THE WEEKEND THAT CHANGED EVERYTHING 14 - TERRITORY

Pedro went to visit Juan at his workplace, not for the first time, as he usually spent some time there when he had free time and was nearby. He had been doing this since before they started their current relationship, when they were just friends.

He didn't knock, simply turning the doorknob and entering.

Juan was sitting behind his desk, reviewing some papers. He lifted his head abruptly upon hearing the door, his eyes widening with surprise and some alarm. He wasn't used to people entering without warning.

"Hello, darling," Pedro said. "How are you?"

"Pedro," Juan hissed, lowering his voice to almost a whisper, "not here, please. Watch your words."

Pedro calmly closed the door and sat down in one of the visitor chairs in front of the desk. He opened his legs, got comfortable, and loosened the first button of his shirt.

"What's wrong? We're alone."

"Even so," Juan said. "You never know. Please."

"Stop messing around," Pedro said. "It's not like this is the first time I've come here. How's everything going?"

Juan took a few seconds to change his demeanor. Pedro could see it: the conscious effort to relax his jaw, lower his shoulders, and adopt the posture of a guy receiving an old friend in his office, not the submissive who had just heard his master call him "darling."

"Fine, everything's fine," Juan said, putting the pen down on the papers and pushing them aside. "What brings you here?"

"Just to hang out a bit," Pedro said. "I was nearby and had some free time."

"Do you want some coffee?" Juan offered, pointing to a coffee maker in a corner on a low piece of furniture.

"Sure," Pedro said.

Juan got up and went to prepare it. Pedro watched him move. There was something in the way Juan walked that betrayed what he was. A softness in his movements that wasn't there before. A tendency to keep his head slightly inclined, as if his neck remembered the weight of a hand that wasn't there. Invisible marks that Pedro had been carving over the months. He enjoyed the view. It gave him a sense of satisfaction, the kind of satisfaction that came from knowing that the man in the suit serving coffee in a downtown office was his creation.

"How's your mom?" Pedro asked while Juan was filling the cups.

"She's fine. I saw her on Sunday. She asked about you."

"Really?"

"Yes. She wants to know when you're coming over for dinner again."

Pedro laughed, a genuine laugh, one of the few that escaped him.

"Your mom loves me."

"My mom loves anyone who talks to her," Juan said.

"And you?" Pedro asked. "How's everything going?"

"Fine. Work is a mess, but what's new."

They drank their coffee in comfortable silence.

"I'm coming over to your place tonight to fuck you," Pedro said with the same naturalness he would have said "it's going to rain tomorrow."
...