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Title: 44 - The Suit
Rating: R No actual sex, just a lot of thinking about it.
Disclaimer: Not the movie, not the real guys, not intended to infringe on anything but the bounds of decency.
Summary: Roz and McKnight get to know each other a little better.
The Suit
A blue fish swam lazily from one end of the tank to the other. He… she… it drifted up a few inches and made its way back past corals and shrimp and waving leaves of tropical aquatic plants. Orange tail on a blue damselfish meant it was a male. Someone had told him that. Probably Grimes. McKnight’s eyelids drooped. It was only twenty-one hundred. The dinner part of the evening was barely over. There would be a period of socializing – drinks for the adults, illicitly-spiked punch for the students – and then there would be dancing.
Grimes would dance. He would dance because he would have to. You can’t attend the Fall Formal with your until-recently-barely-kept- a-secret older lover without dancing. It would be rude to not dance with your older lover.
Much older lover. Ten years too much older. And of the wrong sex too. Goddammit, the only thing right was the surname!
And McKnight hoped to hell that Grimes wasn’t going to dance the way he danced for McKnight. You can’t dance like that in public. Not at a school function. And you can’t dance like that in front of anyone but your lover. Your real lover, not the fake one!
McKnight was back to being awake after thinking all that.
Roz turned a page and sniffed daintily.
McKnight looked over at Roz as she sat – no perched – in the armchair, legs tucked neatly under her body, reading some godawful poetry book, no doubt. Yep, he was right. Percy fucking Bysshe Shelley. Nobody reads that crap except English students, English teachers and fucking librarians. And they always look so smug when they’re doing it.
“You’re a bitter man, Danny,” Roz observed without taking her eyes off the page.
McKnight growled.
“You could enjoy a relaxing evening. We don’t get to see each other all that often. You could be having some fun with your sister’s girlfriend, to whom, I might add, you have been romantically linked, but instead you choose to wallow.”
“I’m not wallowing.”
“Danny, I’m a woman of the world; I know wallowing when I see it.”
“I’m sitting on the couch watching the fish. How is that wallowing?”
Roz closed her book, placed it neatly on the coffee table, and smoothed her skirt over her knees. “You are not sitting; you are lying. More accurately, you are sprawling. You are draped over the couch like a discarded throw. You’ve had three bottles of beer already, and you are wearing your oldest, most faded, and I certainly hope most worn out pair of… what are those? Sweat pants?”
“Standard PT issue.”
“Left over from when you were a sergeant, perhaps?”
McKnight hauled himself up to sitting. “They’re just clothes. What’s your problem?”
“You look like a slob.”
“No one’s looking.” Except for Roz. “No one important.”
Roz rolled her eyes dramatically. “I am supposed to be your girlfriend. Or was at one time. Would you dress like that for your girlfriend? Do you dress like that for John?”
Only, McKnight thought, when he's in the mood for a little PT. And the clothes always ended up on the floor covered in come and stuff anyway. But he wasn’t going to say that to her.
“I hope you don’t,” Roz said.
Jesus! “Looks like somebody got up on the bitchy side of the bed this morning,” McKnight grumbled.
“So you’re a pig as well as a slob?” Roz huffed.
Any minute now she would say something about him being a man. McKnight knew it. “What the hell is wrong with you, Roz?”
Roz crossed her arms over he chest.
“Are you that upset about the PT gear?”
Roz uncrossed her arms and unfolded her legs.
“Fine! I’ll try to find something else.”
McKnight stomped up the stairs. Fucking women, he thought. Who the hell cares what you’re wearing when you aren’t even going out? Grimes didn’t care if he wore PT gear. But then, if Roz were Grimes, and Grimes and McKnight were home together, the clothes wouldn’t stay on for long.
He didn’t even know if he had any more clothes up in his old room, other than worn out sweats and uniforms. All his decent stuff had been moved ages ago. Actually, he wouldn’t even be wearing the sweats if it weren’t for Roz. As soon as Grimes and Linda got in the cab, Roz had turned up her nose at him and suggested he ditch the uniform and take a shower. He’d grabbed the first clean clothes he’d seen. Now he considered putting his battle dress back on, with the sweat and mud from that little impromptu self-defense exhibition or not… that had been fun, come to think of it, showing that smug Captain how to take out an attacker from the side without letting go of your weapon. It had put him in the mood for some physical contact once he got home, but that was, of course, impossible, what with the formal and all.
If Grimes were here, he would put on the BDU and there would be lots of physical contact. Grimes wouldn’t mind a little sweat and dirt.
But Roz wasn’t Grimes; she was Roz. So he found a pair of jeans in the closet. They were a little loose on him, since he’d dropped a bit of weight when he was away, but he could wear them. And he found a brown t-shirt. Good enough.
McKnight stood in the middle of his old room holding the ratty old sweats, remembering how Grimes had looked in them that one night when he’d been to upset to notice he’d put on McKnight’s pants. Upset because he thought McKnight wanted a woman.
Impossible. And doubly impossible once McKnight had seen his own sweat pants dripping off Grimes’ narrow hips.
Fuck, was McKnight ever far gone. Past the point of retrieval. And it didn’t bother him one bit.
When he got back downstairs, Roz was stretched out on the couch, looking voluptuous in her tight sweater and skirt. Linda sure was lucky, he thought. Roz really did have a great rack. And great legs. Not skinny. Nice curves. She was a nice-looking woman, even if she was a bitch sometimes.
“Better?” he asked, and sat in the armchair.
“Much. You look like a regular guy.”
No, he didn’t. He knew because he’d looked in the hall mirror. He looked like a stocky, aging soldier in civvies. He might have been able to pass for an off-duty cop. He looked tired (but then, he’d barely slept since returning home, and he’d gone into work today) and old (with more gray in his hair than he’d remembered) and not at all like Grimes had looked when he’d left a couple of hours earlier.
What the hell did Grimes see in him anyway?
Shit. He’d asked that last part out loud.
“I haven’t the faintest,” Roz replied. “It must have something to do with your irrepressible masculinity. Are you irrepressibly masculine? Or is that just an act?”
Oh, there was no act. He’d been 100% genuinely irrepressible a few hours earlier when he’d come home to find Grimes tucking himself into a pair of tight black briefs – the stretchy boxer kind that go down the legs a bit. McKnight had been stopped in his tracks at the sight of Grimes arranging himself the way you would if you didn’t want anyone to be able to tell if you got an accidental hard on.
Motherfucker!
Then Grimes had put on socks and the suit pants, which took the heat off temporarily. Suit pants didn’t do much for McKnight. He knew he’d be in trouble as soon as the suit jacket went on, though. He hadn’t seen Grimes in a suit before, but he knew it would be good.
McKnight had been okay for a few seconds, until Grimes pulled on a white t-shirt with no sleeves.
“What the fuck?” McKnight had blurted out.
Grimes had jumped. “Sir! I didn’t know you were there. How long have you?… were you there when I was…?”
McKnight nodded.
Grimes blushed and tucked in the shirt. “I have to wear this to hide my chest hair. It shows through the dress shirt.”
For the life of him, McKnight could not see anything wrong with Grimes’ chest hair showing through anything.
“And sleeves show through too.”
Okay. That explained the ridiculously sexy sleeveless undershirt.
“But these sleeves line up with the seams. Roz figured it out.”
McKnight glared at Roz, who was sitting up now, watching the fish.
McKnight decided to ignore her. He closed his eyes and pictured Grimes putting on the dress shirt. Buttoning it up. Deft fingers. Better suited to unbuttoning, but they always looked good. Tucking the shirt into the pants. Putting on the narrow black belt. Checking in the mirror to make sure there were no unsightly lines across his ass – as if anything about Grimes’ ass could ever be unsightly. Fumbling with the tie.
Gift from heaven, McKnight had thought as he stepped behind Grimes to help him tie it. Yes, McKnight would freely admit it, he’d fucked it up on the first go on purpose, so he could steal a few more minutes standing so close behind Grimes, arms around him, the scent of clean Grimes and a crisp white shirt making him dizzy.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Anytime,” he’d said. Cheesy, but it gave him the opportunity to plant an equally cheesy kiss just below Grimes’ ear, and to feel him shiver.
“John looks very nice in his suit,” Roz observed out of the blue.
He sure did. He’d put on the jacket and McKnight had got the sort of instant from-75-to-100%-erection-in-a-split-second that would give a lesser man the spins.
But why did Roz feel the need to mention it? Was she goading him about his unkempt appearance? Or was she trying to make up for her earlier rudeness by praising the person McKnight cared about the most?
Maybe she really liked the way Grimes looked.
Of course she liked it. Who wouldn’t? The suit and the haircut and the body in the suit and the face that the haircut was around…
That fucking haircut. Grimes’ hair had been growing unchecked and starting to get messy. He looked like a bit of a hippy. So Linda had taken him to get it cut. Not too much. But enough. It was shorter at the back and sides, longer on top, and tamed with something slightly sweet, which McKnight could still smell.
He had smelled it when he tied the tie, and as they’d walked to Linda’s, Grimes being careful not to get anything on the suit and McKnight fighting the urge to push him against the nearest tree and get a lot of things all over the suit. That had been a true test of McKnight’s will power, especially after Grimes had put those shoes on.
Black sneakers. Motherfucker.
“You can’t wear those shoes with a suit,” McKnight had said.
Grimes couldn’t. They made him look like a boy playing dress-up, and made McKnight feel like a very dirty old man.
“My real shoes are at Linda’s,” Grimes had said with something almost like a giggle. “I know you don’t wear these with a suit, sir. I’m not a kid.”
Maybe it had been presumptuous of McKnight to think Grimes was serious about the shoes. But damn, he felt old enough without Grimes looking like he was about twelve.
Not really twelve. There was some stubble. There had been a long discussion several nights before, and it had been decided that perfectly-shaved Grimes would look too young for Linda. That was a good thing, because perfectly smooth Grimes in that charcoal suit with the white shirt and the dark tie and the haircut… McKnight stifled a moan.
There had been pictures taken of Grimes and Linda. They were supposed to be for show, but McKnight knew the real reason was so Linda could give him one and he could stick it in his duffel so when he missed Grimes he could pull it out and look at it and if anyone said anything he could say “This is my older sister. She raised me; she’s like a mother to me.” And that would be okay because for some stupid fucking reason it was not okay to look at a picture of a guy when you were in the army but it was okay to keep a picture of your mom with you, even when you weren’t at war.
He already had one picture. It was a snapshot of Linda and Grimes laughing together. They’d been working on Linda’s garden and there was a smudge of dirt on Grimes’ cheek.
That picture was one of the things that got McKnight through the three months apart. That picture, and that little smudge of dirt.
Now he would have a picture of Grimes in a fucking suit.
What he wanted was a picture of Grimes in the jeans with no ass in them, but where would he get a picture like that developed? Did anyone make instant camera anymore? Maybe he’d have to go digital…
Roz had asked for a picture of her with Linda, and then one with her and Grimes. That way the photo lab wouldn’t notice anything odd – people tend to get a little snap happy when they’re dressed up nice.
Nice. Nowhere near strong enough a word.
Linda was dressed up too, in a dark purple dress that looked way too good for a woman of her age. Once Grimes had the proper shiny black shoes on he’d looked like a regular guy. Like anyone you might see at a formal function. He and Linda made a credible couple.
Grimes and Roz looked more likely, though. Closer in age. Closer in height. Size. Actually, they made a cute couple.
Over McKnight’s dead body.
Besides, Grimes had no sexual or romantic interest in women whatsoever, no matter how interested they were in him. And they would all be interested tonight. Too interested. Grimes had put his hand on Linda’s waist and smiled confidently and he looked ready to seduce half the town. The female half.
McKnight rarely thought about himself or Grimes in terms of heterosexual or homosexual. It wasn’t like he would deny, not to himself or to select other people, what existed between him and Grimes. But the word ‘gay’ didn’t occur to him often.
The word ‘straight’ was occurring to him, though. Grimes would make one hell of a straight guy.
Once again, over McKnight’s dead body. All the women would simply have to go without. Grimes was definitely, 100% taken. Taken by McKnight. Again and again.
Roz got up and smoothed her skirt over her thighs. “You hungry? I’m hungry.”
There had been a light supper. Linda might have no problem with the modern idea of pretending to be your brother’s lover’s girlfriend but she was old-fashioned enough to firmly believe that one never attended a formal dinner hungry. But that had been hours before. So, McKnight was hungry.
But not for ice cream, which was what Roz had in mind. Only women think ice cream is a meal. But then, why not? Butterscotch ripple ice cream tasted okay with beer.
Wait a minute. Wasn’t ice cream one of those things women ate when they were upset about something?
“I don’t get it,” Roz announced after scarfing down half a bowl of dessert. “The power dynamic in the relationship.”
Oh, shit, McKnight thought. This was why he liked Grimes so much. Grimes would never binge eat and obsess over emotional stuff. Grimes worked out everything with sex. That was the proper way to contemplate relationships. That was why if anyone wanted to call McKnight ‘gay’ it was fine with him, as long as he didn’t have to sit around on a Friday night not having sex and discussing relationships. Any relationship. Even though he didn’t know for sure which relationship Roz was talking about.
“You and John,” Roz clarified.
Aw, fuck. Did she and Linda sit around discussing relationships all the time? His relationship? Maybe that’s why Linda wasn’t all that broken up when Roz moved to another city. Why would you talk about a relationship when it’s so much better just to have one?
“One would think you two had some sort of a kinky master and servant thing going on, but I know how you feel about him. I know you’d do almost anything for him.”
Correction – do almost anything to him. And with him. As well as for him.
“I don’t get it.”
Of course she didn’t get it. How could she get it? She’d never sat in this chair, or at least the chair that used to be in this spot, by the light of that fish tank, and watched John Grimes lick a drop of come off the toe of a boot, with his jeans around his knees and his naked ass hanging out from under his pushed-up t-shirt, totally changing life forever and for the indisputable better.
But he wasn’t going to say that out loud.
“It’s none of your business,” he said instead.
“Linda used to worry about you taking advantage of John.”
“It’s none of her business either,” he said.
“As I said, I know how you feel about John,” Roz said.
No. She thought she knew. She couldn’t really know. No one could know.
“But there are lines that should not be crossed. I do worry about taking things too far. Perhaps losing perspective. The power imbalance could be risky.”
For fuck’s sake, what was with all this analysis?
McKnight looked right at Roz. Dead in the eye. “You’re jealous,” he said. He didn’t really know, but he figured it might shut her up.
“Nonsense!” Roz sputtered. “Linda doesn’t think of John that way.”
“But maybe you do,” McKnight accused.
That did shut her up. Roz’s mouth gaped like one of the fish in the tank.
“Not that it’s any of your business, Roz, but I will tell you this, just to make things perfectly clear. Grimes is so unavailable, so taken, and so dedicated to me, that I don’t even care that he’s at a formal dance, looking like… looking the way he looks in that suit, dancing with every woman in the room, flirting with them, kissing Linda in front of everyone. I’m not worried at all. Because he comes home to me, and me alone, and you can call it whatever you want – you can call it power dynamic or imbalance or kinky – I don’t care. I am his commanding officer and he serves me in ways you can’t even imagine, but there’s no one taking advantage of anyone because I fucking cherish him. You got that?”
Roz stared at him. Stunned.
McKnight hadn’t put that many words together all at once, outside of a classroom, in months. And he’d never told anyone so much about himself at once either. It felt good. It felt… liberating.
Fuck. He was turning into a girl.
“I saw you one time,” Roz said abruptly.
McKnight wasn’t sure he wanted to hear this. But maybe he did, just to find out which time she’d seen him.
“He was sitting on your lap, facing you. I assume… I assume you were both naked.”
Well, that narrowed it down to about a hundred possibilities.
“It looked like John was wearing only his glasses.”
Oh. That time.
He’d had the feeling they were being watched. He hadn’t said anything to Grimes. He’d known the door was locked. Plus he hadn’t wanted him to stop. Ever.
That college boy thing really got to McKnight. He didn’t ordinarily go for the whole worship of youth culture thing. He’d never wanted someone underage. Ever. Not even when he’d been underage himself. But Grimes’ relative youthfulness… the almost innocent look he sometimes got… that bashfulness that got sexier and sexier the more out of place it was next to whatever Grimes was doing… his slenderness and his purity and his enthusiasm and his utter submission to authority…
Roz had seen that.
And there was not a damn thing McKnight could do about it after the fact. Except maybe gloat a little.
“You got lucky to see that,” McKnight said.
Roz looked down at the floor.
“You’ll never see a sexier man,” McKnight added, giving in to the uncontrollable urge to take pride.
“Men,” Rox said quietly. “There were two of you, not just him.”
That was interesting. Uncomfortably interesting. “I thought I was a pig and a slob,” McKnight joked, seriously wanting to get off the topic.
“Oh, you are,” Roz said lightly. “But face it. You and John. You know. It takes two to tango.”
Two to submit. Two to dominate.
“Must be all that irrepressible masculinity,” McKnight said, hoping to hell that would close the topic.
Roz composed herself. Back to being superior. “I’m not attracted to dominant men,” she said with another one of those sniffs.
That’s not what McKnight had felt. When he’d bent her over the hood of the car, he’d distinctly felt the flutter of her eyelashes. And a little surge in her hips. She’d grabbed his shirt – his uniform – and pressed her tits against him, quite on purpose. You don’t do that unless you’re turned on at least a little.
But that was her business, not his. He wasn’t going to fall for all this girl talk shit. He was going to stick to what he knew. Guy talk. Bullshit a little, brag a little and turn on the game.
“Well, this dominant man turns on Grimes,” he muttered. “That’s all I care about.”
“That’s obvious,” Roz said. Un-fucking-willing to let the subject die. “Anyone could see that. That’s why you two have to be careful about going out in public together.”
That, and McKnight’s growing desire to show the world at large that John Grimes belonged to him and him alone. Irritating urge, that one was. Dangerous.
“They look a bit ridiculous together, don’t you think?” Roz asked. “He looks too young for her.”
McKnight had never heard Roz express the slightest doubt about her little plan before. And Grimes didn’t look any younger in the suit than he did in that fucking hooded sweatshirt Roz had arranged for Linda to give him. Everything hinged on that plan working, though. At least his happiness did.
“Grimes can pull it off,” McKnight assured her. “He’ll flirt a bit and get everyone talking and then he’ll kiss Linda and there’ll be no doubt. Every woman in the room will wish she was Linda.”
Roz snorted. “If only they knew.”
McKnight laughed. “Yeah, well, if they really knew then every man in the room would wish he was Linda.”
“And every woman would wish she was you.”
McKnight shrugged, happy to be joking around instead of being all intense. “They wouldn’t fit the uniform.”
Roz actually laughed. So much better than being snooty. “Oh,” she snickered, “is the uniform a big part of it?”
McKnight got suddenly serious. He’d given up enough for one evening. “That is classified,” he barked, a little too harshly, so now she knew for sure that the uniform was indeed part of the ‘power dynamic’. Fuck it, McKnight didn’t care. It still felt good to have said stuff out loud.
Still. He’d had enough of talking.
“Let’s watch a movie or something.”
There was a mystery on TV. Complex enough to keep Roz interested, gritty enough to keep McKnight happy. Time passed quickly, through the news and well into a docudrama about some religious cult. Linda and Grimes stumbled in around half past midnight.
“…he never would have said that if you hadn’t come up behind me like that at the dessert table!”
“But you presented the ideal target,” Linda said.
Roz and McKnight both stood up.
Grimes’ tie was crooked, and his shirt was a little untucked. His hair was a mess. Linda’s carefully arranged hair had fallen loose and was tumbling around her shoulders. And one strap of her dress was twisted.
There was the smallest hint of lipstick at the corner of Grimes’ mouth.
Grimes grinned. “Job well done!” he announced.
“The evening was a complete success,” Linda added in a slightly too-loud voice. “My reputation as a lucky bitch is secure, and every girl in the senior year has a crush on my boyfriend.”
“Not to mention their mothers…” Grimes bragged.
Not really a laughing matter for Roz and McKnight.
Linda tossed her purse on the couch and the contents spilled out. She ignored it. She must have had more than a few too many. She was giddy.
“Going to have quite the headache in the morning,” Roz muttered as she took Linda’s elbow and steered her toward the stairs. Linda draped herself around Roz’s much shorter frame. “To bed, honey,” Roz said.
“Bed, definitely,” Linda said, slurring her words a bit. “Sleep? Not so sure…”
McKnight had never seen his sister so tipsy. He made sure the two of them made it to the top of the stairs safely before turning his attention to Grimes.
“So, you look like you had a good time.”
Grimes leaned forward, scent of wine on his breath. “Would have been more fun if you were there, sir.”
“I bet.”
Grimes lurched to the front hall and grabbed his sneakers. “Mustn’t soil the good shoes, even after the party,” he said and sat on the bottom stair. Grimes’ usually sure hands had a bit of trouble with the shoelaces.
McKnight stuffed Linda’s belongings back in her purse. She didn’t care tonight but she’d be upset in the morning if her stuff was all over the place. There wasn’t much. A slim wallet, keys, a small hair brush, a tube of lipstick.
McKnight opened the tube and twisted it. Same color as the stuff on Grimes’ mouth. That gave McKnight mixed feelings.
Grimes dropped his dress shoes to the floor with a thud.
“Shall we go home?” McKnight said loudly.
“Oh, yes, sir. Best idea I’ve heard all night. Much better than dancing with all those grabby women. In my whole life my ass hasn’t been grabbed as many times as it was tonight. The students were bad but the mothers! The teachers were okay, though. I think they’re scared of Linda.”
McKnight grabbed Grimes by the tie and pulled him close. “I’m sure I can make you forget all that,” he said.
“I’m sure you can, sir.” Grimes leaned against him heavily. “I’m hot,” he complained.
McKnight wasn’t going to touch that one with a ten-foot pole. It was going to be hard enough as it was to get Grimes home with out ripping that suit off him.
Next: 45 The Uniform
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