COOKIES


Harry felt the warm breath at his ear as Jack leaned over his left shoulder. The firm hand on his left arm followed.

“You want to press the Undo button there?”

Harry frowned. He shifted awkwardly on his seat in front of the home computer. “I’m fine, thanks.”

Jack didn’t move away, though. “You know what you ought to do?” he murmured. “You need to use Back a couple of times. You've got that link mixed up… look.” His right arm shot up from the region of Harry’s waist and his fingers stabbed at the screen. “Under the italicized header. Look, there, by the drop down menu. You got distracted, obviously, that’s what it looks like, opening a load of stuff you don’t really want. That pop-up must be really damned annoying, but if you just -”

“I’m fine!” Harry realized he’d raised his voice, but really, he didn’t know why Jack thought he could just walk through the apartment and interrupt him whenever he liked. He understood that they had to share the computer in the lounge and he couldn’t afford his own laptop yet in his room, but really, all Harry asked was a quiet few moments to himself at the end of the working day and some damned privacy, surely that was the least that any room-mate deserved, yet Jack continued to…

Harry paused his rambling thoughts, took a deep breath and tried to relax.

Jack chuckled softly. The noise made the pulse in Harry’s neck vibrate in the same rhythm: he could feel Jack’s body pressing against the back of the chair. “Pisses you off, right?”

Harry didn’t turn his head around but he knew that Jack was grinning. There was always a certain tone to his voice… “Yes, all right, I admit that it does.”

Jack sighed: his breath lifted a few strands of Harry’s hair at the nape of his neck. “I can understand that.”

“You can?” Despite himself, Harry was startled. Perhaps he didn’t give Jack enough credit for sensitivity…

“Yeah.” Jack nodded vigorously, his fingers tightening on Harry’s left bicep. His arms were encircling Harry now, and his right hand stabbed back up in the direction of the screen. “Because pop-ups drive me mad, too. There I am, just found the perfect site, but I press some link accidentally and I’m whisked off to somewhere with cell phones for a dollar, or a consolidating loan I never knew I needed, or pharmaceuticals delivered discreetly and swiftly to my door, or instructions on how whatever it is, was or will be that I’m searching for, I can find it on E-bay -”

Harry made a loud snort of protest. “Just… leave it, Jack.” He leaned forward, trying to shield the screen with his body, at the same time as his hands hovered protectively, reaching back to the keyboard.

But Jack just leaned in further, his chin resting on Harry’s shoulder. He gripped Harry even more tightly, effectively keeping Harry’s left arm trapped at his side. At the same time, his right hand moved again, traveling swiftly past the keyboard and landing on the mouse.

“Leave that alone!” snapped Harry. He wriggled, but found it difficult to push Jack away. The way that Jack’s arms reached across his body made it awkward for him to grab the mouse back without using force. And really, he shouldn’t need to do that, should he?

Jack was nodding again, his hair brushing Harry’s cheek. “Makes it damned hard to track back, I know, I’d be irritated too. But you can use the history, just close that down…” He clicked on the mouse. “…minimize that…” Another click. “…don’t know why you ever left that application up, it really covers the whole screen, can’t see what you’re doing at all, and it takes so damned long to load, ah, now you can see the history so we can drop down…” Click. “…call up where you last visited…” Click.

“Jack…” Harry’s voice was a little hoarse.

“…right click and restore that lil’ ol’ cookie, pity you deleted it so fast…”

“Jack!” Harry snapped, and it must have reverberated right in Jack’s ear. But the other man didn’t flinch.

“And voila!” Jack crowed, happily, just as the underlying screen came into view, unfurling slowly from the top of the screen down to the bottom. “Now you’ve found your way back, no trouble at all, you just needed to ask the expert, yeah that’s me. And before you ask, it was no trouble at all, won’t even charge you, hey, just any time you need me…” His voice trailed off. His body stiffened. His breath came out on a strangled gasp.

Harry shut his eyes, hung his head and groaned. “Satisfied now?”

Jack made a gulping sound. Harry raised his head again and could see the reflection of Jack’s face in the screen. His mouth was hanging open, like a character in a comic book, as he stared at the site on display.

Around the reflection of Jack’s face, Harry could see the list of luridly colored teasers, scrolling slowly and gleefully down the sides of the home page.

“Harry…” It was neither a question nor a statement. Just a sort of moan.

Harry shrugged. Couldn’t a man have his own private favorites? Couldn’t he spend his time on adult entertainment without being harassed and judged? Couldn’t he…?

He glanced at Jack’s face again and sighed. “You weren’t meant to see this. You’re not to take this out of context.”

Jack raised an eyebrow, though his eyes remained glued to the screen. “And that is… how?”

“You shouldn’t be concerned because I like to… look at men.”

“Naked men,” said Jack, softly. “Naked men with oiled flesh; naked men with ludicrous costumes on - or half off, for that matter - and pretty cheesy settings. A poolside… a gym… and what’s with that grocery store, there? Naked men with muscles where, last time I looked, I didn’t even have a limb, and naked men with prime genitalia the size of large, thick - ”

“Enough!” Harry cried out and slammed his hand down on the keyboard. The screen winked with shocked surprise but closed itself off obediently. Harry groaned inside, he’d worry about rebooting properly later on, after he’d cleared this up with Jack, after he’d…

Kissed Jack. Well, he didn’t have much choice in that, because the other man had spun his chair around, leaned forward and initiated it, very enthusiastically. Startled, Harry opened his mouth to let Jack’s tongue in and quickly realized it wasn’t the swiveling on the computer chair that made him so light-headed. Jack’s fingers tangled in his hair and he grasped back at Jack’s waist, tugging the two of them closer together and opening his thighs wider on the seat so that Jack’s body nestled in between. Harry felt his body shivering with sudden arousal, and could hear Jack whimpering in return.

“Are you shocked?” he whispered into Jack’s ear. He took a chance and bit down on the lobe: Jack didn’t pull back.

“Nah. It’s just porn, you know?” Jack gasped. “Nothing wrong in that. I was just… surprised.” Harry’s mouth was back on his, nipping at his lower lip and he groaned. “You looking at it… didn’t know you…”

“Hm?” Harry licked slowly along the line of Jack’s jaw. “Didn’t know I what?”

“Liked this,” hissed Jack, sliding his hand down inside the front of Harry’s pants.

Harry moaned loudly and sucked in his belly so that there was more space to maneuver. His back arched in the chair, and it knocked against the computer table. The mouse skittered off, dangling over the side.

“Back,” muttered Jack, hoarsely. He lifted a knee so that it perched on the edge of the seat, his thigh nudging at Harry’s groin. “Back. Click. Better than cookies.” He sucked on Harry’s neck, glancing down at Harry’s obvious erection. “Pop-up.” His fingers fumbled at Harry’s zip. “Undo.”

Harry didn’t know whether to laugh or groan. Jack’s hands were up under his shirt and down his pants: there seemed to be more than two of them, judging from the damage they were doing to his rising libido. He sat back upright, suddenly, and pushed Jack backwards. The other man stared at him, panting, disheveled. “Huh -?”

Harry swiftly stood up, panting just as hard. “Bedroom,” he growled. His fingers flipped open the button of his pants and pushed down the zip. He grinned at Jack, his eyes alight. “That’s if you want to see drop-down!”