Chapter Text
Two hadn’t quite expected his little secret to ever backfire in any meaningful way. And, to his credit, it technically still hadn’t. But, Lord, was it about to. Sooner or later.
He hadn’t expected to find himself ruddy-faced and chubbed up on his couch. It had started so innocently. Selfishly, sure, but innocently nonetheless. He should’ve thought it over when he decided to withhold from his new neighbour just how thin the walls that separated their flats were. Back then, he had supposed there was no malice in letting that guitar ring out into the witching hours of the night, in letting his neighbour’s mournful voice lull him to sleep.
If anything, he thought that letting him know would’ve made the man die a painful death by shame—if his bashful nature was any indication. How was one even meant to come face-to-face with the shiest and yet hottest piece of meat this side of the Thames and tell him to shut his gob at night because one could hear every hitch in his breath when he sang. The only answer was, of course, one couldn’t and one didn’t.
One didn’t, and didn’t, and didn’t, until it was too late. Too late, indeed. One-thirty in the morning, to be exact. And Two was more awake than ever before.
A slow, barely-there whimper cut through the white noise of his thoughts. “Fuck…”
Man had invented solutions for these types of problems—plenty of them, actually. Two could put his headphones on and slumber peacefully. He could ball his hands into fists and knock on the wall between them. He could leave the premises entirely and indulge in a smoke. Or, as it turns out, he could just stand there. Stand there, hanging on every sound giving away his neighbour’s activities.
He could run that voice like honey through his head a thousand times over like a broken record. He could think about how the last time he’d heard a sound so close to an angel’s cry was back in uni. The girl’s articulation was perhaps more juvenile than his neighbour’s, and she had a different sound which was, at risk of stating the obvious, more feminine, but he loved her nevertheless. He was suddenly reminded. He thought he’d never again meet anyone like her. And yet here he was.
His neighbour, Vessel, was it?, let out a series of pants which echoed through the sticky air. Two should really stop listening. Vessel was not his, much the same as the girl never was, and this was a gross violation of his privacy. To think that Vessel was unaware of his audience while he pleasured himself, moaning so softly into the open air.
It should’ve made him sick. Instead, Two pressed the back of his head to the wall. He swore he could hear the skin-on-skin contact. He closed his eyes, and his mind would not stop presenting him visions of Vessel—skin flushed down to his torso a shade of pink roses, hair sticky on his forehead, hand wrapped loose and languid around his cock. He should stop, for fuck’s sake. He knew it. He knew this was beyond creepy and invasive, and yet he couldn’t stop listening now that he’d started.
Vessel was so hot. Two had admitted as much to himself when he first set up shop next to Two’s parlour. He had admitted it to himself as a simple, objective fact. He didn’t stare; Not when Two came over to help him haul furniture around only to flusteredly realise that Vessel’s toned arms weren’t just for show; Not when back-to-back appointments exhausted his hands and he was relegated to the pavement for his smoke break, and through the large artsy windows on Vessel’s shop front he could see him delicately wrapping a bouquet, brows furrowed in concentration when placing each stem. He didn’t watch how he would bring a hand up to his mouth every time he chuckled. He didn’t wish he was the one making him flash those pretty canines and crinkle his eyes in a smile.
He didn’t wonder what his face looked like now, lost in the throes of pleasure.
His breathy sighs told Two his mouth was probably pulled open now. He imagined his lips, bitten red and slick. The sound of his fist falling up and down his cock grew louder. And wetter. Two wondered if Vessel spit on his hand before using it to get himself off, if the slide slicked with precum, if he had a bottle of lube on his nightstand.
Fuck, he was so horny and he knew he shouldn’t, knew very well, but a hand found its way under his joggers and he squeezed his cock over the cloth of his boxers.
Despite the bite of summer heat, he'd not seen Vessel in anything more revealing than a henley with the sleeves tugged up to his elbows, but even then his body was impossible to not notice. He wondered now what Vessel would look like bare. He wondered how much hair dusted his chest, those pecs no shirt could ever hide, he wondered how much of it trailed down below his belly button, leading to a patch of wiry hair surrounding his cock. Or, fuck, what if he shaved? He thought it was a shame when pretty boys shaved, like an angel losing his wings, but maybe Vessel could pull it off. He almost opened his mouth to pant, as his hand glided over his cock in his joggers, but schooled himself. If he could hear Vessel, the same must be true for him.
What would Vessel do if he heard him? What would he think? His weirdo neighbour hadn't gotten laid in so long he was listening for the slightest hitches in his breath, for every mumbled fuck that escaped his lips. His neighbour whom Two had a small suspicion Vessel was afraid of. Maybe it was the tattoos, maybe the clothes or something else that was intangible, but Two didn't understand it. Couldn't comprehend why Vessel sometimes spoke to him in mumbles and averted his gaze.
“Ngh…” Vessel moaned from behind a fist now, or maybe his shirt bunched up, pressed between his teeth. “I- fuck.”
God, Two had just lost the right to look him in his pretty hazel eyes ever again. What was he doing? Wait fuck. What was he doing? Oh, shit, this was actually wrong. Not like, hot-wrong.
“Ah, mmph.”
This was wrong-wrong. A complete breach of Vessel's privacy and boundaries sort of wrong.
A high whimper accompanied the quickened pace of Vessel's wet sounds. Two's hand shot up from his trousers, dick painfully shrinking under the weight of his sudden clarity. But Vessel didn't know. He couldn’t have. He continued. “Fuck… I- ah, to-” No, no, no.
Two scrubbed his hands raw under the jet of water. He slept with his headphones on. He woke at dawn.
He didn’t know what to do with himself. He felt awful.
He didn’t know how to avoid his eyes best when Vessel came into the parlour before opening the next day, asking for his help with something.
This was going to come back to bite him in the arse.