Title: Phantom Pains

Author/pseudonym: Barb G

Rating: nc-17, as usual

Pairing: Joe/Billy

Date: March 21st

Archive : (yes or no) sure

Series: Part of the Old Days

Disclaimer Not mine, never will be.

Summary: Billy reflects on their first night back. Well, no. Billy gets hammered their first night back and thoughts happen. Oh, and Joe. Joe happens, too.

Warnings: None, unless you happen to like instant coffee. Melissa beta'ed this and did a great job, although I'm not quite sure what this is doing in the warning section. Don't drink wild cherry pepsi after eleven.

Phantom Pains
by Barb G

Billy sheltered the lighter from the wind and lit his smoke from it. It was an automatic action; if it had required any thought, he doubted he would have been able to do it. He was too smashed to really feel the chill, but it was impossible to ignore how chapped his hands were. Fuck, he forgot how cold Vancouver got in November. No snow, but the wind off the ocean cut through his thin jacket like he was naked.

The door to the cheap motel opened and closed, but Billy didn't turn around. A jacket settled over his shoulders; it was warm, and it smelled like Joe. "You're going to catch your fucking death out here," Joe said around the cigarette in his mouth. "You okay?"

Billy didn't answer, but gratefully drew in the warmth from his jacket. Joe reached out and touched his shoulder. "Bill?"

Billy looked at him, still not breaking his silence. He nodded his head to the music he heard and smiled. "Christ, you're hammered. Come on before you freeze to death, Mr. Hollywood," Joe said. Billy didn't fight the hand propelling him inside, and sudden heat blasted against his face. He blinked, but was beyond caring as Joe took him back to his room and came in with him. He stood in the middle of the floor as Joe prepared a cup of instant coffee with the single element provided in the room.

He laughed, thinking of all the times that they rented rooms in shit-hole motels that called a hotplate a kitchenette. Joe turned at the sound, but must have realized it was a drunken thought because he went back to what he was doing.

Joe finally led him to one of the beds and pressed the hot mug into his hands. The music in his head used his heartbeat as the bass, and he wanted to close his eyes and just sway to it, but Joe snapped his fingers. He looked up, trying to shake his head, but the mug almost spilled.

"Don't burn yourself, you fucking loser," Joe said, but his voice was soft. Billy peered up at him, cocking his head and then took a sip. He didn't feel how hot the instant coffee was with his numb lip, and it scalded the roof of his mouth. He jerked back, startled, but Joe took the mug from him. Billy watched him leave the room without protest and when he returned a few minutes later, the mug had ice cubes floating in it.

He drank some, wincing at the bitter taste; sewer water would have tasted better with a little sugar, and then went to put the mug down. Joe rescued it, putting it down on the bedside table, and then watched him struggle with unlacing his boots. The fucking sadist let him fight with the laces for long time before kneeling down in front of him to pull the boots off himself. Billy tried to smack the side of Joe's head, but hit so lightly he doubted it caused the damage he wanted. Joe looked up at him from his knees, and both of them flushed. Billy kicked back, crawling backwards towards the headboard, but made it halfway before he sprawled back. Joe joined him on the bed and looked down at him. "Some things don't change," Joe said, quietly.

Billy looked up at him, and didn't flinch as Joe's hand moved over his lower belly. He closed his eyes, wanting the hand to move downward, and when it did he hissed, softly. "Still gets you hard, doesn't it?" Joe asked, stroking Billy's dick through his jeans. Billy opened his mouth, but
couldn't speak. His entire body flushed, but when he tried to lift his hips up to meet Joe's palm, Joe drew his hand away. The room began to spin, and he automatically put his foot flat on the floor to keep his vertigo from spinning him off the planet. Joe went back to teasing his dick.

"Does it do it for you in LA?" Joe asked, moving his fingers slowly up Billy's cock again. Billy moaned, half protest and half begging, but Joe wasn't listening to him. "Does it? Your dick get hard when you whore yourself to the yuppies?"

Billy shook his head. It wasn't the same thing. Los Angeles had too much plastic and silicon to be real. Joe moved his palm down, letting the friction grow, and let Billy hump back without moving away. "Not a whore," Billy muttered.

His words must have surprised Joe, because the hand moved back. Billy soundlessly protested again and tried to catch Joe's hand, but Joe wouldn't let him, so he tried to reach himself. Joe caught both his hands easily, and fighting against the grip made the cotton his mind was wrapped in start to tear. "No, William, no. Say it. Say, 'I'm a whore, Joe'," Joe said.

Billy lifted his hips off the bed. His cock seemed like it was pulling all the unneeded blood from his toes to the roots of his hair and it had never been harder in his life. If he was straight he would have fucking killed Joe, but all he wanted to do was beg.

Joe stretched out next to him, throwing a leg over Billy's thigh. The heat from Joe's hands and the contact of the thigh made him flush again, but he couldn't move enough to make more of the friction he needed. He supposed he would look more pathetic if he actually opened his eyes, but he couldn't quite raise the energy. The darkness made it all seem surreal, just like the old days. "Say it, Bill. Say, 'I'm a whore'," Joe's voice raised an octave. "'I'm a whore and I fuck with people for money'."

Billy finally opened his eyes. Joe looked down at him, smile in place, but he was being serious. Billy narrowed his eyes, squinting to see how Joe had changed, but didn't notice anything different. Same fucked-up hair, wild eyes, knowing smile, and the ability to make Billy beg for it.

"Please," he repeated, but Joe was right, money for music. At least with each other they had fucked for the pure joy of fucking with each other. "I'm a whore," he whispered.

Joe let go of his wrist and moved his hand down to Billy's crotch. "Louder, Billy," he said, moving in for the kill. Joe barely moved fingers over his dick, and Billy almost howled in frustration. "Say it like you mean it."

"I'm a whore," Billy said, throwing his head back. But he hadn't been Joe's whore. His bitch, definitely, but he had been too loyal to be a whore. The room began its slow rotations again, and not even his foot on the floor helped. The only thing it did was spread his legs wider for Joe, but he was beyond caring. Joe rubbed him furiously, and the heat it created spread through him. Joe let him move his hips, forcing the hand faster against him. The buzz and the room-rotations and the build-up to the come all bled into each other and the only thing in his world that mattered was the four extra seconds it would take to finally be able to explode.

Joe had moved over him so that he could look down. His lips pulled back in a twisted smile, and Billy couldn't look away; it was how Joe got off from a performance. For years they fed off each other; groupies might have taken away some of the hunger, but the need was still there, even after a full night of fucking. Joe knew it, used it, and gave it back to him. "Please," he managed one more time.

He hadn't expected Joe to kiss him. They kissed while Billy was Joe's slut, but now that he was a whore, he doubted Joe would want him. Joe met him, panting into his mouth as Billy parted his lips out of surprise. Billy couldn't fight off the tongue and he didn't want to. Joe's hand was going to give him carpet burn if they kept at it, but Billy was beyond caring. He counted backwards in his head, three...two...one, and then let himself go. Joe held him, letting him shudder until his body was limp, and then slowly pulled away.

Billy lay there as Joe got up and went to the bathroom. His entire body felt spent, like he could finally let the exhaustion from the performance catch up to him. He started to shiver, still over the covers, and Joe came back to help him pull off his now sticky jeans. He wanted to thank him, but Joe was almost businesslike as he tugged off his shirt. Without being asked, or without Billy thinking of denying him, he stripped his own clothes and joined him in the bed. Too many years had passed for them to fit naturally into each other, but it only took a few moments to remember. Billy turned on his side, and Joe spooned next to him.

The blankets were piss-poor; the threadbare sheet barely kept the woolen second blanket from touching him, but with Joe's furnace behind him, he wasn't cold for the first time that night. That was Joe, great for fucking up his life by day and keeping him toasty warm at night. For their last
years together, that was the sum total of their relationship

He was able to pass-out and call it sleep for a couple hours before the alarm clock woke him up again. It bleeped for less than three seconds before Joe yanked it from the wall and smashed it against the door. He curled back up, but woke up cold again a while later. He went to reach for the covers, but discovered just as he passed the moment where he wasn't truly awake that they were neatly folded down around his hips.

"This one is new," Joe said, fingering a small scar over his ribcage on his left side.

"The fuck it is," Billy snapped, annoyed at being woken up so early. The hangover from the bender the night before flared, but he was able to push away the pain out of years of practice. "What time is it?"

"Six thirty. Where'd you get it then?" Joe asked.

"Eighth grade. Your fucking bike, did you set the fucking alarm?"

Joe ignored the question and stared at the scar instead. "Bullshit," he finally said, and fingered a scar barely visible in the grey light. Billy had to sit up to look at it, and even then the angle was awkward. "This was the bike," Joe said.

Billy stared at the new one, vaguely remembering the ugly fucker with the broken bottle through another alcoholic haze. "Bar fight," he finally said. "Some asshole decided to tear me a new one," he said.

"And this?" Joe asked, touching a patch of speckled road-burn the size of his palm.

"Hitched a ride to Vegas on the back of a bike. He hit a sand dune and lost it," Billy said.

Joe moved his fingers familiarly over the other known injuries. He touched the rough rib that was broken when they fell from a tree trying to look at Joe's next door neighbour lady getting changed. They hadn't seen anything, and Billy had walked around in pain for days before admitting to his parents what had happened. They flipped on his ass, but Billy hadn't realized the
danger of it. There was a cigarette burn on his upper arm which matched Joe's exactly, and a dozen nicks and scratches from countless fights that had ended up bloody. Some of them were too faint to even see, but Joe found them anyway.

"What about you?" Billy asked, rolling onto his other side.

Joe rolled onto his back to show off a three-inch scar on his lower belly. "Got stabbed," he said.

"The fuck you did. You got your goddamn appendix out," Billy said, pushing him back against the bed hard.

"Fuck you. I could have been stabbed," Joe said, but let Billy pin him down.

It was totally by Joe's will that Billy was over him, but suddenly the semantics didn't mean anything. "But you weren't," Billy said. Joe's ability to make up truths had always amazed him. "You're so full of shit your eyes are brown."

"That was so fucking original, Shakespeare," Joe snapped.

"That's why you're the fucking songwriter," Billy snapped back, but Joe grunted as Billy threw his leg over him and sat up over his lower belly. He took a second to adjust Joe's cock behind him so that he wasn't sitting on it, and then sat back. It wasn't often that he saw Joe vulnerable like that, body trembling so as he breathed in painful gasps, and Billy loved how concave his belly was as he sucked in his breath.

Joe's chest was almost hairless. Billy scraped his callused fingers down the line of his chest, and Joe's breathing caught. "You'd better fucking finish this," Joe warned with a low growl.

"Bite me," Billy said, and then to demonstrate he moved down to rake Joe's nipple between his teeth. Joe hissed, and Billy felt Joe's hard cock brush against him, but neither of them mentioned it.

"Yeah? Well, eat me," Joe said; it was meant as a challenge, and Billy took him up on it.

Billy shifted down, moving so that he could crouch down between Joe's spread legs, and Joe took hold of his head and lowered it down to his cock. Billy did nothing but cover his teeth as Joe fucked his mouth. He looked up; Joe had stolen his pillow and used it to prop himself up. He moved his hand slowly down his chest, but stopped when he saw Billy staring. "I forgot how
good you look down there."

"Asshole."

"I'd bore you if I wasn't."

He didn't looked up, not wanting to think of his Joe any other way. He vindictively raked his teeth down the sensitive underside of Joe's cock, not hard enough to really hurt, but enough to kill the mood. Joe only laughed, and grabbed his head again.

He had also forgotten about Joe's stamina. His jaw started to ache and his lips chapped, but he accepted it as his duty. Joe finally tightened his body and let himself come, and Billy caught the semen on his tongue. He moved up, letting Joe kiss him again. Joe licked up the come off his
tongue, even though Billy found the whole idea disgusting. He didn't swallow and Joe didn't expect him to, but it was a compromise between Billy getting up and spitting it out. Their old games came back to him, and it felt good to play them again.

Joe didn't volunteer to give him back his pillow, but he moved down on his side so that he could use Joe's arm instead.

An hour later he woke up to Joe's hand cupping him. He wasn't hard; the end of a pounding headache made sure of that, but he liked the way his dick felt in Joe's soft hand compared to his own rough one.

"Good morning," Joe growled in his ear. It was such a normal thing to say that it surprised him. Especially since Joe began to work his hand up Billy's cock and play with the curly hair. He never tugged hard enough to hurt, but Billy was definitely...aware of the area.

"What time are we meeting Pipefitter and John?" Billy asked. He could pretend to ignore the hand moving against him as long as Joe could. Joe shifted so that his cock rested against Billy's ass, and Billy pushed back against it. He heard Joe's breath quicken, and then Joe bit down on his ear. Again, not hard, but sudden awareness flushed the area with blood.

"Oh, tennish," Joe said. Billy knew that was a lie, but he forced himself not to think of Pipe and John waiting for them in the cold morning while they were wrapped up with each other in bed.

"We should get up," Billy said. His breath caught for a second as Joe removed his hand, but it was only to lick his palm before he continued again.

"Definitely," Joe agreed. Billy hissed as John rubbed his thumb against his glans as he began to really move behind him. Joe hadn't forgotten anything, not a scar or a spot. When he wanted to be, Joe was pure consideration. It was too bad he hardly ever wanted to be.

Billy shook his head, not wanting to think of Joe the asshole, either. There would be enough of him surfacing in the next five days without dwelling on him now. "I have to brush my teeth, you have to shave," Billy said, instead.

"Guitarists can't play if they have gum disease," Joe said, voice low.

"You know, you really are a prick," Billy gasped. Joe threw his leg over Billy's waist to hold him still as his one free hand snaked around Billy's shoulder and the other just began to straight jerk him off. No games, no ploys.

"And you're an asshole, so it just works out," Joe managed, and his voice was strained as well. His hand tightened possessively over Billy's cock, and Billy moved his hand down and worked his fingers over Joe's wrist. Joe's tendons were tight, and they felt like strings to him. He turned his face into the pillow to muffle his laugh, and tried to find a fourth string to make a G bar chord. Joe bit his shoulder lightly.

"I got something else you could play," Joe whispered, but his fingers were feather light against Billy's cock.

"I play guitar, not the ukulele," Billy said, indignantly, and then squawked as Joe moved faster than he could that early and pinned him back to the bed. Billy tried to push the weight off of him, but Joe caught both his hands and held them over his head. Billy struggled, but Joe held him there. Billy stopped fighting, and he looked up. Joe's mohawk had shot off in all directions during the night, and Billy suddenly wanted to smooth it down again.

"Punk ass bitch," Joe growled.

They had gotten shit-faced one night and actually measured a long time ago, and Billy grinned at him. "Punk ass bitch who is half an inch bigger than you are," he corrected.

Joe got off him suddenly. Billy sat up. "Where are you going?" he demanded.

"To get me a knife."

Billy tackled him from behind. He miscalculated the force and the distance to the edge of the bed, and they tumbled off the bed together.

He landed under Joe again, and suddenly realized he wasn't a teenager anymore and Joe was fucking heavy. "Get the fuck off me," he managed.

"Fucking get me off first."

He looked up again, but Joe was serious. His indignation had made his mouth tight and his nostrils flare. "Get off me," Billy repeated, but softened his voice. Joe backed away, and Billy sat up on the bed. "Why didn't you ask?" he said.

"You would have said no," Joe said. "It's not like you didn't get off on it."

"Oh, fuck that," Billy snapped. Joe moved to him, putting both his hands over Billy's thighs. Billy tensed, suddenly aware of the chill in his voice. "You fucking did it on purpose."

"Well, I sure as hell didn't do it by accident."

Billy backhanded him. Joe's hands tightened over his thigh, but he shook off the pain and remained on his knees in front of him. "That wasn't very nice," Joe said, parting Billy's legs. Billy didn't fight as Joe moved his thumbs over his sensitive inner thigh. His body flushed, but he tried to ignore Joe pushing his buttons.

"Why did you want me gone?"

"You wanted to leave."

"Fuck that too," Billy said, but Joe caught his hand before Billy could belt him again. Joe held his wrist as he fought to free himself, until he went limp. Joe dropped his hand and returned to making rough circles on Billy's sensitive skin.

"You wanted out, I let you go," Joe said. He bent down, slowly tracing out the circle he had been drawing with his tongue. Joe's breath touched the line of saliva, and cooled off Billy's flushed skin. Billy felt his muscles tense, and then relax under the Joe's ministrations.

"Awfully big of you," Billy said, voice dripping.

Joe looked up, but he moved his tongue slowly up the crease of Billy's leg, and Billy couldn't stop the shudder. Joe had been jacking him off almost as long as Billy had. The flat of Joe's tongue worked its way up the thick vein on the underside of his cock, and then Joe took him down his throat. Billy stopped him before he almost lost it. He was so hard it wouldn't take much more than the feeling of Joe's breath against his pubic hair. "So aren't you?" he asked.

Joe backed away. His right hand came up to work Billy's slick cock, while his left continued to jerk himself off. "What?"

"Going to ask me," Billy said.

"Nope."

That stopped him. "Why not?" he demanded.

Joe took the head of Billy's cock back in his mouth, and Billy couldn't stop the deep muscle trembles. "We should have picked Pipefitter and John up four hours ago," Joe said. Joe moved his fingers down to the base of Billy's cock, pinching down hard enough to cause pressure, and Billy shook his head, but did nothing to stop Joe. The trembles in his body became tremors, and sweat broke out on his back despite the chill. Joe pressed down on exactly the right spot, and then removed his fingers. The sudden release was so violent that Billy groaned. Joe didn't move off his knees, swallowing all of it, and then pressed his head down on Billy's thigh as his own hand sped up over his cock.

"Let me--" Billy began, but Joe shook his head, once.

Billy let himself watch. Joe kept his face impassive as usual until the last few seconds before he came, and then his face tensed and relaxed. For less than a moment, Joe looked nothing but purely content bordering on blissful. Childlike wasn't the word, but the anger, real or imagined,
evaporated.

When it had gotten really bad--just before they had broken up--Billy lived for those moments. It kept him the loyal slut at Joe's feet when the offers to play elsewhere came up, but it got so bad that not even those moments were enough. Joe pushed him too far, and Billy, for once, had let him. He hadn't realized it was just another way of Joe fucking with him yet again, but it made sense. The first couple months after he left, he had felt like something had been amputated, and he drowned the pain. Eventually his body had learned to compensate for the loss, and he coped with it outside the bottle. Gigs started opening for him again, and he got by.

He could have argued that Joe had ambushed him in the bar the night before with the new tour, but he knew that he had come to Vancouver for more than just Bucky Haight. He came back satisfied that for once, Joe needed him more than he needed Joe, but he had forgotten about the pain of being without as well.

Billy ran his hand through Joe's mohawk, finally able to smooth it out, and Joe opened his eyes. "Don't forget to ask me sometime," Billy said.

end