HEAT WAVE Title: Heat Wave Authorxie_xie_xie Timeline: Post-513 Author's Notes: Hot weather hits the Pitts.
I didn't normally think about the weather. It rained, it snowed, the sun was out. It's not like I was a postal carrier. Who gave a fuck? So when Ted showed up in my office with a stack of papers and started mewling about this summer being the hottest and most humid in Pittsburgh history blah blah blah, I tuned him out.
"Brian? Are you even listening?"
I glanced up from my computer. "Oh. Are you still here?"
He sighed, as if accepting a six figure salary to basically sign checks on my behalf was a burden almost too heavy for his frail shoulders. "I said, our cooling costs for Babylon are more than twice what they were last summer, and it's only July."
I stared at him for a minute, then snorted and went back to the account I was working on. "Well, by all means, Theodore, put on your little mis-buttoned cardigan and wander around Babylon muttering and turning up the thermostats."
"It's centrally controlled by a sophisticated system accessed from a secure computer network, but I'm gathering I have your permission to warm things up a little bit at the club?"
I shrugged and he turned to go, but just as he got to the doorway, I stopped him. "Theodore…"
He turned around. "Bri?"
"The first night you turn up the temperature, have a bathing suit night."
He laughed and headed out. I went back to figuring out what was wrong with the pitch we were giving on Monday for Conley & Carver, a high-end Chicago furniture company that had timed its launch for the exact moment the world economy collapsed.
Ooops.
Bad for them, but bad for Kinnetik, too, because so far all I'd come up with was, "Furniture for people who have no cash, no credit, and no house to put it in." Not the campaign they were dreaming of, even if it did have that edge we were famous for.
Since I did my best thinking while engaged in strenuous physical activity with as few clothes on as possible and the thought of the heat and stench of the baths on a day like this was, frankly, horrifying, I went to the gym. I left the expensively air-conditioned bubble that was Kinnetik and felt the fabric of my suit start burning the backs of my legs as I slid into the leather seat of the Corvette. By the time I got to the gym, I was sweating like I'd been working out for an hour, even with the A/C on full blast.
The gym was at a comfortable ten below zero, and I idly wondered what it would smell like if they, like Babylon, cranked the A/C down to control costs, considering how bad it smelled even at near-refrigeration levels.
Emmett was on the treadmill next to mine, eyes closed, earbud wires running to an iPod strapped to his upper arm – in a bright purple case that couldn't possibly have clashed more with the orange wristbands and green tank he was also wearing.
I reached over and increased his resistance a tad, and the machine gave a jerk that he almost didn't recover from.
He yanked out his earbuds. "What the fuck did you do that for?"
"Your reflexes aren't bad, Honeycutt," I told him. "If only I could say the same for your fashionable ensemble."
"Some of us try to move beyond basic black in our active wear, Brian." He smiled at me sweetly. "You'll find as you age that darker shades become harder to pull off."
I turned up my own resistance a few degrees. "Huh. Like I said, your reflexes aren't bad."
He went back to his musical interlude and after a couple of miles, I moved on to the free weights. The steam room was, understandably, empty, bearing as it did far too great a resemblance to the streets outside the gym. I debated lunch, but the thought of the diner, its cooling system undoubtedly overcome by the triple-digit temperatures, made me head back to the office instead.
Where the Conley & Carver account proved as impenetrable as ever. I stared at my laptop screen, fingers beating against the desk top. "Furniture… design… cutting edge and yet, comfortable." I got up and got a drink. Sobriety was clearly not helping my creativity.
The alcohol didn't help. Neither did the staff meeting at 3, the painful job interview I had to conduct at 3:45, or the glare from Cynthia at 4:10 when I told her I was leaving early.
I'd parked the Corvette in the garage across the street, hoping the shade would keep the interior from spontaneously combusting. I still had to run the air conditioning for ten minutes before I could even get inside.
It was every crappy cliché about hot weather. The asphalt was sending up shimmering waves of heat. The streets were almost deserted. Businesses had big signs in the window bragging about their air conditioning. And when I finally got out of the car, the heat had silenced even the usual Disney-esque birdsong at the house.
The gate to the pool was shaded by its arbor, a suburban affectation I'd meant to rip out but was rethinking in light of the global warming that seemed to have struck Pittsburgh.
The pool was half in shade, but I had to raise my hand to block the glare from the other side. There was a white flash in the blue water, a black duffel bag tossed next to a lounge chair, and jeans and a t-shirt on top of it.
I stripped off my suit and knifed into the pool. Cool water, hot air, Justin's slick skin against mine, his mouth tasting like chlorine.
I dove as deep as I could, and came up on the far side of the pool. Justin shook his wet hair back and laughed before he followed me. He wrapped his arms and legs around me and kissed me again.
He was hard against my hip, and I could feel my cock pulsing against his stomach. I lifted him up on the edge of the pool, my hands gripping his thighs, my tongue licking pool water and pre-come, tracing the vein along his cock.
"Brian…" he said, hands tangling in my wet hair. I let him in as deep as I could, swallowed when I felt him at the back of my throat. He made a choked sound, and tugged my head up, insistently.
I licked the leaking head of his cock one last time, and let him stand up. I lifted myself out of the pool, water running down my arms, and he pulled me over to the lounge chair.
He had condoms and lube in his bag, and for once, the lube didn't need to warm up. He laughed and pulled me into him, pressing against my back with his heels, tilting his head so I could lick his throat.
His pulse was beating against my tongue when the head of my cock pressed into him, and he groaned and said my name again.
He was tight and hot, hotter even than the steamy air. I tried to make it last, but he didn't want it slow. He begged and pulled and dug his fingers into my arms, and I let everything inside me burn its way into his ass, the space between us slick with our sweat and his come.
I'd have laid there tangled up with him for a long time if it hadn't still been so hot. I pulled away, laughing at the mess, but he just jumped up and dove into the pool again.
I stood on the edge, shaking my head. "They charge extra to de-semenize the pool, you know."
He emerged at the shallow end, and stood up, pale in the broken light. "Good thing you're rich. Under the circumstances."
I went inside to use the shower, letting the hot water rinse the chlorine and sweat and come off my skin. Justin followed me in, and I kissed him while I was washing his hair.
He pulled his lips away from mine and laughed. "You'll get shampoo in your mouth."
I shoved his head under the water and rinsed it away. "Problem solved."
Justin wandered into the living room while I was still drying off. I found him there, his back to the windows, the late evening sun pouring softly through the billowing sheers.
"Drink?" I was pouring one for myself.
He nodded and took it from my hand, and I let our sweaty glasses touch for a second.
The pillows on the sofa scattered when he threw himself down on it. I put my glass on the coffee table and took his and put it there, too. He was half-lying down, and smiling. "You know, this heat is brutal here, but in New York it's all the circles of hell."
"I'll try to remember that the next time I'm making a list of why Pittsburgh isn't the worst city on earth. 'Does not stink as bad as New York in a heat wave.'"
"Well, it doesn't. But it's not just the smell." Justin sat up and took his drink back. "The air conditioning in my place just isn't up to this. And everyone's in a fucking shitty mood, all the time. And all they do is complain that it's too hot."
I looked at him. "Sort of like you're doing now?"
He lobbed a pillow at me. "So, does our brand new remodeled kitchen have any food in it?"
When he'd told me he was coming, I'd stocked up, so we didn't have to go out, cook or even call the lone pizza place that delivered out here in the Pittsburghian wilderness. We ate cold chicken and salad and drank beer, sprawled on the sofa in front of the doors looking out on the pool.
Justin, of course, refused to swim until he'd fully digested a meal, but I braved the waters under his watchful eye. Well, semi-watchful; he was sitting on the lounge chair that had been the scene of our recent passionate reunion, appearing entirely engrossed with his email.
"Did you tell anyone I was coming?" he called out to me.
I shook my head. "Not a soul."
"Good." He typed a few lines, then closed his laptop with a smile. "I didn't exactly lie when my mom asked when I'd be home next. I mean… 'next' is ambiguous given that I'm here now, right?"
I climbed out of the pool and picked up a towel. "Lying to your mother, Sunshine?" I shook my wet hair all over him, and then hauled him up off the chair. "Whatever will be next? Drugs? Illicit sex? Grand theft auto?"
Justin pressed himself against my wet body, and tossed my towel away. "Sex with a much older man."
I didn't let him kiss me until I'd challenged the "much."
I fucked him again in our bed upstairs, the duvet pushed onto the floor and his legs draped over my shoulders.
His come tasted hot and salty when I licked it off his belly, and when I was done, Justin flexed and wriggled at the same time, grinning. "It's really good to be home."
I pulled a sheet over us both, kissed him and turned out the light.
When I woke up the next morning, Justin had his face buried in his pillow, one hand stretched across the bed and resting on mine.
I slid out of bed and went downstairs. The sun was barely up and it was already in the 80s on the patio, but I didn't really care. I sat down at the table in the air-conditioned kitchen, sipping coffee in front of my laptop.
By the time Justin came in, groggy, shirtless, and heading for the coffee maker, I'd just emailed my "Good to be home" campaign for Conley & Carver to my art director, with a CC to Cynthia and a note saying I wouldn't be in today.
"What are you doing?" Justin asked, one hand on my shoulder, a mug in the other.
I closed my laptop, and smiled. "Just telling the little people I'm taking the day off." I stood up. "Feel like a swim?"