"Freezing rain and sleet," he called through the french doors. He was met with a groan.
"God damn it, Jim," Blair started, and Jim could hear him getting out of bed and wrapping himself in something, and then he emerged, hair tousled from sleep and body half-swallowed in an oversized terrycloth robe. "I'm supposed to be at Rainier by eight-fifteen. I have work to do today."
The combination of annoyed face and voluminous bathrobe were so funny Jim almost laughed. "Shit, Chief, we all have work. But Simon says the roads aren't passable and the weather channel says it's going to get worse before it gets better." He gestured vaguely out the window. "Unless you can think of some good way not to get ourselves killed on a sheet of ice an inch thick, we're staying in for the duration."
Blair looked like he was going to protest and Jim cut him off. "No way am I letting you drive that car on ice. I don't need any wounded anthropologists, thank you very much."
Blair vanished back behind the doors. "Great," his muffled voice announced. "I'm getting back in bed for a while."
I am not thinking about Blair getting back into bed, Jim thought. I am not thinking about it at all.
I am not thinking about all the things we could do to each other during a three-day storm.
Not thinking. Not thinking.
It wasn't working. With a sigh Jim headed for the shower. This was going to be a long day.
By nine Blair emerged, his ill humor seemingly abated after two extra hours of sleep.
"Morning," he offered as greeting on his way into the kitchen.
Jim, reading Newsweek in minute detail, glanced up. "Look who's awake," he said.
Blair cheerfully flipped him the bird and poured himself a glass of juice. "Want some?" he asked.
"Nah, thanks," Jim said, returning to his magazine. Not thinking about it, not thinking about it, not thinking about it, he told himself.
"You don't need the phone, do you? I thought I'd get online," Blair said.
"Sure, no problem," Jim answered, turning the page, and Blair headed back into his room. Jim could hear him rustling the phone cord into the back of his laptop, and the small ping! as the laptop came to life, and then the muted hum of modem noise, and then the click of keys.
Around one Jim stuck his head into Blair's room. Blair seemed deeply engrossed in whatever was on the computer screen, and Jim was tempted to zoom in and read the text, but he didn't do it.
"You want some lunch?" he asked.
Blair looked up with a start. "Huh? Sure, if you're offering."
Not thinking about it, Jim thought.
"Grilled cheese okay?"
"Make mine wheat," Blair said.
Jim nodded, went back to the kitchen, busied himself with cooking.
By two Jim was starting to go stir-crazy from silence. He knocked on Blair's door.
"C'mon in," Blair called, and Jim did. He stood, slightly awkwardly, beside Blair's bed. The room was crowded, and dim in the winter light: he wasn't sure he'd noticed how dim it was, before.
"What's up?" Blair asked, turning away from his machine and deftly sliding the mouse to the corner of the screen, sending the screen blank.
Jim made a helpless motion with his hands. "It's quiet," he said.
Blair smiled. "Quiet?" he asked, half-teasing.
Jim sighed. "Yeah. I've read Newsweek twice. I'm sick of doing pushups. The cable's out."
"You're bored," Blair said, with something like glee in his voice.
"Yeah," Jim admitted. Then, before he could lose his nerve, "Don't you have some tests you want to run, or something?" It's better than spending the day alone, he thought. As if that's really why I'm asking.
Not thinking about it.
Blair brightened. "Sure, man, let me just take a shower," he said. "I'm pretty grungy."
Blair emerged from the shower in a pair of jeans that looked softer and tighter than anything Jim had seen him in before, paired with a lush blue sweater that Jim instinctively wanted to bury his fingers in.
"What's that sweater made of?" he asked, hoping for nonchalance.
"Oh, it's cashmere," Blair said off-handedly, upside-down, toweling his hair dry.
Jim was startled. "You have a cashmere sweater?" he asked. Some grad student budget, he thought.
"Sam gave it to me for Christmas last year," Blair said. "I didn't want to wear it once we broke up."
"So now..." Jim began, and paused. "What, you're getting back together, or something?"
Blair gave him a look he couldn't quite interpret. "I just figured, it's been long enough, I might as well wear it," he said.
There was a pause.
"Looks nice," Jim said.
Blair grinned. "What, a compliment? Shit, I knew Cascade was freezing over..."
Jim threw a pillow at him. Blair smiled.
All afternoon Blair came up with excuses why he wasn't ready to do any tests: he just wanted to make a pot of tea, he needed to find the right notebook, he felt like tidying the coffee table, was there anything wrong with wanting to clean up after himself for once?
Still, Jim could've sworn he was being tested all the same.
Every time he glanced up Blair was there: his soft wool sweater nearly brushing Jim's ear as he walked past the sofa, his denim-clad ass in the air as he bent to retrieve a dropped pencil, his voice humming in the pit of Jim's stomach.
It took a supreme act of will, but Jim forced himself to appear neutral. As if Blair weren't driving him crazy with unrequited desire. Not thinking about it, not thinking about it, not thinking about it, he repeated to himself, his entire head feeling clenched to match his teeth.
I don't know what I did to deserve this kind of torture, he thought, but I am not going to crack. If I made a pass at him he'd probably run out into the storm and get himself frozen to death. Nope. Not thinking about it at all.
By the time it grew dark Blair's mood seemed to change again.
"Hey, forget the tests," he said, "I think I'm just going to go read for a while."
Jim looked at him, confused and a little annoyed. "You've been stringing me along all day, Sandburg," he said. "I would've thought you'd jump at the chance to run more tests. What the hell is the matter with you?"
Blair wasn't meeting his eyes. "They're not good tests," he said.
"Not good tests? What does that mean?" Jim asked.
"They're a bad idea, okay?" Blair said. His voice was angry.
What the fuck, Jim thought. What the hell kind of tests would be a bad idea? So he said it: "Sandburg, you've poked and prodded and made me look at flashing disco balls, for crying out loud. What kind of tests would be a bad idea?"
Blair didn't answer, and in that moment of silence Jim realized.
He knew exactly what kind of tests these were. He was right: he had been being tested all day, and idiot that he was, he'd made himself fail. He'd faked stoicism and disinterest so well that Blair was really fooled. Blair wanted him, and he'd managed to convince Blair he didn't know desire existed.
Blair wanted him. The knowledge sizzled, delicious, through his limbs.
Now all he had to do was reverse the impact of his obfuscations. Jim smiled, an easy smile, for the first time all day. "Hey, fine, Chief," he said. "Don't let me push you into anything you don't want to do."
Blair looked at him, slightly startled.
"Why don't I make us some dinner?" Jim said.
"I'm not really hungry, and you made lunch," Blair began, and Jim placed a finger on Blair's lips for an instant.
"Shh," Jim said, quietly enjoying the momentary flash of Blair's mouth on his hand. "You go read. I'll get you when dinner's ready."
Blair opened his mouth again and Jim cut him off. "You don't get a choice here, Sandburg," he said.
Blair nodded, silent for once, and padded into his room.
This was going to be good.
Jim threw some pasta and sauce together, ripped lettuce for a salad, opened a bottle of chianti. Started a fire. Lit a candle on the table, just for effect. Went upstairs and stood in front of his dresser for a minute, contemplating.
So he can wear cashmere, Jim thought smugly. Two can play that game. This was the best mood he'd been in for weeks.
When he knocked on Blair's door there was a low buzz at the bottom of his spine. Blair came out and his eyes widened, which was exactly the reaction Jim'd been hoping for.
"Nice shirt," Blair said, surprised.
Jim shrugged, enjoying the way the suede felt against his skin. "Haven't worn it in a while," he said, as if that explained anything.
"Mm," Blair replied.
Jim kept the conversation going while they ate: mostly he told stories from before they'd met, and the novelty of Jim offering information about his past without being prodded drew Blair out of his silence. Jim replenished Blair's wine glass once, then again.
"You trying to get me drunk, here? Shit, if I didn't know better," Blair began, looking at his glass, and then stopped.
"You'd say what?" Jim asked, knowing the answer anyway.
"Nothing," Blair said, and took a gulp of wine.
He's not taking the bait, Jim thought, and this is what I get for acting so disinterested all afternoon. Damn it. But he kept his expression light. He was a patient man. The evening was young.
By the time ten o'clock rolled around both men were slightly tipsy, sitting in the living room, the empty chianti bottle on the coffee table with a lit candle stuck inside, a second bottle of wine newly-opened. They were letting it breathe, a pretty ridiculous notion for a cheap bottle of cabernet, but in the moment's pause Jim took the plunge.
"I'm sorry we didn't do any tests today," Jim said.
Blair looked at him, startled, and then his face tightened. "I didn't have any good ones in mind," he said.
Like hell, Jim thought.
"You sure about that?" he asked, letting his eyes flicker over Blair's face, down his chest, then back up again.
There was a tiny hitch in Blair's breath, and Jim hid his exultant grin.
"Pretty sure," Blair said, although he didn't sound so sure anymore, and Jim told him as much.
"You seemed pretty gung-ho earlier," Jim reminded him, leaning back on the sofa, letting his legs sprawl open. He reached up and stretched, knowing his ribcage was moving the soft suede as he moved, knowing Blair was watching.
"I...I was pretty gung-ho," Blair agreed, licking his lips unconsciously. "But then I thought, y'know, I don't want to piss you off, we're probably stuck here another two days." Amazing how words could seem to mean one thing, but mean something completely different underneath, Jim thought.
"Maybe I would've liked these tests," Jim said, his tone still light, as if they were really talking about research. Blair looked at him and Jim could see the understanding starting to dawn, although Blair seemed to be fighting it, seemed afraid to let it in. Jim smiled, slow and sultry, as if there were nothing in the world he'd rather do than smile at Blair Sandburg. Which, in point of fact, there wasn't.
A small glint was back in Blair's eye, barely perceptible. "Yeah?" he said, looking right at Jim, his cheeks flushed from wine. That's more like it, Jim thought.
"Maybe I was planning some tests of my own," Jim dared.
"What kind of tests you have in mind?"
"Well, say touch, for one," Jim said, and - praying one last time that he'd been reading signals right - reached out with the back of his hand and stroked the cashmere of Blair's sweater, right over one tight nipple, which tightened further under Jim's super-light touch. Blair drew a sharp breath, but he didn't say "stop," just kept looking at Jim, half-dazed.
Jim let his thumb trace a lazy circle around that nipple. "See what I can feel," he murmured, continuing.
Blair's voice, when he spoke, was lower than usual. It made Jim shiver. "Or taste," Blair said, and Jim let his mouth follow his hand and close around Blair's nipple through the soft wool, and Blair made a small sound of wanting in the back of his throat and Jim thought he might burst with desire.
"Or hear," Jim said softly, and grazed Blair lightly with his teeth, and was rewarded with a groan. He pushed Blair onto his back, across the sofa, and followed him, moving in for a kiss, and the kiss was delicious and incendiary and everything he wanted, red and warm and tinged with wine and pepper.
When they broke Blair whimpered softly, thrusting against Jim, and Jim sighed with pleasure.
"Maybe we should test this somewhere else," Blair murmured. "Sofa's a little small for two."
With one foot Jim pushed the coffee table further away, rolled onto the floor and pulled Blair after him. "Floor's big," he offered.
Blair seemed delighted with this turn of events. Between slow, messy kisses he murmured, "I didn't have you figured for a floor kind of guy."
Jim bit his ear and Blair gasped. "Floor's close," Jim pointed out. Hands skirted over clothing, slipped beneath cashmere and suede, explored ribs and backs and chests.
"I'm, ah, all over that," Blair agreed, a little breathless.
And I'm all over you, Jim thought, but at that moment his mouth was occupied in the all-important task of breathing warm air through denim, and he did not speak.
A surprisingly short time later—suede unbuttoned, cashmere tossed onto the table (narrowly missing the candle), jeans and boxers removed—neither man was capable of conversation. Blair was sighing pretty much constantly, and while Jim had all sorts of praise - muscular thighs! beautiful cock! - to offer, he knew it wasn't nice to talk with his mouth full.
Not that "nice" was exactly what he was after. No, the slow and languorous suction he was applying was much closer to nasty than nice, and evidently his partner liked it that way.
Jim pulled back, admiring again Blair's hardness, now gleaming wet and quivering in the firelight. Blair's sighs turned to invocations.
"Oh, God, Jim, please - you can't—you're not gonna..."
A gentle stream of breath across his erection sent Blair's voice back toward non-verbal. Gentle nips at his exposed thighs evoked a whimper. And when Jim's mouth returned, along with one questing finger working its way inside, Blair's entire body tensed and the yell he let out probably woke the neighbors.
Hearing and touch well-opened, Jim had let Blair's gasps and cries keep him strung tight with desire. Blair turned him over and ran one hand along Jim's cock, and Jim bit his lip and came.
"That's some hair-trigger you've got there," Blair commented some time later, raising himself on one elbow. He seemed to like what he saw, Jim mused, and the thought filled him with a warmth he couldn't name.
Jim chuckled. "Guess neither one of us is quite the straight shooter we were claiming to be, eh?"
His partner laughed. "Evidently not." He moved to run a hand along Jim's chest, caressing the curve of hip with something like reverence.
"So, Professor, did I pass?" Jim asked.
Blair sighed happily. "Ohh, yeah," he said.
Pause.
"Perfect score."
The End