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Entry tags:	fic, nba slash

NBA Fic: "All Stars and Crashed Cars" Eddie/Melo/JR Smith, etc.
Author: shadow_shimmer
Title: “All Stars and Crashed Cars” (other Melo/Eddie adventures can be found here.)
Pairing: Eddie/Melo, Eddie/Melo/JR Smith, Melo/JR Smith, Allen Iverson/Melo (implied).
Rating: NC-17
Word count: apx 7400
Disclaimer:This is the product of my twisted imagination. It never happened and I'm not implying that it did. I make no profit from writing this.
A/N and Summary: I’m just playing catch-up with the Nuggets’ season in this one, trying to work in everything from Melo's baby and his upcoming wedding to his very close relationship with JR Smith. The facts are that 1) Melo and JR were involved in a brawl that caused them both to be suspended, 2) JR spent most of his suspension with Melo, 3) JR was with Melo (who was apparently sleeping) the day that Melo was told he wasn’t going to play in the All Star Game, and subsequently 4) they were in a ‘fender-bender.’ JR was driving. Also, the yellow hoodie is real.

I thought that all of that was a pretty good excuse for epic threesome porn.

Thanks to horizon_greene for reading this every time I added a few pages.

All Stars and Crashed Cars


It takes JR until the middle of the third quarter to ask Melo how they’re getting home. It’s been bothering him; he’s not good with uncertainties.

Melo looks at him, sucking on the finger he jammed a minute before. “Eddie,” he says, around the finger, sounding surprised that JR didn’t just know that.

“Right,” JR says, stepping back onto the court, feeling disoriented and wondering when he’s ever had a night this bad before. Last season, with the Hornets, was like living in hell -- stuck on the bench, wondering if his career was over before he even got started. But at least that was consistently bad, not like his roller coaster life with Nuggets. One night he’s part of a team on a six game winning streak, and part of the highest scoring pair in the league, and the next he’s suspended for ten fucking games, and the season’s falling apart.

He’s distracted, feeling sorry for himself, when he picks up his last foul and -- letting his famous temper get away from him -- he launches himself at the ref. Before he can do anything stupid, though, someone’s arm is tight around his chest, pulling him toward the bench.

Eddie says, “Easy, man. You’re done,” as he wraps JR up. “You’ve already got a target on your back. Don’t make it worse.”

Being pulled backward, walking blind, JR just listens to Eddie. And Eddie doesn’t let him go once they’re on the sideline. Eddie’s as big as Melo -- solid, easy to hold onto. Once, while they were suspended and all they had was time, JR was working out in Melo’s gym with him and stopped for a minute to watch Melo do a series of quick, twisting crunches. When he fell back, prone, he told JR, “It’s that --” and he grabbed him, tugged him down to kneel next to him. “Eddie has this muscle.” Melo traced a line over JR’s hip. “Here,” he shrugged. “I don’t.”

Eddie’s still talking to him, coaching him, while they’re tangled up on the sideline. “Our defense has to get better, J,” Eddie says, popping his gum and keeping JR put with a hand low on his stomach. “You can’t get lazy. You can’t lean in like you were.”

JR nods and slips the hand he doesn’t have on Eddie’s wrist down Eddie’s side, pressing in, looking for -- there. The cut of muscle arching over his hip. “Just like Melo said,” he mumbles, and Eddie blinks at him.

Eddie pops his gum one more time -- he’s started chewing gum like a smoker trying to quit lately, and tonight it’s something fruity that reminds JR of girls in grade school -- and lets him go.

*

On the way back to Melo’s house, JR has to sit in the backseat of Eddie’s Mercedes and watch Eddie and Melo communicate without talking. They fight over the radio where Eddie has his iPod plugged in until Eddie pulls one of Melo’s braids and tells him to settle down.

“How bad,” Eddie asks, looking at Melo’s hand, brushing a finger over the bandaged knuckle, in the red glow of a stoplight, “is your car?” He glances in his rearview mirror, then. Looking at JR.

“Not, like, bad,” Melo says. “I’ll get a new one.”

JR wants to jump in and tell them that since he wrecked it, he’ll buy another one. Another Magnum, whatever. Anything Melo wants. Because, fuck, the guilt is a living thing in his gut -- trying to claw its way up and out.

They’ve moved on though, Eddie driving with his knee and a couple of fingers and still kind of holding Melo’s hand. “What’d you do to JR to make him crash?” Eddie asks, grinning.

Melo laughs, and it’s the first time he’s done it since JR had to wake him up earlier that afternoon. He laughs, stretches, and then fiddles with the seat lever so he can tilt the seat back and crush JR’s legs in the process.

Shoving at his gym bag and kicking at a dinosaur family living on the floorboard, JR shifts himself out from behind Melo’s seat and misses part of what Melo says next.

“ -- nothing I haven’t done to you.”

“Shit. Never happened,” Eddie says, stopping for another light and grabbing at Melo’s neck, pulling him.

JR watches them wrestle until the light turns. Eddie hits the gas and swerves a little. JR thinks he might get sick.

“Too small,” Eddie says, putting both hands back on the wheel. “The cars,” he clarifies. “For us.”

“The Magnum wasn’t,” Melo says, finally swiping the iPod.

“That true?” Eddie asks, looking back at JR who stares, wishing he could stretch his left leg because it’s cramping where it’s still caught under Melo’s seatback.

“I slid on the ice,” he says, and he knows he sounds defensive and he knows he shouldn’t. If they want to fuck with him, they have every right.

*

As JR watches Eddie move from the kitchen to the living room -- finding water, an apple, and the remote for the stereo -- he feels like an outsider for the first time since he started staying with Melo after the suspensions.

More than the familiar way Eddie moves through Melo’s space, though, it’s the way Melo follows him. Sometimes just watching, and sometimes shadowing him from one room to the next. It’s like the two of them have become the center of something -- like they’re in the spotlight -- and JR’s relegated to the background.

JR opts for a Rolling Rock, and then another, knowing he shouldn’t but considering the past two months, figuring it can’t hurt. Condensation from his third bottle drips onto his pants, making a spot on his thigh cold and uncomfortable as he sits in one corner of Melo’s couch, wondering why he should miss Melo’s attention so sharply.

Their conversation loops; they say the same things in different ways over and over about the All Star Game and about AI and about Team USA.

“I was proud of you,” Eddie says. “Over the summer.”

Melo nods. “I was good,” he says. And then. “On the court.”

“You’ll probably still make it in,” Eddie says, meaning the All Star Game. “As an injury replacement.”

“Not the same. You know it.”

“I don’t think Allen will go,” Eddie says, checking his phone and then turning it off, leaving it on the couch next to him. Then, “You should tell me what it was like playing with him in Athens.”

Melo actually looks uncomfortable, but JR hopes, kind of, that Melo will talk about it because he’s wondered too.

“Later, maybe,” Melo says, spinning Eddie’s phone between them on the cushion. “You staying?”

Eddie glances at JR and then back at Melo. “And him?”

“He actually has his own room,” Melo says, sounding like he’s trying not to get frustrated. “We’ve never.”

JR tries to explain that whatever is going on, it’s fine. He doesn’t understand, but Melo’s his best friend and JR’s fucked everything so totally that he can barely wrap his head around the consequences. “I’m sorry,” is all he gets out.

They both look at him.

“For the car,” he starts with. “I’ll get you another,” he says to Melo. “And --” he goes on, interrupting Melo, “I’m sorry for getting you suspended,” he waves his hand with the bottle in it, “and then this All Star shit.” He drinks. “And your car,” he says again.

“Go to bed, J,” Eddie tells him. “Sleep it off.”

It’s a good idea and JR runs with it, leaving them alone.

He wakes up around two from a dream he’s had before. The best sex he ever had was with a Hornets cheerleader in the front of his car after a game on a hot, sticky, spring night in Oklahoma City. The door was open, and he was sprawled half in and half out of the car, feeling his foot drag in the dirt of the parking lot, while he held on to her with one hand and on to the door frame with the other. She was breathing hard and whining in his ear.

He wakes up before the end, but the noises don’t stop.

Muffled grunts and mumbles leak through the walls that connect JR’s room with the master suite.

Melo’s talking, but it’s unintelligible. Lost, twisted beneath groaning breaths and the sound of Eddie saying something, quickly and quietly. He speaking in Spanish, though, and JR doesn’t understand a word of it.

*

There’s no way, really, to gauge the level of discomfort that JR feels in the morning. He’s pretty sure that he heard Melo and Eddie doing it last night, and he’s also pretty sure that the answer to ‘how do you repay Melo for ruining his life?’ is ‘by not ever mentioning the fact that you heard him doing it with Eddie Najera.’

The thing with Melo, though, is that he’s always putting JR in these fucking impossible situations. JR’s life used to be so simple. He played for the Hornets; he got pissed at Byron Scott; he sat on the bench and watched his life fade away from him.

Now, though? He’s in Denver -- which is where you have to watch yourself or some asshole who thinks you’re just a big, overpaid, uneducated prick with too many tattoos and too much gold around your neck might start taking pot shots at your car. But more than that? He’s with Melo. And Melo never does what you expect.

Being a basketball player should be easy. It should not entail this sense of fucking obligation. But as soon as Melo stood up for him that night in New York -- fucking punched a man for him -- JR knew he was in deep shit. Now, it wasn’t going to just be a case of stars in his eyes (and JR will be the first to admit that Melo could -- and still does -- make him a little dizzy and star-struck with his smile) that made him do stupid shit for Melo. Now, it was obligation, because Melo got suspended for fifteen games for standing up for him.

So yeah, now he’s living with Melo. And now, he’s telling Melo when to sleep and when to eat and yesterday he was in bed with Melo (he was playing Madden while Melo slept, whatever), when Melo’s agent called to tell him that he wasn’t going to the All Star Game. Which meant, of course, that he was the shoulder Melo got to cry on, and that it was his job to chauffer Melo to the game because Melo was too upset to drive.

JR didn’t exactly just slide the Magnum on a patch of ice, either.

It was the headache. Melo’s so fucking prone to them when he gets upset, and riding in the car last night with his head tilted back and his eyes closed and damp, JR could tell that he hurt. He just took his eyes off of the road for a minute -- just so he could put a hand on Melo’s forehead -- but in the second between when Melo turned into his hand and when JR felt the press of lips on his wrist, he lost control of the Magnum and sent it into the back of the car in front of them.

The dissonant sounds of squealing brakes and crunching metal make it easy to forget -- skip over, maybe -- what came right before.

*

The scene in the kitchen is domestic in a way it shouldn’t be. Steve Hess has people who make Melo’s meals for him every week, and when Melo isn’t eating prepackaged food, he’s eating take-out. This morning, though? Eddie’s cooking. He’s making French toast and bacon and Melo’s leaning into the counter next to him, peeling an orange and flicking pieces of rind across the kitchen at JR.

“Missed this,” Melo says, mumbling around an orange wedge, moving closer to Eddie. “You.”

Eddie moves away, just avoiding the second where Melo’s chin touches his shoulder. “You weren’t alone.” He looks over at JR and away from Melo and corrects himself, “You aren’t alone.”

“Not the same,” Melo says, backing away, turning and then sitting with JR at the table. “Eddie and I,” he says, talking to JR for the first time this morning, “used to be close.”

JR nods. He knows this. “You told me,” he says. But it’s not just that Melo talks a lot about Eddie, but that guys like DJ talk a lot about Eddie and Melo too; how they were pretty much inseparable until Melo left to play for Team USA last summer. Or, maybe, it was until JR showed up. DJ’s never been exactly sure on the timing.

It looks to JR from the way Eddie keeps a certain degree of distance between himself and Melo now that it’s morning, that this might be a sign that Melo hasn’t yet been forgiven for whatever he did to Eddie last summer.

They eat and then Melo and Eddie disappear upstairs and leave JR to doze on the couch until he hears his phone ringing upstairs and gets up, still half-asleep, to go and find it.

Getting to his room means he has to pass Melo’s and the door’s open; Melo and Eddie are in the doorway -- Melo going out and Eddie just leaning in place. The hall gets crowded for a minute with the three of them in it, and JR tries to make himself small so he can get by without bothering (or touching) them, but Eddie catches him before he can get out of reach. JR loses his balance, and falls into Eddie who settles him against his hip almost unconsciously while he watches Melo walk away.

“Wanted to ask you,” Eddie says, turning them so they face Melo’s bedroom. “Where the baby stuff is?”

JR thinks a minute, tries to slow his thoughts down and work the knots out of them because he can’t really get his shit together while he’s pushed up against Eddie, looking into his sleepy eyes and resisting the urge to smooth his hair. Eddie hasn’t showered yet, and while his hair can get crazy during a game, it’s nothing like the way it stands up and then falls into his face after he’s slept on it. Or whatever. Also, he smells…weird.

“Baby?” JR asks, attempting to find someplace to look that doesn’t involve freaking out. If he looks into the bedroom, he sees the bed torn apart and Eddie’s clothes mixed with Melo’s on the floor. If he looks to his right, he sees Eddie. Down, and he’s looking at Eddie’s neck or his chest, or where their bodies meet, right below the waist.

He scrunches his eyes shut and thinks about babies. Right. “There is none. Baby stuff.”

“Really,” Eddie says, voice low, thoughtful.

“There’s a room,” JR explains. “A nursery? But they haven’t really put anything in it.” He moves away from Eddie and into the hall and Eddie doesn’t stop him, just stays, leaning, rubbing a hand across his stomach.

“I don’t think that they’re going to live together even after the baby.” JR’s babbling now, backing down the hall. “Uh, I mean. I’ve only met her -- Lala? Like, once or twice.” He’s almost to his room. “I’m going to the wedding, though,” he says, stopping at his door.

Eddie laughs and shakes his head. “I’m not -- ”

“Yeah, you are,” Melo says, having come up behind Eddie, but his mouth’s full of more bread and it comes out, yeah, y’are.

Eddie cocks an eyebrow at JR and turns around. “Since when?”

Melo ruffles Eddie’s hair, making it fall in crazy angles, and shrugs. “Always. Just never got a chance to say. And,” he points at JR, “Allen just called and he’s coming over after a while to talk to me about All Star shit. You okay?”

Okay about what? JR wants to ask, wants to force the issue out into the open, make someone say it. The idea gives JR an unhealthy thrill. It passes, though. “Yeah, man. Whatever. I’ll just hang out and -- whatever.”

“Means you have to put clothes on,” Melo tells Eddie, touching the back of Eddie’s neck.

“And you don’t?” Eddie asks, glancing backward. Then, “Never mind.” And to JR, “It’s like trying to keep my son dressed, y’know?”

Melo just pulls his shorts up a little and grins. JR, lost somewhere in between them again, nods. More clothes on everyone sounds good.

*

Weak sunlight breaks through the clouds around noon, only illuminating how dirty the city looks: the roads are covered in grit and stubborn patches of smoke-colored ice and the grass is brown and brittle where it shows between wind-sculpted blocks of black and gray-spotted snow.

Inside, JR is trying to drink some of the tea Eddie made earlier. It’s hot but it tastes like peach water and that’s just gross, so JR gives up. He’s trying, kind of, to relate to Eddie since he has a feeling he’s going to be around a lot more now -- especially after JR’s workout with Melo earlier, which meant a little running, a little lifting and a lot of listening to Melo talk about Eddie and how “Eddie likes Indian food,” and “Eddie has this fantastic old couch,” and how “Eddie can be so creative, sometimes,” which sends JR off trying to imagine things he has no context for.

Eventually, JR interrupts Melo and asks, “So, if you guys were -- um. If you were, like, best friends,” he settles on, “why hasn’t he been around more?” And then he waits for the horrified silence.

But Melo just gives him a half-shrug. “I fucked up,” he says, and then his eyes get big. “I hurt him, I think. Somehow? The last time --” And he stops himself, slows down. “I was gone most of the summer and then,” he grins, “there was you.”

JR’s throat feels tight with embarrassment. “No,” he says. “No.”

“Ask him, then,” Melo says, flipping a towel over his shoulder and walking away.

Which has left JR alone in the kitchen with Eddie’s tea, and Melo and AI in the living room, and Eddie still lurking upstairs.

JR decides on the stairs again, wishing that he had his own car at Melo’s and could make some kind of escape, only he really has nowhere else to go and --

Eddie’s pulling him down, tugging him to the floor of the second story landing, and he changes his wish for an escape to something more simple: please stop Eddie from ambushing me, he thinks. Just for the rest of today. But he lets himself fall and lets Eddie manhandle him until they’re lying out of sight of anyone below them, but they can still see through the railing well enough to watch Melo and AI on the couch.

“I’m sure,” Eddie says, “there’s something going on with them.”

JR looks down at where AI is laying across the couch with his ankle propped up in Melo’s lap and Melo’s rubbing gently at the wrap.

JR actually agrees, but doesn’t know how to say it. Or even how to say that he’s kind of known about Melo always, because it’s hard not to when there’s no girls, no strip clubs, no fiancée, and a whole lot of touching.

“What happened with you and him?” is what JR actually gets out, worrying again that he’s crossed the line.

Eddie turns away from Melo and AI and chews on his lower lip. “We were,” he says, taking JR’s hand. “Close.” He links their fingers together and squeezes. “Mixed up in each other.”

JR nods and rolls onto his side, focusing on Eddie.

“I have kids. A wife,” Eddie goes on, “but with Melo all over, everywhere --” he takes their hands and traces them from his mouth down his chest, “I didn’t have any place for them.”

Eddie shifts until their hands are trapped between them, and JR’s palm begins to sweat.

“I couldn’t control him, y’know?”

His voice, when he’s not yelling or laughing or coaching, is low and rough -- almost hypnotic.

“He never thinks. He’s all,” Eddie searches for the word, “instinct.” He shrugs. “You too. Only you never smile.”

JR catches himself frowning and smoothes his expression.

“Anyway, it’s like, I don’t know, there’s everything between us: my family, Lala and the baby, other guys on other teams and AI. And you. And the influence you both have on him.”

“No,” JR says again, tired of denying it. Whatever it is. He’s not a part of it.

“No?” Eddie pushes JR over until he’s on top of him, and it’s not as weird as it seems because Eddie’s kind of pissed off and unless JR decides to make more of it than there is, then it’s just going to be Eddie bitching him out. Closer than usual, but whatever.

“I want him to fucking grow up and take shit seriously and here you wander in -- Byron Scott’s leftovers,” he growls. “And, you -- you have this little, lost, oh Melo you’re so amazing hero-worship shit going on. But also? You’ve got this fucking temper that you cannot manage, and just when it looks like Melo might get his shit together, right? No more drugs and fighting and fucking around, what the fuck do you do, J?”

He’s expecting an answer but JR can only shake his head and say he’s sorry. Again. Under his breath.

“You get him suspended for fifteen fucking games. You get him suspended for fighting. He has to stand up for your sad, sorry ass because he’s infatuated with you and the way you feed his ego.”

Eddie pushes hard on JR’s shoulders where he’s holding him down and JR’s thankful for the bright, black lines of ink that cover the skin from his neck to his forearms because Eddie means to bruise him.

“What the fuck?”

And that’s Melo, kneeling on the stairs behind them refusing to meet JR’s eyes while JR tries to slither out from under Eddie, leveraging himself with his legs and shoving up with his hips until he catches Eddie’s smirk and lays still, trying not to breathe too hard.

“I was telling JR that there’s this whole world that separates us,” Eddie says, quieter now. “And that the only thing that keeps us together, I guess, is sex.”

Apparently, all the tension from not hearing it, not having it explicitly confirmed for almost an entire day, and then wanting to hear it, has been fucking with JR pretty bad. Because as soon as Eddie says it, admits that he and Melo fuck, JR chokes on his own breath and gets dizzy for a second. He could use that as an excuse for the way he arches up into Eddie this time, but Eddie’s not stupid and gym shorts aren’t the best clothes for hiding secrets in.

*

JR panics, but he’s the only one that’s upset. Melo and Eddie aren’t even really paying attention to him anymore and he wants to complain about that, point out that this should be a little bit about him right now, about his anger and confusion. And also his erection. But Eddie just sits up and waits for Melo to crawl closer to him. JR puts his hands over his face before he has to see what happens next.

“I’m leaving,” he says, trying to roll away. Melo’s hands are on his waist now, though, and Eddie’s are on his legs and then someone starts pulling at his shorts.

“Um. This isn’t -- what are you doing?” he asks, slapping at them and staring resolutely at the ceiling.

Someone bites at his hip and JR twitches. That has to be Eddie, he thinks. Eddie would be a biter.

“Shit,” He snatches his hands away from his mid-section just in case he touches someone’s head and they take it as encouragement.

“Go. We won’t stop you,” Eddie says. And if Eddie’s talking now, that means it’s Melo that’s licking his dick.

JR blinks. His eyes burn from staring so hard at nothing and he shakes his head. Um, no, I’m cool. You guys just go ahead -- is what he’s thinking, but what he says is more or less, “Ah, fuck.”

Eddie laughs and JR pretends not to hear it, fisting his hands in the hem of his t-shirt and tensing his thighs under their combined weight.

It takes less than a minute. The shot-clock in JR’s head runs out and resets one time while Eddie -- he thinks -- sucks him, and Melo tongues his balls. He doesn’t say anything when he comes; it’s too unexpected for one, and also, it’s their show.

His temples throb and his hands are shaky from tearing into his shirt when he’s done. He reaches out blindly, before he thinks, and touches Melo’s cheek. When Melo kisses his palm and then his wrist, JR remembers crashing Melo’s car and pulls away.

“That was quick,” Eddie says, sounding muffled, and JR finally looks down. Melo’s licking at Eddie’s lips and it takes JR a second to figure out why.

“Be nice,” Melo says. “He’s young.”

“He’s a year younger than you,” Eddie says, but he’s smiling and pulling Melo up, and then they’re leaving, going into Melo’s room, shedding clothes as they go.

They leave the door open and JR wonders if it’s an invitation or just carelessness. Either way, he should go. Obviously. But instead of getting up and walking his ass back down the stairs and out of this mess, he crawls to the doorway and sits there, arms wrapped around his knees, like he does on the sidelines. Watching.

They’re just kind of, like, making out, JR thinks. Eddie’s face is buried in Melo’s neck and Melo’s arched back a little, staying upright because Eddie’s holding him that way, gripping hard on his upper arms while Melo has one hand shoved into his own shorts.

They shuffle backward until Melo hits the bed and falls, taking Eddie with him, on top of him, and JR feels warm again. He’s seen people have sex before, in porn (of course) and even in real life, and been turned on by it (and JR will be the first to admit that he gets turned on pretty easy: cars, girls, video games, the perfect three-pointer, Melo’s smile.) There was this one time where he totally watched Chris Paul do three girls at once in a hot tub, but this? This is different. This is meaningful and shit, somehow. And also, gay.

Eddie slides Melo’s shorts off and Melo moans, quietly, now that Eddie’s touching him too. JR wishes he could see that better. He makes his way into the room and perches himself on Melo’s beanbag chair, catching Eddie’s eye, waiting for some sign that he’s not welcome, but all he gets is a smile. A real one.

“Hand me that,” Eddie says, pointing to the floor by the chair. “And those.”

JR glances down and, oh. There’s a red bottle and strip of condoms there. Which is so weird. He picks up the bottle and it’s sticky. After he hands it and the condoms to Eddie, he ends up smelling faintly like strawberries.

“It’s a thing,” Eddie says. “Melo’s.” He flips the top. “He uses it to freak me out, I think.”

JR will have to deal with strawberry lube later. He’s got bigger worries now, like, “Are you gonna fuck him? For real?” and “Did I just say that?”

Melo laughs and reaches for JR. “You did, and he is,” he says, pulling JR to his knees next to the bed. “Watch.”

“No, man,” JR says, not meaning it, and watching as Melo shifts his legs apart and Eddie reaches down behind his balls. JR watches Melo tense and bite at his lip and breathe in little, hissing breaths.

JR hesitantly touches Melo’s stomach where he can feel the muscles twitching.

“Amazing,” Eddie says, the sarcasm back. “It doesn’t kill you to touch him.”

JR makes plans to work on his witty comebacks and he turns back to look at Eddie, but Eddie’s moving his hand away and grabbing at JR. “Now you,” he says.

“Um,” JR says. “What?”

Eddie starts messing with the condoms. “What I was doing, J,” he says. “You do it. He’s wet. You can’t fuck it up.”

But JR’s brain stalls on the he and the wet part. That’s not right. It’s not how it works, and yet, JR’s hard enough that if he keeps rubbing up against the bed like he is, he’s going to come again -- only this time in his shorts, and fuck if he’s going to let Eddie see him do some junior high shit like that.

He feels his way down Melo’s stomach and over his thighs, backtracking only when Eddie flicks him on the back of his hand. He takes a deep breath and cups Melo’s balls, glancing up at him and getting a smile. To JR, Melo seems awfully relaxed -- one arm propping his head up, grinning -- for having, like, an amateur, and the guy who has a habit of ruining everything (crashing cars, getting in fights, putting careers at risk, whatever) groping him while his, uh, boyfriend? watches and mocks.

“Almost,” Eddie says and Melo shakes his head.

“Quit,” he tells him. “Leave him.”

“Sorry,” Eddie says, to both of them, completely insincere, and bends down to kiss the head of Melo’s cock, right in front of JR. It doesn’t turn into an actual blowjob, but it’s damn close, and the distraction gives JR the courage he needs to move his fingers down and then in. Turns out Melo is wet. And tight. And hot.

JR gives up and bends over the bed, resting his head on Melo’s chest while he works him with his fingers, hoping he’s doing it right.

He’s eye to eye with Eddie, and after a minute he asks him, “What now?”

Eddie just shrugs and nods at Melo who says, “What you normally do?” as he runs a hand over the back of JR’s head.

“This isn’t --” JR catches himself before he says normal, because that might be hurtful, he knows, and thinks about foreplay for a minute and his limited experience with it. There’s fingering and he’s got that, he thinks. There’s oral, and Eddie’s got that, and sometimes there -- oh. He levers himself up on the arm not otherwise occupied and presses his lips to Melo’s, a little tingly at the surprised, throaty sounds he gets in response.

Kissing Melo is, first of all, strange. Mostly because it’s Melo. But it’s also enthusiastic and a little sloppy and kind of amazing. Like, JR kind of has to stop whatever else he’s doing and climb up on the bed proper so that he can do this right, because Melo kisses with his whole body; he gets grabby and he bites and he rolls and pushes and -- forget about lips. Melo’s on JR’s neck and shoulders and jaw and then, suddenly, he’s still.

The weight shift clues JR in. He’s pressed up on Melo’s side, his shorts half off again and rubbing himself against the plane of Melo’s hip, leaving wet marks along his skin. Then Melo moves over a little, and he’s no longer one, long body for JR to anchor himself to. There are angles now; he’s turned a little at his waist and the leg on JR’s side is bent, and Melo’s moving, arching and flexing up and back. It’s rhythmic. JR recognizes it.

Then, Eddie’s there and JR’s just next to them again. They’re kissing, gently, almost. And -- JR follows the line of Eddie’s back down to his hips -- they’re fucking too. Not so gently.

They talk to each other and JR tries not to listen. It’s not difficult. Melo’s incoherent, chanting Eddie’s name and praying and saying, occasionally that he’s sorry. Mostly, Eddie’s talking in Spanish, except for maybe, once, something about hearts in the snow and summers spent alone.

JR doesn’t follow. It’s hard enough to see Melo like this: open, exposed, weak? Maybe? He looks at Eddie instead and watches him get Melo off with the way he twists his hips and bites, deep into Melo’s bicep. JR never thought he’d think that the way another man came -- the hard, deep breaths, the sudden tight, ridges of muscle in his thighs and stomach -- would affect him in any way. But seeing it, and then touching it, where it’s warm and wet on Melo’s skin, makes JR want to curl in on himself from the sudden pain of arousal. He sucks on Melo’s chest, leaving his hand flat on Melo’s stomach, and rubs himself against Melo’s side until his cock stings with friction and he comes too.

Drifting now, JR holds onto Melo and feels the little aftershocks of Melo’s orgasm still sliding through him, along with the easy, continuous melting and shifting of his body to accommodate Eddie, who still isn’t finished.

“Does it hurt?” JR asks, inhibitions gone with the chemical rush of endorphins and adrenalin in his brain. “When he fucks you?”

Melo hums at him for a second and then shakes his head, “Nah. Not anymore.”

“Then what’s it like?”

“Can’t say,” Melo says, kissing JR’s forehead. “You’ll have to let him do you. He’d like that. ‘Cause you‘ve never done it before and he’s got a virgin kink, or whatever.” He looks up at Eddie. “Right? You wanna fuck JR?”

Eddie looks down at them, at JR, his eyes black under strands of wet hair. He bares his teeth, growls, and comes.

*

When Melo and JR leave for the All Star Game, there is a lot of embarrassed standing around -- all three of them -- and not a lot of eager bounding for the plane. They’re a mess; walking a dangerous line because Timmy Hardaway -- an asshole has-been -- decided to open his big fucking mouth and talk shit about gay people which apparently gives the guys at ESPN a free pass to ask every athlete they can find (NBA player or not) how they feel about the subject.

This leaves Eddie frantic and Melo a mix of excited and sad (and nobody, JR knows, can do sad like Melo.).

“Don’t talk to anyone about this if you can help it, man,” Eddie keeps saying. “But if they do catch you? For the love of god, don’t say anything stupid.” He grabs Melo at baggage check and JR wonders if he should run interference because they’re standing really close. “Just tell them you don’t care what people do in their personal lives as long as they can get it done on the court.”

Melo nods and repeats it back to Eddie, looking like he wants to do something stupid already and JR steps in, “It’s only like four days, you guys. Damn. Get your shit together.”

They both glare at him and start in with their hissed, rushed explanations about how they haven’t been together for, like, eight months, man, and fucking back off and -- “Sorry,” Melo says, after a minute, and then to Eddie: “You have to trust me.”

JR figures that he doesn’t just mean about accidentally coming out in some fabulous drunken escapade involving gambling debts and drag queens, but a more general ‘I’m not going to fuck up or fuck around this time.’

*

Life’s had a tendency to come at JR fast, making him miss things in the middle. Like college. JR went straight from high school into the NBA and he knows that there was something there -- in between -- that he skipped that might have prepared him better for life around (with?) Melo, because growing up in Jersey sure as hell didn’t.

Melo, combined with Vegas puts JR on overload; he’s not much of a talker and he’s a total loser at parties, especially when people that aren’t NBA players are there. Then he just gets self-conscious about his height and the fact that, yeah, he never went to college and never really finished those last two years of high school either because he was playing ball all over the country trying to get famous and get out of Jersey. And when he’s around Melo, people expect him to be as outgoing and easygoing and fun as Melo is.

After Eddie made fun of him for it, he started practicing smiling in the mirror. With mixed results.

As a consequence, JR hasn’t seen Melo much in the two days they’ve been in Vegas. He’s seen lights and fountains and blackjack tables and showgirls and slot machines and Shawn Marion, like, everywhere, but the only time he sees Melo is when he comes back to the room and crawls into bed with him.

Tonight he‘s at a bar in Caesar’s and there’s a girl -- a dancer from one of the teams -- sitting in his lap and sipping at his drink while he chews on a whiskey-soaked ice cube and listens to her talk about school and sex while Chris Bosh draws out plays in a puddle of spilled beer on the bar next to him.

He’s warm, covered with glitter and his teeth ache.

No one notices when he pulls his hood up over his head and leaves. The yellow fabric makes him think of sunshine when he sees it out of the corner of his eye and he wonders if that’s why Melo bought it for him. He’s willing to let Melo dress him, but the sunshine-yellow hoodie is pushing it.

The elevator has mirrored walls and JR sees six of him -- all in yellow and all slightly out of focus -- looking back at him as he tries to remember which floor he’s on. He calls Melo once he’s outside their room and asks to be let in, flopping onto the hard, chlorine-scented floor of the hall, and trying to explain that, “My keycard stopped working, bro. Just -- just let me in,” he finishes in a whisper.

“Wait,” Melo says. “Did you do it with the little arrows pointing down and –”

“Fuck you, man,” JR says, getting louder. “Fuck you and open the door.”

Melo does, finally, and JR tries to get up and walk past him like, whatever, man, I’m too cool for hotels, but he stumbles and Melo has to catch him. This puts JR dangerously close to Melo, close enough to grope him, if he were allowed. “But I’m not,” he explains to Melo, picking up his conversation in the middle. “Because you’re not going to fuck around on Eddie and I’m not gay.”

He feels enormously smug about having had this revelation until Melo holds him closer, pulling him between his legs and says, “Oh?” And then, “You smell awful, man.” He sniffs gingerly at JR’s shoulder. “Like smoke and perfume and booze. Shower off before you get in bed. Or sleep by yourself.”

JR whines and clings for a second as Melo tries to push him away and says, “But you smell good.” Applying drunk logic. “Everywhere, I bet.”

To prove his point, he inhales in the crook of Melo’s neck, then sniffs his way along the planes of Melo’s bare chest and then gets dizzy, slips, and lets Melo lower him back to the floor where he buries his face in Melo’s groin. Just to prove his point. Which he’s forgotten, because now his cheek is against Melo’s cock, and Melo’s half-hard and JR stops thinking altogether and turns so that he can mouth at Melo through his shorts.

He knows Melo’s moving around above him, reaching in his pocket for something, but he’s busy and ignores it until he hears Melo talking.

“Does it count if it’s JR and he wants to suck me off?”

That makes JR pay attention. That and Melo poking him. “Hey. Phone for you.”

“Mmm?” he says at the phone and then snaps a look up at Melo when Eddie says, “Hey, J. Whatcha doin’?”

“Nothing,” he says. “I’m not doing anything. At all.”

“Oh, well, okay then,” Eddie says, and JR can tell he’s laughing. The son of a bitch. “If you do decide to, y’know, give Melo head? Be a big boy and don’t come in your pants over it.”

“Fuck you,” JR says, wishing Eddie was there and handing the phone back to Melo.

“Yeah,” Melo mumbles, looking down at JR and narrowing his eyes. “He’ll say it.” He flips the phone shut and leaves it on the table next to him. “He says,” Melo tells JR, “that he’s glad you came with me. He didn’t want to have to baby sit you, y’know, with the way you tend to need -- what did he call it? Constant supervision. In case you -- “

“Pick a fight with someone or get into a car accident. I know.” JR slumps a little, the liquor swishing through his veins, making him an odd mix of horny and contrite.

“Don’t be. Just -- hey,” Melo says, touching his cheek. “Do this.” And he’s pulling his shorts down.

JR tries. But his mouth’s a little numb and it’s turning him on to the point that he can’t concentrate on Melo, just on the throbbing between his own legs.

“Quit,” Melo tells him. “Hold still a second,” and JR does, not registering what Melo’s about to do until it’s almost done -- until Melo’s got a one hand on the back of his neck and one working his cock and the light bulb turns on.

“Oh god --” JR starts and then Melo’s coming on his face and JR’s about to do what Eddie fucking teased him about and it’s so much more wrong than the whole threesome thing somehow, and also he might pass out in a second.

Melo’s pushing him down, though, and grabbing him hard at the base of his cock, rocking up against him and telling him to settle the fuck down and to breathe. “What do you want?” he asks, voice hard.

“Don’t know,” JR says, trying and failing to focus.

“Wanna get fucked?”

JR scrabbles at Melo’s back, scratching him and pulling him close enough to bite. “No,” he says, and then spreads his legs enough for Melo to lay between them. “Yeah. Damn.” He thrusts up into Melo and winces when Melo grinds down. “Fuck me.”

Melo lets go of him and sits back on his knees, reaching above him for something. His phone? JR wonders if he’s hallucinating and tugs the hoodie off, rubbing his face clean as he does it.

Melo flips the phone back open and says, “Did you hear it?” and then smiles. “Nice. Yeah.” There’s silence, and then, “Later.”

“You left it on speaker?” JR asks, working it through in his head.

“Mmm,” Melo nods at him. “You know I can’t fuck you -- ” JR groans. “But Eddie will,” Melo finishes, laying back down on him. “And he’s good.” This is against JR’s ear while Melo rubs his cock. “Better than me,” he murmurs, almost to himself. “On your hands and knees. Hard. And long. Until you don’t think you can hold yourself up, and you think you might fall apart -- like, you’re all soft inside and worn out and tired.”

“I don’t think,” JR says, turning to kiss Melo, “that I want that.” I don’t think I’m supposed to want it, he thinks, feeling his muscles cramp and tremble in his back.

“You do,” Melo says, letting his hand slip so he can trace a finger around JR’s entrance, making him jump and bite his tongue. “You don’t think so, but you do.”

And JR comes.

*

Melo has the blinds open and the window cracked when they climb into bed. It’s hard for JR to fall asleep, though, with the lights from the Strip making the room glow gold and silver. He’s used to Melo’s house in the suburbs where the nights are dark and quiet. City lights can’t soothe him anymore.

Eventually, his tossing and turning wake Melo who slips an arm over him to hold him still. “What?” he asks.

“Nothing,” JR says, shrugging under Melo’s weight. Then, thinking about Eddie and snowflakes and the quiet and the dark, he says, “I just want to go home.”

End.

Deleted scene: "Dreaming My Way Deep" AI/Melo.