Elisha stayed still for a moment, watching him disappear upstairs. Then he hurried after him. "Wait, Henry!"
Henry didn’t wait for him. He stormed up the stairs with long, angry strides, ignoring the sound of footsteps rushing up right behind him.
"Henry, wait!" Elisha called out, his voice echoing in the stairwell as he chased him step for step.
Henry refused to look back. He reached the master bedroom, pushed the door open, and stepped inside, intending to slam it shut in Elisha’s face. But before he could spin around to block the entrance, Elisha caught the edge of the door, slipping right into the room behind him.
"Why won’t you just listen to me when I’m—" Elisha started, closing the distance between them with frustrated urgency.
Furious, Henry whipped around, his hands flying up to push him away. "I told you to leave me alone, why the hell are you—"
Before Henry could finish, his heel caught on the edge of the plush bedroom rug. His balance gave way, and he stumbled backward with a sharp gasp.
Elisha reacted instantly, lunging forward and grabbing Henry to steady him, but the momentum was too strong.
With a heavy thud, both of them tumbled backward, crashing straight down onto the center of the wide bed.
The impact knocked the breath from Henry’s lungs. Before he could process what had happened, he found himself flat on his back, pinned against the soft mattress. Elisha loomed directly over him, sprawled out on top of him with his heavy weight pressing Henry deep into the sheets.
For a breathless second, the argument died in the air. The space between their faces vanished, leaving them frozen. Henry stared up into Elisha’s dark, intense eyes, his pulse suddenly racing. The anger that had fueled him moments ago dissolved, instantly replaced by a sudden, electric heat that flared between them like a spark hitting dry kindling.
Elisha’s gaze dropped slowly to Henry’s lips, his breathing turning ragged. Without a single word of warning, Elisha lowered his head and crashed his mouth against Henry’s.
The kiss was desperate, raw, and completely consuming. Henry’s eyes fluttered shut, all resistance shattering as his lips parted in a sharp, involuntary gasp. His hands, which had been pushing against Elisha’s chest to shove him away, betrayed him. Instead, his fingers curled into the fabric of Elisha’s pajama shirt, pulling him closer, ready to take the next step.
Just when the moment became most intense, Elisha suddenly snapped his eyes open.
Panic flashed across his face. He jerked back, scrambling off Henry and hastily standing up beside the bed.
"I’m sorry," Elisha blurted out, his chest heaving as he backed away, running a hand frantically through his hair. "It was a mistake. I wasn’t thinking. I was just trying to help you up, and—we shouldn’t be doing this. You’re my best friend."
The words tumbled out of his mouth one after another, a rapid, defensive stream of excuses that wouldn’t stop.
Henry pushed himself up onto his elbows, his breathing ragged, staring at him in sheer disbelief. "You kissed me yourself, Elisha. And you’re calling that a mistake?"
"Please," Elisha said, his voice tight with desperation as he avoided Henry’s gaze. "Just pretend it never happened. We should sleep now."
Henry let out a harsh, bitter laugh, swinging his legs over the side of the mattress. "I should pretend we never had sex, and now you want me to pretend you didn’t just kiss me yourself? Elisha, that’s completely wrong. You keep crossing the line, and then you expect me to pretend none of it ever happened?"
"You’re my best friend," Elisha argued, his voice dropping into a frantic plea. "We can’t do this."
"Enough," Henry snapped, cutting him off with a sharp wave of his hand. "What’s the point of having this conversation when all you see me as is your best friend? Let me tell you something—friends don’t kiss each other like that. And you better learn to mind your own business from now on, because from this moment forward, I’m going to treat you as nothing more than the best friend you keep claiming I am."
Elisha opened his mouth, desperately trying to find the words to defend himself. "Henry—"
"Not a word from you," Henry cut him off coldly.
Without giving him another glance, Henry lay back down, rolled onto his side facing away from the room, and pulled the heavy duvet tightly over his shoulder.
Elisha fell silent. He didn’t say another word, realizing that anything else he said would only make things worse. The frustration weighing heavily in his chest left him with nothing to say. Without pushing his luck any further, he simply climbed onto the opposite side of the bed and lay down, keeping his distance.
A heavy silence settled over the room. Neither of them moved, both careful not to let their bodies touch in the dim light. Slowly, exhaustion took over, and the tension between them faded as sleep finally came.
Hours passed in the deep stillness of the night. It was the first time they had shared a bed since that night three months ago.
Having Elisha lying just inches away, breathing quietly beside him, was enough to bring everything Henry had tried to forget back to the surface.
In his sleep, the line between memory and dream slowly disappeared.
Henry began to stir, a low, ragged gasp slipping past his lips. His breathing turned shallow and hot, his body reacting before his mind could catch up. He wasn’t just dreaming; he was reliving that rainy night three months ago with terrifying clarity
The heat of the room felt thick like steam.
In his sleep-fogged mind, he felt the phantom weight of Elisha pressing him down into the mattress. There had been no lube that night, no preparation, no protection, just raw, desperate friction fueled by alcohol and years of suppressed longing. He remembered the sharp, biting pain of Elisha taking him for the very first time, quickly swallowed by a wave of shattering, overstimulating pleasure as Elisha buried his cock deep inside him, thrusting with a relentless rhythm.
His hand twitched against the sheets, slipping downward in the dark.
Whimpering softly into his pillow, Henry’s fingers slid beneath the elastic waistband of his pajama pants. His touch was hesitant at first, but as the phantom memory of Elisha’s hips driving into him intensified, his grip tightened on his cock. He began to stroke himself, slow and agonizingly deep, chasing a ghost.
"Ah... huh..." a broken moan slipped past his lips in the dark, his body arching instinctively against the friction of his own hand.
In his dream, Elisha’s mouth was fused to his, swallowing his cries while those heavy, punishing thrusts drove him completely out of his mind. He was soaking in his own sweat, his chest heaving with every ragged breath. His hand moved faster inside his pants, stroking harder, driven by the maddening ache between his thighs. Every stroke mirrored the relentless pace of that night—deep, rough, and completely consuming.
"Ah... yeah... right there..." he whimpered, the pleasure building to a blinding crescendo.
His fingers flew faster, the friction burning, his hips twitching off the mattress as the climax violently seized him. With a final, choked gasp, Henry came hard, his hand gripping his cock tightly as a wave of intense, shuddering release crashed over him. His body locked up, a low, breathless cry echoing in the quiet bedroom as he spilled against his own hand, trembling from the sheer force of the pleasure.
For a long moment, he lay there paralyzed, his chest rising and falling violently, catching his breath as the aftershocks faded. Believing the entire ordeal had just been an intense figment of his sleep-addled mind, Henry slowly reached out with his free hand and pinched his arm to confirm whether he was awake.
A sharp wince crossed his face at the sudden sting of pain. He blinked and slowly opened his eyes.
The dim light of the bedroom slowly came back into focus. But the heavy, suffocating silence he expected was completely gone.
He slowly turned his head, desperately hoping to find Elisha still fast asleep beside him. Instead, the moment his eyes adjusted, Henry froze in shock.
Elisha was wide awake, propped up on one elbow right beside him. The dim light cut sharply across his face, illuminating eyes that were dark, sharp, and entirely too intense, watching him with a heavy, knowing gaze. He had clearly been awake and watching the entire thing unfold from the very beginning.
A slow, predatory smirk curved across Elisha’s lips. He looked straight into Henry’s eyes, the shadows of the room wrapping around them like a cage, and asked the question that shattered the last of Henry’s defenses.
"Who was fucking you in your dream, Henry?"