Vital

"But I'm?"

"Straight, I know," Alex said, eyes narrowing at him. "Are you really going to get weird about this, Dempsey?"

Zach choked a little on air and indignation.

"No, no," he finally managed to splutter.

He pictured himself the definition of unattractive right now and wondered in a surreal way if that would be enough to kill Alex's supposed crush without Zach actually having to say or do anything deliberate.

Felt a pang at the thought.

Instead, Alex looked like he was stuck somewhere between vaguely annoyed and warmly amused. Zach's heart was pounding all the way into his ears.

"Okay then... Honestly, Zach, it's not like I expected anything."

"Wha- huh?" was all that came out of Zach's mouth in response, and Alex laughed, his eyes bright and mocking.

"This was a prank?" Zach asked.

Confusion and mortification and too much else to recognize whirled around his chest cavity. He couldn't even feel relieved.

He should feel relieved, right?

"Oh my God, Zach, no, it's not a prank," Alex reassured him, still laughing. "I'm laughing at your expression right now. It's fucking hilarious. Man, I know you'd never like me back. It's chill. I just..." and he turned something more serious then, looking down at his hands in his lap.

His bad one was visibly shaking. Zach wanted to take it, hold it until the quivering stopped or faded. Instead he stood restlessly and took a step back toward Alex's desk.

"I felt weird not saying anything," Alex finished, the words soft and his voice rough around them. Zach could hear the anxiety just under the surface like it was his own. Maybe it was, in a way, like an echo or just a thing they both shared. "Like I was keeping it from you or some shit. I don't know man."

Zach's hands were twisting up in his hair, the back of Alex's chair jutting into the small of his back, and his eyes on Alex like they were cemented there. That was just how it was, how it had been for most of the last six months or so. It was hard as hell to make himself look away from Alex.

"What the fuck," he heard himself mutter unsteadily, his fingers pulling a little at the fringe of hair by his eye. Again. "What the fuck," more statement than question.

And then he was lurching forward, and his hands were on Alex, one on his jaw and the other gripping the back of his best friend's head, his thumb unintentionally on the ridge of scarring above Alex's ear. He couldn't even make himself give a fuck beyond a fleeting worry that Alex would be upset, but he didn't seem to care either, his good hand automatically hard and soothing and hot at the base of Zach's neck.

It was too long and too soon before they pulled away from one another, each breathing harsher and louder than they'd been before. Alex's face was flushed, a light sheen of sweat on his forehead. Zach imagined he didn't look much better, the thought making his stomach flip.

"What the fuck," he said again, like a one trick pony and more breath than actual speech.

"So, that happened," Alex said. "Uh, this may be like stupid of me to ask, you know like masochistic or some shit, but what was that?"

"Fuck," Zach said, staring at him.

"Yeah, you said that already? Like a-"

Zach surged forward and kissed him again, searing and deep.

A second later Alex's hand was on his shoulder, but it was pushing not pulling. Zach forced himself back but didn't retreat the way he had before, kind of half-crouching in front of Alex and his bed.

"-lot," Alex said dumbly, and it took Zach a second to figure out he was finishing his sentence.

Fuck, he'd been talking.

"What?"

"What?" Alex repeated, eyebrows so high they cut his forehead in half.

It was kind of hysterical, and Zach heard himself laugh.

Alex immediately huffed back at him but tinged with something else in addition to the humor.

"Okay, you really need to use your words, Dempsey."

"I-" Zach tried, but he was lost for them.

Something in Alex's eyes flared and went dim.

"Fuck you," he snapped abruptly and Zach didn't even flinch from it, he was so used to hearing the defensive snarl by now. "Seriously? I told you I had feelings for you Zach. And I was prepared for you to let me down! I figured, he'll say he's straight but flattered and it will be done. And then you fucking kiss me? But one kiss, whatever I can believe is… I don't even fucking know, maybe after all the Jess shit that's how you want to let me down gently. Well that's stupid, OK? But it's also whatever if that's what you were going for. Fine. I get it. But you can't keep fucking kissing me dude. Not without an explanation, Zach, fuck."

The last part was angry and kind of hurt and broken, but also warm. Everything about Alex since his attempt had a heat to it that Zach wanted to live inside.

"Look, Alex, I swear it's not like that."

A little of the anger burned away, like a cooling ember, and Alex just looked back at him, all nonverbal 'what the fuck was it like then?' with his eyes wide and mouth hung just a little open and tension in all his muscles and jaw.

"I'm not great with words, you know that," Zach said without really meaning to. The sentence sounded like an excuse, not anything like what he'd been going for.

Alex looked completely unimpressed.

"I don't think I'm straight anymore, Alex."

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

"Like. I used to think I was? Like I noticed guys. I fucking noticed you. But I- I notice girls a lot more, so I could ignore it or whatever."

"You're making no sense," Alex told him.

The words were biting, but Zach thought he could hear more behind them, something deeper and sweeter he could easily sink into.

"I really liked kissing you," he said, making the words open to all the other things he couldn't yet pin down.

Alex's eyes were kind of squinting at him, a little disbelieving maybe, but he nodded just the same, once and again.

"Okay," he said finally, a little strangled. "That's something I guess."

"We could keep doing it?"

"I-" Alex hesitated, then said, "OK."

"OK?" Zach repeated, and he could feel the smile on his face growing until it kind of hurt in that amazing way he hadn't felt since last summer.

"OK," Alex affirmed. "If you're sure? I mean, I'm-"

"Dude, if that sentence ends in any way other than amazing or hot or some... variation... then it's fucking wrong, and I'll be obligated to spend the next twenty minutes talking you up when we could be making out. Your call."

Alex laughed and actually half smirked at that before the expression grew and shed and became more of a genuine grin.

"Well, when you put it like that..."

Zach reached forward to wrap his hand around Alex's bad one like he'd wanted to what was probably not even ten minutes before. Gently, he moved his fingers between Alex's, watching the process carefully. When their hands were successfully entwined, he looked up to see Alex biting his lip and staring and looking happier than Zach had seen him since his dick had started working again.

Zach laughed again at the thought and the sudden happiness that kept short-circuiting his brain, and Alex shook his head and muttered, "what the fuck," and then they met in another kiss, hot and heady and slow and exploring. Hands in hair and skin pressing into skin and words between them Zach couldn't begin to discern.

Clarity was their tongues together, was being close enough to feel the way Alex's heart beat, was the easy way they moved together.

Kissing like this? Feeling like this?

Oh, but Zach knew what it was, almost as well as he knew Alex himself.

Zach pulled back from the kiss for a minute to touch their foreheads.

"I'm really glad I'm here for this," he heard himself say.

Alex's face contorted for a second, the blue of his irises so damn bright, and then pressed harder into Zach, eyes going tightly closed.

"Me too," Alex said against the shell of his ear a moment later, then nipped it a little and pulled back to smile teasingly at Zach. "What the fuck?"