Chapter 15: Night With You

Jordan

It’s just past lights-out when the hum of the prison dies down and the world inside our little cage softens.

That’s my favorite part of the day. Not because I’m some poetic asshole who finds beauty in silence—I hate silence, honestly—but because that’s when the wolves curl their tails, the predators sheathe their teeth, and even the cold concrete feels less judgmental.

It’s also when I can stop being Jordan Vex, the walking warning label, and just be the guy who didn’t sleep last night because he kept thinking about the way his roommate licked honey off his thumb at lunch.

Shut the fuck up. It was distracting, okay?

Like any other night, Quincy would wrap himself in his thin blanket, reading that lame ass novel I got for him with Ray Ray’s help in compensation for the shit I had gotten him into.

It feels so good to soil his perfectly clean record.

He's just too clean to be in here, and sometimes I feel the need to ask why he was in here with the rest of us. Like the actual reason, not the one that flew around in the media.

Once again fellas, it would be my pleasure to put him into more fuck ups so he would be like one of us. The wolves.

Quincy resumed a different position this night. He's sitting already on the floor, back against the wall, arms resting on his knees like he’s been waiting for me to come join him. Like this is our thing now. No declarations. No “come sit, bro.” Just space. And silence.

Seeing as he did so, I stalked and sat on the floor beside him. without needing to ask.

I made room for few inches between us, so as to not get him tensed

He thinks I don't see the way his muscles stiffen whenever we're in the shower, or the sound of his uneven breath. That's a whole different story for another day. I ain't a story teller. But I sure as hell love to see him in a quivering mess, when I'm so close. My dick twitches to assent my words and it takes everything in me not to adjust it in his presence.

“You smell like prison meatloaf,” he says without looking at me.

“You smell like rejection and Catholic guilt,” I shoot back.

He huffs, fighting the smile. Doesn’t win.

“What's your preppy ass thinking about, hmm?”

He takes a moment to reply, as if counting his unsaid words, then he comes up with: “Nothing really, just taking my eyes of….this.” he wove the novel in his left hand.

I stretched out to reach out to reach the book, only for him to throw his arms backward. “C'mon man, let me have a look.”

My skin brushed with his, and it would take a less observant person not to notice how he stiffened. It's his usual reaction when I'm that close.

And that goddamn contact made my dick twitch. Again.

“No, man. Back off, reading ain't your thing.” He said, keeping the book completely out of my reach

I leaned back to myself, looking at his side profile in the dark. His lips, the upper one is slightly prominent than the lower one, giving the defined heart shape. His nose is so pointy, and in a proportion that soothes his face. I'm imagining it nudging my navel while he travels down my…

Fucking hell. Stop thinking at once.

“If I may ask, Mr Laurent, what is my thing?”

“You should also act oblivious and ask me what your name is.”

I let out a dry laughter. Rich boy's slowly getting acquainted with this jackass.

We sit like that for a minute. Quiet. It wasn't awkward, it was comfortable.

I tilt my head toward him. “Are you a talkative during foreplay?”

I'm asking in reference to whatever smut he's probably reading in there.

He snorts. “You wish this was foreplay.”

He never spared me a glance all the while he was speaking, and there's this part of me that hated it so much. I'm this close to grabbing his chin to focus on me. Let his gaze feed on me.

I'm slowly being creepy to my rich dumbass cellmate, and he hasn't even realized it yet. What about when he does?

Well, fuck it. Fuck him.

“Oh, so you have thought about it?”

He pauses, blinks once. “About what?”

It's so weird that my heart is speeding up now he has his gaze on me. What I wanted. I slowly thickly as the pale lights from the hallway touched some part of his face and…

He wet his bottom lip with his tongue. His lip’s is glistening as the pale light touched it.

What saved my fucked up ass was that my face blocked the light. The light is just casting on him, so he can't see that I'm gawking at his round lips.

“Me. You. One soap too many.”

He groans and lets his head thud softly against the wall. “Jordan…”

“That’s my name. You moan it so nice.” I muttered. Like a sixteen year old, I'm left with a half hard dick just by hearing his groan.

I'm so fucked.

I should have gotten laid the night before I was hauled by the police. Who would have thought I would be longing to literally hear my cellmate moan.

He shoves my shoulder lightly, but he’s grinning now. Victory. Or rather, it's chaos for me.

“Do you ever shut up?” he asks.

“Only when I’m sleeping or kissing.” my eyes are fixed on his stretched lips on i said it

No jokes. My words were precise

Quincy gives me a look. That mixture of amused and confused he always wears when I flirt too boldly. It’s becoming my favorite look on him.

He doesn’t say anything, though. Just shifts, arms folding tighter.

“Quick question, yeah?” Quincy glanced at me and then fixed his eyes on the bunk across.

“Shoot.”

“Have you ever had a cellmate before me?” he turns to look at me again. This time, it's long. His lips reverted to a thin line. I can't see those juice lips.

“Yes,” I answered disappointedly. Release those damn lips of yours. “He didn't make it for long, though.” I added.

Curiosity kicked in, and he asked: “why?”

“I…”

“Hold on, I'll guess. You beat the living daylights out of the poor guy. Literally."

I shrugged, I had expected him to relate the reason to violence.

“I mean, I wish I did. The poor guy was a coke addict. After one moment, it was hard to hold on to himself…his addiction. He had one of his episodes one day, a nut got loose in his messed up head. And when I was back to my cell after the yard duty, I saw his lifeless form on the floor. His lifeless eyes were wide open.” I wiped my face with my palm, the memory is still fresh, but I'm unaffected because I, myself, wanted him to end his life one way or the other. He was so fucked up. “But this was two years back though. I've had no cellmate since that one. Some inmates believe I had a hand in his death. Bitch ass motherfuckers.”

He nodded slowly, as though he was slowly playing out all I had said in his head.

“It would have been better if he was just some skinny dude who talked to himself. Or cry into his pillow.”

“Sounds familiar,” I mutter.

“You cry louder,” he says, deadpan.

I laugh, tipping my head back. “You’re getting good at this. Real sharp tongue.”

“You’d know.”

“Oh, I definitely would.”

He groans again, hiding a smirk under the weight of his palm. “You’re a menace.”

“Yeah, but I’m your menace.”

That shuts him up for a second. Just a second.

“You ever think,” he starts, voice lower now, “about who you were before all this?”

I blink. That’s a turn.

“All the time,” I admit. “I used to think I’d end up dead by twenty-two. So honestly, this is kind of a glow-up.”

“Yeah?” he asks, glancing at me.

“Sure. I get three square meals, free gym access, a hot cellmate…”

“Jordan.”

“Kidding. Kidding.” I chuckle, then quieter: “Mostly.”

He gives me a side-eye, but his shoulders relax a bit.

“You?”

“Me what?”

“Before this.”

He sighs. “I used to think I had it all figured out. A peaceful life. A loving Dad. A caring girlfriend.”

That surprises me. I look at him sideways. “Wait—you have got a girlfriend? How come I never knew about her”

He shook his head slowly, going pale. I want to break his damn girlfriend into two for causing a change in his gleeful mood. Or I should never have asked. “I had, rather. She ceased to exist once the sentencing came in. I haven't heard from her or my Dad.”

“Do you still miss her?”

I had my reasons for asking, I had plans to make him forget what her damn name was. I just don't know how or where to start.

“I do,” he said, wiping his face.

Fuck no.

We let that hang between us. I refused to say anything after that. It’s not heavy, just real.

“You think she’d take you back?” I ask.

“I don’t want her to.”

Drum rolls of fucking victory.

“Why?”

He shrugs. “Because I don’t even recognize the guy she loved. And I’m not sure I want to be him again.”

There’s a silence that falls between us. But it’s not lonely.

It’s... us.

I nudged him with my shoulder. “You ever think maybe that guy she loved had no idea what he needed?”

He narrows his eyes. “And what’s that?”

I smirk. “Clearly, a morally ambiguous, hot cellmate with a god complex and a eight-pack.”

Quincy laughs.

Like, really laughs.

The sound echoes off the concrete. Honest. Warm. And it does something stupid to my chest.

“You’re ridiculous,” he mutters, rubbing his face.

“Yeah,” I agree. “But you’re sitting with me.”

“That’s the sad part.”

“You like it,” I say, nudging him again.

He doesn’t deny it.

Instead, he turns his head, his face just barely inches from mine. “Why do you always flirt with me?”

I tilt my head, considering. “Because you’re pretty. And easy to rattle. And... because it’s the only way I know how to talk about the fact that you make this hell feel less like a graveyard.”

He stares at me.

I stare back.

The air between us shifts again. Charged. Heavy.

He looks down first. Just for a beat.

“That’s... strangely sincere,” he mutters.

“Don’t get used to it,” I say, a little too quickly.

He smiles, though. Small. Private.

We sit like that for a while longer. Side by side. Shoulders brushing once. Then again. Not pulling away.

The lights hum faintly. The world stays quiet.

“You scared of dying in here?” he asks, barely above a whisper.

I’m quiet for a moment. Then: “Not anymore.”

He looks at me.

“Why not?”

“Because I stopped thinking about the end,” I say. “Started thinking about moments like this instead. If this is what it looks like before the end... it’s not so bad.”

Quincy doesn’t respond.

But I feel it.

The wall isn’t the only thing we’re leaning against now.

There’s something invisible between us.

And it’s getting easier to rest on it.