This was supposed to be a bit more smutty than it ended up, but whatever. At least I finished this chapter. By the way, there is definitely going to be a sequel to this story with a whole bunch of additional oneshots and I know exactly how it's going to end and there may even be a sequel to THAT. But the sequel to this is going to be based on Alkaline Trio songs instead of Social Distortion songs.

Many thanks to Sexy. Lil. Emo, EllaMichelle, Keefer, IslanderBib (sorry for throwing you under the bus last time!), Kathrin J Pearl, Chloe JP, r2metoo, and one guest for your reviews to last chapter!

Lu slept from eleven-thirty on Friday night until three the next afternoon. Balthazar really couldn't blame him for the exhaustion, and he liked Lu snoring softly in his arms. It was soothing and helped him fall asleep, too.

He never said it out loud, but he'd slept better than he could remember on the Wednesday night they first had sex.

It was also a good thing that Lu slept like a rock. Balthazar had had to slip out of bed several times to eat while the bassist was still asleep and, as far as he knew, Lu never woke up. Balthazar supposed that made sense, though. He'd missed a lot of sleep over the past week.

When Lu finally did wake up, though, Balthazar was asleep. Lu stretched and rolled over, getting a good look at him.

Balthazar definitely looked older than his twenty-eight years when he was awake, but that didn't hold true when he was asleep. He looked younger, more relaxed. It was almost impossible to believe he was a stage-dominating sex god.

Lu reached out and traced his fingers over Balthazar's temple, tucking a stray curl behind his ear. Almost immediately, Balthazar's eyes fluttered open.

"Hey," he said softly. "You going to be conscious for awhile?"

Lu half-shrugged, his right shoulder pinned to the bed. "Probably. I'm more hungry than tired right now."

Balthazar nodded. "Alright. I'll make some lunch. And then we need to talk."

Lu sighed. He knew this was going to happen. He knew what was going to happen. He just wasn't sure how to say it.

But they had to talk. They couldn't put it off forever.

"So, talk," Balthazar said twenty minutes later as he set about making sandwiches. The chain was still around his neck, although Lu shouldn't have been surprised about that. There was no way he could have gotten it off without getting the key from Lu's pocket. He felt a twinge of guilt when he remembered that.

"I… I'm not sure this is a good idea," Lu said quietly. "You and me, I mean."

Balthazar's shoulders slumped again, and Lu wished he could see his eyes, but the singer was facing away from him. Before he could even come up with something comforting to say, the blonde was asking, "Why do you think that?"

He swallowed. "I just keep thinking, 'What happens if this ends badly?' One of us gets hurt and how are we supposed to be able to work together, have a functioning unit? I read all these stories about great bands who have great music, but the band members hate each other. I don't want that for us. I've… I've worked too hard for this to just…" Lu sighed as the blonde finished the sandwiches and turned back toward him. "If I hurt you, are you really going to be comfortable working with me?"

"Honestly?" Balthazar slid one plate across the table toward Lu. "I've had awkward exes before. But let me ask you this. If the band wasn't an issue—if the band didn't exist—would we be having this conversation?"

Lu took a bite of his sandwich—turkey and cheese; he had to admit that it was pretty good—and settled for, "Probably not, since we wouldn't have met."

"Don't be a smart-arse," Balthazar said, but when Lu looked up, the blonde had a smile on his face.

Lu half-smiled back and then sighed. "No. If we didn't have the band, I wouldn't… I wouldn't even have to think about it."

"Think about what?"

"Being with you."

"Luce. Are you saying that, if the band didn't exist, you'd want to be with me?"

"I want to be with you. That's not the point. The point is, what do we do if we break up and things get awkward?"

"That's always a risk in relationships. But that's why we need to be able to talk about this. If anything, it's even more important for us."

Lu's heart rate picked up as he listened. Balthazar was giving him an almost pleading look.

"I just don't think that this—you and me—should be affected by the band. I care about you and I'm fairly sure you care about me. So what difference does it make?"

He was quiet for a minute. His head was still buzzing in protest, but there was no actual argument he could think of.

"We've been able to work together this far. I know it hasn't been easy, but you haven't blown up onstage. Whatever drama we've had so far has been contained," Balthazar added.

"So you're saying, if we do happen to break up, you'll be able to keep working with me?"

"If we talk, yes. Listen, why do people break up?"

"Differences."

"So we talk. If I'm doing something you don't like, you have to tell me. And vice versa. And people grow apart, too. If that starts happening, if either of us starts feeling like it could start happening, we have to communicate that. As soon as it becomes an issue, we need to talk about it. We can't wait until it's ready to tear us apart."

Lu nodded slowly, a tiny bubble of what could have been hope swelling in his chest. Balthazar was fighting this. He didn't want Lu to let go so easily. "Cheating, too. My last relationship ended because Eve was cheating on me."

Balthazar gave him a small grin. "I won't cheat if you won't."

The bassist felt himself start to smile, too. "Deal."

"And if we fight… well, you and Ray have fought before, right?"

Lu nodded, thinking back to the last major fight they had. Surprisingly, it had been Raphael being an idiot and ditching him at a bar. That by itself wouldn't have pissed him off, but he'd left because of a girl. They'd ended up having a shouting match and didn't talk to each other for a week until Raphael realized what he'd done had been a dick move and apologized. Neither of them had mentioned it since then.

And maybe Balthazar was right. After all, things with him and Gabriel had gotten a little awkward for a short time, but they got over it and they were better than ever now. He thought about their affair sometimes, but he was able to interact with him normally—or as normally as one could interact with Gabriel.

"I think we can handle this. It's not like it's much different than our relationship right now anyway," the blonde pointed out.

"Except not sleeping with random people at shows."

Balthazar flinched slightly, but when he opened his eyes again, he was smiling. "You get one more. After that, I hit you."

Lu snorted with laughter. He took another bite of his sandwich and, after a moment, said, "Not that this is going to change anything, but… how many people have you slept with, anyway?"

The singer raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure you want that answer?"

"Yeah, I think so."

Balthazar chuckled. "Alright. Well, the conservative estimate—"

"Estimate? You don't actually know?"

He shrugged. "Some of it was a blur. I wasn't always such a paradigm of morality."

Lu nearly dissolved into laughter.

"Ouch," Balthazar joked. "Anyway, the conservative estimate is the low five-hundreds."

That shut him up. "The low five-hundreds?"

"As I said. That's the conservative estimate. I'm counting three or four between sixteen and eighteen and after that…" He shrugged. "As I said, conservatively, I'm guessing one a week for the last ten years. I know there were times when I had sex with two or three different people a week, and there was one year when I was actually in a serious relationship, but after I got out of that one… I made up for lost time."

"Wow. I mean… wow."

Balthazar shrugged again.

"How did you not get any STDs?"

The blonde grinned. "I'm of the firm belief that I personally kept the Trojan company in business."

Lu laughed.

"What about you?"

"Um… like fourteen. And I guess I should mention this now, not that I ever think it'll come up, but one of them was Gabe."

"You slept with Gabriel?"

"Yeah. About three years ago, before he met Sam and I met Eve. Does… does that bother you?" The singer had seemed stunned by the revelation and Lu didn't know if it was just the abruptness of the confession or because he didn't like it.

"No, but I didn't really expect that. From either of you, I guess."

"It was just the one time. And like I said, it was a long time ago."

"Does anyone else know?"

"You mean Ray or Cas?"

Balthazar nodded.

"Unless Gabe told them, no. Just… the three of us now, I guess." Lu swallowed slightly. "But while we're talking about that, I wanted to… to ask that we hold off on telling them about us. Just for a little while, until we figure out where we are. I just don't want them giving us funny looks or anything while we're still getting used to this."

"But we will tell them, right? Eventually? I mean, this is kind of something they should know."

"Yeah." Lu gave him a reassuring smile. "Yeah, eventually. Just… not right away."

"Alright, love. I can handle that if you can."

Later, when Lu slipped the chain with the key back around his neck, Balthazar didn't say anything, but the bassist saw him smile to himself.

The rest of the weekend was spent alternating between sleeping and watching Netflix. Part of Lu thought it was odd how quickly they'd assimilated into this almost sweet routine when, just a few weeks before, they'd practically been at each other's throats, but most of him was just happy to have Balthazar with him while they just relaxed. And if he fell asleep on top of the singer in the middle of a Torchwood marathon, Balthazar didn't complain.

When Monday finally rolled around, Lu felt almost normal. He was actually relieved to get back to the studio, if only to make sure no one had fucked with Bones (they hadn't, but he'd remembered late on Saturday that his car was still in the parking lot and he wanted to assuage his worries). The rest of the band was happy to see him, too.

"You feeling better?" Raphael asked the moment Lu and Balthazar walked in. Gabriel and Castiel looked up in interest.

"Yeah. Yeah, I'm fine."

"Good. Now go sit in the corner," Gabriel said, practically shoving Lu onto the couch.

Lu allowed himself to fade into the background that day. Whenever he was asked his opinion on something, he gave it, but he didn't speak up on his own. He was content to let the music get recorded without his micromanagement (he still couldn't pinpoint what had triggered his obsession the week before, but he didn't feel it right now) and, instead, pulled out his notebook and a pen and started writing again.

It had been a few weeks since he'd even written anything and he'd intended to start at least getting some ideas down days ago, but last week basically hadn't existed for him and he wanted the weekend to last as long as possible. He didn't stop writing even after Balthazar came over and sat down next to him, so close their knees touched. Maybe it was closer than necessary, closer than they would have sat last week, but no one else noticed.

Lu didn't even try to shield his notebook like he usually did, if only because his handwriting was so atrocious that most people couldn't read it anyway. The only reason Raphael could decipher it was because he'd been reading it for eleven years.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Balthazar asked in an undertone so the others didn't hear.

"Yeah. I'm not gonna flip out or anything. I'm cool," Lu insisted. He glanced up to check on the band. Raphael was sitting next to the sound board and both Gabriel and Castiel were in the soundproofed room, rocking out. The executive decision had been made that, even though there would be some bleed-over on the separate tracks, they fed off each other's energy and they should record together. The song of the day was "Caged and Beaten," and the guitarists had already been at the three-minute song for almost an hour. Their fingers would probably start bleeding soon. But Raphael was completely absorbed and Crowley was nowhere to be found; no one was paying attention to the singer and the bassist in the corner.

"You should still get out of this room for a few minutes. Come on, let's take a smoke break."

Lu thought about it for a half a second before he closed up his notebook and wedged it between his cushion and the arm of the sofa.

"Raph, we're gonna pop outside and burn one," Balthazar announced, standing up.

The drummer didn't even look at them. He just threw a quick thumbs-up over his shoulder, so Lu stood up and followed Balthazar out, unable to resist looking at the blonde's ass as they went. Even wrapped in a relatively loose layer of denim (as opposed to skintight through the knee), it was still impressive, and he had to smile.

Balthazar rubbed the back of his neck when the door closed behind them, his fingers, nails painted black today, trailing over the chain around his neck. No one in the band had commented on it yet, nor had any of the hickeys from Friday night (not that there were many) been referenced despite the light-gray V-neck he wore. It actually looked incredibly soft and Lu wanted to bury his face in Balthazar's shoulder, but he didn't. Instead, he went toward the elevator until Balthazar grabbed his wrist. "This way," the singer murmured, steering him in the other direction.

"We taking the stairs?"

Balthazar shot him a quick leer over his shoulder. "Not exactly."

Comprehension dawned on Lu. "We're not actually heading out to smoke, are we?"

"I'm cutting back," Balthazar said, and Lu couldn't tell if he was joking or not. Currently, he probably wasn't, and as Balthazar released his wrist, he followed him. They made it about halfway down the hallway before the singer paused in front of a plain-looking door and looked left and right to make sure they were alone. Then he twisted the knob, pushed the door open, and went right inside. Unsure of what to expect, Lu followed and was immediately submerged in darkness as Balthazar nudged the door closed behind him.

"Where are we?" the strawberry blonde asked, looking around and completely unable to see.

"Storage closet, I think," Balthazar murmured, and then his arms were sliding around Lu's waist and pulling him close.

"Oh, classy," Lu joked, easily sinking into the singer's arms. His eyes were still adjusting to the darkness, so when he attempted to kiss him, his lips bumped into Balthazar's nose.

The singer chuckled, kissing Lu's chin and slowly working his way to his mouth. "It's not so bad," he said softly. He moved his lips across Lu's cheek, to his ear, and down his neck. A shiver of excitement went through Lu and he let out a quiet moan.

"Is this a good idea?" he panted, well-aware his breathing was already getting heavy and there was the barest hint of a Southern lilt to his words.

"Probably not." Balthazar nibbled at the underside of Lu's jaw, running his fingertips under the waistband of the bassist's jeans to lightly tease at the skin at his hips. "Who cares?"

Lu caught the sides of Balthazar's face and brought their mouths back together with a dirty scrape of teeth over lips. "What are the odds we'll get caught, right?" he breathed between kisses.

Balthazar ran his hands under Lu's shirt and back down, fingers trailing down his spine and to his belt loops to pin them together. "I can't figure out probabilities and statistics on my best day, let alone right now," he murmured.

A soft laugh escaped from Lu before he decided that they were both talking far too much right now. He deepened the kiss and smiled to himself as one of Balthazar's hands found its way into his hair, combing through it, while his other hand rested on his hip. They were just easing into a comfortable rhythm with just enough heat to keep him interested when Balthazar's grip on his hair tightened and he yanked, although not quite as hard as Lu would have liked. He groaned softly, his head falling back, and Balthazar's mouth fixed on his neck again.

He absolutely loved having his hair pulled, almost as much as he loved the feel of the bike lock pressing against his chest as Balthazar bit down on a point near his shoulder. His body flooded with pleasure at the sharp contrast between the singer's mouth, rough against his skin, and the gentle hand tracing patterns along his side. He didn't even realize they'd moved until his head tipped back further and smacked into the wall.

"Ow," he nearly giggled, causing Balthazar to start laughing against his shoulder.

He recovered quickly, though, unbuttoning Lu's jeans and sliding a hand inside. The playful air evaporated almost immediately and Lu closed his eyes, digging his fingers into Balthazar's shoulders and letting out a quiet moan. He gritted his teeth and rutted against his hand, suddenly acutely aware of the single layer of cotton between his dick and Balthazar's fingers. And then he started fumbling with Balthazar's jeans and they were pushing down each other's pants. It didn't even register that they were in a storage closet at Leviathan Records until, from far away, he heard a door slam.

And then he heard muffled voices from outside. He clapped his hand over Balthazar's mouth and they both froze to listen.

"They went out to smoke?" That voice sounded vaguely Scottish. Crowley.

A slow, gravel-rough voice answered, "That's what Raphael said." That would be Castiel.

"I just checked out there. They weren't there." Crowley and Castiel were getting closer, and Lu and Balthazar still had a hand down each other's pants. Panic flooded through the bassist and it must have registered because Balthazar didn't say anything; he simply pulled back and pulled his pants back up as Lu did the same.

"They could be by their cars."

"We'd be able to see them from the windows."

"What if they were in one of their cars?"

"Then odds are, I wouldn't want to walk in on that." Crowley and Castiel had passed by them and their voices were growing fainter. Lu let out a relieved sigh.

"We should probably get back, yeah?" Balthazar asked. Lu's eyes had adjusted to the darkness by now and he could see the singer's grin had returned.

"Yeah, I think so."

"We'll continue this later, though," he added after pressing a quick kiss to Lu's lips. He led the bassist to the door, poked his head out to make sure Crowley and Castiel were really gone, and then stepped out.

When they got back to their studio, Gabriel was out of the soundproofed room and Raphael was still at the board, but Castiel was gone. "Hey, guys," Lu said, trying to sound casual, as though five minutes before, they hadn't been about to fuck each other's brains out.

"Balthy, we need you in there," Raphael said, sparing them half a glance. "We just sent Crowley and Castiel out to find you guys."

"We're here now." Balthazar shrugged. "We didn't see them, though. What song are we on?"

"Still 'Caged and Beaten.' Get in there so I can queue up the playback."

As Lu sat back down on the couch and Balthazar slunk into the soundproofed room, the strawberry blonde shifted in his seat. His jeans felt three sizes too tight and he definitely did not like getting teased into this level of sexual frustration only to be interrupted, but maybe it was for the best. If Crowley and Castiel had happened to walk in on them, it could have been terrible.

Besides, now he had something to look forward to when they finally got home.

If any of you are on Tumblr, I'm tracking the "Blue Archangel" tag so if you post reactions or something to chapters, I can view them there. Ehehehehe...