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Diego studied him for a moment and then his face fell. He looked down at their joined hands and stroked his thumb over the back of Frankie’s hand.
“I… I know, Frankie. Or at least… I hoped. I’m sorry,querido. I think I have some toxic, preconceived notions about sex, and my own body during sex.”
Frankie lifted their hands to tilt Diego’s chin up. “And I have a huge amount to learn about you, your body, your gender experience, and how I can fit into all of it. We’re going to stumble and possibly even fall, and we will inevitably hurt each other in one way or another because that’s what opening yourself up to another person means. Making yourself vulnerable to hurt, so you can also be vulnerable and open to love and pleasure.”
Diego’s face slowly shifted into a breathtaking smile. “You’re… wonderful,” he breathed, and Frankie shook his head, but claimed a kiss all the same.
“So are you. You’ve had so much patience with me all these years as I figured myself out. Now it’s my turn to have patience while we figureusout.”
Diego grimaced. “I still have a lot of figuring out to do for myself as well. I’m not always wholly satisfied with my body, or my gender, or the way that other people interact with either and it’s going to come out in different ways. I just hope you’ll stick with me through it.”
Frankie squeezed his hand. “I will, D. I promise. And hey, we’ve both never been in true adult relationships, so this entire thing is going to be an exercise in newness. I guess that’s why you brought these over.” He flicked his head towards the papers strewn across the couch and Diego nodded.
“Do we need Obie for this?” Frankie asked and Diego cringed.
“We do… I’m sorry. I know this must be hard or embarrassing or…”
“Hey, hey, it’s okay. He’s our investor and one of our best friends. I’m sure he’s not going to judge us. Honestly, he’s so business savvy he might even be proud of us.”
And in the end, he was. Frankie knocked on their door and was surprised when a rather rough looking Obie answered. His turquoise button down was fastened incorrectly, and his jean shorts were on inside out. Seth was lying in bed on his stomach, the long, naked expanse of his back and hip visible under the rumpled sheets.
When Frankie waited a beat too long to say anything, Seth let out a drunk sounding laugh. “What can I say? Love makes me horny.”
Ten minutes later they all met out in the living room, and Diego changed into one of the Mumu’s Frankie had left behind while Frankie wiped down the couch of any contaminants Diego may have brought into the house.
Seth smiled warmly at them both as he served up the cookies, which were only a little bit overdone from having been abandoned in the oven for the whole conversation.
Obie walked through all the paperwork with them and after way too many cookies, and just the right amount of hugs and laughter, Diego and Frankie headed back to their apartment.
Frankie felt sort of emotionally hungover and was ready to crash for the night. He was about to do just that when Diego hesitated in front of his bedroom door.
“Did you want to sleep in here?” he asked nervously, and Frankie’s heart skipped a beat.
He absolutely wanted to sleep wrapped up in his new boyfriend, but he also didn’t want them to rush into anything before they were ready.
“Maybe the first time wesleeptogether could also be the first time we sleep in the same bed?” Frankie offered and Diego looked so relieved he knew he’d given the right response. He could only imagine if Diego was half as nervous as Frankie was, he was probably close to bursting and then there was any gender dysphoria he might have to contend with.
Besides, they’d waited three years for this. How long could it take to get test results back?
Apparently, pretty fucking long. Frankie had failed to account for the fact that Diego didn’t handle stress well. Actually, that wasn’t fair. He handled stress fine on the outside, appearing calm, cool, and collected. On the inside and behind closed doors, however, he tended to fall apart a little. Only two days after they officially started dating, one of the construction workers fell and broke his arm. Thankfully, the cafe and the construction agency had insurance, but it meant a delay of over three weeks while the contractors found someone else to replace the poor man while he was at home recovering. Diego took this all in stride as he informed Obie of the delay and worked out the details with the construction site manager.
As soon as they were back in their apartment, however, Diego locked himself in the bathroom and wouldn’t come out for over three hours. Frankie eventually ended up running down the street to a gas station to use their bathroom. He brought back an assortment of Diego’s favorite junk foods and a slushie and was able to coax Diego out of the bathroom by offering all of the treats as well as himself.
When Diego emerged, he dragged Frankie by the wrist to their couch and proceeded to binge on bad reality TV, sugary treats, and Frankie’s body… as in cuddling. They cuddled. They cuddleda lot. To be fair they also kissed, but cuddling and kissing was pretty much all they did as the days flew by and suddenly it was Thanksgiving, and they were running around prepping dishes and shuttling food over to Obie and Seth’s house. Thank God Obie had a car, otherwise they would have been doing all the transporting and errands by bus. Frankie casually mentioned they should look into getting a car before the cafe opened. Diego looked so overwhelmed that Frankie dropped it.
That night, as they lay in a tryptophan-fueled stupor on their couch, Frankie turned to Diego and cupped his face in his hands. “Do you just not want to have sex?”
Diego jerked back from Frankie’s grip so hard he almost fell to the floor. Thankfully, he caught himself at the last minute and ended up sort of sprawled out on the couch, looking up at Frankie in confusion.
“Are you serious? I’ve been jacking off almost twice a day just to survive. Of course I want to have sex.”
“Then why haven’t you gotten tested?” Frankie asked as gently as he could.
Diego’s cheeks flared pink, and his eyes darted around. He tried to look at anything but Frankie. “There’s… just been a lot going on, and I… I’m just not in the right headspace right now.”
Frankie bit his lip and tried to hold back the words swirling in his chest, but some of them broke free. “You’re not in the right headspace to pee in a cup? We don’t have to have sex when you get the results, D, but as soon as you have them, at least the option is on the table. We’re not even able to cuddle and sleep together in bed because we said we wanted to wait. Now, we could reassess, but I don’t think either of us want to do that, so I guess I just don’t understand why you won’t get tested.”
Diego was giving him a look Frankie had come to associate with his fucking something up, typically around either the business, their relationship, or Diego himself. Thankfully, Frankie hadn’t been doing a lot of any of those recently, but given their current conversation he assumed it was the second or third one.
