#SamGabeHSAU -

This time there's no need for exaggeration. The letters really do come in. Two by Monday, three the next day, a staggering five on Wednesday. By Friday, Sam's written three weeks' worth of columns, enough to get him through finals. Which is awesome, because finals are eating him alive.

That doesn't mean it's all joy in Mudville, though. Sam comes in on Friday to help with "paste-up" (an archaic term Mr. Turner insists on, even though it's all done on computers and no paste is involved) to discover a newsroom sparsely populated and silent. Ed and Harry are nowhere to be found. Chuck is alone, bent over his desk, furiously attacking printouts with a red pen.

"Becky quit," says a soft voice behind him. Sam jumps. Ruby's slithered up behind him. Sam's starting to think she might be a ninja.

"Why? What happened?"

"Not sure. She and Chuck had some kind of big fight, and she stormed out. What was it she was saying?" Ruby cocks her head, her dark hair falling over her neck, and Sam gets the feeling that she's just pretending to have trouble remembering. The move feels practiced. "Oh, what was it-- that's right!" Her head snaps back up straight, and her eyes narrow. "She said: 'Watch me.'"

Sam almost laughs, thinking she's doing an impression of Becky's melodrama. But there's no telling if it was played for laughs or not -- Ruby's got plenty of melodrama of her own.

"Hmm." He surveys the room. "Where are Ed and Harry, then?"

"They're fighting, too. Can't even be in the same room."

Sam's eyebrows rise. "The two of them? They're like conjoined twins. They're fighting?"

"Did you just say 'conjoined'... oh, never mind." Ruby smiles, her lips thick and wide, and leans in closer. "Word in the hall is, Harry's been smooching Ed's little sister on the sly. Who thought he had it in him, huh?"

Something occurs to Sam then that makes his stomach clench. "Ed's sister?"

"Yeah, she's this little freshman, Maggie? Cute girl. Asian, on the math team and does track. Way too cool for Harry, if you ask me--"

Sam passes a hand over his forehead. He feels faint. "So she's adopted?"

"I think they both are." Ruby's smiling just slightly, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. Sam doesn't see a thing.

"I might be the worst advice columnist in the world," he groans.

-

Sam has thrown three pillows at Gabriel and the little bastard still won't stop laughing.

"You are," he keeps saying. "Worst advice ever."

"How was I supposed to know?" Sam throws up his hands. "And the Becky thing could be completely unrelated."

"Could be. And that letter could have been written by that OTHER girl on the newspaper staff with a boyfriend." Gabriel rocks backward onto Sam's bed, big shit-eating grin on his face.

He looks altogether too good with his head on Sam's pillow, and all at once Sam's no longer concerned about anything else. He rises from his chair and goes to the bed, heart pounding.

Gabriel looks up at him and gives him a lazy smile. "Well?" he says. "You gonna join m--"

He can't continue. Sam's over him and on him in an instant, pressing his body down, hands tightly gripping the pillow on either side of Gabriel's head. He feels like he's going out of his mind, like his brain's no longer driving this bus. He breathes hot and ragged into Gabriel's mouth, and as their bodies build up static and friction Sam can only think, ~I need more. I need way more.~

"Gabe," he breathes. "Gabe, I want to--"

Gabriel groans. "Hold on, hold on, Sam, wait."

It hurts to move, to pull back and to sit up, but Gabriel's in serious mode. He props himself up against the headboard, his legs parted and his erection painfully visible behind tented pants. "We haven't talked about this much, and I figure we should before we lose our heads--"

Sam shakes his head. "What? What are you-- what haven't we talked about?"

Gabriel stares at him levelly. "Are you stupid? Sex."

Sam would echo the word back at him but his jaw has stopped working.

"The thing is," Gabriel says, looking kind of embarrassed. "I told you I'd done it. But I kinda don't want to--"

The stubborn piece of bone that is Sam's jaw flaps a few more times. "You-- you-- you-- SEX? Really?"

"It'd just be weird," Gabriel says. "I know, I'm not the type, but my family's religious, and just because I can't get you pregnant doesn't mean--"

Then Sam gets fine motor control back. "I don't want to have sex with you!"

"Huh?" And then Gabriel looks a little ticked. "You don't?"

"No!" Sam laughs. "I want-- I just thought I'd give you a--" He's too embarrassed to say the words; instead he cups his hand over Gabriel's crotch.

Gabriel swears and pushes his hips forward. His eyes meet Sam's. "Really? All this for that?"

"What do you mean, all this? You're the one who freaked out." Sam turns over on his side. He's teasing now; there's laughter in his voice. "Never mind, you've killed the mood."

"Sam!" Gabriel slides in behind him, poking at him with little thrusts of his hips.

"That's right, I wanna hear you beg."

"Sam, you cocktease!"

Sam smiles and turns over. He might be the worst advice columnist in the world, but he has the best boyfriend, so that kind of makes up for it.

Reply · Report Post