Work Text:
1.
His palm spans the back of Matt's neck, warm and not particularly comforting. Still, Matt lifts his head, closes his eyes when Travis's lips press against his. He pretends it's everything he wants, everything he has wanted. He succeeds until he opens his mouth to Travis's tongue and tastes the eighty proof courage there.
Travis rests their foreheads together, far enough apart that they can breathe. "I'm not drunk enough for this," Matt says, and his voice sounds thready and weak even to his own ears.
Travis regards Matt through heavily-lidded eyes. His grin is predatory. "We can work with that." He grabs the Grey Goose from the cheap table between the cheap hotel beds and offers it to Matt. He takes the bottle, and keeps taking it until the coarse bed spread under him and Travis's solid weight everywhere else stops feeling like a bad idea, stops feeling like much of anything.
2.
Another night, another venue, this one with smooth cinder block under his palms and Travis's mouth slack with surprise. "What are you on?" Travis asks when Matt lets him, has to.
"I don't know. Something," Matt lies. He rubs his mouth back and forth on Travis's neck like he can't get enough of the salty skin and stage sweat there. He holds his breath for a second, as long as he can, before it's like Travis wakes up. One hand finds its way to Matt's hair, the fingers of his other dip below the waistband of Matt's boxers. He's not directing, he's letting Matt get whatever he needs. And Matt pretends, he pretends he's fucked up enough that he doesn't wonder if he'll taste her cherry Chapstick on his skin. Travis responds, Travis holds on, Travis lets him take what he needs.
3.
When he comes out of the bunks she's not in Travis's lap demanding his attention, she's not even flashing an obscene amount of skin. She's folded up inside one of Travis's hoodies with her knees against her chest, all under the fabric of it, and pressed up against his side.
Matt wants to hate her.
She yawns without moving her hand from her coffee mug long enough to cover it. She smiles and says good morning when she sees he's up.
Matt wants to hate her, but he can't.
4.
He's a guy from class, different--just different. He laughs when Matt makes a good joke, doesn't when he makes a bad one. He--Bryan--is a metal head, he makes polite noises when Matt says, "I'm in a band," but doesn't know any of their songs. He nods along with Gym Class but drums along with Kill the Frontman. He divests Matt of his clothes like he's unwrapping a present, laughs playfully in Matt's ear until Matt makes him lose his breath.
While their heartbeats slow, he ask about Matt about his tattoos as Matt's ink passes under his fingertips. Matt finds Bryan's scars again--he doesn't have ink, not even under his shirt--and learns every story with an eager kind of relish.
5.
Matt's on the precipice of sleep, enough that he lets the book he had been trying to read fall between his legs, kicks it down to the wall so he maybe won't roll over to it jabbing him in the side. His eyelids close heavily, just barely manages to turn off his light. He thinks he's asleep, completely asleep, because the next thing he knows is a solid weight settling directly on top of him, warm and familiar. His mouth is still sleep-pliant when he's kissed.
The bus hits one bump, then another; the book Bryan sent him pelts him in the leg before falling to the floor with a solid thud.
It wakes him up, enough to open his eyes, enough to realize not Bryan.
His palms push against Travis's shoulders, turns his head away. "What?" Travis asks.
"I'm--I'm seeing someone," he explains. A little thrill shudders through him, still, that he gets to say that.
From the sliver of curtain left open when he crawled in, Matt can see Travis's wolfish grin. He leans in, and Matt can smell the weed stronger than if the smoke had just slipped into the bunks from the party in the lounge. "When's that stopped us before?"
6.
He still has the ring he gave her twisting between his fingertips, clumsier now than the movement had been hours ago. "She doesn't fucking listen," he grouses.
Matt traces the inseam of Bryan's jeans without intent, just a comfortable familiarity. He's leaning against Bryan, warm and solid behind him. He twists his head around enough to kiss the skin at Bryan's jaw.
"She doesn't fucking listen," Travis insists.
Bryan's hand at Matt's waist squeezes companionably, because Bryan does. Matt has to smile, sadly. He thinks about hiding it in the rim of his cup but Travis only has eyes for the lip of his bottle anyway.
7.
Another hotel, another night between the two of them and their aches and their ghosts. Travis gestures at him with the bottle he brought from the bus, but Matt just shakes his head.