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It was intimidating at first, for sure, they had moved into the dorms together at the start of the term and a while after he had discovered Mark was invincible. That brought up several issues, first of all, Mark was his best friend: who he had a crush on since they were kids. Second of all, Mark was invincible: who was his celebrity/superhero crush.
William thought it was going to be a challenge sharing a dorm with him for those two reasons alone. But there was something else about Mark he could never have guessed, it honestly might have surprised him more than his secret identity.
The first night it had happened William was on the verge of passing out, he always did around the same time. After a long night of studying or watching stuff on his laptop, William would eventually doze off. While he was asleep, Mark would come in from fighting a villain and undress, slip into his pyjamas and go to bed. It was their routine. Usually. But just before he finally submitted himself to sleeping he heard Mark say something, blinking awake and waiting to see if he’d repeat himself:
“William…” the other let out breathlessly, and he almost thought in the darkness of the room Mark had somehow seen him awake. Then there was a creak and an unmistakable noise: a low pathetic moan, he bit his lip and felt his eyes glance over. Mark was getting off to him, dry humping what looked like a pillow that he had rolled up and settled between his thighs. William cupped his pants and held his breath, and there it was again. A soft quiet but utterly desperate moan and sad attempt to call out to him. It went on for ages, but with each rock of his hips against the fabric being so lazily sleepy, it took William a minute to realize he had stopped. He doubted Mark had even finished as he flopped over and fell asleep.
What the fuck was that?? William groaned, opening his drawer quietly and finishing himself off after the poor performance and cleaning up. Turning over grumpily and similarly falling asleep. It wasn’t until he woke up, stretching as he sat up and kicked his feet over the side of his bed that he he remembered the night before. He rubbed his eyes and mumbled again to himself: “What the fuck was that..”
“What’d you say?” Mark perked up at the other side of the room, putting on his socks and had already dressed up for class. William lifted his shirt and scratched at his chest,
“I had the weirdest dream, I might still be dreaming, are you going to class for once??” William stood and eyed his trash can. Tissues, so not a dream. Looking back up at the other now slipping his shoes on, tightly tying them together and lugging his bag over his shoulders.
“Yeah or the notes you pick up for me don’t mean anything.. I mean, as long as I’m getting good grades do I need to show up?” The expression he made on his face after he said that meant he knew the answer, and the smug expression on William’s meant he was right as always.
“Well you don’t wanna miss class, what was the thing Amber always called you? Fly away, flyboy” he waved his hands and Mark rolled his eyes, huffing loudly and leaving the dorm, quietly shutting the door behind him.
William fell back onto his bed and let out a deep sigh. Mark and Amber had broken up a while ago and while he was still weird about it, Mark would try and be nicer to her to make up for his shitty behavior by not avoiding her, which he insisted was a good idea at first. William couldn’t imagine where he would be if not for him, he didn’t know where he would be without Mark either. But there was something about his bad behavior that influenced him.
As his eyes wandered across the posters on Mark's wall, along his bed and down to his side table. Before he came to his senses he was on the other side of the room looking through his things. Collectibles, cologne, deodorant, comic books, and even Jewellery. It was weird, William didn’t strike mark as the kind of guy to wear that stuff, his ears weren’t even pierced.
He pushed passed college notes and condoms and found something familiar. It was the perfume he had lost. If it wasn’t for the night before he would’ve shrugged it off and imagined that Mark was just being an idiot and his mind had wandered somewhere else when taking the glass bottle. William didn’t wear perfume, but this one had a particularly nice scent. A long-lasting scent. Which could only mean…
No way.
Surely he wouldn’t.
William squeezed his eyes shut and then swallowed down hard, hesitatingly picking up Mark's pillow and putting it up close to his face. This was perverted and disgusting and… there it was, his perfume. Faint, but there. Unbelievable.
William dropped the pillow and slammed the drawer shut. Walking over to his side and checking his phone for the time. He could get ready for class early just to take his mind off the last couple of hours. So he did.
Before long William had checked off all the things he needed to do that day. Now tucked away in his dorm room, doom scrolling on his phone late at night with a pillow between his thighs and an arm under his other. He gave one final check over his notifications and emails before turning his phone off and plopping it on the side table. Drowsily he searched for Mark in the darkness, but nothing. He waited as much as he could bear before he blinked and it was morning. As he blinked awake to look over at mark, the other was stretched out on his own bed, in only his boxers and a shirt.
“Mark..” William called out drowsily, he cleared his throat and leaned forward, a little louder this time: “Mark!” The other groaned and rolled on his back, yawning loudly and then rolled to face William. It was kind of like when they were kids and having sleepovers, except William probably would’ve chucked something at him, that was on the off chance Mark hadn’t woken up first like he always did and jumped on the bed to wake him up instead . “Hey, did you ever find my perfume?”
Mark hadn’t even opened his eyes yet, eyebrow twitching at the question as he yawned again,
“What???”
William rolled his eyes and repeated:
“My perfume, I was thinking of going out later and I was wondering if you’d found it.” Mark was kind of quiet for a while, and Will had begun lifting a pillow in a threat to throw it to wake him back up. Mark gradually opened his eyes and sat up, still not all there.
“D- uhh, hm, the- perfume, nope.” He shook his head and rolled back over, as soon as he did William lobbed the pillow at his back and he let out a loud groan. “I haven’t seen it!! Leave me alone..”
It was hopeless. Will checked his phone and realized why Mark had been so tired, it was kind of early. So he rolled his eyes and similarly rolled over to go back to sleep.
Later on, he had woken up again to his alarm. Will went through his day as normal, attended classes, talked to his friends and finally headed back to his dorm to get comfortable and continue watching his series on Netflix. It wasn’t anything special, not in comparison to marks life, but it was his routine.
But that night Mark had come back late again, and as much as he fought it, the curiosity kept him awake a little longer. Nothing. Nothing for a while. But just before he was ready to drop the idea: it started again. Williams's heart fluttered and face burned each time the other called his name and at every whine and soft gasp, he let out. Wills eyes would roll back and he’d find his arm already in his pants, quietly getting off to the other. They’d both fall asleep and act like nothing happened the next day. That was the new routine.
The issue was, that it became somewhat obnoxious. The thrill and excitement William felt at first had drifted into annoyance.
At first, he had to fight to stay up, just for a glimpse of Mark in the moonlight in all his beauty and desperation.
It sounded like something straight out of a movie: seeing his best friend getting off to him quietly. His skin and sweat illuminated by the glow from their window.
At first, it was sexy, and now? William was looking up earplugs on Amazon and coming up with ways to get him to cut it out.
For the next week, he did whatever he thought might steer him away from that kind of behavior: He took his perfume back, he found and took back all his shirts that he didn’t even realise he was missing, he washed the sheets from his smell, he’d even pretend like he was getting bothered in his sleep by the noise from long sighs and tossing and turning around in his bed.
But the other wouldn’t stop, honestly, William was half convinced he didn’t even realise he was doing it, like some kind of sleepwalking thing.
But one night a couple weeks in, he really just couldn’t take it. William turned over and realised the other hadn’t even gotten out of his suit. The mask was thrown on the floor and the top part sort of rolled up as he lazily pushed his crotch into the pillow. William sat up, without thinking he impulsively threw one of his pillows over at him and immediately regretted it. His face dropped as his eyes met marks. Suddenly that rush from the first few nights hit him, this was new, exciting again.
“You-“ marks drowsy half-lidded eyes tried to focus on William’s face, waiting for him to continue. “You forgot about your suit,” he mumbled. Mark pushed off the bed and slumped over to the other side of the room. In what he assumed was fear or even embarrassment, William kicked his feet forward and backed up to the wall. Mark was far too quiet, did he interrupt some sort of weird alien thing? He would be lying if there wasn’t a part of him going crazy over this, quickly pressing his thighs together to keep away any more unwanted surprises. Mark put two hands down at either side of William and leaned forward.
“Hey did you say something?” So- he was asleep? The look in his eyes, the slight furrow in his brow, was more obviously an attempt to focus in the dark of the room. William had unconsciously held his breath, chuckling slightly before he repeated: “You’re still wearing your suit, you probably should take it off just in case-“
Mark moved again, putting a knee up on the bed and towering over William a little, “Do you mind helping me take it off?” Any further away and William wouldn’t have heard him, far too distracted to be paying attention. Then again what did he expect? It wasn’t like mark was getting off to any other guy named William. Still he was way too forward, probably still out of it. The two had become so tired as of late. His brows slightly turned as he remembered the only reason he was tired was because of Mark in the first place.
But was he ready for this? It was everything he could dream of, yet why was he so.. he closed his eyes and tried to focus, hands carefully moving to lift the rest of the suit. They managed, both lazily doing their part but eventually Mark was out of his suit, all its pieces dropped on the floor and William still with his back against the wall. Then they had another issue, they were both far too tired to do anything crazy. But that had to have been the only thing stopping them.
So for a small moment, the two sat enjoying each other's company, Mark relying on body heat to keep him warm, and William building up the courage trying to figure out how to relieve himself without ruining their peace.