Platonic (3 page)

The hand stays against his hip, and out of the corner of his eye Mark sees the second condom fly through the air and land in the trash. Behind him, Patrick’s breath is hitched, punctuated with small grunts and the sounds of his hand working his cock fast.

Mark wants to watch him, bask in it, but then Patrick says, “God, you are so fucking tight, so fucking good, I’m gonna come,” and Mark feels the warm wetness against the small of his back and just holds still as Patrick spills over his skin. The drip down between his cheeks makes Mark shiver one last time and then Patrick is letting go of his hip and smearing his hand through the mess and they’re both falling, side by side, onto the couch.

For a time they simply breathe. Mark looks at Patrick, watches his brow relax and a smile grace his lips, and then lets his gaze trip down over all that nakedness. When he looks back up Patrick is watching him.

“Naked asses are okay for the couch, though?”

Patrick laughs, “As long as nothing stains.” Mark makes a show of staying put with his hip propped against the material, keeping his ass away from it. Patrick nods his thanks and leans back, stretching out his legs and running a hand up his cock, smearing away some of the mess. “Well done for not getting come on it,” he says.

There’s more easy silence between them. Mark slides a diligent hand over his ass to keep Patrick’s couch clean as their breathing finally returns to normal and the coolness of the air in the apartment edges in.

Mark shivers and Patrick asks, “You need a shower?”

***

Mark wakes up slowly. Blinking his eyes open, he feels a sharp pang in his neck. He twists, disoriented, and tries to take in his surroundings. The night before floods back as he recognizes the sofa he’s lying on, if not the navy blue blanket over him. He’s in his briefs and socks and nothing else.

He remembers putting them on after the shower and finding Patrick in his jeans, waiting for him on the couch. Patrick had disappeared into the bathroom, then, before anything was said, and Mark had waited and waited but must have fallen asleep before Patrick came back to him. He can see his shoes and jeans by the door.

The blinds are open and early morning light streams in. It’s just gone seven and Mark doesn’t have his first lecture until ten. He relaxes back onto the cushions and looks around the room. It’s a small apartment, probably just this room, the little bathroom he saw last night and the bedroom. The kitchenette only has a microwave, a stovetop, a bar-sized fridge and minimal storage space. There’s a narrow table against a wall with a couple of bar stools, the sofa he’s on, the TV, a coffee table and a desk strewn with books and papers.

Patrick, he knows, is a good lawyer; Mark never imagined he’d live somewhere like this. There are rumors as to why he’s still in his position at Stanford. He’s not quite a real professor and is certainly not planning to stick around for a tenured position, so he’s sometimes called a T.A. and sometimes an adjunct professor. Mark knows that he also occasionally helps out his former classmates on big corporate cases. Mostly, though, he just seems to be hanging around campus, well respected by faculty and students alike, teaching and waiting for the right opportunity to come his way.

Curiosity gets the better of Mark and he gets up, folds the blanket and slips quietly into his jeans. He moves to hover by the desk and cast his eyes over the opened books and printed documents there.

Patrick surprises him moments later, saying “Good morning” in a voice all low and scratchy from sleep. The suit pants and button-down he wears are perfectly pressed, and his short hair is still slightly wet from the shower. Mark thinks about just dropping to his knees right then and there; he’s sure Patrick can’t have any real work for hours and he looks so damn good. A few more hours spent together in bed sounds good too. “Sleep well?”

Mark nods and moves away from the desk. “Yeah. Last night was great.”

“It was.” Patrick leans against his bedroom doorframe and crosses his arms. This time, when the silence starts to stretch, it’s exceedingly uncomfortable. Mark can’t put his finger on why.

Eventually Patrick clears his throat, offers Mark a lopsided smile and says, “Do you need me to call you a cab?”

There’s nothing subtle about
that
, and Mark knows his expression falls before he catches himself and slides a smile in place. “I was hoping I could buy you breakfast.”

Patrick’s eyes narrow minutely. “I can offer you coffee,” he says, “But you’ll have to drink it fast because I need to be somewhere.”

“Working on a case, or—”

Patrick cuts him off. “Just the usual stuff.”

The silence stretches out again.

“Last night was fun,” Patrick says suddenly, “and I’d like to do it again, if being your professor isn’t going to be an issue. But I’m not looking for a relationship right now. Not even a little bit.”

Mark stares at him and pats down his hair, suddenly self-conscious. “Yeah,” he says, even though he feels a little sick. “I thought—”

“Nope.” Patrick uncrosses his arms and sticks his hands deep in his pockets. “No, it was never about that. I thought that was clear. You could hardly call last night a date.”

“It wasn’t. I don’t usually…”

“Fuck around?”

“I don’t do casual.” Mark grits his teeth, walks back to the sofa, finds his shirt and pulls it over his head.

“Why not?”

Mark stares at him across the room. “I want something better.”

“I don’t think, necessarily, that a romantic relationship with all the complicated trimmings is any better than really good sex for the sake of sex. I didn’t realize—”

“No, you didn’t. I didn’t either…” Mark trails off and runs a hand through his hair. It is knotted and undoubtedly ridiculously messy. He should fix it in a mirror but he really needs to just get out. “If I’d known, I wouldn’t have… not with my… not with you.”

Patrick, his voice even and calm, raises both hands in the air. “Dude, seriously, no big deal.”

“Yeah.” Mark stares at him. “I’m gonna go.”

“Cab?” Patrick offers again.

“I’ll call one from the street.” Feeling Patrick’s gaze on him the whole time, Mark grabs his shoes and socks and keeps his eyes down as he works out how to unlock the front door.

“I’ll see you on campus. Honestly, no big deal, not unless we make it one,” Patrick says as Mark gets the door open and moves quickly through it. He doesn’t mean to slam it behind him but it echoes loudly.

He finds his way out of the apartment complex and halfway up a street before he sits on the curb to put on his socks and shoes. He fixes his hair in the reflection of a car window and finds a bus route to his dorm on his phone.

He tries not to be angry, he tries not to think about it, but he’s just fucked someone for the sake of getting off and he feels dirty.

CHAPTER 2

Mark sees Patrick more times than he cares to over the next two weeks. He’s present in half of Mark’s lectures, always sitting in the front corner, taking notes and observing the class. He gives two lectures a week himself and oversees some of Mark’s tutorials. They speak to each other shortly but without malice; there’s no point, and Mark is more than aware that pissing off an instructor is not a smart move.

The Wednesday a week after their tryst Mark visits Patrick during his office hours. He has always been eager to take advantage of freely available advice he values highly. The brief meeting serves its purpose: Mark is taking the essay to the professor in charge of the course and requesting a new grade. Patrick grins at him, sits back in his chair and shrugs.

When the essay comes back, it’s still a B. Mark allows himself one day of anger before he hits the books harder than ever.

***

They bump into each other at a bar. Mark is already drunk; it’s Friday night and that’s what he does. What Mark does all week—what he has done every week since he started college and then law school—is work his ass off. He doesn’t know how to do it any other way. Friday nights are his, though, from seven p.m. until the moment he collapses into bed either to slip straight to snoring or to jerk himself off and come as messily as he knows how, all over his chest. It’s his one night off from study, and he’s learned that drunken horny exhaustion keeps him from thinking too long about his mistakes, his family and all the usual things that threaten to make him miserable.

Tonight he’s with friends who are similarly drunk and dancing, and when he gets to the bar his hip knocks up against someone who smells familiar, smooth and earthy. Of course it’s Patrick.

“I thought you lived on the other side of town,” Mark grumbles as he waits for his drinks.

Patrick arches an eyebrow. The smug expression never leaves his face. “I actually work on this side of town.”

Glaring at him, Mark throws a twenty on the bar, grabs his beer and saunters away.

Patrick doesn’t come near him for hours, not until almost midnight, when the bar is full and everything smells like sweat, alcohol and students. Then Patrick is suddenly there, sliding into the chair that Mark’s friend has just left.

“You know I didn’t mean to piss you off.”

“You didn’t piss me off.”

“Okay.” Patrick watches him. He’s so smart, Mark knows that there’s no point in any sort of lie.

“I got the wrong message.” Mark shrugs and takes another gulp of beer, feeling the alcohol seep straight into his blood and make his head spin. Patrick looks good no matter how angry and embarrassed Mark feels.

“Maybe I gave off the wrong signals. I don’t usually hook up with my students.”

“Who, then?”

It’s the first time Mark has seen Patrick’s brow crease outside of the classroom. Patrick drinks from his own beer before answering. “Friends, mostly, occasionally one-night stands I find in the city.”

“You fuck your friends?”

Patrick leans in closer across the table. Instead of taking Mark’s hand he clinks the tops of their bottles together. “Yeah, look, you’re hung up on the romance thing. I get that. I’ve seen that happen to people before. It’s not me. I don’t judge you for it; you don’t judge me for it.”

“Yeah, except you are absolutely judging me.”

Patrick laughs and leans back. “We had a good night. I’m judging you because we could so easily have more of that.”

Mark’s hair is in his eyes, messy, sweat-curled waves he can use to obscure his view and Patrick’s view of him if he looks down. He’ll need a haircut before he goes home for Christmas. He stares at his hand around the beer and then up at Patrick, who is staring calmly back with a small smile. His chest is broad, his tie loose around his neck.

“You want a blowjob?” Mark asks, his voice low.

This isn’t who Mark is; it isn’t what he wants, except tonight after the week he’s had. The ease with which he knows he can be naked and vulnerable and feel so good, with this man, makes him wonder. He wants to fall in love with someone, buy a house, have kids, but there’s no one here right now, just Patrick, and perhaps Patrick’s mind can be changed.

Patrick is laughing hard at him, a deep belly laugh that makes the cotton of his shirt stretch even tighter over his chest. He swallows the rest of his beer in several long gulps, the work of his neck all Mark can see. “Fuck yeah,” he says as he places the empty bottle on the table.

Mark moves but Patrick reaches across the table and grabs his wrist, making him stay put. “Come find me when you’re sober.”

***

Mark has a Monday lecture that Patrick usually sits in on, and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t spend an extra half hour getting ready for it. He wears his favorite jeans, the ones usually reserved for dates and parties, and a dark red shirt with a decently dipping V-neck. He grabs his black blazer on his way out the door and checks his hair again in the campus bathroom before heading to the lecture.

Patrick is in the front row as usual, chin propped up on one hand as he reads. His eyes find Mark immediately and he arches an eyebrow in challenge. Mark looks away automatically, bites down on his lip and collects himself, and then looks right back, holding Patrick’s gaze as he moves to sit a few rows behind him.

The room is only just beginning to fill, and after staring at the back of Patrick’s head for thirty long seconds, Mark abandons his books and walks down to him.

He goes for casual, “Hey Pat, I—” and is cut off.

“Don’t
ever
call me Pat.”

Mark falters, recovers and squares his shoulders as he rolls his eyes dismissively. “I was hoping you would be able to spare some out-of-hours time for me. To go over a thing.”

“Over a thing?” Patrick asks, pausing to appraise the situation. “You sure you’re fine with this?” he finally says.

“I know what I’m doing.”

“You really don’t.”

Mark bristles and tries again: “I can take care of myself.”

Patrick shrugs. “I’m busy all day today but can probably fit you in tomorrow around lunch?”

“Why not make it tonight?”

“If you want to hang around until eight, I’ll be done by then.”

“I’ll come by your office.”

“Good.”

“Great.”

And with that, Mark moves back to his seat just as the door slams and his professor turns to face the class.

***

That night, at a quarter past eight, Mark sinks to his knees behind Patrick’s desk, gets his hands on Patrick’s thighs and blows him as well as he knows how. He can barely get half the length of him in his mouth, but a solid fifteen minutes of working him with lips and tongue and fist has Patrick twisting a hand in Mark’s hair and grasping at his shoulder as he throbs on his tongue and comes in the condom.

This time Mark gets to watch the pull of pleasure over his face.

Afterward, with Mark bent over the desk, Patrick’s fingers in Mark’s ass and his mouth on Mark’s balls, Patrick assures Mark that he can teach him how to swallow his full length.

***

It’s frighteningly easy, what they get going. Most of it happens at Patrick’s apartment; faculty and the other students can’t know. It happens late at night when they’re both strung out and a little bit tired, or lazily over the weekend. They fuck a lot, and slowly any animosity on Mark’s part fades with the realization that
this
can be good, can be what he needs. They become friends. They have sleepovers that aren’t awkward in the morning. They get breakfast afterward and talk about politics and philosophy.