rareslash | Fic: With or Without Control (The Goonies, Troy/Brand, PG13)

With or Without Control
Author:

justmightbe
Fandom: The Goonies
Pairing: Troy Perkins/Brand Walsh
Rating: PG13
Summary: Brand's having a bad day. Troy gets in the way.
Disclaimer: No money. Don't own them. Don't want to.
Spoilers: Nope, pre-movie.
Author's note: Originally slated for the

lovethineenemy Effigy Challenge but, as I'm The Slow and also The Suck, I missed the deadline by a mile and somehow managed to only barely meet the requirements. ::blush:: Many thanks and much love to

carolinecrane for the beta/hand-holding.

- - - -

and this is getting weird/you went straight to my head
- Sahara Hotnights "With or Without Control"

- - - -

The rain was coming down in sheets as Brand made his way back to the locker room. He had been late to gym and Coach Moore had given him an extra five laps so that it wouldn't happen again. When he'd started, the rain had been just a light drizzle but by the time he'd hit lap number three it was like the sky had split open and was trying to drown him. As he'd sloshed through puddles and tried in vain to wipe the rain off his face, he'd cursed and added it onto his list of reasons why the day sucked.

He'd missed the bus, had been late getting to school and, during lunch, some stupid girl had dumped milk in his lap. After spending twenty minutes in the bathroom trying to dry himself off so he wouldn't look like he pissed his pants all day, he had ended up late to gym. He'd tried to explain to the coach that it hadn't been his fault and had pointed out that it was raining, but the old man had just looked up at the sky, said, "better make it quick then", and walked away.

He stormed through the mostly empty locker room in his squishy sneakers, trying to block-out the snickers of his considerably drier classmates. He stripped down, slung a towel around his hips and headed to the showers. While he showered he counted backward from ten and tried to visualize calm streams and flowering fields like his mom was always doing. But after about a minute of fluffy frolicking bunnies he decided that it was complete crap and turned off the water.

He dried off as he checked the old, cracked clock on the wall. There were only a few minutes before his next class. He hurried to his locker and dropped his towel to the floor. He picked up his underwear and realized that he was going to have to go commando or wear them wet. He rolled his eyes and threw them back in his locker and grabbed his jeans. He thanked God that at least the milk hadn't left a weird stain when it finished drying and pulled them on in a jerk. He made sure to zip them carefully, though. The last thing he needed was a trip to the school nurse because he got his dick stuck in his zipper.

His socks and shoes were, of course, completely soaked. He had no choice but to wear them, though, so he shook them off as best he could. No one was going to know that he wasn't wearing underwear, but people would probably notice if he walked through school barefoot. He clenched his jaw and slammed his locker shut. He grabbed his books and looked up at the clock again. He was never going to be on time, and he considered just skipping class and walking home, but fifteen years of being responsible won out.

He shuffled through his books as he walked, trying to find the homework for his next class. He found it finally, stuck between the pages of his English book with what looked like peanut butter. He rolled his eyes and looked up at the ceiling. "Come on, did I murder puppies in a past life or something? You've got to be kidding me."

He tried to wipe the peanut butter off with another piece of paper, but all he accomplished was smearing an indistinguishable blue-brown blur all over the page. He balled the paper up and threw it against the wall with a growl. Any satisfaction he got from the littering was quickly shoved away by the fact that his hand was now covered in peanut butter-ink. He was seriously considering just screaming until someone came to take him away to the nuthouse when the bell rang.

"Oh shit." He picked his books up off the floor and took off down the hallway. He turned the corner without looking where he was going and ran right smack into someone. He hit the floor with a thud, books and papers flying everywhere.

Before he could even get his breath back, whoever it was that he'd run into was climbing up off the floor. It only took a second for the preppy clothes and perfectly styled hair to register. Brand ground his teeth and pushed himself off the floor. It was just his luck that he would run into the last person in the entire world that he wanted to see. Brand seethed with rage as he watched Troy make a big show of brushing off his clothes.

"Jesus, watch where you're going, Walsh."

Brand's anger rolled through him and his hands balled up into fists. "You watch it, Perkins."

Troy rolled his eyes. "Make me."

Their sneakers squeaked on the old, gray linoleum floor as Brand grabbed Troy by the collar and slammed him against the wall. Troy's startled look would have been funny if Brand wasn't having the worst day of his entire life, but as he was, it just pissed him off more. "Maybe I will."

Troy grabbed at Brand's hands and tried to pry them off his shirt. "What the hell is wrong with you? Get your hands off me, goonie."

Brand pushed his fists hard into Troy's collarbone and he felt himself smile at the gasp of pain. He leaned closer. So close that their faces almost touched. "When are you going to get new material, Troy? That goonie crap is getting old."

His grip on Troy's shirt tightened and Brand could feel Troy's heart pounding. His adrenaline was pumping hard and everything seemed distant except for Troy's face and all the places they touched. In the back of his mind he wondered why he'd never done something like this before.

He shifted his feet and pressed his entire body against Troy's. When Troy pushed back he barely noticed. Because he was too busy noticing that Troy was a lot quieter when he didn't have an audience. That Troy was a lot quieter when he was breathing hard and staring at Brand's mouth.

He dimly felt himself leaning forward, and somewhere behind the warning bells going off in his head and the rushing in his ears he realized that Troy was leaning in too. It only lasted a minute. Just long enough for Brand to notice that Troy used Carmex and wasn't going to need to start shaving anytime soon. But then a door slammed somewhere close by and Brand was shoved away and it was over.

There were maybe two feet between them but it might as well have been miles. Troy's eyes were huge and he was breathing hard. There was a peanut butter handprint on his shirt, which was rumpled and pulled almost completely out of his jeans.

Brand wondered if he looked just as bad as Troy, but he didn't really think so because he hadn't looked all that great to start out with. He wanted to say something, wanted to apologize. He had no idea where to start, though. Somehow 'I'm sorry I slammed you into the wall and got peanut butter all over you and kissed you' just didn't seem like it was going to cut it.

But he had to say something. He'd lost control and taken his bad day out on someone who didn't deserve it. Granted, Troy was usually a first-class asshole and deserved everything he got, but this time all the fault was with Brand. He couldn't just walk away without making sure Troy was okay.

He cursed his conscience and shifted closer. Troy continued to stare at the general vicinity of Brand's collarbone. He reached up unconsciously and Troy snapped back to reality. It was the strangest thing Brand had ever seen. One second Troy was wide-eyed with shock and the next it was like everything that had happened in the last few minutes had never happened at all.

He watched as Troy rearranged his clothes and grabbed up his forgotten books. He gave Brand that 'I'm so much better than you could ever want to be' look that Brand hated probably more than anything in the entire world before pushing past him. "If you tell anyone about this you'll wish you were never born, goonie."

Brand laughed a little at that. Who was he going to tell? He could only imagine how much his popularity would improve when he started telling everyone that he'd kissed a boy. And not just any boy, but the boy who just happened to be the biggest jerk in the entire world. It was just like Troy to assume that everything and everyone revolved around him. It was just like Troy to completely forget that there would be consequences for people other than him if Brand were to tell anyone.

It was just a stupid kiss anyway so it wasn't like it even mattered. It was just hormones or something. Definitely not anything that meant anything, Brand reassured himself as he picked up his books and went to class. It definitely wasn't anything to worry about. He licked his lips and tasted Carmex and couldn't wait to get home.

End of story.

Crossposted to lovethineenemy, rareslash, and my own journal. Sorry if you have to see it more than once.