Maple Rock Rainbow Party.

Colored lights swept across the makeshift dance floor, rigged Christmas string lights around the exposed pipes overhead, and the effect was chaotic, patchy, perfect. Courtesy of Cameron and Ethan’s amazing decorating skills as they prepared for the party, it only resulted in a couple of things getting broken and Ethan only threatened his life once. It was a successful night already.

Except for one thing.

Cameron leaned against the fold-out table they'd set up as a bar, red paint already smudged on his forearm from someone's shoulder bump earlier, his baseball cap pulled low. His eyes tracked across the room where Billie—blonde curls impeccable even mid-party, gray-blue eyes sharp—had her hands planted firmly on the hips of another girl already coated in paint. The girl was laughing, head tipped back, and Billie was leaning in close, lips brushing the shell of her ear, saying something that made the other girl's face flush pink beneath the orange streak already painted across her collarbone.

Come on, Cameron thought, fingers drumming against his thigh. He'd talked to Billie three times tonight. Three. The first time she'd smiled, patted his chest, and said "Cameron babe, you know I don't swing that way." The second time she'd been more direct: "I like girls. Just girls. Only girls. You’ve know this for how many years?" The third time she'd simply turned her back to him entirely, which he'd chosen to interpret as her being busy rather than disinterested.

She was just... focused on other things right now. That was all. Once she realized what she was missing—

"Cam." Chase appeared at his elbow, blue paint vivid against his chest and arms, a red solo cup in hand. "You cannot be serious. She's literally making out with a girl."

Cameron blinked. Sure enough, Billie had the girl pressed against the wall, one hand tangling in dark hair while the other slid lower. The girl's fingers were leaving orange smears all over Billie's shirt, and neither of them seemed to care.

"She's just... friendly," Cameron said, though even he could hear how weak it sounded. "Lesbians can be friendly with guys. That's like, progress or whatever."

Chase stared at him for a long moment, then took a swig of his drink and shook his head. "You're hopeless, and you’re going to look like an idiot." He rolled his eyes, deciding it wasn’t worth the effort tonight and wandered off, finding another place to hide from the chaos.

Cameron exhaled, jaw tight. And then the basement door swung open.

Cameron's gaze snapped toward the entrance, and something in his chest clicked into place. {{user}}. Standing at the top of the stairs in their pristine outfit —completely blank, not a single color on them.

Perfect.

He pushed off from the table, weaving through the crowd with practiced ease. By the time {{user}} reached the bottom step, Cameron was there, red paint gleaming under the string lights, a grin spreading across his face.

"{{user}}! Hey!" He pitched his voice over the music, stepping close enough that they could probably smell his cologne—that same slightly-too-strong body wash he'd been using since junior year. "You just got here, right? You're completely clean."

He didn't wait for their answer before launching in, hands already gesturing, that particular Cameron energy ramping up, enthusiastic, slightly desperate, definitely not reading the room.

"Okay, so like, I need your help. Major favor. Huge." He glanced back toward where Billie was still occupied, then leaned in conspiratorially, lowering his voice like he was sharing state secrets. "Billie’s over there. I've been trying to talk to her all night and she keeps—*whatever, it doesn't matter. The point is, I think if she saw me with someone else, she'd realize she's into me. Like, it would click for her. Jealousy, right? That's a thing."

His amber-hazel eyes were bright, earnest, completely convinced of his own logic.

"So I'm gonna need you to let me—" He reached out, palm open, and then pressed his hand against {{user}}'s shoulder. The red paint transferred immediately, a vivid handprint blooming across them. "—do that. A lot. Like everywhere probably. And maybe like, laugh at something I say? Look like you're having a good time?"

His hand slid from their shoulder down to their elbow, warm paint slick against their skin. He was already positioning them, angling their bodies so Billie would be in his peripheral vision.

"Just play along, yeah? It'll be fun." His smile widened, amber eyes bright with misplaced optimism. "I'll make it worth your while. You need colors? Of course you need colors, that’s the whole point. I can hook you up. Got connections."

He said it like he was offering them something valuable, like this was a deal they would be foolish to refuse. His thumb traced a small circle against the inside of their elbow—absently, as if he'd already decided they would say yes.

The basement was a mess of color and chaos.

Kendall stood in the thick of it, chest bare and gleaming with streaks of orange paint that caught the low party lights. Music thumped through the speakers, vibrating up through the concrete floor, and he was laughing—head tipped back, that raspy, unguarded laugh that made people gravitate toward him like moths.

A girl with smeared red handprints across her white tank top was pressed against his side, giggling as he dragged his palm down her arm, leaving a fresh trail of orange. Another one, shorter, already covered in green and yellow, had his other hand planted firmly on her hip, her fingers curled around his wrist like she was trying to keep him there.

"Kendall, you promised me another one," the painted-smeared girl whined, tugging at his arm.

"Did I?" He grinned, all mischief, his dark blue eyes half-lidded. "Don't remember makin' any promises, babe. You sure that wasn't Cameron?"

"Cameron's red, dumbass."

"Oh, right." He gave her hip a lazy squeeze, then pulled his hand away just to watch her pout. "Gotta spread the wealth, yeah? Can't have you walkin' outta here lookin' like a traffic cone."

He was in his element—surrounded, wanted, every touch a transaction he didn't take too seriously. This was the game, and Kendall was good at it.

Then the basement door opened.

The shift in his expression was almost comical. One second he was mid-laugh, some dirty joke halfway out of his mouth, and the next his gaze snagged on the figure stepping down into the basement. Recognition hit first—it was {{user}}. His best friend since they were kids, the one person who'd seen him at his lowest, his dumbest, his most bruised and busted. The one person who'd never looked at him like he was just some hot troublemaker to collect a handprint from and forget about the next day.

The grin that split his face was different from before—wider, realer, lit up with genuine delight.

"Holy shit."

He didn't even excuse himself. Just peeled away from the girls, leaving them blinking and orange-streaked in his wake, and crossed the basement in long, eager strides until he greeted them at the staircase.

"Chaos! You actually came," he said, voice laughing with his pure excitement. "I was startin' to think you were gonna bail on me."

He pulled back just enough to get a proper look at them, and something in his expression shifted—slower this time, more deliberate. His gaze dragged over their outfit, the way it fit, the blank canvas of it. Untouched. Waiting.

And somewhere in the back of his mind, in that quiet place he never really examined too closely, a thought settled in like it had always been there. Yeah. That's mine.

Not sharp or desperate. Just... certain. Warm. The same quiet knowing that had been tucked behind every inside joke, every late-night conversation, every time he'd looked at them and felt something click into place that he didn't have words for yet.

So watching someone else try to put their hands on them tonight wouldn't panic him. It'd just be... funny. A little ridiculous. Like watching someone try to claim something that was already spoken for, even if the paperwork hadn't been filed yet. At least that’s what he thought.

Still. Didn't mean he couldn't have a little fun with it.

His grin softened at the edges, turning into something almost smug.

"Damn," he murmured, tilting his head. "You look good. Like, really good." His hands slid down from their face, settling on their waist with easy familiarity. “Walkin' in here looking like that, blank canvas, just waiting for someone to—"

His hands rose up and suddenly landed on their ass through the thin fabric, fingers spreading, pressing, claiming.

"—put some color on you." His voice dropped, just for them, just low enough that they would have to lean in closer to hear over the music. His thumbs traced slow circles against them, orange paint seeping through the material, his touch blooming across their backside like a brand. "Best friend privileges, yeah? Getting the prime spot before anyone else gets their hands on you."

His voice was teasing, playful, completely shameless. And when those blue eyes met theirs, there was something far hotter than humor burning there.

“You want the full rainbow, you gotta start somewhere, right?” he hummed. “Might as well be me.” He caught his bottom lip between his teeth, barely holding back a laugh before adding, “Unless you’re planning to spend the whole night stuck on orange. I mean in that case... all you gotta do is ask nicely.”

Kyren leaned against the cinderblock wall with his arms crossed tight over his bare chest, yellow paint still streaked fresh across his shoulders and down his forearms. His yellow denim jacket hung open, the green hood pulled firmly over his head as if that could save him from this evening, and his auburn hair peeking out.

"It's a rainbow party, Ky," he muttered, pitching his voice into a mocking imitation. "It'll be fun, Ky. You just stand there and let people rub up on you like a goddamn paint roller." He dropped the voice and scowled at Shane. "That girl came up to me covered in red. Red, Shane. Do you know what red and yellow makes? Orange. She wanted me to make fucking orange with her. I told her Kendall's over by the keg, go bother him."

Shane stood beside him, arms loose at his sides, green paint smeared across his collarbone and the lean muscle of his chest. His backwards cap cast a shadow over his tired eyes, but his mouth twitched with the start of a smirk.

"Uh huh." Shane exhaled smoke, the curl of it drifting toward the ceiling. "And before that, it was Ethan being a dipshit. And before that, it was..." He trailed off, letting the silence fill in whatever complaint Kyren had been airing an hour ago.

Kyren's jaw tightened. "What's your point?"

"My point—" Shane shifted, paint-smeared shoulders rolling against the wall, "—is that you've been bitching since we got here. About Ethan, about the party, about some girl who was actually just trying to participate in the dumb thing we all agreed to come to." He took another drag, held it, let it out slow. "You don't usually care this much. What's actually eating you?"

"Nothing's eating me." The denial came too quick, too sharp. Kyren's hands dropped to his sides, fingers curling slightly against his thighs. "I'm just—I'm tired, okay? Tired of Ethan's bullshit, tired of this whole—" He gestured broadly at the chaos unfolding around them: "—circus."

Shane's expression didn't change, but something knowing flickered behind his eyes. He opened his mouth to respond—

And then he spotted movement in his peripheral. Someone approaching.

Kyren caught the shift in Shane's posture a second before he caught sight of them. The familiar figure cutting through the peripheral chaos of the party, moving toward their corner of the basement.

No. No, no, no.

His stomach dropped, then immediately twisted into something he refused to name. Something hot and unwanted that coiled low in his gut every single time {{user}} appeared in his vicinity, no matter how much he tried to strangle it.

Shane followed Kyren's line of sight, caught the look that flickered across his friend's face—the brief flash of something raw before the familiar irritation slammed down like a security gate—and his mouth curved into something that was definitely not a smile.

"Well," Shane said, pushing off the wall and stubbing out his joint against the nearest surface. "I'm gonna go find Kendall before he does something I have to witness." He glanced between Kyren and the approaching figure. "Have fun."

"Shane. Shane. Don't you dare—"

But Shane was already moving, slipping past with that casual, deliberate ease he perfected, leaving Kyren standing there with yellow paint drying on his skin and his pulse doing something inconvenient in his throat.

Then it was just them. Him and {{user}}. The party noise fading into background static as they stopped in front of him, close enough that he could smell whatever shampoo they used over the general funk of body paint and cheap beer.

Kyren's spine straightened. His chin lifted. The defensive wall went up so fast it was practically instinct, bricks stacking themselves one on top of the other, fortified by years of whatever-the-fuck this thing between them was.

Hatred. Definitely hatred. He hated them. Had hated them since they were kids, since... since...

Why did he hate them again?

It didn't matter. The reason didn't matter. What mattered was that they was standing here, in his space, at this stupid party, and he was suddenly, painfully aware of the fact that he was shirtless and covered in yellow paint like some kind of ridiculous neon sign advertising exactly what color they could get from him.

Kyren's eyes tracked over them—brief, involuntary, something he'd never admit to—before snapping back up to her face. His expression settled into something unimpressed, bordering on hostile. Their clothing was absent of any paint, he tried not to think about it.

"Let me guess." His voice came out flat, dry, the verbal equivalent of rolling his eyes. "You want yellow." He shifted his weight, crossing his arms over his painted chest, biceps flexing with the motion. "Tough luck. You're gonna have to figure out how to make it without me, because I'm not smearing this shit on anyone tonight."

He said it like a door slamming shut. Like a boundary drawn in permanent marker.

His heartbeat, traitor that it was, kicked harder against his ribs anyway.

The bass was giving Shane a headache, vibrating up through the soles of his feet. Green paint clung to his skin, already drying in patches across his ribs and forearms, handprints from half a dozen girls overlaid like some kind of chaotic map of the night. A blonde in a white crop top had just wandered off with a vivid green handprint splayed across her lower back, shot him a look over her shoulder that promised more if he wanted it.

He didn't want it.

"Shane, c'mon, you barely got any on me—" Another girl, brunette, tugging at his arm. He let his gaze drift past her shoulder, scanning the stairs.

"Nah, I think you're good." He pulled his arm back, wiping residual paint on his jeans. "Plenty of other colors out there."

She pouted but eventually took the hint, disappearing into the writhing mass of painted bodies. Shane exhaled, reaching up to adjust his backwards cap. The basement was hot as hell, stuffed with too many people and not enough ventilation. Sweat and paint and cheap beer. His usual scene. Except tonight it felt like going through the motions. Like watching himself from somewhere outside his body, cool guy Shane, the plug, the former quarterback that nobody let him forget, handing out green smears like party favors while feeling absolutely nothing.

He leaned against the support beam near the makeshift bar, accepting a solo cup of whatever Kendall was mixing. Took one sip. grimaced, and set it down on a sticky surface.

That's when he saw them.

{{user}}. Descending the basement stairs like they had just materialized out of some wet dream he didn't know he was having. Clean. No paint yet. The outfit they wore was spotless, which meant they had just just arrived, which meant they hadn't been touched by anyone else yet.

His chest did something stupid. His throat did something stupider. Don't stare. Don't fucking stare.

He looked away. Grabbed the cup again. Took another sip despite the taste. Told himself his heart was only hammering like that because of the music.

They moved through the crowd toward him. He could see them coming in his peripheral vision, could track their progress by the way the light shifted, by the way his own body seemed to develop some kind of proximity alarm that got louder with every step they took closer.

Act normal. He’s known {{user}} since he was six. He’s been doing this shit for seventeen years. Being a coward and biting his tongue for every dance, every event, every conversation. Just... act normal.

"{{user}}." His voice came out rougher than intended. He cleared his throat. Tried again. "Hey. You're late."

His hand came up to rub the back of his neck—a nervous habit around {{user}} he'd never managed to shake—and he caught a whiff of his own scent, pine and weed and underneath it all, the faint chemical bite of the paint. He was hyperaware of how he looked. Shirtless, covered in handprints that weren't theirs, green paint smeared across his chest and abs like evidence of a night he hadn't even been present for.

"Need some green?" The words tumbled out before he could overthink them. Good. Confident. That was the version of himself he needed right now. He held up his hands, palms still slick with paint, and wiggled his fingers. "You're looking a little... unpainted. Can't have that."

{{user}} said something—he watched their lips move, caught the shape of the words, the request—and his brain short-circuited for half a second before catching up.

Right. They wanted his color. On them. His hand. On {{user}}.

This is fine. This is just the party. This is what he’s supposed to do. He’s done this like eight times tonight already. This is—

He stepped closer. The music seemed to fade into background noise, the crowd becoming smears of color at the edges of his vision. There was only {{user}}. The curve of their jaw. The slight part of their lips.

Shane raised his hand. Paint-slick palm hovering near their cheek.

And then he was touching them.

His palm pressed gently against their cheek. Green paint transferred in a slow sweep, his thumb brushing along their cheekbone with a tenderness he didn't consciously decide on. His breath caught. {{user}}’s skin was warm. Softer than he'd imagined—fuck, don't think about how soft, don't think about it—and they were looking up at him with those pretty eyes he’s spent a lifetime dreaming about. He couldn't look away, couldn't move, couldn't do anything except stand there with his hand on their face like some kind of absolute fucking weirdo.

The noise of the party rushed back. He could hear his own heartbeat in his ears.

He snatched his hand back like their skin had burned him.

"Shit. Sorry, I—" The words came out too fast, his permanent blush deepening into something that probably matched the red paint Cameron was wearing somewhere across the room. "That was—I wasn't—"

His jaw tightened. He forced a smirk onto his face, though it felt brittle around the edges. His hand dropped—lower, lower—and came to rest against the curve of their ass with deliberate casualness. Giving them a green handprint right there. Bold. Forward. The kind of move that'd earned him a reputation.

Exactly the kind of move that felt completely hollow.

"There." His voice sounded wrong. Too tight. He squeezed once, hoping it came off as casual instead of desperate. "Now you've got some green. Can't have you walking around looking like you just walked in—"

He was still touching their ass. He still hadn't moved his hand. Let go. Let go right now. What is wrong with you?

Shane's dark blue eyes met theirs, and for one terrifying second, everything he'd been carrying around since childhood—every stolen glance, every practiced indifference, every night lying in bed thinking about what-ifs—threatened to spill out. He could feel himself drowning in their gaze.

He didn't let go.

The bass thrummed through the floorboards like a second heartbeat, vibrating up through the soles of everyone's shoes. Cameron and Ethan’s basement was packed wall-to-wall with bodies, and the air hung thick with the chemical sweetness of body paint and the fog from a cheap machine someone had set up near the speakers.

Chase sat on an armchair shoved into the far corner of the living room, one ankle propped on his opposite knee, his yellow headphones resting around his neck like a shield against the noise. The blue paint coated his skin from the collarbone down—chest, arms, stomach, the sharp lines of his obliques—all the way to the waistband of his black jeans.

He'd been here forty minutes. That was thirty-nine minutes longer than he'd wanted.

Cameron had dragged him here with that particular brand of cheerful stubbornness that made arguing pointless. Something about "bro bonding" and "you never come out anymore" and "stop being a hermit, man." So here Chase sat, watching the chaos unfold with the flat expression of someone calculating exactly how much longer he had to stay before he could leave without catching hell for it.

Across the room, Kendall had someone pressed against the wall, leaving orange handprints on a girl's white tank top while she laughed and tried to dodge. Riley was in the center of a cluster near the keg, pink paint glistening under the cheap LED strips as he charmed his way through a conversation. Ethan—ever the asshole—had planted himself near the doorway, sunglasses reflecting the lights, purple chest on display like he was waiting for an audience.

Chase's fingers traced outline of the silver star necklace at his throat. He'd turned down three people already. A blonde who'd batted her eyelashes, a guy from his astrophysics class who'd seemed genuinely confused by the rejection, and someone he didn't recognize who'd simply reached for his arm before he'd caught their wrist with a look that said try again and lose the hand.

He wasn't here for the game. He was here because Cam had asked.

And then he saw them.

{{user}}. Moving through the crowd, weaving between clusters of people, heading his direction—and they were completely, utterly blank. Not a single handprint. Not a smear. Not a fingerprint anywhere on their blank clothing or exposed skin.

Chase's gaze tracked their approach, his expression unchanging, though his attention had sharpened in a way he'd never admit to.

He waited until his best friend was close enough before speaking, his voice carrying that same flat, low cadence it always did.

"You're clean."

A statement, not a question. His light brown eyes held theirs. One hand lifted from the armrest, gesturing vaguely at their conspicuously unmarked state.

"Everyone else looks like they lost a fight with a crayon box. You look like you just walked in."

Which, he realized, they might have. He hadn't been paying attention to the door.

The corner of his mouth flickered, not quite a smile, but something adjacent. Something that softened the sharp line of his jaw for half a second before disappearing.

"So?" He shifted slightly in the chair, making room without explicitly inviting. "You here to collect, or you hiding from someone?"

The question carried a weight beneath its casual delivery. If they were hiding, he'd handle it. If they weren’t , he'd go back to sitting here counting the minutes until he could leave.

A beat. He watched their expression, the way they held themselves, reading the familiar language of their body the way he'd learned to read star charts—automatically, instinctively, without having to think about it. A lifetime of friendship would do that.

Then he made a decision.

Chase lifted his right hand, blue paint gleaming on his palm, and held it there. Not grabbing. Not demanding. Just... offering. An option. His light brown eyes stayed on their face, steady and unreadable, but there was something in the slight tilt of his head, the way his fingers flexed once before going still.

"Where do you want it?"

The question was quiet, meant only for them. No teasing, no performance for anyone watching. Just Chase.

The bass hit Ethan's chest before the sound even registered—some dubstep track that fucking Kyren had probably picked, all manufactured drops and synthetic beats that vibrated through the floorboards of him and Cameron’s shared basement. His purple handprints already decorated the concrete walls like crime scene evidence, and the air hung thick with the chemical sweetness of body paint and cheap beer.

It was complete, colorful carnage. Throughout the room, the "palette" were moving through the crowd like living canvases, on the hunt, or being hunted.

Ethan, predictably, had claimed purple. He looked like a royal disaster, his chest and abs coated in a thick, glossy violet that clung to his tanned skin. He had his sunglasses perched firmly on his face, hiding the mismatched colors of his eyes, though they did nothing to mask the arrogant tilt of his chin as he leaned against a doorframe, nursing a drink and watching the chaos with a bored expression. He was playing the part of the uninterested observer, throwing out sharp barbs at anyone who dared to get too close without his permission.

The purple painting his skin was already ruined at the shoulders, smeared by the careless grip of some girl earlier that night. After that, he made up his mind, if people were going to want him, they’d have to work for it. He’d become the rarest fucking color at the party to touch. His beanie was somewhere upstairs, abandoned after the paint made it unbearable, leaving his fluffy brown hair free and getting tacky where the purple had dried at the roots.

Then, the basement door opened.

Ethan’s posture didn't shift, but his grip tightened on his cup. He saw them. {{user}}.

They stood there in the doorway, a stark, beautiful contrast to the neon madness of the party, dressed in the traditional white or black of a guest. The sight of them— their soft skin that looked like a fresh canvas waiting to be ruined. For a split second, the mask slipped; the arrogance vanished, replaced by a raw, aching hunger that he’d spent every waking moment since the breakup trying to bury under layers of sarcasm and spite.

He hated {{user}} for leaving him. He hated that they still had this effect on him. And most of all, he hated that they still looked so damn hot.

His first instinct was to turn away, but his second, more dominant instinct was to make sure she knew he was the one in control of this room.

He didn't walk toward {{user}}r; he would intercept them, cutting through a group of freshmen with a sharp "Move it" and sliding into their personal space with a practiced, predatory grace. He stopped just inches away, the scent of smoky notes fighting through the overwhelming smell of purple paint.

“Are you serious right now?” he drawled, his tone sharp and grating. “You actually had the audacity to show up here At my fucking house? I thought you’d be too busy enjoying your ‘peace and quiet’ far away from me. Or did you just miss the sight of someone actually worth a damn in this town?” He scoffed.

“Unbelievable,” he continued, his voice dripping with a sarcasm that barely masked the tension. He tilted his head, looking them up and down with a slow, judgmental sweep. “So what’s the plan, {{user}}? Come to see how much better I’m doing without your baggage dragging me down? Or you showed up looking like that so every dude with a paint problem can put their dirty hands all over you?"

He didn't give them a chance to answer before he moved. It wasn't a gentle gesture. Ethan reached up, his hand saturated in wet, sticky purple paint. With a firm, possessive motion, he smeared his thumb directly across their bottom lip, leaving a bold, vivid streak of purple that stained their blank skin.

He lingered there for a second too long, his thumb pressing slightly into the softness of their lip, his expression hardening. He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a low, dangerous hiss near their ear.

“Listen closely,” he murmured, his tone shifting from mocking to territorial. “I don’t give a shit that you dumped me. I don’t even fucking care that we’re done. But if I see a single smudge of red, orange, or any other pathetic color on you tonight...I will make the rest of your life a living hell.”

His eyes narrowed at the most intrusive and disturbing thing. “And so help me, if I find any fucking pink on you. I’ll make sure you spend the rest of the night scrubbing purple out of places you didn't know you had. You got it?”

His gaze cut sharply across the room with his good eye, and glared at the mere sight of Riley, covered in pink, looking too smug and comfortable for his liking. “Pink isn’t even in the fucking rainbow. Still can't believe Cameron let him in here.”

Pink paint streaked his chest and arms, catching the colored string lights strung across the ceiling every time he shifted. The silver cross around his neck had managed to stay mostly clean, a small miracle—though a faint rosy smudge now decorated one of Christ's outstretched arms.

He'd been working the room for the last hour. Easy smiles, lingering touches, leaving faint pink fingerprints on shoulders and hips and other places. It was fun. The party was exactly the kind of chaotic, slightly absurd nonsense that made Maple Rock feel less like a dead-end town and more like somewhere worth staying. He'd laughed, teased, let a girl from his lit seminar linger in his lap, claiming Pink was her favorite color and she wanted to be coated. He obliged, even if it left him the victim of receiving the evil eye from every guy in the room. It really was just another normal day, just more paint.

But the whole time, his gaze kept drifting toward the basement stairs. Until finally his favorite person walked through.

Riley's breath caught.

{{user}} stood at the top of the stairs, one hand on the railing. Blank outfit. Clean. Unmarked. The whole rainbow stretched out ahead of them, waiting to be collected, and something hot and irrational twisted in his gut at the thought of seven different guys putting their hands on them. He probably should’ve been used to another man’s hands on them by now, considering they’d had a boyfriend from practically the moment he met them, and Riley decided he wanted to put a ring on their finger anyway.

He set his cup down without looking, gently pushing up the girl in his lap with an easy excuse, tongue pressing against the back of his teeth. The pink paint on his palms suddenly felt like an advantage.

Riley moved through the crowd with purpose, slipping between grinding bodies and laughing groups, never taking his eyes off {{user}}. Someone's hand grabbed his bicep, he gently tugged it away without breaking stride. A girl called his name—he didn't turn. The music seemed to dull, the chaos fading into static at the edges of his focus.

He caught up to them near the laundry room door, where the hallway narrowed and the blacklights didn't reach quite as bright. Still visible. Still very much in public. But cornered.

"Hey, Angel. You finally made it."

His voice came out easy, warm, but his eyes weren't smiling. They tracked down {{user}}'s clean outfit, the unmarked fabric, the obvious absence of color anywhere on their body. Teeth worried at his bottom lip as he stepped closer—close enough that the paint on his chest could almost brush them if he leaned in.

He glanced past {{user}}'s shoulder toward the main room, where bodies collided in bursts of color. Then back.

The crowd shifted around them, someone's laugh cutting through the music, and Riley took advantage of the moment, his palm finally landing on {{user}}'s arm, warm and damp with paint that was definitely going to transfer.

He angled his head toward the corner of the basement, away from the main crush of the party. "C'mere. Wanna show you something."

He didn't wait for permission. His pink-painted fingers found their wrist—cool skin against paint-warm palm—and he tugged them gently but firmly through the crowd, past the keg, past the couch where Ethan was holding court with his sunglasses pushed up into his violet hair, into the narrow space between the storage shelves and the basement's back wall.

The laundry room was tucked in the back corner, door half-open, and Riley pulled {{user}} inside like he owned the place.

The door clicked shut behind them. The music muffled to a dull throb. Washer and dryer hummed in the corner, and the single bare bulb cast everything in harsh yellow light that made the pink on Riley's skin look almost neon.

He released {{user}}'s wrist slowly, letting his fingers trail off, and leaned against the dryer with his arms crossed over his painted chest. The silver cross caught the light again. His expression was still that easy smile, still that charming mask—but something sharper lived behind his eyes tonight.

"Look at you." A soft exhale, almost a laugh. "Clean as a sheet. How cute."

He reached out. His pink-streaked hand found their jaw, thumb brushing along the curve of it, and he watched the faint color transfer onto their skin like a signature. Whoops

"Surprised your boyfriend let you come to something like this." The words came out casual, easy, but his eyes stayed locked on theirs. "This whole—*" his gesture took in the party, the concept, the entire chaos of it "—handprint-collecting thing. That's... a lot of trust."

His hand slid from their jaw to their neck, smoothing down the side, leaving a faint pink trail in its wake. His palm was warm, slightly tacky with paint, and he could feel their pulse beneath his fingers.

"Is he giving out paint to other people tonight too?" Riley asked, head tilting, that handsome face arranged in something between genuine curiosity and something sharper. "Or is this a one-way street?"

Riley's hand came up. Slow. Deliberate. His fingers found {{user}}'s jaw again—more pink smearing across their. His thumb traced the line of their cheekbone, leaving a glossy trail behind.

“Because if you were mine...” His voice dipped lower, all slow Southern drawl and honeyed heat. “I think you already know these hands wouldn’t be touching anybody but you.”

He could feel their pulse under his fingertips, quick and alive, and something satisfied curled in his chest at the contact.

"Every inch." His other hand found their waist, gripping through the thin fabric. More pink. A handprint shaped like possession. "Every mark."

He pressed closer, walking them backward until {{user}}'s shoulders hit the wall. The paint on his chest smeared against their chest—abstract streaks of pink where their bodies met. His thigh slotted between theirs, his free hand sliding down to their hip, then lower. Lower. Until his palm cupped their ass and squeezed, leaving a perfect pink handprint on them.

"You feel that?" he murmured, lips brushing the shell of their ear. His hips pressed forward, pinning them. "That's me. That's all me."

And then he dipped his head, mouth finding the sensitive skin just below their ear, lips pressing against the spot where their neck met their shoulder. The kiss was soft. Almost reverent. His teeth grazed, just enough to feel.

When he finally pulled away, a perfect pink imprint of his mouth lingered where he’d been, soft, smug, and impossible to ignore.

Riley stepped away, one foot, then two, and let his gaze sweep over what he'd done. Pink fingerprints on their jaw. A streak across their neck. A handprint blooming on their waist, another on their hip. Pink smeared across their shirt where his chest had pressed close. And—when he glanced down—their inner thighs were coated where he stepped between them, and his palm print, unmistakable, spread across their ass like a signature.

He exhaled. Slow. Controlled. His hands were still damp, still pink, still capable of leaving more marks.

"There," he said, and that charming smile finally broke through, easy and warm and dangerous. "Now you've got some pink on you." His eyes stayed on theirs, steady, unapologetic. "Sorry, hope your boyfriend doesn’t mind I got carried away."

.