stungunbilly | a better state than this: MOPI fiction (Reply)

a better state than this

by stungunbilly

approximately 1000 words

fandom: My Own Private Idaho.

summary: if you love something, pick it up.

for sinsense; Merry Happy Eggnog-Swilling Hannukwanzaamas, sweet thing.

This takes off from the end of the film.

It took three hours before the body in the backseat began to move. Scott watched carefully in the rearview mirror, smiling at the way the black jacket collar had wrapped around the face, leaving nothing but a tuft of dark blond hair visible. The sun was still high in the sky, and the Idaho countryside spread out around them, as yellow and open as it had been two years ago when he and Mike had last been here. The rental car, “a vintage vehicle” according to the man at the train station, roared with the joy of its six-cylinder engine, eating up the miles towards the small town where Scott planned to stop for the night.

Mike coughed a few times, murmuring, and Scott could hear him sitting up, patting his pockets for a cigarette. Scott’s heart thudded in his chest, and he reached for the radio, turning Patsy Cline down to a whisper before he spoke. His voice wasn’t as steady as he wanted it to be.

“Hey buddy, you lost your boots back there.” He met Mike’s eyes in the mirror, glanced away.

“Favor? What the fuck are you doing here? No, wait, thanks for picking me up and all, but why aren’t you in the city with your wife and business and shit?” Mike sounded less out of it than usual, awakening from one of his surprise naps.

Scott laughed, hoping it sounded normal. “Good to see you too, man. I know it’s been awhile, but I told you I’d see you down the road, didn’t I?”

“Uh, sure you did, but that was, you know, just.”

“Just bullshit? Well, yeah, sorta. But not really, Mike. I kinda knew that I’d be hitting the road again sometime, just not how.” Which wasn’t completely true, but not completely a lie either. He reached into the leather jacket on the seat next to him for his pack of cigarettes, tossed them to Mike. Then he hit the brakes and pulled over to the side of the road.

Mike opened the door and climbed out, bitching under his breath about his shoes. He looked really good, long-legged and lean, stretching the kinks out of his back, leaning against the car’s weatherbeaten red paint to light a smoke. Pretty mouth sucking a little obscenely, totally without intent. Scott’s heart was still loud in his ears, and he had to fake the casual way he smiled, reached over and grabbed the cigarette to take a drag.

“So, you know, were you looking for me? Or, what, taking a trip?” Mike asked, pulling his suede jacket around him in spite of the warm summer sun. He didn’t mention being asleep in the middle of the damn highway, because narcolepsy was something he’d always pretended didn’t exist.

Scott laughed, though he knew it was a bad idea. Fucking Mike, always so willing to take a guy at face value if it meant the other guy’d do the same. Like Scott was just wearing jeans and flannel and driving a piece of shit car around Idaho for a holiday or something. Like nobody noticed when Mike keeled over in the middle of a conversation, or the airport, or a road.

Mike flinched a little, ducking his head and tucking his free hand into a pocket. Scott stopped laughing, and leaned in close to speak. This was his Mike, same as he’d always been. He let his voice go soft and deep, let it be raw with all he’d been thinking of for so long.

“Well, yeah. I kind of thought you might miss me a little.” This was the moment, the one he’d been planning for the last year and a half, after six months of pretending to be his father had shown him what a dumb fuck he was. Mike’s face was full of doubt, and a little anger, so Scott backed off a few inches and tried to get him to make eye contact.

Mike had such a beautiful face, and Scott couldn’t get him to look up. The suede was smooth under his hand, the cigarette burned his wrist a little, Mike’s mouth was soft and dry and completely fucking perfect. He went a little bit crazy.

It was as if he’d been thirsty for years, drinking beer and coffee and shit that couldn’t quench it but gave him the illusion of satisfaction for just long enough to keep him from reaching for water. Mike tasted like a river, earthy and fresh and good. Scott laid him down on the back seat of his stupid-looking vintage car and swallowed down all the sounds of surprise, licked the tears that rained down his face. Kissed that pretty mouth until it stopped twisting up with sobs and trying to ask questions.

Then he pulled off all of Mike’s clothes and touched everything he’d looked at and pretended to ignore for so long. He rubbed his face into Mike’s neck and licked the beautiful nipples he’d toyed with in jest more than once, and Mike cried out his name and grabbed his head to bring him closer, starting to cry again. They ground together, hip to hip and cock to cock, and Scott couldn’t help laughing a little when their eyes finally met, though Mike kept crying, even when he came.

After he came Scott was always a bit fuzzy for a few minutes, and it took him awhile to notice that Mike was holding him tight enough to bruise and talking into his hair.

“What? Mike, what are you saying?” and then he raised his head and could hear the words, soft and bitter.

“Fuck you, man, just fuck you! What did you come back for, where’s fucking Carmella? You killed Bob, broke his heart, you fucking bastard, you look like shit,” and on and on, but his arms and legs were clinging and he didn’t look away when Scott smiled at him.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I was really late.” Mike sniffed, and glared at him.

His Mike.

He held on.