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janie_tangerine
“You know that girl that always is in first row, Lannister?”
“I do, Greyjoy. I very well damn do, and is there a reason you’re gloating at me now?”
“Just saying,” Theon says, and Jaime thinks, don’t finish that sentence, don’t finish that sentence, don't finish that sentence, “that while the time for groupies is over, I mean, supposedly so, considering that you invite her backstage every other moment and that she’s been at each single show of this tour, maybe you could invite her.”
“Can it,” Jaime groans, “no way. I’m not —”
“And why not? Come on, I’ve opened for your band for the entire last month, we drove through half of this bloody fucking country and I know for sure that you’re the only person in it that’s not getting any, and seeing your pretty face, it’s honestly baffling.”
“And since when do you care about how much I’m getting? Are you volunteering?”
Theon laughs, dark hair falling all over his shoulders as he fixes his leather trousers in front of their shared changing room — yes, this venue is so shitty that they have to share rooms in between bands, and fine, Theon’s technically a solo act but he does have a band, and he hopes the others are not being too cramped because their room is so small they can’t even change at the same time. He nods, pleased with his hair, definitely, and then goes to grab a black shirt from his bag and puts it on without closing it. Guess this is the night where he plays with his shirt open making sure his poor manager dies of frustration.
Robb Stark is a saint, Jaime thinks sometimes, because to manage this guy, you really need to have an insane amount of patience.
Good thing that they never needed one and Jon always took care of it, but still.
“I mean,” Theon says, “in the ideal world, I would, but alas, I know that it’s not meant to be. For one, I’m not your Kinsey scale one —”
“How the fuck do you know that?”
“What, that you’re a one or that I’m not it?”
“Both, for —”
“I mean,” Theon goes on, “you obviously aren’t a zero or you wouldn’t stare at your bassist’s ass, and honestly also at your guitarist’s, and I wouldn’t exclude, you know, that you three might have had a go at it at some point —”
“That never happened!” Jaime protests, not that he hasn’t entertained that thought once or twice, but still, he doesn’t bat for that team, as a general rule. He just hates that Theon has apparently figured him out that easily.
“Regardless,” Theon goes on, “you’re a one, but if those two are your type, considering they’re both older than you and ginger and blue eyed and I’m not either of that, I think I’m not it. Also, no way you like pitching.”
Jaime spits his beer. “What the fuck —”
“I listen to your songs, Lannister. Each single evening. I write songs for a living. Think I can’t figure out that you like catching, even with girls? And sadly, while I’m flexible, with men I tend to prefer catching, too, so sadly there is no way you and I might end in bed together. Sad.”
“Doesn’t Robb Stark object?”
“I don’t think Robb would be against you occasionally joining, he does like his guys pretty, but never mind that. What I’m aiming at, here, is that your groupie over there —”
“She’s not a groupie, her name is Brienne —”
“Oh, you’re even on a fucking first name basis. Please, Lannister, have some dignity and kiss her already, and put the both of you out of your own misery.”
“I’m not kissing a fucking fan, Theon. Can it out.”
Theon shakes his head as he drops down on his own chair, giving him the necessary space to change.
“And why not? As long as she’s not underage, but she doesn’t look like it.”
“She’s twenty, and no, she —”
“Oh, you even know her age? Sweet. Honestly, and what are you worried about? A seven year age difference? There’s plenty worse than that.”
“That is not the fucking problem!”
“Well, she obviously has a crush on you, so that is not the problem either. Spill, Lannister, let someone with the necessary lack of inhibitions when it comes to enjoying this crappy art life give you some advice you sorely fucking need.”
“I’ve done fine until now —”
“Please, anyone who’s seen you playing live since you started singing can see how much you hate it, you just have to be happy your pretty face makes people not notice.”
How is that arse so fucking perceptive, Jaime would like to know. Okay, fine, he’s a musician, he knows his own breed, and he has issues, so he guesses it takes one to know one, but what the fuck.
“And so what? No one has booed me for that.”
“Never said that. But you still haven’t answered that question and you haven’t denied once that you actually want to kiss her, so how about you just take that weight off your chest? Believe me, the moment you do your life gets better. And your music becomes less fucking sad.”
“Oh, so now you want me to lose my own brand?” Jaime snorts. He’s banked on sad songs for now, and he thinks he has enough family and Cersei-related trauma left to elaborate to bank on that for a lot longer. He sighs, reaching for a pair of artfully ripped jeans and slipping them on after shedding his own, no point in being modest with someone you’ve shared a shower with.
“I mean that you’re at the second album and five EPs full of sad songs that everyone who has a vague idea of your home life would guess are about them, and I don’t even wanna know what the fuck is up with your sister, and while that’s all good, at some point you’re gonna grow bored or the audience will, so it’s always better to have more than one well of inspiration to tap into, so to speak.”
Jaime scoffs as he fishes in the middle of his clean t-shirts and grabs the first viable one he finds — Woodstock advertising on a bright red background will have to do. This one is even vintage, he found it in some secondhand shop long before he even thought of auditioning for a band, but it still fits him. He’s honestly surprised it still looks bright red at this point, but he’s not going to complain about it, and puts it on.
He really hates considering that Theon might not be wrong.
“You know I'm right.”
Fucking hell, he’s singing it.
“Don’t make Kurt Cobain roll in his grave,” Jaime tells him, but he figures it’s a lot cause. What the fuck has gotten into Greyjoy today, he'd like to fucking know -- he is chatty usually, but not like this.
“Who says he wouldn’t appreciate my efforts? Honestly,” Theon goes on, “what stops you? She’s plenty willing.”
“She’s not —”
“Are you blind to not notice how she looks at you or are you just, you know, that emotionally stunted?”
Jaime groans, trying to fix his hair instead, staring at himself in the mirror and wishing that he was the kind of person who put on make-up or groomed himself for half an hour before going out on stage, at least he’d have an excuse to not pay attention to the Jimini Cricket behind him. Except that it’s hard when the point is that he’s not even wrong, and maybe that’s why he’s into this line of work, you have to be good at reading someone to survive in this business, and yet.
And yet he wishes he’d just leave him alone instead of playing therapist when he certainly needs one.
“I never said I’m not emotionally stunted,” he says, “and she doesn’t look at me like anything, she just likes the music and she gets where it comes from, so —”
“Oh, she gets where my songs come from, are you listening to yourself? And honestly, did you ever ask yourself why singing makes you that uncomfortable when soloing didn’t when you’ve been doing it for what, two years?”
He didn’t.
He accurately did not even fucking consider it.
And it’s one hour until they go on stage and they already did the soundcheck.
Fuck.
“I don’t know, because if someone else sang about my fucking issues it didn’t feel like I was airing my dirty laundry?”
“Oh, there we are,” Theon grins, “we’re getting there. So you’re feeling uncomfortable as hell because you’re stuck singing about your unhealthy shitty family and you don’t tap into any other well, as we asserted before, and maybe you’d gain something if you’d, like, let yourself be happy and sang about stuff that’s not uncomfortable. Just advice from someone whose trade was that from the get go.”
Fucking hell.
“And since when are you this much of a connoisseur of how this whole circus works?”
“Well,” Theon grins, “didn’t you notice what happened six months ago or what?”
Six months ago —
Oh, god.
“You and Stark started fucking,” Jaime groans, “or am I wrong.”
“How crass,” Theon smirks, “my sister would rather put it as we got over the sexual tension we had going on in spades since high school and wasn’t that time, but that’s about it. And guess what, I liked the job before, but now that I’m actually not repressing shit and writing songs about nice things and lo and behold, my life has been a lot better.”
I can hear that, Jaime sighs.
“So, as since it happened I have now seen the difference and sharing dressing rooms with you means that I see how exactly miserable you are all the fucking time, I took upon myself to give you a nudge or two. Or ten.”
Well, if anything you can’t tell Theon that he doesn’t have guts. Which is good, in this line of work, but still.
“Thanks, I think I’m fine.”
“No you’re not,” Theon shakes his head. Fuck. Can he stop being — can he just stop? “Honestly, you should be glad your pretty face distracts everyone from, you know, the problem at hand.”
“Well, I never signed up for that singing bullshit.”
“Oh, but you’re still better at it than Targaryen was.”
At that, Jaime stops dead in his tracks.
“Wait, what. I’m not. He had been doing that for years, it was his trade, I’m not better at it.”
“And that’s where you’re wrong. See,” Theon says, still lounging on that chair in a way that would probably make anyone want to jump his bones, if Theon was their type, and he’s not Jaime’s but honestly he envies him the utter lack of shame when it comes to that, “yes, it was his trade, and yes, he looked comfortable and in his element and whatnot, but it was obvious he didn't write that music, because he sang well but he wasn’t feeling it.”
What the fuck is he even going at now —
“He wasn’t feeling it.”
“It wasn’t his issues. And I mean, I get why for you it felt better if anyone else aired your grieving to the world, but as much as it’s obvious you hate being in the spotlight like that, you put feeling in that. You can hear you mean them. Maybe it's not your trade, but you know Bruce Springsteen only ever started singing because every singer wasn't conveying things well, according to him?”
“I’m well-aware,” Jaime says, “and then?”
“I mean, you didn't sign up for it but you’re good at it, so how about you go and embrace it and stop being awkward? If you do that, your writing just gets better.”
He shrugs. He’s never told this to anyone, but he might as well.
“Guess I thought that if I do it then it means this isn’t temporary anymore.”
“… Lannister, you auditioned for a fucking guitarist,” Theon laughs, “how was it ever going to be temporary? And none of you looks like they want Targaryen to come back, so.”
That’s also true.
He knew that.
He just hadn’t exactly, well, thought about it. In depth.
Fuck, when Tyrion said that he has issues dealing with his crap honestly, he probably wasn’t wrong.
Fucking hell.
“Fine. Whatever. It still wouldn’t be correct.”
“Oh, because she gives a fuck about correct.”
Jaime wants to scream. She does. He’s talked to her enough to know she does, and okay, fine, he likes her, he’s liked her since she showed up at one signing post-concert once and blushed strawberry red behind her freckles while she handed him her vinyls and said that she was glad he moved to singing because the songs were beautiful but Rhaegar lacked soul when he sang them and he didn’t, and —
Christ.
He also has no fucking clue of how to even do that.
Not when —
“I don’t know how to do that,” he blurts.
“You don’t know to do what,” Theon says.
“Did you listen to those fucking songs or not?”
“I listen to them every fucking night, Lannister. So what?”
“And you haven’t figured out what the fuck was going on with my sister?”
Theon glares at him, narrowing his eyes, staring in a way that feels frankly unnerving, and then his mouth falls open, his lips parting, and Jaime is just barely glad that at least that shut him up.
Even if it means he figured that out.
“You mean, you two were — you were —”
“Yes,” Jaime says, “and I’ve never been with anyone fucking else and no one deserves to deal with my fucking baggage, so how about you can it?”
“Sorry, but hearing that just makes me think that you really should give it a go. If the only person you ever —”
“Don’t say it.”
“— is your twin sister, you need to move on and if you like her and she likes you, you absolutely should fucking do it. Hey, know what, I’ll be generous and leave you the changing room free after the gig.”
“I don’t need —”
“I can just drag Robb to the hotel and be done with it. Come on, live a little. What do you think our job is all about?”
“… Writing music?”
“Oh, yeah, writing music, and you’re into rock music and wearing a Woodstock t-shirt because you just picked a genre out of a hat or because you felt that it was the right one? And fine, maybe we’re at the time and age where it’s dying and the Stones belong in a museum and you have to sell a liver to afford concert tickets, but what’s the goddamned point? This kind of music was never made for correctness, Lannister. Of course you write rock songs if you fucked your sister, you couldn’t have gone for anything else. The entire point is letting go, not holding back. And you don’t when you write songs, so how about you act it?”
Jaime loathes that this asshole keeps on leaving him speechless. That’s usually his thing, leaving people speechless.
“We’ll see,” he relents, figuring that at least he’ll get Theon off his back.
“That’s not an answer.”
Of course he noticed. He breathes in.
“Well, I didn’t say I was not going to do anything now, did I?”
“Not good enough,” Theon says, “but really. You need to get some. That girl really dreams of getting some with you. Just go with it and you’ll be so much happier for it, I swear.”
He sighs. “You sound… very sure of that.”
“That’s because I know,” Theon shrugs. “The guy I was with before? In my previous band? Let’s just say that I’m never publishing the songs I wrote about that one year or people would ask me if I’m going to therapy daily, which I should have at that point, but still. After I was done with him I thought I was generally done for and I’d stick to fucking whichever girl showed up wanting to do me, and then things happened, and now I’m here wondering how did I ever think that was the best I could do, so. I’m just sharing wisdom acquired with experience.”
Thing is — he wasn’t even lying. Jaime knew. He had seen him and Stark backstage, kissing and holding hands and barely managing to keep their clothes on before they got to the changing room, the way they looked at each other, like — like they were the center of each other’s world, and he doesn’t think Cersei ever looked at him like that and he thinks he did and he wishes he never had, and —
“Good for you,” Jaime finally manages to say. “We’ll — we’ll see. I mean it.”
“Guess that’s the most I can get out of you,” Theon sighs. “Ah, well, I know to pick my battles. Very well, just let me know when you find out that I was right.”
And with that, he stands up and leaves the room, saying he wants to check the audience and so on, and — Jaime remains there, pulling on a pair of old black leather boots, thinking about how much he feels so fucking raw and exposed singing about Cersei’s bullshit every fucking night, and maybe it would be nicer to do it with something less hurtful than that, except that deep down he knows that Theon was right about one thing — Rhaegar never sang his stuff understanding it. He sang it well, sure. He had a good voice. He was nice to be around and everything, but he never did get it. He had actually asked him once where he found all the inspiration for such sad stuff, and Jaime had just shrugged and said shit families, you know, and he was in awe of the man, but how could he not be? He was older, he was — he was a force to be reckoned with and as much as he could have been as popular as his sister and as much as he came from money, he just couldn’t help feeling dwarfed, and the concept that they played his songs… it made him feel important, somehow.
Now —
Now fuck him, honestly, who fucks up and leaves an entire band and their baby son along with whoever’ll take him, and patience if it means he has to take the spotlight when he really never wanted it.
But still —
Couldn’t Theon just have kept his mouth fucking shut, Jaime thinks, and then drops sitting on the chair, and maybe she won’t be there today, but he knows she fucking will. She told him. She bought all the tickets for this tour as a belated gift to herself for having passed her A levels with flying colors and gaining a full ride to university, so — so she will be there.
Fucking hell.
The thing is — he is into her, he thinks, in a very confused way which screams of how much he should really get therapy instead of just, well, singing about it, but —
He’ll think about it later.
He has a set to plan and songs to sing and to do his job and to not think about how much he hates not just fucking playing the guitar and being done with it.
He can do that.
He can definitely do that, and he also can avoid answering his father’s calls — most likely he just wants to know for the umpteenth time when he’s going to get a real job, as if this isn’t one.
Yeah, fuck you too, he thinks, and then he remembers how his favorite Doors song since he was fourteen ended and he laughs to himself.
Father, I want to kill you, mother, I want to —
Yeah, he doesn’t particularly want to do either, but Theon wasn’t too wrong.
If you have our kind of issues, there’s really no other music we could have chosen, was it?
He smiles to himself and walks out of the changing room.
II
“So,” Theon says, as he drags Robb towards the back exit, “I might have told Lannister that I’d leave him the changing room for the night.”
“… What,” Robb says, following even if he’s trying to slow him down, “he finally decided to fess up to that poor girl?”
“Oh, that’s to be seen, I just gave him the chance to,” Theon shrugs, “which is why we’re taking a cab and going to the hotel at once.”
“Wait,” Robb says, “we should —”
He never finishes the sentence because Theon presses him against the wall and kisses him and fucking hell, Robb would like to just give in and let him and actually he would like to grab Theon’s shoulders and press him against the fucking wall, except —
“We should wait until the Kingsguard is done,” he breathes, “you agreed to sign those records, but it has to be with them. And people paid for it.”
“Oh, of course, ever the correct person —”
“Theon, I’m your fucking manager, you picked me, it’s not like you can exactly skirt around — obligations,” he groans when Theon sucks a bruise into his neck.
“Right, right, so you’d rather stay here and wait two hours instead of running to the hotel with me? We could make it, you know, if Jimmy Page and Robert Plant could —”
“It’s not the fucking seventies,” Robb groans, wishing Theon would just not press, even if fuck but now he really feels like he’s going to come in his trousers like a fifteen year-old and the fact that he’s definitely been wanting to kiss Theon at least since then is not helping, and yet —
“Really? I missed that memo.”
“Theon, we’re never managing to get there and go back or did you forget that the hotel is in the next town over because in this one they were so backwards they didn’t want two rock bands in the same one and they had three of them?”
“See, they still think we’re in the Seventies. Well then, I guess that you have a point, but we do have to make sure to not get too bored, shall we?”
“What the —” Robb asks, and then Theon goes on his knees in front of him, a certain glint in his eye, and — “Theon, we’re in fucking public —”
“And everyone is caring about Lannister and company,” he winks, “and you know I can be efficient.”
Robb should have protested.
The moment Theon pulls down his jeans and wraps his mouth around his dick each single protest he could conceive leaves his head — oh fucking hell, Theon’s mouth is warm and wet and perfect around his half-hard dick, and his tongue is circling it slowly, so very fucking slowly, a damned tease, until Robb groans and grabs the back of Theon’s head, pulling his hair and pushing, and then he can feel Theon grin just before he fucking swallows him whole and ohholyfuckingshit Robb has to bite down on his tongue to not scream.
“Fuck,” he blurts, feeling saliva pool down in his throat as he thrusts his hips forward and forward while Theon’s mouth takes him in even more, swallowing and swallowing and bobbing up and down as he leaks and leaks and gets harder and harder, fucking hell, “Christ, you’re a menace oh fuck harder harder harder —”
Theon does, licking at him faster, sucking him in deeper, and Robb feels like he’s going to spill at every fucking second, and then Theon’s fingers touch the small part at the top of his dick that he hadn’t managed to swallow and brush over his balls and fucking hell Robb is so going to come, he’s so fucking going to come like a fifteen year-old after not even two minutes, and he pulls on Theon’s hair harder pushing his head into his groin and oh fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck he’s —
“I’m close,” he says, “oh fuck I’m close you’re damned menace you really are a fucking tease aren’t you —”
Theon slows down a bit but swallows around his dick as if to answer yes that was the entire fucking point, and then — then Robb just can’t hold on anymore and he grasps at Theon’s shoulders as he spills into his mouth and holy fuck okay sure they’ve done it enough times that Theon knows how it works, but he doesn’t spill a damned drop as he drinks down all the come Robb’s pouring into it and it’s so fucking hot it sends a jolt of electricity along his spine and Robb can’t help coming in his mouth again and again, and when Theon lets his soft cock slip from his mouth very very slowly, very very lasciviously, Robb is about to fucking faint.
“So,” Theon says, “still regretting not being correct?”
He also has a dent in his leather trousers. Oh, fuck this —
Robb pushes him back, grabs his shoulders, pushes him against the nearest wall and slides a hand into his trousers, and of course the bastard went commando, fucking hell —
“You really can’t avoid pushing it, can you,” he wheezes, wrapping his fingers around Theon’s hard, hard cock.
“If Jim Morrison could do it,” Theon shrugs, still smirking, and yeah, okay, the bastard definitely lives in the Seventies still, or the Sixties at this point, but Robb is too fucking gone on him to give a damn.
“You’re not Jim Morrison and I forbid you to follow in those footsteps.”
“I’m sure Jim Morrison didn’t have such a good manager,” Theon winks at him.
“Sure he didn’t,” Robb shakes his head, and then he strokes.
Theon groans loud, his cock twitching against Robb’s fingers, and okay, the leather is inconvenient but Robb can work with that, and so he keeps on stroking and pulling and running his thumb under the head of Theon’s dick and squeezing and then stroking and pulling and squeezing again, and he grins to himself when Theon has to bite down on his shoulder to not scream as he spills all over Robb’s hand, hard, fast, but then again he was rock hard the moment Robb touched him, and like hell he’s going to move his fingers away until he’s spent — he keeps on stroking him through it until he can feel that he’s exhausted and that the trousers are stained beyond momentarily repair, and so what if when he moves his hand out of them he licks the palm very, very slowly, making sure Theon watches that happen?
He swallows, white saltiness disappearing into his mouth, and from the way Theon’s eyes darkened —
“Oh, no,” Robb grins, “you have to sign records in thirty. Now you’re going to go to the changing room, take a shower, put something else on and then at the hotel I’m giving you the full proper treatment.”
“You,” Theon grins, “are mean sometimes.”
“I’m also your bloody manager,” Robb smiles, “come on, right the fuck now. Or do you still want to be there when Lannister gets his shit together?”
“I don’t know, if they were both into it —”
“Theon, don’t even go there and go to wash, how about it?”
Theon makes a show of rolling his eyes before he raises his hands up in defeat.
“Okay, okay, Your Highness The Management, I shall now go and not stick to stereotypes when it comes to —”
“Sometimes before Christmas,” Robb laughs, pushing him towards the changing room, and when Theon gives him the middle finger he laughs harder.
Oh, he will make sure he properly enjoys himself, when they get back to the hotel.
Just not fucking now.
III
It’s not even the fucking first time he invites her into the changing room.
It’s usually the only place where they have a bit of privacy, and now that he thinks about it yes, it’s probably not exactly correct in the first place that he’d bring a fan back, but — well. At this point he’s on a kind of first name basis with her as much as she still looks awed that they’re talking in the first place, and — it’s not like he did it on purpose, she just… said something that made him feel like she really got it during the first signing she attended and he kind of told her that if she wanted to talk about it more he was free after it was over, and —
Well.
Here they are.
“Fancy a beer?” He asks, already holding one out. Bless the fact that this hole of a changing room does have a small fridge.
“Sure,” she says, reaching out to grab it, and then she swallows — “You know,” she said, “you sounded… more intense today.”
“Did I,” he says. “How?”
She shrugs, her large shoulders barely slimmed by the black band shirt sporting his face that she’s wearing, and fuck if it was weird being the face of the merchandise, except that it had to happen.
Fucking Targaryen.
“I’m not quite sure,” she says, “just… there was a difference? In the good sense, though. You felt… more immersed, not to say that you’re not usually, it’s just… I don’t know, I felt like crying more than once.”
Oh.
Well.
“Maybe,” he sighs, “I had a conversation with Greyjoy before that made me realize a few things,” he goes on. “I suppose. I don’t know,” he shakes his head, “I just… you’ve been listening to us since before Rhaegar fucked off, and I just — I guess it just sank in that I’m not going back to my former job anytime soon.”
“Can — can I say I’m not sad that you aren’t?”
“You can,” Jaime shrugs, “it’s just, it felt a bit too much. I never signed up for that.”
“But you sing those songs a lot better than he did.”
“Not the first person that told me that, today.”
“But it’s true. He just — he was good. But you just have a whole other delivery.” She blushes, guileless blue eyes staring into his, and he thinks of how she told him that his songs made her survive high school and some kind of ridiculous bet her supposed friends made about her fucking v-card and he just — fuck. She’s so nice. She’s the kind of nice person you wouldn’t presume listens to his fucked up lyrics, and yet.
And yet she does.
She drinks a sip of that beer.
Jaime does the same, wishing he knew where the fuck he’s getting at, here. He has no bloody idea. Not at all. Except —
“Thanks,” he says, “I just… I guess it was easier if he did it. Because I didn’t have to be the one blurting out my own issues. But — then I suppose it’s why it sounds better. Christ.” He shakes his head. “Not that he got that many of them, I had to explain some to him, and others I refused, but — never mind. He’s not coming back.”
“Well, it was unprofessional of him to leave in the first place,” she says quietly. “And — it was a real good performance, you know. And on one side I can’t wait for people to really notice you, on the other… I’ll miss the small concerts, you know.”
“No one says people will,” he half-smiles. “Maybe we’ll stay indie forever. Honestly, I don’t know if I’d mind. As long as it pays the fucking bills.”
She snorts, drinking more of that beer, half-smiling with those full lips of hers that Cersei would have found atrocious but that look so very soft right now, and he sits down not too far from her, not that the changing room isn’t cramped anyway.
“Best of both worlds?” She asks, still half-blushing, and fuck, how does he do this, yes, he likes her, he’s liked her for some time, it would be ridiculous to deny it, and yet —
“Let’s put it like that,” he clinks the bottle against hers, even if they both half-drunk theirs, and then he knocks it back again, and —
And maybe he should just come clean.
But how do you fucking do that, now he’d just like to know. Fuck Cersei and fuck his issues and fuck the fact that he doesn’t know how to do this like a normal person, and sure as hell for the job he does he’s nowhere near as smooth as tabloids would make him.
Or used to make him back when he still lived with his relatives.
He shudders.
“Can — can I ask you something?” He blurts, wishing he didn’t sound like a fucking thirteen year old.
“Sure,” she replies, and —
Right.
“Uhm. Just, hearing my stuff. The earlier ones. Did — what did you guess was going on with my sister?”
She looks down at the bottle. “Er,” she says, "something very unhealthy. It sounded like you had a thing going on, but everyone always told me I sounded like a creep if I said that. Everyone on the official forum, that is.”
He braces himself. “What if I told you that you were right and that it took me years to get more or less out of that mess and that I really think it’s time to move on with my life?”
Well.
Here it goes.
She looks back at him, mouth slightly parted, surprised, sure, but not disgusted, which — which is good, it really fucking is, because he couldn’t have borne it if it hadn’t been, and wait where did that thought fucking come from —
“That it’s admirable,” she says, “and that — I mean, I’m flattered that you’d trust me with it. I mean, uh, I — in your line of work, I guess you can never know, but —”
“You’ve been coming backstage for months,” he interrupts her, “I think I have a good idea of — what you’d spill around. As in, nothing because you never said a word on the forum either, and you could have just to get cred.”
“Oh, so you read the forum.”
“I lurk. If Oberyn wants to post on it, his business, I’m so not getting close to internet drama with a ten foot pole.”
She snorts. “Can’t blame you. Half of the people there are obnoxious.”
“Well, you still haven’t said anything. And —”
He breathes in.
“What if Theon kind of made me realize that — that I like you?”
Brienne turns to stare at him, her lips parted, eyes so wide —
“Wait,” she says, “you like me how?”
He laughs nervously. “Not — not the way you like friends, I think, and fuck, I don’t — I don’t do this, I haven’t been with anyone since Cersei regardless of how many people threw themselves at me and asking you here and now feels really sordid and oh we’re still stuck in the Seventies and whatnot, but — I just — fuck, I don’t know how to do this.”
She just stares.
“You — like me,” she replies.
“I do,” he says, hoping she can at least guess it from how broken his voice sounds, and then she inches closer, and —
“Let’s say I never did this either,” she replies, her voice trembling, and what — “What do you want to do right now?”
He swallows.
“Think I’d like to kiss you,” he says, hating how weak that sounded, and then she gasps and moves closer —
“What if I told you that you could?” She whispers, haltingly, as if she can’t believe she just said it, and when he moves forward and presses his mouth against hers it’s tentative and shaky and nothing like people think kisses in backstage changing rooms look like, but then she gasps into his mouth and her lips are so soft against his and her hands are touching his shoulders very very gingerly, and no one’s ever touched him like he could break at any moment and he thinks he doesn’t know what the fuck to do with it except whining into her mouth because it feels good oh it does and so he kisses her harder, and harder, trying to see if for once he can channel his predecessors into giving her a decent kiss, a rockstar-worthy kiss he supposes, except that he can just whine into her mouth while she presses harder and harder again and then she moans his name against his tongue as she slightly moves back and —
Fuck.
He’s so hard just with that he thinks it should be embarrassing, if only he could bring himself to give a fuck, except he can’t and he moves back and looks at her and she’s smiling back at him so fucking prettily with wet eyes like she’s about to cry in happiness —
“Christ," he says, “I didn’t — I wasn't sure —”
“Do you want to do it again?” She asks, tentatively, and —
“Fuck, if it wasn’t fucking sad I’d have done a lot more by now,” he admits, and then her eyes narrow and her mouth parts and —
“What is sad?”
“That I know this would be your first time and doing it in this fucking place is just… the bad kind of decadent? It’s not the fucking seventies. And it’s small and it’s cramped and —”
“And what if I don’t give a single fuck about that?” She blurts, and at that his cock twitches again, and —
He glances at the chair Theon had been sitting in before.
A moment later, he’s fallen down on it with Brienne’s legs around his hips, and her hands just got rid of his shirt while he pulled hers off, and oh fuck she had no bra underneath and yes she has small breasts but he can’t give a single fuck, actually — he sits up, moving a hand behind her back and sucking one into his mouth and oh it fits perfectly doesn’t it, and she screams and moans and whines as his tongue rolls over the nipple, feeling it perk under his tongue while his left hand reaches up to her other one and pinches and she screams so hard everyone outside probably heard her, and he can’t give a single fuck, he can’t he can’t he can’t as he rubs his cock against her thigh and she rubs back and fuck fuck fuck fuck god he’s not going to come in his jeans like a goddamned teenager except that the moment Brienne feels how hard he is she grabs his hair and pulls his head back, looking down at him with wide wide eyes —
“That — for me?” She blurts.
“Said I like you,” he rasps, “wasn’t just because of your shining personality, even if I like that too,” and then he thrusts his hips forward and she moans harder and then it’s a flurry of hands until he has his jeans thrown to the side of the room and hers are also on the ground along with her sensible white panties and his sensible black boxers and then he reaches down and slides a couple of fingers inside her and oh fuck she’s so wet —
“I suppose,” he snorts, “that’d be for me, too?”
“And who else,” she huffs back, and then he slides a third finger inside and curls them and she howls, asking for more and saying that it’s not the same when she does it and holy fuck he’s going to fucking die here, and his cock is leaking and hard harder than he can remember having been in his entire life, but not now, before — before he slides his fingers in and out in and out in and out and curls and curls and curls in that spot just behind her clit and she howls his name as she clenches her thighs and rains come on his hand, and then clenches them again and again and his hand is sticky and wet and when he moves it away and licks it clean her eyes turn a darker shade of blue, and then he barely has time to think before she’s grabbed his cock, put a condom on him that fuck Theon left on the nightstand and she noticed and he didn’t and slid down on it at once and —
Christ, Christ, she’s wet and warm and her hands and arms around him are trembling and shaking and he wants to spill he’s so fucking hard but he can’t, not now, not when he’s just inside her, and so he slides out a bit and thrusts up and then she rolls her hips and fucking holy hell she’s moving up and down up and down up and down enveloping his cock in that warm, wet heat and she’s grabbing his hair pulling it back and arching his head up and she’s leaning down to kiss him and his hands are grasping at those broad broad shoulders of hers and he’s fucking into her like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do and it could fucking be at this point, it could for what he cares, and it’s obvious she’s never done this before but the way she’s moving now, like she doesn’t give a fuck, like she’s not holding herself coiled as she usually does, and looking at him like she can’t believe she’s this lucky, he’s just —
He’s just —
“Fucking hell,” he blurts, “Brienne, Brienne, I’m — I’m not going to last, I’m —”
“Don’t,” she blurts, “don’t, I don’t care, we can do it again later, please —”
She wants him to come inside her, fucking —
He comes, at once, just like that, his fingers digging into the soft pale skin of her back, and she screams his name all over again and she’s drenching their legs and crotches again as she clutches her legs and —
And by the time she’s slipped out and flopped down on his shoulder and his arms are holding her close he’s breathing like he ran a goddamned marathon and he just —
Fuck.
Fuck.
“Please,” he says, “tell me you’re coming with me to the hotel after we get out of here.”
“I’ll do you one better,” she half-smiles, almost shyly, as she looks back at him, and — “What if I drive you so you dodge the bandmates’ questions?”
He thinks about what would Oberyn have said, never mind Theon, maybe he could have trusted Brynden and Jon to shut up, but —
“You know what,” he says, “you’re a genius. Yes. Yes, absolutely, you can drive me and the others can worry about the rest.” He feels elated now, unable to stop grinning, and maybe it’s fucking endorphins, maybe it’s that — that it didn’t feel sad or sordid or that she’s warm and heavy against him and she’s looking at him like he’s the best thing that ever happened to her and people don’t look at him like that, they don’t —
“Good,” she says, “then I’ll be glad to. And I’m not going to brag about losing my v-card to you on the forum, don’t worry. Even if it would be tempting.”
He laughs, pulling her closer, his mouth pressing against her hair and fuck it’s softer than it looks like, and —
“I don’t know,” he says, “maybe you could, sometime. But — are you sure? I mean, I’m —”
“Jaime, I’m saying it once and never again, got it?”
“… Okay. Sure. Shoot.”
“The first time I touched myself and came,” she blurts, blushing so fucking red it’s so endearing he doesn’t know how people could have ever told her she was hideous, “it was staring at your picture on some Rolling Stone issue I bought back in the day, so — just — yes, I’m sure. And I mean, it’s not that. If I had known you and thought you were an ass I wouldn’t be here. But you’re not, and I like you too, and this was kind of dreamy, not sad, so — make of that what you will.”
“Oh,” he whispers, and smiles a bit brighter, and nods, and — “So,” he says, “should we blow this shit joint and go to my hotel, miss Tarth?”
“I think we really should,” she smiles back, reaching for her shirt on the ground, and now that she puts it back on, it’s not so weird that it has his face on it, and —
He shakes his head.
He’s thinking about all the implications later.
He really just wants her to drive him back to his room now, and from the way she’s staring at him, so does she.
IV
“So,” Theon tells him the next day, on the tour bus, dropping in the seat next to his, “you did fess up.”
“Shut up,” Jaime groans.
“Oh, you did. I did meet her coming out of your room this morning.”
Oh, fuck.
“And she looked very, very happy. Should I congratulate her today, or…?”
“Just shut the fuck up. You were right, and I’m writing a damned song on the topic, and no it’s not sad, and no you can’t see it, so how about you say fucking nothing?”
Theon raises his hands, a fake-mocking grin on his face, but he does look genuinely happy for him, so.
“Okay, okay, but see, I was right, and you even admitted it, now if it means we’re getting a better record deal tomorrow —”
“You wish,” Jaime groans, and then of course Oberyn comes by and pats him on the shoulder so hard it hurts and tells him he finally joined the club of people having good sex from people they actually like, and he’s just glad Jon and Brynden say nothing while Robb Stark sends him a sympathetic glance, and —
He looks down at his opened notebook, and he smiles, and he realized it’s the first time in his entire life he smiles while writing a song.
Uh.
Well then.
Then he’ll just avoid paying attention to all of these idiots around him, as much as he actually likes them, and work on it.
Yes.
Yes, he decides, thinking about how he will show it to Brienne later, he likes that prospect very, very much.
End.
