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Troye can't pinpoint the exact moment when sneaking around became their thing. When he thinks about it really hard, he can trace it to one morning.
One of the first of their mornings.
They were lying on Connor's bed, legs intertwined, sheets crumpled around their bodies. It was not the first time Troye had seen Connor shirtless (this boy's goddamn selfies), not the first time in the daylight (their goddamn road trips), but it was the first time Troye was allowed - encouraged - to touch.
To explore.
To graze his lips softly against Connor's jaw, to tickle his arm from the palm up to the shoulder, to trace the constellations of moles on his chest with the teasing fingers.
"What is this?" Troye remembers himself asking, as his thumb stopped in the nape of Connor's neck.
Connor turned to look at him, his eyes glazed in unspoken contentment, as he tried to comprehend Troye's question, "What?"
Troye pressed his finger slightly into the spot, circling it for good measure, "What is this?"
Understanding dawning on him, Connor answered simply, "Birthmark. Always had it," and his eyes fluttered close.
Pressing his mouth to the side of the boy's neck, Troye mumbled almost incoherently, "Looks like a love bite." Connor laughed, and Troye felt it on his lips.
"I know."
Troye smiled into the crook of his neck, and stored this moment in his memory as one of the most precious.
It resurfaces several months later.
Again, if Troye thinks about it really hard, he knows why this happened.
Same set-up - them on the bed, streaming sunlight painting the room with golden stripes.
Different bed, though. Different room. The linen is not as soft, the pillows aren't as fluffy, no candles, no fairy lights. This is not the quiet of Connor's home.
A hotel. Troye remembers himself hearing fans' shrieks and squeals from outside, even soundproof windows not able to protect from their force.
Troye is desperate, aggressive, the sounds of people - their friends - talking in the hall, in the next suite, the risk of being caught, the fear of being interrupted are making him abandon all inhibitions.
And he thinks - knows - that Connor feels the same, even if the boy beneath him attempts to hide his shivers and conceal his breathy sighs.
But then Troye's teeth bite a little too harshly on the skin on the boy's neck.
"Tro, baby, hold on." Connor places his hand - it is awfully warm - on Troye's shoulder, "Please be careful, I've got a meet&greet tomorrow."
The last thing Troye wants to be right now is careful but they have been playing the hiding game, the teasing game, for so long that it is probably for a reason, although Troye doesn't know it. Connor is the smart one of the two, he must know why they keep sneaking around.
He hasn't done any harm yet, he sees, since Connor's neck is still as unblemished as always, with the exception of his faded birthmark.
And this is when Troye gets an idea.
He presses his lips to this exact spot, moving slowly, teasingly, building up the tension between them.
"Troye," Connor's tone is trying - failing - to be scolding, warning, and Troye allows himself to use teeth again, "Oh Troye." Here, much better. Connor's hands land on his shoulders, as he presses him closer. "Troye."
The next morning Connor leaves for the meet&greet with a bright red hickey on his neck and a believable explanation for it.
Troye - the tease that he is - can't stop grinning wickedly throughout the day.
But two can play this game, and Connor is surprisingly good at games.
It takes him a couple of weeks to strike back.
They are again in bed together - honestly, when aren't they? - and Connor is wrecked. He is begging, pleading, demanding more, and Troye is a lovesick fool, and Connor is his world.
But the perfect boy has his own flaws, little dirty habits that make him human. Such a trivial thing as Connor's biting his nails becomes Troye's downfall.
Connor's abused, sharp, with uneven edges nails don't really fit on such beautiful, always awfully warm hands. But they scratch Troye's pale skin, leaving violent red marks on his back, on his shoulders that promise to turn into full-on scars tomorrow. And Troye is far too gone to notice, as his pain-induced adrenaline high makes him move faster, harder, pushing him to a high of a different kind.
The next morning, when Troye runs about the house, searching for a t-shirt to wear to his photo shoot, Connor has a cunning gleam in his eyes, but Troye is so easily lost in the green that he doesn't notice, kisses the messy-haired boy on the bed goodbye and leaves.
"Troye, let's try this shirt," Emma suggests, offering him an article of clothing.
He easily takes off his own and, as he turns to put it away, Emma and Dani both gasp.
"Interesting night you had, huh?" Dani asks, tongue-in-cheek.
Troye looks into the nearby full-length mirror.
Two certainly can play this game, and one of them is going to pay for it.
Behind closed doors they are each other's strength, in the public eye they are each other's weakness.
It would be a shame if Connor had to do an uninterrupted online videoconference with thousands of watchful people, wouldn't it?
Stealing a glance at the clock, Troye comes up to Connor and kisses him hard.
No foreplay, no explanation, just a kiss. And Troye can tell that Connor likes this raw, primitive, almost animalistic side of his, as the boy allows himself to be shoved against the back of the couch, allows himself to be pinned down by a possessive, dominant grip on his wrists, allows himself to be pressed down into soft cushions by sheer weight of another man.
Troye is really tempted to speed things up, to kiss harder, to grind harder, to finish before Connor has to go. But there is so much more at stake now, and this is not about sex anymore. Okay, it kinda is but the thrill of the chase is worth it.
That's why, with a final harsh snap of his hips, Troye stands up, straightens his wrinkled clothes, and says, "Aren't you late for your livestream, Con?"
He watches as the boy - a beautiful mess in front of him - bolts upright, swallows a cuss and sprints limply to the office.
But the game is not over yet.
Connor is almost done setting up the webcam, when Troye enters the room, trailing a kitchen stool behind him with a loud scraping noise. He puts the chair right in front of Connor, behind the laptop and out of camera's frame, and takes a seat. He knows that his arousal is visible through his sweatpants by the way Connor licks his lips.
"Hey guys," Connor chirps joyfully, as he waves to the webcam and squints at the screen, refusing to look at Troye, "What's up?"
He is good, he is so good, Troye thinks, his gaze heavy and catching Connor's every movement. But again, it is Troye's modus vivendi - to watch Connor with dark, lustful eyes.
Connor is good indeed, he always answers all the right things, jokes dorkily and gives hearty laughs, the only thing off is that his earlobes are ruby red.
Connor is so good that he manages to keep his eyes on the screen when Troye takes off his t-shirt.
However, Troye is not sadistic (maybe just a tiniest of bits, and Connor loves it). So he waits patiently, sitting shirtless in the middle of the room on the backless stool for 45 minutes, and when there is only a quarter of an hour left for the livestream, he starts touching himself through the fabric of his pants.
"Yes, the trip to Swaziland was incre-" Connor's voice gets higher an octave, and he coughs, taking a huge sip of water from the bottle on the table. "The trip was incredible, yeah." He sneaks another peek at Troye, before fixing his gaze back on the screen. "So beautiful. Yeah, breathtaking." He trails off awkwardly. "I want to do it again. I love this country so very much."
Listening to the melodic lilt of Connor's voice, Troye smiles dreamily and throws his head back, hand still moving slowly. There is no haste.
"Thanks for supporting the cause," Connor finally says to the camera, "Join me next week." He gives one last wave, and then pulls out the webcam cord harshly, shutting the laptop with such force that the crackle of plastic can be heard.
Troye has been waiting for too long, he squirms in his uncomfortable seat, grabbing Connor's forearm with his unoccupied hand, "Please, I need you."
Connor looks back to the mattress in his office that he never, thankfully, bothered to put away, and teases, "Shall I turn the camera back on?"
"Fuck you, Con," Troye gasps.
"I don't think so, Troye boy," is the only answer he gets.
Troye isn't really sure who wins this round. Maybe they both do.
After this time, there is little left for Troye to do, except to wait for Connor's next move. And boy, does he wait.
Weeks, hell, months go by, and Troye resembles a tightly-wound spring. They make love - of course they do, they are Troye and Connor after all - in a lot of different places, in different cities, in different countries. Sometimes it is sweet, sometimes angry, sometimes sleepy and sometimes drunk.
But Connor doesn't make the move, and Troye feels prickles of disappointment and a hint of fear. Is Connor getting bored with it? With him? Has he stopped caring?
His doubts are resolved the night Trevor turns 17. Connor has been in an exceptionally good mood the whole evening, unashamed proud older brother that he is. Troye likes him like that. Connor will make a good father figure. Troye doesn't continue this trail of thoughts.
The next thing Connor does, however, is not very 'fatherly'. The opposite of it.
There is an awfully warm hand placed on Troye's knee, rubbing, kneading, dancing inside the rip of his blue jeans. Troye inhales and exhales.
Connor shifts closer, so that his fingers, cupping the knee, can move to the inseam of Troye's jeans. Inhale. Exhale.
Connor blatantly grabs Troye's thigh, and squeezes. It hurts. Troye's own hand, previously holding a napkin tightly, drops to the edge of the table to hold onto the hard surface. Inhale.
"Hey Troye!" Kian, sitting right in front of them, calls across the table. "Can you take a picture of us?" He holds out his phone.
Kian is tall, and his limbs are long, but not long enough that Troye can grab the phone without standing up. And that is out of the question at the moment.
Connor rises from his seat slightly, his right hand still attached to the inside of Troye's thigh, and passes him the phone. Troye stares at the black gadget dumbly, until he feels a hot breath on his neck.
Connor is close, way too close - not close enough, Troye thinks - and there is this mischievous glint in his eyes again, "Why aren't you taking a picture, Troye?"
As Troye presses the button, Connor's hand moves upwards, and the picture is too blurry because Troye is trembling. He ends up retaking it thrice and sliding the phone across the tablecloth back to Kian. Inhale. Exhale. He can manage this.
He can absolutely not. There are nimble fingers unzipping his pants skillfully, and Troye is scared that he cannot control himself.
"Con," he pleads, and by the look the other boy gives him he knows he has won. He doesn't remove the hand still, even as he takes his own phone and pretends to get a call.
"Sorry, it's business," Connor gestures to the phone and excuses himself, receiving a perplexed look from Andrew.
When Troye leaves the table for the washrooms, he is thankful that he has decided to wear the longest, the most oversized jacket today.
"What took you so long, baby?" Connor leans on the sink, his hip jutting slightly.
As Troye is pushed into the stall (the gaps between the door and the walls not really giving them that much privacy), he mumbles, "I thought you decided to stop this thing." He uses the words, and they feel dumb, but Connor is the eloquent one of the two.
The look he receives as an answer is incredulous, "Watching you squirm in anticipation is the most fun I've had in years."
And as Troye watches Connor drop down on his knees in the stall of a men's washroom inside a mediocre LA restaurant - one would expect that the act would be degrading but it really isn't, it's hot, if anything - he knows that he hasn't lost. Neither has Connor.
Love may be a losing game but they both are a couple of cheaters.