Book 4, Chapter 8: In the Picture 1/2
Title: In the Picture
Authors: kiltsandlollies and escribo
Characters: Billy/Dominic
Word count: 6772
Summary: A late afternoon in shadows and light.
Index
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction; the recognizable people in the story belong to themselves and have never performed the actions portrayed here. I do not know the actors nor am I associated with them in any way. If you are underage, please do not read this story. I am not making any profit from these stories, nor do I mean any harm.
For the past two years, Billy’s rejoiced in most aspects of the long walk from one side of the Baskerville campus to the other, from the scent of chalk, books, and floor wax in the humanities building to that of tempera, clay, and developing chemicals in the fine arts studios. He’s made the walk alone so many times that he doesn't thinks anymore about the path he takes, though he still loves the scenery on the way, and the time the travel allows him to devour apples, coffee, and the occasional fistful of hard candies.
He’s not alone today, however. Dominic walks beside him, the path just as familiar to his eyes and feet. Not one second look is spared in their direction; the students wandering by them are absorbed in their reading or bobbing their heads gently to tunes only they hear, coming through insect-tiny white earphones. Billy’s nose wrinkles at the thought of those things resting near his ear canal, and Dominic laughs, reading his mind before Billy has a chance to say a word.
Billy’s pleased to have the company on his way to the arts building, more pleased that he’s carrying along with them something he can’t quite call a secret. Miranda had barely blinked at Billy’s request to borrow the light-filled studio on the top floor for a personal project, and after consulting her schedules, both for the room and for an appropriately robust dinner in return later in the week, she’d booked Billy’s time and offered him both good luck and advice on late afternoon light and shadow in that studio. She and Billy had in fact become so involved in the conversation that Billy had hated to leave, even after Miranda’s clerk had come into the office warning of another appointment. On the way back to his own office, Billy had congratulated himself on following through on what had been just the cloudiest idea a few weeks before, when Billy's eyes had drifted from the road in front of him to instead watch Dominic sleep in the passenger seat of his car. Billy had ached then to see Dominic again through a camera's eye, and he intends now to do just that.
Last night, as he’d leaned back in his desk chair and peered at Dominic on the couch rereading his notes from someone else's class, Billy had wondered if Miranda knew, or at least had an idea, exactly what or more specifically whom Billy planned to photograph. Dominic’s always spoken of her with joy and admiration and comfort, and Billy, too, feels like he can call her a friend, one who will tell him the truth, but kindly--even when said truth makes Billy’s ears turn pink, such as Miranda’s amused appraisal of both his ties and his beloved, chipped cameras. And as he’d left his desk to lean over the back of the couch and thread his fingers through Dominic’s growing hair, Billy had decided that if he felt the need to tell anyone about his relationship with Dominic, he would tell Miranda, because surely she would understand. Not, perhaps, condone, but understand. Even if the discussion did not go well, it would give Billy a measure of comfort to speak it aloud to someone he’s already trusted with more than his academic interests.
Dominic climbs the stairs into the building now with light feet and an energy Billy wishes he had possessed at Dominic’s age, much less now, and Billy follows him, the wide grin that’s been threatening the whole way over now finally moving across his face. Dominic’s not yet questioned Billy about what they’re doing over here, but that in itself is just as comforting; Billy relaxes in the knowledge that all he’d needed to do was ask for the company and he’d received it. There are few places, Billy knows, where neither he nor Dominic would follow the other.
Billy shakes his head when Dominic makes to turn down the hallway to Miranda’s office, and again when Dominic’s eyebrows rise as they pass the darkrooms and photography labs. They continue to climb, all the way to the top of the building, and Billy looks over his shoulder slowly before he opens the door to the studio he’s wanted to explore for months now. Pressing his hand gently to Dominic’s back in the best encouragement he can give until they are in the room and alone, Billy nods him forward and locks the door behind them with a quiet click.
Dominic’s eyes sweep from one end of the room to the other, reflecting bright blue against the white walls and dust cloths and blond wood tables and chairs spread around the vast space. Billy stays silent behind him for a moment, removing his jacket and tie and throwing them to a table near the door, and then he steps forward to catch up with Dominic, resting his hands at Dominic’s waist, his lips near Dominic’s ear.
“It’s ours,” Billy says quietly. “For the next three hours. I want you to let me see you here, Dominic.” He moves closer, until his body is pressed tightly against Dominic’s. "I’m not a student, and I’m not your friend Barchi; I want your eyes open until they close on their own. Will you let me?”
“If you’d like to,” Dominic says, standing almost unnaturally still in Billy’s grasp. His voice is calm, calmer certainly than what Billy had expected, and Billy smiles, waiting for the rest. Dominic takes a breath--settling himself even more, Billy can feel it--and continues. “Usually, before we begin, the artist or photographer, whoever it is--we'll come to an understanding about what I will and won’t do. What my fee will be.”
Billy hums, closing his eyes and tilting his head to nudge gently against Dominic's. “Shall we discuss that first, then? Your fee.”
Dominic lets out a little chuff of laughter, but steadies himself again immediately, the amusement in his voice evening out. “I’m thinking that for you, I can be a little more forgiving with my negotiations.”
“What a generous man you are, Dominic."
It's Dominic's turn to hum as he rolls his shoulders back slightly against Billy and lifts his chin. “What a generous man you’ll be.”
"We'll see." Billy takes a deep breath and waits for the echo of his retort to fade, then he continues. "That's not a word I'd ever apply t'myself, generous," he laughs. "But maybe, yeah. I could be." His hands move to drift up Dominic's forearms slowly, stopping at Dominic's elbows and applying the gentlest pressure. "So your fee. What is you want, Dom?"
Dominic doesn't blink, doesn't pause or show even the smallest hesitation. “I want equal time, Saturday night. You said three hours, yeah?”
Billy’s grip on Dominic’s body tightens and he closes his eyes again as he considers his answer. Equal time is one thing; equal attention another, and the idea of Dominic turning on him the same focus Billy intends to show here is an unsettling one. Billy can't imagine himself an object of that much interest, no matter how often he's caught Dominic's stare on him; there's only so much Billy thinks he has to offer the eyes or hands, whereas Dominic's come to represent something nearly endless in scope to Billy, worth far more than three hours' attention, certainly, but Billy will take what he can get in this prized space. And Billy can't conjure even in the most cautious, guarded parts of his mind any sense of real danger in what Dominic's asking from him in return for what Billy wants, and that makes it easier for Billy to loosen his hold on Dominic and turn him in his arms.
“Three hours Saturday night," he says, surprising himself with his acceptance of Dominic's terms. "In the interest of fairness and the fact that I wasn't exactly upfront with you about this, I’m not going to ask what you have in mind, but I reserve the same right of refusal I've given you."
“That seems fair.”
“More than, I think.” A corner of Billy's mouth rises and he steps back a bit, trailing his fingernails slightly against Dominic’s palm before he pulls away and begins to pace the room. “Especially considering I'm not wired quite the way you are, am I. And for what you will and won’t do?”
“For you, there’s no limits.”
Billy throws the mildest of surprised glares over his shoulder, tempering it with a smile at the sight of Dominic's certainty punctuating the statement. “There are limits to everything, Dominic; I'm not looking to find them today.”
“No limits," Dominic says again, his eyes clear and focused sharply on Billy's. "Just tell me what you want.”
Billy's nod is hesitant, slow as he chooses for the moment to take his own meaning from Dominic’s words. “It's not that easy to explain, Dom; I don't make my way with words, you of all people know that." When Dominic smiles, Billy does too, then his features settle again. "I want to play with shadows. I want to see if darkness isn’t all that dark in the end. I want to see you hide in it and from it. Embrace it and fight it.” Billy turns on his heel and lifts his hand toward a window, cutting a shadow through a beam of fading light. “I want proof that you cannot be completely captured, Dominic, not even by me.”
He turns to gauge Dominic’s reaction, to see his calm breaking somewhat and conflict and discomfort moving slightly over him before they’ve even begun. Billy takes a step toward him, willing strength into them both, and he nods again. “I'm going to corner you a little, Dom," he says slowly, then lowers his voice and gathers Dominic's face in his hands, a familiar smile returning to his face and more familiar warmth to his touch. "I want you to meet my eyes, the camera's eye, and not as the enemy or even a neutrality. And you can say no, Dominic. You can always say no."
"You've never given me reason to say no before." Dominic punctuates his words by lowering his eyes and showing a slight subversion of his body to Billy’s, and Billy takes a deep breath before he brushes his lips against Dominic's forehead.
“We both know that doesn't mean I never will, intentionally or not," he says simply. "Get clear, Dom; you're not acting as an abstraction here, not an ideal someone else can view in their leisure and have exist without naming. You're-" Billy pauses, looking for the right words. "I'm calling you mine here, Dom, not without giving you the opportunity to return it. I expect you to confront me if you need to, but I also expect you to remember that nothing I ask from you is meant as anything but-shared. Ours. Are we clear?"
Dominic nods and leans into Billy harder, his hands on Billy’s hips, and kisses him, the gesture one Billy allows until he feels like he has to step away or risk forgetting everything he'd planned to do. Billy moves to stand at the table, fussing with lenses and f-stops, giving Dominic time to wander about the room and shake off the intensity of their conversation. Once finished with his own work, Billy continues to leave Dominic alone, watching him quietly and letting himself come to feel at a strange peace, one that leave Billy wondering if he’d be happier in this setting than a proper classroom, if he’d have made a better life for himself and anyone he cared about by pursuing something that brought him more joy than academia. Joy had not been the goal, though, and Billy reminds himself of that before he pushes the thought away roughly and finds that peace again as Dominic finally goes still at the far end of the room, breathing deeply, his eyes closed. When he opens them again and turns toward Billy, Billy finds his own stare held and caught--captured, maybe--and then Dominic breaks his little spell.
"How did you want to start, Billy?"
"By asking you to check that lock again," Billy smiles and nods toward the door before he returns his attention to the camera lens and his words become slightly distracted, a flurry that tumbles from his lips. "And I think kick off your shoes, Dom. I'm working in black and white, so I need--I want as much variation as possible. I want to see you, your skin, everything."
Billy paces the room, peering through his camera at the way light hits the walls, from side to side. He's only half-consciously circling Dominic, careful not to press down on the shutter yet, before either of them is quite ready. This time is a gift, Billy thinks, and while he doesn't want to waste any of it, he also fears rushing, fears that three hours from now Dominic will regret it or that he himself will feel emptier, somehow, more distanced from Dominic even than he'd felt before they'd broken what Billy hopes was one of few walls left standing between them, that long, hot night in that old, ratty hotel room. That won't happen, Billy assures himself; it cannot happen, because he is not treating Dominic as a subject alone. Dominic will not remain behind in this studio afterward to wait for the next photographer, the next wanderer through a garden or a castle ruin. They will leave this room as they'd walked into it, as they'd agreed to what Billy wants to happen here--together.
Dominic's back is to Billy now, and he stretches tall in the middle of the room, his shoulder blades prominent under the fabric of his shirt. Billy lifts his camera to his eyes again and is thrilled when the shutter clicks almost silently. Dominic turns his head after a second, his expression curious but not irritated or particularly surprised, it seems to Billy. "Perfect," Billy murmurs, his face warming a little as he realizes it's a word he says too often, but has never not meant. He toes off his own shoes as a distraction and to better wander around in comfort as well, and beckons to Dominic.
Dominic kicks his shoes out of his way and takes a few steps backwards and shakes out his shoulders and arms, shrugging lightly one last time before he bends forward. His first attempt at a handstand leaves him sprawled on the floor; his second leaves him sprawled and laughing, too. His third carries him halfway to Billy, his legs straight, toes pointed, gravity forcing his shirt down to expose his stomach, before he rather gracefully ends in a back bend followed rather gracelessly by a collapse onto his back. Dominic arches a bit to grin at Billy from upside down, and Billy clicks the shutter on his camera again before he lowers it only a little.
"I can stand on my head, too, if you'd like," Dominic laughs, and Billy smirks and shakes his head.
"In a bit, maybe. Where you are is more than satisfactory."
It takes half a step for Billy to stand straddling Dominic's waist, pointing the camera lens to the floor and focusing on the contrast between Dominic's tanned fingers and where they rest on his bared and slightly paler stomach. Billy spends a few shots just on those long fingers, and then raises the camera to catch Dominic face, still flushed with blood and happiness.
"Where d'you find your energy?" Billy asks quietly, already aware of how their voices can carry in this vast room. "It's not just your age; there has to be something more. Something that can't harm you, Dom," he adds quickly. "Something you've found in you, not from anyone else. And look at you: look at your eyes, Dom; they don't get brighter than this, they can't reflect more than they are now."
Billy sinks to his knees for a moment, still straddling Dominic but focusing tighter now on the line of Dominic's jaw and the set of his cheekbone. When he feels Dominic shifting beneath him, Billy catches Dominic's hand in his own and lowers himself for a kiss, a quick, sweeping brush of lips before he's rising again, pulling Dominic with him and walking them across the room. He steps forward and back to match Dominic's retreat and advance, until Dominic's back meets the wall near the windows and Billy hums with pleasure as he peers through his lens again. "There, the light, 's perfect. How is it, Dom. How are you feeling."
"Alright. Just like this then." Dominic's expression is not quite as steady anymore; he'd clearly been more comfortable with the play than he is staring at Billy through the camera. Or perhaps it's not discomfort, Billy thinks; perhaps it's just the adjustment of feeling on display, unsure what to do with his hands and about what Billy wants from him, unsure whether it's appropriate to laugh or pay the kind of hard attention Billy so often demands of him.
Dominic reaches for Billy, for the briefest steadying touch before he presses his hands against the wall to see what Billy will do or want. The shutter clicks, and Billy's pleased to catch Dominic in a rare blink, just on the kinder side of a mild flinch. Billy gives Dominic a moment before the shutter clicks again, and Dominic sags against the wall this time, looking from beneath his lashes, visibly if only slightly rattled now without Billy's direction.
"Like this?" Dominic's voice is tinged with doubt for the first time since they've entered the room, and Billy watches Dominic's hands begin to slide along the wall nervously.
Billy nods, choosing silence from behind his camera, at least for now. He's certain Dominic will eventually relax under this colder gaze of Billy's just as he does under that of one much warmer. And he can't deny that he's curious about this difference in Dominic's posture and the movements of his hands; while Dominic has always been twitchy, the last few weeks have seen him settled down in Billy's presence, and this sort of relapse is fascinating to Billy. Understandable, yes, but fascinating, too.
"Open your hands, Dom," he murmurs. "Splay your fingers and keep your back against the wall, hmm? Don't think about what I'm doing-take a look at what you can see from the window." When Dominic turns his head, Billy's quick to capture the flex of muscle in his throat and neck, and then Billy sinks to his knees again, this time to focus on the strength in Dominic's hand pressed against the wall. Billy catches the glint of light ricocheting from the thick-banded ring on Dominic's left hand, then turns his attention to Dominic's wrist and the worn, soft cuff wrapped around it. Dominic's fingers dance lightly above the paint, and Billy catches that, too, pleased when Dominic's hand relaxes again. "Good," Billy murmurs. "Perfect."
When he looks up from his perch, it's first to make sure Dominic meets his eyes and not the camera's, and Billy smiles before he raises the lens again to take in Dominic from this skewed perspective. "Tell me what you see."
The camera clicks again and Dominic looks down at it then back out the window. Billy remembers the radio weatherman had said that the weather would be bad today, but the prophecy has yet to come true; it is cold, but the sky is still a clear, bright blue. The fading light of before is still holding on as if by its fingernails, pouring as much as it can through the windows and bathing the room in its light.
"Everything looks so small from up here," Dominic says, his voice soft but roughened too, nerves scouring its surface. "There's a couple disappearing into the grove of trees--not yours, the ones by the stone walls--and another group of students playing footie just there in the courtyard." Dominic straightens a bit and stretches to see further. "Everyone is walking so fast. Where are they going, do you think. Wait, they're back--" Dominic laughs, low and just a touch filthy, Billy thinks. "You can see better than you'd think through those trees, Billy. Makes you wonder what people can see from other ..."
"Vantage points," Billy laughs. "And is there anything else? Anyone?"
Dominic shakes his head, but then swallows, a slight flush moving over his face. "I can see my old room from here. My window."
"Do you miss it?" Billy asks from behind the camera, before he can reconsider the question and fairly certain he already knows the answer. Dominic had lived a more than independent life before he'd stepped so forcefully and well into Billy's, and Billy has had occasion to think that recently he'd held Dominic back from the sort of adventure university is meant to be for someone Dominic's age. Dominic may have tasted more of that adventure already than he'd meant to or wanted to, Billy supposes, thinking of what they'd been through over the last few months, but nevertheless, Billy knows that Dominic spends less time with even his good friends, friends he needs and who care for him, than he used to; to think that Dominic may regret that decision comes to Billy more often than he would admit. "Are there ghosts in that room, Dom? Move closer to the window, hmm? I want that light to surround you."
Dominic moves as asked, leaning his palms against the sill while Billy takes three or four shots of him framed by the window. Billy grabs another chance to focus on Dominic's hands, his long fingers curled around the edge of the sill, and then he checks the count of his film, smiling as he looks back up at Dominic. "The couple, are they still there?" At Dominic's nod, Billy rises to his feet and peers over Dominic's shoulder. "Lovely. No wonder they were making good time over there. Turn around, Dom; face me now."
Billy doesn't relinquish his space as Dominic turns, and they both inhale sharply at their proximity to each other. The camera is the only barrier between them, and Billy lowers it and his hand enough so that he can move closer, so that his lips rest just below Dominic's. He waits there for a moment, letting the gentle tension come over Dominic's expression, and then he steps back, raising the camera again and pressing down on the shutter quickly, regaining his composure while Dominic searches blindly for his own.
"I believe you know where they were going, Dominic," Billy says clearly as he adjusts the flash to compensate for the different light. "Running, the same way we do; always running. 's why we're here right now-because we should take every chance we can get to stand still. Look up for me, Dominic-hands against the wall again, and answer me. Do you miss the residence halls?"
"No." Dominic moves slowly from the gentle tease, his eyes warm and focused on Billy's lips. Dominic stretches his arms out inch by inch until his hands align with his shoulders and his fingers are spread apart. "There was no one there to look after me. Not like that. You--you know what I mean, like. And no one for me to look after. No kitchen." Dominic's laugh is dry, bitter to Billy's ears. "Except for the one downstairs, and it was rubbish. No fire to warm myself by. And it was fucking depressing, Billy; you can't--you're never comfortable, so you're never ... present, like, for yourself or anyone else."
Dominic stops himself, and Billy holds his breath a little, waiting for an admission he doesn't want to hear and grateful when Dominic turns them and his own words down a slightly safer path. "It was like being in a prison. Even if you got lucky, and you gave a fuck about someone, it always felt furtive. No one could stay. No one wanted to. I just felt. Used, all the time. Empty. Like no one did give a fuck, nobody would. I didn't think it'd get better. I didn't think anyone was ever going to--" Dominic takes a hard breath, his lips flattening into a harder line. "Love me. Especially not my philosophy professor--the one I fell asleep dreaming about. I hated it there."
"There's something to be said for furtive, though," Billy muses, again from behind the safety of his camera. Half of Dominic's face and body is backlit now from where Billy stands, and he tries to capture the strangeness of the shot, of the moment. "Not in your particular situation, of course." When Billy lowers the camera again, his expression very calm, he leans forward once more, this time to place his hand to Dominic's cheek. His fingers drift into Dominic's hair, and he exhales long and low as he tilts Dominic's chin so their eyes can meet. "I hate that you weren't looked after before this," he says quietly but heatedly. "Before us. I hate that y'could never trust it was right, even if it maybe it wasn't. I'll make up for that where I can."
Billy touches their foreheads together for a moment, working hard to not think of other hands on Dominic's skin, other fingerprints that weren't Billy's own, and then he backs away, lifting the camera and nodding Dominic deeper into the corner between two windows. "You may have the use of my kitchen and fire for as long as you'd like," he says, fighting to lighten the mood for them both as he refocuses the camera. "On occasion I might suggest you take advantage of their owner as well."
Billy takes a deep breath, reminding himself that he's working against time now that the sun is setting properly. “Furtive,” Billy murmurs again, tries to take some of the sting from the word. “D’you think you could slide down a bit, Dom?”
He watches carefully as Dominic braces his hands on the wall to either side of him and moves to sit on the floor. Billy steps closer, his hand turning the camera's lens expertly as he closes in on Dominic both in frame and out, and when Dominic looks up again, eyes wide and bright and the light in the room making the tips of his hair seem pale and soft as bird feathers, Billy forgets to breathe in his haste to get the shot he wants.
“I would have,” Billy says softly, answering a question Dominic hadn’t asked. “I would have come to you if I could have. Can’t begin to tell you how often I wanted to, even when y'could barely look at me, much less speak to me. Even when it was impossible, Dom, even when it would have made things so much fucking worse.”
Dominic begins to nod and Billy catches his chin, holding Dominic steady as he presses the shutter again, knowing he’s capturing his own hand in the shot as well. Billy lets his knees buckle slightly, shaking his head sharply when Dominic moves to slow his descent to the floor, and his little speech--a confession, it sounds, in the quiet of the vast room--tumbles out between clicks of the camera’s shutter. “I dreamt of finding you there, Dom, waking you, fucking you--all of it. I wanted you even then. Especially then.”
When they’re both on the floor, inches apart in the tight corner, Billy’s hands move quickly to balance his camera on the windowsill and then fly to Dominic's waist, tugging at his shirt and freeing it from Dominic's jeans. The material is half up Dominic's chest and Billy's palms flat on Dominic's skin before Billy looks up. "I still do; 's like I can't not want you, I can't not have you. I would have done anything for you, even in that prison of a room you had. I will. Someday. I will."
"Did you? Did you want to?" Dominic's voice sounds desperate but far away to Billy, and Billy curves his hands at Dominic's sides as Dominic wraps his own arms around his thin chest. Billy nods, just once, and then Dominic relaxes his shoulders, raising his arms so that Billy can tug his shirt off. He exhales hard when he meets Billy's eyes again, and Billy smiles, encouraging the rest of Dominic's own small confession.
"I used to think of reasons you might come for me there," Dominic says quietly. "They were fucking stupid, all of them--like you wanted one of your books back, or you were wanting to help me with a paper--" Dominic's cheeks redden and he lowers his eyes though he's smiling now. "I thought I knew how to make you stay once you'd found me. I knew you wanted me, Billy, and I thought--I knew I could make it so you wouldn't want to leave."
"You might have, yeah," Billy laughs. "Not cold?" Dominic shakes his head, still blushing, and Billy tilts Dominic's chin so he memorize Dominic's expression without the barrier of the camera, recording it instead in his memory. "I never had anything so noble in mind," he murmurs. "Thing is, I've never had your courage, Dominic; if it had been all on me I would've let it die inside me rather than act on some fucking insane urge to share my life--share anything with, with a student. My student." When Dominic looks up, Billy's shaking his head, his jaw set hard. "You've always been stronger than I am, Dominic." Billy closes his eyes and lets his hand rest unsteadily this time on Dominic's chest. "Good fucking thing, too, isn't it."
Billy takes his time composing himself, and when he opens his eyes again, his hands rise and move into Dominic's hair, tugging him close and not denying either of them that tacitly promised kiss of before. For a long while Billy remains still but for the urgent press of his lips on Dominic's, over and over again. When he sits back, it's with a sharp, strong inhale, and he reaches for the camera again while he meets Dominic's eyes.
"Not much more," he says softly. Billy swallows and holds the camera carefully with one hand while the other takes Dominic's hand and raises it above and behind Dominic's head, against the wall. Billy thinks he's much too close to get the focus he needs for the shot he wants, but it matters less every second that passes. It takes him several seconds to remember to raise the camera, too. Dominic reflects back Billy's need tenfold, it feels like to Billy, and a current of gratitude moves between them along with everything else as Dominic relaxes into the pose, waiting for the click of the camera with whatever patience he can muster, shifting when that click finally comes. Billy watches him pull his knees back up tight against his chest and fold his fingers into a fist to resist reaching for Billy.
"When I came to you, I was terrified," Dominic says, words tumbling from him now in his turn. "I wasn't being brave. I just. I wanted you so much. I was just mad for it. For you. I couldn't stand it. I had to know."
There's an eagerness in Dominic's voice that Billy loves, a desire to be understood that Billy's rarely heard from anyone, much less a partner of any serious measure. Whatever his earlier concern over Billy's possible reactions, Dominic sounds fearless now, able to say aloud things Billy can hardly acknowledge to himself. Billy can't capture this part of Dominic on film any more than he could a ghost, but what he can do is focus his lens on Dominic's eyes again, on the intensity and clarity of them when Dominic speaks. However sharply or artistically Barchi had sketched them, there is no comparison to seeing those eyes as they are now, their gaze strong, piercing almost as Dominic remains still. Billy's finger finds the shutter again and again, the sound filling the silence between them while Billy rises slowly, only at the last moment moving his hand from around Dominic's wrist.
"What would you have done?" Billy murmurs, on his feet again and moving backward. "If I'd said no from the beginning? Would you have bargained with me? Backed me into some corner y'knew would fit us perfectly?" A final click, and then the roll of film begins to rewind, the whirr startling Billy into lowering the camera and then looking away from Dominic's gaze, remembering that he had not wanted things to happen this quickly, this easily. They're meant to earn something from each other here, Billy reminds himself, and he keeps his voice steady as he walks to the table near the door, to the opposite corner from Dominic. "Would you have fought for it, Dominic?"
He can hear Dominic relax behind him, shoulders brushing loud against the wall as they drop and fingers tapping lightly on the floor, uncurled from their former tight fist. Dominic answers yes to Billy’s question but his voice doesn't carry as much confidence as Billy thought it might. Before Billy can question that, he hears Dominic straighten up again, chuffing out a breath as if he fears Billy might challenge his answer. "I knew you wanted me," Dominic says again. "I knew from the day you picked me up when I was caught in the rain. You might as well have fucking pulled me then, Billy. I would have let you. I would have done a hell of a lot more than I did, but I was scared. I thought--I was in love with you then, Billy. I was.”
Hidden from Dominic's view, Billy indulges in a smile at the change in Dominic's voice. He remembers that day vividly, remembers how he could have given away his interest so many times in that humid car. It would have been a disaster if they'd done anything about their attraction then and there, and Billy knows it, but nevertheless, Dominic had tempted him that afternoon nearly as much as he does now
"I hadn't earned it then, Dominic," Billy says carefully, forwarding the new roll of film in his camera. "But yes, I did want you; for the first time that day it hit me, and I worked so fucking hard to push it away. You never did that, though, did you. You persevered. As in everything, you persevered."
Billy turns to face Dominic again, bringing the camera to the level of his eyes and pressing the shutter a few times as he walks, nearing Dominic with every step. "We can think for the rest of our lives about what we could have done and didn't, can't we. And yes, we made mistakes-" Billy lowers the camera and his eyes, before looking back up at Dominic with a slow smile. "But we got a lot more right. Miles to go, Dom, I told you."
He drops again to his knees, this time to Dominic's side instead of straddling him, and Billy's hand reaches to turn Dominic's chin slightly, appraising Dominic's profile and the thin shadows thrown on Dominic's cheeks. "Good" Billy murmurs, raising the camera. "What else did you know, hmm. That I would have taken everything you had, whether I'd earned it or not?"
"I would have given it, too." Dominic grins but then seems to catch himself, reaching up to trace a crack in the wall with a long finger and then dropping his hand back onto his knee before he reaches its end. He lowers his eyes, acknowledging to himself and Billy too that what he's said isn't exactly the truth. "I would have wanted to give you everything. At least looking back I do. But."
"But?" Billy finds he's holdings his breath again, and Dominic looks back up, nerves and confrontation back in his expression until Billy lowers the camera a little, meeting Dominic's eyes.
"It scared me, after. I mean, I wanted to know, and I saw it there in the car. In the way you looked at me. I could feel it, Billy; I knew you wanted it even though you were holding yourself together in a way I couldn't, like." Dominic holds Billy's gaze a tense, silent moment before he looks down, and Billy captures that surrender, swallowing hard as Dominic folds in on himself again, arms tight against his knees. "When I was back in my room and had taken off my wet clothes. I was--I brought myself off, Billy; I was pretending it was you, the way I thought you'd do it, and I just. After, when I opened my eyes, it was just me, just my room and I thought I might have gotten it wrong. It wasn't until I was back in class and you were in front of me that I felt it again. Felt it go hot all through me, like, when you looked at me. I knew it. I knew I was right."
Dominic pauses in his confession, his cheeks flushed again with the little remembered victory and his eyes bright. When he looks back up at Billy, Billy feels again what Dominic meant, and Dominic nods, feeling it too. "That's why I did it," Dominic says, a new breathless calm in his voice. "I was in love with you, and I knew you wouldn't push me away. I was scared because I knew it was--I don't want to say wrong, Billy, because it's not. Because you never wanted anything from me and all I wanted was for you to just. Give it back, any of it. I wanted you to feel the same thing, and you did, I already knew you did. It's not wrong; it just wasn't done, and that's different. I knew maybe you wouldn't--let me, or let yourself, because of that, and that scared me. But I couldn't wait until I graduated. I couldn't wait."
"You were scared," Billy nods. "I was fucking terrified, Dominic. Not so much for my job or your classes--it was just easier to make it about that, and I did, and y'called me on it, hard, didn't you." Billy takes a deep breath, surprised again that he's admitted it and that it doesn't feel like cowardice, doesn't smack of failure in either of them. "I'd be lying if I said those things weren't important to me, Dominic; they still are; they're tremendously important. But I was terrified that I'd take too much from you, and yes, yes, and I hated thinking it, but I did, Dom, and it was real--I thought you'd take too much from me."
Before he can be misunderstood, Billy reaches to curve his hand around the back of Dominic's neck and bring him close, touching their foreheads together again and humming with pleasure at the feeling of Dominic accepting his touch. "You have to understand, Dominic, before you I was with someone I kept at arm's length--fuck, at both arms' length and then some, and it was--I want to believe it was the right thing to do. It was comfortable. It shouldn't have been anything more than it was. You didn't leave me the choice, though, did you. I wanted more. I wanted you; I wanted everything about you."
The pictures Billy craved from this afternoon seem almost irrelevant now, and if there were a way to record Dominic's memories as easily and unobtrusively and safely as Billy can capture his image, Billy thinks he would pay to do so, whatever the cost. It's hard to see himself through Dominic's eyes, and there is always beneath Billy's surface the belief that he still hasn't earned the trust Dominic gives him, but he pushes it away to return Dominic's gift of honesty, sitting back on his calves now with another deeper breath and taking up the camera again with one hand while the other strokes along Dominic's cheekbone. "It's not wrong," he says, his chin and eyes set hard. "It cannot fucking be more right."
The click of the shutter sounds loud in the room after their murmured quiet, but Billy presses it nonetheless, concentrating now on Dominic's shoulders and his collarbones, objects of Billy's thorough attention when they're in Billy's bed. "I'd do it again, given the chance," Billy says, more calmly now. "I'd do more. Better. You'd never know anything but how much I wanted you; you'd never question a fucking thing." Billy's hand drifts to Dominic's thigh as he lowers the camera again. "On your back, Dominic."
To be continued.
Authors: kiltsandlollies and escribo
Characters: Billy/Dominic
Word count: 6772
Summary: A late afternoon in shadows and light.
Index
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction; the recognizable people in the story belong to themselves and have never performed the actions portrayed here. I do not know the actors nor am I associated with them in any way. If you are underage, please do not read this story. I am not making any profit from these stories, nor do I mean any harm.
For the past two years, Billy’s rejoiced in most aspects of the long walk from one side of the Baskerville campus to the other, from the scent of chalk, books, and floor wax in the humanities building to that of tempera, clay, and developing chemicals in the fine arts studios. He’s made the walk alone so many times that he doesn't thinks anymore about the path he takes, though he still loves the scenery on the way, and the time the travel allows him to devour apples, coffee, and the occasional fistful of hard candies.
He’s not alone today, however. Dominic walks beside him, the path just as familiar to his eyes and feet. Not one second look is spared in their direction; the students wandering by them are absorbed in their reading or bobbing their heads gently to tunes only they hear, coming through insect-tiny white earphones. Billy’s nose wrinkles at the thought of those things resting near his ear canal, and Dominic laughs, reading his mind before Billy has a chance to say a word.
Billy’s pleased to have the company on his way to the arts building, more pleased that he’s carrying along with them something he can’t quite call a secret. Miranda had barely blinked at Billy’s request to borrow the light-filled studio on the top floor for a personal project, and after consulting her schedules, both for the room and for an appropriately robust dinner in return later in the week, she’d booked Billy’s time and offered him both good luck and advice on late afternoon light and shadow in that studio. She and Billy had in fact become so involved in the conversation that Billy had hated to leave, even after Miranda’s clerk had come into the office warning of another appointment. On the way back to his own office, Billy had congratulated himself on following through on what had been just the cloudiest idea a few weeks before, when Billy's eyes had drifted from the road in front of him to instead watch Dominic sleep in the passenger seat of his car. Billy had ached then to see Dominic again through a camera's eye, and he intends now to do just that.
Last night, as he’d leaned back in his desk chair and peered at Dominic on the couch rereading his notes from someone else's class, Billy had wondered if Miranda knew, or at least had an idea, exactly what or more specifically whom Billy planned to photograph. Dominic’s always spoken of her with joy and admiration and comfort, and Billy, too, feels like he can call her a friend, one who will tell him the truth, but kindly--even when said truth makes Billy’s ears turn pink, such as Miranda’s amused appraisal of both his ties and his beloved, chipped cameras. And as he’d left his desk to lean over the back of the couch and thread his fingers through Dominic’s growing hair, Billy had decided that if he felt the need to tell anyone about his relationship with Dominic, he would tell Miranda, because surely she would understand. Not, perhaps, condone, but understand. Even if the discussion did not go well, it would give Billy a measure of comfort to speak it aloud to someone he’s already trusted with more than his academic interests.
Dominic climbs the stairs into the building now with light feet and an energy Billy wishes he had possessed at Dominic’s age, much less now, and Billy follows him, the wide grin that’s been threatening the whole way over now finally moving across his face. Dominic’s not yet questioned Billy about what they’re doing over here, but that in itself is just as comforting; Billy relaxes in the knowledge that all he’d needed to do was ask for the company and he’d received it. There are few places, Billy knows, where neither he nor Dominic would follow the other.
Billy shakes his head when Dominic makes to turn down the hallway to Miranda’s office, and again when Dominic’s eyebrows rise as they pass the darkrooms and photography labs. They continue to climb, all the way to the top of the building, and Billy looks over his shoulder slowly before he opens the door to the studio he’s wanted to explore for months now. Pressing his hand gently to Dominic’s back in the best encouragement he can give until they are in the room and alone, Billy nods him forward and locks the door behind them with a quiet click.
Dominic’s eyes sweep from one end of the room to the other, reflecting bright blue against the white walls and dust cloths and blond wood tables and chairs spread around the vast space. Billy stays silent behind him for a moment, removing his jacket and tie and throwing them to a table near the door, and then he steps forward to catch up with Dominic, resting his hands at Dominic’s waist, his lips near Dominic’s ear.
“It’s ours,” Billy says quietly. “For the next three hours. I want you to let me see you here, Dominic.” He moves closer, until his body is pressed tightly against Dominic’s. "I’m not a student, and I’m not your friend Barchi; I want your eyes open until they close on their own. Will you let me?”
“If you’d like to,” Dominic says, standing almost unnaturally still in Billy’s grasp. His voice is calm, calmer certainly than what Billy had expected, and Billy smiles, waiting for the rest. Dominic takes a breath--settling himself even more, Billy can feel it--and continues. “Usually, before we begin, the artist or photographer, whoever it is--we'll come to an understanding about what I will and won’t do. What my fee will be.”
Billy hums, closing his eyes and tilting his head to nudge gently against Dominic's. “Shall we discuss that first, then? Your fee.”
Dominic lets out a little chuff of laughter, but steadies himself again immediately, the amusement in his voice evening out. “I’m thinking that for you, I can be a little more forgiving with my negotiations.”
“What a generous man you are, Dominic."
It's Dominic's turn to hum as he rolls his shoulders back slightly against Billy and lifts his chin. “What a generous man you’ll be.”
"We'll see." Billy takes a deep breath and waits for the echo of his retort to fade, then he continues. "That's not a word I'd ever apply t'myself, generous," he laughs. "But maybe, yeah. I could be." His hands move to drift up Dominic's forearms slowly, stopping at Dominic's elbows and applying the gentlest pressure. "So your fee. What is you want, Dom?"
Dominic doesn't blink, doesn't pause or show even the smallest hesitation. “I want equal time, Saturday night. You said three hours, yeah?”
Billy’s grip on Dominic’s body tightens and he closes his eyes again as he considers his answer. Equal time is one thing; equal attention another, and the idea of Dominic turning on him the same focus Billy intends to show here is an unsettling one. Billy can't imagine himself an object of that much interest, no matter how often he's caught Dominic's stare on him; there's only so much Billy thinks he has to offer the eyes or hands, whereas Dominic's come to represent something nearly endless in scope to Billy, worth far more than three hours' attention, certainly, but Billy will take what he can get in this prized space. And Billy can't conjure even in the most cautious, guarded parts of his mind any sense of real danger in what Dominic's asking from him in return for what Billy wants, and that makes it easier for Billy to loosen his hold on Dominic and turn him in his arms.
“Three hours Saturday night," he says, surprising himself with his acceptance of Dominic's terms. "In the interest of fairness and the fact that I wasn't exactly upfront with you about this, I’m not going to ask what you have in mind, but I reserve the same right of refusal I've given you."
“That seems fair.”
“More than, I think.” A corner of Billy's mouth rises and he steps back a bit, trailing his fingernails slightly against Dominic’s palm before he pulls away and begins to pace the room. “Especially considering I'm not wired quite the way you are, am I. And for what you will and won’t do?”
“For you, there’s no limits.”
Billy throws the mildest of surprised glares over his shoulder, tempering it with a smile at the sight of Dominic's certainty punctuating the statement. “There are limits to everything, Dominic; I'm not looking to find them today.”
“No limits," Dominic says again, his eyes clear and focused sharply on Billy's. "Just tell me what you want.”
Billy's nod is hesitant, slow as he chooses for the moment to take his own meaning from Dominic’s words. “It's not that easy to explain, Dom; I don't make my way with words, you of all people know that." When Dominic smiles, Billy does too, then his features settle again. "I want to play with shadows. I want to see if darkness isn’t all that dark in the end. I want to see you hide in it and from it. Embrace it and fight it.” Billy turns on his heel and lifts his hand toward a window, cutting a shadow through a beam of fading light. “I want proof that you cannot be completely captured, Dominic, not even by me.”
He turns to gauge Dominic’s reaction, to see his calm breaking somewhat and conflict and discomfort moving slightly over him before they’ve even begun. Billy takes a step toward him, willing strength into them both, and he nods again. “I'm going to corner you a little, Dom," he says slowly, then lowers his voice and gathers Dominic's face in his hands, a familiar smile returning to his face and more familiar warmth to his touch. "I want you to meet my eyes, the camera's eye, and not as the enemy or even a neutrality. And you can say no, Dominic. You can always say no."
"You've never given me reason to say no before." Dominic punctuates his words by lowering his eyes and showing a slight subversion of his body to Billy’s, and Billy takes a deep breath before he brushes his lips against Dominic's forehead.
“We both know that doesn't mean I never will, intentionally or not," he says simply. "Get clear, Dom; you're not acting as an abstraction here, not an ideal someone else can view in their leisure and have exist without naming. You're-" Billy pauses, looking for the right words. "I'm calling you mine here, Dom, not without giving you the opportunity to return it. I expect you to confront me if you need to, but I also expect you to remember that nothing I ask from you is meant as anything but-shared. Ours. Are we clear?"
Dominic nods and leans into Billy harder, his hands on Billy’s hips, and kisses him, the gesture one Billy allows until he feels like he has to step away or risk forgetting everything he'd planned to do. Billy moves to stand at the table, fussing with lenses and f-stops, giving Dominic time to wander about the room and shake off the intensity of their conversation. Once finished with his own work, Billy continues to leave Dominic alone, watching him quietly and letting himself come to feel at a strange peace, one that leave Billy wondering if he’d be happier in this setting than a proper classroom, if he’d have made a better life for himself and anyone he cared about by pursuing something that brought him more joy than academia. Joy had not been the goal, though, and Billy reminds himself of that before he pushes the thought away roughly and finds that peace again as Dominic finally goes still at the far end of the room, breathing deeply, his eyes closed. When he opens them again and turns toward Billy, Billy finds his own stare held and caught--captured, maybe--and then Dominic breaks his little spell.
"How did you want to start, Billy?"
"By asking you to check that lock again," Billy smiles and nods toward the door before he returns his attention to the camera lens and his words become slightly distracted, a flurry that tumbles from his lips. "And I think kick off your shoes, Dom. I'm working in black and white, so I need--I want as much variation as possible. I want to see you, your skin, everything."
Billy paces the room, peering through his camera at the way light hits the walls, from side to side. He's only half-consciously circling Dominic, careful not to press down on the shutter yet, before either of them is quite ready. This time is a gift, Billy thinks, and while he doesn't want to waste any of it, he also fears rushing, fears that three hours from now Dominic will regret it or that he himself will feel emptier, somehow, more distanced from Dominic even than he'd felt before they'd broken what Billy hopes was one of few walls left standing between them, that long, hot night in that old, ratty hotel room. That won't happen, Billy assures himself; it cannot happen, because he is not treating Dominic as a subject alone. Dominic will not remain behind in this studio afterward to wait for the next photographer, the next wanderer through a garden or a castle ruin. They will leave this room as they'd walked into it, as they'd agreed to what Billy wants to happen here--together.
Dominic's back is to Billy now, and he stretches tall in the middle of the room, his shoulder blades prominent under the fabric of his shirt. Billy lifts his camera to his eyes again and is thrilled when the shutter clicks almost silently. Dominic turns his head after a second, his expression curious but not irritated or particularly surprised, it seems to Billy. "Perfect," Billy murmurs, his face warming a little as he realizes it's a word he says too often, but has never not meant. He toes off his own shoes as a distraction and to better wander around in comfort as well, and beckons to Dominic.
Dominic kicks his shoes out of his way and takes a few steps backwards and shakes out his shoulders and arms, shrugging lightly one last time before he bends forward. His first attempt at a handstand leaves him sprawled on the floor; his second leaves him sprawled and laughing, too. His third carries him halfway to Billy, his legs straight, toes pointed, gravity forcing his shirt down to expose his stomach, before he rather gracefully ends in a back bend followed rather gracelessly by a collapse onto his back. Dominic arches a bit to grin at Billy from upside down, and Billy clicks the shutter on his camera again before he lowers it only a little.
"I can stand on my head, too, if you'd like," Dominic laughs, and Billy smirks and shakes his head.
"In a bit, maybe. Where you are is more than satisfactory."
It takes half a step for Billy to stand straddling Dominic's waist, pointing the camera lens to the floor and focusing on the contrast between Dominic's tanned fingers and where they rest on his bared and slightly paler stomach. Billy spends a few shots just on those long fingers, and then raises the camera to catch Dominic face, still flushed with blood and happiness.
"Where d'you find your energy?" Billy asks quietly, already aware of how their voices can carry in this vast room. "It's not just your age; there has to be something more. Something that can't harm you, Dom," he adds quickly. "Something you've found in you, not from anyone else. And look at you: look at your eyes, Dom; they don't get brighter than this, they can't reflect more than they are now."
Billy sinks to his knees for a moment, still straddling Dominic but focusing tighter now on the line of Dominic's jaw and the set of his cheekbone. When he feels Dominic shifting beneath him, Billy catches Dominic's hand in his own and lowers himself for a kiss, a quick, sweeping brush of lips before he's rising again, pulling Dominic with him and walking them across the room. He steps forward and back to match Dominic's retreat and advance, until Dominic's back meets the wall near the windows and Billy hums with pleasure as he peers through his lens again. "There, the light, 's perfect. How is it, Dom. How are you feeling."
"Alright. Just like this then." Dominic's expression is not quite as steady anymore; he'd clearly been more comfortable with the play than he is staring at Billy through the camera. Or perhaps it's not discomfort, Billy thinks; perhaps it's just the adjustment of feeling on display, unsure what to do with his hands and about what Billy wants from him, unsure whether it's appropriate to laugh or pay the kind of hard attention Billy so often demands of him.
Dominic reaches for Billy, for the briefest steadying touch before he presses his hands against the wall to see what Billy will do or want. The shutter clicks, and Billy's pleased to catch Dominic in a rare blink, just on the kinder side of a mild flinch. Billy gives Dominic a moment before the shutter clicks again, and Dominic sags against the wall this time, looking from beneath his lashes, visibly if only slightly rattled now without Billy's direction.
"Like this?" Dominic's voice is tinged with doubt for the first time since they've entered the room, and Billy watches Dominic's hands begin to slide along the wall nervously.
Billy nods, choosing silence from behind his camera, at least for now. He's certain Dominic will eventually relax under this colder gaze of Billy's just as he does under that of one much warmer. And he can't deny that he's curious about this difference in Dominic's posture and the movements of his hands; while Dominic has always been twitchy, the last few weeks have seen him settled down in Billy's presence, and this sort of relapse is fascinating to Billy. Understandable, yes, but fascinating, too.
"Open your hands, Dom," he murmurs. "Splay your fingers and keep your back against the wall, hmm? Don't think about what I'm doing-take a look at what you can see from the window." When Dominic turns his head, Billy's quick to capture the flex of muscle in his throat and neck, and then Billy sinks to his knees again, this time to focus on the strength in Dominic's hand pressed against the wall. Billy catches the glint of light ricocheting from the thick-banded ring on Dominic's left hand, then turns his attention to Dominic's wrist and the worn, soft cuff wrapped around it. Dominic's fingers dance lightly above the paint, and Billy catches that, too, pleased when Dominic's hand relaxes again. "Good," Billy murmurs. "Perfect."
When he looks up from his perch, it's first to make sure Dominic meets his eyes and not the camera's, and Billy smiles before he raises the lens again to take in Dominic from this skewed perspective. "Tell me what you see."
The camera clicks again and Dominic looks down at it then back out the window. Billy remembers the radio weatherman had said that the weather would be bad today, but the prophecy has yet to come true; it is cold, but the sky is still a clear, bright blue. The fading light of before is still holding on as if by its fingernails, pouring as much as it can through the windows and bathing the room in its light.
"Everything looks so small from up here," Dominic says, his voice soft but roughened too, nerves scouring its surface. "There's a couple disappearing into the grove of trees--not yours, the ones by the stone walls--and another group of students playing footie just there in the courtyard." Dominic straightens a bit and stretches to see further. "Everyone is walking so fast. Where are they going, do you think. Wait, they're back--" Dominic laughs, low and just a touch filthy, Billy thinks. "You can see better than you'd think through those trees, Billy. Makes you wonder what people can see from other ..."
"Vantage points," Billy laughs. "And is there anything else? Anyone?"
Dominic shakes his head, but then swallows, a slight flush moving over his face. "I can see my old room from here. My window."
"Do you miss it?" Billy asks from behind the camera, before he can reconsider the question and fairly certain he already knows the answer. Dominic had lived a more than independent life before he'd stepped so forcefully and well into Billy's, and Billy has had occasion to think that recently he'd held Dominic back from the sort of adventure university is meant to be for someone Dominic's age. Dominic may have tasted more of that adventure already than he'd meant to or wanted to, Billy supposes, thinking of what they'd been through over the last few months, but nevertheless, Billy knows that Dominic spends less time with even his good friends, friends he needs and who care for him, than he used to; to think that Dominic may regret that decision comes to Billy more often than he would admit. "Are there ghosts in that room, Dom? Move closer to the window, hmm? I want that light to surround you."
Dominic moves as asked, leaning his palms against the sill while Billy takes three or four shots of him framed by the window. Billy grabs another chance to focus on Dominic's hands, his long fingers curled around the edge of the sill, and then he checks the count of his film, smiling as he looks back up at Dominic. "The couple, are they still there?" At Dominic's nod, Billy rises to his feet and peers over Dominic's shoulder. "Lovely. No wonder they were making good time over there. Turn around, Dom; face me now."
Billy doesn't relinquish his space as Dominic turns, and they both inhale sharply at their proximity to each other. The camera is the only barrier between them, and Billy lowers it and his hand enough so that he can move closer, so that his lips rest just below Dominic's. He waits there for a moment, letting the gentle tension come over Dominic's expression, and then he steps back, raising the camera again and pressing down on the shutter quickly, regaining his composure while Dominic searches blindly for his own.
"I believe you know where they were going, Dominic," Billy says clearly as he adjusts the flash to compensate for the different light. "Running, the same way we do; always running. 's why we're here right now-because we should take every chance we can get to stand still. Look up for me, Dominic-hands against the wall again, and answer me. Do you miss the residence halls?"
"No." Dominic moves slowly from the gentle tease, his eyes warm and focused on Billy's lips. Dominic stretches his arms out inch by inch until his hands align with his shoulders and his fingers are spread apart. "There was no one there to look after me. Not like that. You--you know what I mean, like. And no one for me to look after. No kitchen." Dominic's laugh is dry, bitter to Billy's ears. "Except for the one downstairs, and it was rubbish. No fire to warm myself by. And it was fucking depressing, Billy; you can't--you're never comfortable, so you're never ... present, like, for yourself or anyone else."
Dominic stops himself, and Billy holds his breath a little, waiting for an admission he doesn't want to hear and grateful when Dominic turns them and his own words down a slightly safer path. "It was like being in a prison. Even if you got lucky, and you gave a fuck about someone, it always felt furtive. No one could stay. No one wanted to. I just felt. Used, all the time. Empty. Like no one did give a fuck, nobody would. I didn't think it'd get better. I didn't think anyone was ever going to--" Dominic takes a hard breath, his lips flattening into a harder line. "Love me. Especially not my philosophy professor--the one I fell asleep dreaming about. I hated it there."
"There's something to be said for furtive, though," Billy muses, again from behind the safety of his camera. Half of Dominic's face and body is backlit now from where Billy stands, and he tries to capture the strangeness of the shot, of the moment. "Not in your particular situation, of course." When Billy lowers the camera again, his expression very calm, he leans forward once more, this time to place his hand to Dominic's cheek. His fingers drift into Dominic's hair, and he exhales long and low as he tilts Dominic's chin so their eyes can meet. "I hate that you weren't looked after before this," he says quietly but heatedly. "Before us. I hate that y'could never trust it was right, even if it maybe it wasn't. I'll make up for that where I can."
Billy touches their foreheads together for a moment, working hard to not think of other hands on Dominic's skin, other fingerprints that weren't Billy's own, and then he backs away, lifting the camera and nodding Dominic deeper into the corner between two windows. "You may have the use of my kitchen and fire for as long as you'd like," he says, fighting to lighten the mood for them both as he refocuses the camera. "On occasion I might suggest you take advantage of their owner as well."
Billy takes a deep breath, reminding himself that he's working against time now that the sun is setting properly. “Furtive,” Billy murmurs again, tries to take some of the sting from the word. “D’you think you could slide down a bit, Dom?”
He watches carefully as Dominic braces his hands on the wall to either side of him and moves to sit on the floor. Billy steps closer, his hand turning the camera's lens expertly as he closes in on Dominic both in frame and out, and when Dominic looks up again, eyes wide and bright and the light in the room making the tips of his hair seem pale and soft as bird feathers, Billy forgets to breathe in his haste to get the shot he wants.
“I would have,” Billy says softly, answering a question Dominic hadn’t asked. “I would have come to you if I could have. Can’t begin to tell you how often I wanted to, even when y'could barely look at me, much less speak to me. Even when it was impossible, Dom, even when it would have made things so much fucking worse.”
Dominic begins to nod and Billy catches his chin, holding Dominic steady as he presses the shutter again, knowing he’s capturing his own hand in the shot as well. Billy lets his knees buckle slightly, shaking his head sharply when Dominic moves to slow his descent to the floor, and his little speech--a confession, it sounds, in the quiet of the vast room--tumbles out between clicks of the camera’s shutter. “I dreamt of finding you there, Dom, waking you, fucking you--all of it. I wanted you even then. Especially then.”
When they’re both on the floor, inches apart in the tight corner, Billy’s hands move quickly to balance his camera on the windowsill and then fly to Dominic's waist, tugging at his shirt and freeing it from Dominic's jeans. The material is half up Dominic's chest and Billy's palms flat on Dominic's skin before Billy looks up. "I still do; 's like I can't not want you, I can't not have you. I would have done anything for you, even in that prison of a room you had. I will. Someday. I will."
"Did you? Did you want to?" Dominic's voice sounds desperate but far away to Billy, and Billy curves his hands at Dominic's sides as Dominic wraps his own arms around his thin chest. Billy nods, just once, and then Dominic relaxes his shoulders, raising his arms so that Billy can tug his shirt off. He exhales hard when he meets Billy's eyes again, and Billy smiles, encouraging the rest of Dominic's own small confession.
"I used to think of reasons you might come for me there," Dominic says quietly. "They were fucking stupid, all of them--like you wanted one of your books back, or you were wanting to help me with a paper--" Dominic's cheeks redden and he lowers his eyes though he's smiling now. "I thought I knew how to make you stay once you'd found me. I knew you wanted me, Billy, and I thought--I knew I could make it so you wouldn't want to leave."
"You might have, yeah," Billy laughs. "Not cold?" Dominic shakes his head, still blushing, and Billy tilts Dominic's chin so he memorize Dominic's expression without the barrier of the camera, recording it instead in his memory. "I never had anything so noble in mind," he murmurs. "Thing is, I've never had your courage, Dominic; if it had been all on me I would've let it die inside me rather than act on some fucking insane urge to share my life--share anything with, with a student. My student." When Dominic looks up, Billy's shaking his head, his jaw set hard. "You've always been stronger than I am, Dominic." Billy closes his eyes and lets his hand rest unsteadily this time on Dominic's chest. "Good fucking thing, too, isn't it."
Billy takes his time composing himself, and when he opens his eyes again, his hands rise and move into Dominic's hair, tugging him close and not denying either of them that tacitly promised kiss of before. For a long while Billy remains still but for the urgent press of his lips on Dominic's, over and over again. When he sits back, it's with a sharp, strong inhale, and he reaches for the camera again while he meets Dominic's eyes.
"Not much more," he says softly. Billy swallows and holds the camera carefully with one hand while the other takes Dominic's hand and raises it above and behind Dominic's head, against the wall. Billy thinks he's much too close to get the focus he needs for the shot he wants, but it matters less every second that passes. It takes him several seconds to remember to raise the camera, too. Dominic reflects back Billy's need tenfold, it feels like to Billy, and a current of gratitude moves between them along with everything else as Dominic relaxes into the pose, waiting for the click of the camera with whatever patience he can muster, shifting when that click finally comes. Billy watches him pull his knees back up tight against his chest and fold his fingers into a fist to resist reaching for Billy.
"When I came to you, I was terrified," Dominic says, words tumbling from him now in his turn. "I wasn't being brave. I just. I wanted you so much. I was just mad for it. For you. I couldn't stand it. I had to know."
There's an eagerness in Dominic's voice that Billy loves, a desire to be understood that Billy's rarely heard from anyone, much less a partner of any serious measure. Whatever his earlier concern over Billy's possible reactions, Dominic sounds fearless now, able to say aloud things Billy can hardly acknowledge to himself. Billy can't capture this part of Dominic on film any more than he could a ghost, but what he can do is focus his lens on Dominic's eyes again, on the intensity and clarity of them when Dominic speaks. However sharply or artistically Barchi had sketched them, there is no comparison to seeing those eyes as they are now, their gaze strong, piercing almost as Dominic remains still. Billy's finger finds the shutter again and again, the sound filling the silence between them while Billy rises slowly, only at the last moment moving his hand from around Dominic's wrist.
"What would you have done?" Billy murmurs, on his feet again and moving backward. "If I'd said no from the beginning? Would you have bargained with me? Backed me into some corner y'knew would fit us perfectly?" A final click, and then the roll of film begins to rewind, the whirr startling Billy into lowering the camera and then looking away from Dominic's gaze, remembering that he had not wanted things to happen this quickly, this easily. They're meant to earn something from each other here, Billy reminds himself, and he keeps his voice steady as he walks to the table near the door, to the opposite corner from Dominic. "Would you have fought for it, Dominic?"
He can hear Dominic relax behind him, shoulders brushing loud against the wall as they drop and fingers tapping lightly on the floor, uncurled from their former tight fist. Dominic answers yes to Billy’s question but his voice doesn't carry as much confidence as Billy thought it might. Before Billy can question that, he hears Dominic straighten up again, chuffing out a breath as if he fears Billy might challenge his answer. "I knew you wanted me," Dominic says again. "I knew from the day you picked me up when I was caught in the rain. You might as well have fucking pulled me then, Billy. I would have let you. I would have done a hell of a lot more than I did, but I was scared. I thought--I was in love with you then, Billy. I was.”
Hidden from Dominic's view, Billy indulges in a smile at the change in Dominic's voice. He remembers that day vividly, remembers how he could have given away his interest so many times in that humid car. It would have been a disaster if they'd done anything about their attraction then and there, and Billy knows it, but nevertheless, Dominic had tempted him that afternoon nearly as much as he does now
"I hadn't earned it then, Dominic," Billy says carefully, forwarding the new roll of film in his camera. "But yes, I did want you; for the first time that day it hit me, and I worked so fucking hard to push it away. You never did that, though, did you. You persevered. As in everything, you persevered."
Billy turns to face Dominic again, bringing the camera to the level of his eyes and pressing the shutter a few times as he walks, nearing Dominic with every step. "We can think for the rest of our lives about what we could have done and didn't, can't we. And yes, we made mistakes-" Billy lowers the camera and his eyes, before looking back up at Dominic with a slow smile. "But we got a lot more right. Miles to go, Dom, I told you."
He drops again to his knees, this time to Dominic's side instead of straddling him, and Billy's hand reaches to turn Dominic's chin slightly, appraising Dominic's profile and the thin shadows thrown on Dominic's cheeks. "Good" Billy murmurs, raising the camera. "What else did you know, hmm. That I would have taken everything you had, whether I'd earned it or not?"
"I would have given it, too." Dominic grins but then seems to catch himself, reaching up to trace a crack in the wall with a long finger and then dropping his hand back onto his knee before he reaches its end. He lowers his eyes, acknowledging to himself and Billy too that what he's said isn't exactly the truth. "I would have wanted to give you everything. At least looking back I do. But."
"But?" Billy finds he's holdings his breath again, and Dominic looks back up, nerves and confrontation back in his expression until Billy lowers the camera a little, meeting Dominic's eyes.
"It scared me, after. I mean, I wanted to know, and I saw it there in the car. In the way you looked at me. I could feel it, Billy; I knew you wanted it even though you were holding yourself together in a way I couldn't, like." Dominic holds Billy's gaze a tense, silent moment before he looks down, and Billy captures that surrender, swallowing hard as Dominic folds in on himself again, arms tight against his knees. "When I was back in my room and had taken off my wet clothes. I was--I brought myself off, Billy; I was pretending it was you, the way I thought you'd do it, and I just. After, when I opened my eyes, it was just me, just my room and I thought I might have gotten it wrong. It wasn't until I was back in class and you were in front of me that I felt it again. Felt it go hot all through me, like, when you looked at me. I knew it. I knew I was right."
Dominic pauses in his confession, his cheeks flushed again with the little remembered victory and his eyes bright. When he looks back up at Billy, Billy feels again what Dominic meant, and Dominic nods, feeling it too. "That's why I did it," Dominic says, a new breathless calm in his voice. "I was in love with you, and I knew you wouldn't push me away. I was scared because I knew it was--I don't want to say wrong, Billy, because it's not. Because you never wanted anything from me and all I wanted was for you to just. Give it back, any of it. I wanted you to feel the same thing, and you did, I already knew you did. It's not wrong; it just wasn't done, and that's different. I knew maybe you wouldn't--let me, or let yourself, because of that, and that scared me. But I couldn't wait until I graduated. I couldn't wait."
"You were scared," Billy nods. "I was fucking terrified, Dominic. Not so much for my job or your classes--it was just easier to make it about that, and I did, and y'called me on it, hard, didn't you." Billy takes a deep breath, surprised again that he's admitted it and that it doesn't feel like cowardice, doesn't smack of failure in either of them. "I'd be lying if I said those things weren't important to me, Dominic; they still are; they're tremendously important. But I was terrified that I'd take too much from you, and yes, yes, and I hated thinking it, but I did, Dom, and it was real--I thought you'd take too much from me."
Before he can be misunderstood, Billy reaches to curve his hand around the back of Dominic's neck and bring him close, touching their foreheads together again and humming with pleasure at the feeling of Dominic accepting his touch. "You have to understand, Dominic, before you I was with someone I kept at arm's length--fuck, at both arms' length and then some, and it was--I want to believe it was the right thing to do. It was comfortable. It shouldn't have been anything more than it was. You didn't leave me the choice, though, did you. I wanted more. I wanted you; I wanted everything about you."
The pictures Billy craved from this afternoon seem almost irrelevant now, and if there were a way to record Dominic's memories as easily and unobtrusively and safely as Billy can capture his image, Billy thinks he would pay to do so, whatever the cost. It's hard to see himself through Dominic's eyes, and there is always beneath Billy's surface the belief that he still hasn't earned the trust Dominic gives him, but he pushes it away to return Dominic's gift of honesty, sitting back on his calves now with another deeper breath and taking up the camera again with one hand while the other strokes along Dominic's cheekbone. "It's not wrong," he says, his chin and eyes set hard. "It cannot fucking be more right."
The click of the shutter sounds loud in the room after their murmured quiet, but Billy presses it nonetheless, concentrating now on Dominic's shoulders and his collarbones, objects of Billy's thorough attention when they're in Billy's bed. "I'd do it again, given the chance," Billy says, more calmly now. "I'd do more. Better. You'd never know anything but how much I wanted you; you'd never question a fucking thing." Billy's hand drifts to Dominic's thigh as he lowers the camera again. "On your back, Dominic."
To be continued.