“I’ve been busy,” I said.
“Fuck yeah, you’ve been busy,” snorted Finley. “Please tell me Montgomery is good in the sack.”
Dom elbowed Finley and said, “You don’t have to answer that.”
“Finley never learned how to be polite,” chimed in Leo as he appeared in the background.
“We should send him to finishing school,” suggested Dom.
“Hey!” squawked Finley.
“But for real, man, spill,” said Leo, leaning closer. “How is the road treating you?”
“It’s, uh…” I groped around for a way to explain it. “There’s…some really cool stuff. But ever since that whole, er, thing happened, I’ve just been lying low.”
“Why is that?” Dom asked, his voice free of judgement. God, I loved him.
“I just…well, I’m kind of freaking out if I’m being honest,” I said.
“Yeah, I thought you might be,” said Dom. “What do you need from us?”
“I wish I knew,” I muttered darkly.
Leo pinched Finley and swooped in to take his spot when Finley turned around to see who had attacked him.
“Um, excuse me,” gasped Finley, utterly offended.
“Listen man,” said Leo, “you are living the goddamn dream. Please, for the love of god, get out there and party it up. Do you know how famous that band is getting? You could get with so many people just by saying that you’re with the band. They’ll be falling over themselves to sleep with you.”
“I’m actually kind of…exclusive with Levi. I think. This thing between us…it is really big. Like, bigger than me and Becca ever were,” I said.
“So, you would actually consider moving across the world for this guy?” asked Leo, letting out a low whistle. “Fuck yeah, man.”
“I am not exactly saying that I would move across the world for him,” I said, “but…well, I could come home now. But I want to try and stay for the rest of the tour because…this feels really important. And I want to, I don’t know, honor that or whatever.”
“That’s great,” said Dom with a small smile. “I’m so glad things are going well with him.”
“Yeah,” I said, “me too. He’s amazing.”
“Oh god, look at his fucking heart eyes,” groaned Leo. “I’m gonna bounce, I can’t handle all this monogamy talk. Finley, you want to catch up on Game of Thrones?”
With that, the two of them were hustling away, leaving me alone with Dom.
“Would you like to tell me about him?” Dom asked.
“He is just so…dreamy. You know?” I began to gush about Levi’s slim frame and quick wit and infuriating dry humor. If anyone could stomach that kind of thing, it was Dom. So, I let myself really sink into it. Twenty minutes later I glanced at the time and startled.
“You alright?” Dom asked.
“Yeah, I just did not realize I had been babbling for so long. Sorry, man. I appreciate you listening.”
“There’s no need to apologize,” he assured me. “I’m really glad to hear that you have such a good thing going. I would love to spend some time with Levi, get to know him a bit.”
I nodded. “The last show of the tour is in Seattle, and the one before that is in Portland. You could come meet up with us and spend some time with the band.”
“Hmm,” said Dom, tapping his chin absent-mindedly. “Or I could just fly out and see a show on the East Coast.”
“What, you mean like this week?” I asked.
“Sure,” said Dom with a shrug. “I’ll do a video about traveling as a gay man and write the trip off as a business expense.”
“Oh my god,” I said, turning it over in my head. “Yeah, that would be amazing. I think it would be really good for me to spend some time with you.”
He grinned. “Do you think you can score me a ticket to one of the shows?”
“Oh yeah,” I said, “I bet I can even dig up a backstage pass.”
“Well, that’s settled then,” said Dom. “I can’t wait to see you in person, dude. We’ve all missed you a lot.”
“I know, I’m really homesick,” I admitted.
“Not for long,” Dom said. “I’ll bring home to you. And then it’s just a couple more months before you’re actually back for good.”
“Right,” I said, trying to reassure myself. “Just a couple more months. I can do this.”
Atlanta was a catastrophe.
There were picketers—honest-to-god picketers—outside the venue when we rolled up. The kind of people with signs proclaiming how much God hates the gays, and that we are all going to rot in hell. I should have expected it, being in the south. But we had not had to deal with anything like that in Richmond or Raleigh, so I had fallen into a false sense of security.
I had to navigate around the protesters, careful not to hit any of them. I felt sick to my stomach, thinking about the fact that those people hated us so much. They were there because Levi was gay…and because he had been caught making out with me. I bit back the urge to vomit, blinking hard to clear my vision as fat tears threatened to spill out.
“Fuck ‘em,” Dalton called, flipping off the protesters through the window.
“Amen,” piped up Eddie.
Levi made his way up to me, his hand falling onto my shoulder.
“Are you okay, baby?” he asked.
I nodded, lying without saying a word. It felt horrible, but I did not trust myself to speak without bursting into tears.
“Listen,” Levi said, “I know that this is really hard. And I want you to know that you can lean on me a bit more than you are. I won’t break, I promise. Just…wanted you to know that. I’m here for you, no matter what.”
And there went any chance of me getting the bus parked without crying. The tears started streaming as I threw the vehicle into park.
“Can we—” I started, not sure quite what I was asking.
“Yeah, come here,” he said, leading me back to the bunks as everyone began preparing to get off the bus. “We’ll just be a minute,” Levi told Cooper, who nodded sympathetically.
Once we were alone, Levi was pressing against me, plastering his body against mine up against the wall. It was almost comical, a guy seven inches shorter than me trying to wrap himself completely around me. But it was perfect too, and I had never felt quite so cared for.
“I’m so sorry,” I said around a sob. The tears were falling quickly by that point, and I was not even bothering to wipe them away.
“What on earth are you sorry for?” Levi asked, genuinely confused.
“For…for being like this,” I whimpered. “I should be able to cope, I should—”
“Should never does anybody any good,” Levi advised me seriously. “It fucks us up, thinking that there’s a standard we should be meeting. You’re doing just fine, and I want you to remember that, even when I’m not here to tell you. Okay? When I’m onstage or in a meeting or doing an interview, try to remember that you’re doing just fine.”
I gave a half-hearted nod, still struggling against tears.
“Levi…”
“Yes, love?”
He said it so naturally, as if it were something he had said a million times before. It startled me so much that I stopped crying and stared down at him for at least a minute.
“Did you just…?” I trailed off.
“Hmm?”
“You called me…Levi…”
Does he love me? Does he feel the same way that I do? I wondered. Oh god, please let him love me.
A smile broke across his face, and he reached up to stroke my cheek.
“Porter Hansen,” he said very clearly. “I am in love with you.”
12
Levi
Atlanta, GA/Orlando, FL
This is probably the only time in my whole fucking life that I will ever say this, but thank god for those asshole protesters.
I mean, screw them, they’re horrible.
But seeing Porter so distraught about their bigoted as
ses somehow led to me saying the thing I had been wanting to say for what felt like forever.
“Porter Hansen, I am in love with you.”
Holy fuck. There it was, my proclamation given to Porter as a gift. And while I had dated plenty of other people, I had never been in love before. The sweet, hot hum of it was pulsing through my veins like honey. Fuck, I loved him so much. He was everything I wanted, everything I needed. And even in his despair, his sorrow, his devastation, he was the most beautiful person I had ever seen.
We just stared at each other for a few, very long seconds.
And then I was leaning up to kiss him and he was wrapping those strong arms around me. His beard had grown in slightly, and it was soft against my skin. I licked at the seam of his lips and he opened to me, inviting me in. The pain was still there—much as I wished it was, my love was not a cure for his problems. But our connection seemed to act as a balm, soothing him.
I could feel my cock starting to get hard, trapped in the confines of my jeans, and I bucked against him without even realizing that I was going to do it. His hands went right to my ass, holding me tightly against him as he ground back, his own cock thick and hot even through his jeans.
Hot fucking damn.
“Porter,” I gasped, pulling back just enough to look him in the eye.
“Yeah?” he panted, his eyebrows raised.
“Just wanted to ask…are you sure you wanna do this? Now?” I gestured between us.
“Levi, my love, I have never been more sure of anything in my life.”
And if that didn’t get my heart fluttering all over again…
Fuck, he was such a sweet talker.
I pulled him back to my bunk and unbuckled my belt before sliding into the cramped space. He climbed in on top of me, and somehow, we managed to get both of our flies unzipped and our cocks out.
“I love you, I love you, I love you,” I chanted as he took both of us in one of his big hands and stroked us together.
“Levi,” he whined, kissing at my jaw, my neck, my ear.
My desire seemed somehow even more heightened than usual. I guess it was enhanced by the love, or whatever. But I was barreling toward orgasm in record time, and I didn’t even have enough composure to be embarrassed by that fact.
“Shit, that’s it…fuuuuuck, Porter…”
I tilted my hips up, thrusting into his hand and loving the sensation of his cock slipping against mine.
He let out a little cry, and I reached down my hand to stroke alongside his. I thumbed at his slit, and he let out an unholy sound that lit me up from the inside. I thought, at first, that the sensation would flare and then dissipate. But instead, my limbs continued to tingle, my eyes slid shut, and pulses of spectacular pleasure began to course from the center of my chest outwards. Every inch of my body seemed to be full of fireworks as I began to come, thick ropes of it shooting across both of our t-shirts. It went on and on, my mouth open in a silent cry of ecstasy as I rode out the strongest orgasm I had ever experienced.
When I started to come back down to earth, the first thing I noticed was that I was hoarse. Maybe that silent cry hadn’t been so silent after all. Good thing we were alone on the bus.
Porter was slumped against me, his entire chest fucking wrecked with both of our releases.
I let out a silly little laugh, and he squinted at me quizzically.
“You alright?” he asked.
“I’m…totally great,” I said, still laughing. “I just came harder than I ever have before…and all we did was rub up against each other for a minute.”
That set him off, and suddenly we were both laughing hysterically, the mess on our chests smearing.
“Oh Levi,” he said, wiping at his eyes with his clean hand. “I love you so much.”
There was that honey sensation again. Fuck, love was great.
“Mmm, me too,” I said, reaching down for his dirty hand and idly licking at his fingers.
He shot me an impressed look and said, “You are absolutely depraved.”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re into it,” I said.
“I really, truly am,” said Porter.
We spent the Fourth of July in Orlando. I had been envisioning trips to DisneyWorld and Universal Studios, but that wasn’t what we ended up doing. While everyone else was off enjoying the Florida weather or whatever—it was swampy as hell, I never understood why people liked vacationing in Florida—Porter and I took a Lyft to the airport to pick up Dom.
Now, I know I had only spent a few hours with Porter’s roommates, but Dom was already my favorite. He just seemed like a really level-headed guy, you know? All supportive and kind and pragmatic.
I kind of wished it had occurred to me to invite Dom to come visit us on the road, because it was clear from the moment he pulled Porter into a tight hug that Porter felt a million times better. The tension is his shoulders started to leak away, and the tight lines on his brow relaxed for the first time in weeks.
It also didn’t hurt that Dom was fucking adorable. His thick-rimmed black glasses gave him a sorta intellectual appearance, and he was dressed nicely in tight jeans and a button-down floral shirt. I wanted to ruffle his hair and chat with him about fashion.
“Levi, it’s so nice to see you again,” he said brightly, once he was done hugging Porter.
“Yeah, same!”
Porter made an abortive movement, as though he was reaching out for my hand but decided against it at the last minute. It made my heart kinda ache, because affection obviously came to him naturally, but he was tamping down on the instinct out of fear that we might get noticed by a random passer-by.
“I’m famished, is there somewhere we can grab a bite?” Dom asked, hoisting his backpack onto his back.
“I’m sure we can find somewhere,” I said. “I’ll get another Lyft and have them drop us off somewhere quiet.”
I hoped that Porter would be okay eating in a restaurant if it wasn’t crammed full of people, but I glanced at him just to check. He looked mildly stressed out, but he didn’t raise any objections. We ended up at a dive bar with dim lighting and out-of-this-world nachos.
“So, Levi,” said Dom, taking a sip of his drink. “How is the tour going? From a music industry standpoint, I mean.”
I grinned, reaching under the table to take Porter’s hand. He squeezed mine back tightly.
“It’s actually going really well,” I told Dom. “We’re getting a lot of critical acclaim now that more people are hearing our music. And our management company is talking about offering us a really fantastic contract once this tour is over, so I’m looking forward to the opportunity to start recording again. It’ll be so fun to work on our next project knowing that we have a solid fan base.”
“I totally get that,” said Dom. “There’s kind of a hamster-wheel feeling to the start of a career, where you’re just working a ton to try to get some traction. And then once you get to be fairly well-known you can relax a bit and really focus on the work itself.”
“Is that how it was with your videos?” I asked.
“Yep,” said Dom. “I didn’t actually think that I would have the chance to do this full time, and now I can’t imagine doing anything else.”
“That’s exactly how I feel!”
“The band is amazing, Dom,” piped up Porter. “I’m so excited for you to come see them play.”
“I’ve been listening to your stuff,” Dom said with a smile. “It’s really fun, very reminiscent of the stuff I liked when I was first getting into music.”
“Yeah,” I said, “I think our biggest pull is nostalgia. Which is pretty cool, because that’s why we started playing this stuff. It was the music we grew up listening to.”
“Hey,” said Dom, an idea clearly dawning on him. “This might be nuts, but would you consider being a guest on one of my videos? Maybe once the tour is over?”
“Oh my god, are you serious?” I exclaimed. “I would love to.”
Porter nudged me and said,
“Maybe you could film it while you’re in Seattle after the last show?”
I grinned at him. “Sure thing. Although I have a feeling I’ll be spending quite a bit of time in Seattle after we wrap up this circus.”
It was a joy to watch his face as he realized what I was saying.
“You’re thinking about moving to Seattle?” Porter asked, his eyes wide and hopeful.
“I mean, I couldn’t be there full time. I’ll need to spend a lot of time recording in LA if we sign with Pigeon Kiss Media. But I have a feeling I might have enough money to have two apartments in different cities.” I winked at him, and Porter blushed.
Fuck, I loved that blush. It got to me every damn time.
“That’s fantastic,” Dom said cheerily. “It’ll be great to have you around.”
“I’ve always wanted to spend time in the pacific northwest,” I said, reaching for a nacho.
“Fuck yeah,” said Dom, “we’ll show you all the sights. Porter, we should start making a list of everywhere we need to take him.”
And I know this is kinda silly. But I was so happy to be accepted by Dom. He was essentially giving me his blessing to date his friend, and that probably wasn’t something that he gave lightly. He was serious and logical and thoughtful. He wouldn’t throw away Porter’s heart, and there he was trusting me with it.
“Baby, can you pass me the sour cream?” Porter asked, and Dom smirked at him.
“Baby?”
“Oh, shut up,” snapped Porter, but he was laughing.
“God, you two are disgusting,” Dom said with a smile. Then he turned to me and said confidentially, “I have never in my life heard Porter use a pet name before.”
“What?” I asked, turning to stare at Porter. “Seriously?”
He shrugged, avoiding my gaze. “I guess I just haven’t ever felt like this before.”
That earned him a whole lot of heckling from both Dom and me, and that lovely blush darkened.
I loved him so much.
Fuck.
He was everything in that moment. Breathtaking and beautiful and mine.
The Limelight Page 15
