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“This thing blows, man,” Newt says, exactly three hours into the mandatory PPDC gala he and Hermann have been forced to attend.
Hermann rolls his eyes, finishes off the rest of his gin and tonic with a careful sip. “It’s not meant to be fun,” he says. “It’s meant to be—oh, I don’t know. Productive.”
“Productive,” Newt snorts. He’s not drinking, not like Hermann is, but he did stuff his plate full of junk from the buffet tables. Mozzarella sticks, some shrimp, tiny little sandwich things—it’s what he’s owed, frankly. Because this thing does blow, even if Hermann refuses to admit it. These fundraiser things always do. Even on the off chance they manage to sucker some rich asshole into writing them a check, it almost always goes towards jaeger upkeep, which—while it’s crucial, okay, Newt doesn’t deny that—still means k-science is helplessly underfunded. “Okay. Sure.”
The ice in Hermann’s glass is melting, and he swirls it and the little slice of lime around in a circle. Newt chews sadly on a bit of sandwich. “It is boring, isn’t it,” Hermann finally sighs. “How many hours to go?”
Newt scuffs at the floor with the toe of his fancy dress shoe, clicks his phone’s power button to check the time. “Two.”
Something akin to despair crosses Hermann’s face. “I’m getting another drink,” Hermann says. “Would you like anything?”
Newt shakes his head, and Hermann disappears towards the bar as Newt easily polishes off the rest of his plate of snacks. Two whole hours to go. Two hours until he can get out of this stupid suit. Would it be rude to hit up the buffet again?
He hits up the buffet again. He puts a few more mozzarella sticks on his plate and is busy cramming them into his mouth when there’s a little tap on his shoulder, and Newt swallows thickly, his eyes watering. Probably Hermann, scolding him for being impolite or something. “What?” he says, turning.
It’s not Hermann, though for a split second, Newt thinks it could be. The guy’s like Hermann if Hermann gave a shit about dressing nice and having a stylish haircut, and if he veered to the indecent end on the scale of ill-fitting clothing. (The buttons across his pecs are fighting a losing battle.) They’re very nearly identical, down to the big brown doe eyes and sharp cheekbones. It’s—weird. He gives Newt a neat little smile and holds out his hand. “Stryver,” he says. “Philip Stryver.” He’s got a flat, American accent and a watch around his wrist that looks as if it cost as much as, if not more than, his fancy suit. Wealthy donor? (Be polite, Hermann would say, don’t fuck it up, Newt would say, because he looks like the type of guy that could easily fund a good few months of their research with a single check if Newt plays his cards right.)
Newt wipes his hand on his suit pants and takes Stryver’s. “Newt,” he says. “Uh. Dr. Geiszler, I mean.”
Stryver shakes it, and then brings his other hand up to rest on Newt’s wrist. He wraps his fingers around it. His smile is almost predatory. It’s weird to see that kind of expression on what’s basically Hermann’s face. Also a little arousing, if Newt is being honest. “You here with the PPDC, then?”
“Yeah,” Newt says, forcing a grin. “Scoping out donors. I work in the science division, study kaiju and all that, it’s pretty cool, you know, if you’re interested—”
“But alone, aside from that?” Stryver interrupts.
Is he going to drag Newt out to a back alley and murder him? “Uh,” Newt says, “I’m here with my lab partner?” He casts a desperate glance at the bar, where Hermann has evidently been accosted by some high-ranking military assholes and having his ear talked off. He looks bored, keeps also looking around the room—probably looking for Newt.
“Not what I meant,” Stryver says. His thumb strokes the skin of Newt’s wrist. “Are you here alone?”
Oh? “Yeah,” Newt says.
Stryver drops Newt’s wrist, but his hand goes to the small of Newt’s back. “I’d be interested in making a donation,” he says, voice low. “Maybe we could discuss this in a more private setting? My hotel room?”
What the hell, Newt thinks. The dude’s like a horny Hermann. Newt isn’t just going to not fuck him. “Sure,” he says.
He expects Stryver will get handsy and try to fuck him the second they make it to his very luxurious hotel room, but he doesn’t. They make out in the elevator, and Stryver pushes him onto the silky king-size bedspread, and Newt’s all set to strip out of his fucking suit when Stryver orders room service. “How does champagne sound, Dr. Geiszler?” he says, as Newt watches him dial the number blankly.
“Uh, fine, I guess?”
Stryver requests a bottle of champagne once the staff picks up, then presses the receiver to his shoulder. “Lobster?” he says to Newt. “Chocolate-covered strawberries?”
“Uh,” Newt says. “I mean, I kind of ate already—”
But Stryver orders those, too, then hangs up. “Make yourself comfortable,” he says, leering again, and Newt takes the chance to finally take off his ugly tie and suit coat and kick his shoes across the room. It’s not very graceful, but Stryver seems to be into it.
“So what do you, you know,” Newt says, unbuttoning his cuffs, “do?” He could be a politician, maybe. Newt hopes he’s not one of those pro-wall assholes; he’s not about to betray the PPDC for some dick.
“You know,” Stryver says, and nothing else.
“...Alright,” Newt says.
Their champagne and strawberries and lobster come in no time, and Stryver insists they eat on the bed. He’s a little more fun once he’s got some booze in him. “Dr. Geiszler,” he declares, as he tops off Newt’s second glass, “you have lovely eyes. They inspire poetry. A man could get lost in those eyes.”
“Cool,” Newt says, at a loss for how to respond to something like that. It’s been way past when the gala was supposed to end. Hermann’s probably looking for him and pissed off. He doesn’t mind the attention Stryver’s giving him, but if he’s not going to get naked any time soon— “Look,” Newt begins, “this and nice and all, but—”
Stryver brushes Newt’s hair out of his face, then picks up an already de-stemmed strawberry, and Newt falls quiet. He nudges it at Newt’s lips; Newt takes the hint and a bite. The guy’s got nice, long fingers, just like Hermann’s, and Newt can’t help but swipe the very end of his tongue against one of them when he goes back in for another bite of strawberry. Stryver’s pupils dilate. Score, Newt thinks.
With an affected sexiness he doesn’t totally feel, Newt reaches up and holds Stryver’s hand in place and finishes the strawberry, then sucks Stryver’s index finger and then his thumb into his mouth to get the rest of the chocolate off. “Dr. Geiszler,” Stryver stammers, and Newt pulls off with a pop and downs the rest of his champagne.
“Newt,” Newt corrects, and tosses his empty glass aside and tugs off Stryver’s tie.
Stryver’s hung, it turns out, which is a wonderful stroke of good luck for Newt. He certainly takes a hell of a long time to put it to good use, though. “I use only the best,” he tells Newt, as he slicks his fingers up with some of the lube from the bottle he’s gesturing at (also, apparently, sent up by room service, which means that Newt’s walk of shame back to the Shatterdome tomorrow morning—assuming Stryver lets him stay the night—will have an extra fun element of the staff knowing exactly what he got up to).
“Did you look up Amazon reviews or something?” Newt says with a grin. Stryver’s cheeks go pink. “Nothing wrong if you did,” Newt corrects in a hurry, “that’s sexy. Thoroughness is sexy. Uh. I can’t wait.”
Stryver opens Newt up a bit slower than Newt would’ve normally liked, but Newt appreciates the gesture, and anyway, there’s a methodical neatness to it that’s reminiscent of everything Hermann does. It just makes it easier for Newt to imagine it’s Hermann above him: Hermann’s fingers, long and elegant, twitching within him, Hermann’s hair falling across his sweaty forehead, the muscles of Hermann’s oddly built arms straining, and if Newt squints his eyes just so he can pretend Stryver’s haircut is just that much less stylish. Newt has to bite down on his lip to keep himself from moaning out the wrong name when Stryver finally slides on a condom (also, he assures Newt, the finest on the market), hooks Newt’s ankles over his shoulders, and pushes into him slowly.
“Oh,” Newt gasps out instead, and then gasps out a few more insensible and incoherent things as things progress, and soon the arms Stryver's braced on either side of Newt’s head begin to shake. He’s not going very fast, though, so, impatience building fast, Newt kicks at Stryver’s back with his heel. “More,” Newt says, “go a little—”
Stryver picks up speed, leans down and starts kissing up Newt’s neck, sweat-damp hair falling free from his hair product and across his forehead. He just looks so much like Hermann, you know, that Newt thinks he can be forgiven when Stryver wraps a (big) hand around him to jerk him off and Newt cries out “Oh, Hermann—!” on impulse.
“Philip,” Stryver corrects, and Newt cheeks go hot.
“Right,” Newt says, “ah, sorry, I mean, Philip, Philip—”
“I am going to make the biggest donation,” Stryver pants, “you have ever seen, Newt—”
Hermann’s less than pleased when Newt rolls up to the lab the next morning in his outfit from the gala with sex hair sticking up in five different directions, suit coat flung carelessly over one shoulder. “Where in the hell did you go?” Hermann exclaims, throwing down his chalk, and Newt’s a little touched to detect no insignificant amount of worry. “One moment you were there, the next—and you weren’t answering your door, or your phone—I thought something—!”
“You were really worried about me?” Newt says, and grins. “Aw, Hermann, that’s so cute. I’m alive, don’t worry.”
Newt can’t stifle his yawn, and Hermann finally takes in Newt’s disheveled and messy appearance and blanches. “You didn’t—”
“Get laid?” Newt says, and grins. “Hell yeah I did, man.” He holds up his hand for a high-five. Hermann doesn’t take it. Newt lowers his hand. “He was some super rich guy, bought me a bunch of champagne and shit. He had silk sheets, Hermann.”
Hermann looks extremely embarrassed, or maybe scandalized; his face is flushed when he turns back to his chalkboard. “I see,” he says.
“I think I scored us some money, anyway,” Newt continues, rolling up his sleeves. “He kept thanking me while we screwing, it was so weird. Like, buddy, I should be thanking you, you’re the one with a massive d—”
“Newton!”
“Right,” Newt says. “No personal life in work, I forgot, whoops. It’s just, you know, you’re my only friend, I can’t exactly tell anyone else—”
“Newton,” Hermann says again, and Newt shuts up.
Newt didn’t give Stryver his email or anything, so he wasn’t totally expecting to ever hear from the guy again, but he supposes there aren’t too many k-biologists named Newt Geiszler messing around in Hong Kong to choose from, and he gets a package from someone who turns out to be Stryver less than two weeks later. He opens it in the lab without looking at the return address first, under the impression it’s some equipment he ordered, which is a huge mistake.
Newt holds up a powder-blue lingerie set in no small amount of bewilderment, and Hermann chokes on his coffee. “I think,” Newt says, “there’s been a mistake.”
As Hermann sputters and pounds at his chest, eyes bulging, Newt goes digging about in the packaging and pulls out a little card. A check falls out when he opens it. Newt- Saw this and thought of you. Dinner this Wednesday on me? -Philip. There’s a time and an address scrawled at the bottom—someplace Newt recognizes as one of the swankier parts of the city—and a coy invitation to wear his gift, and then Newt picks up the check. He lets out a long whistle. That’s a lot of zeros. “Shit, Hermann!” he says. “It’s from that guy I screwed!” He waves the check in the air. “Look how much money he donated!”
“Lingerie,” Hermann rasps, because of course he would be stuck on that. “He sent you—”
Newt picks up the set and holds it up to his chest; it’s a corset with matching lace underwear, with little bows and a sheer skirt. Looks like it's about his size. Kinda weird that Stryver remembered that, but whatever. “Who knew Philip was that kind of dude,” Newt says. “Oh, look!” He dives back in the box and pulls out lacy, bow-adorned stockings and holds them up alongside the skirt and corset. “These too. And garters. What do you think, man? Is it a good look for me?” He grins at Hermann.
Hermann excuses himself from the lab quickly.
Newt goes to dinner with Stryver, because at this point, he kind of wants to see where this goes. Newt was right: it is in a really swanky part of the city. He feels a little dirty walking in, in all honesty, the lingerie Stryver bought him—a perfect size, somehow—only just concealed under his suit. At least he’s not wearing heels. He'd probably fall flat on his ass. Stryver’s waiting at a booth for him, champagne already uncorked and poured into glasses.
“Hi,” Newt says cheerfully, inching in next to Stryver. “I’ve never been here before! It’s cool.”
Newt picks up a menu, but before he can consider his options Stryver’s hand immediately goes to his knee and he squeezes it. “Did you wear it?” he says, voice low.
Cutting right to the chase, then. “Yep,” Newt says. Stryver’s hand—concealed beneath the table—inches up, right up at the waistline of Newt’s pants, and he undoes Newt’s belt and immediately dips below the waistband. Newt feels him brush at the lace of the panties, and then hears him very faintly groan. It—kind of turns Newt on, to be honest, in a sexy exhibitionist way. Stryver’s fingers dip lower, reaching the garters, the beginning of a stocking, and he strokes his skin through the lace and Newt’s breath hitches and he blushes and he drops his menu.
“Champagne is more than enough, actually, I think I'm good,” Newt squeaks, and swallows down the contents of his glass, and Stryver—one hand now rubbing circles at the front of Newt’s boner—summons a waiter over for their minuscule check.
Stryver unbuttons Newt’s shirt in the limo—limo!—the second they get in, and starts feeling him up eagerly, stroking over the corset, dipping below the top to rub Newt’s nipples. It gets Newt—well, it really turns him on, and he strips out of everything but the lingerie and ends up riding Stryver right there, partition rolled up. “Newt,” Stryver moans over and over, kneading his ass, and the little skirt flutters with each hard thrust upwards, “Jesus—”
“Her—uh, I mean, harder,” Newt groans, gripping the headrest.
They don’t even go back to Stryver’s hotel. Stryver just drops Newt—mussed, with a bit of a hitch in his step—off in front of the Shatterdome with a little wave and a promise for more quote-unquote gifts.
It’s late, and the chances of Newt running into anyone else in the halls are slim, so Newt doesn’t bother buttoning his shirt all the way up before he slips inside. He fumbles with his keys when he makes it back to his quarters and drops them on the ground, though, and when he bends over to pick them up, he catches Hermann ducking out of sight just behind him. Newt rolls his eyes. “I saw you, dude,” he calls over his shoulder in the direction of Hermann’s door. Hermann leans back into view. He’s in pajamas.
“I wasn’t waiting for you to get home,” Hermann says quickly.
“Didn’t say you were,” Newt says.
“You woke me up,” Hermann continues. “With your stomping and clattering about.”
Hermann’s hair is pristine, which means he’s lying—Newt’s seen Hermann’s bedhead, once back when they had a drill in the middle of the night, and he knows what Hermann looks like when he’s just woken up. This is not a Hermann who has just woken up. This is a Hermann who has definitely been lurking by his peephole for at least several hours. “Sorry,” Newt says.
Hermann’s eyes are fixed on the bit of blue lace peeking out under Newt's shirt, and then dart up to the barely-concealed hickey on Newt’s neck. “How was your date?” he says.
“He has a limo,” Newt says, as if that explains everything. Maybe it does.
Hermann sniffs. “Did he give you another check?”
Newt scowls, his door half-pushed open. “Look, Hermann, you don’t have to be an asshole, if you’re implying what I think—”
Hermann flushes. “I didn’t mean—” He runs his hand through his hair, obviously distressed. “I simply meant,” he says, calmly, “that I question the integrity of a man who feels as if he has to buy your time. You deserve—more than that.”
There’s a very long, very awkward silence. “Uh,” Newt says. “Thanks for that, I guess? That’s—nice of you.” Hermann nods tersely, and then slams his door; Newt hears him furiously clacking to bed. He shakes his head. Hermann's a weird guy.
Another lingerie set comes the next week after Newt and Stryver have two more dinners-turned-fucks, a light lilac this time, as well as fur coat—a legitimate fur coat—and another check made out to the Hong Kong K-Science Division. “I just don’t get Philip,” Newt tells Hermann, once Hermann comes back to the lab after mysteriously ducking away for twenty minutes when Newt opened the lilac set. “Do I seem like a guy who wants this kind of shit?” He tried telling Stryver that he really didn’t need to keep buying Newt stuff—Newt’s not in it for that, really. He may be shallow, but it’s for purely physical reasons: Stryver’s just got a great dick.
Hermann seems to have temporarily lifted his ban on personal conversations in the lab. “Are you not?” He sounds oddly curious.
“I mean,” Newt says, “if we’re being technical, lingerie—no, sorry, why am I telling you this?”
“Indeed,” Hermann says, “ah, yes, back to work, then, let’s not—” He fumbles his chalk. Newt stows the lingerie and fur coat out of sight under his desk.
He wears the whole get up the next time he and Stryver have a date, which is less of a date and more of fancy wine in Stryver’s fancy hotel room before Stryver can’t stop feeling Newt up and bends him over the edge of the bed, fur coat flipped up enough to pull down the lilac underwear to Newt's knees. “I’m not a fan, by the way,” Newt pants, as Stryver absolutely rails him from behind, “of fur. Real fur. In the moral or aesthetic sense. I’m a biologist, dude, you know—and an, uh, a vegetarian—” Stryver grips a thick handful of Newt’s hair and yanks his head back, sucks another hickey into his neck. “Oh, fuck!”
“So no fur,” Stryver murmurs, the nails of his other hand digging into Newt’s hip and his lips brushing Newt’s neck. “What would you like, then, Newt? Just name it.”
Newt thinks about it. Really, really thinks about it. “A new laptop,” he says. “Or a motorcycle.”
Stryver reaches around and starts stroking Newt’s dick, licking over the hickey he left. “You ride a motorcycle?” he says.
“Nah,” Newt says. “But, you know, if I had one, I could learn. Do that again.”
Newt stays the night because he was too lazy to call a cab, and it turns out Stryver’s secretly a big cuddler. He hooks his arm across Newt’s chest and spoons up behind him, noses at his neck. “I did get you something,” he says. “But it’s not a laptop.”
He lays something across Newt’s neck and clasps it shut with a little click—a diamond choker, Newt discovers, when he reaches up and feels at his throat. Newt can’t help from letting out a long whistle. “You really don’t have to keep buying me fancy shit,” he says, turning over to face Stryver. “I’m serious. I’m fine with just—you know.” He gestures between them. “Screwing.” Besides; he's still not really sure what the source of Stryver's seemingly-endless income is, but he has a sneaking suspicion (brought on by Stryver's continued caginess and the covert and muttered phone calls he makes at least once a date) it's from something dubious and less-than-legal. Normally, Newt's all for Sticking It to the Man, Living Fast and Dying Young, ecetera ecetera, but he doesn't exactly want to be implicated in Stryver's financial records should—you know, hypothetically—less-than-savory types come knocking for money they're owed.
Stryver blinks. “But I want to buy you fancy things,” he says. “I want to…” He reaches out and strokes Newt’s cheek. “Newt. I know it’s a little sudden, but—” He’s pulling a small square box from his pocket, opening it, and Newt’s mouth drops open at the size of the diamond on the ring inside.
“Whoa there, tiger,” Newt says. “Yikes. Okay. Don’t you think that's very sudden?”
“Consider it, won’t you?” Stryver says, and resumes stroking Newt’s cheek once he repockets the ring. “You’re a very unique man.” He pulls Newt tight to his chest, and Newt thinks oh my God.
“He proposed to me,” Newt greets Hermann the next morning, tossing the large bouquet of roses Stryver gave him unceremoniously onto his desk.
“Did you say yes?” Hermann greets in return.
“Yes,” Newt deadpans. “I did. Will you be my best man? No, of course I didn’t say yes!”
“I only asked,” Hermann says, scowling, “because—” He motions to his neck, and Newt reaches up and feels his own—fuck, he forgot to take off the choker before he changed for work. He fumbles with the clasp until he hears Hermann sigh, and then Hermann is clacking up to him and leaning his cane against Newt’s work table and working his elegant fingers over the clasp himself. His fingers brush the hickey Stryver left back there, and Newt hisses. “Sorry,” Hermann says quickly, breath warm on his neck. “I—my apologies.” The diamond choker drops, and Hermann hands it to him before he clacks back to his chalkboard.
What a goddamned weird last twenty-four hours.
Stryver starts sending Newt bouquets of roses directly to the Shatterdome. And boxes of fancy chocolates. And more diamond chokers, and more silky, lacy stockings, and expensive silk and satin robes.
“Have I told you about my lab partner?” Newt says over his next dinner with Stryver, desperate for conversation that doesn’t involve Newt’s vibrant eyes or his charming smile. They’re having more fancy champagne and tiny-portioned pasta. He tried to convince Stryver to just order pizza and maybe stream a movie together, but Stryver wasn’t having it.
Stryver swallows his mouthful of lobster. “No,” he says. “No, you have not.”
Newt twirls pasta around his fork. “Hermann,” he says. “That’s my lab partner. Hermann’s a great guy, you know? Probably my best friend. Total genius, too.” Handsome, he doesn’t say. Hermann would’ve ordered pizza and streamed a shitty movie with him if he asked.
“Have you considered my proposal any more?” Stryver jumps in. He’s digging around in his pockets again, and this time, the hunk of diamond he pulls out has nearly doubled in size. “I thought—if the last one wasn’t good enough for you—”
“Uh,” Newt says. “Um. Not now, I don’t think. Sorry, I’m flattered and all, but—”
Stryver nods furiously, and then pulls out a bracelet, dotted with emeralds. “To match your eyes,” he says. “Take this, at least. Maybe I could get you something in green, next?”
More lingerie? “If you want,” Newt says, cracking a grin, and stabs at his plate.
Stryver sends Newt a green lingerie set after all, along with another bouquet of roses.
“I should just break up with him,” Newt says mournfully in the lab the day after the green lingerie comes in. “I feel bad. The guy’s, like, head-over-ass for me, for some reason.”
Hermann’s filling out paperwork at his desk. He grunts something noncommittal.
“And I’m just in it for the dick,” Newt says. Hermann winces. “I’m not ashamed to admit it, Hermann, he’s got a big dick. That shit’s hard to come by, you know? And he’s out here sending me flowers and diamonds and inviting me to run off to Italy with him, and I'm, like, eighty-percent sure he runs a crime ring, did I tell you that?—I gotta break up with him. We’ve got another date tonight. I’ll tell him then.”
Newt decides to wear the green lingerie—one last show of gratitude to Stryver before he unceremoniously dumps him—and is trying to find a suit he hasn’t worn yet to fit over it when there’s a knock at his door. Newt pulls on one of his new little silk robes over the lingerie instead of changing entirely; he hopes it’s just Hermann, because the stockings are very much still visible, and Hermann’s the only one who—what? Has an inkling of Newt’s massive kink for running around in lace?
It is Hermann. He’s clearly a bit flustered at Newt’s state of undress when Newt opens the door. “I was—wondering if you wished to get dinner before you left, but I see you’re—”
“Philip’s taking me somewhere again,” Newt says. “To eat, I mean. I was just getting ready to go.”
Hermann’s jaw is working furiously. His eyes are fixed just below the hem of the robe, at the stockings. “Ah. I can see that,” he says.
Newt frowns. Hermann’s been weird about all of this, frankly, but he’s been especially weird about the lingerie thing. “What’s the deal, dude?” Newt says. “Is this—” he jerks open the front of the robe in an ill-advised, heat of the moment act, flashing the top of the little corset to Hermann, but it’s not as if Hermann hasn’t seen him ass-naked in the emergency lab shower before, a little underwear isn’t going to kill him, “—really that weird to you?”
A soft little noise leaves Hermann’s mouth and surprises Newt, so quiet Newt almost misses it, and that’s when Newt looks at Hermann. Hermann’s leaning heavily against the doorframe. His knuckles are white aroun dhis cane. His eyes are on Newt’s chest, on the little white bow at the top of the corset, his pupils wide and dark. “Holy shit,” Newt says, finally understanding. “Holy shit, Hermann! You’re into it!”
“Please don’t tease,” Hermann says weakly, shutting his eyes.
“I’m not—” Newt can understand why Hermann would misunderstand—Newt’s grinning pretty wide about all this. “Look. I’m not teasing. Hermann—is it just the lace, or do you—you know—dig me?”
“Of course it’s not just the lace,” Hermann says, bright red, but still managing to look affronted.
It’s not exactly a love confession, but it’s good enough for Newt. He yanks Hermann in by the front of his sweater and takes the full weight of him in his arms, knees the door shut, and then pushes Hermann up against it and starts kissing him like he’s imagined doing for ages. Hermann’s cane clatters to the floor; he forcefully grabs Newt’s ass through the robe and lace, and Newt gasps, “Shit, Hermann, I was only fucking that guy because he looked like you.”
“He looked like me?” Hermann says, and then, pressing his face to Newt's neck, says “Oh, don’t talk about him, oh, Newton—”
Newt gets Hermann on his bed in no time, tosses his robe halfway across the room and straddles Hermann, and Hermann moans so loudly when he finally gets his hands on Newt’s corseted chest Newt’s worried the entire hall must hear it. He doesn't really care if they do, to be honest. “Look at you,” Hermann says. “Gorgeous, and lovely, and—”
Newt’s not bashful, not by any means, but hearing Hermann (Hermann!) speak to him like that, flatter and compliment him like that, makes him feel warm all over. He nearly ducks to hide his face. He grinds down, instead, relishing in the feeling of Hermann’s erection through the layers of cotton and—on Newt’s end—lace, in the feeling of Hermann's hands on his body, and he leans over and kisses him again. Hermann’s hands slide over his ass once more, kneading, stroking down to thumb over Newt’s little garters, and Newt breaks away only so he can scoot down Hermann’s body and unbuckle his ugly pants. Those go down, then his briefs, and—he moans, maybe just a little, because this is the dick of the guy he’s longed to bone for what feels like a decade and he's earned it. Also, Hermann's pretty hung, too. It's magnificently poetic. “Oh, wow, Hermann,” Newt says, somewhat overwhelmed. “Wow. Uh—”
“I’m sorry,” Hermann says, adorably flustered once more (starry-eyed and pink-faced), looking down at where Newt kneels between his legs like he can't believe it. “Will—that be a problem?”
God, if he isn’t the cutest. Newt grins, and presses a little kiss to Hermann’s dick (Hermann chokes out a little gasp) before he inches back up and kisses Hermann’s lips. “Not at all,” he says, feeling mildly giddy, grinning wide, and Hermann grins back shyly.
Stryver is surprisingly understanding about it all. Newt sends him a simple note explaining the circumstances (not every day the guy you've been head-over-heels for since you were twenty-three announces he feels the same, you know), along with a pseudo-heartfelt apology and offer to return all the gifts, and Stryver's note in return is genuinely heartfelt in understanding and assurances that the gifts are Newt's to keep. (Which Newt supposes is very, very good news, considering the mess that's Hermann made of the latest more intimate ones.) If Newt ever reconsiders—if things don't work out with Newt's lab partner, or if Newt ever wants a casual dinner again, even—Stryver urges him to not be shy. (Newt does not imagine he will ever reconsider.)
Hermann, meanwhile, takes on the duty of buying Newt lingerie with wild enthusiasm.