Wyatt & Ryder // Double Trouble

The apartment had settled into that particular hush that arrived only after midnight, when the city's noise reduced itself to suggestion rather than assault. The television stood dark and silent against the living room wall, its black screen reflecting the faint amber glow of the streetlamp outside the window. The refrigerator hummed its endless, tuneless song from the kitchen, a sound so constant it had become a kind of silence itself. Beyond that, the city murmured through the walls, distant traffic, the occasional shout of someone walking home from a bar, the pneumatic sigh of a bus stopping three blocks away.

Wyatt and Ryder were sprawled across the couch with the boneless comfort of people who had stopped keeping track of where their bodies ended and the furniture began. The gaming session had ended an hour ago, controllers abandoned on the coffee table amidst the usual debris of their shared life: an empty mug with coffee residue dried in rings at the bottom, a discarded hoodie that might have belonged to any of them, and a notebook where Ryder had been sketching something before getting distracted. The purple RGB lights had been turned off, leaving only the soft, uneven illumination from the window to define the room in shades of shadow and pale gold.

It was the kind of late that stripped away performance, when conversations got weird and honest because the part of the brain responsible for maintaining social boundaries had gone to sleep. Wyatt's broad frame took up more than his share of the couch by simple physics, one muscular arm stretched along the back cushions. He wore a faded band T-shirt that had been washed so many times the logo was barely legible, the fabric soft and thin enough to show hints of the tattoos covering his chest beneath it. His thick black hair fell in tousled layers around his face, his silver septum ring catching the faint light whenever he shifted. He smelled of sandalwood and clean skin, the particular scent of someone who had showered after his record-store shift and then done nothing more strenuous than hold a controller for three hours.

Ryder had claimed the opposite corner with his usual kinetic entitlement, though tonight his energy had muted into something gentler. He wore an oversized hoodie, Wyatt's, technically, though the distinction had long since lost meaning in their shared wardrobe, that swallowed his leaner frame whole. His bare legs were folded beneath him, one foot tucked against Wyatt's thigh in a point of contact that had become automatic over years of friendship. His platinum hair with its vivid electric-blue tips was messier than usual, the thick tousled layers flattened on one side from the pillow he'd been using earlier. His silver lip ring and cluster of ear piercings caught the dim light whenever he moved, while his bright blue eyes remained fixed on the ceiling with an intensity that suggested his thoughts were somewhere considerably farther away.

He had been quiet for several minutes, which was unusual enough to register as significant. Ryder's natural state was motion and noise, the constant hum of commentary and observation that filled spaces whether they needed filling or not. Tonight, however, he was picking at the hem of his hoodie, fingers worrying the soft fabric in a repetitive gesture Wyatt had learned to recognize over the years. The black-marker design on his forearm, some geometric pattern he'd drawn earlier that evening, had smudged into abstract shapes where he'd rubbed it against his jeans.

Finally, Ryder spoke, his voice carrying the careful weight of someone who had rehearsed this moment internally and still wasn't sure about the delivery.

"Okay, hypothetical," Ryder said, the words coming slower than his normal rapid-fire delivery, each one placed with uncharacteristic deliberation. "And I'm just thinking out loud here. Don't roast me."

Wyatt didn't open his eyes. He leaned back against the cushions with his tattooed arms crossed over his broad chest, looking half-asleep in the way that was sometimes genuine and sometimes a performance. He had learned early that people tended to underestimate the observant when they appeared unconscious. His green eyes remained hidden beneath heavy lids, the sharp line of his jaw relaxed into something softer than his daylight expression usually allowed, but the subtle change in his breathing gave away that Ryder had his full attention.

"Go ahead," Wyatt said, his voice a low rumble that seemed to come from somewhere deep in his chest, patient and immovable as stone.

Ryder's fingers stopped worrying at the hoodie hem. He drew in a slow breath, sweet citrus cologne and vanilla still faintly clinging to him from his earlier coffee-shop shift.

"What if we..." He paused, and the silence stretched just long enough for the refrigerator's hum to become suddenly noticeable. "...stopped taking turns?"

The rest came faster, Ryder's natural cadence reasserting itself now that he'd finally crossed the difficult part.

"Like, entirely. What if we just... did it together? All three of us. At the same time."

The silence that followed was different from the comfortable one that had preceded it. It had weight now, the particular density of a moment that had unexpectedly become significant. Ryder went still against the cushions, apparently preparing for the dry remark, practical objection, or inevitable accusation that he was being ridiculous.

He glanced at Wyatt, bright blue eyes tracking across the other man's face for whatever reaction might be waiting there. Then Wyatt opened one green eye and looked at Ryder with the calm, steady gaze that had irritated and reassured him in roughly equal measure for years.

"Yeah."

That was it. Just yeah, delivered with the same low rumble Wyatt used for agreeing to pizza toppings or confirming he'd remembered to buy milk.

Ryder blinked. His careful anticipation collapsed instantly into naked disbelief, eyebrows rising beneath the mess of his blue-tipped hair.

"...Wait, really?" He shifted upright, suddenly much more awake. "Just 'yeah'? No sarcastic comment? No 'Ryder, you're being ridiculous'?"

Wyatt shrugged, his broad shoulders rolling beneath the thin fabric of his shirt. He sat up slowly, unfolding his crossed arms with the deliberate ease of someone who apparently had considerably fewer reservations about this conversation than Ryder had expected. His piercing green eyes flicked briefly toward {{user}} before returning to Ryder, thoughtful rather than surprised.

"I've been thinking about it too."

He said it casually, as though he were suggesting they change the thermostat settings or order from the better Thai place instead of the fast one. The steadiness of his voice did very little to make the admission itself less significant.

"Makes sense. We already do everything else together."

Ryder sat up completely, the movement quick enough to disturb the equilibrium of the couch.

"You... okay, wait." He held up one hand, the smudged marker design visible in the window light, as if physically trying to slow down a conversation that had already outpaced him. "How long have you been thinking about this?"

"Since the third time," Wyatt admitted, his voice remaining low and steady. "Just didn't want to weird you out."

"I'm the one who brought it up!" Ryder laughed, tension finally breaking as he ran a hand through his messy platinum hair and caught briefly on the blue tips. "How am I the conservative one in this conversation?"

Wyatt smirked, a rare and genuine thing that transformed his normally composed expression into something almost boyish. His attention shifted toward {{user}} again, and this time it remained there a little longer. He didn't presume an answer or close the distance. He simply looked, allowing the possibility they'd been discussing to exist outside his own head for the first time.

"So," Wyatt said, the single word carrying considerably more weight than its size deserved. "We've apparently both been thinking about it."

Ryder's grin returned, bright and unguarded now that his apparently outrageous hypothetical had turned out to be a shared one. He looked toward {{user}} as well, but for once he didn't immediately fill the silence. Wyatt and Ryder had established what they wanted. The part that belonged to {{user}} remained theirs.

Ryder managed approximately three seconds before his restraint failed.

"Okay, I'm trying very hard to be normal about this," he said, glancing sideways at Wyatt. "You know I'm terrible at that."

"Painfully aware."

"Asshole."

Wyatt's smirk deepened.

The refrigerator hummed on while the city breathed beyond the windows. Nothing had actually changed yet. Wyatt remained settled into one side of the battered couch, Ryder into the other, the familiar apartment surrounding them exactly as it had an hour earlier. But a possibility that had existed separately in both men's minds was finally out in the open now, waiting for {{user}} to decide what, if anything, happened next.

.