“Not that I’m complaining.” Theo ran his fingers through Jack’s hair, a disaster as always. “But what was that?”

“Mm.” Jack propped his chin on Theo’s chest but looked away. “Just...in the mood, I guess. For that.”

“All right.” Theo ruffled his hair. “So. Cat, or no cat?”

Jack rolled over, staring at the ceiling. He didn’t reach over and take Theo’s hand. “I have no opinion on cat.”

“So.” Theo nudged him with his elbow. “Cat.”

“Sure, Theo.” Jack closed his eyes, smiling halfway but looking somehow defeated. “You can get a cat.”

August was nearing its end.

Many of the summer exchange students had already gone home—back to their boyfriends and girlfriends, their normal lives, where they’d give smiling kisses and laugh a little and lie a little and never really tell the truth about what they’d done. The city wasn’t empty, but there was a feeling of waiting. An idleness.

Even so, Friday night and the club was full up, shots being poured at the bar, and Jack was drinking one of those fruity turquoise things that smelled like tanning lotion. It was his third—and Theo’d been keeping up, shots of whiskey, and the night was hot and sweltering, and they grabbed ice cubes from behind the bar and ran them over each other’s necks while they danced. Licking up the water, the hint of shimmer he’d finally convinced Jack to wear for the first time since Pride, a little over two months ago.

They were perfectly in tune, knowing each movement of their bodies, knowing the ways they fit. He held on to the thick muscles of Jack’s backside—fuck, he was hot—and rubbed his full cock along Jack’s, just cheap fabric and sweat between them.

Jack had a fourth drink. Theo took another shot.

Midnight in Cork, in the summertime, getting down to the last three cigarettes in the pack, good craic with the DJ between sets, passing a joint around, and if Jack seemed—if he felt just slightly different—they were just drunk and high and dehydrated and—

“Come on.” Theo took Jack’s wrist, pulling him off the dance floor, shoving him into the toilets.

“What’re you—”

“I’ve been wanting to do this for months.” He pressed Jack back, up against the sinks, “Years, probably,” and he remembered that he hadn’t locked the door, but he was in too much of a hurry to care. He felt the smooth surface of Jack’s abdomen, the dark buds of his nipples, as he ran his hands under his thin shirt and kissed him, feasting at his mouth.

Jack kissed back like he always did—brutal but tender, and breaking. “That first night—”

“Yeah.” Theo smirked down at him from his not quite two-inch advantage. “I owe you one.”

He dropped to his knees. Music pumped, rhythmic and toneless, and the graffiti glittered on the walls, and he rubbed his face against the twitching mass of Jack’s prick.

And he paused.