Flowbee, SGA

slodwick

runpunkrun

linabean

Flowbee
by Pares

When the stolid little woman with the huge shears patted the plaited leather bench beside her, Rodney plopped himself right down.

"What are you doing?" John asked slowly.

"I could use a trim, and Belmont was all booked up when I went to see her."

"What if she has no idea what she's doing?"

"Well, even if it looks stupid, it will still be shorter, and it'll, you know, grow out."

John wondered if he looked as horrified as he felt. The guy sniffed everything you put in front of him like there was a plot against him on every planet they went to, but was hunky dory with having razor sharp blades near his throat as long as they took a little off the sides.

The woman whipped a little cloth shawl around Rodney's shoulders; the efficient little snip-snip-snip of her scissors seemed weirdly loud. Soon there was a fine dusting of hair on Rodney's shoulders and the woman took away the shawl and shook it out with a brisk snap.

Before she let Rodney up, though, she tipped his head forward and brought out the straight razor.

John tensed, hands balling into fists despite himself, but she merely whispered it against Rodney's hairline, neatening up the back of Rodney's neck, the shining blade rasping softly against the fine hair and tender skin, leaving it smooth and clean.

He'd spent a fair amount of time on Rodney's six, and he could probably have drawn the curve of Rodney's ass from memory, but it had somehow never occurred to him to stare at the back of Rodney's neck on the longer, duller hikes.

John swallowed thickly and thought about just how deeply screwed he was.

*

Even the short walk back to the gate was enough to make John's mouth go dry.

Ronon's hair looked exactly the same, but he was clean-shaven now, and he looked predictably, almost painfully, young, while Teyla's burnished brown-red hair now had becoming streaks of tawny gold and copper orange, giving her a look that was somehow flirty yet polished.

John had politely declined all attempts at a salon makeover, but had stood by and watched as Rodney submitted with rather surprising grace to a lather and shave by the same woman who'd cut his hair. Now he sported smooth pink cheeks and clean white skin just above the collar of his black jacket.

John felt weirdly mesmerized; he kept having to tighten his hands around his P90 in order to keep himself from running a finger down the slope of Rodney's neck.

Insidiously, he began to daydream about ways he could goad Rodney into saying something so obnoxious that even Teyla wouldn't look reproachful if John should take it upon himself to slap Rodney in the back of the head, ring and pinky finger grazing the vulnerable skin now laid bare.

*

Back in Atlantis, after John had rolled his eyes and shouldered through the crowds that had apparently convened solely to ooh and ahh over the rest of the team's New Look, John stalked his way to the mess hall and glumly filled a tray with fruitcups and a bowl of colorless something-soup that tasted... nothing like anything he could recognize, actually, although he was coming to associate it with the way you could feel club fog at the back of your throat.

Rodney showed up with a tray of his own, looking oddly furtive. He set his tray down and dropped into the chair across from John.

"You hate it, don't you? You think my hair looks stupid. Is it the back? It's all uneven, isn't it?" Rodney reached around to touch the back of his head, eyes huge. "She did a hackjob and now it'll look stupid for a month," he said miserably.

"It looks fine," John said instantly, feeling a little confused; after all, Rodney's hair, even to John's discerning eye, didn't look much different from the way it had this morning. Freshly naked nape aside. "And I thought you didn't care if it looked stupid, anyway? I mean, if you don't like it, it'll grow out, just like you said."

"You've been staring at it like it insulted your mother," Rodney insisted. "You and your hair are ashamed to be seen with me, just admit it."

Teyla and Ronon arrived at the table in time to hear Rodney's lament.

"I don't think your hair looks stupid," John sighed half-heartedly. This apparently mollified Rodney enough to allow him to dismiss any insecurities he'd ever had about personal grooming in order to devote himself to his dinner.

"Rodney, your haircut is quite handsome," Teyla said kindly. "Goru bark?"

Rodney nodded and filched three layers of bark from her plate, crumbling one into his nothing-soup. On the bench beside him, Ronon was stroking absently at his newly shorn chin.

"They do a nice job, don't they?" Rodney said. "Smoothest shave I've ever had."

Nodding, Ronon said, "It's just... It feels weird. I haven't been clean-shaven since school."

"Everyone looks very nice," John promised, and Ronon grinned at him and reached over to ruck up his hair.

*

For the next three days, John perfected the art of glancing at Rodney though his lashes in order to camouflage the fact that he was eyeballing the back of the guy's neck every chance he got. He took to jerking off in the shower while thinking about touching that little round mole with the tip of his tongue.

He'd also gotten good at leaning against walls with his arms folded against his chest, just to the side and slightly behind Rodney, so he could look at it in relative safety. This backfired on him in the transporter, though, when Rodney burst out, "Jesus, what is it, do I have a zit or something?" and John remembered that the inside doors of the transporters were polished to a mirror high sheen, allowing Rodney to catch him in the act of gawking.

John felt himself flush and the moment the doors opened, he hurtled out of the transporter and made every effort not to break into an actual run in his attempt to dodge Rodney. Who of course hounded him.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute, what the hell is going on? Did I miss something? Are alien spores messing with your personality? Was there a head injury I was not privy to?"

"C'mon, Rodney. Just let it go already, huh?"

"Let what go?" Rodney demanded.

John opened his door and walked in, glaring out at Rodney and crossing his arms against his chest again.

Rodney just stared in at him from the hallway until John lifted his eyes heavenward and finally waved him in. "Would you just... Get in here!"

Finally deigning to cross John's threshold, Rodney walked in and the door slid shut behind him. There was a brief, awkward silence before Rodney, predictably, broke it.

"Look, is this about me not being able to climb the rope in the gym? Because I can work on that. Believe me, Ronon can be very motivating, and I mean, seriously, more motivating than certain death."

"What?" John asked faintly.

"I'm just saying, if you're going to kick me off the team for sub-par physical performance, just, just, can't you give me some time to make it up? You know, a, a, fitness extension or something?"

"Rodney," John said, honestly shocked, "I'm not throwing you off the team! Where the hell did that even come from?"

"You've been staring at me! You've got this speculative look on your face all the time—"

"Okay. I've been staring. And maybe even speculating, but I swear, Rodney, I'm not kicking you off the team. I wouldn't do that. I mean... we're team!" John said earnestly, as if that explained everything.

The tense cast of Rodney's mouth relaxed, but then his eyes narrowed in suspicion once more.

"Then what is it?"

"Your haircut," John admitted. "Sort of."

"I knew it!" Rodney crowed. "Wait, what?" He palmed the back of his head again self-consciously. "You said it was fine!"

"It is fine. Your haircut's perfectly nice, goddamn it!"

"O-kaaaay. No, seriously, what's going on here?"

John was suddenly exhausted by the whole song and dance.

"I've been staring at you, you idiot. I've been speculating about you."

Rodney, it seemed, had nothing to say to that; for a long second they just looked at each other, and then Rodney bolted forward and grabbed two handfuls of John's T-shirt and lifted his face to kiss him.

It was sort of jarring, and the force of Rodney's action mashed John's upper lip against the line of his teeth, but he lost no time in opening his mouth to Rodney's, in letting Rodney in.

He'd hardly had a chance to let Rodney's tongue flicker against his before Rodney was pulling away to nose at the soft spot under his left ear, to close his teeth against the hard curve of John's jaw, to lay a stripe with the flat of his tongue against the grain of John's beard along John's throat.

It was like Rodney couldn't bring himself to focus on any one thing.

John curled his hands around Rodney's shoulders and gently disengaged him from where he'd been worrying John's earlobe.

"I'm gonna say you were doing some speculating of your own," John said, trying to remember to breathe.

"You have this, there's this, the way your skin just..." Rodney exhaled a little puff of frustration. "It's difficult to explain."

"Let's just take it from the top, okay?" And he tugged Rodney close and moved in to kiss him when Rodney blurted, "I really want to blow you," anxiously, his breath hot on John's lips.

John felt himself nodding stiffly, and noticed that he was grabbing at Rodney's arms way too hard, especially if he was gonna let the guy get to... doing what he'd just asked about doing.

Maybe the weirdest part of this whole thing was the way Rodney hurriedly maneuvered John into sitting upright on his own bed, kneeling between John's spread legs, his big hands warm and strangely heavy on John's knees. Rodney's face was... strange. Open and yet almost solemn. He was breathing through his mouth at the moment, his reddened lips parted slightly, his chin lifted as Rodney just looked up into John's face and... stared at him.

Just about the time John would have shoved Rodney away and vetoed this sudden turn in their relationship, Rodney's hands smoothed up John's thighs and made short work of John's button and fly. For a moment, he cupped the bulge he'd just uncovered a moment before tucking his fingers past the open fly of John's boxers with his other hand. Then he bent his head to lip at the crown of John's already mostly-hard dick.

The second Rodney's mouth touched him, John's spine turned to Jell-O. He flopped back on the bed, staring helplessly at the ceiling, because he knew if he looked, if he actually watched Rodney's mouth working him, if he watched Rodney's little forehead-frown of concentration and smooth eyelids and long lashes and the way his cheeks hollowed out as he made happy busy little slurping sounds, he'd lose it pretty much instantly.

He felt his hands spasm, and rather than clutching at Rodney's shoulders, he focused on spreading them against his cool sheets, mouth open and dry, breath hitching in his lungs.

For a moment, the slick heat left him, and Rodney lifted his head, giving John an assessing look.

"This is good for you, right? I mean, obviously it's not terrible or you'd have shown me the door, but uh. Well. Some direction wouldn't go amiss. I mean. Not everyone has the same sensitivities, and I could probably make it better if you gave me a few hints or something."

Better?

John only lifted his head enough to gape at Rodney, and Rodney must have found his expression answer enough, because he tilted his head and smiled with surprising sweetness. "Ah. I'll just... um, get back to it, shall I?" and dropped his head back into John's lap.

Letting his head bounce back heavily against the mattress, John closed his eyes and reached out to gingerly stroke the soft, bare skin of the back of Rodney's neck, feeling the muscles flex under his hand as Rodney bobbed his head and squeezed the base of John's cock with firm, rhythmic strokes. The skin felt unbearably fragile under John's palm, and he curled up until he could see the top of Rodney's head and the line of his neck and shoulder. Sliding one hand under the neck of Rodney's shirt, careful not to choke him, John curved his hand against the top of Rodney's shoulder and the side of his throat, letting his thumb sweep the skin just below Rodney's right ear.

"Rodney, I—" he began hoarsely, but Rodney stopped swirling his tongue and lifted his head again.

"No, no need to thank me. I do have some experience in this arena," Rodney said grandly, before switching gears and asking, "How do you feel about saving it? Because I'd really like it if you'd fuck me."

John couldn't do much other than stare at him. Rodney's searching look seemed about to devolve into one of open anxiety, if the way he was biting his lower lip was anything to go by.

Leaning forward, John clasped Rodney's face between his palms, dipping his head to kiss him.

The air was humid, close and oxygen-starved, and his room felt suddenly freakishly small, as if it had collapsed into no more than a bubble just big enough to encompass John's ridiculously small bed and Rodney, on his knees. Christ.

"I can't guarantee that I'll last," John admitted unsteadily.

Rodney immediately shucked his shirt and then started unzipping his own pants, saying, "Then just, just, your fingers—"

"We— we can do that, yeah," John said unevenly, and Rodney kissed him again before stretching out on his belly on John's bed. After a pause, he lifted his head. "You do have lube, right?"

John just stuck his hand between the mattress and the frame and came back with a flattened tube.

He thought about slicking himself up, but the curve of Rodney's ass demanded his first attention.

"Look," he said softly, "I haven't done this... in a while."

Strictly speaking, he hadn't done this ever. To a guy. Who wasn't himself.

"You'll be fine, you'll be great, would you just—"

Slicking up two fingers, he spread Rodney's cheeks with his free hand. Rodney wasn't trembling, exactly, but there was a tension thrumming through him that John could feel as he stroked his wet fingers along the crack of Rodney's ass.

Rodney hid his face in John's pillow, and John found it slightly disconcerting to not be able to see Rodney's expression.

"Don't let me hurt you," he warned sternly, before glopping more lube on his hand and pushing the tips of his first two fingers just past the hard ring of muscle. Now Rodney did tremble, and there was a soft gasp, and John pressed in a little further, feeling the slow yield of Rodney's body. He could see Rodney nodding against the pillow, the way the back of his neck flushed, and he felt Rodney shift to get his knees underneath him, felt Rodney lift up and push back, so that John's fingers sank deeper inside.

"Now you, now you," Rodney was demanding, muffled by the pillow but perfectly understandable.

John rotated his wrist and Rodney gave a little jerk and made a mewling sound. Pulling out, John took a few deep breaths before going back for more lube and getting to his hands and knees. He ran his dry hand up along Rodney's spine and then down again, cupping his hip before leaning over him, lining up behind him, thigh to thigh, and pressing home.

The hair at the back of Rodney's neck was dark with sweat, and his neck was shining with it, and when John was as deep as he could go, he shuddered a little and scraped his rough cheek against the sweet, slick skin there. This earned a low, broken sighing sound from Rodney, who slacked down where he'd been bracing on his forearms, making John shift with him. The new angle made Rodney give another half-startled full-body jump, and just like that, he felt Rodney come: the twitch of muscle, the small, high almost-yelp, the way Rodney went absolutely still before his shoulders visibly relaxed.

John went still, too.

"Uh, should I—"

"Keep going," Rodney muttered, still muffled by the pillow, but bracing on his arms again.

"But isn't it kind of un—"

Rodney shoved back again and John couldn't finish his sentence.

Kind of surprised at his own stamina, John turned his attention to fucking Rodney. His entire world was the slap of flesh, Rodney's solid heat and ragged breathing, John's own bitten-off gasps and the squeeze of his hands on Rodney's hips. John didn't bother to try to talk himself out of closing his teeth against the back of Rodney's neck, wet salt and sweet fine-grained skin against his tongue...

"Christ, Rodney," John managed, before squeezing his eyes shut and finally, ecstatically coming.

After John finished, he stretched out on the bed and Rodney instantly draped himself along John's body. John opened and closed his hands a few times, feeling wrung-out, light-headed and completely blissed. Rodney himself seemed barely conscious, and when John shifted beneath him, he made little cranky noises that weren't actually words.

Angling his head, John set his lips near Rodney's ear and confessed, with utter sincerity, "I really like your haircut."

END