sixthiterationlogs | Just to break my own fall

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Just to break my own fall

WHO: Bodhi and Jude
WHERE: Jude's house
WHEN: After the holiday party
OPEN TO: Closed to Jude Sullivan
WARNINGS: Sappy bullshit

Bodhi's not usually quite this stupid over Jude, partly because he restrains himself, partly because even he's not this ridiculously romantic. Their banter at the party wasn't even that out of the ordinary, even if Jude taking his hand in public was a bit beyond the usual. They both fed each other's nonsense until they were completely twitterpated, and it feels fantastic, if distantly kind of foolish. Too hard to care through Jude carefully (and unnecessarily) helping him into his robe and scarves, through the snow-shimmering walk hand in hand, the cold bringing a little extra color to Jude's cheeks (and probably his, but what does he care). Impossible to think about anything else as they finally wend their way toward the house and Bodhi's hand tightens on Jude's through their gloves and looks away just to give himself a break from grinning so hard. Spending nights with Jude has ceased to be a big deal and of course his damage is still a wall between them, but he's the good kind of nervous anyway. This feels like it could almost be normal, a real, regular date with a functional person like Jude deserves. The faint swirl of soft, pretty nothingness lets him collect himself a bit as they head up the steps.

Then there's hurrying through the door as a practical matter. No reason to let the house get colder. But that's as practical as he feels like being, and as soon as the door is closed he turns, catches Jude's shoulders, and steals a kiss. A quick one. He knows they have to deal with the fire and coats and bullshit, but he's been waiting on that for what feels like a very long time.

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It's a plan Jude isn't privvy to, and might not entirely agree with besides. The kissing is good, somehow even better in the wake of everything--he's been reduced to his most basic parts, in a way. Skin, tongue, lips a little numb from the prolongued attention. Sleep is certainly on the horizon, after the fullest meal he's had since arriving and sliding along the fuzzy warmth of coming in someone else's hand; but it isn't so close that he succumbs under Bodhi's mouth.

Lifting his chin, he nudges them face to face, head turned slightly against the back of the couch. The hand not petting idly at his hip smooths over Bodhi's hair, pushing it away from his face.

"What about you?"

Bodhi tries not to let himself freeze. His sense of security was definitely a mistake. The choice was coming, and there's always still a way he can ruin everything. Make Jude feel rejected and he'll poison the whole night. Try and tough out what he'd rather avoid and Jude will probably know and be upset. He's smart like that. Kriff, he didn't want to talk about it. They'd been doing so well.

He's quiet too long, catches himself trying not to meet Jude's eyes. Of course he's found a last minute way to fuck things up.

He has to say something. What escapes him is the truth. "I... I don't know if that's a great idea..." The worst thing is it's not like he thinks Jude will suddenly do something to trigger an episode. Not after all the care they've taken. He's not even sure how much his hesitation has to do with the usual malfunctions. They're certainly making it worse, making a loss of control and a sense of exposure seem scarier, but he's never been confident this way.

It isn't something to push; even Jude knows that. He's waved people away in the past, too keyed up, too bad a smell in the air or a twitch behind his eye that he didn't want to see the other side of. But it isn't something to let go of with a shrug and a nod, either.

"If you want to try anyway, whenever, I don't mind." Eventually the petting hand stays at his hip, resting and not squeezing. "But if you don't, that's alright too."

It's less that something different than that something must be different, but Jude feels largely the same. Things are how they are; sometimes they change, and they stay that kind of same awhile longer. His current mood doesn't much allow for any extreme feeling, on what they do with the rest of the firelight.

Jude's mildness and care don't erase his worries like sometimes happens, but they lessen. It's not fair to hold back on Jude, not fair to refuse that vulnerability. He doesn't have to be confident. Kriff, he'd still rather not, but he recognizes in that the reluctance to upset a status quo he can live with, not a real positive desire. It's a risk. He hates risks. Some things are worth those.

"If... if you want to try, I..." He hopes he doesn't sound too reluctant. He is, but that's not the point. The easy way is to just curl up around Jude and drift off, and it's a hell of a temptation.

"First try's never perfect," he murmurs, the inevitable squeeze at Bodhi's hip not a real grip, not a hold, but just calling attention down and to that side. Jude lets go, patting the couch next to him, starting to turn a bit toward one side. He imagines it must be easier, with a little bit of distance. "We can just see how it goes, it's okay."

There's a yawn under his voice, stifled, expressed in a bit of a stretch as he moves. "Just sit, next to me or--" Jude bites his lip, not so fuzzy as to blindly make the offer. "Would it be better if I used my mouth?"

Bodhi doesn't blush much--even the last few minutes haven't put much color in his cheeks--but when he does, it's sudden and vivid. If he weren't still on top of Jude, it'd be hard to believe he'd just finished bossily driving the younger man over the edge. Bodhi's perfectly happy giving attention. He never learned how to deal with getting it back. "Um."

It's not... It isn't a bad idea. He certainly can't imagine any way he could convince himself he felt threatened in that position, but it can't just be that--that practical. Kriff. "I don't, I mean, I haven't--are you sure?"

It's not a reaction he's ever gotten before, but it's a very Bodhi reaction; enough so that he smiles and shakes his head. Jude's hair starts to fall back over his face, and he raises a practiced, if loose hand to push it back. "I don't have to, if you don't want me to." He wonders briefly what I haven't was going to end with, but he can't follow the logic to its end.

His own flush is easier to shake away--less for the offer, than the hovering impulse to put his pants back on, and Bodhi still straddling his thighs. "But, I'd like to if it's okay."

Turning this down remains a temptation, but Bodhi was hooked the moment Jude let slip I'd like to. How often does Jude really ask him for anything? He bites his lip a second, then kisses Jude entirely too softly for this moment and slides off him. Letting himself drop to the couch is a nice moment all its own, actually. He's been a bit contorted trying not to squish Jude or fall off the sofa.

It's just a moment before the nerves are back, though. It's mostly the good kind of nervous, heightened more by insecurity than the fear that he'll fuck up in some horrible way.

The moment stretches a bit, while Jude finds his discarded shirt and wipes himself an approximation of clean; stuffs himself back into his underwear and jeans but doesn't bother with closing them. Perfunctory motions, while he compartmentalizes his actions from his inability to properly think this out. Wipe off, put his dick away, slide to the floor. Figure how to think again, because that's his hand hovering at Bodhi's knee and he isn't sure what follows.

"Can I," he asks, despite that overall permission. The rest of the question is a finger trailing up Bodhi's inseam, lifting at the last curve to touch a tip to the waist of his pants. If Bodhi prefers, Jude won't do more to touch him than curve over and open his mouth.

Bodhi loses himself in the moment's respite for just a breath or two, taking the quiet and soft scuffling over logistics to be just a little calmer. He can't even safely be nervous over ordinary things anymore, but he's got a lot of warning. It'll be fine.

More than fine, maybe, or so he thinks when he looks down and can't stop the thought that Jude is adorable like this. The fall of mussed hair, eyes brightened and deepened by the angle and the firelight--being on his knees isn't the half of it. Bodhi opts not to say anything, but his little crooked grin makes his interest clear. "Y-yeah." But rather than leave it that, he covers Jude's hand with his, guiding his fingers to the ties on his pants. Jude can do the work, but Bodhi feels like he's participating. Putting Jude's hands where they're wanted really does work.

It works for them both: it's a clearer kind of permission, showing Jude exactly where he's allowed to start. And it never hurts to have Bodhi take his hand--the moments in which Bodhi reaches out are the ones that make this work. Make it feel like more than Bodhi doing, allowing something, for Jude's sake.

Which isn't to say he won't enjoy this. Jude rests his elbows at the edge of the couch, between Bodhi's knees, keeping contact simple, careful. Arm against leg, finger against tie, taking his time to pull them free. His gaze tracks up and down, checking Bodhi's face, dropping to that strip of skin. Brown gone pale between winter clothes and longer nights. Widening it fascinates him, distracts from the caution of tracking Bodhi's mood.

"If you need to pull me up, or just say stop--I won't mind," he assures him, taking no chance on eye contact in the moment. He's watching his hands now, the trousers untied, fingers slipping the hem so they can tug Bodhi's clothes at each hip. Another brief look up, his attention is caught and held by the triangle of skin he's exposed. Jude leans in, chancing a kiss to the trail of hair and breathing deep.

Bodhi watches him quietly for a long moment, focused more on that than the potentially overwhelming physical. He's mostly nervous in the regular ways a person would be nervous right now, or at least a very insecure person, but no reason to tempt fate. Eyes on Jude, attention on Jude as much as he could manage, his tea-eyed boy in all his gentleness.

He can't keep it that abstract forever. Not with Jude nuzzles against his belly--his intake of breath is sharp and faintly voiced, high pitched and shaky. He brushes Jude's hair through his fingers aimlessly, biting his lip to keep some of the sound in. He hasn't paid much attention to his own faint arousal until now, but finally it's more than a vague idea that he should be feeling something.

Jude relaxes for the hands in his hair; that as much as getting hard signals Bodhi's engagement, and--it's just nice. He likes this--the proximity, the heavy smell, the sharp but quiet sounds. All of his attraction and devotion narrowed into this, kissing his way down Bodhi's stomach as his hands sort the shape and fact of his cock out of his pants.

He doesn't know if he should squeeze, once he has the shaft in his grasp, so he just holds it. Better to stick to what he's said, what Bodhi's agreed to. Next time--

Well, first: prove it's worth a next time. He needs his hand for now, though he feels Bodhi stir when he brushes the length along his throat, under his chin. If he can get him hard enough, he can make good on his word: just his mouth, no squeezing, no grabbing. Nothing to trap Bodhi but a body he can easily push off. For now, he holds Bodhi's cock up along the straight press of his thumb under the shaft, to give him a chance of seeing Jude test the head with his tongue.

Bodhi shifts from biting his lip to his knuckles to keep himself grounded. He's onboard with relaxing for Jude, but he's still fighting himself without question. Giving up control, letting go of any of the tension feels like surrender. And what the fuck is the matter with him, thinking like this? Jude is gorgeous and sweet and they've been at this all night and he can't manage this one thing?

Because what he needs right now is performance anxiety on top of everything.

Focus on Jude. He can't relax into himself, but maybe he can forget to worry about how long this is taking, about how Jude deserves better and might feel like Bodhi doesn't want--

Just Jude. The hand he's not biting down on remains in Jude's hair for a moment and then drifts down his cheek, and some of the edge dulls. He missed too much worrying, but he does calm down in time to catch Jude teasing him with his tongue. That, more than anything, lets him let out the breath he didn't realize he was holding, let go of the tension in his jaw. He's not quite there, but he's not fighting the very possibility. "Baby..."

He's still getting used to that; taking the word and connecting it to himself. It's like a structure he has to build each day--baby is one of the blocks, and another is the relationship itself, and several more are the warp of time and space, and the canyon, and everything within its walls.

And tomorrow there will be another block, slotting into place. This is part of his life now: humming and sinking down on Bodhi's cock, with his hand in his hair, and Bodhi calling him baby.

It's a good distraction, from the absence of family, friend, home. The only closure he craves tonight is getting Bodhi to come in his mouth. Bodhi to sleep on top of him on the couch, or on the cushion-strewn floor, close to the fire. It's as far as Jude lets himself think, everything else is sensation--the taste and weight of Bodhi on his tongue, the stretch of his lips. He pulls off once for what feels like a sneeze and is just the impulse to swallow, unobstructed. A couple of breaths later he's back down, meeting his hand and trying to take Bodhi deep enough that he won't need to hold any part of him down.

Bodhi was so caught up in calming himself down over the whole idea he didn't think to steel himself for the actual moment, especially coming all at once as it does, Jude's quick, relentless slide down his length. He was completely unprepared for the intensity of it, for wet heat as much as friction. That was the never he didn't bother to finish among all the broken-off thoughts that he's failed to construct properly tonight. He's been where Jude was once (and not enjoyed it much), but not been on the receiving end, and kriff, it's a lot. The groan it draws from him is sharp and ragged, all his defenses failing at once to let the shuddering noise escape.

He's certainly not half-soft anymore--the speed of his own reaction after so much dragging reluctance does its part to overwhelm him, too. He takes a long few seconds to even try to lack his eyes back on Jude, not that that helps him center himself, either. It's about all he can do not to let his hips move or his hands tighten, and in no time at all he's on the edge, almost too fast to enjoy. "J-jude, I--I'm almost--" He pulls his hand from Jude's hair, expecting him to move away.

Jude does, but briefly, making a more tentative return with an assessing gaze aimed up at Bodhi. Warning is hard to parse from protest, and maybe it wasn't kindest to assume Bodhi would want this part over with as quickly as possible. They certainly hadn't hurried before this.

"Sorry," he murmurs, though he's only just--it's a hard thing to be sorry about. "I can go slower." Deed over words, he sinks carefully back over Bodhi's cock, letting it slot in along his cheek. With a tilt of his head, he has a little more control, a slower and wetter glide than trying to take him straight back along his palette.

Bodhi definitely intended warning, and if protest was buried under there somewhere, he wasn't going to admit to it. Once again he'd assumed he knew what was next, that Jude would back off and he could quickly, yes, get this over with. "Th-that's not--not what I--" It's easier now that Jude's slowed down, but it's still so much.

And Jude still looks so sweet.

Kriff.

"D-doesn't matter, I'm--I'm just not going to last, and--" A sharp inhale. Whatever else he's fucked up, he's not going to let Jude get surprised.

Pausing to chat is at least in the spirit of slowing down, even if it's the first time anyone's been this chatty. Which makes it sound like there are more times than Jude can count on a hand, having done this, and that's far from the case.

It's Bodhi: slow and chatty comes with the territory.

Jude licks and rolls in his lips when he comes back up. The taste lingers, but he hardly minds. "It's fine," he reassures, grasping some of the point. Head tilted up, hair falling into one eye, he looks at Bodhi when he says it, trying to drive it home. "Just--let it happen." Just enjoy it seems a little much, but he isn't going to flounce off if Bodhi comes in his mouth.

With a lingering glance, he sinks back in to swallow him down.

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Just to break my own fall

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