WHO Eliot Waugh and Tim Stoker WHERE Tim's room WHEN First morning of no memories WHAT Tim meets his neighbor, they try to jumpstart any possible memories, end up just really enjoying one another's company instead STATUS Complete WARNINGS Language, sex talk, mild/brief NSFW moments
Eliot’s first thought was this is rehab. Except, he was almost entirely certain that rehab didn’t do co-ed rooms. That he wouldn’t have gone to sleep in a dark, beautifully tailored three piece suit. He sat up, peered at the tiny woman in the bed next to his, patted himself down and not finding anything particularly useful, went out into the hall so he would not disturb his roommate.
In the less than useful department, Eliot did have a flask. Once he was out in the hall, he twisted off the cap and sipped. Tequila. Well, this definitely wasn’t rehab, but at least he was able to start the day off right.
His current plan was to stand in front of his door until he met someone in the hallway that could tell him something that would help this make sense. But in the meantime? Day drinking seemed like a perfectly acceptable alternative.
Though he had no recollection of where he was, when he was, or who he was (fuck -- who was he? It felt like his name was just on the tip of his tongue but he couldn’t quite figure it out), Tim awoke in an unfamiliar bed in a room by himself. There was that, at least. There was a device with a button in his hand and the clothing he was wearing… well, they weren’t bad. Cuffed jeans, boots, t-shirt. He could get with that.
Setting the device down and climbing out of bed, he looked around and spotted a mirror, eyebrows raising a bit when he saw his reflection. The man that looked back at him wasn’t what he’d been expecting but, then again, what could he have possibly expected when he wasn’t even sure who he was?
He looked around the room for another moment before finally moving to the door, opening it, and peering out into the hallway. He jumped a bit when he spotted the man leaning against the wall between his door and the next. “Oh shit,” he said in a delightful London accent, before chuckling. “You spooked me, mate. Any idea where we are?”
Eliot offered his flask as a peace offering.
“Honestly, I kind of hoped someone else would have answers if I just stood here looking pretty.” The stranger had come from the room next to him, so it struck him that they should know one another. Right? Probably? Eliot took a moment to study the Brit’s face and see if anything came to him.
Name? Did they like one another? How long had they known one another?
Nothing.
“Really I’d settle for just knowing my own name at this point.”
That amused him, though he didn’t hide the quick up and down glance he gave the other man. “Well, pretty isn’t inaccurate.” No, he definitely found the other man quite good looking. And apparently he had no shame in telling him so.
But that also gave Tim an idea and he moved further out of the doorway, patting the pockets of his trousers. Front pockets were empty, but when his hands went over the back pocket there was a mobile phone there.
An iPhone.
“Well, that’s… a little useful, maybe.” He was able to unlock it with his thumb print. “I’ll have to look through this later and see if I can find anything.” He shrugged and tucked the phone away again, before grinning at the other man. “What’re you drinking?”
“Rude,” Eliot smiled. There hadn’t been a mirror in his room and he had no idea what he looked like, but based on the blonde man’s response, it looked promising. He was tall and trim and at least the suit was beautiful, along with the jewelry he wore on his fingers, the watch on his wrist and his ability to accessorize.
“Tequila,” Eliot offered. He still had his hand out with the flask. “Eventually someone has to know something, right? There’s a weird familiarity to this place, like this isn’t the first time this has happened-- am I making any sense? Do you feel that?”
He smirked a little at that, but took the flask with appreciation and, lifting it in a small cheers, took a quick sip. Ooh. “That’s smooth,” he replied and then handed the flask back. “Good taste.”
Which was obvious considering how well the man dressed. “Though I’m not sure I’m much for tequila first thing in the morning.” Or whatever time it was.
Tim nodded then. “It does make sense, though I… don’t quite feel the same. This place isn’t familiar to me at all, which should probably be freaking me the fuck out, but…”
“Would the freaking out help?” Eliot teased. Once he had his flask back, he took another drink from it before replacing the cap and pocketing it. Breakfast was the most important meal of the day after all.
“Pfft, no. The tequila probably would though.” Tim chuckled and finished closing the door to his room, leaning back against it. “So, we’re neighbors, eh? Good to know.” He paused and flashed Eliot a grin.
“Do you want to still stand here looking pretty and hoping for answers or should we go look around and see what stuff this place has?”
“Wait,” Eliot had gotten a glimpse at Tim’s room before the door closed. “Did you have a roommate?” He had a roommate. Was it just Eliot’s imagination, or did Tim’s room have much more space?
This was clearly the important question to ask. Not-- hey maybe we should figure out our names, or -- maybe we should explore the area around us and see if we can pick up more information. No, Eliot just wanted to check out Tim’s room for completely innocent reasons.
Tim paused when the other man said ‘wait’ and lifted his eyebrows a bit at the question. Weird. “Um, not that I know of?” he replied, turning a bit to re-open the door. No, it was pretty empty except for the one bed, dresser, and closet. There was a mirror haphazardly hung on the wall. “Unless they’re meant to be sleeping in the wardrobe or something,” he teased. “Why? Does your room not look like this?”
With the door open, Eliot helped himself, mouth agape at the terrible unfairness of the situation. He gestured to the opened up space where a second bed should have been, and scowled. Terribly unfair.
“Oh, it looks like this, without half the room taken up by another bed and desk. My roommate was sleeping, I didn’t disturb her.”
He turned around and made another scoffing noise to once again punctuate his jealousy. For that, he did pull out the flask-- really it was more of an excuse-- and unscrewed the cap to take another drink before offering it back to Tim.
Well, that seemed to suck a little for Eliot, huh?
Tim took the flask and a healthy sip from it before handing it back, an amused look on his face. “Well, it was nice of you to not wake her. I don’t know how I managed to luck out, but I guess I did based on your reaction?” He chuckled then. “I saw other doors in the hallway… I’m guessing those are other rooms. I wonder how many others there are here?”
So far all he knew was he, Eliot, and Eliot’s sleeping roommate were it. Reason stood that there had to be other people too, right? Tim shrugged a bit. “I wish there was more stuff in here, but c’est la vie.”
Eliot opened up Tim’s closet which was mostly empty and felt a little better, “I do have more clothes. Now don’t mind me, I have to snoop.”
It was helping them. Right? Eliot opened up the desk in the room, looked through drawers, but Tim’s room was mostly empty. Eliot had mostly crept out of his room or he would have looked for more.
“None of this makes sense.”
Eliot crossed his arms over his chest in thought, flask still in hand, he looked at Tim carefully. “You look like… a Daniel. Dan. Danny.” Eliot had to call him something, right?
“Maybe you’ve been around longer if you have more clothes.” It made sense, right? Even if he had no recollection of how he’d even gotten there in the first place. “Are all of your clothes so nice? Three piece suits, I mean.”
But he smirked and tucked his hands into his front pockets, eyebrow arched a bit. “Suppose Dan’ll work if I can’t ever figure out my actual name. And you…” He paused, pondering. “You look like a… hm, something not boring, certainly. Like a Liam, maybe.”
Though he gestured to the mirror. “Unless something else comes to mind?”
Eliot spotted the mirror and blinked with surprise to see a face he didn’t recognize. He touched his fingers to his face to examine his reflection a little closer, but it didn’t help it look anymore familiar. “Liam works.”
He turned on a heel away from his reflection, and back at Dan. Dan or Daniel? Liam liked Dan. It felt more blonde though he was glad he didn’t have to explain why felt Dan felt more blonde than Daniel.
“Well, Dan.” Eliot started. “Perhaps we should try to jog our memories. We could try to take a look around and see what we find…”
But judging by the expression on Liam’s face that wasn’t his preferred method of jogging.
Dan quietly watched as the other man admired his reflection, unable to help admiring him a little, too. Was there a reason he found him so damn attractive? Maybe they did know one another, perhaps in an intimate way, and that was the reason for it.
Maybe. A part of him hoped that was the case, anyway.
He smiled a little at the way his new name sounded coming from him. “There’s an ‘or’ hanging out around waiting for that sentence to be finished,” he teased quietly.
To answer Dan, Eliot very neatly took off his suit jacket and hung it up in the closet to keep it pressed. He tucked away the flask in the inner pocket for safe keeping before returning to face Dan and answer his question.
“I’m about 99% positive we would have slept together. Clearly recreating that moment might help both of us.”
He gave the softest shrug of his shoulders as if that were the only logical option. And even if it didn’t, there was plenty of time afterward to explore the campus together.
Dan was quiet as Liam removed his suit jacket, following his movements. His suggestion wasn’t a surprise and a corner of his mouth perked into a grin. “It’s a solid theory and one I’m happy to test.” Why wouldn’t he be?
He took a careful step or two toward him to close the distance and, taking just the briefest moment to search his face, leaned in to press a firm kiss to his lips. A hand moved, lifting, fingertips brushing at the scruff along Liam’s jaw as the kiss deepened. Because yes, at the very least, he found this quite enjoyable.
It was when they kissed Eliot realized he could not remember a single former lover. Not his first, not his most recent, nor however many there might have been inbetween. He might have wondered if he had ever been with anyone at all, except the actions were comfortable, familiar. He knew the mechanics of kissing, using his teeth ever so lightly on Dan’s upper lip to tease him.
He didn’t worry about where to put his hands or what would come next, and so Eliot was confident that this wasn’t his first time. Or, judging by his performance, Dan’s.
Perhaps they had other partners, but not remembering them seemed like a pretty good reason to accidentally end up in someone else’s bed and Liam found he couldn’t be bothered to care about any social repercussions.
He had a lot more layers of clothing than Dan. First there was the expensive silk tie with the origami levels intricate knot. Eliot loosened it and then interrupted the kiss briefly to pull it over his head and hang it on the knob of the closet door.
He had a vest and button down shirt. And he went about undoing the first layer as he leaned back in to continue kissing Dan.
No, this felt almost too natural and easy. Maybe they had slept together before, like Liam had suggested. It made sense. And this felt perfectly normal to Dan — though that didn’t really mean much.
When the kiss resumed, he grinned against his lips, his own hands working to unbutton and unzip his trousers, fingers pulling at the fabric of his shirt. He broke away just long enough to pull the cotton t-shirt over his head and tossed it off to the side. If only because he didn’t want to waste any time not kissing him.
His boots would take longer — fuck — but that would be fine. He’d deal with that when he got there.
Liam noticed small scars. Not just on Dan’s face but neck and arms. As if giving him an excuse to investigate them further, he kissed several of them. They were still fading, healing. Still, the number of them confused Liam.
It was when Liam finally got his shirt and vest off, however, that a very deep, large scar ran across his navel. It shocked Liam momentarily, and he, while still very interested in continuing with Dan, had to pause, and ran the pads of his fingers over the mark that looked like he’d been gutted. The scar tissue under the skin was thick, older, too. It probably wasn’t going to fade much more than its current state.
“What the fuck,” Liam whispered.
Dan had hardly noticed the scars in his own reflection — he’d noted them, but hadn’t wondered about them too much — but the one on Liam’s stomach? That was hard to avoid.
Still, he leaned forward and pressed a few softer kisses to his face, fingertips brushing at the scar and against Liam’s hand. He was sure there was a story there, but there was no sense in asking because it’s not like he would know.
“Are you alright?” he asked quietly after a few seconds, his other hand coming up to tuck a loose bit of hair sweetly behind Liam’s ear.
“Mhm,” Liam said. He was not alright, but he also didn’t want to think about it that hard. Their scars. The two of them. It made him start to question their situation a little more uncomfortably. Did his roommate have scars? Signs they perhaps hadn’t actually survived what created them? That this was some kind of purgatory or worse?
Nope, Liam would not let his mind wander down that rabbit hole.
Instead his lips became aggressive, if only to keep both of them from talking or asking any questions. Liam walked Dan backwards toward his small bed, so he could push him toward sitting and finish undressing him. The boots were a pain in the ass, but without thinking, Liam made a quick gesture and the laces were undone and loose enough to remove his shoes in a few seconds.
Huh. Liam knew magic.
Except suddenly feeling his boots loosen while Liam continued to kiss and undress him shocked him almost more than the sight of his scar. He pulled his head back a little and frowned a bit, out of confusion. “How’d you do that?” he asked, glancing down at his boots. Though now that he had the opportunity, he was going to take it, so he toed them off and let them fall to the floor with a quiet thud each.
“Magic?” Liam said. Somehow that didn’t feel like a flippant answer. Liam knew magic. As if to test that theory, Liam held up both hands, making a complicated series of gestures with his fingers, like a dance.
The ceiling of Tim’s room darkened and then filled with tiny bright lights, shooting across like a beautiful, miniature meteorshower. A minor illusion, but it was pretty and made the room slightly more romantically appropriate for their rushed affair.
That should have jogged a memory. Had Liam tried something like that before? Something to impress Dan? Something to better set the mood in this strange place while they had their dalliances.
It failed to spark any memories.
Liam kneeled on the bed next to Dan and resumed kissing him, while his hand reached down to stroke his partner and redirect his interest.
“Holy shit,” he breathed. The sudden appearance of the tiny, indoor meteorshower made Dan’s jaw drop in surprise and wonder. In a way, he felt like a child looking at fireworks — it was beautiful.
But Dan was certain he’d never seen anything like it before and he hoped, somehow, that he’d always remember this one moment.
Magic was real.
His attention was diverted once Liam’s lips were back on his. He groaned at the feeling of his hand around him and leaned into the kiss, returning it with fervor.
Liam stroked with one hand, and with one eye open, reached with his other hand for the dresser drawer. Being an RA’s room had its perks. Not just that Dan lived alone, but the Residence Assistant was responsible for encouraging safe behaviors and very conveniently, had a drawer full of condoms and small packets of lube.
Liam grinned. How very fortunate for them indeed.
He shed the rest of his clothing, turned Dan on all fours, gave his ass a slap, and then made very good use of the materials the dormroom had to offer.
It begged so many questions and yet, with every thrust of Liam’s hips he cared less and less.
Well, one thing he was discovering was that he definitely liked this. Everything about it, really, and that was proven by the sort of noises Dan made in the midst of everything. Pushing back against him, trying to hold onto the bed frame — he was glad there was no one else who shared the room and that the walls seemed at least decently thick.
Hopefully they didn’t wake up Liam’s sleeping roommate.
But also? Oh well if they did.
Dan could feel his climax building and, using one hand, began to stroke himself until he released. “Oh fucking fuck,” he groaned out when his orgasm hit, pushing his hips back against the other man desperately at the same time.
Liam grasped onto Dan’s shoulder and picked up the pace, thrusting a few more times until he himself let out a very loud, satisfied groan and finished. He stayed sheathed inside for a few moments as he caught his breath, pulling Dan upright and holding him close. When he could feel his heart begin to slow, he planted a few kisses on Dan’s shoulder and pulled himself out slowly and carefully, dealing with the condom until it could be properly disposed of later.
Liam didn’t want to do that now, and instead pulled Dan down with him on the bed.
“Anything?” Liam asked.
He was slow to catch his breath and his muscles felt tired for the moment, but as Liam pulled him down onto the mattress, he tucked himself up against his side with a shake of his head. “No,” he replied, turning his head a little to look over at him. “Nothing other than that was really good,” he added with a tired smile. “Or I assume it was. It felt really good. You?”
“Easily the best lay in recent memory,” Liam teased. He wrapped his arms around Dan and pulled him so they could properly nestle with one another. Not even a spark of a memory. The illusion above them was slowly fading as the lights of the tiny shooting stars dimmed and the ceiling returned it it’s previous state, like a movie theater lights coming back on after a feature.
He added a few more kisses to the side of Dan’s face.
“Still can’t believe you get your own fucking room, though,” he complained, but clearly through a smile as he spoke.
There was something deeply moving about laying there, wrapped in the other man’s arms, watching magical shooting stars streak across his ceiling before fading away. He couldn’t figure out what was so moving about it, not exactly, just that he liked the way it made him feel.
Dan chuckled and closed his eyes briefly at the kisses to his face before turning his head to catch Liam’s mouth in a stolen one.
“You’re welcome to visit me here anytime you like. Since we’re neighbors and all.” He really wanted to get to know him better now, even if they had to take guesses at things. “I feel like that fact just makes things more convenient.”
“In case I need to borrow a cup of sugar,” Liam suggested, giving Dan a squeeze. It didn’t make sense that they were students, despite the fact that the building felt like a dorm. But given the flask in Eliot’s suit and the lack of supervision, rehab was doubly unlikely.
“...We can wait to explore where we are, right? I’m sure someone else is on top of it,” Liam yawned.
That made him snort softly, but he rolled over onto his side more and draped an arm over Liam’s torso, tucking his face against the crook between his shoulder and neck with a sigh. “Mm, I suppose. I don’t really wanna move now, anyway.” No, he was weirdly content and he was sure this wasn’t what random hookups were meant to feel like. But what if it wasn’t random?
Dan gave a sleepy smile and let his eyes drift shut, his body fully relaxed. “Is it weird to say that I like this?” It was weird. It had to be weird. “Actually, the fact that I felt the need to ask probably answered that for me…”
“I hope you like this,” Liam said. He combed his fingers through Dan’s hair and planted a kiss at his temple. “You’re obviously mad about me,” he teased. “I haven’t met your parents yet, but that’s because they’re still upset about how I stole you from your last boyfriend. He was a doctor, so. Since my work as a magical superhero is deeply undercover, it’s just really hard to impress them. Secret identities, you know how it goes. We met when one of those costumed villain types tried to take over New York, ransom it for a million dollars, you know, like they do…”
Liam was happy to continue making up their backstory, unless Dan decided to jump in.
The truly weird thing was that Dan felt like he could probably very easily become mad about Liam, though he kept that to himself.
“Oh, that’s right. My boyfriend Steve. We were on holiday in New York and it was a whole taking over the world thing, wasn’t it? Really puts a damper on trying to enjoy oneself. I think you saved my life from the big bad villain, though, and it was just love at first sight.” He snorted in amusement, grinning when he opened his eyes again to look at him.
“Well, I am very good looking,” Liam agreed. “You think I look good in a suit, you should see the whole costume. It’s like a whole Tuxedo Mask thing going on, fighting evil by daylight, winning love by moonlight.”
That was a very odd thing to remember. A bit of a cartoon theme song. Hm. He wasn’t sure he had the words quite right but maybe if they kept talking, other small strands would start to reveal themselves.
“You’re an…” Liam paused and then said the first word that came to mind, “...accountant. Actuary? Something smart, obviously.”
Dan smirked and leaned in, pressing a kiss to Liam’s pulse point just under his jawline. “For the record, I think you look good in the suit and out of it.” He had no idea what the other man was referencing and for all he knew, he was still making something up, but he smiled all the same.
Well, until he mentioned the accountant and then he visibly grimaced a little, laughing it off. “Maybe an actuary, but definitely not an accountant. Or maybe I’m an editor for a prestigious magazine?” He settled in and let his eyes drift closed again. “I think we should have a quick nap and then find something to eat… and maybe other people. If there is anyone else. What say you, hm?”
“Romantic comedy route,” Liam mused. “That works. What kind of magazine are we talking? Fashion, literary, tech, fashion, current events, fashion?” Liam shifted, making himself comfortable before his eyes started to drift close.
Food would be good, eventually.
Other people? He was pretty content with the company as is.