Chapter Text
Alex awoke to the thrum of the rain and the distant rumble of drums and guitars. Music? Right, he was at Glastonbury. But what time was it? The main stages weren’t due to start until midday. He must have slept for longer than he’d meant.
He blinked his eyes open and found himself staring at the ceiling. The camper’s interior was awash with daylight; pale walls soft against the dark wood furnishings. The light that spilled in through the gap in the blind had faded the shadows to grey, but thankfully it was a gentle light that hadn’t triggered his hangover. At the base of his skull there was a headache just waiting to happen, and something told him not to move too fast in case he woke it from its slumber.
He rubbed his eyes, and his stomach growled. Perhaps he wasn’t quite as hungover as he’d feared. His appetite seemed functional and breakfast felt long overdue, and whilst coffee and a burrito might not be the solution to all of his problems, it would be a bloody good start to help him disentangle his hazy memories of yesterday.
He yawned, stretched, and rolled over to his side – and nearly collided with Miles.
Christ.
He moved backwards sharpish. Miles’s eyes were closed and he lay there oblivious, but Alex’s heart was a jackhammer. Fuck the coffee. His pulse had accelerated straight from zero to sixty and every word of their last conversation was now ringing in his ears.
Breathe, Alex. For god’s sake, calm down.
Fuck. At least they were no longer so awkwardly entwined. Miles must have separated himself in the night because he was now curled on his opposite side, facing Alex’s way. He remained fast asleep, breathing softly, his hair a riot of tangles that fell over his eyes, and it was a sight that had no right in making Alex’s stomach flutter like that, nor his fingers twitch with the urge to smooth those dark strands back. He didn’t dare do it. Not without Miles’s permission. Not after his confession last night.
I’ve been wanting you to kiss me all day. I really bloody want you to.
God. He’d been drunker than he’d realised. What had he been thinking, saying that stuff? No bloody wonder Miles had panicked. Alex would’ve panicked too if Miles had said those things to him.
Or would he?
He turned the thought over in his head. Well… perhaps not. After all, it wasn’t as though anything he’d said last night was untrue. His desires hadn’t changed where Miles was concerned; the effect that Miles’s proximity was having on him was making that clear enough. Was there any point in regretting his loose words, if those words were the honest truth?
Yes, his brain said. You were drunk. Very drunk. You probably sounded like a complete prat.
Miles shifted in his sleep, and sighed.
Alex went still.
Shit. Get out of the bed now. Do a runner. Quick, before he wakes up.
He gritted his teeth. His stupid brain was really not helping. There was no chance he was bailing on this whole thing now; it was too late for that. What was the point of running when Miles already knew how he felt? There was nowhere left for him to hide, and besides which, he was bloody sick of hiding. He couldn’t run from these feelings anymore, or bury them, or disguise them. Whether or not his desires were reciprocated, he had to stand his ground and be true to himself. He had to be honest with Miles.
Miles’s eyelids fluttered. He sighed again, and then he blinked sleepily.
“Alex?”
“Yeah, ’m here.”
Miles rubbed his eyes. He stretched his legs out beneath the covers and then scruffed back his hair, leaving it even more dishevelled than before. His gaze settled on Alex’s face, and there was an awkward pause while they stared at each other. Naturally, as soon as Alex needed to initiate an actual conversation, his mind had gone blank. He racked his brains for some kind of opener, but he came up with nothing. The only thing his ever-helpful brain was telling him to do was to bury his face under the pillow and never come out.
Miles cleared his throat. “So… dare I ask, how’s the hangover?”
“Um… probably too early to say. Might be alright, if I don’t move for a bit.”
“One of those, eh?”
“Yeah.”
“You gonna stay in bed all day, then?”
“Uh, I dunno. It depends.”
“Right.”
Miles dropped his gaze. He began to take an apparent interest in the folds of his pillow case. Alex cursed his own ineloquence. Maybe he should’ve written Miles a bloody letter instead. Or a song. Anything would’ve been better than this. If only Miles had let them talk it out last night, in the dark, it would’ve been so much easier. But no, he’d insisted on this daylight heart-to-heart, and now Alex was floundering.
The patter of rain on the roof intensified, and then eased off again. The subsequent silence seemed even heavier by comparison. Miles began to fidget with the covers, twisting them back and forth between his thumb and forefinger.
“Hey,” Alex said. “Did you do summat to your hand?”
Miles flinched. He pulled his hand back and hid it under the duvet. “No, it’s nothing.”
“That’s not nothing. You’ve got bruises on your knuckles. What’d you do, get in a fight?”
“Erm… no, not exactly.” Miles was turning pink, and he wasn’t meeting Alex’s eye.
“Hey, come on. What happened?”
“Alright, look. I know it’s stupid, so don’t have a go. But I might’ve sort of… given the Winnebago a bit of a smack when I got back here last night.”
“You what?”
“It’s fine, it didn’t hurt. I was drunk.”
“Miles, for fuck’s sake. Let me see.”
Alex reached down, grabbed Miles’s hand and held it up to the light. Miles’s knuckles were coloured with bluish splotches, like he’d gone one too many rounds in the boxing ring. On closer inspection, it didn’t look that bad, and none of the skin was split, but Miles had gone bright red in both cheeks.
“Al, it’s fine. I’ve had worse.”
“This wasn’t… you didn’t do this because we argued last night, did you?”
Miles bit his lip. “I was just drunk. It doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it fucking matters, I can’t believe you would–” Alex cut himself off. What could he say? Miles had punched the bloody campervan all because they’d had a fight, and it was hard to decide whether to feel guilty, or furious, or absurdly touched. In reality Miles seemed to be suffering more from embarrassment than from his actual injury, but that was hardly the point. Either way, he looked so sorry for himself that all Alex wanted to do was grab him and give him a hug.
But he didn’t do it. Instead he brought Miles’s hand to his mouth, pressed his lips to the damaged skin, and kissed each knuckle in turn. He did it carefully so as not to hurt, and stroked his thumb over the bluish bruises.
“You bloody idiot,” he whispered, between kisses. “Bloody, bloody idiot. Chrissakes.”
“Hey, that tickles.”
“Too fucking bad. That’s what you get for being a twat.”
“Alright, fair enough. But if you’re gonna do that, you’d better go and give the Winnebago a kiss too. I think it came off worse.”
Alex stopped and glanced up. Miles wasn’t frowning at him anymore. He was still pink in the face, but now his lips were quirked in a tiny smile and his eyes had regained a familiar twinkle.
“Are you serious? Are you fuckin’ laughing at me, Kane?”
Miles’s smile grew. “Only a little bit. Go on, keep kissing me knuckles if you want. ’S making me feel like the Queen.”
Alex bit back a smile of his own. “It’s not bloody funny.”
“It is a little bit funny.”
Alex kicked him under the covers, and Miles’s smile became a full-on grin. He kicked Alex back and there was the briefest brush of bare skin as their feet collided. Alex couldn’t take his eyes off him. The way Miles looked right now, all sleep-ruffled and smiling… it was doing something to his insides. God, he ached to move closer; to reach out and touch. But how could he be sure that Miles would want him to?
Alex steeled his nerves. He lifted Miles’s hand and pressed one more tiny kiss to the bruised skin, but not like the ones before. This time, he let his lips linger, and he didn’t break eye contact. The amusement ebbed out of Miles’s face.
“Al?”
“Yeah?”
“Look, I need to know… all that stuff you said to me last night. Did you mean it?”
“Yeah. I did.”
Miles swallowed. “So… what, erm… what exactly is it that you’re asking me for?”
“Nothing. I mean… nothing except what you’re willing to give me. I dunno what that is, but… I don’t want to lose you. I don’t care about owt else.”
There was a lengthy pause. Alex forced himself to breathe. He was still holding on to Miles’s hand, and as they watched each other he began to trace idle figure eights around Miles’s knuckles. Miles cleared his throat.
“Alex… I need to tell you something.”
“What?”
“It’s gonna sound weird.”
“’S never stopped you before.”
Miles breathed a sigh. “Okay. Well… you know the day before yesterday? When you were telling me about that porn you found on me laptop?”
“Um… yeah?”
“I know you said you didn’t look at it, but you should know… it weren’t, like, just girls. It was blokes as well. I mean… it was videos of blokes with blokes. I’ve erm… that’s been me for quite a while. I just never told you.”
Alex stared at him. His heartbeat fluttered in his throat. “I never… I didn’t know that.”
“That’s ’cause I didn’t want you to know.”
“But… why not?”
Miles curled his fingers into the sheets. “Because of me and you. What we have, it’s… it’s worth so much to me. I weren’t about to risk our friendship for… anything else. I can’t not have you in me life, and I knew if I told you the truth, then you’d guess… how I really felt.”
Another silence descended, heavier than the last. Alex had lost the power of speech. The revelation was too big to process. How had Miles managed to keep such a thing from him? How had Alex failed to notice? He struggled for words, and meanwhile Miles seemed to shrink in front of him, curling into a tight ball.
“Miles, I… I dunno what to say.”
Miles winced. “Fuck, I shouldn’t have said anything, should I? I knew you’d freak out.”
“I’m not freaking out, it’s… I just don’t get it. If you felt like that, why didn’t you kiss me last night on the dancefloor?”
“Because I was fuckin’ shitting meself! I knew I’d blown me cover and I thought you were only making a pass at me ’cause you were that wasted and you’d decided you felt sorry for me–”
“Jesus, Miles, no. Not the bloody case. At all.”
Miles bit his lip. “Well, I didn’t want to wind up as your drunken mistake. And you can say you’re not freaking out, but you should see your face right now. You look like you’re planning to stop returning my calls as soon as we get home.”
Miles’s words were shaky, his eyes cast downwards as he spoke, and it was almost as if he’d taken not just one leaf out of Alex’s book, but all of them. He’d become a mirror for Alex’s own shyness, reflecting it all back at him. But Miles wasn’t supposed to be shy. Miles was supposed to be the brave one. If Miles wasn’t going to step up and push them towards some kind of resolution, what the fuck was Alex meant to do about it?
Miles seemed to be inferring an answer from Alex’s silence. He was folding further into himself and he made no attempt to look Alex in the face. “Al, listen. I think it’s best if we just forget it, yeah? You’re me best mate and I can’t fuck that up for the sake of… of a drunken fumble or an experiment. If that was all you wanted out of me, then–”
Alex kissed him.
It was without thought or plan. His body moved for him, and the shock of Miles’s mouth flipped his stomach upside down. God, the taste of him, the sudden heat of him; it wasn’t like any other kiss. Miles gasped against his lips but Alex couldn’t even stop to breathe. It felt like an eternity, but it was surely only seconds. They parted and then Miles was staring at him, his eyes gone so wide they seemed to take up half his face.
Alex fought his breathing back under control. “That’s not… that’s not what I want. I’ve got feelings and I… me brain just won’t shut up about you, okay? I dunno where this is going, and I can’t even explain how I feel, but… fuck it, Miles. I dunno what else to say.”
Miles kept staring. He opened his mouth, then closed it again.
Alex flinched. “Christ, I’m sorry. You know I’m shite at this, I’m not brave like you are. You’re never stuck for how to say what you mean, or scared to put yourself out there. I wish I were brave like that, but I’m not. Can barely cope with me own drama half the time. You know I wouldn’t even’ve got through that bloody gig yesterday if it weren’t for you? I swear, you’re like my fucking hero.”
Miles blinked at him. “What the fuck are you talking about, man? Of course you’re brave. You’re one of the bravest people I know.”
“Come off it. How’d you work that one out?”
“Don’t tell me you don’t see it.”
“See what?”
Miles shook his head. “Alex, there’s nothing heroic about anything I do. There’s nothing brave about showing off in front of people when that’s how you get your kicks. Being brave is the total opposite of that. It’s being shit-scared to do something, but then doing it anyway – and between the two of us right now, that’s not me. That’s you.”
Alex stared at him. “I don’t… I mean… that’s what you think?”
“Bloody right I do. Okay, so you get stage fright sometimes, but so fucking what? You still went out last night and rocked the whole of Glastonbury. And you say you’re scared to deal with this… thing between us, but you’re the one who started this talk, not me. I’ve been too scared to say a fucking word. I mean, Christ Al. You can say that I’m your hero, but trust me, you’ve always been mine.”
Alex’s stomach fluttered. God… was that truly how Miles saw him? Not as someone flawed by shyness, but as brave because of it? The thought was a revelation. But how could Miles, the king of self-confidence himself, possibly think of him like that? Miles, with all of his assurance and swagger? Miles… who was staring at him now with worried eyes, and biting on his lip–
Alex reached for him. He put his hand against Miles’s cheek and gently cupped his face. “I… I can’t believe you were scared to tell me how you felt.”
“Couldn’t help it. It’s– I care about you too much to fuck things up between us.”
“But if I’d known, maybe I’d have figured out me own feelings sooner. Perhaps I’d have realised there was summat else going on. I’m starting to think… maybe there always was.”
Miles’s eyebrows went up. His eyes were wider than ever and he seemed frozen to the spot. Alex stroked a thumb against his cheekbone, and for a minute they stared at each other, saying nothing. From the world outside came the sound of a distant drumbeat, but inside the camper all was still except for their breathing.
“So, what d’you reckon, then?” Alex said quietly. “You and me. Are we thinking the same thing?”
Miles visibly swallowed. His gaze searched Alex’s face. Alex let him look, and he willed himself to be open. There could be no more barriers between them now; no more masks or pretence. He needed Miles to read his mind.
Miles touched his fingertips to Alex’s temple. “I think I do know what you’re thinking,” he said. “But I’m still scared to be wrong.”
Alex leaned into him. “Don’t be. You’re not wrong.”
He put his lips to the corner of Miles’s mouth. Miles took a sharp breath, but this was a far more careful kiss than the one before; a mere brush with no heat behind it. Nonetheless, Alex’s heart was racing. His whole body yearned to close the gap between them, but he held himself still. He moved his fingers into Miles’s hair and closed his eyes.
“Will you... do you want to kiss me?”
He whispered the invitation into the inch of space between them and held his breath, some part of him frozen by the notion that Miles might have changed his mind after all.
Miles breathed out a warm rush of air, and then his hand was on Alex’s waist. “Alex...” he said. “I… I want to do more than kiss you.”
Alex’s eyes flew open, but only for a second, because Miles was pulling him in and pressing their mouths together and oh god, Alex couldn’t think. The kiss seemed to demand his surrender, and it shouldn’t have been a surprise because this was Miles, for fuck’s sake, but he hadn’t been prepared for this. The press of Miles’s tongue was slow but insistent and Miles held him in place with a hand to the back of the neck, and the intensity of it was turning Alex’s insides to putty. No girl had ever kissed him like this. No kiss had ever rendered him so utterly defenceless.
Miles licked into his mouth, their tongues slid together and Miles began to kiss him harder. Tension gripped Alex’s stomach and god they were really doing this, weren’t they; this was a kiss that was going somewhere and they weren’t taking the scenic route. He moved one hand to the small of Miles’s back, and then lower; cupped a handful of rounded flesh, and squeezed.
Miles gasped and bit him on the neck. He yanked Alex forward and their legs tangled and a sudden shock of hardness pressed into Alex’s thigh. Miles made no effort at all to disguise it, and fuck, this was nothing like the incident yesterday. Miles was looking straight at him and the expression on his face was crystal clear. He had a hand on Alex’s hip and his fingers were prowling the edges of Alex’s clothing. He tugged on Alex’s shirt.
“You wanna take this off?”
“Mmm…”
Alex lifted his arms and Miles grabbed the hem and pulled the t-shirt loose. He raised his own arms in turn and Alex reciprocated, and then they were lying there in just their underwear.
“Okay?” Miles whispered.
Alex nodded wordlessly. He couldn’t have spoken if he’d wanted to. His gut was tying itself in knots and his mouth was so dry he couldn’t swallow. Miles pulled him close and ran a hand up his chest and Alex could barely slow his own breathing. Fuck. Had he ever been this turned on in his life? If so, he couldn’t remember. The tension in his stomach had moved lower to become a beating pulse between his thighs. Miles pressed a kiss to the underside of his jaw and he shuddered. A soft whimper escaped his throat before he could stop it.
“Fuck,” Miles breathed the word into Alex’s neck. “I love how you sound.”
Alex flushed. He was making himself too bloody obvious. He had to find some way to hold his ground, but Miles was taking him apart. Those confident hands were all over him, pressing into his back, burying themselves in his hair. God, his hair. Miles kept tugging on it and it was making Alex weak. But he couldn’t surrender. Not this fast. Not if he wanted to keep some shred of dignity.
Miles was gripping him by the hip again, tracing the waistband of Alex’s boxers and teasing the boundary between cotton and skin. Alex was painfully hard, and looking at Miles there was no doubt he could tell, but Miles stayed at the border and made no move to touch below the waist. His eyes searched Alex’s face.
“Do you want me to…” his words tailed off.
Alex’s heart was beating double time. He still couldn’t speak. He could only nod, and that was challenge enough. The look in Miles’s eyes was making him dizzy.
For a few seconds Miles kept teasing that divide between skin and fabric, as if giving Alex one last chance to back down, but then he lifted the elastic, slipped his fingers underneath, and Alex’s mouth fell open in a gasp. Jesus bloody Christ. Miles was wasting no time on preliminaries. His grip was hot, and firm, and oh god. Oh fuck.
Alex’s stomach did a backflip. Miles was moving his hand in even strokes, his gaze fixed on Alex's face, and fucking hell, Alex was an idiot. Why had it never occurred to him to realise that of course Miles would be good at this? Him with his clever hands, and his stupidly talented fingers and–
“Ummf–”
Alex nearly bit his own tongue in an effort to be quiet. He squeezed his eyes shut. Fuck, it was too much. It was like being under a microscope with Miles watching him like that. Alex had nowhere to hide; no way to disguise how fucking good Miles was making him feel. Another whimper escaped his throat and he flushed hot, and then suddenly Miles was kissing him again and there was nothing but the slick press of their tongues, the heat of their mouths, and the aching pleasure where Miles was gripping him.
“Al,” Miles whispered. His breath came hot against Alex’s lips. “Look at me.”
Alex kept his eyes tight shut. Christ, Miles didn’t know what he was asking. It was one thing for Alex to tell Miles how he felt, and quite another to actually show him. If he looked Miles in the face right now, Miles would know. He would see how helpless Alex was for him. He’d see the naked truth hidden beneath all those careful layers.
Miles slowed their pace. His kisses became softer and his other hand found its way back into Alex’s hair. “Al,” he whispered again. “Hey. Come on, it’s just me.”
Alex’s heart fluttered. With some hesitance, he opened his eyes. Miles was looking right at him, and no telepathy was needed to read his emotions. His face was full of fondness and yearning and lust, and there was no wall to keep Alex out; no disguise to deflect him. Miles was playing with all his cards face up, letting Alex see every single one, and fucking hell, if there’d ever been a moment for bravery, then this was fucking it.
Alex kept his eyes open. He slid his hand down beneath the covers and pushed his fingers into Miles’s boxers. Miles’s breath hitched.
“Fuck, Alex… oh fuck–”
He jerked forward and moaned into Alex’s neck, and Alex buckled under a wave of desire. God, he’d never heard Miles sound like that, and now it was all he ever wanted to hear again. He moved his fist and Miles let out a muffled sob, and then they were arching into each other with low moans and breathless gasps, their mouths colliding in bruising kisses.
Alex had to pull back for air. He pressed his face to Miles’s shoulder and inhaled the heat of him. God he smelled so fucking good. Like skin and rain; like muddy fields and rock ’n roll. Alex took a sharp lungful, nose pressed tight to Miles’s jaw, and Miles shuddered like he couldn’t help it. In a sudden move, he grabbed the waistband of Alex’s boxers and yanked them down to thigh-level, and now there was nothing between them except for the stroke and slide of Miles’s hand.
“Christ,” Alex panted the word. “Miles– god, please– I want– oh fuck–”
Miles gripped him by the scruff of the neck. “Tell me. I’ll do whatever you want me to.”
“I–”
Alex’s breath left him in a rush. He was suddenly on his back and Miles was on top of him and they were kissing so urgently that Alex could barely keep pace. He arched upwards, but to no effect; Miles was a solid weight and the movement did nothing whatsoever to shift him. Miles began nipping at his neck and Alex bit back a cry. Christ, he was losing his fucking mind. He was pinned to the bed and going nowhere and Miles could’ve done anything to him right now, and Alex would’ve let him–
“Al,” Miles growled right into his ear. “Tell me what you want.”
“I want you to... to...”
Alex couldn't even spit out a sentence. But fuck the words. He gripped Miles’s shoulder and pushed, and the look on Miles’s face made it clear that words weren’t necessary. Miles slid down Alex’s chest, leaving a trail of heated kisses, and then he was tugging off Alex’s boxers, followed by his own, chucking them into the aisle. He sank lower, cupping Alex’s hips as he vanished under the duvet, and Alex’s heart raced. Miles pressed a kiss to Alex’s hip bone and another to his thigh, and then he began to ghost warm air over sensitive skin and Alex’s throat betrayed him with a high pitched whine. He curled his fingers into the sheets and held his breath, every muscle rigid, and then everything dissolved in the heat of Miles’s mouth.
“Oh Christ–”
Alex’s hips bucked and Miles held him down with both hands. He pressed Alex into the mattress and carried on regardless, and Alex nearly lost it. There was no fucking way Miles hadn’t done this before. No inexperience or hesitation showed in the way he moved his mouth, and licked, and swallowed – god. It bordered on obscene. Wave after wave of pleasure rippled out from every flex of his tongue, and Alex choked on a moan, unable to fight it, his head thrown back and his fingers gripping Miles’s nape to hold him still, right there, oh fuck–
Miles let out a muffled groan and his right hand vanished from Alex’s hip. Seconds later he pitched forward, and it was blatant he was multi-tasking under those bloody covers, but there was no way to see; there was only the rustle of the sheets, and the way he panted, and the accidental graze of his arm against Alex’s knee.
Alex tightened his grip in Miles’s hair. He kept forgetting how to breathe; he could only writhe and squirm as Miles worked him over, struggling to hold on to some semblance of sanity. He’d given up trying to be quiet and his breathless moans seemed to be fuelling Miles’s enthusiasm. Miles’s callused fingers moved in maddening strokes, and Miles’s mouth was so hot it was almost a burn. It was the best kind of suffering, and Alex couldn’t keep it to himself. He let his voice carry to a higher pitch, and lost himself in the heat of his own desire.
“Fuck… Miles… fuck, yes–”
Miles whined. He swallowed and curled his tongue, and Alex cried out. He was skirting a tantalising edge, barely holding it together, and god he didn’t want Miles to stop, but it still wasn’t enough. It couldn’t end like this, with them so far apart. He had to see Miles’s face. Had to kiss him, and touch him, and make him feel this same desperation.
“Miles.” He pulled on Miles’s hair. “Fuck– Miles, come ’ere.”
“Mmf–”
Miles stopped what he was doing. He crawled up Alex’s body and emerged from beneath the covers with pink cheeks, breathing heavily, his hair a tousled mess. “You… okay?”
Alex didn’t answer. He threw his weight sideways and flipped them both over, and Miles let out a startled huff as he landed on his back. He stared up at Alex with dazed eyes, and god he was perfect, every bloody inch of him, and Alex was shaking from the sensation of being pressed so close, with Miles’s skin so hot against his own.
“Al–”
Alex kissed him. He rolled his hips in a slow thrust and Miles moaned into his mouth. Desire like sparks of electricity shot down his spine, and Miles arched into him, urging them at once into a quickening pace, and the friction between their bodies turned to an intolerable ache. Miles’s fingers tightened around his waist and Alex moved against him, helpless to silence his own groans as Miles bucked upwards and clenched a fistful of his hair. Alex reached between them and wrapped his fingers around them both, stroking them together in a slick and rapid rhythm, the ache between his thighs a tense and throbbing heat.
Miles threw back his head, his mouth open in a gasp. He bucked into Alex’s fist with a sound like he’d been punched. “Oh god… Alex… baby–”
Alex’s every muscle went taut. He choked on a cry and in the next instant he was coming so hard he couldn’t fucking see, his vision blacking out and waves of pleasure surging right down his legs until even his toes were tingling, and in the midst of it all Miles was moaning in his ear, trembling and panting beneath him. Alex pressed his face into Miles’s neck, wracked by volleys of aftershocks, and then Miles was squeezing him tighter, shuddering against him, and they were clinging to each other as though the whole bloody world were ending.
Time must have passed. How much was impossible to judge. Slowly, the world crept back into focus. Soft light seeped in from the corners of the blinds, painting muted shadows on the walls, and the rise-and-falling cadence of distant guitars merged with the hum of the generators. Miles’s arms were warm, his breath ticklish against Alex’s ear, and on the roof the rain drummed its gentle patter.
Alex melted in their embrace. It was like he’d left his body and was floating somewhere near the ceiling, his every limb turned weightless. Miles’s fingers were in his hair, tugging him back to Earth, but sated as he was, even that light touch sent a flutter over his skin. God, when had he ever felt like this? So utterly satisfied and yet still craving more. What the hell had just happened to him?
He raised his head with an effort and found Miles looking at him with an expression of wide-eyed wonder. For a second they stared at each other in spellbound silence, and then Miles’s lips curved upwards into a smirk, and Alex began to blush.
“Fuck, Miles. Did you really just call me–”
“Ssssh.” Miles planted a kiss on the corner of Alex’s mouth. “You liked it. I could tell.”
“Hey–”
Miles shut him up with another kiss, this one full on the lips. He cupped Alex’s jaw and pulled him closer, and Alex found he was too boneless to argue. He let Miles kiss him, opened his mouth to the soft press of Miles’s tongue, and barely protested when Miles rolled them over to the side. His heart rate was slowing to softer beats, and god, he could’ve lain here and let Miles kiss him forever.
When he opened his eyes again, Miles was smiling at him. It was a smile that Alex had never seen before. It was like the one Miles wore whenever he wrote music, but warmer, and fonder, and something in it made Alex’s chest ache. He stroked his hand against Miles’s cheek, and Miles leaned in to the touch.
“No regrets?” Miles said softly.
“Fuck no.”
“Me neither. Well… maybe one.”
“What’s that?”
“That I didn’t proposition you a long time ago.”
Alex huffed a quiet laugh. “How long ago are we talking? When… I mean…how long have you felt this way about me?”
Miles glanced down at his fingernails. “Honestly? It’s been at the back of me mind since not long after we met. But I never let meself think too much about it. Thought I’d get over it and move on, you know?” His lips curled at the corners. “I weren’t counting on you inviting me into your bloody bed.”
“You say that like it were a master plan.”
“Bet it was. Wouldn’t put it past you. A blatant attempt to rob me of me innocence.”
“There’s nowt fuckin’ innocent about you, Miles.”
Miles grinned. His eyes crinkled at the corners. “Played it pretty well for a bit though, didn’t I?”
“Mhm, guess you did. But… really? All that time?”
Miles glanced away again. “Um… yeah. Sorry.”
Alex laid a hand on his waist. “Hey. Don’t be.”
Miles looked back at him, and now his smile was small and shy. They watched each other for a minute without speaking, while Alex traced soft patterns with his fingertips. It was bizarre to think that Miles had felt this way about him for so long, but at the same time it felt irrelevant. All that really mattered was how they might make up for lost time.
Alex smoothed his thumb over Miles’s hip bone, and revelled in the warm press of skin. Miles half closed his eyes.
“So go on, then,” he said quietly. “Tell me.”
“Tell you what?”
“What gave me away? Was it our… brief encounter yesterday morning?”
“No.” Alex gave him a gentle shove. “I thought that were an accident. I figured it out later on.”
“How?”
“Easy. It was the way you looked at me. I could tell what you were thinking.”
Miles blinked. “Oh yeah?” He dug his fingers into Alex’s hair and began to rub gentle circles. “I guess you were always good at that. Give it another go, then. What am I thinking right now?”
“Hmmm.” Alex closed his eyes and pretended to concentrate, though in truth his mind had gone blank. His skin was tingling beneath the pressure of Miles’s fingers. “Let’s see. You’re thinking… that you wanna lend me another pair of your jeans, since I got the last pair all covered in mud. And after that… you’re thinking you wanna take me somewhere nice and buy me breakfast.”
Miles burst out laughing. His hand cupped the back of Alex’s neck. “No, Al, that’s not what I’m thinking. Not even close.”
He pulled their bodies flush, skin hot against skin. He made space for his thigh between Alex’s legs, his hand curling into Alex’s hair, and he pressed their mouths together.
Alex let him do it, and he laughed into the kiss.
By the time they finally made it out of the camper, it had stopped raining. The damp ground glimmered in the sunlight and the campsite was bustling with voices and music, and with people trudging back and forth from their tents. There were no missed texts on Alex’s phone, which likely meant his friends were still passed out, so he and Miles got their boots on and prepared to head over to the tipi tent. Miles had conceded to lend him a second pair of jeans after all, and these were an even closer fit than the ones he’d borrowed yesterday. It was hard to miss the way Miles kept looking at him in them, but Alex found he didn’t mind it one bit.
He put a deliberate sway in his stride and bumped Miles with his hip as they walked. “What’s the matter with your face, eh? These tight jeans doing summat for you, Kane?”
Miles gave him a look that could have melted butter. “You want me to carry you right back to the fucking camper? Because I will.”
“Mmm, I might. But maybe later.”
Miles snorted. He wrapped an arm around Alex’s waist. “Cheeky little–”
The rest of his words got lost in a sudden burst of noise. Alex looked up at the unexpected sound of whoops and clapping, and there ahead of them was Matt, and Jamie, and Nick, all sat outside their tipi tent in deck chairs, all three holding cans of cider and grinning. Jamie gave him a mock salute, and Matt put two fingers in his mouth and whistled.
“There they are!” he called out. “Finally had enough of each other, eh? Nice of you to join us.”
Miles blinked at him. “Erm… did we miss something?”
Jamie snorted. “Yeah. You missed breakfast, and lunch. Matt went to call for you earlier with some hangover burritos, but from what I hear you were… otherwise engaged.”
Alex stared at his friends. He opened his mouth, but his words had once again disappeared. His face was burning with the hottest blush he’d ever experienced – shit, how the hell did everyone know?
Nick gave him a sympathetic smile. “Matt said you guys… uh… you’d left your window open.”
Oh god.
They hadn’t shut the bloody window, and that meant he and Miles had probably put on a show not just for Matt, but for the whole fucking campsite; every moan and sigh… and pet name. Christ. He’d have to lie low for the rest of the festival; he’d have to hide in the camper until it was time for them to leave and then–
Miles gave him a squeeze.
Alex glanced sideways into soft brown eyes. Miles was watching him with a gentle smile, his hair wind-ruffled, his cheeks a blushing pink, and god, all Alex wanted to do was kiss him. And after all, why the fuck shouldn’t he? Why should he be afraid of what other people might think, or whether they knew what his feelings were? It was his heart to wear on his sleeve if he chose to, and though it left him vulnerable, maybe that was okay. Miles had been right when he’d said that being scared was a part of being brave, and if Alex had learned anything, it was that not all bravery came from donning a suit of armour. Sometimes, to be brave, you had to take the armour off.
He turned to face Miles, and pulled him in close. In full view of everyone, he kissed him right on the mouth. Miles made a tiny sound of surprise, but then he closed his eyes and let Alex kiss him, and in the background the whoops and cheers rose to a ridiculous crescendo. Alex began to smile, and then he was smiling too much and they had to stop, because Miles was laughing too. Alex threw his arm around Miles’s waist and hugged him, and then blushed as Miles slid a warm hand into the back pocket of his jeans.
Matt had started hiccupping through his giggles, half choking on his cider. Nick thumped him on the back and gazed at Alex with a beatific grin.
Jamie snorted and shook his head. “Well, now that’s finally fucking settled,” he said. “Can we please go and listen to some bloody music? We are at Glastonbury, and personally I didn’t come here just to watch the two of you make out.”
Alex made a face at him. “Ready when you are. Give us the map, then, I’m taking over.”
Matt chuckled and handed him a thrice-folded piece of paper. It was printed with an image of Glastonbury bedecked with damp and muddy fingerprints. “Here,” he said. “Go on, we’ll follow you.”
Alex held the map with one hand and squeezed Miles with the other. Miles grinned and pressed a kiss to Alex’s temple. “Lead the way then, Al,” he said.
Alex smiled. He kept his arm around Miles’s waist and the five of them set off together, moving as a unit through the campsite and the people, past the fluttering flags and across the sun-drenched mud. The music swelled louder as they walked, the clouds scudding in the windy sky, and Glastonbury stretched out before them like a promise. Miles took hold of Alex’s hand, their fingers intertwined, and Alex’s heart beat like the beckoning drums. The festival welcomed them with its arms open wide, and soon they were as one with the cheering of the crowd.