Roman knew there was going to be trouble the moment he saw Marc.

The ice skating community was a small one. As long as he was in it, there was always the chance he would run into Marc somewhere. Even so, seeing Marc across the lobby of the hotel sent an immediate shiver of dread through his body; it was compounded by Deniz's voice close behind him, talking halting French to the concierge.

Roman darted to Deniz's other side and tugged on his arm. “Forget the tour; let's go up to our room.”

Deniz frowned at Roman as he was pulled away from the desk. “This is the only time we have to sightsee, you'll be in seminars all week...”

“I don't care about sightseeing.” Roman pulled him close and his voice became a purr. “I want to try out the bed.”

A patient smile and roll of the eyes didn't slow Roman's progress drawing Deniz towards the lifts. “We'll have plenty of time for that. But how often are we going to be in Paris?”

Roman stopped further protests with a kiss. Usually this tactic was much more effective the other way around; but Roman was a bit desperate, so he put extra effort into it. Ignoring the other guests moving past them through the lobby, he darted his tongue into Deniz's mouth and dug his fingers into his scalp. There was a brief moment of resistance, then Deniz gave in with a growl and a push towards the lifts. Roman laughed and broke away, turning to reach for the button that would summon the lift; in all the kissing he'd almost forgotten the reason he'd been distracting Deniz in the first place. Until a familiar voice stopped his finger inches from the call button.

“Hello, Roman.”

Roman watched the smile drop off of Deniz's face. Deniz turned suddenly burning eyes on Marc. For a moment it seemed like Marc was resisting the urge to step back. He gave a small nod in Deniz's direction. “Hello, Deniz.”

The temperature in the room seemed to have dropped ten degrees. Roman saw Marc swallow nervously.

“Are you here for the conference?” Marc ventured, smiling at Roman. Deniz was still staring daggers at him, his body seeming to thrum. Roman wanted nothing more than to get him away from Marc. Now.

“Yeah,” Roman said tersely. “Sorry, Marc, we were just headed up to our room.” He grabbed Deniz's arm again, tugging at him as the elevator doors whooshed open behind them and an older couple stepped out. It was a pointless gesture... Deniz remained rooted to the spot.

Marc was nodding at Roman, but still watching Deniz. “Maybe I'll see you at the lectures...”

Deniz suddenly yanked his arm out of Roman's grasp and stalked off towards the lift. Roman backed towards the lift as well, a look of dismay on his face. “Sorry...” he muttered towards Marc. He hurried inside.

The silence in the lift was so thick it was hard for Roman to breathe. He looked at the stony set of Deniz's face and his trepidation shifted quite suddenly to irritation. “I didn't know he was going to be here.”

Deniz didn't respond. The car slid to a smooth stop and Deniz pushed through the doors before they had fully opened. Roman hurried after him, calling his name with increasing indignation. Deniz continued to ignore him as he reached their room and used the plastic key-card to open the door. Roman followed him through with an exasperated sigh.

Roman stopped near the door and watched Deniz snitting around the room. He tossed the key card on the table by the window. He flipped open the suitcase and began to rummage carelessly through the clothes, making Roman's eye twitch. He apparently didn't find what he was looking for, because he tossed a shirt back into the suitcase with a darkly muttered “Shit!”

When Deniz approached the bathroom, Roman blocked his way. Deniz glared down at him from inches away, but Roman didn't back down. “So, what, you're not going to talk to me the whole week?”

“Shit!” Deniz growled again, and turned to sit on the end of the bed. Roman moved to the table across from him, leaning back against it.

“Look, I get that you're upset about Marc being here. But why are you mad at me?”

“Did you know he was going to be here?” Deniz asked, eyebrows raised.

Roman's eyes narrowed. “Of course not!”

“You didn't seem very surprised to see him,” Deniz retorted quickly.

“You're wrong,” Roman said shortly. He threw his hands in the air. “He's in the Skating Association, Deniz! He's going to be at some of these events sometimes, and I'm going to run into him. It's unavoidable.”

As Roman spoke, Deniz's eyes were slowly becoming slits. He shrugged a bit. “I suppose so. How many times have you seen him at these little 'events?’”

His brow furrowed. “The last time I saw him was...”

A scene flashed through Roman's mind, of Marc getting into a cab; of Deniz watching him, his face tight; of the car pulling away before he had a chance to wave. Shame and sadness mingled with his anger and made him feel sick. He realized how much Deniz's face looked like it had that day. “...was when he left Essen. You were standing right there the last time I saw Marc.”

“Ok,” Deniz said, getting up abruptly. He loomed over Roman suddenly, leaning into him, thudding his hands down on the table alongside Roman's hips. “Why should I even believe you?”

He pushed Deniz hard away from him, making Deniz stumble back. “I am not going to spend the rest of my life apologizing to you! You know I'm sorry for what I did, but if that's not enough for you...” He ran out of steam and simply looked at Deniz, whose anger seemed to have broken. There was a long moment of silence between them. Roman turned for the door, not even sure where he was going.

“Wait,” Deniz said, and was behind him, close, crowding him against the door. “You're right. I'm sorry. It just... it surprised me. Seeing him here. Just... don't go.”

Roman didn't respond immediately. He just stayed there, eyes closed, held against the door by the implacable pressure of Deniz's body. Part of him wanted to keep fighting, keep working around the edges of this thing that had been living between and within them since their too-easy reunion. To stop pretending it didn't exist, to dig it out and cast it away so that they could finally be whole again. But could they? Could they ever?

He turned to face Deniz almost reluctantly, his mind too filled with these dark thoughts of what if and will we ever to get anything but the most mundane pleasure out of Deniz's hands under his shirt or the soft pressure of his lips. Deniz must have felt Roman getting ready to push him away, because he pushed himself more firmly against Roman's body. He scraped fingernails down Roman's back to the waistband of his jeans, squeezing under the tight fabric up to his forearms, cupping a cheek with one hand while running the fingers of his other along the cleft of his buttocks. His mouth opened and breathed into Roman's, tongue following breath.

And something suddenly broke between them, a mad tangled rush of desperation and desire that drove Roman hard against Deniz, pushing them back into the room and to the bed. Hands groped gracelessly for belt buckles and shirts, tearing clothes off themselves and each other. Roman fumbled through the overnight bag for the lube and condoms as Deniz ran his teeth up Roman's back in a series of nips. He turned to put the condom on Deniz, but Deniz snatched it out of his hand before he had a chance. He pushed Roman's leg out of the way and worked the condom slowly down Roman's penis, squeezing and rolling the tight latex a bit more carefully than was strictly necessary. When he’d finally finished, he turned onto his stomach and looked over his shoulder at Roman.

Heart thudding unsteadily, Roman squirted lube into his hand and rubbed it along his shaft, liking the slippery feel of his own hand on his cock. Deniz watched him work the lube over the condom with dark eyes. Roman reached for Deniz, sliding his fingers into him, pushing gently but insistently at the slight bulge of his prostate. Deniz let out a groan.

The need to be inside Deniz hurried him as he pulled his fingers away and shifted to kneel between Deniz's legs. He pushed forward, perhaps a bit harder than he should have, all the way inside. Deniz grunted, pushing his face into the comforter, hands clenching and drawing the blanket into his fists. Roman pulled back slow, slow, then forward again fast, drawing a loud moan from Deniz. He found a rhythm, bracing his hands on Deniz's back as he rolled his hips back and forth, back and forth. His own breath sounded harsh in his throat as he pounded into Deniz, rougher than he'd done before on the rare occasions when they switched their usual roles. A dark tingling raced through his body as he relished the slippery friction around his cock.

Then Deniz tightened around him, the pressure sudden and intense. His own body responded immediately, his balls seeming to contract as the orgasm hit, spilling him out into the confines of the condom. He cried out, coming, breaking, rocked by a pleasure so strong it was like agony. The room seemed to disappear around him for a moment, his vision blackened and blank.

Then it was over, and he could see again, could feel again. The muscles of his legs were fluttery with reaction, and he sat back on his heels, pulling out of Deniz unceremoniously. He could see wetness on the blankets beneath Deniz's hips and realized that Deniz had come while Roman was inside him. This surprised him even more than Deniz wanting to bottom. He looked further up the bed to see Deniz's hands still bunched into fists, his eyes squinched shut, his mouth drawn down in a grimace as his breath shuddered in and out.

And suddenly Roman felt like crying, seeing Deniz like this. He slipped the condom off and dropped it carelessly on the floor, then crawled up the bed and curled in behind Deniz. Roman pulled Deniz's back tight against his chest, pried his fingers loose of the blanket and twined his own between them. Gradually Deniz relaxed against him, his breath easing, his muscles loosening. And as they both began to sink towards sleep, one thought followed Roman down: why do we keep doing this to each other?

***

Roman tried to concentrate on the speaker at the front of the room, but it was difficult; the presenter was speaking English, which always required him to focus more than listening in German. It didn’t help that every time he got stuck on an unknown word or phrase, his mind bounced back to the hotel room where he'd left Deniz sleeping early this morning.

A break was finally called, and Roman stretched in his seat before getting up and joining the queue for coffee. His sleep had been light and restless, interrupted every time Deniz shifted or made some small sound. It had been a long time, years, since sleeping next to Deniz had made him so hyper-aware of every twitch and noise. They'd been sharing a bed for so long now that Roman usually found it difficult to sleep without him there. The only other time it had been like this was towards the end of his time with Marc, when he'd been in a state of near-constant anxiety that he would be found out, that Deniz might know what was going on.

Well, it had only been one night that they'd been here, and they hadn't even properly talked about the obvious tension. As he finally reached the coffee and poured himself a cup, he resolved to sit Deniz down and hash this out before they went to bed tonight. Even if it took all night. Hell, even if it took all week. They weren't going to spend another minute in silent, stony denial.

Feeling a bit better about the whole thing now that the decision had been made, he turned to go back to his seat near the front of the room. He stopped in his tracks when he saw Marc sitting towards the back, head bent over a notebook, writing. His stomach dropped. He was about to turn tail and hurry back to his seat when Marc looked around and directly at him. He gave Roman a small smile and went back to his notes. Roman considered running away, but knew it would be pointless... there were four more days to the conference and he couldn't avoid Marc forever. Besides, he was going to work things out with Deniz whether he talked to Marc or not. Bolstered by his own confidence, he walked over.

“Hello, Marc.”

He seemed surprised to hear Roman's voice. He looked at Roman, then glanced at the man sitting next to him, who had also looked up at Roman's greeting. Marc smiled. “Roman. Hello.”

“I'm sorry about yesterday. Deniz is just... well, he's still a bit...”

“It's fine,” Marc said shortly, casting a furtive look at the man next to him, who had gone back to his own notes with an oddly stony expression.

Realization dawned on Roman, and he took a step back. “Sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt.”

“You didn't,” Marc assured him, putting a hand over the other man's. “Roman, this is Kevin. My boyfriend. Kevin, Roman.”

Kevin looked up at Roman with cool eyes. “Pleasure,” he said in a clipped tone, then looked back at his notes. Roman didn't need to ask how much Kevin had heard about him from Marc by the waves of ice coming off him.

“Likewise,” Roman offered, knowing there was little point in trying any harder. He raised an eyebrow at Marc, who looked a bit abashed... but not overly so. He was saved from trying to make conversation by the presenter, who was back at the podium and asking that everyone return to their seats. “See you later,” Roman muttered, and hurried back to his seat.

Any hope of following the seminar was gone as his brain replayed the encounter. Well, what did he think? That Marc would pine after him forever? That he would become celibate and live some tragically monk-like existence? It was ridiculous. Roman had made his choice. He had sent Marc away from Essen in the back of a cab so he could take on the seemingly insurmountable task of rebuilding his relationship with Deniz. Marc had obviously done what anyone would do, and moved on. It was as it should be. It wasn't like he was jealous of Kevin. Sure, the cold shoulder was a bit on the rude side. It was hardly surprising considering Kevin's knowledge of Roman had likely come from Marc, who could hardly be expected to say nothing but glowing, lovely things about the man who had led him along the way Roman had.

And now he was hot with shame as he thought about how he had treated Marc. He liked to think sometimes that Marc had pursued him far too aggressively, even knowing that he was in a relationship with Deniz. Although he never shied away from his own responsibility in what they’d done, he'd always toyed with the idea that if Marc had just given up and left Essen sooner, none of it would have happened. There was some truth behind that too... but not as much as Roman wished. Because Marc would have left sooner, would have turned his back on Roman for good, if Roman hadn't been so obviously confused, so clearly thrown for a loop by the reappearance of this man in his life. The real truth was that Roman hadn't really wanted him to leave, hadn't really wanted to give up on whatever was still between them... no matter who got hurt along the way.

He thought about Kevin for a moment... was he jealous? He poked and prodded around the edges of whatever he was feeling, trying to get at the center of it. Kevin was with Marc now. Kevin got to hold his hand, and kiss him, and feel him pressed against him in the night. Kevin, not Roman. There was jealousy, but Roman was relieved to find that it was only a twinge, more reflex than reaction. He wanted Marc to be happy, because he did care about him. Even loved him, in a distant way. But the desire to be with him had faded like an old photograph, leaving nothing but memory.

When they broke for lunch, Roman went straight for the lifts. He wanted to talk to Deniz now, and never mind if he didn't get back to the seminar. All that mattered was healing this rift as soon, and as thoroughly, as possible.

“Hey,” he called as he opened the hotel room door. “We're on lunch break, I thought we could...” he stopped, looking around the room. The Deniz-less room.

Frowning, he pulled out his cell phone and checked to see if he'd missed a call or a text message. There was nothing. Room service had already been through the room, leaving their bed neatly made. The towels in the bathroom had also been replaced, so Roman couldn't tell if Deniz had taken a shower before leaving. He called Deniz's cell phone, but it went almost immediately to voicemail. He hung up without leaving a message and sent him a text instead.

Feeling a bit deflated, Roman left the room and went back downstairs. He got a salad from the hotel deli and ate it with his phone next to his hand. He thought Deniz had probably just gone sightseeing without him… but the lack of response to his text made him increasingly nervous.

He continued to check his phone throughout the seminar, finally giving up and leaving during the afternoon break. He went to the concierge desk to see if Deniz had picked up any information about the city, but after a maddeningly long attempt to remember enough French to get his question across, he finally worked out that the concierge didn’t remember seeing Deniz. He tried calling again as he went back up to their room, but there was still no answer. He did leave a message this time: “Hey. Just wondering where you are. Do me a favor and call me back so I know you're not dead, ok?”

He flopped onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. His stomach was an acidic knot, and any number of horrible scenarios ran through his brain at lightning speed. Deniz, on a train back to Essen without him (unlikely considering his clothes and toothbrush were still in the room); Deniz prowling the back rooms of some seedy gay bar somewhere in the city; Deniz arrested for getting drunk and starting a fight at a pub; Deniz lying in a hospital somewhere, the victim of a mugging that had turned violent. A hundred more.

He rolled onto his side and reached for the TV remote, hoping to distract himself with some mindless television. But of course the shows were all in French. Still, he found some trashy-looking reality show and watched, quickly realizing he didn't need to understand what they were saying to get the gist of the trash. In spite of the anxiety thrumming through him, he felt his eyelids grow heavy. By the time one reality show became another, he had slipped into a light sleep.

He woke to the hotel room door opening and closing, and a light being turned on. He pushed himself up on the bed and blinked owlishly at Deniz as he walked over to the mini bar and pulled out a bottle of water. He seemed not to see Roman at all as he sat in the chair by the table and began to untie his shoes.

Roman tried to think around the ball of cotton fuzz his brain had become. He looked at the clock next to the bed and saw that it was nearly seven. The sky outside the windows had already darkened. “Where were you?” he asked muddily.

“Out,” Deniz replied tersely, kicking off his shoes and pulling off his socks.

“Did you get my messages?” Roman's voice began to have an edge.

“Yep,” Deniz replied in the same tone, getting up and walking towards the bathroom, stripping off his shirt on the way. With a growl of frustration, Roman followed.

“Look, the silent treatment is not gonna fly, Deniz. We need to talk about this.”

Deniz had stripped off his pants and was standing naked by the shower. He turned the water on and adjusted the temperature. “I'm not really in the mood for talking,” he said, and Roman's eyes flicked helplessly downwards, seeing exactly what Deniz was in the mood for. He caught Roman looking and stepped towards him.

“No,” Roman said, backing up. “This is not going to help...”

Deniz cut his words off with a savage kiss. He pulled Roman’s shirt open, and Roman heard the minute clatter of buttons landing around the bathroom. Deniz's momentum carried them to the sink, which he pushed Roman against, roughly. Roman had to lean back over it to get away from Deniz's probing mouth.

“Stop. I don't want this.”

Deniz nuzzled at his neck, bumping his leg against Roman's traitorously hard cock, making it perfectly clear that he knew Roman did want this. Or some part of him did anyway, and that part was one Deniz had always held complete fascination over.

And of course Roman could feel his focus drift as Deniz nibbled at his neck and pushed his hardness against Roman's stomach. His hands came up and touched Deniz's shoulders, then slid up to his neck. Deniz brought his face back up and kissed Roman, hard and full.

Before Roman knew it his shirt was off, then his pants; then they were under the pounding water, and Deniz was kneeling before him, sucking and licking, making Roman's back arch and his toes curl. Then he was pushed against the wall of the shower, one of Deniz's arms wrapped around his stomach and the other braced against the wall beside his head, thrusting into him and gasping in his ear. And then it was done, and they were a heap of tangled limbs as the water sluiced off them and washed them clean.

***

Roman was staring at the ceiling again, Deniz curled up on his side. He looked over at Deniz's back, wondering how this was ever supposed to get better when he kept letting things go on like this.

It seemed crazy that things had been so normal and happy between them just two days ago. That they'd been poring over a Paris travel guide at their kitchen table as Florian grumbled at them from the couch. That they'd walked into the hotel laughing and holding hands. Everything had been fine and good and then, along came Marc.

Which was utter rubbish, of course. Things had been off between them since they'd gotten back together. Mostly Roman chalked it up to the fact that their relationship was not going to be the same as it had before; that things would inevitably change and they would necessarily grow into this new relationship. But there was more to it than that…

Once or twice Roman had tried to broach the topic of the reason for their break-up, wanting to make sure that Deniz wasn't holding onto the anger or mistrust that had been bred by the affair. Invariably Deniz would quickly change the subject or distract him from the topic. What was happening now, in this Paris hotel room, was simply a heightened version of what had been going on in their relationship for months.

So what now? Deniz still wanted to deny it, to stick his head in the sand and only take it out to spit passive-aggressively at him or fuck him. Perhaps he thought if they could make it through the trip and get back to Essen in one piece, they could forget all about it and go back to their occasionally tense but mostly happy existence. But Roman knew it wasn't going to work... they had to figure it out before they went home, or it would fester until they were both too sick to heal.

“Deniz?”

The sound of his own voice startled him. He hadn't even been aware he was about to speak until he heard it. Deniz shifted a little but didn't respond. He was sure Deniz had been awake this whole time, just as he had.

“Deniz, are you awake?”

A sigh.

“Deniz, we have to talk about this.”

He rolled over and into Roman’s space. His hand had drifted down and found Roman’s cock before Roman even knew what he was doing. He licked a line up Roman’s jaw and then claimed his mouth. And Roman, for all his well-meaning determination, melted immediately. He opened his mouth to let Deniz in, pushed his hips up against Deniz’s hand.

“No,” he mumbled into Deniz’s mouth. Then more firmly, “No!” and pushed Deniz. He rolled off Roman and onto his side, and their eyes met. “I want. To talk.”

Deniz swung his feet out from under the covers. He sat up on the edge of the bed, his elbows on his thighs, his back bowed. Roman couldn't see his face. “I don't want to talk,” he said in a low voice.

“I know,” Roman replied shakily. “But we have to, Deniz. We can't keep doing this.”

“I don't want to talk,” Deniz repeated, as though Roman hadn't spoken, “because I'm afraid of what I'll say.” Roman stared at his back, his heart thudding horribly, his stomach twisting. “I'm afraid,” Deniz continued, his voice thick, “that I made a mistake. That I shouldn't have taken you back. That you're... that you're going to hurt me again. That no matter how much you love me, you're going to leave. Because everyone leaves me.” His voice cracked on the last word.

Roman reached for him. He shifted and draped himself over Deniz, arms around his chest, head on his back. He held on as Deniz rocked back and forth, his words coming haltingly between racking sobs.

“I try so hard to be what people want me to be. So they won't find something better. But it never works. My mom, my friends, you... everyone leaves. And if they don't, then I push and push until they do.”

And here he was, the Deniz that Roman had only ever suspected existed underneath all the confidence and bravado. The broken little boy; abandoned by his mother, rejected by his father, beaten down again and again until he didn't believe anyone could ever really love him. Roman felt sick, knowing that he'd played a part in this too. At the same time, he knew that he was not, could not, be solely responsible for the continuation of this heartbreak.

“I'm not leaving,” Roman said firmly, surprised at how strong his voice sounded. “Your father didn't leave, and most of the friends that matter are still your friends. And all you ever need to be is exactly who you are, ok?” Deniz seemed unable to respond. Roman climbed off the bed and got down on his knees in front of Deniz. He grabbed his hands and caught his eye. “And even if we all left, every one of us, you would make it. You would be ok. Because you're a lot stronger than you think.”

“No,” Deniz shook his head. “I'm not.”

“Yes.” Roman took his head in his hands, stopping the restless shaking. “You are. You've survived so much, Schatz. And you've grown and learned and you...” His own voice broke, and he looked down, trying to stop from breaking down himself. Deniz put a hand on his face, and Roman looked up at him.

“You've been through a lot too,” Deniz whispered. He brushed his thumb along Roman's cheekbone.

“Yeah,” Roman agreed. “We both have. And maybe we need to stop trying to convince ourselves that we don't deserve each other. That you're so perfect or I'm so perfect. And then being so torn apart when we find out we're wrong.”

Deniz nodded, sniffling. He leaned down and put his forehead against Roman's, closing his eyes.

“I found this gay club,” he said, and Roman's eyes snapped open. “I wasn't even thinking about it at first, really, I just went to this gay neighborhood called Marais. There was a little club and I went in and I started looking for someone. I didn't even care who, I just... I wanted some random fuck. That was all. And there was a guy...”

Roman could feel something squirming through his body, bringing out a cold sweat. His hands dropped from Deniz's face to his legs and he tried not to become angry. He tried very hard.

“We went into the back room and we were... I couldn't do it. All I could think about was you.”

The anger dissolved with an almost audible pop. He watched Deniz's face now, his heart racing with reaction.

“You're right,” Deniz said. “You shouldn't have to keep apologizing. We've both made mistakes and we've both paid for them. It's not fair to keep punishing each other.”

Roman smiled a little. “See? You learn. You grow.”

“I love you,” Deniz whispered.

“I love you,” Roman whispered back, and stretched up to put his arms around Deniz's neck. Deniz squeezed him in tight around the waist, and they stayed like that for a long time.

***

“I want to go to the Eiffel Tower.”

“Of course, love, but it would make sense to go to the Louvre first, so we can see the tower after dark.”

A scoff. “Do we have to go to the Louvre? Art museums are boring.”

“We. Are. In. Paris. We are going to do something cultural.”

Another scoff.

“Besides, you liked "The DaVinci Code," right?”

“Yeah, that was a cool movie.”

A brief pause that might have included an eye roll. “That's the museum from the whole beginning of the movie.”

A pause. Then, “Really? Where the guy gets killed? And where the thing is supposed to be at the end?”

“Exactly.”

Another pause. “Awesome, let's go to the Louvre.”

They spilled out of the lift in a cloud of laughter. They nearly ran into Marc, who was waiting there with Kevin at his side. Roman looked at Deniz, whose smile was fading slowly. Marc simply looked resigned. “We keep meeting like this.”

Roman laughed politely. “I know. We're just on our way to do some sightseeing.” He was glad for the arm Deniz kept around his waist.

“Well, don't let us keep you,” Marc smiled, gesturing towards the hotel doors. “Have fun.”

They went past Marc and Kevin. Deniz turned and gave Marc a look that had considerably less loathing than the one a few days ago. “Have a nice night.”

“You too,” Marc replied automatically, a bit stunned. He and Kevin got in the lift.

They continued on towards the lobby entrance. “Who was that guy?” Deniz asked, frowning.

“Kevin,” Roman said. “His boyfriend.”

“His boyfriend. Huh.”

“'Huh' what?” Roman asked, eyes narrowing.

“Seems a bit young, don't you think?” He turned an eye on Roman, grinning mischievously.

“Brat!” Roman snarled, twisting his finger into the spot on Deniz's side where he knew Deniz was ticklish. Deniz squirmed and laughed, pushing his hand away, and together they walked out into the Paris sunshine.