Izzy and the Right Answer

by R. Cooper

  “Oh please,” Ronnie popped back smartly, fondly, despite almost wheezing. “You kept that close to your chest, but I have two words for you: Bridal. Carry.”

  Rocco’s expression was too disgruntled to be called a frown. A glower was better. “Ronnie,” he said hesitantly, then leaned in to kiss Ronnie’s sweetly on the mouth instead of arguing.

  Iz looked down at his knees.

  “I’m happy you chose Ronnie,” Iz started, then caught his breath, considering. “Of course, I am. But… did both of you not choose me because of sex? I’m not angry, I don’t think. Possibly. Though I didn’t think Ronnie should choose me, so I can’t blame him for that. And you should have what you desire. You both deserve it, and—”

  “Hey.” Ronnie’s hand appeared in his line of sight, curling over his knee. “I know this guy was shy about it, but we did choose you. We’re here right now.”

  “You’re happy to be here?” It was so easy to keep things from Iz. Everything had to be clear.

  “I’m about to get ready for work, so if anyone needs the bathroom—oh.” Giselle stopped in the doorway and all three of them looked up. She slapped a hand over her eyes. “If this is a prelude to sexytimes, you could at least shut the damn door.”

  She disappeared before Iz could get his mouth open.

  Ronnie took his hand from Iz’s knee. Rocco cleared his throat. Soft music was still coming from Ronnie’s phone.

  “We should study,” Rocco said. As if he truly meant that, he reached for his bag.

  Iz had no interest in his book.

  Both boys were flushed. They were sitting together on his bed, in his bedroom, and Giselle had taken one look at them and assumed something sexual was happening, or about to happen.

  He hadn’t forgotten their discussion, either. “But you two want to have sex.”

  Rocco didn’t move, not even to look at him. His bag fell back to the floor.

  Ronnie looked, but that was all. “Like, in general?” He swallowed. “With each other? Right now?”

  Iz inclined his head. “Yes.”

  Rocco turned to frown at him. “We’re not animals.” He sounded offended and confused.

  “Yes—no. I know that.” Iz gestured to them both. “But you’re in love, and you enjoy sex, and you love me—or like me—and—” he briefly faltered. “Do you want to have sex with me? Some couples do that.”

  “Are you offering?” Ronnie demanded in a very high voice. “What the fuck?” he breathed in the next second.

  “Okay.” Rocco got up, closed and locked the door, then sat back down. “Maybe lower voices.”

  Iz hadn’t been aware of being loud. But in the sudden quiet, he heard the water come on for Giselle’s shower.

  “Do you even want to?” Ronnie was still struggling with his breath, though not his volume. “I’m not having sex with you if you don’t want to, Izzy.”

  “You find me attractive and I think I feel the same. I can be curious.” Iz frowned at both of them. “I can want, even if it’s differently than you do. But I’m not sure. Not about that, or what it would do, or if you even want to now, or what that means. So I asked.”

  “I don’t think he thought you were ready,” Rocco explained, rubbing Ronnie’s back. “You surprised him.”

  “If we want to? Like….” Ronnie shook his head, then leaned over to capture one of Iz’s hands. “You aren’t a stranger we’re bringing home for a threesome.”

  Obviously, Iz wasn’t a stranger. But that situation would have a different dynamic, which he supposed Ronnie was trying to explain. Iz nodded.

  Ronnie sighed in relief, then continued. “We said we’d be honest. So, do we want to? Yeah, I do. Rocco?” He didn’t glance back and didn’t seem surprised at Rocco’s answer.

  “Yeah.” The husky note in Rocco’s voice was familiar. “Not only that, but that has occurred to me.”

  Now Ronnie looked back at him. His tone was sly. “How many Izzy fantasies have you had?”

  Rocco met his stare with narrowed eyes.

  More teasing. Iz ignored this to focus on what Rocco was talking around. “You mean sex individually but also together?”

  Their attention instantly came back to him.

  “We don’t expect anything,” Ronnie said, a small smile lighting up his face. “You’d have to want it too, and you’re not built that way. Everyone’s got their own terms and conditions, and that’s fine. This is good, really.” He gently squeezed Iz’s hand. “But since you asked, do I—or would I—want you? Yeah, Iz. But I’d also like to kiss you again sometime, if you wanted.”

  “We had this talk before, Izzy,” Rocco added. “I know you remember.”

  “Not far from where you are now,” Iz answered, as soft as the memory. After several moments of thought, he nodded but didn’t say anything else.

  “Jamie.” Ronnie saying his name so seriously brought Iz’s gaze up from the bed. “Something else on your mind?”

  “You like having sex with each other?” Iz licked his lips. “I mean, you’re fine with the situation as it is?”

  “I love him.” Rocco’s contribution momentarily silenced Ronnie. “Stop thinking that way.”

  Doubt led to bad thoughts. Naturally, Rocco knew that.

  “You’ll keep having sex?” Iz pressed, to be sure.

  Ronnie snorted. “Try and stop us.” His teasing could be very reassuring, especially when he followed it with a gentle explanation. “This—us—it’s a lot, Izzy, for anyone. I can’t tell you not to worry, because you will, but there’s no rush on this or anything else. Now, or never, or sometimes, or whatever—as long as we get to be with you and talk to you.”

  “Whatever you think most of the others do with their hookups, it’s what they want. It doesn’t mean everyone does or feels comfortable with that.” Rocco paused. “My sexual history isn’t anything close to Eric’s. Honestly, I’m still surprised you two would even look at me.”

  “Ugh, shut up,” Ronnie told him tenderly, then let go of Iz so he could cup Rocco’s cheek. “Me too, though,” he whispered and brushed his thumb over Rocco’s cheekbone.

  “What do you two do together?” Iz asked, then wondered if that was too much when Rocco froze.

  “I want to laugh, but I think that’s hysteria,” Ronnie confided, still in a whisper, then twisted to study Iz. “Is this real life? Am I eighteen again and dreaming?” Rocco’s hands appeared at his waist, arms looping around him to drag him against Rocco’s chest. Ronnie went without a fight. He tipped his head up, his legs a sprawl, his cheeks duskier than roses. He never once looked away from Iz. He took a deep breath. “He fucks me and I live for it.”

  “Oh.” Iz meant to look down, but his gaze caught on Rocco’s hands, spread over Ronnie’s chest, dipping under the hem of his shirt.

  Ronnie’s breath was shaky. “No one expects you to—”

  “Is that all?” Iz looked back up.

  “Oh, you know, blowjobs, hands, lots of making out.” Ronnie’s voice was compellingly unsteady for all that he was trying to sound casual. “The usual stuff,” he added, and then huffed in frustration, maybe remembering that Iz had no usual stuff. He turned, putting more of his body in Rocco’s lap, and spoke against Rocco’s neck. “Like porn, only real life, and with a lot of kissing and Rocco telling me how amazing I am.”

  Rocco locked eyes with Iz. His face was very dark but he raised one eyebrow. He always did stand his ground.

  “Well, you are amazing,” Iz told a squirming Ronnie, “and I’ve never even fucked you.”

  Ronnie’s soft little moan made something interesting flicker through Rocco’s expression.

  “Is he aroused just from talking about it?” Iz asked Rocco, his heart beat loud and fast and present through his entire body. “Talking about it makes me react too.”

  “Holy shit,” Ronnie complained quietly. “I wasn’t ready. Of course, he’d be like this. He’s not even done and I’m gonna die.”

  Iz tracked the slide
of Rocco’s hand under Ronnie’s shirt but raised his head when Rocco spoke up, hoarse in a way Iz now recognized the cause of.

  “That’s natural, a physical reaction,” Rocco assured him, as though Iz didn’t know that bodies responded to stimuli. Rocco must have been shaken too.

  “You both keep telling me to think about it.” Iz’s voice also had a husky note. He didn’t talk while masturbating, or maybe he would have noticed before. “Which means you both have thought about it.”

  “Of fucking course, I have.” Ronnie shivered and Rocco’s hand went higher, exposing skin. Ronnie turned to look at Iz with eyes almost painfully bright. “I loved you for years. Him too. Of course, I did.”

  Iz stared back, his skin cold enough for goosebumps but also stinging and hot. He could hear the shower, Ronnie’s music, Rocco’s breathing, carefully slow, and Ronnie’s, faster.

  “In the absence of evidence—” Iz swallowed to wet his mouth “—I wouldn’t object if you two wanted to be more demonstrative.” He had the distant thought that he should talk to Patricio, but then remembered Patricio had told him to do this. And anyway, “I trust you both.”

  Ronnie hid face and moaned again. Rocco twitched, then stilled.

  “Did you just ask us to make out in front of you?” Ronnie’s question was muffled. His hand tightened on Rocco's bicep.

  “He suggested it,” Rocco corrected bluntly. Ronnie whined and said something that didn’t sound like words to Iz, but meant something to Rocco. His lips parted. “He likes that idea.”

  A laugh—hysterical or not—finally escaped Ronnie.

  “Do you?” Iz wasn’t trying to make them tense or uncomfortable. “Do you like the idea?”

  “I think….” Rocco went silent for several moments, his hand sliding up and down Ronnie’s spine, taking Ronnie’s shirt with it. Ronnie shivered for it, long and slow. “I think you would appreciate what he’s like when I’m fucking him,” Rocco finished at last, making Ronnie clutch at him and Iz’s heart kick. “But, I also don’t think it’s the time for that today, for a lot of reasons.”

  “I trust you,” Iz said again, although now he needed to know what Rocco was talking about.

  “There’s a lot between this and that,” Rocco went on, watching Iz intently as if waiting for something.

  Iz knew porn but not Ronnie’s panting breaths as he listened to this exchange, or how controlled Rocco would be for more when he was already so careful. He shook his head to show he didn’t understand but he wanted to, and Rocco pulled his hand out from Ronnie’s shirt to curve it at the back of Ronnie’s neck. Ronnie lifted his head to stare at him, so close that Iz forgot to breathe.

  “Yeah?” Rocco asked, rough-voiced and gentle.

  Ronnie answered by kissing him.

  His mouth was open, but it wasn’t a desperate, violent movie kiss. He brushed his parted lips over Rocco’s and shifted to bring their bodies closer the moment Rocco kissed back. It was slow, with no breaths, and then hard, quick breaths, and soft, wet, little sounds. Ronnie gripped Rocco’s bicep tight. His other hand came up, lost somewhere Iz couldn’t see until Ronnie kneeled over Rocco’s lap, and then he saw it curled into Rocco’s hair.

  They were sitting at the edge of the bed, but Ronnie showed no fear of falling. Rocco’s hands were at his waist, and when Rocco moved back, Ronnie followed him, gaze on Rocco’s mouth when they separated. They held their breath, or didn’t seem to be breathing, and then all it took was for Ronnie to lean forward.

  Another kiss, still gentle, but insistent.

  Iz curled his fingers into his sleeves, distantly aware of the tension in his body.

  Rocco edged up Ronnie’s shirt, thumbs sweeping over the bare skin of Ronnie’s lower back, then his palms. Each touch sent tiny shudders through Ronnie, like bolts of electricity that pushed him forward—pushed his hips forward, just a little.

  The music was going. The shower too. Iz was breathing fast, noticeably so, and covered his mouth with his hand.

  Ronnie gasped, making Iz jump. The sound was needy, and Iz dragged his eyes from Rocco’s hands on Ronnie’s skin to in time to witness the slow descent of Rocco’s mouth to Ronnie’s neck, Ronnie’s head tipped back to allow it. His eyes were closed. He was shivering.

  It seemed like the kind of thing Rocco would want to stop to soothe, although Iz had no way of knowing that. He tried to shake the thought away, but it stuck.

  “Please don’t stop.” Soft words slipped past Iz’s hand. He thought Ronnie would open his eyes, or blush as he remembered Iz was there, but Ronnie shuddered again and fisted his hands into Rocco’s sleeves. “Unless—I mean unless you want to.”

  Rocco should have blushed. Maybe he did, but it was lost in the color already in his face and down his neck, or hidden when he kissed the spot behind Ronnie’s ear. “Yeah?” he asked again, whole sentences in the way he said it, encouraging and reverent and rough.

  Iz did not know the state of feeling horny, but he knew what it was to be turned on. He heard it in the question and in Ronnie’s shaky exhale, felt it in the tightness in his chest. Physical arousal made him hot and slow. He didn’t move or couldn’t move except to swallow and press his hand harder to his mouth.

  Rocco fell onto his back and pulled Ronnie on top of him.

  A noise slipped out of Iz, like a hiccup.

  Ronnie went still, only for a second, maybe two. “Iz?” he asked softly. His head was down, his eyes shut. Rocco’s hand swept up Ronnie’s back, rucking his shirt up to his shoulder blades. He was so very pretty. They were.

  “You look good.” It rushed out of Iz, urgent and warm and a bit anxious. “You look so good, and I—are you hard?” Their hips were flush, and until now, Ronnie had not stopped moving. If they were hard, they could feel it, pressed together like that. “I’m getting hard,” he admitted and wanted to close his eyes. “This is everyday to you so maybe you aren’t. But I am.”

  Ronnie let out another moan and dropped his head to Rocco’s collarbone. Rocco soothed him, finally, the way Iz had expected him to earlier—long, slow caress down his spine. Iz didn’t know what that would feel like. Ronnie loved it. He melted easily under Rocco’s hands. They were so beautiful. Iz was hot all over and getting hotter and he would never melt like that.

  Iz hiccupped again. His throat was tight. His eyes were stinging. “Oh. I—I think I’m crying. No, don’t—” He flung out a hand when both of them turned to look at him. “I don’t want you to stop. I don’t know why I’m—” He did his best to scowl. “You’re beautiful and I’m aroused, but I—”

  “Izzy.” Rocco was still calming Ronnie, and now Iz too. “Iz. Come here. Not for—anything. Just. Come here so I can reach you?”

  Iz scrubbed at his cheeks, at his mouth, then nodded before shuffling closer. Ronnie sat up as he did, lips swollen, spots of color under his jaw. Iz tried not to check to see if either of them was hard, but that wasn’t how his brain worked. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I don’t know why this is happening.”

  “You were overwhelmed by our combined hotness.” Ronnie put his fingers under Iz’s chin. He might have been teasing. He might have been speaking the truth.

  “I didn’t know what to think,” Iz confessed, whispering. He looked down. Rocco was essentially pinned by Ronnie, but his hand was warm on Iz’s knee. “I couldn’t think,” Iz told him, and all his breath caught in his lungs again. “Sorry. I might—I might need to calm down. That’s not what a regular person would need. You were so pretty. And your hands. Rocco, I would like to watch you touch him more. I’d like to see him touch you. But—”

  Ronnie inched closer, face very close, eyes soft, and placed a kiss on the edge of Iz’s mouth. “I’m so good right now, Iz. Frustrated, but good. And that’s not a big deal, okay?”

  “Not a ‘big’ deal,” Rocco commented. “Ali would have a field day with that one.”

  “It’s not an issue,” Ronnie corrected with a roll of his eyes for Alistair’s sense of humor.

 
“I can leave you alone for a while,” Iz offered, and Rocco sat up in one easy motion as if Ronnie’s weight was nothing. He stabilized Ronnie with one hand while staring at Iz.

  “To screw around on your bed? Without you?” He was shocked, but he was also still aroused. Iz did his best not to stare.

  “I don’t mind,” Iz insisted, although they had both kissed him on this bed before and somehow that made it different from Ronnie’s bed, or Rocco’s. “There will be laundry.” He tried to focus on that. “Come is so messy.”

  “No, no, no.” Ronnie shook his head. “This wasn’t about a fuck.”

  “It could have been, if you had been alone.” Iz glanced between them, their befuddled, flushed faces. He put his fingertips to Rocco’s mouth. “I won’t respond like Ronnie.”

  “Because you aren’t Ronnie.” The rumble from the words carried all the way up Iz’s arm.

  “I won’t respond like Rocco, either,” Iz said to Ronnie. “You shouldn’t be left longing. It’s not right. You’ve done enough of that.”

  “I mean, once I can walk normally, I might go outside for a bit? Get some fresh air? But I’m good, Izzy. I’m fine.” Ronnie smiled to show he meant it.

  “The first time I had sex, I didn’t even know the guy.” Rocco spoke up, his gaze momentarily dropping to Iz’s shoulder. “We were drunk. I was horny and nearly seeing double because I drank too much to hide how scared I was.” He coughed, then looked back up. “It wasn’t… objectively… good. For either of us. It’s a lot for some people. Even your quote-unquote regular people. If you want to or never want to… sexual stuff is complicated, is all I’m trying to say. Sorry. I don’t have a lot of higher brain function right now.”

  “Mine would have been really romantic except the next day he basically iced me like I didn’t exist, so….” Ronnie gave a slightly forced shrug. “There’s a whole bunch of shit attached to sex, Iz, even when it’s with just two people.”

  “So many feelings,” Iz complained.

  Ronnie nudged his chin up to kiss him again, soft and fast. “Good feelings, though, I hope?”