Summer in Indiana was apparently a whole other beast to summer just about anywhere else. There was more humidity here, the sun wasn’t as powerful, and the temperatures didn’t get as high. Okay, maybe that last one had something to do with global warming but whatever, he was going to move on from that particular level of depressing.
It presented a whole new problem for Tommy that he didn’t really like. Without school going on there was more time in the day that Tommy needed to be following Hargrove. More time in which Billy could get into his possession trouble. Which meant Tommy had to follow him more. Work would only get in the way of that.
So Tommy started the summer by quietly quitting his job at the diner. He hated giving up the work, it was satisfying and familiar and the lunches were nice. But he didn’t need the money, so he apologized for it, pointed out there were probably some high school kids who needed the work for the summer anyway, and started the extended period of staking out the life of his boyfriend.
Not boyfriend. Sort of boyfriend?
Fuck. He was just a stalker, wasn’t he?
At least there was one advantage to needing to follow Billy to figure out that moment to save his life during. Billy worked at the community pool. And, as luck would have it, someone had taught him how to swim.
- - - - -
Is there anything quite so beautiful as Billy Hargrove in his lifeguard gear? Summer felt that much hotter when Tommy looked at his boyfriend striding out of the locker room in those red shorts and the white tank top and oh god Tommy knew he was drooling.
He wasn’t the only one of course. There were housewives that had started showing up at the pool at the start of Billy’s shift every day. Seeing them made Tommy think about a conversation, long ago, on the island beach. About how he never wanted to be like them.
As he watched the women stare and drool and watch a recently eighteen year old guy sitting and doing his best to be a fucking life guard, he realized it had never been a risk. He actually cared about Billy, he wanted more than a lay and a pretty face. He wanted to cherish the guy and hold him. To taste him and show him love and enjoy those moments of chaste but lingering kisses that left him breathless and lost.
Tommy’s too hot and he’s worried it’s going to show in his trunks. So he rises from his lounger where he’d been working on his tan and let himself sink into the cool of the water, one of the actual dedicated swim lanes. Once there he started himself on laps. He knew when Hargrove’s shift would be done, he could recognize the angle of the light on the water, so he knew he could lose himself to the swimming for as long as he needed to and not lose track of Billy.
Of course he wasn’t expecting just what came next. He must have lost track of time in the mindless passing back and forth in the water, in the focus on the flawless form that Billy had spent countless hours teaching him along a purple beach, and in other places as well. He remembers the joy of it, parting the water around his body and seeing things in a whole different and wholly more confident light. Remembers the smile of pride that he’d earned on his boyfriend’s face, and his own swell of joy over having put it there. So Tommy was lost in it all which meant, well…
“Not bad,” he heard as he came to a stop at one end of the pool, taking a moment to catch his breath fully and enjoy a cool summer breeze on his skin.
The way Billy smiled at him made Tommy want to propel himself from the pool and kiss those beautiful lips. Of course he didn’t do that. It would be trouble. He’d get his ass not-kicked and people in town would give them both grief and yeah, bad ideas abound.
At least he knew to think before he acted.
“Had a good teacher,” he said with a shrug, trying to act unaffected by the praise. “So, you always stare at the people who clearly don’t need guarding?”
“Anyone can drown, chef,” Billy returns immediately.
True enough. That was half of why he’d accepted Billy’s lessons. As a safety measure.
“Didn’t you usually work these hours?”
Tommy’s heart leapt, just a little. He hadn’t thought that Billy really paid that much attention to him here. Sure there had been a few instances of Billy running errands for him (moments that made Tommy’s heart jump to just have Billy there and in his space briefly), but paying attention enough to notice his time at the diner…
“Should you really be talking to me when there’s other stuff to do?”
It earned him a laugh. “You trying to get rid of me? Mighty suspicious. First you show up at my work on the regular. Then you’re not answering questions about your job. Now this? Guy might think you’re focused on him or something.”
Back home he’d flirt at this point, he’d say ‘well isn’t it interesting how you noticed me that much’. But this was Hawkins and 1985 and Billy didn’t know that Tommy could map out the scars on his body that he didn’t even have yet, all without looking. So he shrugs.
“Something else came up. Got different things I’ve got to do now.”
There was a look on Billy’s face, intrigued, and a bit dark too. Something with a hunger to it that Tommy knew very well. A look from when Billy talked of going home, of showing him California beaches properly, of introducing Tommy to all the places that mattered to him.
“So you’ve found your hint or whatever the shit you were after?”
“Basically,” Tommy says. “And soon I’m going to have to deal with that. But not today. Figured I can probably coast on what I’ve got saved up for now, so I might as well take some time to enjoy myself. The water’s been calling me.”
“Not as good as a beach.”
“No man. Not as good as a beach. I hope to see some good ones some day. Not back in Jersey. Out in California maybe.”
That wistful look lingered for a moment. And oh man Tommy wanted to promise to share them with Billy. Which wasn’t something he could do. Not right now. So he’d have to let it go.
“So, summer job?” Tommy said, trying to turn the conversation just a bit. “Passing time until fall semester at some nice college?”
Better to be clueless to some degree. He didn’t actually know what Billy wanted, beyond ‘going home’.
“Saving up for my own trip. And it’s a good way to keep up the tan.”
Okay yeah, that sounded like Billy. It made Tommy laugh happily to hear such honesty. More than that, he could see the happiness there. Not as much as he’d seen back in Temba, but some of it. Important notes of happiness that made Tommy a bit more relieved.
Because in this moment he realized it was probably likely that Neil couldn’t easily lay a hand on Billy right now. Couldn’t exactly hide bruises in how little Billy was wearing.
“Well, I need to get back to my laps,” Tommy says with a shrug. “And you’ve probably got some brats to teach to float or some shit, right?”
Billy nodded, his attention faded out a bit. His eyes catch on something else and he nods before standing. Which leaves Tommy on his own. With a sigh he throws himself back into his laps. He needs them to work off the new tension in his body. Work off the longing. The desperate desire for a touch he knows he might never feel again.
- - - - -
He doesn’t know whose idea it is, of course. But the offer comes one afternoon when Tommy hauls himself out of the pool, water running off of his body and out of his wig (he will owe his brother so much later over how well the wig was standing up to everything). Maybe it’s Carol’s fault, she’s been eyeing him a lot more over the summer. Though why she was bothering to sniff around when he knows she’s going off to college soon is beyond him.
But the offer came as Tommy was dripping wet and he knows there are eyes on him from those same housewives that often spend time eyeing Billy.
“There’s a party tonight,” Billy noted as Tommy was crossing by the lifeguard chair, intending to grab his towel. Billy would be finishing his shift soon which means that Tommy needed to get showered, out, and ready to quietly trail the Camaro soon.
“Oh, is there?” Tommy said as he grabbed his towel up and rubbed his arms a bit drier than they currently were. “I’m sure there’s a lot of parties in the summer. People looking for one last hurrah before they get to college and find those parties.”
He could hear Billy snort in that way he did when he didn’t want to admit to being amused to something.
“Whatever man. It’s at the quarry.”
Ah. Just as likely to be a warning as an invitation. There had been a few nights this summer where Tommy had thought he’d seen Billy get settled into bed for the night and snuck off to the quarry, only for Billy and the Camaro to show up. Really, it was getting to the point where Tommy was considering finding a place to sleep near the house on Cherry Lane.
“Well I guess I’ll have to enjoy my own bed tonight,” he answered with a shrug. Seemed like he was being waved off more than anything.
“Yeah, or you could find a way to warm your bed up.”
An invitation then. One that wasn’t as tempting as Billy clearly thought it was. There was no small town girl just out of high school that he was going to take home. Once he might have, but now? Now the only beauty this town had that he wanted was Hargrove himself.
“You’re in a holding pattern still, right? Before you head out? Might as well pass some time. Bring drinks.”
Tommy laughs then. So that’s what he was being invited for. Some chicks and to serve as the source of booze here. Yeah yeah, fair enough.
“Not getting you guys drunk,” Tommy dismisses, and he slips to the showers. Time to get cleaned up and sneak off to wait and watch.
- - - - -
Of course Tommy shows up. He can’t not show up. For once he has an excuse to linger at a party that Billy was going to be at, so why would he not do it? Granted he doesn’t buy or bring any booze for them. Fact of the matter was that he didn’t intend to facilitate the kids’ drinking habits. Didn’t make anything better, and he hated the idea of them drinking so close to the quarry. Whether they were up high where they could fall, or down low where they could get into probably contaminated water, he didn’t want to feed into that.
What Tommy did have was girls. They moved around him like he was something to see, and Tommy knew how to play at all of this. He’d spent enough years as a partier back home to know how to do this. He could keep his eyes on a swivel for Billy while he danced with one tipsy girl to another. Knew how to let them down gently but make them feel special.
By the end of the night he knew the story he spun through several different girls was starting to spread. A story of lost love, someone hurt and taken away from him by a father who would never approve of them together. He said he had been trying to find his Sunshine for a while now, had been using his money to hire a private dick in Indy, and had chosen to settle down here because it reminded him, just a little bit, of home.
Really, he was starting to sound like the tragic hero of a Hallmark Channel romance, the sorts of things Mary used to watch. But over time it earns him a safety buffer. The girls still want to dance, but they don’t seem as intent on earning their way into his arms for anything but the roll of the music. That’s a relief all in and of itself, especially since he already has eyes on his Juliet.
He’s magnetic at a party. Someone started a bonfire a long time ago, bathing Billy in this warm orange glow that flickered and danced in his eyes. It also danced in irregular patterns across the stretch of Billy’s bare chest, where his muscles were still shining from his defense of his keg king title.
Tommy wanted to lick his skin, taste the stickiness of beer with the sweat of Billy’s body with the no doubt lingering hints of chlorine. Which of course he’d never be able to do. But damn he wished he could. Wished he could pull Billy against him as they danced, to feel his heat and the strength of his muscles and see those eyes boring into him, his face haloed by golden light in even more golden curls.
“You came.”
There was just something about Hargrove that meant the guy could just catch him off guard. It kept happening and Billy didn’t even know how amazing that was. How powerful it made him to be able to get the drop on him. Because one moment Tommy had been fantasizing, and the next here he was, smiling that smile that used to make Tommy feel like he was the only one in the world.
“Yeah, well turns out I still couldn’t sleep.”
That earned a nod from Billy. He tilted his head to the side, to the trail up the side of the mountain. While they walked Tommy let his eyes fall to his feet, not commenting as he listened to Billy light up.
“Been hearing a lot about you tonight. I think Hagan’s been jealous, he’s not the Tommy on everyone’s lips tonight.”
Tommy snorted at that comment. He’d seen more than enough of Hagan to think that the guy deserved the sort of attention he got.
“You know how to spin a fucking tale man.”
“Not as much of a tale as it seems,” Tommy said as they came to a stop together at the edge of the trail. He let himself look down over the edge, carefully. Falling was still something he wasn’t a fan of.
“Yeah, not buying that. You’re going to get yourself invited to the next thing at this rate, so the girls can coo over you.”
“And take their eyes off of you? No man, I don’t think I’m going to sign up for this again,” Tommy answered with a smile.
Billy rolled his eyes at that. Tommy knows even without looking that Billy’s rolling his eyes. Years they were together, so many years. His heart aches to know it’s there, that he can’t watch it, that he can’t stare into those eyes.
“Sure man. Claim you aren’t having fun if you need to, but I don’t think anyone here will buy it.”
The words hurt, and Tommy can’t explain why. He thinks he knows why. He thinks it’s because if this was Billy as he knew the guy then the suggestion would never have come. And more than that…
“I need to go,” Tommy said, because his stomach was turning now, churning and screaming because it hurt so much. Because this is intimate, in the same way so many other things they had done before were intimate. But no, it wasn’t that at all.
Because Billy Hargrove doesn’t know who he is.
“Party’s still-”
“I need to go,” he repeated, his voice shaking, and Tommy knows it’s going to his hands and if he doesn’t go soon then there will be problems.
When he shakes he’s not like another person. And that would be a problem.
It’s only worse when Billy nodded rather than saying anything. Rather than comfort him Billy just nodded and let him go.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
branchandroot
Early June, 1985
Date: 2023-09-30 06:51 am (UTC)It presented a whole new problem for Tommy that he didn’t really like. Without school going on there was more time in the day that Tommy needed to be following Hargrove. More time in which Billy could get into his possession trouble. Which meant Tommy had to follow him more. Work would only get in the way of that.
So Tommy started the summer by quietly quitting his job at the diner. He hated giving up the work, it was satisfying and familiar and the lunches were nice. But he didn’t need the money, so he apologized for it, pointed out there were probably some high school kids who needed the work for the summer anyway, and started the extended period of staking out the life of his boyfriend.
Not boyfriend. Sort of boyfriend?
Fuck. He was just a stalker, wasn’t he?
At least there was one advantage to needing to follow Billy to figure out that moment to save his life during. Billy worked at the community pool. And, as luck would have it, someone had taught him how to swim.
Is there anything quite so beautiful as Billy Hargrove in his lifeguard gear? Summer felt that much hotter when Tommy looked at his boyfriend striding out of the locker room in those red shorts and the white tank top and oh god Tommy knew he was drooling.
He wasn’t the only one of course. There were housewives that had started showing up at the pool at the start of Billy’s shift every day. Seeing them made Tommy think about a conversation, long ago, on the island beach. About how he never wanted to be like them.
As he watched the women stare and drool and watch a recently eighteen year old guy sitting and doing his best to be a fucking life guard, he realized it had never been a risk. He actually cared about Billy, he wanted more than a lay and a pretty face. He wanted to cherish the guy and hold him. To taste him and show him love and enjoy those moments of chaste but lingering kisses that left him breathless and lost.
Tommy’s too hot and he’s worried it’s going to show in his trunks. So he rises from his lounger where he’d been working on his tan and let himself sink into the cool of the water, one of the actual dedicated swim lanes. Once there he started himself on laps. He knew when Hargrove’s shift would be done, he could recognize the angle of the light on the water, so he knew he could lose himself to the swimming for as long as he needed to and not lose track of Billy.
Of course he wasn’t expecting just what came next. He must have lost track of time in the mindless passing back and forth in the water, in the focus on the flawless form that Billy had spent countless hours teaching him along a purple beach, and in other places as well. He remembers the joy of it, parting the water around his body and seeing things in a whole different and wholly more confident light. Remembers the smile of pride that he’d earned on his boyfriend’s face, and his own swell of joy over having put it there. So Tommy was lost in it all which meant, well…
“Not bad,” he heard as he came to a stop at one end of the pool, taking a moment to catch his breath fully and enjoy a cool summer breeze on his skin.
The way Billy smiled at him made Tommy want to propel himself from the pool and kiss those beautiful lips. Of course he didn’t do that. It would be trouble. He’d get his ass not-kicked and people in town would give them both grief and yeah, bad ideas abound.
At least he knew to think before he acted.
“Had a good teacher,” he said with a shrug, trying to act unaffected by the praise. “So, you always stare at the people who clearly don’t need guarding?”
“Anyone can drown, chef,” Billy returns immediately.
True enough. That was half of why he’d accepted Billy’s lessons. As a safety measure.
“Didn’t you usually work these hours?”
Tommy’s heart leapt, just a little. He hadn’t thought that Billy really paid that much attention to him here. Sure there had been a few instances of Billy running errands for him (moments that made Tommy’s heart jump to just have Billy there and in his space briefly), but paying attention enough to notice his time at the diner…
“Should you really be talking to me when there’s other stuff to do?”
It earned him a laugh. “You trying to get rid of me? Mighty suspicious. First you show up at my work on the regular. Then you’re not answering questions about your job. Now this? Guy might think you’re focused on him or something.”
Back home he’d flirt at this point, he’d say ‘well isn’t it interesting how you noticed me that much’. But this was Hawkins and 1985 and Billy didn’t know that Tommy could map out the scars on his body that he didn’t even have yet, all without looking. So he shrugs.
“Something else came up. Got different things I’ve got to do now.”
There was a look on Billy’s face, intrigued, and a bit dark too. Something with a hunger to it that Tommy knew very well. A look from when Billy talked of going home, of showing him California beaches properly, of introducing Tommy to all the places that mattered to him.
“So you’ve found your hint or whatever the shit you were after?”
“Basically,” Tommy says. “And soon I’m going to have to deal with that. But not today. Figured I can probably coast on what I’ve got saved up for now, so I might as well take some time to enjoy myself. The water’s been calling me.”
“Not as good as a beach.”
“No man. Not as good as a beach. I hope to see some good ones some day. Not back in Jersey. Out in California maybe.”
That wistful look lingered for a moment. And oh man Tommy wanted to promise to share them with Billy. Which wasn’t something he could do. Not right now. So he’d have to let it go.
“So, summer job?” Tommy said, trying to turn the conversation just a bit. “Passing time until fall semester at some nice college?”
Better to be clueless to some degree. He didn’t actually know what Billy wanted, beyond ‘going home’.
“Saving up for my own trip. And it’s a good way to keep up the tan.”
Okay yeah, that sounded like Billy. It made Tommy laugh happily to hear such honesty. More than that, he could see the happiness there. Not as much as he’d seen back in Temba, but some of it. Important notes of happiness that made Tommy a bit more relieved.
Because in this moment he realized it was probably likely that Neil couldn’t easily lay a hand on Billy right now. Couldn’t exactly hide bruises in how little Billy was wearing.
“Well, I need to get back to my laps,” Tommy says with a shrug. “And you’ve probably got some brats to teach to float or some shit, right?”
Billy nodded, his attention faded out a bit. His eyes catch on something else and he nods before standing. Which leaves Tommy on his own. With a sigh he throws himself back into his laps. He needs them to work off the new tension in his body. Work off the longing. The desperate desire for a touch he knows he might never feel again.
He doesn’t know whose idea it is, of course. But the offer comes one afternoon when Tommy hauls himself out of the pool, water running off of his body and out of his wig (he will owe his brother so much later over how well the wig was standing up to everything). Maybe it’s Carol’s fault, she’s been eyeing him a lot more over the summer. Though why she was bothering to sniff around when he knows she’s going off to college soon is beyond him.
But the offer came as Tommy was dripping wet and he knows there are eyes on him from those same housewives that often spend time eyeing Billy.
“There’s a party tonight,” Billy noted as Tommy was crossing by the lifeguard chair, intending to grab his towel. Billy would be finishing his shift soon which means that Tommy needed to get showered, out, and ready to quietly trail the Camaro soon.
“Oh, is there?” Tommy said as he grabbed his towel up and rubbed his arms a bit drier than they currently were. “I’m sure there’s a lot of parties in the summer. People looking for one last hurrah before they get to college and find those parties.”
He could hear Billy snort in that way he did when he didn’t want to admit to being amused to something.
“Whatever man. It’s at the quarry.”
Ah. Just as likely to be a warning as an invitation. There had been a few nights this summer where Tommy had thought he’d seen Billy get settled into bed for the night and snuck off to the quarry, only for Billy and the Camaro to show up. Really, it was getting to the point where Tommy was considering finding a place to sleep near the house on Cherry Lane.
“Well I guess I’ll have to enjoy my own bed tonight,” he answered with a shrug. Seemed like he was being waved off more than anything.
“Yeah, or you could find a way to warm your bed up.”
An invitation then. One that wasn’t as tempting as Billy clearly thought it was. There was no small town girl just out of high school that he was going to take home. Once he might have, but now? Now the only beauty this town had that he wanted was Hargrove himself.
“You’re in a holding pattern still, right? Before you head out? Might as well pass some time. Bring drinks.”
Tommy laughs then. So that’s what he was being invited for. Some chicks and to serve as the source of booze here. Yeah yeah, fair enough.
“Not getting you guys drunk,” Tommy dismisses, and he slips to the showers. Time to get cleaned up and sneak off to wait and watch.
Of course Tommy shows up. He can’t not show up. For once he has an excuse to linger at a party that Billy was going to be at, so why would he not do it? Granted he doesn’t buy or bring any booze for them. Fact of the matter was that he didn’t intend to facilitate the kids’ drinking habits. Didn’t make anything better, and he hated the idea of them drinking so close to the quarry. Whether they were up high where they could fall, or down low where they could get into probably contaminated water, he didn’t want to feed into that.
What Tommy did have was girls. They moved around him like he was something to see, and Tommy knew how to play at all of this. He’d spent enough years as a partier back home to know how to do this. He could keep his eyes on a swivel for Billy while he danced with one tipsy girl to another. Knew how to let them down gently but make them feel special.
By the end of the night he knew the story he spun through several different girls was starting to spread. A story of lost love, someone hurt and taken away from him by a father who would never approve of them together. He said he had been trying to find his Sunshine for a while now, had been using his money to hire a private dick in Indy, and had chosen to settle down here because it reminded him, just a little bit, of home.
Really, he was starting to sound like the tragic hero of a Hallmark Channel romance, the sorts of things Mary used to watch. But over time it earns him a safety buffer. The girls still want to dance, but they don’t seem as intent on earning their way into his arms for anything but the roll of the music. That’s a relief all in and of itself, especially since he already has eyes on his Juliet.
He’s magnetic at a party. Someone started a bonfire a long time ago, bathing Billy in this warm orange glow that flickered and danced in his eyes. It also danced in irregular patterns across the stretch of Billy’s bare chest, where his muscles were still shining from his defense of his keg king title.
Tommy wanted to lick his skin, taste the stickiness of beer with the sweat of Billy’s body with the no doubt lingering hints of chlorine. Which of course he’d never be able to do. But damn he wished he could. Wished he could pull Billy against him as they danced, to feel his heat and the strength of his muscles and see those eyes boring into him, his face haloed by golden light in even more golden curls.
“You came.”
There was just something about Hargrove that meant the guy could just catch him off guard. It kept happening and Billy didn’t even know how amazing that was. How powerful it made him to be able to get the drop on him. Because one moment Tommy had been fantasizing, and the next here he was, smiling that smile that used to make Tommy feel like he was the only one in the world.
“Yeah, well turns out I still couldn’t sleep.”
That earned a nod from Billy. He tilted his head to the side, to the trail up the side of the mountain. While they walked Tommy let his eyes fall to his feet, not commenting as he listened to Billy light up.
“Been hearing a lot about you tonight. I think Hagan’s been jealous, he’s not the Tommy on everyone’s lips tonight.”
Tommy snorted at that comment. He’d seen more than enough of Hagan to think that the guy deserved the sort of attention he got.
“You know how to spin a fucking tale man.”
“Not as much of a tale as it seems,” Tommy said as they came to a stop together at the edge of the trail. He let himself look down over the edge, carefully. Falling was still something he wasn’t a fan of.
“Yeah, not buying that. You’re going to get yourself invited to the next thing at this rate, so the girls can coo over you.”
“And take their eyes off of you? No man, I don’t think I’m going to sign up for this again,” Tommy answered with a smile.
Billy rolled his eyes at that. Tommy knows even without looking that Billy’s rolling his eyes. Years they were together, so many years. His heart aches to know it’s there, that he can’t watch it, that he can’t stare into those eyes.
“Sure man. Claim you aren’t having fun if you need to, but I don’t think anyone here will buy it.”
The words hurt, and Tommy can’t explain why. He thinks he knows why. He thinks it’s because if this was Billy as he knew the guy then the suggestion would never have come. And more than that…
“I need to go,” Tommy said, because his stomach was turning now, churning and screaming because it hurt so much. Because this is intimate, in the same way so many other things they had done before were intimate. But no, it wasn’t that at all.
Because Billy Hargrove doesn’t know who he is.
“Party’s still-”
“I need to go,” he repeated, his voice shaking, and Tommy knows it’s going to his hands and if he doesn’t go soon then there will be problems.
When he shakes he’s not like another person. And that would be a problem.
It’s only worse when Billy nodded rather than saying anything. Rather than comfort him Billy just nodded and let him go.
It hurts in ways Tommy didn’t have words for.