wickerpark | (no subject)

Christmas was fucking cold, Gael thought as he walked down the street. His phone would buzz occasionally, and he'd pull it out to a snapchat from Carlos. At first those snapchat conversations had been pretty damn dirty, with pictures to go with it. Over time they were getting just more conversational, innocent.

This was not one of those moments as Gael watched Carlos's hips roll suggestively before he pulled the camera up and winked at it saying he missed Gael. And fuck him if he wasn't groaning a little, because he missed Carlos too. For more than the sex, which was probably just...wrong. The guy was in the Navy, Gael told himself. What could possibly come of a relationship like that? Carlos would break his heart, no doubt.

"Hey," a voice said, catching Gael's attention as he looked up. Seth Mansour was a sexy, middle-aged, mild-mannered, sexy a fuck accountant that lived next door to him. Gael had met his kids, and even grew up with the eldest daughter. And while she was pretty, her dad had always captured Gael's imagination. More so when the man and his wife got a divorce. He'd been 14, then. And like all 14 year old boys, he let his lower half do most of his thinking- especially when it came to watching Mr. Mansour from his bedroom window. And then he saw Mr. Mansour bring the first guy home, and Gael had always wondered if the man knew Gael could see into his living room from his bedroom...Because, well. There wasn't much effort to hide what came next.

"Hey," Gael said with a smile before he bit his lip. His phone buzzed again as Gael leaned against Mr. Mansour's gate. "Been a while."

Mr. Mansour laughed gently at that, nodding his head as he smiled a bit shyly. The man was not shy, though. At least not once they were behind closed doors. And Gael knew that well enough from first hand experience. And that had his body stirring at just the thought of it.

"Your dad's still working?" Seth asked as he bit his lip, looking Gael up and down lewdly. It was clear that he'd missed him, and their little...adventures. For a man who was 'new' to the gay scene, Gael thought with amusement, he'd certainly not gone at it timidly.

"Uh, yeah. For a while yet. He's taking next week off, which leaves me with a lot of free time. To catch up with friends..." He said stepping up closer as Seth grinned and laughed a little more nervously. Or maybe that was excitement. His phone buzzed again, and he ignored it. "You know...you could come by some time."

"You could come in, now." Seth countered, and Gael felt his heart skip a little. For a moment, his thoughts drifted to Carlos, and his heart sank just a little.

We're not dating, he told himself as he looked back up at Seth and grinned and nodded before he opened the gate and let himself in. They weren't dating. And he couldn't say no to this, he thought.

It was much later, and after a shower in Seth's bathroom, before Gael left the man's building. Seth walked him down, and even pulled him back for another suggestive kiss, grabbing his ass as he murmured something about Gael needing to come back upstairs. But Gael could only smile at him, kissing him again before he turned and started down the steps...

And then froze. Because Daniel Prochazka was not the person he expected to see standing outside the gate to their neighbor's building.

Threaded | Flat

He'd knocked off early, which was one of the benefits of being in charge. And also, admittedly, was something he was able to simply because of the long hours he put in while Noelle and Gaël were at school. There wasn't, after all, anything to come home to when the apartment was empty.

As such, the latest milestone had been reached ahead of time. He could afford to spend a little extra time with Gaël instead of waiting until the next week when Noelle was flying in from London. Or, at least, that had been the plan. But the apartment was empty when he'd come in, and when he checked Gaël's room - well, he'd gotten the kind of eyeful that was going to be burned into his retinas for all time. It was one of the times when he really missed Léon, he thought, scrubbing his hand over his face as he stalked back down to lie in wait. Not because Léon would have been much help on what he was about to have to do, but because it would have been someone to scream to. He didn't really have anyone to scream to these days when the kids drove him to it.

It was the thing no one ever told you about being a widower.

So he'd gone downstairs, and he'd pulled his temper into check as he waited. And waited. And tried not to visualize what was happening upstairs while he waited.

He didn't immediately speak to Gaël when his son turned and saw him standing there; he honestly didn't trust himself to. "Mansour," he said, though, in an arctic-cold tone that must have gotten the point across, because the piece of shit swallowed visibly and backed quickly into the condo building. Not that that was going to save him, Daniel thought as he aimed the same look at Gaël before he caught his arm in a grip. "Have you fucking lost your mind?" he hissed as he stared down at him before yanking them down to their own building. "What in the ever living fuck were you thinking?"

No thinking had probably been involved, he thought as he pushed Gaël into the elevator. Gaël had been doing this kind of thing since Léon had been shot in that convenience store. And honestly, he was as much at a loss at how to deal with it as he had been when he was sixteen year old trying to keep Léon alive.