4 | Nomenclate
"Tonight?" Matt asks carefully as they stand one morning in the kitchen, drinking coffee. "You have plans for tonight?"
"No plans," Kelly answers, Matt's pale complexion indicates what he's thinking about, his attempt to overcome his anxiety over what he's asking. "Tonight is good. I've been thinking about it, I think we should find a name for it," he says with a cheeky grin, "like a code name."
"Help?" Matt asks flatly, unsure of what Kelly means. "Could you help me tonight?" he tries it out.
"Na, that's too official, too one-sided. Fooling around?" he offers, "Na, too obvious, we can't say that near the guys."
"We're also not fooling around," Matt says dryly.
"Work out?"
"Might be confusing… work in?"
"Sounds like doing chores. We need something clear, but also something that sounds fun… something we could set as a plan for us to do, without it being too obvious." He thinks for a moment, his eyes moving around the apartment as if looking for inspiration. "How about Game Night?" They both know their console is broken, so there won't be any confusion. It'll sound palpable to the guys if it ever slips out in the firehouse.
"Game Night?" Matt repeats hesitantly.
"Yeah, Game Night tonight? See it works." Kelly's happy with his invention. "You okay with it?"
"Sure, yeah, Game Night."
"So, tonight?"
"Hmm," Matt nods shyly, his insecurity back.
"My room. 21:00?"
"Hmm,"
"Okay," Kelly says, leaving his position from leaning against the counter and putting his mug in the sink. "I need to get to work, I'll see you later."
"Hmm,"
"Matt," he catches Matt's eyes before he leaves the kitchen, "you want this, right? This is what you want?" He emphasizes the 'you', to check, to be sure, that this is Matt's wish and he's not being pressured into anything.
"Yes,"
"Okay." Kelly accepts though Matt's answer was not without reservation. "So try to think of it as fun, let it be fun, okay?"
…
"Hey," Kelly says as he turns around to the sound of a knock on his open door, finding Matt standing nervously at the door. "Come in,"
"Hey," Matt says as he steps inside, finding himself standing awkwardly in the space just inside the door.
"Sit, you want a drink?" Kelly points to the Ottoman across from his bed, pouring himself a tumbler from the whiskey standing on the dresser, he holds the bottle above a second tumbler, waiting for Matt's answer.
"I thought the point was not to erase it with alcohol,"
"One drink, to help the nerves," Kelly smiles. "We have to talk first anyway. So?"
"Sure,"
"Cheers," Kelly offers his glass as he passes Matt his drink, sitting down next to him.
"Cheers," they clink the glasses before sipping on the drink. Matt sighs in relief as it burns down his throat.
"You showered." Kelly states now he's closer to Matt.
"Yeah, I was at the gym, trying to, uh, you know… you're showered too..." Matt half states-half asks.
"Yeah," Kelly smiles shyly, "was nervous I guess, wanted to uh… whatever." They silently understand they somehow had similar thoughts, as awkward as they may be. "So, I've come up with some ground rules for us, okay? One is that we only do it in here."
"Why?"
"I thought it'd keep the rest of the apartment neutral. Keep it out of your room in case it goes wrong. Keep your room yours, safe."
Matt nods in silence, overthinking Kelly's words, taking to heart how caring and sincere Kelly's thoughts are to his own needs.
"Second thing, just to clear any doubt, we can both keep seeing other people while we do this. I don't want it to prevent us from leading our own separate lives, okay? If it ever comes to sex, we'll keep it safe, but there's no exclusivity clause here, or whatever. If we want to sleep with other people, we can."
"Agreed." Matt's answer is short. He's not really sure how he feels about it, doubting he'd be wanting to keep trying one-night stands, but he can't ask Kelly to give his lifestyle for him.
"Third thing, we're going to have safe words. You say 'wait', we'll freeze whatever we're doing, give you a moment to breathe, to adjust, but we won't necessarily break it off. If you say 'stop,' we'll stop completely, hands-off, no questions asked." Kelly pauses to gauge Matt's reaction, before adding. "We're going to do this at your pace, Matt, you call the shots. Whatever you need, okay? I just ask you to try not to run; Not to close down and shut me out, okay?"
Matt nods carefully, his eyes glued to the floor, knowing this will be his greatest challenge; to remember, whatever happens, it's not Kelly's fault, not to punish him with silence. "Anything else?"
"Yes," it's now Kelly's turn to swallow thickly before speaking, "my body, during these sessions, or whatever we want to call them," he waits for Matt's eyes to meet his, "is yours to do what you want with. I want you to feel at ease to check things out, to experiment." He can see the blush rising in Matt's cheeks, feeling his own cheeks becoming warm as well. This is so awkward, but he pushes forward. "If you want to touch me, to undress me, to um, kiss me, you can, okay? Don't feel uncomfortable or like you have to hold back. This is for you, feel confident to call the shots."
Matt's eyes move slowly to look briefly down Kelly's body before meeting his gaze again, an unreadable expression on his face. He stares at Kelly for a moment, until the latter becomes somewhat uncomfortable. He speaks again just to break the awkward moment.
"That's eh, it from my side. Anything you want to add?"
Matt shakes his head, blinking his eyes to regain some focus.
"What did you have in mind to start with?" Kelly asks curiously, trying to bring Matt back to activity.
"Don't know," Matt says quietly, "thought you'd be the one to, uh, initiate."
"How do you usually start with the surrogate?
"We have tasks we have to fill every session,"
"Tasks?"
"Yeah, the therapist gives me and the surrogate tasks for every meeting,"
"So, do you have a task for today?"
"No,"
"Why not? Did you speak with your therapist about us doing this?"
"Yes, Kelly I did." Matt loses his patience, becoming edgy. "Enough with the interrogation, just... just start with normal things, normal touch between two friends. Like you used to touch me before everything happened." It's the first thing to come to mind, but it makes sense. He's been so reserved lately, they've lost almost every kind of physical communication between them.
"Like this?" Kelly asks, putting his right hand on Matt's shoulder, squeezing lightly, feeling Matt tense in spite of himself.
"Yes,"
"Like this?" Kelly asks after a while, as he shifts to lay his arm higher across Matt's shoulders, feeling Matt's tension grow. He hasn't held Matt, or anyone like this for ages, though there was a time, when he was younger, when Andy was still around, he'd often find himself in this position, usually moving Andy quickly into a friendly headlock, ruffling his hair. He can't do that now with Matt. Matt has always been more careful, more held back, though Kelly did catch him in a few headlocks back in the days.
The memory of Andy hits him heavily and he moves his arm again, attempting to avoid the weighty mood that had suddenly set in. He lets his hand remain on Matt's shoulder, his arm laying across his back. He can feel Matt tense, his breathing becoming controlled and heavy as if he's trying to calm himself. After a long moment, Kelly moves his hand to Matt's nape, holding it there, his fingers carting gently at the tips of Matt's short hair.
"You okay?" he asks gently into Matt's ear, slipping his left hand to lay on Matt's forearm.
"Hm-hm," Matt grunts, trying and failing not to grind his teeth. They sit like that for a moment, Matt slowly coming to terms with the contact.
"I've missed touching you like this," Kelly confesses softly. "You've been so closed off lately."
"I know, I'm sorry,"
"No, you don't need to apologize. I'm just glad to do this. I want my friend back too."
.
"Can we be done?" Matt asks softly, almost pained, after another long moment where he'd fought against his urges to shrug Kelly's arm off. He'd counted down from 10 four times in his head, he'd let himself take notice of the weight of Kelly's arm, the feel of his fingers tickling at his hairline before he'd allowed himself to break it off. "I think that's enough for now."
"Yeah, sure, of course," Kelly is quick to remove his hands, aware of his promise. But Matt moves just as quick to grab Kelly's hand in his. His elbows on his knees, he just holds Kelly's hand for a moment between his two hands.
"Thank you, Kelly,"
"Matt, you don't have to thank me all the time."
"Yes, I do. I know it's weird, and it's not obvious that you're willing to do this. I'm grateful that you are."
"Like I said, I want my friend back too," Kelly says with a smile. Bumping lightly against Matt's shoulder, somehow re-balancing everything between them. Matt nods in acceptance, a small smile on his face before he gets up to leave the room.
"Good night, Kelly,"
"Good night, Matt."