Page 39 of Paint Eater
He didn’t ask any more questions, though. Jay had brought a ladder—how he got that into the subway, he had no idea—and they got to priming it with thick white paint.
The sun was still low, and the shadow of the building was cast over them, giving them some relief from the heat. Still, they both ended up taking off their T-shirts, and Logan didn’t miss the way Jay stared at him, biting his lip hard. That ember that Jay had buried in Logan’s stomach flared at the sight of Jay’s teeth digging into soft and sensitive skin, but he ignored it—if he didn’t, they wouldn’t finish painting.
Jay hummed as he worked, and Logan fell into a trance, painting the porous wall Jay had washed only the previous day. Thick white globs fell onto the ground, speckling his chest and hands and shorts, but there was nothing wrong with getting messy. Not here, with Jay.
Jay groaned, stretching with his hands high up in the air. “Fuck, that was a lot. I’m melting,” Jay said when they finished, reaching for one of their water bottles and chugging it.
Logan looked at the curve of his neck, the jut of his Adam’s apple, the way sweat glowed on his skin.
“Want some?” Jay asked, shaking the bottle, but he was smirking, obviously having caught Logan staring.
Logan took the bottle from him, drinking greedily, and this time it was his turn to catch Jay staring. He smirked, but Jay didn’t seem phased, smile widening.
He leaned towards the floor, picking up one of the large paintbrushes from the ground. “We should wash these before they get ruined,” he said thoughtfully and raised his arm, jerking it down quickly so that paint splattered across Logan’s torso.
“What thefuck?” Logan shouted, looking at his chest.
Jay was bent over, laughing. “It’s non-toxic,” he wheezed. “Oh my God, your face.”
Logan glowered and looked around for the other brush, but it was too far away for immediate revenge. Instead, he strode over, catching a startled Jay by the wrist and forcing his hand to paint a stripe of white on his own chest.
Jay squealed, trying to wrench free, but then they were just arm-wrestling in the air, swiping at each other with the brush whenever one got the upper hand until Jay just dropped the brush.
“Mercy,” Jay cried, laughing, pushing Logan away from the brush.
“You have no fucking impulse control,” Logan said, but he was laughing too.
“I really, really don’t,” Jay agreed and kissed him.
It was that simple for Jay. Just a kiss. One of many, probably, with many other people. An impulse to follow thoughtlessly.
Logan couldn’t let Jay know that it wasn’t the same for him. That those touches haunted him, that he almost missed them as they were happening, struggling to forget that they would end in only a moment when Jay had enough.
But Logan couldn’t have enough. It was strange, this feeling of wanting. He’d thought he’d eradicated it from himself, stomped out the terrible impulse to yearn. But then Jay had come and given so easily. Logan didn’t know how to saynoanymore. How to moderate the feel of Jay’s lips against his. How not to press forwards instantly, how not to open his mouth, how not to let those desperate sounds escape him.
Logan had managed to control himself—or be controlled—all his life. This lack of it was terrifying.
Jay was smiling when they parted as ifhe’dbeen the one to be given something. And Logan wasn’t stupid—it wasn’t like Jay was trying to hide it. Jay liked him. Or, at least, Jay liked what he had seen of Logan so far, which didn’t include his cowardice. Didn’t include the way he so easily gave in to the forces in his life.
What Logan knew most of all, however, was that Jay could not find out how Logan felt. If he did, Logan would not be able to resist—would dive forwards and drown in whatever Jay was willing to give him.
He couldn’t do that to Jay. Couldn’t take something from him that Logan simply wasn’t allowed to return.
Jay kissed him once more, light, before pulling away. “We reallyshouldclean the paintbrushes,” he murmured, voice low like he didn’t want to break the still air between them.
“Yeah.” It was Logan that pulled away like it didn’t matter.
If he wanted to keep doing this, he had to be careful. Wanting was one thing. Having was another.
**********
Logan held the orange juice in his hand, wishing desperately that Nisha was there so she’d share the flask she always carried to these things.
Surviving one of the dinners his mom dragged him to sober was one of Dante’s rings of hell.
“Darling,” his mom said, putting her hand on his shoulder from behind, making him flinch. “Is this what I brought you here for? To slouch in the corner without talking to anybody? Straighten up.” She didn’t hiss the last words, but she might as well have.
Logan straightened up.
