More questions than answers (closed to Curtis 11/11)

[silenttrainbaby]

There were nights when he wasn't at Curtis's. The nights where Grey stayed at Rat's, he curled himself around Rat's smaller frame the cat slept with them, too, the smallest of the spoons.

When Grey wasn't there, there were times when he kept to himself on the sofa. But it's so quiet and he still didn't like too-wide spaces in the dark, when he was alone.

He wandered, then, listening at Yona's door, quiet, then Curtis's. Curtis who tossed and turned.

He padded in, the cat following at his heels, wearing just a pair of sweatpants and he knelt in from of Curtis, reaching out a hand to rest it on his shoulder, to still him.

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[manwiththeknife]

Afterward, all that he would remember about the dream would be a deep sense of claustrophobia. An intense heat. A desperate feeling of dread. But the details were washed clean the moment he sprang awake, reaching for the knife under his pillow.

Panting in the dark, Curtis blinked until Grey's face swam into focus.

"Jesus Christ," he said, dropping back onto his pillow with a wary sigh. "What is it?"

[silenttrainbaby]

Grey shook his head. It wasn't him, it was Curtis and whatever he was dreaming, or that gave him a reason to come in, anyway. He pet down Curtis's arm, searching his face in the gloom.

The cat, for his part, jumped on Curtis's bed.

[manwiththeknife]

"Okay," he nodded, scrubbing his hand over his face. There was a soft thud at the foot of the bed and when Curtis lifted his head, the cat peered back at him, its eyes keen in the dark.

"I'm fine," he insisted, voice rough with sleep.

[silenttrainbaby]

Whether he was or not, Grey was staying for a while, and so was the cat who took advantage of Curtis's heat, curling against his side. Grey stayed there, next to the bed. He rested his chin on one arm, his other hand still on Curtis's shoulder.

[manwiththeknife]

Coughing out a sound, almost a laugh, Curtis shifted over on the bed, the cat letting out an annoyed meow as it was jostled. "If you're staying, you might as well get off the floor."

He wasn't going to make the kid kneel there all night.

[silenttrainbaby]

He didn't need to be asked twice. Grey crawled up into the bed and under the warm covers. He rested his cheek against Curtis's shoulder, throwing an arm around Curtis's waist and laid there quietly.

Both he and the cat clearly made themselves comfortable.

[manwiththeknife]

He should've fucking known, but he still stiffened, momentarily shocked to have the kid immediately wrapped around him like an octopus.

"Yeah, make yourself at home," he said wryly, reaching up to ruffle his hand through Grey's hair.

[silenttrainbaby]

It wasn't that Grey was at all philosophical, but the idea of home was an interesting one for him. Rat was home and Curtis was home. Curtis knew everything, knew Grey's life, understood when no one else here did.

He could hear Curtis's heartbeat, but he lifted his head at the hand in his hair, with a wry arch of his brow. What, was he a dog? He reached up to brush Curtis's hair.

Ha.

[manwiththeknife]

"Hey, come on, watch the hair," Curtis said, like he didn't keep it cropped short, impossible to muss.

It had been easy maintenance on the train, and now, it didn't seem important enough to change.

[silenttrainbaby]

It felt bristly but soft on Grey's palm and he smiled, just a little. He turned around to look at Curtis in the murk, their legs tangling under the covers. His hands were between them, but he didn't reach out, sensing that he needed to be careful, tread lightly.

[manwiththeknife]

"What is it?" Curtis said, after a long moment. "You keep looking at me like you wanna ask something."

And Grey could ask, words or not. Gilliam had done a lot of Grey's communicating for him, but that didn't mean that he and Curtis hadn't found a rhythm of their own.

[silenttrainbaby]

They did. But here, things are different. The space, the freedom allowed for a different dynamic, even though Grey wants it to stay the same, in many ways, as it had been.

He lifted his hand, bringing the tips of his fingers down along the bow of Curtis's mouth. Doesn't he want to? Doesn't he feel lonely?

[manwiththeknife]

It was a sad fucking fact that Curtis was lonely. Had been lonely for most of his life. It was loneliness by design. Self inflicted. He fucking hated himself too much to drag anyone else under with him, and even allowing himself relief, like so many of the others did, carried with it an unbearable weight of guilt.

Teeth clinched, his eyes fluttered shut, and for a moment, he did nothing but lie there, his hand curled tight in the sheets.

[silenttrainbaby]

When Grey had approached Curtis in his bed what seemed like ages ago, he'd reacted the same way then. Next, Grey knew, would come shouting. So, Grey needed to try a different approach.

In a flash, he leans forward, replacing his fingers with his mouth, pressed to Curtis's.

[manwiththeknife]

He fucking hated himself for expecting this, but doing nothing to stop it. Half wanting it, in a vague, aching sort of way.

But what he really wanted... He wanted to fucking crush Gilliam's throat with his own hands-- hand, now. To crush the life out of him, wiping the memory of him from all of their minds. And that, maybe, was the worst crime of all. He wanted to steal all those good memories of Gilliam, their leader and protector and friend, from Grey's mind. He wanted to darken them. To show them all what a fucking liar Gilliam had been.

He wanted something that didn't taste like engine oil and dust and death. He wanted something for himself, that wasn't stained by blood and shadowed by Gilliam and Wilford's overbearing presence.

He wanted to keep pushing forward, but what the fuck did that even mean anymore?

Goddamnit. He growled wordlessly, his hand finding its way into Grey's hair, and he opened up to the kiss, his first in too fucking long.

[silenttrainbaby]

There was a gasp lost in the press of mouths. Grey, had he a voice, might have moaned. He returned the kiss, deepened it, his tongue slicking along Curtis's. He even cocked his head, working to get the angle just right, his leg slipping between longer, stronger ones.

[manwiththeknife]

Hovering over him, Grey was lithe and warm and perfectly, inexplicably eager. Curtis felt as dirty as he ever had, aching and desperate and a fucking shame. Just like Gilliam. Just like Wilford.

He squeezed his eyes shut and saw Grey, dead on the floor of that absurd steam room. Tanya, Andrew, Nam... Edgar. All of them.

"Grey," he hissed, and it sounded like a warning, even as he pressed against Grey's thigh, shifting until their hips slotted together.

[silenttrainbaby]

A warning, yes, but this was about giving and receiving, about touch and being touched - something Grey craves like sunlight. He rocked his hips and felt Curtis against him, kissing away the word, kissing away his name sounding like that. There were, after all, other ways Curtis could sound.

[manwiththeknife]

The kid had the name of another man tattooed over his heart-- literally, and had already attracted the attentions of someone new. Curtis felt like a thief. But that was really no different than any other day. And Gilliam was right, it would've been better with two arms. Two hands. He felt off balance and clumsy, but that couldn't be blamed entirely on his arm.

But whatever guilt he felt, whatever uncertainty, was quickly drowned out by greed. By the need to feel skin against his, their clothes becoming an increasing annoyance. If he tried hard enough, he could convince himself that he could take this, this one fucking thing for himself, just once.

[silenttrainbaby]

But he could take this because Grey was offering it, giving it. It was what he knew, what he did, what he wanted to do.

Sensing the shift, the cat exited stage right and Grey kicked off his sweatpants, leaving him naked as he kissed Curtis's mouth, his neck, working to get his thin clothes away, too. This was good - touch was good - he still craved it.

[manwiththeknife]

That should've been the point when he stopped it. Right then. But he didn't. He let Grey undress him, a bitter, humorless cough of laughter punching its way from his chest. He couldn't remember the last time he'd actually been naked in front of another person. Everything on the train had been hasty fumbling in the dark.

Over the last months, Curtis had filled out, muscle building slowly under his sallow skin, his left arm the only point of real atrophy. He was still scarred, but broader, but in ways he'd never cared about. He was a lot of things, but he'd never been vain.

He didn't want to look, but he knew that Grey was built of elegant lines, sinewy muscle and olive skin, even in the train's darkness. And the thin, spidery lines of ink tracing patterns on every visible part of Grey's body.

The awkward fumbling between the men in the tail had always been about necessity. Their circumstances had changed, but maybe this was no different.

With a low growl of a sound, he used all of his strength to flip them over, boosting himself up over Grey with his one good arm and pressing him to the bed with his hips.

[silenttrainbaby]

Breath caught with the movement, Grey watched him with dark eyes, even as he reached between them, moving just as quickly, a hand wrapping around them both, stroking them both hard.

Always rushed, always fumbling, always dark. All those things. Here, the bed is softer, the air cleaner. The need, though, yes. The need hasn't changed at all.

Take it, Grey's expression said. Take him. He canted his chin up, a leg hooking around Curtis's hip. Take it. He nudged Curtis's erection down.

[manwiththeknife]

"Jesus," he whispered helplessly, his hips jerking mindlessly, his cock nudging beneath Grey's balls.

Condoms had long since been extinct on the train, and regardless of his education, they'd been far from his mind at seventeen. In the city, it had never occurred to him that they might be a necessity. He wasn't thinking about the consequences as he shifted onto his haunches, took his weight off his arm and spit into his palm.

Preparation would have to be quick. Like it had always been on the train. Because otherwise, his brain would catch up. Otherwise, he'd do the fucking smart thing and stop this.

Before any of that could happen, he was stretching Grey open with scarred fingers, hitching Grey's leg higher around his hip and then pressing into him, panting into the curve of Grey's neck as he thrust in to the hilt.

[silenttrainbaby]

There was the softest groan, the pant of breath as Grey was filled. Then his ankles were hooked behind Curtis's hips. He slid his hands down that broad back, fingers digging into the meat of the muscle of his ass, and he used his heels to push, to get Curtis deeper.

[manwiththeknife]

It was an odd thing, to realize that he was nearly thirty five and had never fucked in a bed. Their bunks in the tail hardly counted, and his fumbling, teenage encounters had happened in cars and once, in a storage shed, hurried and giddily nervous, while they'd listened for nearby parents.

It was a struggle, keeping balance like this with his one arm. Frustrating, because he wanted that other hand to touch, to map out the skin beneath him.

Forehead resting against Grey's, Curtis rocked his hips, letting his brain shut down and his body take over.