Near midnight, after several hours of not especially helpful research and some attempts at calligraphy that made Trevor second guess every decision he’d ever made in his life, Trevor emailed Sky.
What’s a step above entry-level dom?
Sky’s answer came in a message about a minute later. Hello? Trevor could almost see Sky’s puzzled frown. I don’t think entry level is the term you want. It doesn’t get me hard, anyway
Trevor sighed. Did you know there are seminars? But they cost $$$ and I don’t think dorks would match the vibe
Sky responded faster this time. Fuck you, dorks do get me hard
It’s not about that, Trevor informed him. Tho ty. Maybe someday, but it isn’t now. He barely trusts me.
Hot Neighbor? Sky wondered, then typed for so long Trevor got the feeling his eventual reply had been heavily edited. Did you try to push?
Trevor considered calling Sky out for the editing, but that was mostly because he didn’t want to admit to his own failures. I helped him wrap his hand. Because he can’t. Because of the stitches.
So yes. Sky’s text had no tone indicators but Trevor imagined his tone was silkily smartass. I bet you loved that.
It’s not like I pushed him down the stairs so I could tend to him afterward or something, Trevor responded defensively. I didn’t do that with you either.
No. Sky agreed immediately, Trevor imagined with a sigh. You actually hold back longer than you think.
That didn’t exactly track with how Trevor recalled their first time with anything close to him getting pushy with Sky, although Sky might remember it differently, or be thinking of another time altogether. Trevor remembered Sky sleep-deprived from overthinking and too many projects, twitchy, horny, restless, and so bratty-fussy that Trevor had finally been annoyed enough to grab his hands and hold them down.
Which, since Sky had been sitting practically on top of him on the sofa, had brought their faces close. So he’d seen Sky’s eyes go wide and then shut before Sky tried to turn away. Trevor had let him go, but Sky hadn’t moved. He’d scowled and turned back toward Trevor without bringing his gaze up from Trevor’s throat and then said quietly, “I think maybe you should do that again.”
So Trevor had. Too eagerly, when he thought about it now.
Sky wasn’t being nearly that level of brat at the moment, but the memory did spur Trevor to ask, Why are you awake? Still that busy with whatever you’re trying to do at work? I don’t want you burned out.
A lavender heart emoji did not give Trevor any kind of answer. You make things so difficult.
Stung, Trevor frowned at his phone. I don’t mean to. I want to make things easier for you. I can go.
Hot Neighbor would know what I’m talking about, Sky continued as though Trevor hadn’t just offered to shut up. Or will, if you get your way. Tho maybe he isn’t Problems like I am.
You’re not Problems. Trevor didn’t lose his frown. You test me. Instead of asking. But you’re not Problems. He forced himself to think about his conversation with G.G. earlier, the high points as well as the disappointments. Maybe… the testing is part of it for you. He tested me too. If there’s a problem, it’s that I’m not smart enough. The trouble with geniuses is trying to keep up with them.
Trevor’s phone lit up. He answered the call before the ringtone could really start.
“Is he a genius?” Sky wondered, so quiet the phone must have been pressed to his cheek.
Trevor settled back against his headboard and closed his eyes. “He’s something,” he muttered, close to grumpy with it. “Not a wizard, but not exactly a warrior. I don’t know yet. You’d probably figure him out in five minutes.”
“Ah,” Sky exhaled heavily. “Well, I have an edge on you there. What did he do to test you?”
“Nothing on your level,” Trevor answered smartly, making Sky laugh.
“Really, though,” Sky went on, his tone lighter, “what happened? What on earth did you talk about while bandaging this poor hot man’s hand?”
“Pushing.” For the first time, the term didn’t sit easy with Trevor. Probably because G.G. wasn’t like Sky and had no problem calling it what it was. “Domination,” Trevor added. “You.”
The scramble at the other end of the call made him think Sky had nearly dropped his phone. Which part of Trevor’s discussion with G.G. had startled him more, Trevor couldn’t say. But he should at least explain why Sky had come up.
“There was D&D talk for a moment—not that he plays, I don’t think—but I made one of my dumb jokes about dungeons, and then it occurred to me, he’s more experienced and he builds things. He might actually have a…. It doesn’t matter. I don’t think he was very impressed with my credentials.”
He didn’t know what he’d expected from Sky at this admission, but it wasn’t a thoughtful hum and then, “First, you learn frighteningly fast when you want to. Secondly… if he is more versed in these things than you, with tastes he already knows about, then I don’t know how to tell you this, my dear Trevor, but he probably clocked you ages ago. And if he’s talking to you about dungeons, of whatever kind, then it’s because he wants to.”
A rustling followed the words. Trevor only heard it because he was surprised into silence. He opened his eyes and sat up. “Clocked me?”
“Oh, he probably thought about it for months before saying anything, for reasons of his own. Probably from the first time he witnessed you lovingly arrange a situation to exactly what you think is best for whomever you are taking care of. He might not have done anything about it until you brought your brand of domin—of concern—to his door, but he knows what you are, doesn’t he?”
Trevor spent several seconds trying not to sputter or snap. “Did you do that?” he demanded at last. “I thought that was….” I think maybe, Sky had said, despite how he must have been thinking of it before then. I think maybe you should do that again. “God, you really never admit to anything unless forced, do you?”
Sky’s voice was small, his face probably turned away from the phone. “I don’t give in easily. I can’t help it. But… you make me want to. Whatever you call yourself, you make people like us hungry. I saw it. He probably saw it too. That’s the only reason I might understand him better than you. I don’t know what he wants, but I know he wants to trust you with it. If he’s like me at all, he does.”
G.G. had scurried away from Trevor’s every attempt to even say hello. “But he didn’t….”
“He is now,” Sky interrupted. “Maybe you’ve been proving yourself. Or he’s realized he’s being lured in and he likes it.” Trevor didn’t get a chance to object to that. Sky was softly chiding. “You’re a lot more than just a dork, Brian Trevor. If he’s smart, he’ll get that. Even if you are entry level.”
“Hey,” Trevor protested absently, then hesitated. “I don’t think I’m luring him. He seems…” Shy. Skittish. “…Careful about what he reveals. Probably because not even his family appreciates what he has to offer. Like they don’t understand it, so it’s not worth their time.” Trevor nodded to himself, familiar with wary, protective, difficult, remarkable people. “I think you’d like him. You’re both different… special.”
“Are you trying to seduce me?” Sky asked tartly. “You don’t need to flatter me. I’ll be submissive for you, but I’m no pet.”
Trevor didn’t scoff the way he should have, mostly because hearing Sky call himself submissive, even snippily, was a leap forward and he wasn’t going to risk having Sky getting self-conscious about it. He sat with the word pet, thinking it an interesting choice for Sky to use and turning it around in his mind while also letting silence fall between them because silence worked even on sparkly-boy wizards.
“Oh, fuck you,” Sky whispered as if outraged, but notably didn’t take back anything he’d said. “I can tell you’re thinking about what to do with that. How about: get me off now so I can fall asleep faster?”
There was another pause Trevor chose not to interrupt.
He shifted on the mattress, debating whether Sky had admitted it on purpose or if it had been a genuine slip. It didn’t really matter, but he thought Sky ought to say it again for his own good.
And Trevor would like to hear it again too.
“Trevor,” Sky started.
Trevor wasn’t interested in any wriggling attempts and cut Sky off without apology. “You should say it again.”
Something, probably a protest, caught in Sky’s throat. “Brian.”
Whatever you call yourself, Sky had said. Trevor had assumed Sky had started calling him by his real first name in these moments for Trevor’s sake. Now it seemed more like Sky being tricky and dodging what made him uncomfortable.
“It made me happy to hear it,” Trevor confessed smoothly. “And you want to make me happy, don’t you?”
“Brian,” Sky said again.
“A good pet who wants to make me happy,” Trevor continued, liking it as he said it, wondering if G.G. had ever been a beloved pet. “Aren’t you?”
Sky had started to breathe faster. “That’s not fair.”
“‘I’ll be submissive for you’ implies you’re doing me a favor,” Trevor mused, “but that’s not the case, is it, Sky baby?” The sound Sky made, low and frustrated, was rewarding. Trevor carried on. “We never did get you anything like that. I should have. It might have made it easier for you, helped you, to have the accessories.”
Unlike Trevor, Sky would look gorgeous in leather. In anything, really. A delicate chain or a tight band or a ribbon around his neck. Whatever he wanted.
“What…” Sky’s voice has a rasp. “What would you have gotten me? Would Ellie and I match?”
Which was an awkward moment to realize that Ellie’s collar was close to the color of Sky’s hair.
Trevor paused, shooting a glance to his desk and the notebook marked for Sky. “I meant to talk to you.”
“I know.” Sky’s voice was still rough. “Do this first. Please.”
Trevor’s voice got rough too. “Do what? Get you off? You could do that alone. What else, Sky? Tell me.”
“I…” Sky fought it, a word or two at a time. “I…. I want…. You should… treat me… like… that.”
“Like a pet?” Trevor wondered, shoving down the fire in his chest. “Then let me see you.”
He got up to lock the door and to start music on his laptop at a volume to cover the sound of his voice while not disturbing his grandmother.
Sky hiccupped and switched the call to video.
Sky was in his darkened living room, on his back, the red couch beneath him. He was beautiful, his glasses still on, his hair half-flattened.
He made a small sound when Trevor must have appeared on his screen, the lights on and glaring, Trevor in a t-shirt as he returned to sit on the bed.
The trouble with wanting to tie Sky up, or down, was that it couldn’t be done long distance. If a problem occurred, like a fire or something, Sky would be stuck. If they tried to get around that with loose knots or self-releasing cuffs, Sky couldn’t be trusted not to squirm away or click himself free.
But pressure was the best way to make Sky happy. Even Sky had finally admitted it.
Trevor thought of his notebook again, then focused on Sky, who was staring at him intently, his lips parted as he waited.
He looked good next to such a bold, primary red, even with his hair a lighter shade of blue. Trevor kept that to himself, along with most of the other things he was thinking. He couldn’t physically trap those hands or ankles, so he pressed from another direction entirely.
“I said let me see you.” The whipcrack in his tone made Sky jolt. His dark eyes widened. Trevor usually started gentle. Not tonight. “Clothes off. Don’t waste my time.”
Sky wet his lips and stared, hungry but unmoving.
Trevor shook his head to deny what those eyes were asking for. “A good pet would be naked for me,” he announced, and when Sky started to frown, to argue, Trevor ended the call.
He inhaled deeply and turned off the overhead light, though not the one on the nightstand. His whole body hummed with excitement.
The call came within seconds. Trevor accepted it.
Sky was crouched on his hands and knees and out of breath as if he’d just finished tearing his clothes off. He shivered in his cold apartment, goosebumps rising along his arms, his nipples hardening. “Trevor,” he began.
“Are you?” Trevor demanded, not a hint of a tremor or a rasp in his voice.
Sky’s mouth moved on a breathless, unvoiced What? He closed his eyes, then reopened them with his head tipped to the side to watch Trevor almost warily. He swallowed. “Yes.”
“Yes, what?” Trevor prompted without hesitation, leaving Sky to blink and stare in shock.
“Yes, Brian,” Sky tried but Trevor was ready for that too.
“Yes, Brian, what? You know what I want to hear, Sky. Say it or I’ll hang up again, let you get yourself off with some unsatisfying toy that doesn’t know what you are.”
Sky tried and failed to strangle a gasp. He shut his eyes again as a shudder worked through him. Sky had been talking this way for months. Dropping hints or issuing a challenge. Time to find out.
Trevor waited.
Sky licked his lips and then exhaled the words, “Yes, I’m a good pet.”
Trevor curled his free hand where Sky couldn’t see. He was steady and cool and not on fire. “You want a collar? Like the good pet you say you are?”
Sky opened his eyes, revealing more surprise. Whatever he saw in Trevor’s expression, he sucked in a noisy breath before dropping his head. “Yes.” It was barely a whisper. “Yes. If you got it for me. Yes.”
“Blue?” Trevor suggested, not shaking though he wanted to. “Like Ellie’s?”
Sky shuddered again but didn’t argue. That was telling, but Trevor still had to hide his nerves as he pressed. “And a bed to match hers, so you can sleep at the foot of mine?”
Sky locked eyes with Trevor, his breathing louder than the music. Then lowered his gaze, keeping it trained on the couch. “Brian.”
“A genius at the foot of my bed,” Trevor was scared to death, hot all over, and hard in his sweats, “and happy to be there? To be my pampered boy?”
Sky squirmed, shifting his hips like he did when turned on and not allowed to touch himself. “Yes.”
Trevor couldn’t even pet him. But he didn’t let his tone gentle.
“Yes?” he prodded. “You’d sleep in a bed on the floor?”
“Yes, I’d sleep at your feet,” Sky corrected, but soft, his eyes still averted.
Trevor stroked him the only way he could and Sky shivered for it. “Would you, Sky baby? I could get a bed embroidered with your name.”
Sky’s gaze came up to meet his. His flush was visible even in the dark.
Trevor gentled his voice even more. “And a matching blue leash you’d bring to me when you need it,” he suggested to watch Sky squirm again. Sky was so understandably defensive with the rest of the world, but he was letting Trevor humiliate him by offering him a version of what he wanted. “Sky the submissive,” a twitch went through Sky, Trevor carried on, growing even softer, “there to be spoiled as long as he’s good. But he won’t be, he can’t be, so he’ll get punished too… because he also wants that.”
That was more embarrassing to Sky than the dog bed. Possibly because it was Trevor and not someone better.
But the sad thought didn’t get a chance to take hold. Sky said, “At your feet,” again, his head down. “With you,” he added.
“You’d have to be very good for that,” Trevor answered, as though they hadn’t slept tangled up together countless times. “Have to give me what I want. Be a good pet. Do you like that idea?”
“Yes.” Sky didn’t even sound impatient although he hadn’t stopped moving, small, restless twitches and shivers.
“No squirming,” Trevor ordered. Sky’s breathing hitched, but he stopped. “So obedient already,” Trevor told him, a fraction of the things he wanted to say to Sky now. “Just because I offered you a collar and a bed. Maybe you really are my pet the way you keep telling me you are.”
One of these days, he was going to have to gag Sky to muffle all the noises he made when he wanted something but also felt he should argue about wanting it.
“Shut up,” Trevor commanded without raising his voice. Sky silenced himself over the course of several pained breaths, finally going quiet while pushing one palm down to his knee in agitation. Trevor tracked the motion, and the gleam in the thick, dark hair on Sky’s inner thigh, and purred, “Oh.” It only made Sky shiver more.
“You like it so much,” Trevor exhaled the realization, then nearly purred again. “Let me see how much you like it.”
That should have been easier for Sky. Sky had bared himself to Trevor dozens, if not hundreds of times. But he was slow to move, changing the position of the phone before sliding his knees apart to better let Trevor see his wet little cock.
“Good boy,” Trevor said immediately, staring while Sky shivered and couldn’t catch his breath. Trevor couldn’t stop staring. He wanted to touch. He wanted it in his mouth. He dragged his gaze up. “Beautiful.” Sky started to make a sound but stopped himself, looking quickly to Trevor to see if he’d noticed. Trevor said it again. “You’re beautiful, smart boy.” Sky sank his teeth into his bottom lip but kept his reaction down. Trevor decided to reward that with everything else. “If you were here, I would take care of that for you. You deserve it for how quickly you gave me what I wanted this time. Are you pleased with yourself? You can speak now.”
Sky’s thighs were trembling. “I could be better.” He revealed in a shamed whisper. “I want to give you what you want.” He didn’t lift his eyes. “I want to. I just can’t without…. You’re so good to me, and I’m….”
“Do I need to tie you up to make you say it?” Trevor wondered, as carefully tender as he could manage to be. Sky pushed his hand down to his knee again rather than squirm. “You’re beautiful like this,” Trevor continued, watching that restless hand, listening to Sky’s breathing grow uneven. “Amazing. My pet.” Trevor was in awe and let Sky know it. “My genius Sky.” Trevor’s knuckles were white with how tightly his hand was clenched. He watched each word of praise hit Sky and then added, softly, sweetly, “My submissive.”
“Yes.” Sky bit his lip the second the word was out, then let his hand fall the second after. He continued to shiver, with arousal, with the cold, with shock at what Trevor had gotten him to say, but his hands went flat and motionless. His head stayed down.
“Do you know what I want to do to my submissive Sky? I’d tie him to my bed.” Trevor petted Sky with words, a fantasy he knew Sky had. “I’d leave him there all day so I could fuck him as I please. No thoughts allowed in his head but when he’ll get stuffed next and how sore I’ve left his holes. You like that? Being a hole for me? A toy? Or should I sometimes let you come?”
Sky bit his lip but a muffled whine emerged anyway.
“That’s what my submissive gets,” Trevor was riveted to the sight of him, “if he says it.”
Sky was already nodding. “I am. I am. Please.”
“The word, Sky.” Trevor hadn’t forgotten. “I want the word.”
“Yours,” Sky rasped. “Yours,” he repeated, sending a shock through Trevor that he had to shake off so he wouldn’t lose Sky. It was just like Sky to jump beyond the line Trevor had set for him.
“Yes.” Trevor answered warmly, practically crooning. “Yes, good, smart boy. That’s so much better than I expected. You always amaze me.”
Sky’s hand twitched, landing partly up his thigh. He shoved it clumsily back down to the couch. “Trevor.” It was too slow and dreamy to be a whine. “Trevor.”
“Yes, baby?”
“You aren’t here.” That was closer to a complaint, but confused, as if for a moment, Sky had forgotten the miles between them.
“I’m here. I’m right here, watching my Sky, listening to him.” Trevor shifted against the headboard but kept his voice steady. “Take one of the pillows I bought for you. Pick the softest one and put it between your legs.” Trevor had read the reviews before he’d ordered them. “Soft, isn’t it?” he asked after Sky tried to move his sluggish limbs to obey.
Sky lifted his head as he shoved the pillow beneath himself. The pillow was black and a sort of crushed velvet fabric. He was going to stain it, but that was a special reminder for him to find in the morning. For now, he arranged himself carelessly over the pillow, and, as if his thinking was on a delay, finally looked to Trevor for explanation or further instruction.
His glasses were fogged and slipping down his nose. His lips were dark from how hard he’d bitten them. He stared at Trevor expectantly, shivering without even seeming to notice anymore.
“I asked you a question, Sky,” Trevor prompted, wanting to make sure Sky was with him.
Sky blinked, still for one moment as if trying to remember what he’d been asked. “Soft. Yes. Soft.”
Trevor put a hand to his cock but didn’t even let himself press down. “Soft so you can rub yourself off on it like a horny little animal.” Sky’s whine was confused, but his hips were already moving. “Like a mindless pet who only wants to feel good.”
He hadn’t bought the pillows intending for Sky to fuck them, only to sleep on them. They were so giving and shapeless that it only took a few seconds for Sky to realize they wouldn’t be enough. He tried bunching the pillow up to get more friction, close to holding it in place as he fucked it, but that must have made the glancing, teasing lack of pressure worse. He bit his lip again.
He was flushed down to his chest, panting and still unable to look Trevor in the eye while he tried to find the pressure he needed. He whimpered. “Please. Please. I can’t…” Still choking on the words. “Trevor, please.”
Trevor watched him when all he wanted to do was reach out to make him come.
“Tell me what you are, Sky baby.” The kindness made Sky keen before he caught it. Trevor clucked his tongue, as gently chiding as he could be while rock hard. “Look at me and tell me. Say what you are.”
“Submissive,” the answer came faster than he would have thought, a strangled cry and some harsh breathing and then Sky panting it, “Your submissive. Trevor, please. I’m yours. Please.”
“Stop.”
It hit Sky hard, made him shake and hiss, turning his head away. A wrenching shudder went through him, then another, but he stopped.
“That’s it, gorgeous. That’s good. That’s so good. Wet your fingers for me so I can watch you play with your cock. And look at me. I want to watch you come.”
Sky turned back to let Trevor watch him lick his fingertips and then slip them down between his legs to touch himself. His eyes were half-closed but his gaze was fixed on Trevor, right where it should be. Where it should always be, at least in Trevor’s darkest fantasies.
“Want your hand,” Sky admitted, anguished, gasping already. “Want you.”
“I know, baby,” Trevor breathed heavily, right there with him. “Show me how much.”
Afterward, when Trevor had whispered every endearment in the world to a sleepy, muzzy, far too cold Sky, and ordered him off the couch and to the bathroom, where he made Sky drink some water and rinse with mouthwash if he was too out of it to brush his teeth. After he had directed Sky to his bed and let Sky curl around the phone under a heavy cocoon of blankets, and Sky’s voice broke on Trevor’s name as he finally said good night, Trevor hung up and left his room to walk blankly through the house.
He had some water too, apologized to Mr. Tams for disturbing his rest, then returned to his room. His bed did not feel like a cocoon. He lay on his back anyway, and reached into his nightstand for a small amount of lube.
Then he thought over the day’s events and brought himself off.
The light was glaring so he kept his eyes shut.