Pictures of You [Completed]

Twelve. I Don't Smoke

Luke didn't like that all the cartons of cigarettes had gruesome pictures on them. Like Ashton's with the baby crying. The store was lined with them. There was one with rotted teeth, another of a corroded mouth ulcer. Another with lungs that looked spotty and cancerous. He picked up two of the last kind and went up to the cashier. He wasn't a smoker anyway so it didn't matter.

He was smoking though—but that was for health reasons.

The last few days had been really good—with the exception of the cigarette cartons and the consumption of their contents—Luke loved Europe so far. Everything was old in a way that was different than New York. The pavement just felt like it had been urbanized for much longer than 300 years. And the architecture supported that sentiment. If he got down a narrow street without any neon signs around, he could almost pretend he'd been transported back in time. Well, except for the tourists.

Luke walked up to one of his fellow tourists at the cafe and handed him a pack of the cigarettes. "There you go, baby," Luke draped his arms around Ashton's shoulders to hug him from behind. "I told you I'd pay you back."

"Four days late? My hero," Ashton added dryly leaning into Luke's cheek kiss.

"Don't be like that. We've been busy." Luke pretended to pout sitting in his own iron outdoor chair across from Ashton. He slipped his shoe off and ran his foot up Ashton's calf. "I got it back to you in the end..."

Ashton sighed and conceded siping his coffee, watching over Luke with lingering eyes. "I got you some food while you were gone."

"What is it?"

"Like a B-L-T with egg on it," Ashton said in a tight voice that was disguised as being casual. Luke would give him this, the man knew the weight of what he said.

"Okay. Thank you," Luke took the same tone with a soft, trying-hard-not-to-be-fake smile. He leaned back in his chair dreaming of lighting up a cigarette.

"I won't have to work tomorrow, so a lot of us were talking about going to the clubs," Ashton hummed. "If you haven't been clubbed out."

"Me?" Luke cooed. "The club is my favorite place. Call me Brian Kinney."

Ashton smirked and rolled his eyes. "Yeah, baby, you're no Brian Kinney," Ashton shook his head. "You're Justin if I've ever seen him. Just as fucking annoying."

"Hey!" Luke giggled over his fake offense, but it kind of turned him on to hear Ashton think that about him. "Which club are you wanting to go to?"

"Are you familiar with all of them now?" Ashton scoffed.

"No, just wondering." Luke hadn't moved his foot away from Ashton's leg yet, and he used it to tease at his thigh.

Ashton put his hand over Luke's foot and caressed the soft skin. "We'll figure it out, I think. Why? Which one are you and your little birds flocking to tonight?"

"Tonight's not a club night for us. I think we're bar crawling instead...don't you wish you were with us?"

"I wish I was with you," Ashton hummed. "That's it."

Luke scoot his chair closer to Ashton and pet the hair at the back of his neck. "You'll have me all to yourself soon. Tomorrow is our day."

Ashton had leaned into Luke's affection like a dog, or a contented cat. "I'm really looking forward to that."

By the time Luke and Ashton made it back to their hotel, Luke had had maybe half of his sandwich and two Ginjinha shots out of mini chocolate shot glasses, and was feeling really nice.