Platonic (30 page)

CHAPTER 15

They make it to late October. It’s almost six months since Daniel left and almost four since they last saw each other. Everything seems so perfectly fine with them that as Mark slowly spirals down into something ugly, he feels himself drifting even further because he knows Daniel has no idea. Mark can’t bring himself to clip his emails shorter, to share less of his day, to love Daniel anything short of all the way. And yet he knows he’s losing his grip because he feels miserable and work is no longer providing the distraction he needs.

Some nights he’s angry with Daniel for not noticing the unnoticeable. On others he is angry with himself for not being able to handle this as beautifully as Daniel always does. And he’s terrified that if Daniel knew how badly he felt, the entire thing would be off and they’d be lost to each other again.

He spends far, far too much time inside his own head and without a confidant because his best friend is across the Atlantic and increasingly busy with a career and new friends. It’s achingly familiar.

Then Mark loses a case and can’t get out of bed on Sunday early enough to pick Max up and go for a run.

He finally slips up and skips an email to Daniel; every time he starts to write it, his throat tightens and his hands ball into fists. He drinks a bottle of wine and then opens another, collapses on the couch and watches the worst porn he can find until he’s wrung two orgasms from his body and is exhausted enough to sleep.

A few mornings later, complete distrust in the future clouds his mind, like an itch at the base of his spine he can’t reach, and he wonders if it is all truly worth it. He misses Daniel, clearly, in ways that Daniel isn’t missing him. He wonders if it’s because he loves Daniel more and then hates himself for thinking it. He’s never understood his deep ache for intimate proximity before, but that’s what this is. He had it with Jason even more than he ever suffered it with Daniel. Those few months when he’d felt as if he was in love, when he’d finally enticed Jason out of his clothes and into bed, Jason was right there but was never close enough, never ever intimate enough.

His skin prickles, wanting Daniel’s body against him, wanting immediate and full-bodied responses right there in front of him: laughter and tears, ticklishness and fever—just being there. He misses Daniel, but there’s nothing he can ask of him that will help.

That night, when he loses himself in more shitty porn and cheap wine, he sees a pop-up ad that makes his fingers hover before he closes it.

Meet Locals in Your Area.

He’d cheated on Jason so easily. With Daniel it would be infinitely harder and it would tear him apart. He couldn’t—but the moment of temptation was there anyway. He sighs and calls Daniel straight away.

Daniel’s voice is bleary on the line. “Mark?”

Mark stares at a spot on the wall and bites down on his lip, and Daniel calls his name again, voice coming awake: “Mark?”

“I miss you,” he says, and his voice is wrecked, choking. “I… I need something but I don’t know what.”

He can hear the rustle of sheets and closes his eyes, imagines Daniel naked and sitting up under sun-honeyed sheets. It makes him smile, just for a second. “What do you need, sweetheart?” Daniel asks.

“You,” Mark says, and then it all floods out: the case, the wine, the porn, the hookup ad and how terrified he is that somehow he’s ended up in this more deeply than Daniel could ever be.

“I didn’t do anything, nothing to jeopardize this, I thought about it, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I called you instead,” Mark tells him.

“And I am so, so proud of you for doing that.” Daniel says and Mark can tell he means it. “I know this is hard, but we’re almost halfway through and we can do this. This—you—are more important to me than anything.”

“Except your work,” Mark accuses bitterly, and then bites down on his bottom lip again.

“No,” Daniel tells him, “Not except my work. You’re… you must hear how silly we sound: so in love after a few days together. But I am right there with you and you
are
more important than my work. This year will set me up with clients and money for a decade and then I can focus fully on you.” Mark breathes. “Say the word and I will get on a plane and come to you.”

“No,” Mark says, “I overreacted to… to God knows what. I’m being silly.”

“You’re not being silly. But we need to work out what you need. And don’t ever think you’re in this more than me, don’t ever…” He trails off and Mark can hear him take a deep breath. “Rita never told you about Nic, did she?”

Mark searches his mind but he can’t remember. He’s been trying not to talk to Rita about Daniel lately because it hurts, and most of the time none of it makes sense when he says it out loud.

“I fell in love with a guy even though we said it was casual. He had dark curly hair and the cutest little upturned nose—he had green eyes that were exactly like yours, and I tried so hard not to see it. He was in New York just because; he was a waiter, a musician, an artist, and I fell for him by accident. When he left me it hurt so much. That was only the second breakup I had to withstand, and for him it wasn’t even a breakup.

“That was a year before I saw you and Ben on that street corner. It was… I mean it had to be six or seven years after high school. Understand me when I admit this: I never got over you either and I am in this just as deep as you are.”

It washes over Mark slowly, Daniel’s story, and he remembers halfway through that Rita has told him bits of it, warned him to be just as careful with Daniel’s heart as with his own. The idea that Daniel never got over him crystallizes as reality and he shudders to think that half an hour before he was contemplating ending it because it all felt too hard.

“Mark?”

“I’m here.”

“I get that this is harder for you than it is for me, I don’t understand why; maybe we need therapy or better friends or maybe this is just the way it is. But this not working out isn’t an option anymore because it will destroy me. Tell me what I need to do to get you through this.”

“I really…” Mark breathes out a sigh of relief and as he breathes in the frustration creeps back because he doesn’t know. He lets out a groan. “I really just need you and I can’t have you and I hate it.”

“The physical closeness?”

“The having you right here to touch, yeah.”

Mark can hear Daniel thinking, moving around his apartment on the other side of the world, and he yawns.

Daniel must hear it because he asks, “How tired are you?”

“A bit, I guess. I haven’t been sleeping well.”

He can hear Daniel sigh. “You should get some sleep and I should actually get up and attempt an early start to the week.”

Mark doesn’t mean to make the small pathetic sound that escapes him but he does.

“What time do you have to be up for work?”

“Seven.”

“Okay, I want you to get up at six and I’ll Skype you for an hour, try to figure more of this out.”

This time Mark’s sigh isn’t as angry or bitter, though somehow he’s now both worried and relieved. He lets the week of fatigue creep up his spine. “Thank you,” he says.

“Thank you for calling. Go to bed and dream of me, I’ll talk to you in the morning.”

***

When Mark’s alarm goes off at five-thirty, he actually manages to pull himself from his bed and into the shower. He washes and shaves and styles his hair for work. He pulls on lime-green underwear, jeans and an old T-shirt for the time being, leaving his suit and shirt hanging on his closet door. Then he sits and fidgets in front of his computer.

By the time Daniel’s Skype call comes through, Mark has realized that it’s the middle of Monday for him, so his very first question is: “Are you sure I’m not keeping you from something important?” The next question is: “Where on earth are you?”

Daniel is clearly sitting in the center of a made bed—not the one in the apartment; this is far nicer, with rich reds and golds tinting the walls around it and the pillows behind him.

“Hotel,” Daniel explains, grinning conspiratorially.

Mark just pulls a face. He is already breathing easier because he is able to just… pull a face and communicate.

“Work’s busy. I canceled a meeting—and I do not mind at all—but if I had gone home it would have been three hours by the time I came back. I grabbed a room here; it’s a three-minute walk back to the office. So I can spend all my time with you.” He grins again.

“Daniel, that’s insane.”

Daniel just shrugs, and Mark wonders for the hundredth time exactly how much this year-long assignment is paying. He hasn’t asked and Daniel hasn’t told him, because theoretical joint bank accounts are one thing, but actually discussing the reality of Daniel coming home and them adopting the lifestyle he can afford, together, leads to questions of cohabitation and marriage and children, all of which they continue to discuss completely in the abstract.

That Daniel has spent more money than Mark would consider wise on a hotel room—for just an hour—is making him slightly uncomfortable.

“I have an idea that might help us,” Daniel says. “And it requires privacy, and I want so badly to make you feel better.”

Mark blinks slowly at him. He can already feel his skin tightening over his muscles, his blood running a bit faster through his veins with the implication of Dan’s crooked smile and raised eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“I know it’s never as good as when we’re together but I’m gonna try really hard, okay?” Mark nods at him. “Get undressed for me?”

It’s not as though they’ve never done the Skype sex thing. It’s been six months and needs are needs, but Skype always sounds so loud in Mark’s little apartment and it’s usually just fast, desperate jerking off. Mark can already tell that this is going to be different.

Mark loses the jeans and the shirt he’d thrown on, takes his glasses off and leaves them on his bedside table. He sets his laptop down at the foot of the bed and scootches back to lean against the pillows.

“Nice undies,” Daniel teases when Mark’s settled there. “Take them off.”

Mark doesn’t point out that he will be entirely naked while Daniel will still be dressed impeccably in black pants and a light, asymmetrically zippered sweater. He just does as he’s told, gives over all his control and does so happily.

“This needs to be about my hands on you, okay?” Daniel asks and Mark nods. “So, lighter touches, more skimming, less rubbing, if that makes sense.”

Just as Daniel’s hands have always been.

It makes sense. Mark closes his eyes and remembers every moment they’ve spent over together, trying to capture the phantom touch of his boyfriend as he runs his hands up his own thighs.

He touches himself lightly, skimming from his knees to his hips and then back down, just rustling over the hair there.

“Thumbs on your hipbones,” Daniel says and Mark does as he’s told, caressing them back and forth the way Daniel always does.

He gasps and closes his eyes. “Better than on your own?” Daniel asks.

Opening his eyes, Mark nods soundlessly. “Not as good as you, but… this is nice. This is good.”

“Good. Keep going for me.” Mark’s eyelids fall closed again. “Up your waist and cross your arms over, hands over your chest and then back down. Again, for me.”

Mark swallows the saliva in his mouth and wishes he had someone to kiss.

“You like when I scratch you,” Daniel offers, “just lightly, up and down, up and down.” This is soothing as much as it is arousing and instead of thinking of Daniel there, in a hotel room in London, Mark imagines him here, with him. “Over your nipples and around. God I love your nipples, love doing this to them for hours. Even though I haven’t, not for hours—not yet.”

Mark doesn’t think they’ve ever had hours, not properly, not without the press of time around them. They’ve never been properly lazy with one another, never focused so much on one touch when there are a thousand others they always race to get to. “Keep going in circles. Back down to your belly.”

Mark lets out a happy sigh and smiles.

“Back up your body, nice and slow for me, heavy hands but fingertips still…”

“Soft,” Mark responds.

“Yeah. You know how I like to spread my hands over your chest? Fingers dipping down your ribs and thumbs over your nipples, flicking back and forth?”

Mark does. Daniel always does this when he’s sitting over him. For effect, to instruct perhaps, Daniel does it to himself now, over his nice jacket, as Mark watches him from across the Atlantic. With his arms crossed over himself, Mark traces his hands up just as Daniel asks and lets out another sigh that takes some of the tightness and angst away with it.

“I like being able to feel your heartbeat,” Daniel tells him, “and how fast you’re breathing.” Daniel watches him for a long minute as Mark’s thumbs dance back and forth over his hard nipples and his breath gets louder and shallower.

“Okay, sweetheart, now my hands go down your sides and onto your thighs.” It’s impossible for Mark to make it happen this way with his arms crossed but he just knits his brow for a second and then places his hands on his legs. “I love your thighs, love how long and lean your legs are, love leaning my weight there and feeling the muscle. You’re going to have to fight me to go jogging with you when I get home, but I’ll end up doing it, just to watch you move.”

Mark squeezes his thigh muscles and feels his ass flex in response. He blinks his eyes open for a second and locks eyes with Daniel. He mouths, “Thank you,” and Daniel smiles at him. Mark lets his eyes fall shut again.

Daniel drags it out for forty-five minutes, this light touching and mapping of skin, coaching Mark on how to touch himself as he would if he were there—with hands used to needles and thread, charcoal blocks and paintbrushes and thin lead pencils. When he’s got Mark sweating and leaning back on one hand, hips rocking up into the air, cock hard and jutting out, he tells him to touch himself.

Mark’s hand goes around the base of his cock immediately and tugs a fast stroke up.

“No,” Daniel interrupts, laughing at Mark’s eagerness, and Mark freezes. “Light touches, like mine. When I’m teasing.”