Title: In The Midnight Hour

Author/pseudonym: Tinnean

Fandom: The Big Chill

Pairing: Sam/Richard

Rating: NC-17

Email address: Tinneantoo@aol.com

Disclaimer: Lawrence Kasdan still owns them; I'm still playing with them.

Status: new/complete

Date: 4/01

Series/Sequel: This is part 9 (oh, wow, who woulda thunk it!) of The Connection series, and follows The Weight

Other Web Site: http://www.angelfire.com/ny4/tinsel/

Archive: I'd like to see it archived all over the net, but since I don't belong to that many lists...if I sent it to you, please archive. Otherwise ask. I'm easy.

Summary: Sam and Richard meet at Alex's funeral.

Warnings: m/m, m/f implied, spoilers for the movie

Notes: Thanks to Silk for being there. And to Gail for her help. Without them, I'd still be writing het.

In the Midnight Hour
by Tinnean

Karen was standing between Michael and Sarah, her stance oddly protective. Sarah's eyes were red from weeping at the graveside. Michael's were hot as they raked over her body.

"You'd never get a crowd like this to my funeral," Karen said with a brittle laugh, endeavoring to distract him.

"Oh, come on now, Karen. I'd come." He waggled his eyebrows. "And... I'd bring a date!"

A smile parted Karen's carefully made-up lips, but it fell far short of her eyes. "Why doesn't that surprise me in the least, Michael?"

"That's just the kind of guy I am," he responded absently as he spotted Meg and Chloe, Alex's girlfriend slipping out the front door. His journalistic nose twitched as it sensed a story. He abandoned his two college friends and followed the other women at a discreet distance.

****

Sam Webber kept a cautious eye on Karen. She stood by the buffet with her arm around Sarah Cooper's shoulders, talking softly to her.

He used to flirt madly with Karen in college, knowing full well that while she enjoyed trading double entendres with him, she was committed to Nick.

He had thought, way back then, that he was playing the noble, besotted, Cyrano character in their little love triangle, but now he understood himself much better. It had taken the male lead in the TV show in which he had a small part to expose him to that aspect of his sexual orientation.

For a while Robin, his ex-wife, had been willing to cover for him, but then she had fallen deeply in love with her hairdresser, who turned out to be the one stylist in Hollywood who wasn't gay!

Now Sam had to be especially careful. Not only would his visitation rights be jeopardized, but his standing in the movie community as well. So he was often seen with this up-and-coming starlet, or that high-fashion model, and sometimes he even fucked them.

But his heart was tied up elsewhere, and had been for some time now.

He watched hungrily as the neatly dressed man in the dark business suit took a bite of his sandwich. A smear of mayonnaise got on his lip, and Sam had the sudden urge to go up to him and kiss it off.

The man glanced up just then and caught Sam's sultry gaze. He ran his tongue nervously over his lips and licked the bit of mayo off. Sam grinned wickedly, his patented, J.T. Lancer, charm-'em- right-out-of-their-panties smile. A hectic flush mounted the man's cheeks.

Sam glanced down discreetly at the front of the man's trousers. Ah, yes, a very satisfying reaction.

Richard was sporting a very impressive hard-on.

Sam looked up to find Richard frowning. Yes, he was hard, but he was not happy about it.

Sam put couple of ice cubes into a plastic cup and poured some Scotch over them. Then he picked up a can of Dr. Pepper and walked to where Richard was standing, raptly studying his sandwich. Sam had no doubt he could smooth the other man's ruffled feathers. He handed him the soda.

"Richard."

"Sam."

"I've missed you."

"Really? It's been hard to find excuses to come out to the coast. And then, the last time I was there..." Richard let the words peter out.

Sam groaned softly. "Don't remind me! That officious, interfering excuse for a publicist! If he had told me it was you, right from the start, I would have cancelled that business meeting!"

"Would you have? That looked more like a *date* than just dinner with the *suits*! Or should I say *suit*, singular, as in just you and him in that back booth?"

Sam looked into Richard's dark eyes, which still reflected the hurt. His charm was not about to get him off the hook this time. "Nothing happened, you know."

"Sam, you don't owe me an explanation. I know you have a life in LaLa Land." But it had felt as if his heart had been ripped out and stomped on. The man Sam was having dinner with was so young, and so obviously...available. "It isn't that big a deal."

The actor felt his stomach drop. Was Richard ending their relationship? He'd be damned if he let that happen! "Isn't it? Oh. If our situations were reversed, I would have stormed into that restaurant and caused a scene!"

Richard wasn't about to tell him how close he had come to doing just that. Instead, he took a deep swallow of his soda and blotted his lips with a napkin. He avoided Sam's eyes. "I followed you there. I saw you, and him ... Excuse me, Sam. I've got to use the, uh..."

Karen's husband turned away from his occasional lover and blindly put down the can and his sandwich. Sam looked at the mangled remains and felt his heart stutter.

Richard *had* to still care; Sam certainly did. If there was any question of that, this sudden turn of events had proved otherwise. But Sam knew it would take major explaining to convince his lover that the man he had seen him dining with was...what? The son of a friend? The nephew of a business associate? Someone from back home?

*A big mistake*?

He deserved better than that. When Richard, mild-mannered Richard, starting calling California 'LaLa Land,' Sam knew he was pushed to his limit.

There had to be something there he could salvage, and he was determined to find it. The realization that Richard might no longer want him, might be using that date he had gone out on as an excuse to end their relationship, was scaring the shit out of him.

He took a step to follow him, but found his path blocked by a young teen who was holding a copy of Us Magazine. "Are you J.T. Lancer?" he asked in a voice that wavered between octaves.

Sam restrained his patience. "J.T. Lancer is the character I play on TV. I'm Sam Webber."

"Well, whoever you are, will you autograph this for me?"

"Don't you think we should be thinking about Alex today?"

The kid gave him a look that conveyed the message that if he'd had his choice, he'd be anywhere else but there. "I'll give you a buck!" the boy offered.

Sam took the magazine and scrawled his name across his picture on the cover, taking a perverse pleasure in the act of obliterating his face. He tossed the magazine back to the kid and muttering
something about needing the bathroom, strode hastily out of the room.

"Hey, Larry, was that J.T. Lancer?"

"Nah, that's the asshole who plays him!" The kid's eyes took on a sly cast. "Wanna buy his autograph? Five bucks!"

****

Sam knocked on the door of the powder room.

"Just a second!" Richard's voice was somewhat muffled.

Sam reached for the doorknob and rattled it.

"I *said* just a second!" Richard yanked open the door. But before he could step out of the way, Sam was crowding him back into the small room and locking the door behind his back. His hands tangled in the other man's dark hair, and he pulled his face down.

"Fuck it, Richard! Kiss me! It's been too long!"

"Not *my* idea!" Richard whispered hoarsely.

Sam was fascinated by the way his full lower lip thrust out. He forgot about all his carefully reasoned arguments. He took that lip between his teeth and drew it into his mouth, suckling it,
gently at first, and then with more force as desire lit a fire low in his gut.

Richard moaned, and Sam swallowed the soft sound. His hands reached down, and he shaped his lover's arousal, tracing the broad head through the thick cloth of his trousers. Sam's tongue swept into Richard's mouth, teasing him into responding.

"Fuck me, Richard! I know you're angry with me, and you have every right to be. Take it out on my ass!"

"Be careful what you ask for, Sam. Right now I could take you without lube!"

Sam shuddered from the heat of the other man's words. "Is that what you want, babe?" His hands went to his belt, and he unfastened it. He dropped his trousers and stood before the other man, his cock dampening the snug white briefs he wore. Sam held out his arms, as if in surrender. "I'm all yours, Richard," he said in a flip tone.

The other man ripped Sam's underwear in his anger and his hurt. Spinning him around, he kicked his legs apart and pushed him forward to balance on the pedestal sink. Sarah had a bottle of baby oil on the shelf beneath the window, and Richard poured a dollop into his palm. He began working it into the skin behind Sam's balls and up to the puckered opening.

Sam shivered as he realized that in spite of his pain, Richard still wouldn't do anything to harm him. He spread his legs wider and moaned as his lover inserted a second finger into his narrow passageway.

There was a tense moment while Richard searched for a condom. Sam pressed his erection against the cool porcelain of the sink, desperate for some relief. And then the head of Richard's cock began to slide past the tight ring of muscle and started the burning glide that would bring them both to orgasm.

Warm material rubbed against Sam's buttocks. Richard had merely opened his trousers, not even bothering to lower them. Sam knew he meant it as a form of punishment, but the idea of his lover
dressed, while he was nearly naked, was so exciting that he knew he wouldn't be able to hold out much longer.

"Richard, *please*!"

Richard understood what he wanted. He began stroking Sam's cock harder and changed the angle of his thrusts so that he connected with his lover's prostate.

After that, it was all over but the shouting, which they couldn't do in case someone was waiting outside the door. Richard clapped a hand covered with Sam's come over the other man's mouth to
muffle his groans. Sam's tongue tickled his palm. He bit down on Sam's shoulder to stifle his own moan.

Richard kept his arms firmly around Sam's waist while they waited for the tremors that rippled through them both to subside and for their breathing to return to normal.

Sam winced as Richard's softened cock slid from him. In spite of the care he had taken in preparing him, Richard had fucked him fiercely. Sam knew the memory of this interlude would be something he would jerk off to for months to come.

"I'm sorry I hurt you, Sam," Richard murmured in his lover's ear.

"I'm sorry I hurt *you*, babe."

"I want to know why, Sam. I know you have to fuck those women sometimes, but why that ...*kid*?"

Sam shrugged. "I was lonely. And bored." He couldn't bear to see the disappointment in Richard's eyes. He stooped to pull his trousers back up. "And you weren't there." He drew in a deep breath. "I saw you in the restaurant, but by the time I got to the door, you were gone." His mouth twisted unhappily, and he wound his hand around Richard's neck. "You know something, babe? I'm a top."

Richard looked confused. "Pardon me?"

"I *fuck*. I don't *get* fucked." He toyed nervously with the strands of hair that fell over the base of Richard's skull.

"But..."

"Except for you, babe. I bottom for you."

~End~