rivers_bend

Title: Treasure more than Ruby-Red Lipstick
Characters: Sutan Amrull and Tommy Joe Ratliff (Adam/Tommy)
Words: ~1550
Rating: Adult
The Obvious: I do not know any of the people whose personas are mentioned here, and neither believe nor mean to imply this actually happened.
A/N: for the friend-in-need square on my schmoop_bingo card.
Summary: Tommy knows what he wants, but he needs Sutan's advice about how to get it.



The bus was dim with the curtains shut, and cool still from running all morning with the A/C on. The rest of the gang was either shopping, or getting food, or on the other bus watching a movie Sutan had no desire to see. He was tired, and just wanted to lie on the sofa bench with his feet up and his arm flung over his face like a Victorian lady who'd just heard her husband had been lost at sea. Or like he was attempting to block out the sliver of sun trying to drill through the edge of the blinds. Whatever.

When he heard the door open, he peered out from under his elbow to see who it was. "Tommy, baby," he said when he saw the shock of blond hair back-lit by the doorway.

"You alone?" Tommy spoke softly like he thought he might have woken Sutan up.

"Not anymore. What's happening?"

Tommy sat on the bench across the way, swinging his own legs up and lying down in a mimic of Sutan's pose. Except he wasn't too long for the bench, so his feet rested on the cushions instead of on the counter. He didn't say anything, just put his own arm over his face.

"Hey," Sutan said. "Seriously, are you okay?" He sat up and reached across the gap to touch Tommy's hip.

Without uncovering his face, Tommy said, "You said I could ask you anything, right?"

Sensing, now that Tommy was actually talking, that this was more embarrassment than distress, Sutan sat back and said, "Anything, girl. You know that."

"Okay," Tommy said, peeking at Sutan and then covering his eyes again. "I'm not asking to be puritan."

"Puritan?" This was not going anywhere good.

Tommy dropped his arm to his chest and tipped his head to look across the aisle, frown between his eyes. "Er, prurient?"

"Okay…" Better than puritan. Probably.

Tommy raised his arm again so it was half-blocking his face from Sutan's view, tucking his hand behind his head. "So what I'm wondering is, do you, like, let guys fuck you?"

Now he knew they were talking about fucking, Sutan was pretty sure he knew where Tommy was going with it, but before they went on he felt the need to be certain he wasn't going to inadvertently crush the boy or anything. "So we're clear, you're not asking if you can fuck me, right?" he said.

Tommy laughed, a short, almost-pained bark. "That would make everything even more complicated."

Sutan debated skipping right to what he thought Tommy wanted to hear, but decided he'd be better off letting Tommy get this off his chest in case there were important tangents.

"I've been on both sides of the equation at one time or another," Sutan said.

Tommy peeked at him again. "You can do that?"

It was Sutan's turn to laugh. "Do what? Switch?"

Now Tommy uncovered his face, peering up at Sutan in the filtered light. "I thought you, like, picked one or the other."

Keeping a straight face, god knew how, Sutan said, "Well. Some people won't top or won't bottom, but lots of guys just do whatever feels good at the time."

Tommy looked like he wasn't sure what to do with that information so he was going to file it away to think about later. "So what I wanted to ask," he said, "is how do you get ready?"

"How do I—" Sutan was lost.

"Don't you have to like, stretch yourself or something?" Tommy left his face uncovered, but he was looking down toward his knees. In the shadowy bus, Sutan couldn't tell if he was blushing.

"You can practice if you want, but Adam's a good top, sweetie—we are talking about you doing this with Adam, right?" Sutan wasn't sure what he was going to do if Tommy was talking about having sex with some other guy, because he was pretty sure Adam was going to be devastated if that was the case.

Tommy looked horrified. "Yes, fuck, I'm not just gonna to do some random dude." He sounded incredulous, like Adam was the only possible man on earth a person might want to have sex with.

"Just checking," Sutan put his hands up in defense. "As I was saying, Adam will take care of you."

"You've had sex with him?" Tommy didn't sound jealous, just curious, but Sutan trod carefully anyway.

"Boys talk, honey. I've known Adam a long time. He won't hurt you."

"He's trying to kill me." Tommy curled onto his side, head propped on his arm. "He is such a fucking tease."

"Sweetie, you're straight, and he's your boss, and you're on tour. I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to kill you."

Tommy made a snorting noise.

"If your plan was to lube yourself up, peel him out of those sexy pants after the show, and sit on his cock, I can guarantee you that will get his attention."

"Oh, god," Tommy said.

"That was your plan?" Sutan was actually impressed. "Maybe we need to be talking about plugs."

Another pained-sounding bark of laughter. "No sex toys on stage. I was thinking day off."

"In which case I think you'd get farther if you let Adam do his thing." Sutan leaned back and tapped his lip thoughtfully, a move calculated to distract Tommy from worrying at his thumbnail. It worked; Tommy looked at him. "Does he know you want this?"

"We've fooled around. I've asked. I've begged. He says I don't really want him to fuck me."

This was pretty much in line with what Adam had told Sutan, only he left out the begging part, replacing it with a clearly stupid theory that Tommy thought he had to say he wanted Adam to do him in order to keep his interest.

"That boy doesn't know what's good for him," Sutan said. And then he outlined his plan.

He explained to Tommy the ABCs of anal sex, recommended some good brands of lube, and said he wasn't kidding about the plugs if Tommy wanted to make sure he liked it before he got Adam to give it to him.

"Do you want me to come shopping with you?" Sutan offered. "I'm not sure what we'll find here, pity we're not still in New York—"

Tommy had shifted while he was listening and now there was enough light to see the flush that stained his cheeks. "That's okay," Tommy said. "I'm—that's okay."

Sounded like the boy already went shopping. Good for him. Not wanting to cripple him with embarrassment, Sutan went back to lecture mode. He covered cleanliness, common pitfalls, and gave an enthusiastic précis of prostate function which made Tommy giggle.

"Now," Sutan wound things up. "The morning of attack, do one last solo mission; fingers, dildo, plug, whatever you're working with, so you're feeling comfortable. Then shower. Go knock on Adam's door, bottle of lube and three condoms in hand. Not more than three, because that looks greedy, not less, because condoms can break, and you might want to go more than once. Not that Adam won't have some, but you want to look prepared."

Tommy nodded.

"Hand him the supplies, push him over to the bed, tell him you're done fooling around, you're done with him telling you you're straight, and you want him to fuck you 'til you can't breathe."

Tommy seemed to be having trouble breathing right then. "What if he laughs at me?" Tommy asked.

"Totally not going to be a problem." Sutan would make sure of that. Adam was careful, but he wasn't completely stupid. He was so gone on his bass player that he was going to implode soon, and Tommy clearly felt the same way. A discreet talk with Tranma about the difference between protecting your tour and making yourself and the guy you loved utterly miserable, and a Tommy who wouldn't take no for an answer, and Adam would come around.

"Thank you!" Tommy stood. "There's a CVS two blocks over, right?" he said, and without waiting for Sutan to answer, he slipped out the door.

Sutan went to find Adam.

Four days later, after being missing for their whole 24 hours off, Adam showed up for pre-show and practically poured himself into the makeup chair.

"Somebody got laid," Sutan said, not even pretending to reach for his kit.

"Fuck off," Adam said, grin nearly splitting his face in two.

"I told you, didn't I?"

"Fuck off."

"And you want him even more now that you know what you were missing, and it isn't going to kill the sexual tension on stage at all, is it?"

"I hate you."

"Uh huh, I can see the hate flooding off you in waves." Sutan gestured, taking in Adam's glow, his spread knees, the utterly relaxed set of his shoulders. "Oh, wait. That's pure satisfaction," he said, finally reaching for his brushes.

Forty-five minutes later Adam was out the door, off to meet a girl from the local paper, and Tommy wandered in, looking blissed out, if a little vaguer than usual.

"You," he said, "are my favorite person ever."

"Except for Adam," Sutan guessed.

"Except for Adam," Tommy agreed.

Sutan pushed him down in the makeup chair, since he only had one eye done. "My pleasure," he said, trying not to grin like a total sap, not that Tommy would notice in his current state. "Now let me help you with this."

Tommy closed his eyes and let Sutan get to work.




Heaps of thanks to bexless, atomic_dawn, and amazonziti for beta and cheerleading and reminding me that Sutan was on ANTM :D Responsibility for any remaining errors lies with me.