"Everyone I love?" Nick asks Olive, his voice shaky. She nods, and he closes his eyes and takes a couple seconds to continue, as he remembers everything.
I didn't want to hurt anyone again.
***
He's at a bar, having an illegal drink on a first-class fake ID, but he's alone. He picks up the shot glass and tilts it back and forth, watching the alcohol shift so smooth. The light catches it and for an instant the liquor isn't clear but an off-yellow, and his mind flashes back to soft tan skin, slick with sweat. He takes the shot.
***
When people ask, he says he likes Philadelphia. But people don't ask, much, so he doesn't have to lie all that often. He misses Jacksonville, though in an abstract way. It was where he learned what he could do, how he could make other people feel. Olive always told him it was his superpower, and that no one else in the world was like him, and he felt special.
But he's not in Jacksonville anymore, and he's not supposed to let people know what he can do. It's hard to control—but if someone suddenly feels lonely even in a sea of friends at a lunch table in the cafeteria, they blame it on being a teenager, on hormones—not on high school freshman Nick Lane, sitting alone with his peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
Kendra's doing a lot better than he is. She's sixteen and pretty, and he's fourteen and—well. Tall for his age, thin and kind of gawky, a mess of blond hair cut jagged on his head. Kendra takes home a boyfriend only a few weeks after their first day of school in Philadelphia. Nick takes home unnecessary extra credit homework for his English class because he doesn't have anything else to do.
Nick's in the basement in the den. He likes it here because his bedroom is just down the hall past the bathroom, and when people come over he doesn't want to talk to—(doesn't want to affect with his—superpower)—he can hide without them knowing, go into his room and play that new Radiohead cassette he got over and over until they go away.
He's just writing a response to a question about Twelfth Night when he hears the slam of the front door upstairs. He cocks his head to the side and listens, hears two sets of footsteps walking overhead and then the soft laughter of his sister, followed by a male voice. Young. Not his dad. Kendra's boyfriend, then. Nick heard about him last night at dinner, when their mom wheedled it out of Kendra over mashed potatoes and gravy.
"He's a nice guy, Mom," Kendra had said.
"Ask him over for dinner tomorrow," their dad had said, and it wasn't a suggestion. Kendra had nodded and finished her potatoes.
Nick picks up his books and papers and stands, about to retreat to his room. But before he can take a step, the door to the basement bursts open and a heavy tread comes down the stairs. Nick ducks his head but looks up at the guy, who has paused at the bottom of the stairs in surprise at finding Nick. The other guy purses his lips and squints at Nick. He leans sideways a little and then points at him. "Are you the brother?" he asks.
"I'm Nick."
"Right, Nick. I'm Lincoln." Lincoln walks forward and holds out his hand to Nick, who stares dumbly for a second before shifting all his books to his left arm so he can shake Lincoln's hand with his right one.
"Whatcha got there?" Lincoln asks, pointing at the books.
"Just some English homework," Nick mumbles, and moves to step around Lincoln to get to his bedroom, but Lincoln blocks his way and grabs his wrist gently, making Nick stop.
Nick blinks rapidly and glances up at Lincoln, hoping Lincoln can't feel the sudden inexplicable ratatatat of his heartbeat. Lincoln is looking at the textbook Nick is holding, and Nick takes the opportunity to notice the blue of his eyes is familiar—almost the same shade of the blue of Nick's own eyes. Nick flushes and tries to step away from Lincoln now that he's read the title of the book, but Lincoln won't let go. Nick nervously pulls at his wrist and locks eyes with Lincoln, seeing there a strange flicker of recognition.
Lincoln narrows his eyes and stares into Nick's face, and Nick finds himself caught between the instinct to run and the desire to stay. His eyes dart from looking at Lincoln's hand to his eyes to his—his lips? Nick almost whimpers, uncomprehending at what he's feeling. He's not—he's not gay—he's not anything, he doesn't think about that, but—
"Lincoln? What are you doing down there?" Kendra calls from upstairs, and in a flash Lincoln has let go of Nick's wrist and sprung back a step. Nick speed-walks to his room and shuts the door behind him, the alarmed and confused look on Lincoln's face the last thing he sees—now burned into his memory.
***
He's humiliated. Dinner is awful—he sits down and eats, doesn't say a word to anyone, doesn't look up from his mac and cheese. It doesn't matter; Kendra and Lincoln and his parents do all the talking, Lincoln gamely telling them about living in New Jersey—"Just a 20-minute bus ride out of New York City, but we didn't go in as often as you'd think"—and Kendra telling them about how she and Lincoln met in their junior year history class, when they got paired up to do an in-class assignment of a timeline of the Civil War—"We argued about everything, but Lincoln was usually right," Kendra admits—and Nick can just sit there until he is allowed to leave, wallowing in terror that his mood is going to reach out to all of them and spoil the whole dinner. He pinches hard on his inner thigh to stop thinking about what happened, but every time he risks a glance up, Lincoln's blue eyes are intent and dark staring at him across the table, reminding him what he did.
When dinner is finally, mercifully over, he bolts out of his chair to head downstairs, but his dad calls after him, "Nick. Dishes."
Nick closes his eyes and blows out a quick breath, trying to calm down. He balls his hands into fists and then flexes them out, focusing on the stretch in his palms to distract his mind from the panic flooding in.
Distantly, he hears someone say, "Oh, I'll help," and then Kendra and his mother saying in a chorus, "Oh, no, you don't have to do that!" The polite insistence of Lincoln's voice finally breaks Nick out of his reverie and he turns around, heads back into the kitchen, and starts running the hot water.
"You really don't have to help," he says to Lincoln, who has sidled up next to him with a dish towel, ready to dry.
"I want to," Lincoln says softly, and Nick can't help himself from looking over at him.
They're about the same height—Nick might have half an inch on him—but Lincoln seems taller, bigger. There's a confidence about him that should seem intimidating, even scary, but is instead simply reassuring. Lincoln knows who he is. Those types of people are harder to affect, Nick's noticed. If Nick can control himself while they wash dishes, Lincoln won't feel anything he's not supposed to feel and they can part ways pleasantly, what happened in the basement a distant memory.
Lincoln has other plans.
"What was that, downstairs?" he asks Nick once Kendra and their parents have gone into the sitting room to watch TV.
Nick drops the plate he's holding into the water, splashing himself. He looks down at his shirt and grimaces, then picks up the plate again and keeps scrubbing it.
"I don't know what you mean," he says carefully to Lincoln.
"Oh, come on," Lincoln says, lowering his voice. "That was—something. It wasn't nothing."
Nick suppresses the memory, knowing thinking about it—Lincoln's grip tight on his wrist, Lincoln's face inches from his own—will only bring back the emotions, and that's the last thing he wants right now.
"It wasn't—it wasn't what you think," Nick stammers. "I—um—I didn't like—I didn't like you holding my wrist."
He hears Lincoln chuckle a little next to him. "Are you sure about that?" Lincoln murmurs, plucking the plate out of Nick's hand, rinsing it, and drying it with the towel.
Nick stands there, hands sitting in the water, fingers pruning. He closes his eyes and bites down on his lip hard to stop himself from acknowledging the twist of heat that's spiked from his chest to his groin. This isn't real, it's not him, it's you, stop it, stop it, what are you doing, you don't even like boys, you don't even like anybody, it's not okay, stop, stop, stop, stop—
"Nick?" Lincoln asks, a note of concern in his voice. "I'm sorry, I just—" He lowers his voice. "I might be dating your sister, but I'm—not only into… you know. Sisters."
Nick looks up and stares at Lincoln in confusion. "What?"
Lincoln fidgets, and for the first time, Nick sees a crack in that armor of self-confidence. "You know. In the basement. That sort of thing." Lincoln waves a hand casually. "Guy stuff. I like that too, sometimes."
"Guy stuff…?" Nick's eyes widen in understanding. "Are you—g—"
"No, no. I like chicks. But guys… Guys are all right too sometimes. You know."
Nick doesn't know, he has no idea, he has no idea about anything, but suddenly there's a faint glimmer of hope that it's not completely his fault, what happened, that maybe—possibly—
"Do you…" but he can't finish that sentence, because if the answer to "Do you like me?" is "No" then he's not going to be able to control whatever flood of emotions he gets and he can't deal with the whole household feeling his wave of depressed rejection.
Lincoln doesn't follow-up on that, but he keeps taking the dishes out of Nick's hands and rinsing and drying them until they're done, and then Lincoln goes into the sitting room with Kendra and their parents and Nick goes downstairs and curls up in bed.
***
Lincoln comes over again that weekend.
Nick's seen him around school, noticed the way the T-shirts he wears are a little snug, hugging the lines of Lincoln's chest and accentuating the curve of his back. He's watched Lincoln laughing with friends on his way to class, and once, horrifyingly, caught Lincoln's eye in the hallway, the knowing look on Lincoln's face burning a hole into his chest. The last thing Nick wants is Lincoln back in his house, in his basement, in his space.
It's also the thing he wants the most.
Kendra is making lemonade and cookies upstairs in the kitchen, playing homemaker for Lincoln's benefit (Nick knows all her tricks, and knows that she'll keep the lemon rinds to rub over her hair later, trying to bleach some of the red out of it). Nick can hear her laughing with Lincoln all the way from his bedroom with the door shut, and despite himself he strains to listen whenever their voices go too low to hear. Nick's sitting cross-legged on his bed going through Rolling Stone, but he's not reading any of the words about Green Day. He's playing his Radiohead cassette, but not really listening.
"I can't help the feeling, I could blow through the ceiling if I just turn and run…" Thom Yorke moans from the tape deck. Nick rubs his hand hard on the back of his neck, hanging his head down.
Then he hears Kendra and Lincoln's voices louder and realizes the door to the basement is open. Nick freezes and hears the telltale sound of feet clomping down the stairs. It's Lincoln, Lincoln is coming down to the basement. Nick wants to shut the tape deck off, try to pretend he isn't home, but he also can't quite bring himself to move an inch. He's hyperaware of every sound and movement coming from the den, and he hears when Lincoln goes into the bathroom.
Nick sucks in a deep breath and lets it out slowly. He holds his hands out in front of him and tries to stop the tremors that are running through them. Deep breath in. Blow it out. Deep breath in. Blow it out. He closes his eyes.
He can hear the sound of the toilet flushing, and then the tap running. Then it stops. There are about five solid, full seconds of silence, and Nick opens his eyes and looks up. The door to the bathroom opens. And then a second later the door to his bedroom opens.
Lincoln stands in the doorway, not quite meeting Nick's eyes. He looks around Nick's room, taking in the band posters—Oasis, Nirvana, Radiohead, The Kinks—and shelves of books, mostly science fiction, a lot of Isaac Asimov. "Bones" starts playing on the tape deck, and Lincoln taps his fingers idly against Nick's doorframe to the beat, still not looking at Nick.
Nick can't tear his gaze away from Lincoln. He doesn't fully understand what's going on inside him, but he knows one thing: he's never—never—never ever—ever—wanted to touch someone as badly as he wants to touch Lincoln.
"When you've got to feel it in your bones…"
Thom Yorke's wailing snaps Lincoln's attention to the tape deck, and then his eyes wander to Nick.
"I love this album," he says to Nick, and Nick nods immediately, licking his lips.
Lincoln's eyes fix on Nick's lips, and there's a tense, terrifying moment that seems to stretch for eons in either direction, where Nick can't breathe and Lincoln is breathing harder than he should be—
And then Lincoln is moving into the room, pushing the door closed behind him and not breaking eye contact with Nick, stumbling a little over the flannel shirt balled up on the floor, but making it to Nick on the bed in seconds. Nick scrambles back against the headboard, feet sprawled out in front of him, arms splayed out, awkward, and Lincoln crawls onto the bed up towards him. Nick sticks one of his feet up and presses it against Lincoln's chest, stopping him. Lincoln looks down at it, then up at Nick in confusion.
"What are you doing?"
"You don't want this," Nick whispers.
Lincoln furrows his brow and then laughs once. "I've been thinking about it all week, Nick, come on, come here."
Nick stops pushing with his foot, shocked. "You—you have?"
"All the time," Lincoln says, his voice low, his eyes dark. Nick gulps.
"Even—even when we're not at school?" Nick asks, not even daring to hope.
Lincoln pauses and then laughs again, raucously, leaning back and catching his balance by grabbing Nick's foot with his hand. "Yes, you idiot. Especially not at school."
Even when I'm not affecting him, Nick realizes. Nick's foot drops and Lincoln takes the opportunity to surge forward, grabbing Nick's ankles with both hands and pulling him down the bed toward him, so Lincoln is leaning over Nick's torso, faces just a foot apart. Nick squeaks in surprise and then tingles all over when Lincoln hovers over him, his strong arms framing Nick's face and shoulders.
"Okay," Nick says, and Lincoln grins widely before lowering his face down to Nick's. He waits just a millisecond, his lips barely touching Nick's, and Nick can feel Lincoln's eyelashes against his cheek, can feel Lincoln's fingers curling into Nick's hair, can feel the faint quiver of his muscles as Lincoln holds himself up above Nick.
And then Lincoln melts down, presses his lips to Nick's, and the whole world changes.
He's gasping into the kiss, into his first kiss, and Lincoln chases after his breath, crushing Nick's lips against his own, sucking Nick's tongue into his mouth and then melting against Nick's body. Nick jolts when he feels Lincoln against him—not just his chest against Nick's, bodies lined up and fitting to each other perfectly—but Lincoln rolls his hips down into Nick's groin and Nick groans against his lips. He's hard, Nick thinks, panting at the idea, and then when he puts his arms around Lincoln's back to pull him closer, always closer, he's aware: So am I.
They kiss, frantically, hands everywhere, and Nick whimpers when Lincoln rolls his hips down again into him and doesn't stop, starts a rhythm—that Nick can't help but reciprocate. His heart is pounding in his chest, he's breathless, he can't get enough of the taste of Lincoln's lips, and he doesn't care that the bed under them is squeaking at every rock of their hips together. Nick wraps his legs tight around Lincoln's legs, pressing them together harder, and Lincoln gets one hand down and slips it up under Nick's shirt, his nails scraping down the side of Nick's abdomen.
They keep moving together, even as Thom Yorke croons, "Nice dream… nice dream… nice dream…" on the tape deck, and then fades away. There's a hush of silence broken only by the sound of the bed, their jeans rubbing together, the smack of lips and quiet sounds of broken-off moans, then the guitar starts on "Just" and the crescendo of drums and bass and guitars rises just as Nick starts to feel the edge of an orgasm. He shudders and thrusts up against Lincoln harder, faster, and hears a surprised but pleased moan from Lincoln, who breaks off kissing Nick just to pant against Nick's cheek, breath hot, lips pressed against his skin, hips rutting down against Nick rough, and then crying out as he thrusts down sharply a few more times as he comes and then stops, falling boneless against Nick. Nick is aching, so close, and Lincoln lifts his head enough to suck hard against Nick's neck, biting at his skin, and Nick wonders in a flash of hot longing if he'll leave a mark—and that pushes him over the edge, grinding against Lincoln's thigh and gasping when he comes, vision blacking out for a second.
Thom Yorke sings, directly to Nick:"You do it to yourself…"
Nick hears Lincoln laughing against him, can feel the vibrations on his chest and blushes realizing how close together they are, have been, must be. He looks down at Lincoln's face buried into his chest and touches the back of Lincoln's head gently with his hand, rubbing a little, threading his fingers into Lincoln's dirty-blond hair.
"What are you laughing at?" Nick asks quietly, afraid of the answer.
"That was awesome," Lincoln says, and Nick can feel him smiling against his chest. "That was really, really fantastic."
Nick's heart expands, and he almost tears up at how happy he feels, how totally and completely right everything feels, even if just for a moment. Kendra's still upstairs, he can hear the whirr of the electric beater, and he feels guilty momentarily before the feel of Lincoln shifting on top of him distracts him.
"Hey," Lincoln says to Nick. "Don't worry. This was good. We're doing this again."
Nick wonders if Lincoln is just perceptive or if he knew what Nick was feeling because—because Nick can't even begin to comprehend how to control his emotions right now. But the promise of doing it again halts any self-doubts in their tracks, and Nick hesitantly presses a kiss against the top of Lincoln's head. Lincoln takes in a deep breath, and then pushes himself up, off of Nick.
"I have to go back upstairs now," he says to Nick. "We were just talking about Radiohead, okay? She won't know any better."
Nick nods dumbly, then smiles at the way Lincoln's hair is sticking up on the top of his head. He reaches a hand up and smoothes it down. Lincoln grins at him, and then ruffles Nick's hair, turns, walks across the room, opens the door, and leaves. Nick hears him stop in the bathroom on his way back, running some water, maybe trying to wash off the smell of sweat and sex, but Nick collapses onto his bed and breathes it in deep. That's what two people together smells like, he thinks.
When everyone in the house is inexplicably in a great mood for the rest of the weekend, Nick doesn't even feel a little bit guilty.
***
Nick orders another drink, then another, not even wincing thinking about the tab on his credit card. He sighs, thinking about the past. How did I let that happen? he wonders. But he knows, knows deep in his bones, that he couldn't have changed it if he wanted to. And he knows that it wasn't just him, projecting, as much as he wants to believe it was. It would be so much easier, doing what he has to do, if that were the truth.
***
It does happen again. And again. And again. Sometimes they just make out, sometimes they just touch each other in passing when they can get away with it, but sometimes they rub up against each other and get off as quickly as they can, hot and daring, usually in Nick's bedroom but sometimes in the bathroom, sometimes in the den when Kendra's on the second floor changing in her bedroom, and once, when they really knew better but did it anyway, on the staircase to the kitchen, the possibility of being discovered just seconds away at any given moment.
Nick doesn't want it to stop, is terrified of what will happen if someone finds out, but is also jealous beyond all possible imagination when he sees Lincoln holding Kendra's hand on the couch while they're watching TV.
"Why don't you break up with her?" Nick asked Lincoln once, struggling to contain his jealousy.
"I like redheads," Lincoln responded flippantly, shrugging. "And anyway, if we did break up, I wouldn't have an excuse to come over to your house anymore."
"We're friends," Nick objected. "We play video games and listen to music and talk about school and…"
"And get off together in your bedroom?" Lincoln finished, grinning cheekily.
Nick blushed. "You know what I mean."
But Lincoln just shook his head. "I like Kendra too, Nick. Not… the same way I like you. But she's cool."
Nick spends a lot of time working on controlling his emotions when Lincoln isn't around, hoping that he'll get better at stopping his projecting when they're together. He's still worried, so worried, that he's made up everything between them, that Lincoln's only feeling Nick's emotions and that's why he likes Nick, that if Lincoln really had a choice, wasn't affected by Nick's feelings, he'd be disgusted by what they do together.
So one day, he decides to against everything Walter Bishop and William Bell ever warned him about, and he tells Lincoln what he can do.
They're sitting cross-legged on the floor of Nick's room playing Mario Kart on his Super Nintendo—Lincoln is always Luigi and Nick likes to play as Toad—and Nick is about to win on Rainbow Road when Lincoln hits him with a red shell from behind and blows past him to cross the finish line. Lincoln drops the controller and raises his hands in the air, pumping his fists and laughing.
"Whoo-hoo!"
Nick looks over at him ruefully, but with more affection than he'd ever felt for anyone—anyone since Olive, anyway. Lincoln looks back and his eyes widen a little as he smiles at Nick and leans in to kiss him. Nick balks and backs away, shaking his head.
"I can't do this anymore," he says to Lincoln, gripping the controller tight in his hands. Lincoln's mouth drops open.
"You don't want to… you don't like me anymore?" Lincoln asks, his voice hurt.
"No! It's not that!" Nick says quickly, reaching out a hand to touch Lincoln lightly on the knee. "I just… I can't. Lie to you. Anymore."
Lincoln squints at Nick. "Lie to me? About what?"
Nick sighs and looks down at the controller, then back up at Lincoln. He stares him in the eye. "It's a secret. A big secret. No one knows. My family doesn't even… they might suspect, but they don't know."
"What are you talking about?"
Nick places the controller down carefully on the floor in front of him.
"I lived in Jacksonville before Philadelphia…"
"Yeah, I know," Lincoln says.
Nick's eyes flicker up and he half-smiles. "You don't know the half of it."
Lincoln doesn't say anything, just waits.
"When I was little, just three or four, my parents started sending me to this special school… a school for gifted kids. The people who ran the school paid for my tuition, so it was no burden on my mom and dad. And…"
"And what?"
Nick buries his face in his hands. "They gave us this… this drug. Cortexiphan, it was called. And they taught us how to do things… crazy things. Things out of a science fiction movie. Like out of the X-Files or something."
Lincoln is quiet, and Nick looks up, terrified. But Lincoln is just sitting there, contemplative. He gnaws on his bottom lip and picks at a speck of dirt under his fingernail. "So what can you do?" he finally asks quietly, and Nick feels a flood of relief. Lincoln might actually believe him.
"I… project. My emotions. Onto other people." Nick holds in a breath while he watches Lincoln's reaction.
Lincoln screws his face up and cocks his head to the side. "You mean, if you feel happy, the people around you feel happy?"
"Um… yeah. Not all the time, I can control it a lot of the time. But sometimes… I can't. Especially when I'm with you," he says to Lincoln, his voice earnest. "You make me feel things… really strong. And I don't know…"
"You think I don't really like you," Lincoln says crisply.
Nick flails inwardly and opens and closes his hands a few times. "Yeah," he mumbles.
Lincoln laughs. Nick looks up, startled at the unexpected noise.
"You know, I always wondered."
"What?" Nick squawks.
"I've spent enough time with you now—I know exactly what you're talking about. I mean, I only believe you because it explains with what I've suspected."
"What?"
Lincoln sighs, but smiles. "I can tell when I'm feeling you. It's like… it's sort of like my feelings and thoughts are running one way, like water in a river, and then all of a sudden they're hit by a stream coming in from an angle, and it kind of shifts me. It's so strange. Like for a while I thought maybe that's just hormones or whatever, but it only happens when I'm with you. Especially when we're… kissing or doing more than kissing… sometimes, um…"
"Sometimes what?" Nick demands.
Lincoln flushes, and Nick thinks it looks good on him. He's captivated by Lincoln's discomfort when he says, "I can feel you… when you're, um, close. It's like a layer on top of my own… uh. Orgasm. I can feel both of them."
Nick gasps but then starts chuckling, which turns into laughter. "I… is that why you almost always…"
"Huh?" Lincoln asks.
"You always come first," Nick whispers to him.
Lincoln's mouth drops open. "Shit, that's not fair," he protests, shaking a finger. "It's… you have no idea how… intense…"
"Shh, shh, no," Nick says. "That was… literally the best response I could have gotten to telling you I have… what I have."
"So you mean no one else knows?" Lincoln asks.
Nick shakes his head. "No one. I mean, the scientists at the school, and the kids I went to school with. But… no one else."
"So did you all learn to project your emotions?"
"No, that was just me. Some kids… could do way cooler stuff."
"Like what?"
Nick chuckles. "Uhh, like pyrokinesis."
"Holy shit," Lincoln breathes. "But you can't do that?"
"Noo… just the emotions thing."
"Well, at least it's something," Lincoln says.
They can hear Kendra upstairs in the kitchen, moving around, making something—more cookies, or a cake, or a quiche, or something, Nick knows she hasn't quite gotten Lincoln under her thumb as much as she wants so she keeps baking hoping it will win him over—and they shift a little where they're sitting.
Nick suddenly realizes. "So… you do really like me? If you can tell when I'm projecting, then you can tell when I'm not, and…" And I'm not forcing you into this.
"For the last time, Nick, yes! I really like you."
"But are you—"
"Oh my god, shut up, c'mere—" Lincoln reaches for him and grabs the collar of his shirt, hauling Nick over on top of him. They kiss, and Nick relishes the taste of Lincoln, like mint and chocolate wrapped up in that undeniable scent of boy. He nibbles at Lincoln's lower lip, something he's learned Lincoln likes over the weeks they've been together, and then slides his hand heavily from Lincoln's waist to his chest, curling his fingers into the fabric of Lincoln's shirt and pulling it up to reveal a sliver of tummy.
Lincoln arches into Nick's touch and Nick slides his hand up Lincoln's stomach to his chest, then hesitates. They haven't taken off clothes before. He doesn't know if it will be okay, but—
Lincoln makes a frustrated noise and then moves Nick's hands and takes his shirt off himself in one swift motion. Nick's eyes widen, taking in the smooth expanse of Lincoln's torso, all tan skin and muscle. He reaches his hands out delicately and, catching Lincoln's eye for permission, presses against Lincoln's chest, pushing him down onto his back on the floor. Nick straddles Lincoln and rubs his hands from Lincoln's shoulders down his chest to his abdomen, then stops.
They look at each other, curious, wondering if they're going to—if tonight—. Nick moves gently off of Lincoln, gets up, and walks to the door of his bedroom, locking it. Then he turns on whatever cassette is in his tape deck—it's Jeff Buckley's Grace and it's stupidly, obviously queued up to "Lover, You Should've Come Over." Nick huffs a little and then chuckles under his breath, walking back to Lincoln.
"Is this song a hint?" Lincoln asks, grinning, and Nick laughs and smacks him playfully.
"It wasn't on purpose, I swear. I found this tape at a thrift store last week."
"Sure you did," Lincoln says, and Nick rolls his eyes, throwing his leg back over Lincoln's lap to straddle him again.
"Shut up," Nick says, leaning down and kissing Lincoln softly. "We don't have long, we've already been down here half an hour."
"Then hurry up and take your shirt off," Lincoln replies, waggling his eyebrows. Nick makes a face at him but his heart starts pounding. This is new. They haven't done this. And he can't wait.
He pulls his T-shirt off, throwing it away against the dresser, and then sits a little self-consciously on top of Lincoln, not sure what to do next. Lincoln is drinking him in, his eyes raking from Nick's neck down to his stomach, at the trail of hair that disappears into his jeans.
"I…" Lincoln breathes, and touches his fingers against the button of Nick's jeans. "Are we…?"
Nick nods, and Lincoln doesn't hesitate any longer, using both hands to unbutton and unzip Nick's pants, and then he slowly slides one hand fingers first between the jeans and Nick's underwear. He's already achingly hard, and Lincoln licks his lips and gulps, feeling Nick, cupping him through his boxers.
Nick moans a little, pushing into Lincoln's palm instinctively. He's beat off before, of course, but thinking about having someone else's hands on him is a whole different type of hot. He wants it—he wants naked—now.
He lifts up and Lincoln grabs Nick's wrist with his free hand, holding him. They lock eyes, and Nick sees: Lincoln knows what Nick's feeling. Knows what he wants. Knows it because inside Lincoln he can feel the urge too, something separate from his real self, but still inside him, a whisper of Nick's soul into Lincoln's head.
"Take your pants off," Lincoln murmurs to Nick, pushing him up and then pulling at the sides of his jeans, inching them off Nick's hips. Nick tries to get his jeans off without standing up, but it's futile: he gets up off of Lincoln and shimmies out of them. He's about to go back down and then thinks better of it, leans down and undoes the button and zipper of Lincoln's jeans and then grabs at the cuffs of both pant legs, yanking Lincoln's jeans off and leaving them in a heap with his own. He sees Lincoln watching him, taking in all the bare skin, his gaze predatory, and before Nick can get over his sudden rush of brazenness, he's pulling his boxers down over the head of his cock and then stepping out of them, standing naked over Lincoln.
Lincoln's mouth is hanging open, his eyes wide, his face bright and honest. His eyes fix on Nick's cock, hard and already dripping with precome, and without looking away Lincoln lifts up his hips and pulls his own boxers down over and away, kicking them off to the side. Nick stares at him, at the beautiful curve of his chest to his waist and his cock, pink and thick and incredible. Nick kneels quickly down, and before he can stop himself he's holding the base of Lincoln's cock in one hand, and slipping the head of it into his mouth, sucking. He looks up through his eyelashes at Lincoln, who is straining to keep his head up so he can watch Nick, but his face is twisted in gorgeous anguish, panting hard and chest heaving. Nick lowers his face down and takes more of Lincoln into his mouth, and Lincoln cries out softly and jerks up, fucking into Nick's face. Nick feels the head of Lincoln's cock hit the back of his throat and he pulls back, sputtering a little at the unexpected fullness.
"I'm so sor—" Lincoln starts to say, but Nick silences him by sucking him back into his mouth, bobbing carefully, methodically, until he can fit almost all of Lincoln into him. It's amazing, indescribable, completely perfect, and he has no idea why he never thought about doing this before. Lincoln tastes good, a little salty but not gross like he'd always thought another man's dick must taste, and Nick is going to get off just from getting Lincoln off with a blowjob, he can tell.
Suddenly Lincoln gasps, and Nick's eyes dart up. He knows, Nick realizes. He can feel it.
"God, come here," Lincoln moans, pulling at Nick's shoulders and dragging him on top of his body, slotting their legs together so their naked cocks are side-by-side, trapped in the tight heat between Nick and Lincoln.
Nick groans and starts thrusting against Lincoln, undone by how good it feels, bare chest on bare chest, bare legs on bare legs, and cock against cock. Lincoln reaches a hand down between them and circles both their cocks with his fist. Nick cries out into Lincoln's shoulder, biting down to muffle the sound, and they rut against each other, skin getting slick with precome and sweat, and Nick is so close—so achingly close—and then Lincoln's hips arch off the floor as he comes, and he's swearing and saying over and over again "Nick, Nick, Nick, fuck," and that sends Nick over the edge, thrusting up hard into Lincoln's fist, still circled around his cock. Lincoln has the presence of mind to keep working Nick through his orgasm, but then Nick collapses onto Lincoln's chest, boneless, and Lincoln lets his hand fall down beside him.
Nick slides off of Lincoln's chest until he's tucked up against his side, one leg still flung over Lincoln's legs, an arm slung over Lincoln's chest.
"God," Lincoln murmurs. "That was…"
"Amazing," Nick says, and they both start laughing, giddy and flooded with endorphins.
They're quiet, both breathing hard, coming down from their orgasms, both of them sticky from sweat and come but too bone-tired to do anything about it. Nick closes his eyes and presses his face against Lincoln's bicep, in a state of total relaxation and happiness.
"Dream Brother" starts playing on the tape deck, and Lincoln sighs, shifting under the weight of Nick's arm and leg.
"I really do like this album," he admits to Nick.
Nick giggles against his arm. "Thank god. Me too." He feels Lincoln's chest shaking with quiet laughter.
"There is a child sleeping near his twin…"
Lincoln blows out a breath and starts to sit up. Nick makes a muffled sound of protest, but Lincoln just chuckles and shakes his head. "Kendra's going to come down here herself if I don't get up there soon."
"The door's locked," Nick mumbles sleepily.
"Oh, and that doesn't look suspicious at all," Lincoln says, but he lays a hand on Nick's back and rubs gently in small circles. "Look… what we have is…"
Nick opens his eyes and looks up at Lincoln looking down at him.
"It's so big. Bigger than my thing with Kendra, my thing with anyone. I… I'm not sure when that happened but I wanted you to know."
Nick's heart swells and he puts a hand up, his fingers tracing the lines of Lincoln's face. Lincoln closes his eyes and lets Nick trail his fingers from the ridge of his eyebrow down his cheek to his jaw, but then Lincoln takes Nick's hand in his own. He kisses the back of it and then drops it, standing up. Nick watches as Lincoln picks up his boxers, jeans and T-shirt and moves to the door. He presses his ear against it and listens. Satisfied no one is in the den, Lincoln undoes the lock on the door and opens it a crack, peering out just to be safe, then opening the door completely. He looks back at Nick one more time, a soft, sweet expression on his face, and then walks the three steps to the bathroom.
Nick hears the water running for a long time as Lincoln cleans himself up, and then he can tell when he's getting dressed. Nick can't bring himself to get up off the floor, sweat and come drying on his skin and making him feel gross, and he can just take a shower, it's his house, it's not weird—but he wants to keep the smell and feel of Lincoln on him as long as he can. He inches over on the floor until he can push the door shut with his toe, and then he grabs his T-shirt and balls it up under his head, making a pillow.
He hears when Lincoln comes out of the bathroom and heads upstairs, can hear him greeting Kendra in the kitchen and Kendra saying something to him that makes him laugh. Nick closes his eyes and pretends it's him upstairs in the kitchen with Lincoln, making lasagna or whatever, laughing together out in the open. He falls asleep to dreams of him being the one holding hands with Lincoln on the couch, and only wakes up with a start when his mother calls down the stairs that dinner is ready.
***
Nick takes his seventh shot and then the bartender cuts him off. "I don't care if you're having a rough night. That's enough."
Nick shrugs and leaves, unsteady on his feet as he walks down the street toward his apartment. It's fine, he has an early morning tomorrow anyway. A long drive ahead of him, and then he has to do the hardest thing he has ever done, ever will do. He deserves the hangover he'll have tomorrow.
***
After that time, things get different. Not bad, not at all. But different. They steal longer moments away with each other, taking their time as much as possible. They learn the quickest ways to get each other off—but they also learn the best ways, the ways that leave Nick spread out and whimpering at the lightest touch of Lincoln's fingertips. Eight glorious, wonderful months fly by as Nick commits to memory every ticklish part of Lincoln and everything that makes him laugh (and everything that puts that wistful look on his face when his eyes look so blue). Nick wonders if it can last forever.
But as Lincoln spends more and more time with Nick, he spends less and less time with Kendra, and she finally gets sick of it.
"She broke up with me," Lincoln says on a cold, cloudy morning in early May. "Says I don't care enough about her."
Nick is quiet.
"Maybe I don't," Lincoln admits. "Not the same way I—"
Nick blows out a breath. He reaches for Lincoln's hand and squeezes it. "We'll still see each other," he says.
Lincoln shakes his head. "It won't be the same. You know that. I can't come over here anymore, it's too weird for Kendra."
"Screw Kendra, we're friends. She doesn't even have to see you, you can just come in the back door and we can play video games and…"
Lincoln smiles tightly and looks at Nick. "Maybe. We'll see."
A couple weeks later, Nick misses Lincoln fiercely. He curls up in a ball on his bed and cries, missing the warmth and closeness. The whole house is miserable, though they blame it on the rainy weather of spring. Nick blames it on losing the best thing he ever had. He starts skipping school, can't bear to see Lincoln in the hallway and not touch his hand or throw him against a locker and suck onto the corner of his jaw in that spot he knows is so sensitive.
And he wants to get Lincoln alone to talk, at least, to try to figure out how they can move forward together, but Lincoln is almost never alone, and then all of a sudden he's dating some girl named Alicia, and it's like a punch in Nick's gut. He tries to talk to Lincoln, tries to hard to get him to have just a simple conversation, but Lincoln dodges him. Finally Nick gives up trying, figures out Lincoln's class schedule so he can avoid him in the halls, and the school year ends.
Nick spends the summer volunteering at an animal shelter, trying to get away from people, afraid of what he'll do to them with his grief.
Another year passes of awkward moments passing each other in the hallways, Lincoln with Alicia almost permanently on his arm until right before prom, when he dumps her. (Nick dares to dream, for a second, that that means Lincoln will come back to him. He doesn't. That same day his sister Kendra couldn't stop crying at dinner and she had no idea why.)
Nick watches his sister graduate, and then watches Lincoln walk and get his diploma just a few minutes later. He doesn't feel anything.
When Lincoln goes away to college, Nick thinks it's over, really over. No more hope. He tries to move on, live his life, but it turns out there's not much for him in it. He knows, objectively, that he's depressed. He feels miserable constantly. He's just existing these days, not living.
Thanksgiving that year is Kendra's first holiday back from college, and she decides to throw a party for all her friends from high school who are also back in town. Nick dreads it, tries to figure out an excuse for not being in the house that night, but he doesn't have any close friends so he can't plan a sleepover or a movie night.
Nick fights for the main party to take place upstairs in the sitting room, and he has his parents on his side. Kendra is annoyed because in the basement den it would be more fun, more private—but Nick is adamant, and he wins, in the end.
The Saturday night of Thanksgiving break, the doorbell starts ringing and people filter in. Nick can hear them upstairs through his ceiling, muffled chatter that gets louder after music is turned on. He buries his head under his pillow and tries not to think about anything.
Then there is a knock on his door. Nick shouts, "Go away, this isn't the bathroom!" but then whoever it is tries the doorknob and wow, Nick really should have locked his door tonight.
He curls up under the covers of his bed, pretending to be asleep. For a second, the music from upstairs is loud, unmuffled by any closed doors, and he hears the Spice Girls sing "If you wanna be my lover!" before the door is shut. He squeezes his eyes shut and hopes whoever opened the door left when they closed it.
But then he feels the bed move as someone sits on the edge of it, next to Nick. Irritated, Nick takes the pillow off his head and is about to chew out whatever party guest it is when he sees—
"Lincoln."
"Hey, Nick," says Lincoln, smiling at him.
"What are you—"
Lincoln leans down and stops Nick's question with a kiss, and oh god, Nick missed the taste of him, the way his lips felt, the closeness of him, and he's reaching for Lincoln but—
"Stop, stop," Nick says, moving away and sitting up against the headboard. "You can't just… waltz back into my bedroom and pick up where we left off. It's been over a year since we even talked to each other."
Lincoln sighs. "Yeah, I was an asshole."
"What?"
Lincoln looks at him earnestly. "I was afraid, Nick. I didn't want to come out."
The way he's talking about it, so frankly, Nick realizes something has changed. "Are you—did you come out at college?"
Lincoln smiles a little. "College is so different. People still judge you, but they don't matter as much. And there are so many people—so many new types of people I never knew in high school."
Nick furrows his brow. "So you came out? Are you gay?"
Lincoln shakes his head. "Look, I didn't date girls just to cover up what we had between us. I like girls. And guys. You. I like you. But I'm pissed it took me till college to get over myself and just come out and admit it."
"Don't…" Nick frowns. "It's a big deal… you… I get it."
Lincoln sighs. "No, I fucked things up between you and me, Nick. But when I heard Kendra was having a party tonight, I thought it'd be a great time to come and grovel in front of you begging for forgiveness."
Nick laughs. "Seriously? Was that your groveling then? Coming into my room and trying to kiss me?"
"I just… it's been a long time." Lincoln looks at his hands. "I could feel you, all through the rest of high school. All through dating Alicia and even through the summer and when I was at college. I could always feel you in the back of my head."
"That's—I wasn't trying to—"
"I know, Nick. But what we had… have… was so much. Don't you think it would take a lot to break that link?"
"Do you want to break it?" Nick asks in a small voice, but Lincoln shakes his head.
"I don't think I could deal with that. I've gotten used to you being in my head."
Nick bites his lip and closes his eyes. "I missed you."
He feels Lincoln's hand on his knee, as Lincoln turns so he's mostly sitting on the bed facing Nick. "I know you did. I missed you too."
"So, what now? We go upstairs holding hands and tell everyone we're dating?"
Lincoln raises an eyebrow. "Would that make you happy?"
Nick snorts. "No, I don't think so."
"So what would make you happy?"
Nick bites the tip of one of his fingers worryingly, thinking. Finally he smiles brightly, "Let's talk about the new Radiohead album."
Lincoln bursts out laughing, but then says, "'Paranoid Android' is the best thing that has ever happened."
"Oh my god," Nick says. "I know."
After that things turn… normal. As normal as they can be. And Nick is happy again, at least enough to get by when Lincoln went back to college. Every break Lincoln has, he comes back to Philadelphia and spends his time with Nick. They have sex, but they also just sit and talk sometimes. A few times they call each other, but it's hard because the only phone in Nick's house is in the kitchen, and he doesn't want his parents hearing him talking to Lincoln like that—just yet.
They get through Nick's junior year like that, seeing just enough of each other to make it last.
Nick's senior year is a lot of the same, though Lincoln is distant when he comes home, his mind elsewhere.
"Sorry," he says to Nick. "I switched majors to criminal justice and it's intense."
"Criminal justice? What happened to history?"
"I want to help people," Lincoln explains. "Make things better."
Nick nods in understanding. He helped me, made me better, he thinks. Maybe he can do that for everyone else too.
The summer before Nick goes to college, instead of coming home to Philadelphia for break, Lincoln goes to a summer retreat in D.C., a special course for students who are thinking about joining the FBI. Nick knows he can't keep Lincoln from following his dreams—but he starts spiraling, and he doesn't know how to make it stop.
When Nick goes to college in the fall, at a school in Philadelphia. But things just get worse. He's so worried about connecting with people because he knows now that it can be permanent—Lincoln says he can still feel glimmers of Nick's emotions even when they're far apart and haven't seen each other for months. And that terrifies Nick, especially because no matter how many therapists he talks to or pills he takes, he's unable to feel real happiness again. College is dark and small and scary, and he wants out.
Nick starts to feel crazy, like everything he feels is going to have an effect on everyone he passes, make people mad or sad when they shouldn't be. What right does he have to do this to people? Why can't he make it stop?
He tries to get Lincoln on the phone, but there's no answer. It's a Saturday night, he's probably out with friends having a good time. Nick feels sick, lonely, worried, and that night he almost does it—he has the razor blade ready and hovered over his wrists… and then the phone rings.
Nick picks up immediately, praying it's Lincoln, but it's his dad's voice, broken and sobbing, telling him Kendra is dead, Kendra killed herself, slit her wrists in the tub. Nick starts shaking his head no, no, no, no, no, no but it's real, it's—how did—why her? And in the back of his mind, Nick starts to panic: What about Lincoln?
He starts calling Lincoln's number at his dorm room over and over again, trying to reach him, desperate to know he's okay, and after the sixth time, someone picks up on the first ring, and—
"Hello?"
It's Lincoln.
"Thank god," Nick sobs into the phone.
"Nick, what's wrong? Nick? Are you okay?" Lincoln asks across the line. "Talk to me, please, you're—"
"Can you feel it?" Nick whispers.
There's a pause, and then Lincoln sighs heavily. "Yeah, I can feel you."
Nick blows out a quick breath and then says, "I love you, you know."
"Yeah," Lincoln says back. "I know. And I—"
Nick hangs up the phone, grabs his keys and fake ID, and heads down the street to the first bar he can find.
***
The next morning he wakes up to a blaring alarm and gets up immediately, set on doing what he has to do before he changes his mind. It's the only way, he thinks. I can't hurt anyone else. Him. I can't hurt him.
He drives all the way from Philadelphia to Boston in one shot, only stopping once to go to the bathroom and buy donuts at a gas station.
When he gets to Boston, it's four in the afternoon, right on time, and he drives up to Cambridge to the Harvard campus, parking outside the building he knows Lincoln lives in.
Nick takes in a deep breath. He can feel tears starting to build but he pushes them back, yells inwardly at himself that I have to do this and then he focuses.
If he really, really tries—he can feel Lincoln's presence inside the building. Can feel him, and he can feel himself inside Lincoln's mind. Okay.
Nick closes his eyes and starts to force himself to forget: he thinks of all the moments with Lincoln—when they met in the Lanes' basement, standing at the kitchen sink talking, the first time they kissed, the first time they made love, the first time they talked about dating each other, what it would be like—Nick thinks about all of it, and then he lets it fade away, covers it with black and buries it, so deep, down, down, down, down and away and out of himself, forget me, forget me, forget me, he chants, and he's undoing every single strand that holds him to Lincoln, taking his heart back, taking his mind back, taking back all the touches, all the caresses, removing the memories and leaving behind just a dull ache. Nick keeps pushing and pulling at it, screaming in his mind at Lincoln to forget forget forget forget it didn't happen we didn't happen it didn't happen forget me forget us forget it all and then the last bit, the hardest bit: he makes himself forget. If Nick pushes it all away hard enough, then he can make everyone feel the same way—I was trained to do this, he thinks, remembering long afternoons sitting cross-legged next to Olive while Walter Bishop made them try to make toys burst into flames.
He keeps pushing, and then he can feel it, like a rope snapping, and everything in him that has been tied to the people he loves—Lincoln, Lincoln, Lincoln—disappears, all binds lost.
It's better this way, he thinks. I can't hurt anyone anymore. Because there is no one left to hurt.
He starts the engine of the car, and then pulls away, driving out and away from Boston. Nick doesn't know where he's going.
He just goes with it.
***
Nick wets his lower lip, eyes darting down to the table and then back up at Olive. He shakes his head a little and then sighs, resigned. He smiles at her.
"You look good, Olive. You were always the strong one. Me, I was never strong."