Warning: implied homophobia, implicit gay bashing and Jim Moriarty being creepy.
The first time was with Roger Anton, sitting on the edge of his bed, sniffling and bruised, holding a damp flannel to his nose. Jim wrung out a clean one in the bowl, cataloging the bruises on Roger's face.
"Jim, please you gotta fix it. If Carl tells anyone..."
"Hmm." Jim folded the cloth in a square, reluctant to hand it over because the bruise around Roger's eye looked delicious, emphasized the tears in his cool blue eyes. Roger didn't do tearful, he did haughty and joking and lustful.
Jim liked this look best, bruises around the left eye and cheek standing out in sharp relief against the milk pale skin, cut on the bride of the nose and down his upper lip, darkening the pathetic fuzz for a mustache reddish brown.
"Who says I can help you?"
"You did."
"Right," he grinned, "I did, didn't I?" He handed the boy the cloth, taking the stained one and dropping it in the bowl. Roger didn't apply it right away, folded and refolded the flannel, shifted his weight. Oh, bruising on left hip, must have happened when he was thrown into something, a wall or locker.
One glance at Roger tells him the whole story: the furtive touching with Davis behind a bank of lockers, Power's head raised from the obsessive scrubbing of his trainers at the sound of Roger's choked off moan, the slow walk around the corner to see what could only be two boys thrusting against one another, Roger's neck thrown back and mouth curled in an obscene O. The shocked sound from Power's, the not quite conscious snap of his fist, the too-quick scuffle that Roger should have won but didn't, the fear and shock blinding him to Power's physical inferiority.
"I can pay," Roger said. "I have a few hundred quid saved-"
"No," Jim cut him off. "I don't want your money."
Roger relaxed. Jim could see the pitifully slow click of his thoughts, thinking Jim meant to do this as a gift, a favor in light their fumbling tryst last summer. Jim smiled at him, setting the bowl on his desk and getting up to sit next to Roger as he slummed back on the bed."Thanks mate, I owe you one."
"You owe me more then that," Jim said before he ran his tongue along the sharp bruise of Roger's cheek, tasting chlorine and blood and dirt and what he thought was fear and he wanted to roll the taste of it around his mouth like a sweet.
"Jim..." Roger started to sit up and Jim stopped him with a hand on his chest.
"I'll take care of Powers. In turn, you'll come here after the pool ounce a week for the rest of term." He slid his knees over Roger's and and grabbed his thigh, right over where he guessed the bruise was. Roger's answering gasp delighted him.
"J-iim? Please," Roger whispered. Oh, this was new, he does fearful well too.
"Won't be anything we haven't done before. Nothing that would show." Jim spun the lie tight. He had a stash of books and magazine behind his wardrobe, there were things he wanted to try with ropes and leather cuffs and knives. "No one will know. Not about Powers, not about this." He leaned in to lick Roger's jaw tabby cat quick.
Roger trembled underneath him, as if he meant to escape Jim's room and the flat and his life. He could, Jim wouldn't stop him, but the sweetness lay in Roger have no other choice, that he needed Jim more then Jim needed him.
"And Carl?" Roger asked. Jim hummed in delight. "I'll take care of Powers. You rest up."
He kissed Roger then, and the boy shuttered, even though Jim thoughtfully kissed the undamaged cheek.
-
Roger's black eye just about faded by the time Carl Powers died in the pool.
From his perch at the topmost deck, Jim watched with a giddy sort of joy as Roger and the rest of the swim team huddled at one corner of the pool, the tears on his face real enough. He didn't care to comfort Roger, and would not plan too, his sadness and revulsion adding an extra edge to their fucking.
All the edge, if he was honest with himself, bored with Roger's body and his freckly hands and his slender cock. He wanted to run down and lap the tears from Roger's face, grind against his thigh while Roger moaned in distress.
"Hey kid, clear off." Leather shoes with new treads across the tile. Police, Junior office by the sharp tone, an more experienced one would try for kindness or forced caring.
Jim schooled his face to an approximation of numb shock. "Yes sir," he said, with a hint of a tremor in his voice. He zipped up the bag at his feet, careful not to touch the laces dangling from the open zip, slung it over his shoulder and walked away.