(no subject)

[thedreamthief]

It's not that Ronan hadn't considered Tris a fighter. It'd been obvious from his first day here that she could hold her own, just in the set of her shoulders and the tilt of her jaw. There's a little too much about Tris that reminds him of himself, in ways he finds entirely uncomfortable.

Which probably explains why he doesn't particularly like her.

And now, with aching sides and a bruised stomach, not to mention the gash across his brow from a well-placed knee, Ronan really doesn't like her. Ronan at least had gotten in some good hits of his own, but it'd been obvious right from the start that she'd been trained, and trained well. Ronan took boxing lessons when he was a kid, but he's never been trained in mixed fucking martial arts.

From what he can remember, Adam's scheduled at the garage for a few more hours so, using the key he'd dreamt up a week ago, Ronan lets himself in, quiet and efficient. There's no point going to his own allotted apartment, not when there's next to nothing in it in the way of first aid equipment and there's not a chance in hell he's risking Gansey seeing before he has to. Definitely not before he's no longer bleeding.

He doesn't particularly want Adam to see either if he can help it.

Which is unfortunate.

The door clicks closed behind him and scowls at Adam. "Aren't you supposed to be working right now?"

Comments

[thedreamthief]

Ronan doesn't need to ask. If he knows anything about Adam at all -- this one or the one from home -- it's that he doesn't do anything without being sure. Even when he's scared, even when he doesn't know the possible outcome, Adam is brave.

Swallowing, Ronan makes himself keep still. He can be brave, too.

He stays still and close, looking at Adam's lips again as he whispers, "So what about Krem?"

[incognoscibilis]

Of all the questions that Ronan could have asked, Adam hadn't expected that one. What about Krem indeed. They were friends and, frankly, had about ten years between them. Krem and Adam had been new to the city together a bonded based on mutual fear and uncertainty, then become friends.

It wasn't the same as what he and Ronan had gone through together and would go through.

"There wasn't anything between us." Honestly, he would have thought that Ronan would be making suppositions about Blue if anyone.

"I can't be as obvious with Kavinsky. I won't be able to dream a Mitsubishi for you and I'd never text since you hate your phone. But I do like you, Ronan Lynch."

[thedreamthief]

Ronan frowns at the mention of Kavinsky, unsure of what exactly that's supposed to mean. Maybe Kavinsky is to Adam what Krem is to Ronan, though the similarities between the two are almost non-existent. Ronan may not trust Krem or particularly like him, but Kavinsky is a entirely separate level of asshole.

Adam's words should be a comfort, or something like it. They should make him warm and relaxed and hopeful. But he still feels off-kilter, wary of showing his hand.

His lips curl into a mean sort of grin. "Was that the hardest thing you've ever admitted to?"

[incognoscibilis]

There was no comparison. Krem was a friend. Kavinsky was...Adam struggled to find the appropriate word before his mind settled on thief. Ronan was the Greywaren and Kavinsky had been a common dream thief who wanted to steal Ronan too.

He's almost glad Ronan doesn't remember that lost weekend.

"No," he says. "If this was something strange or awful, then it might be hard, but it isn't." The hard part was letting himself be wanted, in trusting that this was something real instead of the desperate need to be desirable. This was real. Ronan was real. What Adam felt was real.

"Kissing you was the easiest part. It was the one that made sense."

[thedreamthief]

"It's easier to kiss someone than to admit like them," Ronan clarifies, though Adam's response still needles under his skin, curls around his core. His gaze drops to Adam's lips again and lingers.

He can be brave, he reminds himself.

"You know it's more than that," he manages eventually. "You came here knowing more than I do. Does it get harder from here?"

[incognoscibilis]

"I know," he said. "I know it's more than that. It's why I waited to be sure." Ronan was right though. The kissing was easy. So was reaching out and threading fingers into Ronan's, even if he had to be mindful of bruised and split knuckles.

On impulse, he raised Ronan's hand to his mouth, brushing his lips against the bruises.

Against his skin, Adam admitted, "I didn't mean for this to happen in the bathroom."

[thedreamthief]

Somehow, the brush of Adam's lips against his split knuckles feels more intimate than the kiss and his breath catches, eyes wide and staring. It still feels like a dream, like a dozen he's had before while sleeping and awake.

But better.

His lips quirk, faintly. "You actually had this planned?"

[incognoscibilis]

"For once, I didn't have this down to a perfect plan," Adam said, wearing his most serious expression to point out the humor.

There had been a thousand mental rehearsals, his nightly game of choosing the words for his favor from Glendower shifting into an attempt at the most elegant way of saying he knew what Ronan felt and that he felt the same. None of what he said now was precise or elegant at all but at least it was true.

"D'you still want to crash here, then?"

[thedreamthief]

"I didn't come here to sleep," Ronan says, refusing to release Adam's hand. Not yet.

Then again, maybe Adam doesn't mean now, maybe he means all the times Ronan breaks into Adam's apartment because he can't handle the loneliness of his tent or the sterile walls of his own apartment.

"We still have a pizza to eat," he points out, though he doesn't pull away. It's like this bathroom is a safe bubble, a dream bubble. The second it bursts, so does the dream. Reality will come crashing in.

[incognoscibilis]

Adam shot back one of Ronan's own smirks at the suggestion, but didn't otherwise acknowledge that if he wasn't here to sleep, well...

It didn't have to be like that. Maybe Ronan didn't even want that. Adam could barely understand that Ronan wanted this of him at all.

"We do."

He didn't let go of his hand either.

[thedreamthief]

It isn't difficult to interpret Adam's smirk, but he doesn't comment on it. Five minutes ago, he wasn't even sure if Adam had any interest beyond girls; taking the leap to anything beyond holding hands seems terrifying.

But, again, he reminds himself he can be brave, too.

Ronan squeezes Adam's hand, lightly. "I'd rather kiss you again."

[incognoscibilis]

"In the bathroom?"

Adam squeezed his hand and stood up, pushing away from the bathtub and toward Ronan. It gave him the room to scrutinize the cut on Ronan's eyebrow, which didn't seem to be bleeding anymore. The result would likely be a nasty scar, but he was under the impression that Ronan didn't mind.

"Couch is more comfortably than the edge of the tub."

[thedreamthief]

Ronan feels his stomach drop out as Adam stands, the rejection swift but gentle.

Except Adam leans in then too, eyes fixed on Ronan's eyebrow, assessing. He swallows, still craving Adam's touch but heading into the other room all the same.

Too afraid to presume, Ronan stands and pushes past Adam into the living room. The pizza remains untouched on the kitchen counter and Ronan eyes it for a second before walking to the couch. He lifts a hand to his brow as he sits down, touching the sore skin there lightly and checking his finger for traces of blood. "Should leave a mean fucking scar," he says with a slight grimace. "Maybe I'll tell people I got attacked by a mountain lion."

[incognoscibilis]

"Better a mountain lion than a small, angry girl." He should have known better after being friends with Blue; tiny people had a higher concentration of explosive rage. On her, it was impressive, as opposed to Adam when he raged and it was just tragic.

"Makes you look dashing." Adam set the pizza down in front of them and sat by Ronan, thighs bumping together as he looked over to him. "Still rather kiss again?"

[thedreamthief]

"Never said she was tiny," Ronan points out, but it's a week argument and the only one he has.

He drops his hand away to rub his palm against the knee of his jeans, nervous and awkward. He glances at the pizza and then back to Adam, relieved that Adam's brought it up again. There are a million things he wants to say, and most of them he can't. None of these feelings are new to him, but he's under the impression they are for Adam. He won't push.

Swallowing, his eyes drop to Adam's lips again. He sucks in a breath and nods. Always, he wants to say. At least until I wake up.

As hard as his heart is beating, he finds he can't form words at all.

[incognoscibilis]

They were only new to Ronan. Adam had had weeks, a whole summer all over again, to contemplate the Ronan who brought him presents at the garage and gave him a cinnamon-scented bicycle. All of that regained time had let him decide.

It gave him the space to be confident. Or whatever it was that passed for confidence in someone like Adam Parrish. Brave, maybe, which was not quite the opposite or the same as confidence. Brave enough to kiss Ronan again.

"I'm real, you know," Adam says against his mouth. "This is real."

[thedreamthief]

Maybe if Adam says it enough, Ronan will eventually start to believe him. Or maybe he'll wake up in a world where they're their true selves, the ones they each remember, and the normalcy will pull them back into some other reality, one where this never happens.

For now though, Ronan can't find it in his power to deny himself.

"Then kiss me for real," he whispers against Adam's lips, reaching up to curl his hand around the back of Adam's neck and pulling him in.

[incognoscibilis]

Shit. Later, he would have to tell Ronan that that growl of his just shot right down his spine. Adam was suddenly aware that their kisses had been gentle, chaste things and he wasn't at all in the mood for things to stay that way.

Was this how Ronan had felt with Adam's hand curled at his neck? It was like some kind of inexorable pull, like two planets that were bound to crash together.

Kissing Ronan felt natural. When he'd dated Blue, Adam had had to analyze what it might be like to kiss her. Now, instinct told him when to part his lips, to press harder.

[thedreamthief]

Adam does exactly as Ronan asks, his lips parting on an exhale, releasing warm breath against Ronan's mouth before he returns it with his own. It doesn't feel like kissing Grantaire - that had been all harshness, all teeth and tongue in pursuit of an ends. This is kissing because Ronan wants to kiss, because maybe Adam does, too.

He's shaking before he realizes is, though he hopes it isn't obvious, whining instead as he licks lightly into Adam's mouth, testing. Ever touch, every further, lingering moment, it feels more impossible.

But Ronan can't stop.

[incognoscibilis]

It was a noise that Adam didn't think Ronan capable of making, all soft and plaintive, but of course Ronan could be soft if he let himself. If he wanted and they both wanted. Making a fist in Ronan's shirt was easy, so was moving over him, propped up on bent knees and elbow.

Kissing Ronan like he needed him to breathe was easy.

[thedreamthief]

Adam moves swiftly, a hand fisted tight in Ronan's shirt before he's straddling Ronan's lap, a knee on either side of Ronan's thighs and Ronan's hands immediately drop to Adam's sides.

"Fuck," he breathes, breaking the kiss with a quiet, overwhelmed laugh.

It doesn't feel like any dream Ronan's ever had, but it still doesn't feel real either. Not with Adam's skin warm beneath fabric and Ronan's palms, Adam's breath warm against his lips. He lifts his hand from Adam's side to cup his jaw, thumb grazing along cheekbone and corner of mouth. He pulls Adam in to kiss again, slow and sweet, exploratory.

[incognoscibilis]

"Yeah." He hadn't expected it to be like this, but maybe he should have. Once the gate was opened, there was nothing to stop them from crashing through it like idiots. "What do we..."

Where would they stop? Would they even want to? Adam got the very real sense that they were at a precipice and they needed to make a choice. At least as far as what happened tonight.

Or he could just let Ronan's kiss go sweet and let his mind go swimmy with the affection of it.

[thedreamthief]

It's not like any kiss Ronan's shared before, sweet and wet and hesitant. Ronan doesn't know how many people Adam has kissed in his life, if it's only been Blue or if there have been others. Not that it matters. All that matters right now is the taste of Adam's lips, the slick slide of his tongue, the ragged hush of his breathing.

He pauses only long enough to shake his head and whisper against Adam's lips. "Just don't stop kissing me." His hand slides back into Adam's hair, strands soft between Ronan's fingers. "Please? Not yet."

[incognoscibilis]

Academically, Adam had known that Ronan had been different before Niall Lynch's death, but it was never a Ronan he had observed. Now, for the first time, Adam thought he might be getting a glimpse. Ronan and sweet or Ronan and vulnerable were not typically words he associated, but there he was, voice soft and touch gentler than Adam thought Ronan capable.

"I won't," he said.

[thedreamthief]

It isn't an open-ended promise and, even if it were, Ronan wouldn't hold him to it. Adam may be certain of his feelings as they are now, but feelings change.

And Adam's too sensible to stick himself with Ronan for too long.

For now, Ronan will take what he can get though, relief and gratefulness rushing through his veins as he cradles Adam's face with two hands, gently thumbs at his jaw to lick lightly between full lips. He feels drunk on this, indulging far past moderation and he eventually forces himself to stop, pulling back reluctantly though his fingers remain on Adam's face, memorizing the shape and touch beneath his fingertips.