19
It’s been a long, exhausting day. After the Scrabble, Allie looks tired and pale, and puts up little resistance when Alex suggests she take a nap while the turkey bakes. He, Polly, and Ben tidy up and prepare the Christmas dinner while she sleeps, all of them avoiding the question of how many Christmases they have left with her.
Although she looks better when she joins them, dressed for dinner, Alex keeps an eye on her and ensures everyone’s alcohol is kept to a minimum. There’s too much emotion still swirling in the air and if this ends up being their last Christmas together, he wants dinner at least to be a good memory for Ben. For all of them.
At one, presents unwrapped and admired, he and Ben send Polly and Allie to bed, brushing off protests from the women. They clear away the table and rinse and stack the dishes, then let Bart out for a final run before having one last glass of wine together in front of the tree, sitting without speaking. When Alex puts his empty glass down, Ben flicks the lamp off and they follow Bart up the stairs.
Alex settles Bart down before pulling on his pajama pants. He finds his watch on the dresser and puts it on, smiling at the familiar feel of it, then goes to look out the window at the sea while Ben cleans his teeth.
“What’s wrong?” Ben calls.
“Nothing.”
“Then why can I sense you freaking out from here?”
“I’m not freaking out,” Alex says.
The water shuts off and Ben comes to join him at the window, slides his arms around Alex’s waist and rests his chin on his shoulder.
“Of course you’re not, and you’re definitely not standing there worrying about how long you’ll last when we get into bed.”
Embarrassment heats Alex’s cheeks and squeezes his eyes shut. Ben’s ability to read him is one of the things he both loves and finds infuriating. It makes it impossible to argue with him and he makes a mental note to ask Matt how he copes with Clare
Besides, he thinks, if Ben knows that's what's bothering him then it must be an issue.
“Baby,” Ben continues, “stop creating problems that don’t exist.”
“What? I’m not –”
“Yeah, you are,” Ben says. “Look, I realize that I’m a lowly lawyer and I don’t know what things like an atresia are but I do know this. When you’re really horny and there’s a lot of emotion and you finally toss in sex, chances of shooting your load sooner than you want are pretty high.”
“Wow, such an elegant way with words,” Alex says, leaning his head back against Ben’s.
“Hey, they fear me in a court room because of the way I wield words I’ll have you know.”
“Yeah you keep telling yourself that.”
Teeth graze the skin of his neck.
“I didn’t last much longer than you did and I only held out because I was focused on you.”
“You know, that doesn’t really help,” Alex says with a snort of laughter. “Now I feel like I was neglecting you.”
Ben sighs and pushes away to sit on the bed.
“Alex listen, this whole pathetic loser act is bullshit. Maybe it’s time you let it go.”
Wide eyed, Alex sits down, more than a little stung by the words.
“I’m not putting on an act,” he starts to say but Ben cuts him off.
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it. I have been a first-class asshole for the last month or so but you think you neglected me? You vomited off twelve fucking pounds, Alex. And I didn’t even notice. But you’re worried that you came too fast and that it means you neglected me? Really? Come on, you and I both know who neglected whom and who is going to be groveling for as long as he lives.”
Alex smiles in spite of himself and bumps Ben’s shoulder with his own.
“I know,” he says; catches the look Ben is giving him and sighs. “No I mean it, I do know. Maybe because of everything else it just sort of hit me today is all. I’ve never been very good at controlling…that…”
“Oh my god, Alex, you say I’m the five-year-old?” Alex can hear the exasperation in Ben's laugh. “You’re thirty years old, you can say coming. Or ejaculation. Or shooting your load. Or whatever you want to call it. Especially with the person who makes you do whatever you want to call it. You’re a fucking nurse, why are you so uptight about this?”
“Dude, I work with kids. I don’t have to explain sexual function to them,” Alex says feeling defensive. The fact that he’s blushing fuels his annoyance. “And I don’t know why I get so embarrassed, I mean it’s not like I’m embarrassed when we’re actually – “
“God help me, if you say, ‘doing it’, I will make you sleep with the dog.” Ben growls, pushes himself back against the headboard, spreads his legs, and pulls Alex up so he’s sitting with his back to Ben’s chest. “Differences in the ways we were raised aside, I’ve just always put it down to you being a bit shy, which is one of the things I find really hot about you. Especially when you blush.”
Smiling, Alex reaches back to put an arm up around Ben’s neck and presses his cheek against his chin. Ben continues.
“For the record, I’ve never noticed that you’ve been especially fast apart from a few times when you’ve been really worked up and that is actually kind of hot. I mean the idea that I can get you so excited you can’t hold back, is a turn on in itself.”
“Really?” Alex asks. Runs his fingers over Ben’s forearms.
“Yeah, really. And before that over anxious mind of yours finds something new to freak out about, you get me overexcited all the time too. I just know how to forestall it most of the time.”
He kisses the side of Alex’s head.
“Control is like anything else – you have to practice and we can do that, it could be fun, but Alex,” he uses his chest to push Alex forward then turns his head to so they’re looking at each other, “you have to stop just deciding you’re always at fault for every little thing. The whole martyr thing is getting a little old, so call me on my crap if I’m being an ass. Don’t just put up with it. And if I’m neglecting you, tell me. I can’t promise I’ll always get it right but God, how many times do we have to do this?”
“When did you get so smart?” Alex asks, leaning his forehead on Ben’s.
“When I asked you out.”
“Good answer.”
“Safe answer,” Ben replies, laughing.
He leans forward to kiss but Alex stops him with a palm to the chest.
“Nope I need to clean my teeth and use the bathroom first.”
He disappears, ignoring the muttering behind him and when he returns, Ben is sitting up in bed.
“You know you can leave the door open,” Ben says.
Alex scowls.
“Yeah, not going to happen, okay? That really does not do it for me.”
He climbs into bed and wriggles down to rest his head on Ben’s chest. Despite the time, he’s not ready to sleep.
“Doesn’t do it for me either but that isn’t actually my point,” Ben says. “I was trying to say you don’t have to hide from me. Bodily functions are bodily functions. They are what they are.”
“You missed your calling as a nurse,” Alex says. “I know that, there are just some things I like privacy for, okay?”
“Okay, fair enough. Can I ask you something?”
“Am I going to get embarrassed?” Alex asks. He smooths his hand over Ben’s belly and enjoys the contrast between the soft skin and the line of coarse hair that runs down from his navel.
“Probably.”
Alex sighs.
“Yeah go ahead.”
“Did you ever actually get sent to a conversion therapist or anything like that?”
Surprised, Alex lifts his head up and rests on his elbow.
“No. My parents wanted to, but never did. After what happened, they’d bring the priest and church council members around for dinner and there’d be lectures and things but that is all. Why?”
“I’ve worked on a few cases with the LGBT youth group with teens who were made to undergo conversion therapy and it can be pretty horrific.”
“Guess I got lucky.”
“Lucky? Right,” Ben says and Alex doesn’t need to see in order to know his face is set with annoyance. “I was just wondering if that is why you are so shy about sex.”
It’s nearly three on Christmas morning and this is what Ben wants to discuss? Alex closes his eyes and lets his head drop on to Ben’s belly, gratified by the soft ‘ouf’ he gets in reaction. He sighs again.
“I’m not shy about it.”
“Yeah you are. And don’t get me started on masturbation.”
“What? I … do that. We’ve had phone sex,” Alex protests, “which by definition, mister big shot lawyer, requires me to … do that.”
“To do that? I rest my case. And we’ve had phone sex twice. In two years. For all I know you could have been faking it on the other end of the phone. What do you do when I’m away?”
“I wasn’t faking it,” Alex protests, digging his fingertips into Ben’s side. “And when you’re away, yes I do. Sometimes.”
“Says you,” Ben replies. “Baby, you’d rather run ten miles in the rain, I know you. I’m sorry, but that’s weird and I just wondered why.”
“Being raised by a homophobic, ultra conservative, right wing fundamentalist isn’t enough for you? Do we have to discuss this now?”
“Yes, we do. Come on, the very fact that you dodge this subject every time it comes up, if you’ll pardon the pun – ow, don’t pinch - and that you’re trying to dodge it now means we do.” Ben cards his fingers through Alex’s hair. “You even avoid touching yourself when we fu- have sex.”
“I do not,” Alex says, still hiding his face against Ben.
“Uh yeah you do. Unless you have to, you are strictly hands off.”
“Seriously, you notice that but you don’t notice if we’re out of milk?”
“What can I say? Your cock is more interesting than milk.”
“Ben,” Alex says into Ben’s navel, “do you have to?”
Ben pulls Alex’s shoulders so he’s forced to slide up the bed until they’re face to face again.
“I love you. I love how shy and easily embarrassed you are. I love how you can’t pass a dog without stopping to discuss the damned weather with it. I love that you can cook but can’t make coffee for shit and that although you can run a marathon and barely break a sweat, I can beat your ass at squash in less than a half hour. I love how much you love my family. I love your floppy hair and your ridiculously cute dimples. I love your ass and those long legs,” Ben says and slides his hand down between the legs in question and gives a gentle squeeze. “And I love this a damned sight more than I love milk. I just want to understand.”
Alex forces himself to not hide his face in the pillow.
“It’s not that I don’t ever … it’s just that … I know it’s stupid but doing that…” he groans when Ben raises an eyebrow, “…okay, okay, sometimes I still feel guilty.”
“Even now?”
“Not as much but well, yeah even now.”
“And when we have sex?”
Alex shakes his head. God can this conversation please be over?
“No, never with you. That’s always felt right with you. You know that thing you said earlier? About me playing the poor, pathetic, queer the world has wronged?”
“Oh God baby, I didn’t m-”
“No, you were right. I have been. I’ve always thought of myself as the victim, like nobody understood. It never occurred to me that I was choosing to make myself miserable. I’ve spent so long blaming my mother for what happened, and, yeah, she is responsible for a lot of it but so am I, that I forgot I could choose something different. You make me feel so good that I guess it was kind of easy to make you responsible for making me feel happy.”
“Now, who’s the idiot?” Ben grins and Alex rolls his eyes.
“Yeah I know. As for …that…shut up…. look I know it’s ridiculous and it’s not like I think it’s bad. I know it’s a completely natural and normal thing to do. It isn’t about that, I just have some not great stuff associated with it and, Ben, there are some things I truly can’t help.”
He pauses, biting his lip, and hopes Ben will let the subject go. To his surprise, Ben grips his hips and lifts him, so Alex is straddling his chest.
“I know that,” Ben says sliding his hands over Alex’s thighs. “What if I found watching you, really hot?”
Alex closes his eyes and shakes his head.
“Ben,” he whispers, “I don’t think I -”
“Then stop thinking,” Ben says running his finger along the inside of Alex’s thigh and smiling when he moans. “And I can help.”
“Ben,” Alex tries to say. Ben tugs at Alex’s pajama pants and smile. Alex knows what he’s going to say and knows he’s lost.
“Baby, please?”
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