His hands fold behind Vance's neck, fingers slipping beneath the collar of his shirt, as he's lifted by wide hands and held against the wall. A helpless sound finds Ethan's lower lip held between his teeth as he works, as he hooks his heels against Vance's legs and wool-alpaca-mohair fabric whispers where their cocks rub stiff together. A prick with a needle as he stitches a button in place stops his work, and Ethan sucks his finger into his mouth to taste the salt-swell of beading blood against his tongue.
Against Vance's tongue, bowed lips curved narrow to suck.
"Damn." Ethan sets the vest away, checking quickly to make sure he hasn't smeared blood against it. He pushes the stool away to stand and makes his way to one of the worn down couches in the main area of his workspace. The curtains are drawn, the door is locked, and on a Saturday, he rarely takes walk-ins. Should he need to, Ethan can sleep sprawled here, unbothered.
But right then… right then Ethan settles on his back and draws one of his knees up against the back of the couch, the other leg hanging off the edge, toe of his shoe brushing the floor. He presses one hand to his face, working his glasses off with an uncaring shift of his hand so they fall to the couch behind him.
If there is no reciprocation, there is no worry in imagining, because who has to know? Who has to know that as Ethan shifts and slips a hand into his pants he imagines it to be Vance's? Who has to know that as he strokes, he imagines Vance watching him, bending to whisper soft things against him, reminding him not to come, telling him not to squirm, praising him for his work and his mind and his beautiful hands and –
Ethan moans, brings his free hand to bite his knuckle to keep the sound at bay, and shudders, trying to hold back the release that is so close to messing his pants. He's like a teenager, giddy and eager and so damn horny. It isn't like him to be so taken with someone. He's rarely felt anything but vague annoyance for most of his customers, until they invariably leave ecstatic with the things he crafts for them. Meeting men at all is hard when one works as much as he does. Finding partners even for a quick fuck is harder still when one is as uncomfortable as Ethan tends to be in arranging it.
So perhaps this is the best way to go then, to allow this once and get back to work.
Ethan's hand curls tighter, thumb stroking against the slick slit at the tip of his cock. He turns to his side and a long groan pools warm breath against the back of the couch. Vance is behind him now, and they are both bare. Powerful fingers seek tenderly to rub against Ethan's hole, lazy circles that bring Ethan's hips to slow, stirring thrusts. His fist screws down harder, faster. Vance is demanding Ethan open for him, pressing in his finger, two, spreading them before he lines himself up to push inside.
He buries his moan against the cushion, panting. His entire body rocks as if in counterpoint to Vance's firm fucking. He calls Ethan an artist, Ethan murmurs aloud into the silence that Vance is his muse. A firm arm wraps around his skinny body and squeezes, a hand seeking out one dark, pebbled nipple to pinch. Ethan mimics the motion on himself and his voice snaps, cracking high. Jerking unsteady strokes, he bucks against the tunnel of his hand and clenches it closed when he spills pearly ropes of come across his fingers, shaking.
Ethan groans, arching his neck and pressing deeper into the couch as his imaginings slowly seep to tendrils of smoke and then nothing at all. He allows himself to lie still until one of his legs gets pins and needles, until he needs to use the bathroom, and so pushes himself up and goes. Ethan washes his hands, he washes his face, draws wet fingers through his hair and regards his reflection in the little mirror. He looks exhausted, already black bags hang beneath his eyes. He will sleep like the dead once this work is complete, once he has seen Vance in it, admiring himself, thanking Ethan for his work…
He smiles, scoops up some cool water in his palm so drink, and then turns the tap off and dries his hands before returning to his sewing machine.
chapter three
The first talk is enough, at least, to convince Vance that he made the right choice in coming to New York for the entire convention. He had worn his Zegna and finally felt like himself. Now, as the end of the weekend draws nearer, he finds himself impatient for some sort of news.
The airport has been less than helpful in their efforts to not only locate his luggage but have it sent to him. Vance is over hearing excuses and promises and lies. After a particularly groveling phone call, he resigns himself to having to wear the same three suits he has with him for the entirety of his stay. He can already picture the looks of pity and amusement from his colleagues. A man so contented to make himself known, and seen, yet so woefully unprepared for that world.
He does not think about the other call he is waiting for, though he convinces himself he is hardly waiting with trepidation. He does not think of the little studio and the messy man within it. Handsome, inarguably, but far too proud, too outspoken for his own good.
There is a message for him, blinking bright on his hotel room phone, when he returns after his second lecture of the day. The young woman at the front desk lets him know that his suit is ready and leaves a phone number. A cool pleasure eases down Vance's limbs as he gathers himself to go.
It would be untoward to call; this is the sort of thing that should be done in person.
He explains in passing to a few of the other doctors staying there that he's just stepping out for a little while; certainly he'll be back in time for dinner. A cab is easily found at the front of the hotel, and in silence, Vance rehearses his words. Glass and metal skyscrapers give way to ruddy-brick tenements and restaurants with names in Helvetica font. Vance is wise enough this time to stop the driver at the corner, rather than circle, and he walks the half-block to the shop.
It is just as he remembers, unwashed windows and its little non-descript sign. The curtains are open this time, and he can see Ethan at the table within, tapping away on his phone. His eyes alight above the rims of his glasses as the bell tinkles merrily, and just as quickly, Ethan's gaze dips lower, searching the lines of Vance's suit.
"Charcoal gray?" Ethan asks.
Vance finds that today, when he is rested and comfortable and with a lot more patience to spare, he can smile at the tone.
"I enjoy the color." He allows the scrutiny a moment longer before clearing his throat and stepping a little closer. "The hotel informed me that you called while I was at a conference."
Ethan spares Vance's suit what is, unmistakably, a look of both regret and pity, before he pushes his stool back from the counter and sets his phone aside. He rubs his hands against his eyes, upsetting his glasses, but when he lets his fingers fall away there is a smile there, crooked. Vance cannot help but note the dark circles under his eyes, and the tired slump in his shoulders.
"It's ready," Ethan says as he steps past and through the curtains to his workshop.
When they part again, it is to reveal a suit as blue as sky in springtime. Offset by off-white in seam and shirt, with complementary scarlet and orange in tie and pocket-square, respectively. Ethan pushes the form out in front of him, on squeaky wheels, and stands beside it with hands folded behind his back.
"You'll need to try it on so I can make any adjustments, but there shouldn't be much."
Vance regards the suit, undoubtedly well made, but not something he would ever be seen in. The color is dated, the cut is simple, and he is sure, just from looking at it, that Ethan has cut it too short, and the vest will sit too tight.
At least that makes it easier.
"No, thank you."
Ethan's brows draw a little before he raises one. "No?"
"I will not try it on, thank you. I have no interest in it."
Ethan swallows hard enough for the sound to be heard. His eyes narrow and he turns to the suit, looking it up and down and up again. In silence, his lips part, and his shoulders draw up as his hands tighten together behind his back.
"The fabric is no longer being made, vintage wool-blend made by a factory that used to be here in the city," Et
han says, though there is strain in his voice to do so. "Alpaca and mohair, which will weigh very little but insulate against cold and damp. It seems a good match for London's –"
"Seemed."
With a jerk of his jaw and a single shake of his head, Ethan continues. "A double-breasted design would age the fabric. It would look too retro–"
"It does."
At this, finally, Ethan snaps his attention back to Vance.
"I made it for you," Ethan says. "Just for you, specifically fucking––there's no other like it, there won't ever be."
"Then you should keep it," Vance reasons. "A display of admirable skill for any potential clients of yours to see. And it is that, to be certain. A well-made suit. But entirely not the suit I asked for." Vance raises a hand before he can be interrupted. "In fact, you gave me no chance to ask for one at all, assuming you knew better. I'm sorry to say, Mr. Adler, you've missed the mark terribly here. This is not something I would ever wear."
Ethan seems to sway on his feet for a heartbeat, eyes closing. A soft sigh parts his lips and Vance reassures himself that this was necessary, a lesson that needed to be taught to an upstart in how to handle his clientele. He reassures himself again, as with shaking hands, Ethan turns to the form and begins to work open the suit-buttons.
"I told you," Vance says, "that I will not try it on."
"Then don't."
The jacket slides free with a flash of champagne-silk within, and Ethan tosses it to the counter. The tie, then, freed with careful fingers from beneath a carefully pressed collar. The vest. The shirt itself. Finally, Ethan unfastens and jerks free the trousers from the form.
Vance watches, the disappointment and hurt on the younger man's features, the exhaustion there that shakes his hands and pulls his breathing short. But he had not asked. He had not asked what colors Vance prefers to wear, he had not asked what the suit would be for. He asked nothing at all, he simply declared.
And he found himself to be wrong.
"What are you doing?" Vance asks him, as Ethan takes a hanger from a box beneath the table and reassembles the suit on it.
Working his lips between his teeth, Ethan holds his breath and his movements for several heartbeats before continuing. He is rough, almost careless with the suit, scarcely settling it into place before draping it over the counter and rummaging for a box from beneath.
"I'm packing it up for you."
"I'm not paying for it."
"Of course you're fucking not," Ethan says, a snap in his voice that finally splits the tension like a whipcrack. "Because you're––"
Vance raises an arch brow. "Because I'm?"
"A fucking asshole," declares Ethan. "A brat who wants everyone to jump when you say jump, and then criticizes them for not asking how high."
He folds the suit together with brusque motions, and Vance notes that his eyes are elsewhere as he does. It is enough that Vance, however briefly, feels uncomfortable. It's like watching someone burn a painting or shred a manuscript. It's like watching someone strangle their child.
The box is thrust against his chest, and Ethan's baleful green gaze, ringed in black, levels on him.
"Take it. Take it and throw it in the garbage. Take it and go fuck yourself in it. Don't ever come here again."
Vance stands struck. He had imagined that perhaps Ethan would have acted sheepish, at best apologized, at worst sulked. But never this. Vance has never experienced anything like this before. He stands dumb, as Ethan turns on his heel and returns to his workroom, letting the curtain flap dramatically in his wake. There is no other sound, no other words exchanged between them, and Vance finds himself turning to go as well, careful to close the door quietly as he does.
He does not throw the suit away.
He hails a cab and returns to the hotel wondering if for the first time in his life, a lesson he had attempted to teach to another has rebounded.
He does not go down for dinner that evening, preferring to take it alone in his room. The television hums quietly for the white noise it offers, though Vance doesn't watch it. He regards the box, set on one of the chairs in his room, unopened. He thinks over the encounter more and more, until his mind is ablaze with everything he could have said and didn't, and with everything he had said and shouldn't have.
After two bottles grudgingly taken from the minibar, he goes to the box. Its corners are crumpled, crammed together in anger, but Vance can imagine how it might have been. Assembled as neatly as the suit, tied together with ribbon––no, with jute, cheap and rustic in its charm.
Vance opens the box, and extracts the hastily folded suit.
Against the crimson-and-gold duvet, patterned in the same tired florals as every other hotel he's ever stayed in, Vance spreads the suit to let it breathe. It seems the right word for something that beneath his hands thrums with a life and now an anger of its own. What appeared on the form to be a tawdry and entirely incorrect creation now seems to glow with the details he notices. Hand-stitching, reinforced, against those places where it is likely to wear first. A label––E. ADLER––sewn into the collar of the jacket.
There is no harm now, Vance supposes, in trying it on. There is no loss of pride in doing so in private, to sate his curiosity.
Vance lets his hands run over it, always a sign in itself of good work if it feels right. It feels warm, immediately, against his palm, and Vance recalls the brief listing of textile make and availability before he had interrupted Ethan to claim his disinterest. He settles a finger beneath the lapel to feel the intricate stitching there, by hand, he's sure. He runs his knuckles down the front of the shirt to feel its weight.
Slowly, he begins to undress, setting his own clothes aside for the night and carefully working the buttons on the jacket and vest to take the shirt out from within them both. It settles against his skin like water, just cool enough, just heavy enough, and it doesn't pinch in the shoulders as most store-bought shirts do. He is broader, he knows, than the size he needs, and too small for the size up. He can't remember the last time he had subjected himself to anything not made specifically for him, but this –
This is something remarkable.
Vance does the buttons and runs his palms down the front of the shirt to settle it, finding that it doesn't need to, it isn't bunched or bent or snagged. It rests against him, comfortable, soft, smooth. So much so that Vance finds his breath catching a little when he moves and it moves with him––he doesn't have to fight the fabric.
The tie is already in a full Windsor, as he would have done himself. Vance did not need to tell Ethan that for him to know, and the realization settles uneasily in the pit of his stomach. He imagines, as he slides it snug against his throat, how Ethan might have adjusted it instead, eyes bright above his glasses and skilled fingers slipping carefully along the expensive silk.
Vance stops himself from trying to calculate how much the materials alone must have cost.
Socks upheld by garters around his calves, Vance bends to remove the trousers from their hanger. Pressed into perfect creases down the center, there are a few wrinkles now from how they were shoved into the box. Vance spans his hand across the front to smooth them, brow knitting when he cannot.
His shirt is long enough to slip easily within, without an excess of material that will gather. Ethan allowed for his slender hips and the length of his torso, and the smooth lining against his legs slides cool, despite the warmth of the suiting itself. The hook and bar closure above the zipper settles smooth against his stomach, a modern touch in its styling. It doesn't squeeze or ride too high when Vance bends to check the length of the trousers against his ankles.
Perfect.
More and more as he assembles the suit against his body, he begins to regret his cruel words to the man who made it for him. Vance takes up the vest, next, and settles it over his shoulders, smiling when it comes to just below the waistline of his pants, enough to cover, enough to appear seamless when he begins to do the buttons up. He feels the ve
st cinch just where it needs to, comfortable and flattering.
Running his hands down the vest, as well, Vance imagines not his own hands, but Ethan's. Careful, elegant and rough from work. He imagines the younger man settling the clothes against him, frowning at something he sees as an error when it is anything but. Vance imagines feeling Ethan settle the tie against his chest carefully, adjust it against his throat. He thinks of how Ethan's fingers were just a little cooler than Vance's skin, how it had caused shivers to run down his spine.
Vance smiles as he takes up the jacket, at last, and settles that over the rest of the ensemble.
It sits wonderfully against him, not a seam out of place, neither too long nor too short. This is the suit Vance asked for after all: perfect.
He wants to hate it. He wants to loathe the color and the ostentation of its accents. He wants to resent the man who wasted both their time in making it. He cannot. Not when a turn reflects a flattering silhouette, settles snug without being tight. Not when movement feels almost as if he's wearing nothing at all, and certainly not a three-piece suit. Vance's own body creates the warmth within, soothed from skin by the cooling textiles that whisper against him. He would not grow hot in this; he could not feel too chill.
And Vance cannot help but see how the color calms when it's contrasted to his own skin and hair and eyes. His carriage seems more elegant for it and his pride transparent without being overbearing. Vance lets his fingers follow the buttons down the front and his eyes close.
Ethan's fingers adjust and tug gently. He murmurs around the pins his mouth and takes up a little of the jacket's hem, a hair's breadth too low by his estimation. It's an easy fix, he tells Vance, just a moment more.
He is on his knees, and after he presses in the pins to hold what only his eyes could ever see as an error, Vance draws a breath and imagines Ethan's hands against his thighs instead. His silky curls spiral between Vance's fingers as he grasps Ethan where he kneels. Long lashes brush blushing cheeks as Ethan blinks up at him, rosy lips parting on a shaking sigh.
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