Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Chris Keller walked out of Oz on a foggy March morning. Eleven years in a glass box and the dull, grey sky made the fluorescent lights look cheerful. God was pissing in his face once more. Then he saw Toby, and the sun could have blown up, and God offed Himself for all he cared.

An armful of Toby, mauling his lips, rubbing himself against Chris through two layers of cashmere, unruly curls tickling his face, designer glasses hitting his nose.

Toby was cackling like a maniac, swinging their joint hands between them. “Bye bye, motherfuckers!” he screamed, raising his finger to the gates behind them, gave one last insane whoop for good measure before dragging Chris to a waiting car.

Angus. Great. Two years since he last touched his Toby, save for stolen gropes in the visitation room, and twice, a blowjob during a legal session, and now he had to put up with a goddamn chaperon. Of course, Toby was banned from driving for life and given the choice between some random cabbie and Angus, he'd take Angus. Hell, the kid was hot, like a scrubbed up, meet-the-parents version of Toby, without the madness and the quirks. Chris wondered if that's how Toby had been twelve years ago, when he'd first stepped through those gates. How Toby had been when Vern got his hands on him. Dear old Vern. You had to owe it to the old Nazi, his taste in men had always been flawless. Exhibit A, yours truly. Exhibit B, his Toby. Vern would have gone head over heels for Angus, wouldn't have felt any peace until he'd dragged every inch of his squeaky-clean baby skin through the mud.

Chris shook his hand and thanked him for his help, letting his thumb drag a little too long on the offered hand, enjoying the blush on the boyish cheeks. Toby was rocking on his heels beside them, radiating nervous energy.

Toby dragged him by his sleeve to the back of the car. They sat side by side at a respectable distance, trapped by their respective seat belts, exchanging intense glances in the corner of their eyes, ignoring Angus who kept a steady flow of polite drone in the front seat. Living arrangements, working arrangements, paperwork. All the while, Chris' hand was trapped between Toby's owns, in Toby's lap, Toby's fingers stroking it absently.

“Where we going?” Chris suddenly asked, Angus' blabber finally seeping to his brain.

“My place.” Toby said, squeezing his hand.

Toby's place. Not some roadside motel. Not some five star palace hidden away from the prying eyes of polite society, of Toby's folks. Toby's place. Chris felt a weight lifted from his chest and a prickle in his eyes that he vaguely remembered feeling once, maybe twice every decade.

He smiled at Toby and Toby smiled back.

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In summer, they took off for three weeks on the bike. They left behind fumes and neon signs, aiming for sea, sex and sun. They crossed swamps and stared at gators in the eye. They took a long hike through deserts, fueled by Toby's desperate pleas to avoid the worst of the Bible Belt. Chris would have blazed through it, leaving in his wake a trail of Hellfires bright enough to blind those fuckers for the rest of their useless lives, but Toby had seemed so anxious, and Chris had never been that good at telling him no.

In Denver they stayed long enough to shake the sand and dust off their clothes. Chris wanted to push it to Vegas, they'd already gone so far off their way it seemed a pity not to show Toby round a city he always had a weird fondness for. But Toby threw himself at him and pleaded him no, clinging to him desperately, visibly shaking. He could have reassured Toby and told him not to worry, that no long-lost skeleton was waiting for him in Vegas, but he knew Toby would not have believed him. He only had himself to blame for this state of affair, so he just held him back and soothed him.

They slept in the type of roadside dives Chris was used to, leaving cum stains on threadbare sheets, and sometimes, whenever Toby got tired of slumming it, in stuffy, overpriced five star palaces. The look of disdain of the clerk's face as they took in Chris' three day stubble and Toby's wild, matted hair never got old, their hand hovering on the call security button until Toby airily flashed his platinum Amex at them, and their manner turned to the most obsequious deference. Chris never quite knew whether to laugh or vomit, but he'd learned Toby needed his shower and high thread-count sheets on a regular basis, so he kept it shut. He got his fun where he could, in the look of terror in the car valet's eyes as they took in the Harley, breaking a sweat as they weighed which prospect was the scariest, losing their jobs for not asking or what the fuck they'd do if Chris actually handed them the keys. It was all very amusing until Chris remembered he'd been in their shoes once too often, the invisible, nameless fucker whose lot in life was to please some filthy rich bastard and their kept sextoy, the sextoy often more of a vicious bitch than their keeper, all too eager to sneer down at someone they'd just barely climbed over. So Chris took pity and asked the poor kid where he could park the beast.

In the desert, they stumbled on a bunch of bikers and automatically fell back into con-mode. Later on, Chris knew Toby would dismiss it as doing what they had to in order to ensure their own safety, but in the moment, there was no denying how comfortable it felt. The bikers kept eying Toby weirdly, so he stayed deferentially by Chris' side, Chris getting a dark thrill when he casually draped an arm around Toby's shoulders. Mine. No touching without his permission. Which he's gouged his own eyes out before giving. Toby sat by his feet around the campfire and Chris almost had a stroke when he slithered up his legs and gave him a very public blow job amongst catcalls and manly laughs. Later, he dragged Toby behind some dried up bushes and fucked him frantically, Toby rubbing his ass back on him and whimpering loudly. The day after, Chris would wonder how much of it was for his own benefit, and how much of it was Toby getting a dangerous kick out of rubbing what they couldn't have in their companions' faces, but in the heat of the moment, Chris couldn't think. He wanted Toby like this all the time, totally his, at peace, finally surrendering to what they both knew he really wanted, yet couldn't let himself grasp for some fucked-up reason. They fell asleep in the dust, Chris wrapped protectively around Toby, his nose buried in his curls, and Chris' last thought before he passed out was that he'd found Heaven on Earth in a remote corner of the Texas desert. Toby shook him awake in the middle of the night, anguish marring his eyes, and they took off silently, no question asked. Chris knew many people lived inside Toby, waging mysterious wars amongst themselves, and Chris had long given up wondering the whens and whys of which one took over. He sincerely doubted Toby himself managed to make sense of it.

Finally they made it to Key West and wandered around in a daze, mostly keeping to themselves. Chris saw Toby eye the men, toned and bronzed all of them, some sporting 5-o'clock shadows and muscle shirts, others skimpy white shirts and superior eyes. He had to patiently remind himself that all this was even more foreign to Toby than to him. Before Oz, Toby had lived the perfect heterosexual WASP lifestyle, married with 3 kids in some fancy, protected suburb. Then he'd been catapulted to Oz and in Vern's bed, Chris' bed. For the past four months the tables had turned and he'd had Chris in his bed, without the protective cocoons of iron bars and electric fences. Chris could almost hear the cogs turning in his head. Is this my life from now on? Is this what I'm supposed to do? Where the fuck in this tribe do I fit in? Chris had given up years ago on these questions. He'd never fit in, and never would. All he could think of while he looked at the men was which one would make the prettiest corpse. So he clung to Toby like a starry-eyed newlywed, desperate to avoid the time bomb of either of them getting hit on.

In the end they ran out of time and had to ride home the direct way, sticking to coast roads and big cities. Reality didn't wait.

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In September, the routine set in and Chris remembered why people drank, snorted dope or let themselves be conned by charming strangers. Or killed indiscriminately.

By the way Toby threw himself at him whenever they passed a liquor store, mauling his lips with desperate urgency in the middle of the street, he remembered too.

Toby cut his hair, and if Chris stole a discarded lock while the hairdresser looked away, copper root and sun-bleached strand, well, nobody needed to know. He was allowed his weaknesses too, a moment of cheap sentimentality, a memento of these three weeks spent chasing their very own American Dream.

Every morning, Toby donned his tailored suit and silk tie, the perfect poster boy for upwardly-mobile professionalism, Chris' very own golden boy. He was a consultant of sort or rather, if you asked Chris, a con-sultant, but really, nobody asked him, and whatever the job was, it seemed to bring in a fair amount of cash. Just like Chris' old con jobs had.

Chris went to work too, a law-abiding, productive member of society. He strictly worked repairs, Toby and Angus had made sure of it, no contact with customers and no access to accounts, safely kept away from temptation.

Holly had accepted him easily enough, seemed unperturbed by his presence as he trudged around her house, emerged every morning from her Dad's bed. He'd never wanted kids of his own, convinced that the extinction of the Keller bloodline was the least he could do to achieve some measure of redemption. He'd never had trouble with Kitty and Angie, but he'd had to lie and dodge with Bonnie. Nothing new under the sun, but for the greater good this time. He watched them, her and Toby, quiet and blond, as they huddled over homework or college brochures, so remote from anything or anyone he'd ever experienced, yet oddly, such a natural part of his universe now. She was like an extension of his Toby, bright and disturbed, as surely hardened by the Schillinger mark as Toby had been, her own brand out of reach of any plastic surgeon's most acute scalpel. Chris overheard hushed, heated conversations between Toby and Victoria: Holly acting out, getting into fights at school, challenging teachers.

At one point, Chris realised he would do anything for her, just like he would for Toby, and when the realisation struck, he remembered what Toby had thought, that he could harm her, the flesh of his lover's flesh, and he had to take off on the bike, and he rode, rode, rode, not stopping until the pain had subsided and he could, not forget, no, he would never be able to forget this, but put it behind him, classify it as one of these innumerable betrayals that had made Chris Keller who he was.

When he came home at 2am, Toby didn't ask any question but heated up his dinner, fed him, and took him to bed.

The day after, he caught Toby inspecting the bike and, for the following week, the criminal cases in the news.

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At 6:50 pm, the doorbell rang and Toby went to get the food.

At 6:55, Toby unplugged the house phone, turned off his computer, switched off his iPhone and turned on the $15 phone only his Mother, Angus and Holly had the number of.

At 7:00, Toby locked the door and put the key on its hook.

Lockdown.

At 7:05, they were sitting in front of the fireplace, scratching their heads and staring at a box of matches and a pile of ready-cut kindling imported from Vermont. Chris had spent his whole life in trailer parks, ranch homes and run down city centre apartments. He'd never been face to face with a fireplace except in some johns' fancy homes, and then, it hadn't been part of his job to get that fire going. He wasn't sure why Toby looked so confused, but his best guess was that Toby had always been too busy to play caveman with his perfect family. Too busy working, too busy drinking, too busy whining. Whatever feral skills Toby had learned in Oz, lighting fires was not one of them. Even Mc Manus was not dumb enough to let the cons play with matches.

By 7:10, sly insults regarding each other's virility (or lack thereof) were flying back and forth.

By 7:15, Chris had had enough and went to fetch denatured alcohol from under the sink. The only stuff foul enough you could trust even Toby not to binge-drink. He doused some on the kindling.

By 7:20 they had some sort of an asthmatic fire going and were staring at it, very pleased with themselves.

At 7:25, Toby got into a frenzy and stormed the town-house, bringing back a cashmere blanket from their bedroom and candles from God knew where. Most probably some dark recess of the house that magically opened when you recited some frathouse pledge of allegiance in Latin or the opening sentence of Little Miss Manner guidebook. Which would explain Chris' unfamiliarity with it.

At 7:29 everything was set up and Chris felt as though he was trapped in a Hallmark card or a soap opera.

At 7:30, he had a lapful of Toby and decided he didn't care that much. If Toby wanted his evening of perfect upper-class romance, he could have it.

By 8:15, Toby had gotten bored of snuggling in front of the fire and sharing lovey-dovey kisses, and went to get the chessboard.

At 9:20, Chris had wiped the floor with him and Toby decided Chris had been right all those years ago. Chess really was a sucky game. He suggested they try strip-chess.

At 9:45, they had an epic argument regarding whether or not Toby's glasses constituted an article of clothing.

At 9:50, Toby solved the problem by performing a little strip-dance all over the chessboard.

At 9:51, Chris couldn't have explained what checkmate meant if his life depended on it.

At 9:52 Chris tried to touch and got his hands batted away. Not yet.

At 10:00 they sat on the floor in front of the fire, eating five star take-out straight from the delivery boxes, with plastic cutlery stolen from Toby's favourite deli. Chris asked what Victoria would have to say if she saw her Toby eating stark naked with just one fork, and Toby stole his biggest oyster in retaliation.

At 11:00, they wrapped themselves in the blanket and settled down for a nap. They had a long night ahead of them.

At 11:15, Chris craved a smoke, nevermind that Toby would bitch at him for smoking indoors. But he couldn't get his cigarettes without dislodging Toby's dozy head from his lap so he stayed put. He plucked a golden thread from the blanket and threw it into the fire instead, watching in fascination as the hair blazed and charred, trying to catch the faint smell of burning flesh. For all the ways he'd taken lives with his hands, he'd never experienced the smell of burning flesh in full.

At 11:50, Toby blinked twice and stared up into Chris' eyes, smiling.

At 11:55, they retreated to the bathroom to brush their teeth, eyefucking each-other in the mirror as they stood side by side at the sink.

At 00:00, Toby cupped his jaw in his hands as Chris wrapped his arm around his waist. Chris saw a few grey hair at Toby's temples, a few wrinkles in the corner of his eyes, and maybe Toby wasn't quite as lean, but his kisses tasted just like they had 10 years ago. The taste of an elusive dream, and of rightful property. The taste of damnation and salvation all at once. A taste Chris knew deep down he didn't deserve, but that kept throwing himself at him nonetheless. Chris held him tight and swore to never again let go.