Eyes wide with shock, his lower lip caught gently between teeth, JC freezes beneath the kiss, absently notices that Chris’ mouth tastes of coffee, that his hand clutches fervently at his knee. For a moment, he is caught, doesn’t know what to do, until he feels Chris draw slowly back.

‘… don’t.’ he breathes.

‘Don’t… kiss you?’ Chris sounds confused, leans slightly away as though to try and peer at JC through the darkness. ‘Don’t… don’t what, man? Help a deluded idiot out here, a little, huh?’

His heart thudding loudly, skittering almost gleefully against ribs that feel suddenly too tight to contain him, JC feels the tingle of excitement ooze through his system, heating his face, sharpening his nerve endings, pooling warmly around his groin. He catches his lower lip between his teeth, feels the slight difference in the texture of his own skin, and huffs out a softly amused laugh at his own reaction.

It is the wrong thing to do.

Chris removes his hand from JC’s knee, wriggles backwards against the sliding gravel, pulls away through the darkness and almost hisses in his anger. ‘Jesus, JC, you don’t have to fuckin’ laugh at me! I get the fuckin’ hint, alright?’

The sense of excitement falters within JC, fades into a dull ache that clutches tightly at him, impulsive causes him to stretch out a hand that is impatiently, angrily batted away the moment it touches too-warm skin.

‘Don’t!’ Chris snarls, struggles to rise from the ground. ‘I don’t need your fuckin’ pity, JC!’

‘I wasn’t…’

‘Oh,’ Chris’ voice is hard, devoid of the humour and warmth that JC has previously found within it, and he is a towering shadow over JC’s slumped figure upon the ground. ‘I think you were.’

‘No -,’ he says quickly, is only vaguely aware of the breathlessness to his voice. ‘I was just…’

‘Yeah. Exactly.’

‘I was just thinking it’s been a long time since last anyone kissed me!’ he insists in a rush of words, a flow of embarrassed heat to his cheeks. He doesn’t think that he should be explaining himself, not to Chris whom he’s nigh on positive will do nothing more than use the admission, the confession of anonymous night against him at every opportunity, not to anyone. He doesn’t understand why he’s telling him anything, knows that he’s not to blame, that Lance seemingly isn’t the only one with issues… But he feels compelled to at least try to ease the irritated hurt from Chris’ voice. ‘And you sort of took me by surprise, there…’

‘So -,’ Chris’ voice is suspicious. ‘If there’d been a neon sign that flashed my intention to suck face with you, you wouldn’t have told me not to?’

JC frowns. He doesn’t remember saying anything of the sort, recalls only the fluttering ache within him. ‘Huh?’

‘You said “don’t”,’ Chris points out. He sounds aggravated still, and JC can make out the dim motion of an arm whipping out sideways in something that is probably akin to exasperation. Despite himself, he flinches back against the canvas wall. ‘I kissed you, you said “don’t”, so I won’t anymore.’ Chris insists. ‘O-fuckin’-kay?’

‘No.’

The sound of JC’s voice seems to surprise them both. Standing over him, Chris stills, whilst JC turns his gaze from the shadowed figure, stares blindly into the cool night air, breathes deeply, tries to understand when it was that his mouth started speaking without prior permission to do so from his brain.

Chris clears his throat, and JC knows, instinctively, that it is a prelude to speech – to words that he suspects he doesn’t wish to hear.

Scrambling to his feet, he reaches out with hesitant fingertips, brushes them against the sleeve of the sweater that Chris wears, feels the dried patches of streaked mud, the scratching sensation of cheap wool, and sighs. ‘I was finishing what I was saying before,’ he offers quietly. ‘That was all. I wasn’t saying “don’t kiss me”, Chris, I was…’

‘What?’

‘You said that you find your fun wherever you can,’ JC points out, managing to keep his voice light and steady, despite his sudden urge to yell. ‘Well, I don’t, Chris – I don’t find it funny in the slightest to kiss someone… to kiss me just because you’re bored!’

There is a moment of stunned silence between them, before Chris tugs his sleeve hastily away from JC’s fingers. ‘You think that’s what that was?’ he demands, his voice low with harsh surprise. ‘You think that’s why I kissed you?’

‘Well -,’ Uncertainly, JC frowns. ‘Yes.’ He says, then; ‘Be honest, Chris, anyone could have come wandering past and you’d probably have done exactly the same thing to them!’

‘Jesus…’ Chris breathes, sounds astonished by the quiet venom that traces its sinuous way through JC’s words. ‘You really have no fuckin’ clue, do you? I didn’t kiss you because I’m fuckin’ bored, JC!’

‘No?’

‘No! I kissed you because I could!’

‘And that’s supposed to make me feel better, is it?’ JC can feel anger rumbling through him; the nauseating churn of his stomach as vitriolic acid creeps in to taint the back of his throat with bile that rises the longer he imagines the tables turned – Chris pitying him as opposed to the alleged other way round. He wants to push, bite, shove, hurt - do something to distract himself from the blanket of darkness that hovers at the edges of his mind, memories of times long distant reverberating cruelly through his thoughts.

He doesn’t want to do this all over again.

‘Actually,’ Chris’ voice is hard, icy with words as yet unspoken, and JC thinks that he can feel the derision of his glare burn against his skin. ‘It was supposed to fuckin’ tell you something, JC…’

He stares at the darkened shape just in front of him. ‘Tell me what?’

‘Forget it.’

‘Tell me what?’ he demands, feels the tremble of anger writhe within him, curls his hands into tight fists in an effort not to lash out, not to retreat to the person he used to be before his parents made him seek the assistance of therapists.

Before they all made him feel as though his routines were all that he has in the world.

Through the gloom, Chris steps nearer, ignores the waves of irritation that sweep away from JC’s body to encroach upon his space. JC can hear him breathing: the soft whispers flowing smoothly between them, can feel the gentle sensation of warm mouthfuls of air touching against his own parched lips. He stands still, waits with tight spine and narrow eyes for Chris to snarl abuse, to tell him that he’s a fool, to push him away, to make him reconsider everything that he’s started to let go of in the hopes of a brighter world…

‘That we’re in exactly the same fuckin’ boat, JC -,’ Chris murmurs, tilts his head, kisses him.

The slide of lips against his own is tantalising, pushes the building rage temporarily to one side, along with confusion as to the meaning of Chris’ words, and JC gives in to it with reluctant ease, clutches for a moment longer to the sensation of bitter fury before the tremble in his limbs ceases to be about anger and starts to coalesce into lethargic need once more.

He feels hands scrabble against the shirt that he wears; push past the streaks of dirt-stained cotton onto skin that feels bruised, tender beneath determined fingertips, reaches out as he opens his mouth to say something – then falls quiet as Chris’ tongue surges forwards, entangles itself about his own tongue, and he groans, lowly at the sensation.

JC cannot remember the last time that someone kissed him – carries vague recollections of a rare party on campus, cheap alcohol and heady feelings of falling – but he suspects that it didn’t feel as good as Chris’ tongue in his mouth, hands pressed tight and flat against his skin, fingers spread to touch as much of his back as he possibly can, does…

When Chris’ teeth catch against the swollen curve of JC’s lip, he inhales sharply, pulls away and blinks dazedly through the gloom at the intent face before him. ‘Chris…’

‘This is usually where you’d freak out, man -,’ Chris rasps, his hands still touching JC’s back, yet the feel of their press is altered. No longer seems so connected within JC’s brain, feels instead as though their owner is retreating from him.

‘Why?’ JC asks, then; ‘You don’t know me.’

‘No -,’

‘You don’t know how I react to things.’

The laugh is soft, echoes with amusement and a dying sense of challenge, dies as Chris shakes his head. ‘No,’ he says again, ‘but I can guess, JC…’

‘And that’s your guess? That I freak out when someone kisses me?’

Beneath his hands, Chris shrugs, shifts forward to smile against the bend of his cheekbone. ‘Don’t know.’ He whispers, breath searing slightly burnt skin. ‘Maybe?’

Tilting his head, JC reaches for Chris’ mouth once more, feels himself shiver with the need to instigate a kiss, to convince the man pressed against him that he isn’t as fragile as he probably seems – that he has reserves of strength, need, hope not yet tapped into – but as he touches his lips against Chris’, JC hears the sudden shout of laughter from inside the marquee behind them…

And freezes.

Hesitantly, Chris draws back, rests his forehead carefully against JC’s shoulder, strokes a gentle path across his hipbone with the pad of a thumb. ‘This you proving me right?’ he asks, quietly, the marquee relatively quiet behind them once more.

‘No…’

‘Then what?’

JC smiles, dips his head, presses his teeth against the heated skin of Chris’ neck. ‘This is me saying “not here”,’ he murmurs.

‘Have to be your caravan.’ Chris tells him, lifts his head and bunts his mouth briefly against JC’s temple. ‘Fuckin’ lost the keys to mine.’

‘Yeah, you said.’ JC laughs, steps back, tugs Chris impatiently forwards. ‘C’mon,’ he says. ‘It’s okay…’