kids, because his flame-out the night they met Skylar still kinda rankled. Chuckie’s always been good with people. He didn’t like that he couldn’t figure out a way to hang in there with people his own fuckin’ age just cuz they'd read books he hadn’t. And what he learned in the course of his research was that most of ‘em, if you’re honest about what you don’t know and you actually act interested in what they’re studying instead of blowin’ ‘em off, they’re happy to explain it. Most of ‘em are pretty fuckin’ bad at it, but they’ll give it a try. Because they’re fuckin’ excited about it, they’re fuckin’ - they like it. Chuckie hadn’t realized that a lot of college kids actually like the shit they do.
Anyway, if Katie the English major at BU could make him care about sonnets for fifteen minutes and Joe the international relations major at Tufts could make him give a shit about nuclear non-proliferation treaties and mutually assured destruction, Will who he’s stupid in love with and whose dick he sucks several times a week should be able to make him care about theoretical mathematics.
But Will’s got this look on his face - it’s not good, and Chuckie consciously loosens his hands, starts rubbing circles on Will’s hip bones with his thumbs. “Baby,” he says quietly. “What’s goin’ on?”
And Will says, “Chuck, I ain't like you.”
Chuckie pauses. He knows that sentence came about as outta nowhere as it's possible for a sentence to come, and also - Will’s telling him he ain't like him? “Yeah, I know,” Chuckie says, overly calm. “I fuckin’ told you that. What the hell are you talkin’ about, man?”
“No, you don't get it,” Will says, and he actually gets off Chuckie's lap and starts pacing. “I'm so fuckin’ - ” And then he picks up a book off the floor, shakes it at Chuckie. That's one of the things Chuckie likes about livin’ with Will, there's books everywhere. Makes him feel smart by association. Anyway, Will's shakin’ a book at him and says, “I read this once. Read it in two hours. Don't need to read it again because everything in it, I remember.” He taps his temple, probably too hard. “That's not normal, Chuck!” His voice is getting louder, shakier. Chuckie has no idea what's happening. “I used to do Skylar's o-chem homework for her,” Will says. “Not a lot, she wouldn't let me do it a lot, but sometimes.” He stops then, in the middle of the floor. Then he looks back up at Chuckie. There's a wildness on his face and in his tone that Chuckie doesn't like at all.
Chuckie pushes himself off the couch and crosses to where Will is standing, shaking with whatever he's feeling, hands in fists where his arms are crossed over his skinny chest. God, he loves him so fuckin’ much. He slowly extends his arms, drops his hands onto Will's shoulders and smooths them down to where his elbows are tucked in tight against his ribcage. Chuckie's good with people, and he knows terrified when he sees it. “What's goin’ on?” he asks, voice as gentle as he can make it.
When Will looks up at him, Chuckie is stunned to see tears in his eyes. “I ain't like you,” he says again, quiet. “And it's okay, you don't gotta - I know what a fuckin’ weirdo I am. But don't push me, Chuck. I can't - I just got you back.”
And it’s not like Chuckie didn’t know what Will was doin’ when he refused to answer his questions about work, but this is a level of fucked up Chuckie wasn’t actually ready for. He slips his arms around Will, pulls him closer whether he wants to come or not. “You fuckin’ idiot,” he says softly. “We've known each other since we were ten years old. You think I’m fuckin’ scared a’ you?” He pulls back and ducks down to look Will in the eyes, keeping him in his arms. “You think your brain is some big fuckin’ secret?”
Will looks up at him then, finally, and he looks wrecked. “You are so fuckin’ dumb,” Chuckie says, and Will laughs wetly from where he’s tucked his face back into Chuckie’s shoulder. “Never be afraid I'm freaked out by your big brain when I'm the only person on the planet who knows how fuckin’ dumb you truly are.” He pulls Will closer, holds him tight, strokes up and down his back. And then Chuckie takes a risk. It's not a risk, really, he knows that, but it feels big to say. Bigger than “I love you,” which he and Will have said openly since they were teenagers. “I love it,” he says softly. “Baby, I fuckin’ love how smart you are. I wanna go places with you and have my arm around your waist while you recite equations in people's faces, and then I wanna go home and ride you into the mattress.”
Will looks up then, grin a little bit twisted. “But not fuck me into the mattress?”
Chuckie rolls his eyes and pulls Will closer, cuffing him lightly in the back of the head. “Stop picking fights, dipshit. I got zero complaints about how we do things.” He presses a kiss to Will's temple. “And anyway, I can fuck you just as good from the bottom as I would from the top.”
So maybe it's not always easy. Maybe sometimes it takes everything Chuckie has to meet the moment, make it work. Sometimes it's fuckin’ hard. But it's hard like hanging a door is hard, hard like building things instead of destroying them. It's work, but it's work he's proud to do.
They don't smoke much as a rule, but Billy turns up at the bar one night with a bag of weed so nice it smells good, so now they’re at Will and Chuckie’s gettin’ loaded. Will and Chuckie don’t generally touch each other much in front of the guys, nothin’ that can’t be written off as friendly, but two puffs on Billy’s good-ass weed and Will’s climbing in between Chuckie’s legs and pulling his arm across his chest, head on his shoulder like they’re watchin’ a game by themselves, so you know Morgan is just burstin’ with questions.
“So like - how does it work?” he asks from where he’s layin’ on Chuckie’s couch, head tipped back over the arm. He’s lookin’ at Will and Chuckie upside down.
“What are you talkin’ about, man?” Will asks, grin in his voice.
“Ass fucking,” Morgan clarifies. “Like, with two dudes, how do you know who’s in charge? Like, whose dick is drivin’?”
Will just starts laughing and lolls his head back on Chuckie’s shoulder, and Chuckie remembers that if he doesn't smoke much Will really doesn’t smoke much. So, okay, it’s on Chuckie to handle Morgan. “Morg, I got about a thousand questions about your understanding of human sexuality,” he says.
“I’m serious!” Morgan says. “Like, who goes down on who? How do you know who’s supposed to? I guess the actual ass-fucking part makes sense, like, obviously you - ” and he waves a very stoned hand by the side of Chuckie’s head - “are gonna be doin’ the fucking, but does that mean you never get your dick sucked?” He twists his head around, lookin’ at Chuckie like Chuckie just kicked his puppy. “Do you gotta suck his dick and you never get your dick sucked? That’s so unfair!”
Chuckie rolls his eyes. Whatever. This weed is so good, and Morgan kicked open the door. Whatever. “First of all,” he says, “I don’t fuck him. He fucks me. Second of all, no, Morgan, there isn’t a fuckin’ order of operations we bring to bed with us, jesus christ.” But he can tell Morgan is stuck on the first part, which - whatever. Chuckie just didn’t want Will to feel any kinda way. He doesn’t actually care if Morgan and Billy know that he takes it.
“He fucks you?!” Morgan sputters.
“Yup,” Chuckie says, popping the p and pulling Will a little bit closer.
“But you’re bigger than him!” Morgan says. He sounds genuinely baffled. “Doesn’t that mean he’s gotta be the girl?”
At that, Will starts laughing again. “Morgan,” he says, “I can assure you that there ain’t no girls in this relationship.”
Morgan’s about to start in again when Billy says, “Morgan. Consider this.” He takes a deep drag on the joint, passes it back to Chuckie. “When two guys are fuckin’ each other, it ain’t actually about pussy.”
Will just about loses it at that, and Chuckie’s laughing too, and jesus christ Chuckie didn’t know it was possible to be this happy. There oughta be a law.