get back here and let me hold you motherfucker
With no other options left, Casey chucked his empty beer can at the guy. He jumped as it bounced off the alley wall with a clang and landed crumpled on the asphalt by his feet. Finally, he looked up and spotted Casey leaning over the edge of the rooftop, his asshole face scrunched in confusion. “What the hell? How’d you get up there?”
“Don’t worry about that. Where’s the turtle guy you were with earlier.” His words slurred together, and he knew he probably sounded drunk off his ass. Whatever.
He cocked his head. “Raph?”
Casey’s fists clenched at the fact that this random guy he’s never even met knows Raph’s name. It took three encounters and more than one fistfight before Raph told Casey his name, let alone anything else. “Yeah. Raph. Where’d he go?”
The guy stared up at him for a moment, then said, “Why? What do you want with him?”
The nerve of this guy. “None of your damn business. I’m a friend of his. Who the hell are you?”
Crossed arms. “I’m a friend of Raph’s too. And I’ve never met you.”
“Hey, that’s my line, asshole.” Casey jabbed a finger toward him and swayed with the movement. “I’ve been Raph’s best friend for years, and he’s never mentioned a washed-out grub of a guy who doesn’t know how to keep his hands to himself.”
The guy froze for a moment. Then, “Casey Jones?”
Oh, perfect. The guy knew his name too. “Yeah? And? Who the hell are you?”
“Oh. I guess I have heard of you. I just didn’t expect you to be, uh…” He shrugged. “I’m Woody, Mikey’s friend. Raph took off looking for you a while ago.”
Oh. Now that he mentioned it, the name Woody had been said to him a few times before. New guy, Raph says Mikey is totally into him. Well. “Great. Catch ya later.” He turned to go, then paused and looked back. “Raph’s not big on people touching him. So. Maybe just tone that down.”
Woody squinted at him, an infuriating smile tugging at his lips. “When did you see me…?” He glanced back at the bar he had walked out of. “Were you watching us earlier? Through the window?”
Casey’s face was suddenly hot. “Nevermind,” he muttered and took off, hoping to god that this Woody guy wouldn’t go blabbing about this conversation to Mikey or anyone else. But knowing Casey’s luck, Raph would hear all about his weirdly possessive shovel talk by the next morning.
_
Casey stared up at the water tower, teeth chattering around the cigarette in his mouth. He’d stayed there for a solid twenty minutes before deciding it was a lost cause, then a few more because he needed to have a cry over how much of a lost cause it was. The warmth of the beer had worn off a while ago, but the woozy feeling hadn’t, and now his face was tacky and his nose was snotty.
This was their spot. If Raph had been looking for him for a while, he had probably already checked here and given up. He had probably also tried texting or calling Casey with no answer. Not for the first time, Casey wanted to strangle himself when he pictured his trusty old cell phone shattered against the sidewalk. Raph had no way of tracking him down. No reason to either, considering how much of a dick Casey had been earlier, storming out on him like that. Hell, he’d probably given up already. Gone home to his family. Or maybe back to the bar, to Woody with his touchy hands and casual smiles. He’d told Woody that Raph didn’t like being touched, but he hadn’t seemed to mind all that much when Woody’s hand was squeezing his arm. It had taken Casey months to get to that point, when a touch or a tap didn’t have Raph doing a double-take.
Yeah. Raph was probably doing what any reasonable person would do. Staying inside where it was warm, being with people who were nice and normal and didn’t freak the fuck out at you for no reason because they had too many feelings all jumbled up in their thick, stupid skulls. And here was Casey, standing out on a rooftop on a frigid February night, shivering his ass off and wishing the guy he was in love with was stupid enough to come find him.
He let his head hang down for a second. Let himself feel just how pathetic he was. He wiped his nose on the sleeve of his hoodie, trying to keep the snot from dribbling onto his lip. “Stupid…” he muttered. “I’m so fucking stupid.” He dropped his cigarette, ground it out with his sneaker, and turned to go.
A clattering from across the roof made him freeze, and then Raph was pulling himself from the fire escape onto the roof. He looked at him, brown eyes shining, skin dark and flushed. “Case,” he said, voice breathless like he’d been running. “There you are. I’ve been looking everywhere. You didn’t answer my calls.”
Casey stared back, mouth hanging open.
Raph looked him over, frown pulling his lips down, and took a step forward. “What the hell are you doing up here? Why’d you run off like that?”
Casey shook his head, suddenly overwhelmed by the way Raph was looking at him. His eyes were locked onto him, his body leaning forward, like Casey was the only thing that mattered right now. “I–” He needed to say something. “I went back to the bar.”
Raph’s frown twisted with confusion, another step forward. “You did? When? I didn’t see you.”
“I saw you. With that Woody guy. You were s-smilng–” He clamped his mouth shut on the hiccup, hoping Raph hadn’t noticed.
He glanced up. Raph looked horrified.
“Are you… crying?”
Yeah… yeah, he couldn’t do this. “Uh. I’m gonna, um. I’m freezing my butt off out here, I’m gonna go home. Night.” He turned and, since it worked so well last time, bolted for the edge of the roof.
“Casey!” Raph shouted, and he barely had time to register the sound of footsteps pounding behind him before strong hands were yanking him back by his jacket and pulling him from the edge of the roof.
He struggled, it was instinct. The edge of the roof, freedom and escape, was right there, if he could just wriggle out of Raph’s hold. “Let go, I’m fine!”
“Would you just–!” Raph managed to get an arm around Casey’s waist, wrestling him back toward the middle of the roof. “Quit. Running. Away!” He grabbed Casey’s arm, yanked him around, and pulled him forward. Arms clamped around him, squeezing him against Raph’s body in a tight hug.
Casey struggled once, twice more against the firm hold, then slumped. As if all the fight in his body left him at once. Raph was hugging him. Hugging him tight, like he was afraid Casey would slip through his fingers if he let up even just a little. It felt good. He closed his eyes.
They both stood still, breaths coming out as labored, white puffs in the night air. Raph was warm against Casey’s chest, the smell of his leather jacket familiar, and Casey pushed his snotty nose into his shoulder. Raph’s hand came up to hold his head there, fingers twisting into his hair.
Casey sniffled. “’m sorry.”
Raph sighed, but didn’t let up on hugging him. “What are you cryin’ for, Case?” His voice sounded a little hoarse, wrung-out, and Casey felt a tug of guilt at being the cause of it.
“Nothin’, I’m just drunk.”
A huff, and then Raph was leaning back to look at Casey’s face. He put calloused hands on either side of his head. Casey sniffed, trying not to look too snotty and gross as his sort-of-boyfriend inspected him. Raph’s thumbs rubbed along his cheeks, wiping at old tear tracks. He looked worried, his eyes dark in the dim moonlight.
“Talk to me, Case. You’re freaking me out.”
“Don’t mean to. You just. I just always feel like...” He clenched his eyes shut for a moment, wishing he was more sober. He gripped the lapels of Raph’s jacket. “I love you.” He heard Raph’s breathing stop, but kept going. “And sometimes it feels like I love you so much it’s gonna just– just tear out of me, like some kinda monster. Like, it hurts, sometimes, in my chest.” He put a hand against his chest, and leaned his cheek against Raph’s hand, which hadn’t moved. “And when you– when you do stuff like last night. When you act like it’s nothing, I just–”
“Casey,” Raph said, his voice low and unsure.
“And then when I went back to the bar, I saw you with that guy and he was– you let him put his hand on your arm, just like that, and you were smiling at him. You know how long it took before you let me do that? Before you smiled at me like that? I thought…” He shook his head, opening his eyes only to train them on Raph’s chest, memorizing the way the leather wrinkled between his fingers. “I don’t know what I thought. But basically, I love you. That’s it.”
Raph was silent. His thumbs moved along Casey’s cheeks in continuous circles, but he was silent. They stood for long enough with nothing but the sounds of New York between them that Casey worked up the courage to look up. He blinked.
Raph looked scared. He was staring at Casey’s tear-streaked, reddened, snotty face, and he looked scared. “Casey, I…” he said, breathy, but didn’t continue.
Casey sighed, gave his best wry grin. “You don’t gotta say it back, Raph.”
Raph frowned again, bit his lip. He shook his head. And then he was tugging Casey forward and pushing warm, dry lips against Casey’s chapped ones. He closed his eyes and let Raph pull him closer, curling an arm around his shoulders. They had kissed before, but this was different. Slower, sweeter. Tender in a way Casey didn’t know Raph was capable of. Raph had never kissed him in a way that made him feel like broken glass, like he would fall apart if Raph’s arms weren’t holding him together. It was a moment suspended, the only sound the wetness between their lips, the only sensation Raph’s teeth pulling at his bottom lip, Raph’s thumb against the soft skin under his ear, Raph’s breaths against his cheek.
Raph pulled back and looked up at him. Casey looked back, unsure what to make of the glint in Raph’s eyes. He’d never seen this one before. It was new.
“Casey,” Raph said, voice still low and breathless.
“What?”
“I let Woody touch my arm because he’s my kid brother’s best friend. I was being real fuckin’ nice. But I want you touching me way more than I want him touching me. You get me?”
Casey stared down at him, then nodded.
“Casey.”
“What?”
“It’s freezing out here. I’m taking you home. Don’t run away again.”
Casey shook his head. “I’m not gonna run away again.”
Raph kissed him one more time. “Good.”
AO3
