L.R.H & C.T.H | cake one shots | boyxboy

Benefits | Part One

Summary: In which Calum and Luke are friends... with benefits
Word count: 690

***

"You're leaving?" Calum asks.

He was lying on the bed, the hotel bedsheet pulled up to his waist and covering the lower half of his naked body.

"I have to go to work." Luke replies as he slips his shirt back on, because it was more or less true.

His shift starts in half an hour - leaving plenty of time to hang around - but he needed those minutes to remind himself that this was all things were, all they could be.

Sex with Calum was just sex - nothing more.

"And besides, don't you have a radio show in thirty minutes?" he asks, lacing up his sneakers.

"Well, yeah," Calum shrugs.

"See? Busy, busy, busy," Luke says, his cheerful tone at odds with the emptiness he was feeling inside.

"Can't we just hang out for a while? Play FIFA or something? I'm tired and I don't wanna think about all the interviews we have this week."

"Aww, did I tire you out, big boy?"

"Heck no. This is the most fun I've had in weeks." Calum replies, cracking a small smile.

"Same here, but I really have to go," the blonde states, striding over to the bed and planting a kiss on Calum's cheek.

"Call me whenever, yeah?" he adds as he walks to the door.

"Will do," Luke hears the other say before he steps out into the hall.

Thirty minutes later he's standing behind the counter at work, as preoccupied as ever.

He shouldn't have kissed Calum, he realised. It was no more than a peck on the cheek, but he didn't want to give anything away. He didn't want Calum to find out that he wanted more, especially since he knows the other boy doesn't feel the same way.

He was everything to Luke, but to Calum he was just some boy he slept with whenever he was in town.

Still, those few precious moments were what Luke lived for - even though they brought him nothing more than temporary bliss.

"Excuse me," says a voice, startling Luke from his reverie.

"Yes?" he turns to the redheaded girl who had spoken.

"Could you turn it up, please?" she asks, indicating the radio that was sitting beside the cash register.

Luke does as she says, and soon the voice of a radio DJ breaks the cafe's comfortable silence.

"...and today we have Ashton, Michael, and Calum from the upcoming movie Beau Rivage!" the DJ was saying.

The redhead and her friends squeal excitedly as Luke's stomach drops at the mention of Calum's name.

Not now, please, he thinks.

As much as he loved hearing the other's voice, he needed to have some time alone with his thoughts. Sleeping with Calum always messes with his head, and right now Luke badly needed to regain his composure.

It didn't help that he knew the boys would be asked about their love lives. This was a question Luke hated with every fibre of his being because it made him want to tell the world that Calum was his - something he obviously couldn't do because they weren't together.

When the dreaded question finally came, Ashton, Michael replied with their usual "single" and "Pringle".

"Pringle? What does that mean?" the DJ asks.

"It's kinda like single but hungry." Michael explains.

"Oh, I see!" the DJ laughs. "What about you, Calum? How's your love life?"

"Yeah, Cal, tell us about your love life!" Ashton adds, the playful tone of his voice catching Luke's attention.

Why are they teasing him? Is he dating someone? he wonders, hoping it wasn't true.

The thought of Calum seeing someone else made his blood boil.

"It's basically nonexistent." Calum chuckles.

"Riiight," Michael states.

"Oh come on, now, spill it!" insists the DJ.

Luke could almost see Calum shrugging. "I don't know, I mean there's someone that I hang out with a lot but I'm pretty sure they don't care about me."

What the hell? he thinks. Here I am, miserable as ever, and they're just ignoring him. Who do they think are?

"I'll just ask him," Luke whispers under his breath. "Next time I see Calum, I'll ask him about it."