An Oral Fixation

For Nicole.

Quinn Reed had been in love with Cooper Bradshaw for 2 years, 4 months, 19 days, 3 hours, and 42 minutes. He knew the exact time, down to the very minute, because he'd thought about it constantly pretty much every day since. In his head he referred to it as The Moment of Realization. They were sitting in their Digital Visual Effects class a couple months into their sophomore year at the University of Utah when suddenly Professor Yamura told an off-color joke that made the entire class burst into laughter. Quinn looked over at Coop, who was straddling his computer chair and leaning on the seatback. His dark hair was covered by his signature black New York Yankees hat (backward like always), and he was grinning that broad, gorgeous grin that had never failed to make Quinn feel a bit light in the chest. Then, completely at random, Coop glanced sideways at Quinn and gave him a little suggestive flick of his tongue, and—bam!—that was it. That was the very second Quinn realized that all of the weird little things he'd been feeling for Cooper since the previous semester—the stomach flips, the tingles whenever Coop touched him, the breathless, pulse-pounding anticipation whenever Coop stood too close—had somehow, unbeknownst to him, coalesced into one fierce, burning, searing, gut-deep emotion: love.

The problem with being in love with someone like Cooper Bradshaw was that he seemed to be incapable of being single for very long. He'd had a girlfriend most of sophomore year, followed by a brief but volatile affair with a hot but slightly crazy TA from the math department. (Quinn still hated that guy.) Junior year had been a parade of boyfriends of all shapes and sizes, from a tiny, super flamboyant, cross-dressing twink to one of the tall, thickly muscled African American players on the basketball team, followed by a short stint with a bubbly blond cheerleader named Chloe who'd set Quinn's teeth on edge.

Unfortunately that was also the year they'd moved into a four-bedroom apartment in Benchmark Plaza with Patrick and Lonnie. Quinn got the room between Coop and Lonnie and suffered through dozens of nearly unbearable nights trying to ignore the sex-a-thons happening on both sides. He didn't give two craps what—or who—Lonnie did. It was listening to Cooper that killed.

It wasn't as if Quinn spent all his time pining for Coop. He'd dated on and off. He'd even had a casual boyfriend for most of sophomore year and a more serious one the next. But his luck seemed to be that whenever Cooper happened to be single, Quinn was otherwise involved, and no matter how in love he might have been with Cooper, the idea of ditching his boyfriend for the mere possibility of starting something with Coop had struck him as selfish and wrong. Of course it was only afterward that it occurred to him it might have been even more unfair to stay with those guys when he was admittedly in love with someone else. Luck, she sure was one flighty bitch. And hindsight liked to regularly slap him in the face.

Given their history of bad timing, Quinn thought it was something of a miracle they were both currently single and about to spend spring break together road tripping through California with their roommates. Cooper had returned to school the previous semester with a long distance boyfriend back home—Simon, a former high school flame he'd reconnected with over the summer. Quinn had been broken up with his own boyfriend, Gabe, since the middle of July, but a handful of visits from Simon had convinced Quinn that him being single or not, any chance he might have had with Cooper was gone. Simon was beautiful, funny, smart, modest...and sadly impossible to hate. Quinn had liked him despite himself, and though he'd done his best to hide his rather inconvenient crush on Cooper (to put it mildly), he suspected Simon had known—and been kind anyway. That had only earned the guy another million and a half cool points in Quinn's book, no matter how much he'd wished he could be the one in Cooper's arms instead.

Simon and Cooper's relationship had ended suddenly over winter break, which came as a surprise to everyone, most of all Quinn. They'd seemed so perfect for one another, but when Quinn had asked Cooper about what'd happened, Coop had simply shaken his head and said that Simon deserved better. Curiosity almost compelled Quinn into asking Cooper what he meant, but he'd managed to keep that—and his excitement—at bay. It seemed wrong to be excited about the demise of what appeared to be an ideal relationship. If he loved Cooper, Quinn's first wish for him should have been happiness, right? Even if that happiness didn't include Quinn. But naturally, that feeling only lasted so long. It was hard not to be thrilled that Cooper was single again when Quinn was unattached himself. He'd been praying for that very thing for years, after all, and as much as a part of Quinn really did miss Simon, he couldn't actually say he was sad Cooper and Simon were over. He thought maybe his time had finally come. Except, well, Coop had been so subdued since the breakup, so sad and quiet and strangely un-Cooper-like. He hadn't even gone on any dates or had a single hookup as far as Quinn knew. That, out of everything else, was the weirdest part.

As much as Quinn wanted him, he couldn't bring himself to make a move in the face of all that melancholy. It was only as their road trip approached and winter melted into a brisk and sunny spring that some of the gloom lifted. Cooper slowly came out of his funk and returned to his normal, playful, flirtatious self. And still he hadn't started dating anyone. Quinn thought it was a sign. Had to be. This really was his time. Right now. Spring break. There was only one thing left to do: convince Cooper to take a chance and see if they could make even better lovers than friends.

****

"Daddy, are we there yet?" Lonnie's voice was whiny enough to make a ten-year-old proud.

From his position behind the wheel of the old Ford Escape they'd used to make the drive from Utah to California, Cooper grinned and cast a quick glance at him over his shoulder. "Don't make me pull this car over and come back there, young man."

Quinn chuckled and looked sideways at Lonnie, who appeared to be contemplating Cooper's words.

"The good kind of coming or the bad?" Lonnie asked.

In the passenger seat, Patrick snorted. "There's a bad kind?"

"Well, if he came in my eye, I'd call that the bad kind."

Quinn choked on the sip he'd just taken from his water bottle. He coughed and cleared his throat. "How would you know what it feels like to get cum in your eye, Lon? Something you're not telling us?"

Lonnie cast him a demure smile. "A gentleman never tells."

Patrick snorted again, but this time he followed it up with a dry laugh. "What gentleman are you talking about? I don't see one in this car."

"Speak for yourself," Cooper said. "I'm so gentlemanly it hurts."

Quinn practically heard Patrick's eye roll from his spot behind Cooper. "If you call fucking anything that moves being a gentleman."

Quinn's stomach clenched. Oh, no, not again. Why was it that Patrick and Cooper were always at each other's throats? This was supposed to be fun. He didn't want to deal with them sniping at each other the entire time, even if their mutual dislike was working to his benefit this trip. It hadn't taken them very long to decide that the four of them sharing one room would be a guaranteed recipe for disaster. So, for the duration of their break, Quinn was Cooper's roommate, and Patrick was Lonnie's. Quinn probably couldn't have planned it better if he'd tried, but truthfully, he would have rather had all his friends actually get along for once. In a couple of months, they'd be graduating and going their separate ways, save for him and Cooper, who would be moving into a two-bedroom apartment outside of Austin. (They'd both been offered entry level software engineering positions with an up and coming game developer in Texas.) He hated the thought of the last of their time together being tainted by anger and bad feelings.

"That's exactly what I'd call it," Cooper answered. "I'm equal opportunity, baby. There's beauty in everyone if you pull your head out of your ass long enough to look."

Patrick huffed. "Says the guy who's never dated a troll in his life."

"I'm hungry," Quinn jumped in before Cooper could respond. Even less than the fighting, he didn't want to listen to Patrick making jibes at Cooper. Yeah, he was protective. It came with the territory of being in love. He'd had to listen to Patrick's griping about Cooper's manwhore ways since they'd all moved in together the year before. Patrick had a boyfriend—a long distance one who rarely came to visit, but a boyfriend all the same—so why it mattered to him what Cooper did, Quinn couldn't hazard a guess. Of course, there was the slightest, tiniest, no-way-in-hell chance that Patrick was also nursing a secret crush on Cooper. It seemed unlikely with all the animosity that flew around between them, but as much as the idea made him feel vaguely nauseated, Quinn supposed it wasn't entirely outside of the realm of possibility. Patrick barely got to see his boyfriend during the school year, after all. He had to get lonely.

Quinn shifted uncomfortably in his seat and pushed that thought away. "Anyone up for a burger?"

Lonnie gave him an incredulous look. "Dude, we just ate lunch like an hour ago. How can you be hungry?"

"Hell, I'm always hungry myself," Cooper said, and Quinn nearly sighed in relief. Argument averted. For now. "I could go for a burger, actually."

Lonnie chuckled. "You guys are a couple of fat asses. I can drink a protein shake in the morning and be good 'til dinner."

"Some of us happen to think protein shakes are nasty," Patrick said disdainfully. He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose with one long finger. "You want to be healthy? You need to focus on lean meats and vegetables, and you shouldn't be skipping meals either."

"I doubt we're going to find any vegetables at Santa Monica Pier." Cooper sounded amused. "Or lean meat. They're going to have carnival stuff: ice cream, hot dogs, pizza, cotton candy. In other words, my kind of food."

Quinn grinned. "And mine."

"Don't even get me started on hot dogs." Patrick made a disgusted sound. "If you only knew what was in those things..."

"Whatever it is," Cooper said, and from his tone, Quinn could tell he was smiling, "it's delicious."

****

When they finally got to the pier, Quinn had to fight hard to hold in his excitement. Inwardly, he was bouncy as a little kid. He hadn't been there in years—not since a family trip when he was seven—and it had been his idea to come. He knew the guys were indulging him by agreeing to spend a few hours of their afternoon there, but he was hoping they'd have fun anyway. The day was bright and gorgeous, the temperature warm enough to justify breaking out the shorts and tank tops, despite the cool, salty breeze coming in off the water. Being March and a weekday, the pier wasn't overly crowded. They could walk around, eat some food, maybe get on a ride or two, and then it was back to their hotel in Los Angeles and some club Lonnie had been talking about non-stop since they'd left Utah. After a couple of days in LA, their plan was to drive up to San Francisco to check out The Castro; then it was back to Salt Lake. Not the wild and crazy spring break many of their peers were experiencing down in Mexico, but good enough for a group of video game and engineering nerds. "So where to first?" Cooper asked, tossing an arm around Quinn's shoulders. Quinn tried to hide his shiver. He knew Coop was naturally demonstrative. A hug, a brush of fingers, a pat on the back—Cooper did those things without a second thought and probably not even the slightest suspicion of just how much they affected his friend. But Quinn felt heat spread over his entire body from the contact. It was hard to resist snuggling into Cooper's embrace like he wanted to.

"Well, they do have an arcade," Quinn said. It was one of the things he'd wanted to check out. Video game design was his and Cooper's major, and he was hoping they might have some of the cool, older games, like the original Pac-Man or Galaga or maybe even Joust. He'd love to battle it out with Cooper as an ostrich-riding knight. Unfortunately, he hadn't seen one of the original Joust machines since he was a teenager, and that one had been a cocktail cabinet. Playing on an upright would be fun. He preferred the higher controls, and the fact that he'd have to stand close to Cooper to play didn't hurt.

Cooper grinned at him. "Let's go then."

They headed to the arcade with a grudging Patrick and smiling Lonnie trailing after them. Both of them were majoring in computer engineering, and neither one of them cared about video game design, but at least Lonnie was always up for playing. There had been some serious Call of Duty showdowns at their apartment. Patrick wasn't a fan, though. He usually rolled his eyes and disappeared into his bedroom to work on whatever computer system he was building. Quinn didn't think the arcade would hold his attention for long.

Turned out he was right. Patrick was very obviously bored after a few minutes. Behind his glasses, pale blue eyes appraised the admittedly shabby-looking arcade with obvious scorn. He crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Quinn. "Seriously? This place hasn't been updated since 1985."

"No one's forcing you to stay," Cooper said mildly. "Go walk the pier if you're not interested."

Patrick sighed and turned on his heel. Lonnie looked torn for a moment—stay with Cooper and Quinn or let his best friend wander off alone. After a second, he made his decision and gave them a rueful smile. "We'll come back in an hour, okay?"

Quinn nodded. He could respect Lonnie's loyalty to Patrick, even if he'd never much understood their friendship. Lonnie was way worse than Cooper in the promiscuity department, and yet Patrick never ribbed him for it. His disapproval seemed to be reserved solely for Cooper. Not that Cooper was really that bad—the people he brought back to the apartment were usually his boyfriends (or girlfriends), and Quinn had never known him to cheat—but saving this last time, it typically didn't take him long to move from one relationship to the next. Lonnie's partners were strictly female, as far as Quinn knew, and normally of the one-night-stand variety. He guessed it was just Cooper that Patrick had an issue with, not the sex itself.

Quinn honestly didn't get all of the animosity. Cooper was just...well, he was awesome. Quinn wasn't exactly unbiased, true, but for him Cooper's attributes were blindingly obvious. He too was loyal and smart and funny. Genuine. And Patrick aside, he seemed to get along well with everyone. People naturally gravitated toward Cooper. He had this aura about him, this warm, positive energy that drew people in. Those who knew him loved him; those who didn't know him wanted to. There was just something about Cooper Bradshaw. He made friends easily, and everywhere. Perhaps that was what Patrick disliked. He'd always been the shyest of their group, the most reserved. Maybe it was really that simple—Patrick envied whatever it was that made things so easy for Cooper and resented the fact that he didn't have it himself. Quinn would probably never know, but it was the only answer that made sense.

Cooper's shoulder bumped against his. "I see Street Fighter, and I think that might be an original Ms. Pac-Man over there. Come on."

****

Forty minutes, two Ms. Pac-Man games, three rounds of Street Fighter,, and two pinball machine battles later, Quinn was standing in a crowd watching Cooper get his ass handed to him by a kid who couldn't have been more than twelve. They were several songs into Dance Dance Revolution, and the kid was cool as a cucumber. Cooper, on the other hand, was pink-faced and drenched in sweat. At some point during a tricky foot combination, his hat had flown off, revealing thick black curls sadly flattened by the cap he was rarely without. Quinn wanted to touch them. He always wanted to touch them. He'd been wondering if they would be coarse like curly hair often was, or soft, the way he imagined in his fantasies. Maybe tonight he'd finally get to find out.

A few seconds more and Cooper missed a step, and then couldn't seem to regain his rhythm. The round ended and Cooper leaned against the balance bar, his smile showing signs of obvious relief. "Good job, kid," he panted, holding his hand out to the boy who'd effectively trounced him. The kid shook his hand and smiled back. Quinn almost laughed. Cooper was almost doubled over, and the kid didn't even look winded.

Cooper gingerly stepped off the machine, wincing slightly. Quinn grinned and handed him his hat. "Sore?"

"Yeah." Cooper ran a hand along the outside of his right thigh. "Man, I'm getting too old for this."

"You're twenty-one," Quinn said with a laugh.

Cooper gave him a crooked smile as he settled the baseball cap on his head, bill backward. "Then I guess I need to start working out more often."

Quinn wanted to say something to the contrary. Man, did he want to. Cooper might not have had some ripped, bodybuilder physique with massive biceps and a washboard stomach, but he was long and he was lean, and in Quinn's opinion, pretty much perfect. But in an arcade, surrounded by kids and couples and other guys their age? Not exactly the best setting for a love confession.

"Want to head out and find Lonnie and Patrick?" Cooper asked. "They're probably headed back this way."

"Mind if we check those out first?" Quinn nodded toward the line of photo booths across the arcade. There were a bunch of the newer ones that offered the option of adding effects and choosing from different frames and backgrounds, but there were a couple of the old-fashioned booths too. Those were the ones he was interested in.

"Sure."

Quinn glanced sideways at Cooper. "You can wait outside if you want. My mom and I used to go into these booths all the time when I was a kid. We have a collection of photo strips on our fridge back home. I think she'd like it if I sent her some."

"Aww, what a good boy you are." Cooper laughed and reached out to pat his head. "I can't just let you take those pictures alone, though. A few maybe, but then we'll do some together. Your mom will just have to put up with my ugly mug too."

"She thinks you're adorable," Quinn said. He'd never mentioned it to Cooper before, but it was true. He'd sent her a picture of the two of them from a camping trip they'd taken with Lonnie and Patrick the previous fall, and she'd commented on how cute Cooper was. Then she'd promptly asked if they were dating. Quinn was sad to have to say no.

Cooper grinned. "Really? Well, then I guess she won't mind at all."

They made their way over to one of the older booths and shoved themselves inside. Quinn adjusted the stool to his height while Cooper yanked the curtain closed behind them. Luckily, Cooper was only an inch or two taller, so the setting would work for them both, although it wasn't like there was very much room for the two of them to sit down anyway...unless Cooper sat on his lap. Quinn felt his cock stiffen at the thought and groaned inwardly. He couldn't help it, though. Cooper was pressed right up against him as he fed quarters into the machine. Quinn was literally surrounded by Cooper's smell—clean sweat, the soap he used to wash his clothes, the citrusy scent of his shampoo. All Quinn wanted to do was close his eyes and inhale.

"Okay, let's do this," Cooper said, seemingly oblivious to how utterly turned on Quinn was. "We can do some serious ones first, and then we'll just get stupid."