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The impersonal beige tile in the bar’s bathroom is the same tile as at the hospital, in the bathrooms in the emergency department and on the third and fourth floors.
Everything at PTMC is the same shade of beige, like someone at some point down the line decided it was the appropriate color for a hospital: impersonal, but not too cold, not too detached. The bathrooms, especially in the ED, are starting to show their age; no matter how much cleaning and disinfecting they get, the tiles always look half-dirty, yellowed with time and decades of grit. At some point before Frank started his residency, the hospital began renovations, a slowly cascading series of cheaply-executed ventures to replace bathrooms and other facilities that were well past their sell-by date. Unsurprisingly, the ED is always last on the list, which means Frank will be seeing these tiles for years to come, both inside and outside of his dreams.
Fingers tighten in Frank’s hair. A sharp pull. Pain sparks and slithers down his spine and settles at his sacrum, where it always hurts. The epicenter of Frank’s demise.
“You paying attention, kid?”
He’s not. He’s thinking about hospital renovations and his job and how much his teeth ache.
Frank nods anyway. The fingers are still tight in his hair. He’s not a kid, hasn’t been a kid for a long time, but Zach’s has got a good twenty years on him and somehow he always makes Frank feel young and fucking helpless. Maybe because right now he is. Maybe because Zach accentuates it in the way he talks to Frank. The way he touches him.
“Good boy,” Zach croons.
He reaches down and pats Frank’s cheek roughly, condescendingly. His palm is rough, warm, huge. Something about the touch makes heat curl and snag in Frank’s belly. He can’t tell if it’s nausea or nerves or a sick kind of desire. He swallows down the feeling so he doesn’t have to think about it and runs his tongue over his lips and tries to ignore the familiar taste of bile.
They always do this here. In one of the locking single-stall bathrooms of a bar that’s too close for comfort to the hospital, and even closer to Robby’s place. A doomed middle point between the two. But this is where Zach wants to go, where Zach always wants to meet him, so Frank doesn’t argue. He tried that once. Never again. At least Frank learns his lessons quickly. Knows how to fall into a rhythm.
Maybe that’s his problem. He’s too good at getting stuck in a groove.
At least the location is convenient. Just a pit stop on his way to Robby’s to watch the game.
“Look at you, so pretty on your knees for me,” Zach says.
He runs his fingers through Frank’s hair. It’s greasy and sweaty from thirteen hours at the hospital, but Zach never cares about that. He doesn’t care that he’s making it look worse by running his fingers through it, either. He probably likes messing Frank up. Leaving him a little worse than he found him.
The tile hurts Frank’s knees, but that pain is nothing compared to the way kneeling makes his back ache, especially after a shift. But Zach always wants him on his knees. Wants him looking up at Zach from below with big, wet eyes. And he won’t say it out loud, but it’s obvious: he likes seeing Frank in pain, weak and needy and hurting. He fucking loves it when Frank cries.
Frank opens his mouth and gives Zach a glimpse of the pink, wet inside of his mouth. At this point, Frank knows the script. He’s smart; if he doesn’t want this to take all night, if he wants to hurry up and get his part of the bargain, he knows how to speed this up. Zach is predictable, at least. A known quantity, for all the danger he poses.
Frank looks up at Zach and licks his lips again, this time more purposeful. He knows what he looks like: a pretty invitation.
Looking down at the picture Frank paints on his knees, Zach hums in appreciation and reaches out to thumb roughly over Frank’s wet lower lip. Abruptly, he sticks two fingers into Frank’s mouth and presses down on his tongue, a little mean, and shoves them back until Frank chokes. Zach laughs. And then, almost too eager, his touch disappears, redirecting his wet fingers from Frank’s mouth to his own zipper.
The metallic sound of teeth, Zach’s fly unzipping, sparks something in Frank’s chest, his ribcage. No matter how many times Frank does this, his stomach turns over with nerves. With anticipation. With an uncomfortable pang of guilt and shame.
But the itching in his veins, the ache in the deep pit of his stomach, overwrites it all. He wants. No, he needs. Aching and pathetic and desperate.
Frank thinks about beige hospital tiles and opens his mouth wide enough that his jaw clicks. He thinks about watching the game later with Robby, Robby’s arm slung warm and solid over his shoulder on the couch. The bathroom smells like cherry soap and Pine-Sol and piss. Zach smells like musk, like sweat, and his cock presses down thick on his tongue until Frank’s nose brushes against dark, curled pubes. He doesn’t gag more than twice, and even then it’s not bad. He’s gotten good at this. Frank’s always been a fast learner.
Zach gets a good grip on Frank’s hair for leverage and fucks his cock to the back of Frank’s throat. At least Frank doesn’t have to do much, for Zach, other than look pretty. Other than to be a warm, wet hole. Zach likes control, and Frank tells himself it’s better this way, easier that he doesn’t have to put in the effort to make it look good, to try and figure out what will make them come.
No, Zach will find his pleasure himself. He’ll fuck Frank’s face until he’s panting, until Frank’s eyes are blurry with tears. It’ll only take a couple of minutes. It’s always fast.
Still, Frank counts down the seconds. He doesn’t bother trying to breathe much. He knows he won’t get a good breath in until Zach is finished with him. His head gets foggy, his vision swims, his back throbs with a stabbing, complicated snarl of pain.
He clenches his fingers into fists at his sides until his nails dig into skin. He thinks about hospital linoleum. His student loans. How it’s smart to do this, to let himself be this -- better than fork over his hard-earned cash for what he needs. This way, he doesn’t have to explain where all his money went. Doesn’t have to think about it at all. Free is almost kind, really, when he reasons it out. It’s not like this is hard. It’s just a moment in time. A handful of heartbeats and a little bit of pain. Frank’s had worse happen to him at work -- violent assaults, verbal batteries. This is just a drop in the pond, and Frank’ll come out winning.
He just has to get through it, past it.
Eventually, Zach’s thrusts get erratic. His fingers clench tighter in Frank’s hair. And then, with a couple of grunts, Zach buries himself deep. Against his tongue, his lips, Frank can feel Zach’s cock kick with orgasm as he comes down Frank’s throat. He lingers there in the aftershocks, dick in Frank’s mouth, hands in Frank’s hair, while Frank’s vision swims.
For a second, Frank almost panics. He can’t breathe. His nose is too stuffy, his throat is too full. But then, as it always happens, Zach’s fingers loosen their grip. He starts to card his fingers through Frank’s hair, gentle in a way that makes Frank shiver in the worst way. Slowly, he pulls his dick out of Frank’s mouth and Frank sucks in a ragged, painful breath.
“Shit, you’re always so good for me,” Zach says. He brushes a thumb over Frank’s wet cheek and chuckles. “So pretty when you cry.”
He gets like this sometimes. A little too sweet, a little too soft. He has this strange and unsavory attachment to Frank, like sometimes he thinks they’re something they’re not. Zach has been getting pushier, needier, more desirous of Frank’s time and attention, but for now, he’s reluctantly settling for what Frank is willing to give. Zach’s attachment is offputting in a way that makes Frank wary, makes him worry about Zach escalating things somewhere Frank doesn’t want to take it, but Frank also isn’t paying him for what he wants, so he lets it slide for now.
He lets a lot of things slide these days.
Frank swallows, sits back on his feet, and wipes the back of his hand over his mouth. It comes away sticky with spit and cum and tears. His stomach roils like the sea during a storm, queasy. His throat hurts. His back screams.
Zach is rubbing his hands over his own face. Collecting himself. His dick is still out, hanging right in front of Frank’s face, glistening with spit and slowly softening.
Frank takes another shaking breath. In and out. Then, he pushes himself to his feet and wobbles there for a second, steadying himself with a hand on a beige, tiled wall. He ignores the way his vision still swims, blinking stubborn black specks from the corners of his eyes. He has places to be. He’s supposed to be watching the game with Robby.
“I gotta go, man,” Frank says. He gestures toward the door, but doesn’t move.
“Sure, yeah,” Zach says, like he forgot himself.
He shoves his dick back into his jeans and zips himself up. He turns and washes his hands at the sink. When he finishes, Frank steps up next to him and follows suit. Rinses his mouth out with water, spits, and cleans his face off with a damp paper towel that smells like cardboard.
Frank lingers. Sticks his hand out, palm up. Wanting.
“Greedy,” Zach says with another condescending laugh, but he fishes the goods out of his pocket and deposits a baggy of pills into Frank’s palm all the same.
“Thanks,” Frank says.
“Till next time, yeah?” Zach tells him. He reaches out and pats Frank’s cheek. His hands are big and warm and Frank shivers at the touch, the way it lingers. “Call any time, kid. You know I’m here for you.”
Frank just nods. He fishes out a pill and dry swallows it. He can feel it work its way down his throat, too big, too dry.
“Sure,” Frank says.
He doesn’t want to see Zach ever again. He knows he will anyway. He’ll call him without a thought next time he needs to, and Zach will ask for more and more. And eventually, Frank will be desperate enough to let him have it.
Frank looks down at the familiar beige tiles, scuffs the toe of his shoe against them while thinking about the hospital, and then unlocks the bathroom door and leaves Zach in his wake.
--
“I stopped for a drink on the way here,” Frank says, the lie easy and sweet on his tongue. “But I brought some beers.”
Robby was off today. He looks more relaxed than usual as he lets Frank into his condo, dressed in soft looking jeans and an even softer looking flannel, sleeves rolled up past his elbows. His forearms are toned and fuzzy with a dusting of dark hair that is mirrored on his chest, where he’s left a few buttons undone.
“Hey, kid,” Robby says, and Frank’s stomach churns at the endearment. Robby must catch something in his expression, because his own goes soft. “Rough shift, huh?”
It wasn’t, but Frank nods anyway. He clenches his teeth together and pretends his tongue doesn’t taste bitter.
Frank sets the six pack down on Robby’s coffee table. A mix of shit that Frank grabbed blindly at the first corner store he stumbled past that had a license. IPA’s and blondes and sours. A mix of shit to try. He probably shouldn’t drink tonight, but he knows he will. It’s not like he took much. Just enough to cut down the sharpness of the pain in his back, the itching in his fingertips. He knows he’ll fall asleep too early on Robby’s couch and wake up in the morning feeling fuzzy, foggy, wiped. But he’d feel that way anyway, so why not share a couple drinks with Robby before the inevitable? It doesn’t help that Robby likes shared activities -- he likes to sit on his couch and share new and different beers with Frank while also sharing the game. It’s that mutual point of connection, an easy shortcut to camaraderie, to intimacy. Frank likes it, too.
He likes how easy it is to just exist around Robby. How close Frank feels with him, both at the hospital and here at Robby’s place. He likes the easy way Robby now guides him to sit down on the couch, how Robby plucks out a beer at random, opens it, and puts it in Frank’s hand.
“You eaten anything?” Robby asks.
Frank shrugs. His stomach feels like a pit. At this point, he’s not sure if it’s hunger or something else entirely. He’s not sure it matters anymore.
“A while ago. Not really hungry.”
Robby scoffs. “You need to eat.”
He pats Frank’s shoulder, turns on the game, and disappears into the kitchen. Frank barely even has time to blink before Robby is back and sliding a grilled cheese in front of Frank. He’s got one of his own in a greasy paper towel in his hand, already messily half-eaten.
Frank swallows, throat tight. “Thanks,” he says.
“Only the best for my best resident,” Robby laughs, like making Frank dinner means nothing.
Mechanically, Frank eats his sandwich. His stomach turns over and clenches twice before, about halfway through, his body decides that the pit in his stomach was, in fact, hunger. He scarfs down the remaining half, washes it down with a few long gulps of beer, and leans back on the couch, shoulder to shoulder with an already relaxing Robby.
“Good?” Robby asks. His sandwich is long gone and he’s nursing a beer that smells a little bit like pine. It reminds Frank slightly of the way the bathroom had smelled of Pine-Sol and he tries not to wrinkle his nose at the smell on Robby’s breath.
“Yeah. Thanks again. Didn’t realize how hungry I was.”
“That happens.” Robby tips his beer toward Frank, wiggling the can in invitation. “You want a try?”
Frank doesn’t, not with the astringent smell of it already in the air between them, but he also wants the experience of sharing with Robby like he always does. So he nods and trades cans with Robby and they share a sip of each other’s beer. Frank manages a small sip, and tries not to think about the bar bathroom while watching Robby take a long gulp of Frank’s. His eyes follow the way Robby’s throat works, the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he drinks. Robby’s throat is long and dotted in brown stubble with a few kisses of grey. Sometimes, Frank feels like he could look at Robby all day. He feels that way at the hospital, watching Robby in his element, efficient and hyper-competent -- but it’s almost worse here, catching intimate glimpses of Robby at his softest, bathed in the comfortable warmth of his own home. Seeing Robby like this feels precious, like a secret just for him.
Frank’s mouth feels dry when Robby trades the beers back.
“They’re playing like shit,” Robby says.
“Huh?”
Robby chuckles. He lets a big hand fall over Frank’s shoulder and gives it a squeeze. A muted shiver cascades down Frank’s spine. “You’re real tired, kid. You should probably be asleep, not here, watching the game with an old man like me.”
“I’m good,” Frank says, trying to ignore how heavy his limbs feel, how tired his eyes are.
“Uh huh,” Robby says, but he doesn’t kick Frank out.
Frank looks back at the television where the Pens are having a rough one. Playing like shit, like Robby had said. Robby’s hand stays sprawled over his shoulder and the warmth of his touch spreads all the way to Frank’s belly. A grounding comfort that anchors him right to the couch while Frank watches the shapes on the screen and lets himself drift and zone out while absentmindedly drinking his beer.
At the bar earlier, highlights from another hockey game had been playing on one of the grainy televisions. Frank had watched for a few minutes before Zach had showed up, before Frank had pushed himself up from a barstool to follow Zach right into the bathroom to get his fix.
The thought of Zach makes him slightly queasy, enough so that he shifts and realizes how close he’s drifted to Robby, pressed right up against his side. It’s maybe too close, Robby a long line of warmth against Frank, so close that Frank can count each breath Robby takes, but Robby hasn’t moved away, so it’s probably fine. In fact, as Frank shifts, Robby just squeezes his shoulder and pulls him closer still. A silent but reassuring acceptance of Frank’s proximity.
Frank likes it when Robby touches him, when Robby gets close and stays close. He likes the way Robby looks down at him with an expression of warmth and affection, something almost paternal and proud, like Frank can do no wrong. Frank’s greedy for it, both at work and outside of it, always coming up with excuses to see Robby, even on his days off. Like today. To watch the game.
Zach’s attention is a horrible funhouse mirror of Robby’s. Zach touches him almost the same way that Robby does, with his big, warm hands, and the way he looks at and talks to Frank is almost paternal, too -- but Robby’s attention doesn’t make Frank recoil, doesn’t make him shudder and swallow down worry and bile every time it happens.
The looming threat that Zach certainly wants more from him, that he somehow feels entitled to Frank, is something that makes Frank both nauseous and nervous all at once. Here, now, separated from Zach by the firm wall of Robby at his side and with the gnawing ache in his blood momentarily quenched, Frank finally allows himself to feel an appropriate amount of trepidation at how the situation has escalated. He should be worried about Zach, and he should also be worried at how easily he falls to his knees for the man, just for a hit. Lulled in by familiarity, by an easy fix. For a while, the fact that Zach was familiar had been preferable to seeking this kind of arrangement from a total stranger, but at some point, Zach started creeping his way toward a line Frank doesn’t want to cross, and now he’s starting to toe it. And for once, Frank feels scared.
What if Frank never had to see Zach again? What if he could just have Robby like this forever, with no funhouse version of him waiting in the wings, no shadow forever looming in the back of Frank’s head.
There are drugs in the hospital.
Would it be hard to get his hands on them?
Would he get caught?
If he did get caught, would Robby protect him? Would Robby understand?
Frank thinks he might. Robby gets him. He likes Frank. He looks at Frank with pride, like he matters. Frank thinks he might understand even more, if Frank could prove how important he was, how valuable. Not just a good doctor in the ED, but someone useful to Robby, too. This soft version of Robby found only in the warm light of his house, the one who rolls his sleeves up and makes Frank grilled cheese. The one who lets Frank lean against him without a second thought.
Maybe, if Frank made himself important enough, Robby wouldn’t ever look at him with anything other than the warmth he does now. Even if he caught him doing something bad.
Frank’s head swims with the heady possibility.
He puts his hand on Robby’s thigh. Careful, but decisive.
Robby goes still underneath him. “Kid?”
Frank shifts. He looks up at Robby with a gaze he’s spent a long time practicing. He knows what he looks like from above, all big eyes and flushed cheeks. Maybe Robby will like the picture the same as Zach does.
He lets his hand slide a little, inching up Robby’s thigh and toward his sensitive inner thigh. He makes his intentions clear by looking down and then looking back up at Robby, running a tongue along his bottom lip.
“Please?” Frank asks.
Robby looks more than a little bewildered. Blindsided, maybe. Like he hadn’t ever expected this, even with how close he and Frank are sitting. His ears are flushed along with the apples of his cheeks. He shakes his head a little, sharp and impulsive in the way he always does when he’s trying to clear his thoughts, when he’s thinking just a little too hard.
“Frank,” Robby says carefully.
He looks like he wants to say no, but his eyes keep catching on Frank’s mouth. On the lure of Frank’s pink tongue, the teasing hint of it.
“Please, Robby?” Frank says. “Let me?”
As he speaks, he’s already pushing off the couch and sliding to his knees at Robby’s feet. And Robby doesn’t stop him. He just sits there, glued to the couch, waiting, watching. Eyes caught on Frank like a snare. The rug underneath Frank’s knees is plush and old, clearly well loved through the generations. Frank wonders if Robby grew up playing on it.
Even kneeling, Frank’s back barely even hurts.
“Fuck, kid,” Robby says. “You sure?”
But Robby’s hands are already at the buckle of his belt, the button on his jeans. When he unzips the zipper, the teeth’s metallic sound barely even registers in Frank’s ears. Frank’s paying too much attention to the hair on the back of Robby’s hands, the way his long fingers work his already half-hard cock out of his pants. Hockey must drone on in the background, but all Frank can hear is his own heartbeat and Robby’s quickened breath.
Frank shuffles forward, pressing himself into the protective bracket of Robby’s legs. It’s strikingly different, like this, with Robby sitting, with his legs touching Frank on either side, instead of someone towering above him, detached.
Unlike Zach, Robby doesn’t play with Frank’s mouth first, doesn’t push his fingers back to Frank’s throat just because he can. Instead, he reaches out and gently pushes Frank’s bangs off his forehead. It’s sweet, almost. Cautious. Abruptly, Frank realizes that he must drive this encounter, so he settles a hand at the base of Robby’s rapidly hardening cock to steady it, leans forward, and licks a flat stripe up from the base to the tip.
Above him, Robby curses low and almost sweet. He threads his fingers so softly through Frank’s hair.
Fully hard, Robby is big, bigger than Zach. Both thick and long in a way that makes Frank’s mouth water and his throat tighten in anticipation. But that doesn’t deter Frank from wrapping his lips around Robby’s cock and sucking him down eagerly, no hesitation.
Frank knows how to do this well. He knows how to be good.
With Zach, he never has to try. He just lets Zach dictate the pace, lets Zach fuck his face until he’s finished. But Robby’s hands stay loose on Frank’s head, fingers too gentle and too soft in Frank’s hair. But Zach wasn’t Frank’s first, he’s just Frank’s easiest, the path of least resistance. Frank knows what other men like, and knows what he likes himself, too -- he knows how to suck Robby down and bob his head over Robby’s dick, applying pressure and tongue and rhythm. He knows how to make it good. He has a lot of experience.
Frank’s had a pill and some alcohol. The resulting fatigue leaves his gag reflex practically nonexistent. He uses that to his advantage, taking Robby deep, swallowing him down until Robby’s gasping, moaning his name with a surprised kind of reverence that makes fire flood Frank’s veins. He didn’t think Frank would be good at this, and his surprise, his delight, is better than any drug.
Frank knows that Robby’s effusive with his praise at work. Quickly and absolutely destructively, Frank learns that extends to his more intimate encounters, too.
“That’s it,” Robby breathes. “You’re so good, yeah. Just like that.”
As easily, as smoothly, as if Robby were guiding him through a procedure in the ED.
And Frank eats it up. It’s horrible how much he loves it, how much it makes something so greedy, so hungry, in his gut grow teeth. If Frank thought he was insatiable for Robby’s praise at work, always turning toward it like a flower to the sun, he never knew what it might do to him here in Robby’s home, with Robby’s cock filling up his mouth.
Passively, Frank wonders if Robby would keep talking to him like this if he brought Frank into his bedroom and spread him out over the mattress, but he quickly banishes the thought. The idea makes him dizzy, makes his heart leap into his throat in a way that threatens to choke. And he can’t afford to get distracted now. Can’t afford for this to be anything other than perfect.
A little faster, Robby guides, along with So good for me, and You’re beautiful, and Frank eats it all up like he’s starving. He lets Robby’s praise warm him, and spurn him on in enthusiastically sucking Robby off, fucking his mouth on Robby’s cock like he can’t get enough. Maybe he can’t.
Time goes a little fuzzy and Frank gets lost in the rhythm of it, the repetitive action. The swell of the praise. It takes longer, longer than it usually does with Zach, but Frank doesn’t even mind. It’s almost nice, having something to focus on, something to do, and it’s more than gratifying having Robby praise him the whole way. His head is swimming and his jaw is aching by the time he starts to feel Robby’s body go tense, by the time he hears Robby’s breathing quicken, but he feels so good, too. So useful. So wanted.
“Just like that, yeah,” Robby’s saying. “Keep going, I’m close.”
Even still, he doesn’t pull at Frank’s hair. He keeps his hands light, his words soft. It’s a lot. Almost too much. Frank almost wishes Robby would grab him, would just fuck his cock down his throat with a grunt, but Robby doesn’t. He just keeps talking, crooning, praising Frank, until he’s breathing out a quiet “Frank,” and his cock is kicking in Frank’s mouth and spilling all over Frank’s tongue.
His cum is no more bitter than a pill, so Frank easily swallows him down and cleans him up with barely even a thought.
Frank leans back on his heels as Robby tucks himself away, face slack with pleasure, body loose and eyes dark with something that looks a lot like admiration. Robby’s smiling, too. Something soft, something proud. And Frank did that. He made Robby look like that. He barely even had to try.
Frank feels good. So fucking good.
With big, warm hands, Robby pulls him into his lap. He kisses Frank’s neck, his cheeks, his lips. He slides his hand into Frank’s pants, takes his half-hard cock into his fist, and jerks Frank until he’s hard and whining. He hadn’t even realized he was turned on. With Robby’s hand on him, he suddenly feels hotter than fire, coiled tighter than a spring.
Robby tells him he’s good, so good. He praises Frank more than he’s ever done at work, words filled with awe and a kind of warmth Frank’s never heard out of him before. He lets Frank bury his face in the crook of Robby’s neck and works his cock until Frank goes taut, then boneless.
And then, because he’s Robby, he even cleans everything up at the end, leaving Frank breathless and half asleep on the couch. Dozing. Feeling fully and totally at peace.
“Hey kid, you with me?” Robby asks.
He passes Frank a glass of water and Frank takes it. Downs about half, then sets it down on the coffee table with a shaky hand. The lights are low, dim. He feels only half awake.
“Yeah.” Frank yawns. “Sorry, tired.”
Robby chuckles. He looks unbearably fond. “Can’t imagine why.”
Frank should probably go back to his own place, but he’s so tired. Devastatingly so. The thought of getting himself home is even more exhausting. His face gets caught in another long yawn, long enough that Robby chuckles at him, reaches out, and runs his fingers through Frank’s messy hair one last time. Frank’s heart thuds heavily, loudly in his chest. He wants to lean into the touch. He’s too tired to tell if he does or not, but with the way Robby laughs again, Frank thinks he might have.
Frank swallows. His mouth tastes bitter. Like beer and cum and chemicals.
“I’m beat. Can I sleep on your couch?” Frank asks.
Robby frowns. He looks at the couch, then at Frank.
“Bed’s big enough for two,” Robby says. “If you’re fine sharing.”
Frank just had Robby’s cock down his throat. He swallowed down his cum without a second thought. Frank wants to laugh about it, but he’s too tired. Half asleep and worn thin. He could fall asleep right here, right now, and not have a care in the world.
He thinks about Robby's bed. About Robby's mattress.
“Yeah,” Frank says. “If you are.”
Robby reaches out. Grabs him by the hand and helps Frank stagger to his feet.
“C’mon, kid. Let’s get you to bed.”