Deliverance - Hooch and Matt's Story (3 page)

“Can I?” If possible, Matt’s grin grew.

“Take my socks off?” Hooch groused.

“No, dickhead, the brace. I promise to put it back on.”

“You could start with the socks.” Hooch grinned, peering up, head raised with the two pillows on Matt’s bed. “Or with yourself.”

“Guess I could do that, or I could kiss you.”

“Not much I can do about that.” Hooch’s grin almost matched Matt’s by the time Matt was beside the bed, kneeling on the floor, and proceeded to kiss Hooch until either of them gave up or gave in, but neither did, and so they kissed until they were both breathless.

“Shit,” Hooch groaned.

“What, did I hurt you?” Matt’s alarm was almost comical.

“No, just too horny.”

Matt’s grin was part relief and part wickedness. “I can do something about that…” His hands were on the brace and then Hooch’s trousers, but when Matt pulled on the jeans, Hooch got jostled and had to clench his teeth not to groan. Matt slowed down, and together they managed to get them off, same with the briefs, until Matt could take off the socks while Hooch was getting out of the shirt himself. When Matt came back up to look down at Hooch’s naked body, for the first time in months, he was shocked at what he saw. Trying valiantly to hide it, but too late.

“I know.” Hooch drawled.

“Yeah.” Nothing Matt could say, and so he ran his hand over the far too thin body that had lost muscle mass and definition, but none of its allure. Not all of the tan was gone, and the surgery scar, still fairly fresh, stood in stark relief. No better than the burn wounds, those small round dots that were scattered across Hooch’s upper body with no sense nor pattern.

“You’ll get back into shape. I’ll make you a recovery PT program when you can use the gym.” Matt looked up, smiling.

“Eventually,” Hooch commented drily.

“Well, at least we have proof you’re alive.” Matt cocked his head, flashed  a grin and pointed at Hooch’s erection. “Been a while, right, buddy?”

“Yeah, lifetime.”

“Best I remind you, then.” Matt moved down, his lips touched Hooch’s cock, tongue drawing out and lapping, eliciting the deep groan that Hooch had suppressed earlier. His lips closed around the cut head, intent on sucking down, when Hooch awkwardly batted at him.

“No.”

“What?” Matt came up, surprised and confused, “why not?”

“I’m not tested.”

“Huh?”

“HIV. Can’t get tested yet.”

“I don’t understand…” Shock, fear, worry and confusion warred in Matt’s face. “But they didn’t…I mean…”

“No, they didn’t, but in that shithole…I had open wounds. Anything could have gone in. Blood, saliva, shit, piss, anything.” Hooch’s eyes were intense, haunted, and Matt twitched visibly. The glimpse of the horror was almost worse than knowing the full extent.

“The risk must be almost none.”

“I had every other crap, though.”

“But not that, come on, it’s not possible.”

“I don’t care.” Hooch reached for Matt’s shoulder, managed to pull him closer. “I’m not going to risk you. You understand?”

Looking at Hooch for a moment, Matt nodded slowly, acknowledging the ache that was gripping his insides. Heart or guts, he wasn’t sure, just this ache that intensified the longer he looked at Hooch. “Okay.”

“Handjob?” Hooch asked.

“I’d suck you with a condom.”

“No, no more goddamned rubber.” Too many gloves that had touched him in the hospital.

Matt nodded, got up and onto the bed to very carefully stretch out beside Hooch, still in his full uniform, boots and all. Managing not to jostle the mattress too much, he propped himself up on his elbow, grinning down at Hooch while his free hand began to lightly stroke the cock that had lost its erection. “Let’s see how still you can lie…”

He moved down to kiss Hooch again, whose hand found its way to Matt’s neck. Holding close, smelling, tasting, touching, and needing so goddamned much to feel alive, Hooch ignored the pain. Matt stroked faster, adding twists and using everything he’d ever known about Hooch’s preferences.

Eventually, Hooch felt his balls draw up and the pain of his orgasm almost blackened him out. He cried out, nearly a scream, which Matt swallowed in a deep kiss, not realizing that part of Hooch’s desperate attempts to remain still

and his complete abandon

was the blinding pain in his pelvis, fuelling the orgasm itself.

Matt drew back, hand still on Hooch’s cock, as he grinned down on him, watching him pant for breath, face sweaty, and something in Hooch’s expression that he’d never seen before. Something above and beyond mere lust. Being alive, maybe that was it.

“You alright?” Matt murmured.

“Yeah, shit. Couldn’t be better.” Hooch grinned, started to laugh and stopped himself immediately. Laughing was torture. “You?”

“I’m alright.” Matt smiled, wiping his hand on the bed linen.

“Bullshit.” Hooch looked at him.

“Okay…got me.” Matt laughed, “but how?”

“I want to watch. Stroke yourself.”

Matt nodded, eyes alight. “Guess I can do that.” He was soon kneeling on the bed, in full view, opening his BDUs and pushing down his briefs. Cock in hand, he began to stroke, all the time looking at Hooch, who didn’t take his eyes off him.

“Want to see you.” Hooch murmured, and Matt obliged. Ripping the tunic off, the t-shirt flew to the ground straight after, then returned to stroking himself. Muscles rolling and bunching beneath smooth skin. Perfectly chiseled and still as unblemished as the first time they’d had sex, in a safe house in the Gulf. Matt craned his head back, being watched intensified every sensation, and he slowed down for Hooch’s benefit, while tensing his abs and working with his body until each and every muscle stood out, as hard as his cock. When he sped up once more, his movements turned harsh, punishing, and his breath came fast and noisy.

He went over the edge with a strangled sound, cum splattering onto Hooch, catching himself in the last moment before he let himself fall down onto the bed. On his knees instead, struggling for breath and grinning down at Hooch, who was still watching him with burning intensity in his dark eyes.

“I was right.” Hooch murmured.

“What?”

“The sound you make when you come.”

Matt stared at Hooch, remembering every word in the hospital.

“I…”

But Hooch waved him down, pulling him into a kiss instead, only letting go of Matt’s neck when he broke the kiss and murmured, “you, you are quite something.”

Matt was confused, but Hooch said nothing else, too exhausted. He let Matt take care of both of them, wiping them both down.

“Want to go onto the couch?” Matt smiled, his hand splayed out on Hooch’s chest, fingers covering two of the burns.

“Give me an hour? Pretty damn wiped.”

“Sure.” Matt looked for the blanket, “mind if I stay?”

Hooch just snorted softly and Matt quickly got rid of the rest of his clothes, then lay down beside Hooch, pulling the blanket over both of them. Lying close, he breathed in the scent that was Hooch and yet was different. He’d be back to the old Hooch, though, he’d make sure. He’d lose the clinical scent, the otherness.

Matt lifted his head when he heard Hooch’s regular breaths, watching the face, relaxed in sleep. Forging this image over all of the ones of the past.

Hooch. Alive. Nothing else mattered.

* * *

Over two hours later, Matt had helped settle Hooch on the couch in the living room, in a pair of shorts underneath the brace, to watch a Dallas Mavericks game on TV. The remains of a chicken dinner stood on the table beside him, and a couple of empty Buds right next to it.

Hooch looked up and grunted a nonsensical question as Matt came back from the kitchen, dropping a letter into his lap.

Matt shrugged, gestured at the letter before wandering back into the kitchen to grab a couple of fresh beers. He stalled midway, fridge door open, breathing deeply. Had he done the right thing? Fuck knew, but he’d gone with his gut instinct and his gut had twisted into a knot at the thought of staying any longer in the ‘don’t ask - don’t tell’ pit of lies. He shook himself out of his musings, pushed the fridge door shut with his elbow and opened the bottles. Leaving enough time for Hooch to read.

When he stepped back into the main room of his small apartment, Hooch was holding the letter in his hand. “Why?”

Matt set the beer down onto the table and slouched on the chair which he’d pushed right next to the sofa. Feeling strangely reluctant to touch Hooch right now. ‘Why’, a good question. It had been perfectly clear in his mind at the time of making the decision. Putting it into words was suddenly a challenge and he took a good swig from his bottle, stalling for time, before looking at Hooch.

“I had enough.” It was that simple, when it came down to it.

“You loved it.”

“Yeah…” Matt shrugged. He had, being a Marine was what he’d always wanted. As a kid, playing soldier, as a teenager, and finally as a man. Before he realized how very much his sexuality was himself. Lying about that part of himself? He’d managed, until Hooch’s capture. Love was a strange and powerful thing, and entirely unplanned. “Had enough of the fucking lies,” he finally offered.

“Suddenly?”

“Yeah.” Wrong, and Matt drew in another breath, expelling it noisily. “No, but I thought I’d gotten used to it.”

“Had something to do with me.” Hooch made it a statement not a question, and Matt grimaced. At least Hooch didn’t ask him if he knew what he was doing, accepting Matt’s decision as what it was: final.

Matt suddenly raised his head in anger. Aggression born out of frustration, but damn, Hooch had changed the rules of this game entirely. “Fucking yes! It has to do with you. Not knowing, not being able to ask, just lies. Lies and more lies. No grieving allowed, not a fucking thing. Couldn’t contact your family, haven’t got a fucking clue where they are, and Texas is damned big. Couldn’t even pretend I was your buddy, in case anyone wondered why the fuck a Marine was buddies with a Delta. No messages, not a fucking thing and I was going insane!” Matt was getting more agitated, and he stood up. “I was so fucking desperate, I would have tried anything. But who the fuck was I? Just some stupid fucking Marine who was going off the edge, not knowing if he’s lost the fucking man he fucking loves!”

Matt was fuming, but Hooch didn’t show a reaction, except for a quiet, “do you?”

“What?” Matt snapped.

“Do you?” Hooch calmly repeated.

Matt felt as if all air had been driven out of his lungs. Deflated, he sat back down on the sofa. “Yeah.”

Hooch nodded, folded the letter and placed it back on the table. “Okay.”

Matt looked at him in confusion, then shook his head with a frustrated grunt. Hooch was still as exasperating as he’d always been, and Matt really didn’t appreciate feeling like an idiot right now. “What the fuck does ‘Okay’ mean?”

“Got a job offer.”

“Huh?” Matt leaned closer, “what?”

“Promotion. They want me to train Delta. Stationed in Fort Bragg.” Hooch shrugged, “no more battlefields.”

Frowning, Matt tried to make sense and get an indication what Hooch thought about this, but no chance. “You’re not that old yet, you got some years left on active duty.” Pointing at Hooch’s pelvis, “and the injury’s not cause for retirement from active duty, is it?”

“Probably not. They’ll know in a few months. Recovery can be up to a year.”

“Then what are you going to do? They can’t force you, can they?”

Hoch shrugged, “no, not yet.”

“Well,” Matt drew in a breath, “that’s alright then. Back to normal once you’ve regained your health and strength.”

“No.”

“No?” Exasperation was creeping into Matt’s voice.

“I take it.”

“You…
what
?” Matt leaned forward that abruptly, he almost slid off the chair.

“It’s time.”

“Why?” Painfully aware of how he echoed Hooch, whose lips quirked into the customary half-grin. Taking hold of the waistband of Matt’s shorts, Hooch twisted his fist into the fabric and pulled him up and close, while Matt could do nothing but follow the motion, letting himself drop onto his knees on the rug in front of the sofa.

“What now?” Matt raised both brows.

Hooch’s fist twisted tighter, pulling Matt even closer, until there was no further to go without jostling him. “You tell me. You’ll be out of a job.”

Matt rolled his eyes, “I’m going to open a fitness club with the money I’ve saved. It’ll be based on military fitness training.”

Hooch grinned. “You’ll be fucking rich.”

“Question is, where do I settle down? I have no fucking clue.”

“Fayetteville.”

“You’re not fucking serious!” Matt’s eyes widened, “that’s right next to Fort Bragg.”

“Precisely. Camp beds are shit.”

“How the fuck are you going to explain living with a gay guy? Because I’m fucking sick of lying.”