Brash

[emmasi]

Hello all. Long time no fic. This is just a little one-shot to dip my toe back in the water and to explain why Ash has triggered such aggression/regression in Brax. Enjoy!

Story Title: Brash
Type of story: One-shot
Main Characters: Brax/Ash
Other Characters: Phoebe
BTTB rating: T
Genre: Drama
Does story include spoilers: Yes for UK (I think?)
Any warnings: slash, mild violence
Summary: Ash lets slip to Phoebe the true nature of his relationship with Brax.

BRASH

Phoebe leaned in to kiss Ash. He held her by the shoulders and gently pushed her away. “Phoebe…”

“What?” she asked, confused and impatient.

“I’m not interested,” he said as politely as possible.

“But you’ve been flirting with me since you got here! Don’t pretend like you haven’t.”

“Yeah,” he conceded, “but I flirt with everyone. It’s fun. But I forget sometimes that other people take it seriously. I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to lead you on. I thought you were with Kyle; I thought you weren’t really interested in me either.”

Phoebe considered him for a moment, then decided to go for it. “Well, I am.” She leaned in again.

Again, Ash pushed her back. “I mean,” he said more definitely, “I’m not interested…in girls.” Phoebe stared at him as if she didn’t understand what he’d said, so he added: “I’m gay.”

“You?” she said, disbelieving. “You’re gay?”

“I know,” Ash smirked, “I’m so masculine and rugged, but not all gay men are twinkly little fairies.”

Phoebe folded her arms suspiciously. “Does Brax know about this?”

Ash’s eyes flicked away from hers as he nodded. It was a tiny gesture of guilt that Phoebe immediately pounced on.

“Wait, you shared a prison cell with Brax, didn’t you? Did you and he ever…?”

“Brax is straight,” Ash answered firmly. “He loves Ricky. He’s starting a family with her.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

Ash folded his arms and remained silent.

**

“Brax?” Ash hurried into Brax’s apartment and closed the door behind him.

“Hey, what’s up?” asked Brax, startled out of his solitude.

“Phoebe knows.” Ash hesitated to add, “…About us.”

Brax stared at him, unblinking and seemingly vacant, for an uncomfortably long moment.

“You told her?” Brax concluded quietly. “Of all people, you told Phoebe?”

“No! I didn’t say anything! She was coming on to me!” Ash protested, trying to prove that it wasn’t his fault. “I told her I was gay, and then she asked if anything happened between us in prison, and –”

“And you told her NO!” Brax shouted, as if raising his voice could rewrite history. He stepped threateningly close to Ash, who backed up in fear.

“I… I didn’t say anything.”

Ash held his breath, waiting for Brax to snap and bash him, but Brax just turned away and put his head in his hands.

“Why did you come here?” Brax groaned through his fingers.

“I wanted to see you,” Ash answered sincerely. “You’re my friend, Brax.”

“Friends?” Brax turned on him., full of accusation “Is that really all you wanted? You didn’t come here thinking you’d find me on the outside and we could pick up where we left off?”

Ash folded his arms to keep from openly hugging himself and stared at the floor. “You never told me about Ricky,” he explained sulkily.

Brax scoffed and rolled his eyes toward Heaven, briefly praying for some way out of this mess. But praying had never worked for him before.

“It’s okay, Brax,” Ash reassured him. “I know now. I know you love Ricky, and she loves you. I don’t want to do anything to mess that up.”

Too late, thought Brax. “Ricky cannot find out about this. If she knew I cheated on her, with you –”

“You cut her loose before you went inside, right? So technically –”

“You think she’s gonna care about technically while you’re sleeping on our couch?!”

“She doesn’t have to know,” Ash agreed. “It’s over anyway. Things are different on the outside, I get that. But I thought we were still friends. Good friends. We are, aren’t we?”

Brax hesitated, then grudgingly nodded. He didn’t want that relationship to be ruined as well.

**

Brax stormed into the main house and found Phoebe standing in the kitchen. He had his hand on her throat and her back bent over the sink before she could ask what he was doing.

“If you ever, ever, tell anyone about this, you’re dead, you got it?!”

“Brax!” Ash ran in after him and tried to pull him off of her, but he couldn’t do much without risking hurting Phoebe more.

“I thought,” Phoebe croaked up at them both, with a spiteful gleam in her eye, “there was nothing to tell?!”

Brax glared down at Phoebe, feeling the violent, panicked thump of her heart in her throat. He flexed his fingers a little deeper into her skin. He wanted to make that feeling stop…

Ash, who had settled for gripping Brax’s shoulder, could see the deadly rage building in his friend and tried to bring him down. “Brax…”

Brax heard the desperate, calming whisper in his ear and closed his eyes. He took a deep breath and reluctantly let Phoebe go.

Phoebe gasped dramatically and clutched at the sink for support. She rubbed her reddened throat with one hand and began filling a glass from the tap with the other. The glass shook as she held it to her lips; the water spluttered as she coughed into it.

Brax stood back, disgusted, positive that she was milking it. He couldn’t have really hurt her or scared her that bad…

Brax threw Ash a damning glance, silently declaring ‘This is your fault’, and then left before he did something he’d truly regret.

**

“Brax, wait!”

Ash caught up to him on the graffitied bridge that crossed the stormwater drain behind the house. Brax had been walking so fast that Ash did not expect him to stop, and so he almost ran into the back of him. Brax turned around, lightning-fast, and grabbed Ash by both shoulders to stop the collision. Ash barely had time to notice that Brax was crying before the stricken face was coming at him. Ash winced, bracing for the vicious impact of Brax’s skull on his nose or cheek or jaw, but was taken by complete surprise when he felt Brax’s soft, warm lips cover his own, and Brax’s tongue in his mouth.

It must have only lasted for a few seconds, but it felt like a lifetime.

Ash blinked, speechless, as Brax pulled away from him. Tears were streaming down Brax’s face.

“Why did you come here?” Brax pleaded.

The End...?

Your move, writers