Prompt by @crimsonfool on Twitter.
Arthit likes to consider himself proficient in the art of self-control.
It’s evident in the way the way he’ll grumble at his laptop screen as he’s up late finishing another assignment, disallowing himself to indulge in the icy pink drink in his fridge until he’s finished. It reveals itself when his peers are snickering at their professor’s jiggling underarm skin as she cleans a patch of the chalkboard, and Arthit merely mashes his lips together and looks down at his notes, messy but complete.
But the most boast-worthy example of his ability to resist temptation comes in the form of successfully dodging his boyfriend’s admittedly enticing advances before they can manifest themselves into yet another sleepless night that has both of them rubbing at sore muscles the next day.
Because Arthit knows…if he gives in, he’ll lose himself to the feeling of warm hands against his pale skin and hot breath whispering sweet nothings in his ear, and that will be the end of his credibility as the more disciplined one, the more mature one, and he’ll hate himself for the way he can barely keep his eyes open in class the next day.
So he shoves his hands in his pockets and turns his head when Kongpob’s eyes cloud over with a certain want, afraid that his own expression will give away his equal desire.
Now, it’s a weekend, and they’re strolling back to campus side by side, separated only by a ghost’s whisper of space between their forearms; nothing to drawn in suspicion from prying eyes, but close enough to share each other’s warmth as intimately as they can manage.
It’d been a good evening, as many of their dates are. They’d gone to the local planetarium to look at stars, just as Arthit had promised Kongpob after they’d unfortunately missed a meteor shower. Arthit had fallen asleep on Kongpob’s shoulder under the giant dome theatre as they linked their fingers together in the dark, and Arthit had swiped blue ice cream off the corner of Kongpob’s lips with a laugh as they sat in an inconspicuous corner of the museum’s cafe.
They’re leaving now, buzzing with the adrenaline of each other’s uncomplicated company.
And then Kongpob stumbles briefly, and Arthit snaps out of his date-happy daze to grab his elbow.
“Ah, my shoelace,” his boyfriend clicks his tongue before walking over to the side of the pavement and raises his foot onto the edge of large concrete planter to re-tie the loose cord into a tidy bow.
He takes his time, as he always does, and Arthit finds himself suddenly with his attention unoccupied and with no place to direct it…until his gaze falls on Kongpob. Or, more specifically, a part of him that sticks up and out now, that wouldn’t otherwise be so prominent to Arthit’s view when they’re walking side by side.
Arthit blinks a few times, and gulps. He knows Kongpob is attractive, but he rarely takes a moment to admire just how so when they’re both fully clothed, and certainly not in public.
Yet here he is; mouth hanging slightly open as he traces the deliciously curved outline of his boyfriend’s glutes, snugly wrapped in fitted khaki trousers.
Date attire, Kongpob calls it.
Arthit calls it (in his head) bubble wrap.
He wonders briefly, a ghost of a smile forming on his lips, what it would be like if he could play Kongpob at his own game. Just sneak a hand out and—
“P’Arthit!” Kongpob suddenly yelps, turning around to face him, cheeks slightly reddened. “You just…”
“What? What did I do?”
Arthit treads back a few steps, blinking rapidly.
Shit. He’d managed to let his hand take on a mind of his own, and if the growing smirk on Kongpob’s face is any indication, he won’t get away with this one quite so easily.
And then his back meets the cool concrete of the exterior of the building they’d stopped outside, in the dim shadows just out of the street light’s warm glow, and mischievous thumbs come to hook themselves in his front belt loops.
“P’Arthit,” Kongpob says, in a low growl that Arthit hates for…reasons. “If you were this eager to get back to the dorm, you could’ve just said.”
“I’m—don’t be ridiculous,” he says, craning his neck as far back as possible, as if a mere inch would put him out of kissing range.
“Tell me, P’Arthit, why did you do that then?” Kongpob is so close now that Arthit can smell the peppermint he’d eaten earlier. And it’s all he can do to resist now, his eyes wandering desperately over every curve, edge, pore and freckle he can make out in the dark.
“B-bouncy,” he manages to blurt out, still dazed with the hypnosis of Kongpob’s closeness.
“Bouncy?” Kongpob chuckles with amusement, then bites his lip, leaning in to whisper hotly, “You can uh, bounce it again if you want.”
Eyes wide with realisation, Arthit swats Kongpob’s hands out of his belt loops before side-stepping out from between him and the wall.
Kongpob shakes his lead with a laugh as Arthit rubs at his reddening ears, clearly flustered. He lightly kicks at a tiny stone on the pavement, before—
“Kongpob! Are you coming or what? Hurry up, or I’m going back to my own room.”
He snaps his gaze up, taking in Arthit’s words.
A few seconds, and then he catches his boyfriend’s hidden smile, and it’s all they need to sprint back, laughing between pants for breath.
Arthit sleeps in the next day, but not before planting soothing kisses to sore muscles.
Especially the bouncy ones.