AN: For the S/T "DIY" prompt on tumblr. This takes place shortly before the epilogue of "Revolution Sybil Style Now!". Disclaimer: I have no idea how much a long distance call would have cost at a public phone in the UK in 1995.
August 1995
Climbing the stairs, he hears the telephone begin to ring. Of course the bloody lock sticks and he struggles with it, swearing. The answerphone picks up on the fourth ring with Sybil's cheery "Hullo! If you're trying to reach Sybil or Tom, you've got the right number!" After which Sybil herself comes on, sounding rather more subdued. "Hi, darling. It's me. I guess you're out..." He can't blame her for sounding disappointed. He's not been in the last two times she rang. Even though they've managed pretty well through her absence thus far - she's been on tour a little over a month now, and they've spoken at least twice a week - it's just been a busy time.
Finally Tom manages to get inside and sweep the receiver off its cradle. "Hey!" he says breathlessly. "You still there?"
"Hiya!" Sybil says. The machine doesn't shut off like it's supposed to and their voices echo out into the flat. Tom, who's fallen into an armchair, winces at the feedback. He leans over to stab at the button with his finger until the amplification cuts off.
The band won't play until later in the evening and the rest of them have gone window shopping, so Sybil actually has some time to talk. "The blokes want to do a big dinner later," Sybil groans. "I hate that. I always just want a nap afterwards."
"So don't eat a big dinner," Tom says. He grabs a canister of peanuts off the table and crunches up a handful.
"I suppose you're eating yours now," Sybil teases. "What is it, crisps?"
"Peanuts."
"Well, have some fruit or something at least."
He grins. "And what fruit have you eaten today?" This has been their pattern since she's been gone: she half-jokingly mother-hens him from afar, and he calls her on it.
"I had some orange juice this morning, Mr. Mum."
"You didn't drink too much last night?"
"Not last night. I was still hungover." She chuckles. "You know how it is, being up all night for days on end."
"Yeah. Not the healthiest lifestyle, tour." He pours out another handful of nuts. "Well, take it easy, love. Don't make yourself ill." She does sound run down, and he worries about her.
There's a short silence, but neither one wants to ring off yet. "I'm not a very good conversationalist today," Sybil says apologetically. "I'm feeling a bit fried, really."
"It's fine, love. I just like hearing your voice," he says.
"Me as well." She sighs. "I miss you."
"I miss you too."
Another brief lull. Tom makes a joke to break it, saying in a lecherous tone: "So, what are you wearing?"
That gets a laugh out of her. "Feeling a bit deprived, are we?"
"And you're not? Or is there something I should know?" He can banter about this, now.
"Do you know, I really haven't been - deprived, I mean - up until the last few days. But lately it's all I can think about."
"Me too," he confesses. Though with him it hasn't just been in the last few days. "We could, ah, do something about that. Over the phone." He lowers his voice, even though there's no one on his end to hear.
"Tom! I'm not doing that on a payphone. Who knows who's listening." But she sounds interested.
"Why would anyone be listening?"
He has a point. "Someone might see," Sybil says lamely. She looks around, thinking that there's small chance of that. The phone she's using is tucked away in a little walled-off space at the end of a short corridor off the pub's main room, which is nearly empty. It's quite private, unless someone walks right up and starts acting like a nosy parker.
"So? You're just talking," Tom points out.
"I suppose." My poor boy, she thinks, half-smiling. "Oh, why not. So... I've not done this before. How do we start?"
He laughs, surprised. "I wasn't expecting you to say yes." He does sound eager. "Can you, out in public?"
"I don't think so," Sybil says. "But I can help you, can't I? I'm sure you'll make it up to me." She lounges back on the seat.
"You know I will." His voice has dropped half an octave and she thinks of how his eyes look when he's turned on, the way they go intense and sort of blaze out at her, and she wishes they didn't have to wait another month and a half to really be together. "Let me just - hold on a minute - " she hears fumbling, and what is unmistakably the sound of his belt buckle being undone. Sybil feels her face getting hot and looks around again: still alone.
"So," he says, "What are you wearing, anyway?"
She shrugs, as if he can see her. "Jeans. T-shirt."
"Have you got a bra on?"
"Tom, I'm playing drums tonight. Of course I've got a bra on."
"Mm, that's a nice thought too." His voice crackles a bit over the connection. "But anyway. Let's lose the bra, shall we? Metaphorically," he adds.
"As if I'm going to start taking off my clothes in the bloody pub." She smiles. "All right, bra's gone. Are we doing this here?"
"Well, I know how you like public places." She can hear his smirk. "So I'm reaching up under your shirt..."
She imagines his hands warm on her breasts, and her breath starts to come a little faster. "My nipples are getting hard," she tells him, feeling a bit silly. She's not been overly shy about talking dirty in the past, but it's different when he's right there and they're caught up in the moment.
It seems to have an effect on him, though. "Yes, that's good," he says. She can hear a slow rhythm starting in his speech, and she smiles.
"I'm sitting in your lap facing you. And... we're kissing, really deep like we haven't seen each other in ages." Which we haven't. Sybil feels a fleeting ache in her core. "Tom, I just want you to touch me," she murmurs.
"Oh, I am," he says. His accent's coming out stronger, she notices. "I've taken off your shirt, by the by."
"But we're right out in the open," she says with mock outrage.
"I know. Everyone'll see," he purrs. Another thrill shoots through Sybil's midsection, and unconsciously her free hand begins to pet her denimed thigh, back and forth. She rolls a fold of the rough fabric between her fingers. "Your skin's so soft," he says, and she can almost feel his hands slipping down her bare back, moving underneath her arse to shift her more firmly against him. She moves her fingers up to the waistband of her jeans, strokes the skin of her belly just above it.
In London, Tom leans his head back against his chair and tells her how he's kissing her throat, her breasts. In his mind he runs his thumbs over her taut little nipples and relishes the way she always shivers and closes her eyes at his touch. "I love that," she murmurs.
"I know."
He strokes himself faster as she describes undoing his trousers and kneeling in front of him - let's just pretend the floor isn't covered in filth - and kissing down his stomach. His hand is no substitute for Syb, of course, but her voice does things to him and... well, it beats the Agent Provocateur catalog.
He hears a gasp over the line, a groan. "Oh, God," she says indistinctly. The sound of her sudden, obvious increase in arousal takes him unawares, takes him nearly to the point of no return. He backs off himself, panting. Not yet.
"Wait a minute, are you..." he says.
"Yes." She gives a little moan. "And I'd better wrap up quickly before someone comes down here."
Jesus. The image of Sybil pleasuring herself in a public phone just about does it for him. Tom takes himself in hand again, tries to construct a mental picture that will appeal to her. "You're... moving yourself up against me, the way you do," he says. "You little tease, you're driving me mad."
"I love driving you mad." She's breathing harder. He imagines how she must look: hair a little mussed from travel, her face flushed, eyes heavy-lidded. Chest heaving.
"And now?" He's getting close again.
"I'm touching myself and thinking about your cock in me." Apparently she's no longer in the mood to spin a narrative, but that's just fine with him.
"God, Sybil, I wish..."
"Oh, Tom, I'm so wet," she says. "Oh, God, I'm coming, I'm..." her breath escapes in half-stifled groans, and he feels that exquisite, agonizing ramp-up within himself, familiar but much more intense than with the usual wank. It lasts just a microsecond longer than he feels it will and then release spreads through him, closing his eyes tightly, and he joins his voice to Sybil's.
"Fuck," he mutters at the end. And in the next breath, "Sybil, I love you so much."
In the pub, Sybil sags against the wall and slides her hand out of her knickers. "I love you," she murmurs, aching for him to be here, to be inside her.
They sit silent a moment, recovering together, apart.
"I suppose that'll have to do 'til you come home," Tom says.
The ache is slowly fading from her. Not completely, but enough to stand it a while longer. "I thought it rather lovely. I've not had the privacy to do that for a while." She laughs. "I suppose I made my own privacy just now."
"My poor darling. My poor, horny darling," Tom teases, and she begins to giggle. "Well, next time just ring me up. I'm always ready for another go."
"Ring you up, eh?" She snorts laughter; this has struck her as unbearably funny. Granny'd be aghast at such a display, trot out one of her pet aphorisms. Sybil can just hear her sniffing Vulgarity is no substitute for wit, dear. That's if she hasn't dropped dead of shock at the thought of her granddaughter having phone sex, and in public, no less.
Tom laughs as well. "That's my Lady Sybil. All refinement."
Sybil looks at her wristwatch and sighs. "I'd better go."
"Right then. Have a good show."
"It should be, there's a big uni crowd here. I'll ring you again in a couple of days," Sybil promises.
"I'll have a towel ready," Tom deadpans, and she harrumphs at him and rings off. She sits a moment longer, bathing in the pleasantly muted hum of conversation mixed with music from down the corridor.
The burr of the phone startles her, and she's put the receiver back to her ear before she's thought about it. "Hello?" she asks hesitantly.
"Three-forty for seventeen minutes, please," a crisp female voice says.
"Sorry?"
"Please deposit three pounds forty pence for seventeen additional minutes." The operator slows down her speech as if she's talking to a child, which makes it absolutely, painfully clear that she is not a machine. "You've pre-paid one pound for five minutes long distance talk time, and you were on for an additional seventeen minutes. Please deposit - "
"Oh, God," Sybil mutters. Her cheeks burn. She fumbles some coins out of her pocket and into the slot. "There. Sorry." For all of it.
"Thank you for using BT. Have a lovely day." Click. Sybil wonders if the note of amusement in the operator's voice was her imagination.
Tom's going to laugh his head off.