So, bracing himself, setting his shoulders, Darien pushed open the door. What he saw inside was not particularly encouraging. Noah had his laptop open and was typing away furiously, the loud sound of the clacking keys filling the room, those unrelenting eyes fixed on the monitor and nowhere else.
“Noah?” Darien called softly, hating the tentative way that his own voice sounded. This was his bedroom. His house. Surely he was allowed to get to feel comfortable here, of all places?
Noah glanced up, looking over his shoulder at him, his eyes set wide and huge in his pale face. It was just for a moment, a look that Darien didn’t know how to read, but he entered his room and perched on the corner of the bed closest to the desk where Noah sat like he was bolted to the chair.
“Noah, what is it? Did something bad happen at school?” He was almost hopeful, though he knew that was terrible. Something bad happening at school that was external to them. He wouldn’t have to talk about himself, in that case. Wouldn’t have to try to defend himself, because school was outside of Darien’s control.
“I’m busy, Darien,” Noah told him, his voice small and very polite, the voice that he used with strangers, on the rare occasions that he was forced to talk to them. “I have work to do.”
Darien bit his lower lip, and he considered, he did, just walking out of the room, out of the whole apartment. Of calling Ken, or Lance, or even Aaron, to see if they wanted to do something. Noah didn’t want to talk, and who was Darien to try to force him to?
He knew the answer to that, though. He was Noah’s lover, his boyfriend, his friend, and Noah so clearly needed to talk. But the question was, would he let himself trust Darien enough to talk to him? Or had nothing changed?
“Noah,” Darien tried again, forcing his voice to come out calm and cheerful. “Babe. Tell me. What’s going on?”
Noah turned to him again, his movements small and quick and efficient, a sure sign that something was bothering him. Not like Darien needed any more of those signs. In his own way, Noah was telling him things were not good. Hell, those brief little movements were the same for Noah as if he’d been standing on the edge of a building screaming his discontent with a bullhorn.
The signs were not easily read, not until one got to know Noah, but they were there and Darien did know how to read them. So he reached out his hand to Noah, offering him some sort of comfort with more than his words, and after a brief hesitation, Noah took it and finally got up off of the chair.
He would sit beside Darien now, so Darien figured. He would spill his guts, tell Darien what was wrong, and they would deal with it. Together. Wasn’t that what couples who were together did? Wasn’t that how relationships were supposed to work? He would be the first to admit that he was no expert but that’s what he’d been led to believe.
Noah didn’t sit beside him, though. Instead, Noah settled on his lap, straddling him, their chests pressed tightly together. Noah kissed him then, and despite all of the turbulence in Darien’s head, he couldn’t help but find it deeply arousing, the way Noah’s hot tongue plundered his mouth.
How could anyone run so hot and cold like this? One second, Noah wasn’t even talking to him, and the next, he was kissing him like his life depended on it. And worst of all, though Darien felt somehow, deep down, that they needed to talk, his body was reacting so strongly to Noah’s kisses that he couldn’t even make himself focus on anything else.
