The return to the flat proved as excruciatingly trying as Philip had assumed it would be. The willpower he had found to keep his eyes locked on the night had not extended its way through him; gaze still averted, he lingered his hand up the in-seam of Thomas's trousers. Suddenly gathering his wits, he removed the pressure of his hand and turned its palm up as he asked for a cigarette.
Thomas complied, but complained the while. Once their cigarettes starred the dark, they fell into the safer score of debating whether or not it constituted a habit if you only ever borrowed them. The topic roiled aimlessly between them until they had alighted on the stoop.
They stood outside for longer than Philip would have thought possible, alternating their stares between the sky and the vehicles rolling along. The air was still hot, but it had the benefit of being far fresher than his flat was likely to be, which, while it didn't sober him, did have benefit of making him feel more alive than not.
Yet his life seemed to find itself more whetted when he was drowned in pleasure and, while the air was very well and good, it certainly wasn't more satisfying than tasting the sighs which he could provoke from Thomas's lips. As though on cue, Thomas heaved a sigh of his own volition.
"Yes," Philip said, absently agreeing to the proposition he'd felt had been put to him. He turned to the door and made rather long work of unlocking it. Once he'd finally managed to grasp the art, he plucked the cigarette from Thomas's fingers and tossed it, along with own, to the pavement. He received a light shove in response, which he allowed to tip him over the threshold and indoors.
He decided against the absence of passersby to grab Thomas's hand and pull him inside, leaving the both of them ensconced in abject darkness as the door closed. With his free hand trailing the walls, he walked the both of them to his bedroom.
They stopped their path at the dull ending of a bedside table, whereupon Philip turned on a lamp. He squinted against the light, however dim it may have been, and turned around to slip his gaze directly into Thomas's. The blue eyes flickered with mirth.
"That was fun," Thomas said, sounding as though in conspiracy. He wrapped himself around Philip, slowly but heavily, and knocked him back into the table. Thomas saved the lamp from upsetting and Philip held him tighter, laughing into his shoulder.
"That was the idea."
The two fell into step, just slightly out of their usual time for the ever-changing rhythms beating in their blood. Increasing elements of spiffy dress lay strewn about the floor, all attempts to catch anything on the chair proving abortive, but for a stud which was surely lost forever within.
Something tossed had caused quite the stir over a table: The bottles thereupon knocked into one another with a startling sound, which was then soothed away by a few soft thumps and clinks as they hit the floor. Philip reluctantly lifted his head toward the tumult, if only to ensure that nothing was pouring into the floor. He turned Thomas's curious gaze away from the mess and back to him.
"I think we can worry about that tomorrow."
"That," Thomas replied, pressing an oddly sweet kiss to his lips, "is the best thing I've heard said."
"You're not very romantic," Philip said, voice laced with mock-affront.
Thomas made a non-committal sound and shifted his weight downward, stopping so that he rested with an elbow propping him up and a hip jutting into the bed between Philip's thighs. Thomas's free hand slowly traversed his chest in outline, drifting down on the current of hair until his fingers tangled into the thatch above his cock.
"Tell me again. Properly," he added, dropping his forehead against Philip's stomach. His hand slid lower and he wrapped his fingers around his prick. He bit and sucked at the skin of his belly in designs sure to leave marks against forgetting.
Philip took a moment to gather his voice back from where it had seemed to creep into the bruises, then nearly began to repeat his dismissal of the mess when he wondered if that hadn't been what had been meant. The option for him to renege was a sterling one (if he did, doubtless Thomas wouldn't push), but he let it tarnish quickly; he didn't want to spoil anything else. Didn't want to chance unhappiness creeping its way across Thomas's features.
"I love you."
Immediately, Thomas's teeth gave way to soft lips and tongue. He pushed wet kisses in a steady downward path to his erection, then up its length until he took the head into his mouth. He slipped himself over it deeper and Philip could feel a groan vibrate around him. The feeling of it wanted to kill him, to stop him then and there.
"Ah - god. Stop. Stop, stop - "
The words sounded, and felt, as though they were being ripped from him and, god, he was loath to say them. It had been perfect, but ideas hazily-had had occluded his desire for such perfection. At least just then.
"What is it?" Thomas asked, confused. The question came through swollen lips and he looked at him a little unclearly, though the fringe which had fallen into his eyes. The mad thought came to Philip that it was no wonder such things weren't allowed: they were far, far too much to be borne witness to.
Philip shook his head, awkwardly extricating himself from the embrace. "I want - wait."
Thomas looked on in consternation as Philip stood and crossed to the side of room. He stood before the disarrayed table and fingered the bottles still atop it, tilting them back to see what they were. Naturally, the bottle Philip was after had fallen to the floor and rolled away.
"I thought that could wait?"
"Be patient; you need all the virtue you can get."
"I'm fine," Thomas retorted, sitting up. "What's it your doing?"
Sinking between Thomas's legs, he swirled the vial. "Getting this. Hold the top," he ordered, and put the lid into Thomas hand as he tipped the contents of the bottle into his own. The oil pooled into his cupped palm and threatened to spill as he held up the vial for Thomas to close. Once done, he returned it to the floor.
He let the oil drip thinly between his fingers, onto his prick, stroking it with his unoccupied hand for just long enough to cover himself. "Lie back," he said. Thomas's eyes flickered from what he was doing to his face before he acquiesced. "I don't want to hurt you, but - " the words were overwhelmed by a sigh from Thomas as Philip pressed an oiled finger into him. He restated himself, then, "I want to bugger you. I want to fuck you."
The words, put so boldly, seemed to Philip more lascivious than the act he was engaged in. The act seemed a secret of their tribe, but the words belonged to a world that would expire at the mere prospect of their reality. The world wouldn't be sentient for the act of Philip pressing his cock into Thomas's arse, with the force of a novice. No one would see the surprised red streaks left by Thomas's nails against a very pale arm.
"Don't move," Thomas directed earnestly. His eyes rolled back and he managed, "Oh god, your heart."
"I can't stop moving that," Philip said, his voice a strange flurry. He leaned forward, wrapping his arms around Thomas's waist, and buried his face against his chest. They remained for a time, immobile wrecks of hammering hearts. Even the stillness was stupefying, almost painful in the constriction and the heat around him.
Eventually, Thomas's warning grip on his arms slackened. Philip disentangled one, and reached beneath himself to stroke Thomas's prick back to life. He could feel the tremor of the hips beneath him which turned into slow, steady rolling motions. Freeing his hand from Thomas's erection to allow it to create friction against his belly, Philip replaced his arm beneath Thomas and pulled him closer.
Philip was too far gone to make make a sound beyond his laboured breathing, but each deepening thrust of his cock provoked a jagged sigh from Thomas. As the violence of his movements increased, the sighs shattered into keening, which Philip silenced with a frantic sort of kiss. He was terrified that Thomas would ask him to stop, yet couldn't help unsealing their kiss toward an overwrought coalescence of gasps.
He felt as though he were being rent limb from limb as he came - inside of him. That was the though cycling through his brain and he lifted his hands to Thomas's face and brought their mouths together desperately, kissing until his lips grew sore.
"You're perfect," Philip mumbled, drawing back. He saw tracks of tears which shone sideways down Thomas's face and he softly brushed at them with his thumbs. "Did you hate that?" He asked uneasily, guilt sliding from his question to his guts.
"No," Thomas half-laughed. He reached his hands through Philip's hair and pulled him into, what would have been in any other circumstance, a chaste kiss. "I'd not have let you keep on if it only hurt."
Philip withdrew himself from Thomas, immediately regretting that most intimate loss of contact, and moved onto his side. He went to bring his hand to Thomas's cock once more, but Thomas intercepted it and pulled it around his waist as he rolled over.
"Just keep ahold," he said, so softly that Philip wasn't sure if he was meant to hear. He pulled Thomas flush to him and kissed his neck once, before there was simply nothing.
Not having entirely realised that he had fallen asleep, his waking up came as something of a surprise. He had faded into the world, which felt still so like a dream - the soft glow of the lamp seem to be intertwined naturally with the still-warm air, thick with the scent of the oil and sweat and spent lust.
He shifted himself away from Thomas's back and onto his own, drifting thoughtlessly on the precipice of sleep which, for all his wanting, he never found himself tipped over.
Nearly an hour passed in this futile effort before he gave up, standing and realising with a shocking force that he wasn't yet sober. He steadied himself and tried to will any remaining champagne away as he was made his way to the adjoining room, hoping in vain that his mind would be relieved with such efficiency as his bladder. No such luck.
Philip found himself staring at the tub, considering for only a moment before he started the water running. As this set about its task, he made his way into the pantry and glanced about its, frankly disheartening, stores. He rarely ate in and Godfrey had, reasonably enough, let himself slacken the reigns over its precision - which, naturally, Philip now damned him for.
A lonely-looking lump of bread sat swaddled next to a dish of strawberries and another of cream. He dipped a finger into the cream and licked it off, immediately grimacing at the floral taste the oil had left on his skin; he felt it fair play by Nanny for having eaten with his fingers. He grabbed the fruit and returned from whence he came.
Upon Philip's return to his bedroom, he found that Thomas still slept. He looked lovely as he did so - devoid of anything but himself and still the most beautiful thing Philip had seen. He held the dish in one hand and peeled the stem of a strawberry away with the other, letting the greenery drop to the floor, and pressed it against Thomas's lips.
"Hmm?"
Thomas took it into his mouth once he'd awoken further and ate it as he sank bank to his earlier position.
"Here," Philip said, rolling him onto his back. "I don't want to starve you." He balanced a handful of berries unsurely atop Thomas's chest. Before Thomas had time to respond beyond a curious, sleepy look, Philip sought out the tub to turn the water off.
He put a tray over its width and sat the dish on it before he grabbed a bar of soap to wash the oil from his hands. He placed the bar next to the dish and sank himself chest-deep in the water, which felt only like a more visceral version of the air.
Sleep crept over him enough to tug him down, to overweigh him, but almost in a way that left him too tired for the act of sleeping. Still, the water seemed so much more lulling than his bed; he leaned his neck against the rim of the tub and half-dozed until he heard Thomas's voice drag itself through the silence.
"That'd be a very stupid way to die," he levied.
Turning, Philip couldn't help but laugh at the sight before him of Thomas holding an ashtray in one hand, a cigarette in his mouth, and his prick in the other hand as pissed nonchalantly. "Are you that busy?" Philip asked.
"Yes. Had to save you from a watery grave, apparently."
"You know, I've managed to bathe alone for many years now without any problems. But, if you're concerned," he said, sitting up and pushing the erstwhile forgotten tray farther along, "get in."
Thomas obeyed wordlessly, sitting flush against him. He pulled the tray closer, placing the ashtray upon it as he smoked. Philip reached around him and grabbed a few berries, peeling the stems off and dropping them to the floor before he popped them in his mouth in one.
"I'm sorry," he said, catching Thomas's amused expression, "but I'm starved."
"Whose fault is that?" Thomas laughed.
"There's only this and bread," he admitted. "I could - well, I've got to call tomorrow and get a surrogate gentleman. I could call early and see if one could be sent 'round for breakfast. There's a guest room, so it wouldn't really be odd, your being here."
Thomas turned around to look at him. "I could do that. For you."
"No, you couldn't," Philip said, smiling. "If I nicked someone who looked like you off of a lord, my mother would make her way to London before you'd a chance to do up my tie the first morning. Anyway, it's only for the week. But if I called, we'd have to be respectable tomorrow."
"Well," Thomas said, frowning slightly as he stubbed his fag end into the ashtray, "I can starve."
"I don't want you to starve. Eat some of these," he tilted the dish slightly. "There's cream, as well, but you'd have to get it." Philip lifted one of the berries into the air obligingly and Thomas bit in half.
"Mm, I'm not moving."
"I'm glad."
The actions surrounding the food soon fell to Thomas, who would let Philip bite them in half before he ate the rest himself. For his part, Philip sunk them both a little deeper into the water and began to trace absent patterns around Thomas's chest and belly, slicing them through as he drew his finger down in short, sharp lines. He took an unsolicited strawberry and bit in half, then turned Thomas's face to him and swiped the bared edge across his cheeks.
"What've you done that for?" He laughed, stealing the berry away as he wiped his thumb over the lines.
"I wanted to see if I could pass you for a fallen actress. I don't think you'll do," he said, voice tinged with sadness. "Perhaps one of those fairies."
"I don't actually like you," Thomas informed him, still smiling. Philip ran his tongue along the red streak he'd created and found Thomas's ever-red mouth for a tart kiss.
"Maybe you'll make for a fallen actress yet," he said, quirking his brows. Thomas kissed the bare space between them and fell back against his chest.
"I don't think I will," he finally replied, mouth full. He peeled a stem and placed a naked strawberry into Philip's mouth.
"Mm, no. That's all right. I don't go in for actresses, anyway."
"Why ever not?"
"I find, " Philip began, slipping his hand down Thomas's front until the crook of his thumb and finger surrounded the base of his penis, "them lacking. Somehow." Philip tightened his hold and pressed his grip slowly up Thomas's length, then down again, repeating the motion until he was hard beneath his hand.
Thomas's head dropped back against his shoulder and Philip studied the line of his profile from where his chest rose above the water to his hairline, revelling in its smoothness. Thomas found his free hand and interlaced their fingers as Philip kissed the line of his neck and continued pumping his cock.
"I love you. So much. I do. I love you - "
Philip kissed the skin behind his ear and cut him short, "I know. I know, shh." He stroked his thumb roughly over the slit of Thomas's cock and brought his hand, still intertwined with Thomas's, to the man's chest, running their fingers roughly over a nipple. "God, I wish I could keep you here. Always. Away from anyone else. Only us, right now, always, " he murmured lowly, straight into Thomas's ear. Philip increased the pace of his hand around Thomas's prick. "Wouldn't that be Heaven?"
The words were was coming out garbled, but he was merely giving voice to thoughts, as though doing so would give them strength to wend their way around Thomas and tangle him in Philip's dreams. Thomas nodded dazedly as his hips moved himself more hurriedly into the friction of Philip's hand.
"Just - tighter -"
- and Philip tensed his grip firmly. Thomas's head jerked back against him even harder as he came, mouth agape and soon the air was awash with the his obscene sounds which Philip kissed as they echoed from his throat.
As the room echoed in silence, Philip lit upon what he thought a madly obscene thing - he stemmed a strawberry and ran it through the ejaculate which had layered in the water, then let the he berry drop into his mouth. Thomas caught the idea of what he was doing and turned away, nuzzling his head into Philip's arm and shutting his eyes.
"Don't bloody do that," he mumbled.
"I adore anything to do with you," Philip replied, beginning to do the same with another before he opted to put it into Thomas's mouth instead. Thomas made not even the slightest pretence of objection. "See? You were made for strawberries."
"I'll have to tell people that."
"You'll be so very popular," Philip said. He brought Thomas's heavy head to his again for a kiss. "Shall we get back to bed? This'd be a very silly way to die."
"That's a way to put it," Thomas said, cracking his eyes open just enough to peer into Philip's face. "I want to stay for a while"
Philip sat a little more upright, pulling Thomas with him. "If you want to risk it, I can try to save us before we have an incriminating death."
"I don't think I trust you with it, but go on. Impress me."