InsaneJournal

Castles in the Air (Rickie/Jordan [MSCL], R)
Title: Castles in the Air
Pairing: Rickie Vasquez/Jordan Catalano [My So-Called Life]
Rating: R
Word Count: 1160
Warnings: None.
Summary: Rickie fantasizes.
Notes: My Yuletide '08 main story, written for Luna.

Jordan Catalano has always been, like, this unreachable fantasy man. He's two years older than the rest of us, and he has that stupid car that I'm pretty sure runs on sex instead of gasoline. And the way he leans against things...sometimes I think I could watch him lean all day.

So Angela dated him, which was, like, the weirdest, most warped excuse for a relationship ever, and then Rayanne umm-ed him, which was maybe even weirder, and every time someone I knew had contact with Jordan, it seemed like the chance of me ever having actual contact with him got further and further away. And, I mean, not contact like the weird conversations we've had (has anyone ever had a conversation with Jordan Catalano that wasn't weird, though, I wonder?) and the times he's helped me for no good reason. I mean actual, necessary, physical, satisfying human contact.

Not that there was ever really a chance in the first place. And not like I even really want it, you know? Because when I think about it--when I really sit down and make myself actually think about it--there is really nothing I could see myself doing to Jordan. Or Jordan doing to me. Or us doing to each other.

Jordan isn't ever going to kiss me, or hold my hand, like he's done with Angela, and he definitely isn't going to umm me, like he did with Rayanne. I've sort of spent my whole life trying to resign myself to the fact that nobody's ever going to want to kiss me or umm me. That I'm going to be, like, some kind of monk, or something. But with better clothes, I guess.

Life could be worse.

Life has been worse. Half my life has been, like, Very Special Episodes of some bizarre television show I can't escape from.

It's just that the idea of, like, celibacy...it just really sucks, you know?

But maybe I'm being melodramatic. Maybe I just need to get out of Three Rivers and find other people like me. They have to exist. And in the meantime, I'll watch Jordan lean against his locker and I'll watch the looks he and Angela give to each other when they think nobody else is looking, and I'll jerk myself off thinking about Jordan Catalano umm-ing me under the bleachers, behind the gym, in the shop classroom when his class is over. I mean, not that I've ever actually even been inside the shop classroom. But...you know.

Oh, yeah. I have an incredible fantasy life. I mean, I guess it's kind of weird that it all takes place in school, but I'll take what I can get.

Well, except this one, well, scenario, I guess you'd call it. It's kind of, like, my favorite.

So, the band's getting back together--Frozen Embryos, or Residue, or whatever they're going to call themselves now. And I'm talking to Tino and he says maybe I should come to the loft tonight and they'll practice and then he can give me a ride wherever I need to go. Like, afterwards.

So my fantasies have a lot of setup. I know that.

But of course Tino doesn't show up, because he's basically the least reliable person in Pittsburgh and maybe the world, and the other guys get pissed and leave, and so it's just me and Jordan at the loft.

And he asks if I want a ride somewhere, and I'm really not sure what to say to that because I don't want him to drop me at Katimski's, and I want him to drop me at Angela's even less. So I take a minute to think about it while Jordan puts his guitar in its case, and when I still haven't decided, he just stands there and looks at me for a minute, the way he does sometimes, like he's coming out of the daze he's always in. His eyes actually focus for once, and he says "Or we could just stay here for a while."

And then...he kisses me. I don't know how he moves across the loft and I don't really care, because Jordan Catalano is kissing me and I finally know what it feels like.

Not just to be kissed. To be, like...desired.

His hands are bigger than I realized and he holds my face in them. His lips are sort of chapped and his jacket smells musty, but he's washed his hair recently and I can smell his shampoo. It smells incredible, and then I can't believe I'm focusing on the smell of his shampoo and I just start kissing him back.

I imagine Jordan Catalano to be a really forceful kisser. Like, barely letting the person he's kissing breathe. Kind of like the opposite of how he is with everything else in his life.

So he kisses me, and we sink down onto this bed--okay, there's a bed in the loft for some reason, and it doesn't matter why, because this is a fantasy, you know? And the thought crosses my mind that we're actually going to do it, and I look up at him and his eyes are all icy but he gives me this tiny little smile, like, reassuring me.

In this fantasy, neither of us takes off all of our clothes. Actually, that's the same in all my fantasies about Jordan Catalano. I don't know why. It's probably like, really meaningful or something. But when I'm imagining it, I don't care about the reason behind it, just that it works. It, you know...it gets me off.

So we're lying there on the bed together, and our clothes are sort of half off and half on, and we're kissing and I'm hard and he's hard and he's sort of sweaty, but in a really sexy way, and then he stops for a minute and his eyes are still icy and he's breathing hard, and from the look he gives me, I know.

I know he wants me, and I just let myself drift on this sort of cloud of desire. Of Jordan Catalano desiring me. Of anyone desiring me, maybe, but Jordan Catalano works as a face for "anyone".

He starts kissing my neck and he reaches one hand inside my jeans, and he murmurs against my skin. At first, I can't make out the words he's saying, and then I realize what the words are, and I smile and close my eyes and arch up against his hand as he tells me again that I'm beautiful, so beautiful that it hurts to look at me.

And then I...well. These things always end the same way, don't they, whether you're with someone or by yourself. I open my eyes and clean up the mess I've made and hope that nobody heard me breathing fast or groaning or anything.

Sometimes at school the next day, I can't seem to look at Jordan Catalano.

It hurts.