sam is getting blurry around his edges as the poison does its work. crazy that just a little bit of toxicity brings the best (and worst) out of people. but knox can see his tension loosening, feel him feeling it, this thing that knox lives in. see. look. it's real. it's real and it makes you feel alive. 

and suddenly that word doesn't seem so bad. because he feels addicted to sam, too. and that's why he's blown away when the boy stands up with a spark. 

he keeps his hand clasped. they've leapt over a hurdle without even realizing it. but that's the thing about going up - it's a breakneck pace and there's no stopping it. he swallows that pill. 

tw; drug use

SPOILER: Click to show

he does pause though, because an attendant steps over. marcus. his personal attendant, paid a hefty sum to stay under summer's radar, counting down the clock because knox has this down to a science. he offers him powder and knocks winks at sam.


he untangles their fingers so he can grab the offered straw. he presses, inhales, and his veins turn to ice. breath comes out like a blizzard and his shoulders rise. marcus goes to turn but knox stops him, licks his finger, picks some of what's left up, and then the attendant is dismissed. 

he turns, gently takes sam's hand again, closes a bit of distance. "open your mouth. it's softer, this way," he says.

samuel carter

☉

watching knox enjoy his muse doesn't bother sam. it's just another part of knox. much like handling a dead body, such as play mortician, is a part of sam's world. another part of it.

it doesn't bother him, mostly, because he's curious.

he's never taken part, but it's offered, and it's offered by somebody he trusts. so he decides to fall, to make a trust fall, and he takes knox' offer with a bashful, "okay," and opens his mouth.

there's definitely a tinge of pink. he's embarrassed; anxious, excited. what is it like? what will it be like? he's read and he's seen on television, but what is it really like?

his grip on knox' hand doesn't tighten, but it is firm. and solid-- it shows he's excited. like the small smirk on one side of his mouth.

knox prescott

his other fingers dip under sam's chin. knox's eyes are wide so he can see all of it. there is a rainforest around them, filled with fireflies and glow sticks, and sam is walking without seeing. so he coaxes his mouth open, presses his fingers gently to his gums. 

"it will tingle," he says. "you should feel it quickly." he is gentle because he knows this is a first. his energy is burning at the edges of his skin, however, and it takes everything not to let his hand shake. 

knox bites his own lip as presses his fingertip to the point of sam's canine, grace over his bottom lip. his lips are so soft. fuck. 

he squeezes their tied hands and swallows, then turns him around. he rests his chin on his shoulder, whispers into his ear, "watch it sharpen. take it in. i'm right here."

samuel carter

☉

oh, and knox was right. he _did_ feel it quickly. prickling across his skin. but it wasn't like the bugs crawling across his skin in a dark coffin during the heat of a war. no, it was something different. something colder, something hotter.

like fire and ice. moving along his body. it made him feel numb, and loose. his body was tense at first and he didn't even realize it. but as his eyes slip closed he hears knox. his white rabbit leading him into wonderland.

watch, his eyes open then and he feels the pulse through his veins.

take, all his numb but the feeling of knox' breath against his skin and their hands together. he breaths, focuses on the way their bodies mold together.

i'm right here.

finally he breathes. it was only a few seconds that passed but he felt like it had been an eternity. being held in knox' arms. he leans back and glances at knox' own blown pupils. he smiles slowly, almost an air of cockiness about him.

"it's not so bad." and then, he's teasing, shrugging his shoulders. "i don't see what all the huff is about."

he's got dad jokes ladies and gents.

knox prescott

sam's breaths shudder through him. he presses in closer and they become part of the background scene - just another couple swept up by the aura. the hand around sam's waist moves to his hip, to the bare skin above his dark pants. knox wants him to see, yes, but he also wants him to feel. 

feel how each thrumming of his fingertips is an echoed drumbeat; as the world tips around them, they stand in its midst, detached but still connected. 

the ingenuity of the moment is made even more so when sam cracks his awful joke. knox's whole body wracks with laughter, filling in all those cracks and crevices, the spaces that had lingered between them. 

"okay," he says and then quickly, he does it again - untangles his hand, lets him go, but not really. they're close now; sam's not so far away anymore. "watch this." and then he sneaks a kiss on the side of sam's neck and then he's running in front of him, shirt unbuttoned and fluttering in the wind as he sprints towards the pool.

he looks like a gangly gazelle as he hops and then takes one final leap. he pulled his legs in, rolls into a ball, and the water swallows him - the waves that arc upward are filled with silver and they glitter as the water sprays.

samuel carter

☉

the closeness of knox caused sam's heart rate to increase even more. it felt like more than just a kiss. so much more. but he can't tell why. is it the shared substance between them, or something else they shared.

one thing is for sure. as knox pulls away sam is magnetized to him. he licked his lips like he was preparing to return the favor, he'd even worked himself up into a false confidence-- but he's gone.

"k...knox?"

but again, he's pulled along. he follows in a jog after knox and even manages to catch knox' shirt. he watched as the other dives into space itself. how'd it get down there? no, space was in the sky. maybe knox could fly now?

his brain is thick with a fog he can't think through. so he doesn't bother. he just starts to strip his pants off, like weights being taken off a hot air balloon. because he wants to feel knox touch him again and he can't do that with clothes on, right?

he's down to his boxers before he jumps into the pool as well. it's not a cannonball, and it's about the time knox surfaces that he's sliding in. he moves his hands through the water with a goofy sort of smile on his face, hand pushing black hair to stand on end with the small bits of the galaxy he's got on him.

and then he's smiling. straight cheesing. like he's giddy and can't control it. really?

"it's cold," he extends a hand. "c'mere and warm me up."

knox prescott

when he's under the water, he's weightless. nothing else matters. everything disappears for a moment and his body is covered in a tepid glow. he tells himself, over and over, not to open his eyes, but the urge is too much. so it's a brief flash - of sparkling, swirling glitter - and then it's gone as he squeezes his eyes shut again and floats, remembering that. 

and the remembering is what makes it special - because he is not losing air. he's drifting away and it feels so nice. 

and fuck, he's in a pool. his lungs beg him for release so he kicks his way to the surface, comes up gasping. he's rubbing his eyes, slicking his wet hair back, and while he's still getting his bearings sam is there. 

sam is in the water with him. he sidles up to him, still blinking glitter from his eyelashes (to no avail). he takes the outstretched hand, tugs him in, and casually drapes his arms around sam's shoulders. 

"i didn't think you'd come in," he says, smile giving away his amusement. "it's really something though, isn't it?" he waves a hand through the shimmery water.

samuel carter

☉

“it’s beautiful. i didn’t think i would be a fan, but…”

maybe he just liked the company. no, not maybe. he definitely liked the company. namely as said company wrapped close and shared their warmth. sam absorbed it like his life depended on it. perhaps now it would. dangerous.

“are you enjoying yourself? you seem adamant that i have a good time, but i just want you.”

one hand lifts then, to caress soft skin and glitter spreads across from skin to skin.

“you’re plenty enough to satisfy me knox. whether you believe it or not.”

and while it’s all a bit new, and while he’s a bit not sober in the head, he does the only thing that seems clear among the chaos of the evening. he moved his lips closer to knox’, in a hope that knox will meet him half way. he doesn’t steal a kiss, but he is asking for one. in a pool of stars lassoed from the sky just for them.

knox prescott

is he enjoying himself? of course he's enjoying himself. he's in his element. he's back home. for the night, at least, he can pretend like everything is back to normal - life is all just one big party with no fucking consequences. 

one of his consequences nearly kisses him then, though, and gods, he wants to give in, but there's that nagging paranoia in the back of his head. it's the good kind, though. the sensible kind. the kind that's saying don't make him public. keep him to yourself. don't let everyone think he's just another fling. 

so he winces and he raises his hand from the water and touches sam's lips, waiting for him to open his eyes so he can shake his head, so he can come in close enough that their foreheads are touching and he can say, "not here."

he could stay in this dreamy pool forever, but sam is wanting more and knox doesn't want to come down. and the only way to not come down is to go up. so he laces their fingers and he pulls him through the pool, leaving a trail of swirling stars in their wake. 

he throws a shared towel over his and sam's shoulders, drawing the top over them like a hood. he grins devilishly because his gaze is appreciating sam's - quite literally - glittering body as they go back into the mansion, as they wind up the stairs, as knox unlocks the door to the west ring, as quiet - nearly true quiet surrounds them when knox pulls open a door and tugs him into his room.

samuel carter

☉

at first, he's worried. at first, he's sure that numbing bit that he'd had with knox is wearing off because he can feel it. paranoia in the rejection.

as knox pulls away, it's clear in sam's expression. what did i do wrong? but knox has silenced him with his fingers and has left sam unable to speak. instead, he answers, and a rush of excitement and anxious butterflies swarm his stomach. like the swirling stars they leave behind as he tugged out of the pool.

but he follows. oh gods does he follow. it's not magnetism this time, they're walking hand in hand, beneath the same towel like two proper dweebs. but sam doesn't care. he's never had this much fun in his life. this night will forever beg the question,

was he ever truly alive before knox?

the noises of the party die down as they go up, and up. the room they enter is lavish but not nearly as much as the one before. he looks around it before pulling the hood down. it's different than his own home on mt. pyre. so different. it isn't cramped, it isn't sharing space with a reception counter.

"is this your room?"

his heart is so loud. could knox hear it? beating away in his chest with every passing second. his hand is still attached to the one leading him through wonderland. he was afraid if he let go that he'd get lost.

but in this room, perhaps he felt safe enough to let go. safe enough that knox wouldn't just run away from him. but he's reminding himself as he looks at each personalized bit of knox' room that knox did run from him in a bedroom. and he'd told him not to kiss him-- so sam resigned himself to be patient.

even if all he wanted to do was, for the first time, feel a pair of lips on his own.

which was admittedly very new for the boy who had previously thought himself an asexual creature.

knox prescott

and despite these past few months, despite his desperate need to assure himself that he doesn't need this place, his sister, his name, he feels at home. granted these four walls are decked out in a manner nowhere else in the house is; some of his posters have been torn down since he'd left. 

he ambles over, fixes the corners of one where it looks like it had started to pull. and it's puzzling for a moment, before he realizes that Summer Atreides must have stopped the maids as they carried out his father's order. 

the led lining along the wall is a blue and it bathes them both in a space-like light. knox touches a handheld on his bed (the sheets are still askew, quilt half-draped on the floor, untouched) and the lights pulse blue and purple. 

the sounds of the bass, that thrumming, is really the only remnant of the party they can hear. he's been here a hundred times over, feeling his heart matching the beat, looking up at a pretty boy who's staring at him in just the right way.

so he stands and ghosts of himself stand with him, and he closes the distance with sam, and his hands find his cheeks as he draws himself up, draws himself close. the lights bounce off his brown eyes, wait, no, not green/blue/hazel eyes looking hopeful, desperate, wanting to get over this part to get to the next part to get to the morning. 

where he wakes to an empty bed. or he's crawled out before the sun can rise, note on the table, because in the morning is when the magic fades. when his love is gone, all used up or tossed aside or 

he's supposed to be different. 

what was meant to be a kiss turns into knox hanging his head against sam's chest, dropping his hands to sam's shoulders.

"i . . . we can't," he whispers. 

samuel carter

☉

seeing knox touch the bed had sam all the more excited and a bit nervous. nervous because he's read enough, he's seen enough, but he's never practiced... should he tell knox that?

but then knox is across the room and suddenly all thought of speech is gone from him. because those cold fingers are on his warm and pink tinted cheeks. he's finding it hard to breathe-- but the silence is deafening. the numbness of nothing hits him like a freight train.

once again, rejection.

goosebumps over over his flesh and instead of pushing knox away, he recognizes a broken soul when he sees one. once again, it's magnetism. he's drawn to it, obsessed with it; addicted to it.

wrapping his own arms around knox, slowly and gently, he simply embrace him.

"we can just talk, or go back to the party..."

what's wrong with me? what have i done? what don't you like about me?

he feels it isn't fair to ask, so he doesn't. instead, he just bottles the paranoia and fears away to deal with in therapy. but one slips away, one slips past his defenses.

i'm not good enough, a shadow of something he wants; a spec, a temporary pleasure like the rest.

"i don't mind."

it's the truth, and it's painful, but he's come to peace with it.

knox prescott

his ability to read people is both a blessing and a curse, and he has enough of a history with these types of situations to recognize crushing disappointment when he sees it. sam tenses and that tension leaks between them, ballooning, until suddenly and stubbornly they are once again on opposite sides of the universe. 

he grinds his teeth in frustration. we can just talk, or go back to the party. i don't mind. 

he snaps his head back up, grabs sam's face, looks for answers for the first time. because the drugs are still pumping through him and nothing is impossible - even the doom that awaits them in the dawn. 

"tell me what you want," knox says urgently. "not what i want. what you want."

because he has every godsdamn reason to believe sam won't leave in the morning. and knox will still feel like this. he comes closer again and his breath (smells like strawberries and vodka) spreads warm over sam's lips.

i'm scared and i don't know why. and i don't know how, but i'm fucking scared, sam. and if you do this, don't you dare leave me.

samuel carter

☉