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Here he goes again, Withnail thought, as he dispassionately watched his flatmate panic over nothing. Marwood was currently whipping himself up into a frenzy about some letter—a sodding letter!—that had arrived earlier through the letterbox, adding to the slightly concerning pile next to the door that had been growing for the last few days. Marwood had scampered downstairs the moment he'd seen the postman from the window, and fished the inconspicuous off-white envelope off the pile before scurrying back up again.
It sat now on the table behind the settee, still unopened, although Withnail was pretty sure several hours had passed since it had been placed there. It seemed to gleam in the dim light of the living room, its envelope a pristine cream against the gloom of its surroundings. As easily as it caught the eye, it seemed its owner was doing the best he could to ignore it.
Instead, Marwood was fretting in the kitchen, banging some pots around and making a considerable din. Withnail was pretty sure Marwood's hands were shaking fiercely, as they always did when he got into this frame of mind, preventing him from doing whatever cleaning-up he was procrastinating with and only worsening his mood with frustration. From his perch on the settee, Withnail observed his companion shuffling through the cabinet to grab the box of instant coffee, and immediately pour a heap of it into a mug, so much that the mug wouldn't have any room left for water. With what almost sounded like a shriek, although muffled by his closed lips, Marwood grimaced and poured half the powder back into the box, spilling it on the side and all over the floor in the process.
At this point, Withnail had decided enough was enough—he could hardly let Marwood torture himself all day, could he? Reaching out to grab the envelope, he swung himself off the settee and into the kitchen. Marwood paused and turned to him, and promptly caught sight of the letter clutched in Withnail's hand, turning almost a sickly green as he did.
"I believe this envelope is for you," Withnail intoned, holding out the letter for his companion to grab if he so wished. He didn't, though, and even seemed to flinch away as it approached him.
"You're right," Marwood gulped. "You can put that back right where you found it."
"So you can ignore it again? Fat chance!" Withnail waved the letter under Marwood's nose and watched his eyes flicker to the name on the front. "If you don't open it soon, I might as well do the honours."
The sudden change in Marwood's demeanour would have been astounding, if it was one of his occasional performances. Instead, it was real panic that crossed his face in that moment, a terror that flickered in his eyes before settling into a tight-lipped smile.
"You wouldn't dare," he breathed, but he made no move to take the letter from Withnail—perhaps he's afraid of holding the damn thing, Withnail thought briefly, before affirming: of course he's afraid of holding the fucking thing, he can barely even look at it!
As that thought passed through his mind, Withnail was overcome with the need to find out who the letter was from. What made this one unlike any other letter on that pile? He had to satiate this sudden curiosity somehow.
"Tell me who it's from, then," Withnail demanded. "Tell me who you think it's from, and I won't pester you so! I'll even put it back on the table, seal completely intact, so you can fret over it later."
"No," Marwood shook his head, "don't tempt me." His unnerving grin had faded into a frown, obviously concerned about maintaining some sort of private correspondence away from Withnail's prying eyes (something which didn't really make sense, as Marwood tended to leave letters scattered around the house, easily picked up by anyone who had any sort of inclination for reading). "Just put it back, Withnail." Irritation had crept into the edges of his voice.
"In absolutely no circumstance am I going to do that, luvvie," Withnail grumbled. He considered himself curious at heart, even as stuck in his ways as he so appeared to others, and this was something he intended to find out at all costs. How could he let his flatmate keep something from him—something that was obviously tearing him up, nonetheless?
He flipped the envelope around so the writing faced him, and read: Peter Marwood, 27 Greenland Street, Camden Town, Greater London. So the letter was strictly for him, after all: definitely not a threat of eviction or a warning of an unpaid bill then, as the house was in Withnail's name only. That suggested professional correspondence—or perhaps even personal.
Before he could investigate further, a hand swept through his vision. He barely managed to keep the letter out of Marwood's grasp, turning away from him and sprinting out the kitchen towards the living room. There he turned his eyes back to the letter and read the return address. Most of it was too small for him to make out, but he saw the word "Watford" before Marwood launched himself at Withnail from the kitchen threshold.
"Get off, you twat bastard—Withnail!"
Scrambling again away from his enraged flatmate, he tore at the seal of the envelope as he entered Marwood's room. There was nowhere he was able to go from there, and so Marwood would soon catch up to him. Holding the revealed letter upon high, so the shorter man wouldn't be able to reach, he read out loud the first line.
"Dearest Peter–"
The air was torn out of his lungs as he fell back onto the bed, a weight settling on his chest. Marwood was crouched over him, left hand planted right over his heart, right hand reaching out to tear the letter from Withnail's grasp. Finding himself unable to remove the letter from Withnail's hand, he instead pinned the wrist that the hand was attached to onto the bed with a vice-like grip.
Looking down at Withnail, Marwood's eyes burned with a righteous anger at his flatmate's betrayal. Genuine fury rarely ever surfaced from beneath his nervous disposition, but when it did, it could be explosive. Withnail didn't want to face that anger and all the iciness that tended to follow any time soon, so he took it upon himself to distract Marwood with something, anything at all.
In his unthinking desperation, he reached up and mashed his lips against Marwood's downturned mouth.
Immediately, Withnail realised this probably wasn't the best course of action—if anything, it would increase Marwood's ire tenfold. He was probably even thinking scandalised thoughts now! His internal monologue would be surely going haywire—how dare Withnail, how dare he kiss me?—as his body froze, suspended above Withnail's.
To distract Marwood further, even if only to briefly delay what he assumed would be the hysterical fit to beat all others, Withnail wrapped his legs around Marwood's waist and tugged him down closer, until they were pressed together from nose to hip.
At this point Marwood seemed to collapse onto Withnail, the tension in his limbs loosening until he let go of Withnail's letter-holding arm. Withnail took the opportunity to throw the letter off to one side, but could not follow it as Marwood's hand once again reached out and grabbed that wrist. Marwood dragged his arm up off the bed and manoeuvred it just so—so it was curled around Marwood's back.
Withnail's mind boggled. Marwood didn't seem to be as concerned about the contact as Withnail thought he'd be—in fact, all his shock seemed to have drained out of him the moment Withnail's legs had surrounded him. Furthermore, neither of them had broke contact with the other's lips, and they'd been locked together for a good thirty seconds.
Even with all this, Withnail was still surprised when Marwood's lips actually moved against his.
In full honestly, to say Marwood's lips moved would be an understatement. He lifted them up and then dove right back down onto Withnail's several times in quick succession, with seemingly no rhythm or consistent pressure. The suction, if Withnail could call it that, was all over the place, too, but he barely had the time to think God, he's a terrible kisser! before his lips were finally freed.
Withnail was sure it would end there—it seemed the perfect time for Marwood to break out of his mood and leave Withnail lying on the bed, half-hard and frustrated. Instead Withnail barely even caught Marwood's expression (pupils wide, mouth relaxed, without a single lingering trace of anxiety) before the man on top was diving downwards towards his neck.
Whilst Marwood fails at kissing lips, he apparently works wonders on the neck, Withnail thought as his flatmate attached his lips to his collarbone. Withnail had no idea if he was kissing there, or making bruises, or even damn near tearing the flesh off with his teeth, but in any case it brought a wave of electricity running through Withnail's body, causing him to wrap all his limbs even tighter around Marwood.
This in turn brought their hips impossibly closer. Marwood groaned in response, biting down on Withnail's shoulder as he slid his hands underneath Withnail's shirt and across his stomach.
Some part of Withnail wondered if he should stop this, prevent Marwood from carrying out actions that he'd later regret. It had seemed obvious from all Marwood's fretting about homosexuality that the poor boy had a lot to figure out about himself, but prompting those thoughts with sex seemed a tad cruel. Even so, Marwood's enthusiasm took Withnail back—apparently he had underestimated his flatmate's courage.
While Withnail was puzzling this over, Marwood had ceased biting at his flatmate's collarbone and was laying with his head on Withnail's shoulder. His hands were still under Withnail's shirt, and his fingers meandered upwards to stroke along his chest, catching on his nipples with a harsh scratch. Withnail let out a cry and jolted his hips upwards, causing Marwood to make a shocked hissing sound as his hardness met Withnail's.
Now that the final hurdle had been reached, as it were, Marwood continued to grind down as Withnail met him, measure for measure. It seemed they were both close, likely from the adrenaline of running around the house earlier. Withnail could feel himself reaching the edge, and subsequently tipped over it, leaving him clutching Marwood closer to him and crushing the poor fellow's head to Withnail's chest.
Marwood flinched at the sudden movement, which was unlike the rhythm that had built up beforehand, and Withnail took it upon himself to make his flatmate reach the same release that he had. Slipping one arm from around Marwood's back, he attempted to roll them over, but Marwood shot him a glare that made him change his plans.
Sure, fine, Withnail thought. I was going to blow you, but we can skip that step, you ungrateful wanker.
Instead, he reached his freed arm downwards, brushing against Marwood's scratchy jumper as he scrabbled at the button of his trousers. Undoing that, Withnail reached up and palmed against the front of Marwood's tented y-fronts, rubbing back and forth to the sound of his flatmate's increasing delight. Finally, Marwood let loose a string of breathless cries, and Withnail felt it jump beneath his palm before a spreading heat followed.
With all the grace of a horse taking its first steps, Marwood flopped down on top of Withnail, all the strength having left his arms. Rolling sideways, his head nestled in the crook of Withnail's shoulder as he laid to the left of him.
They waited there, lungs heaving, breath slowing to a more sustainable pace, until Marwood jolted upward. He turned, and Withnail could observe the contentment leaching out of him, to be replaced with his usual anxiety-driven pallor. Marwood's eyes flitted around the room, as if searching for an escape route, before he narrowed in on Withnail, still laying down at his side.
Withnail opened his mouth, unsure of what to say. Thankfully he was spared the ordeal of talking about what they'd just done by Marwood's sudden, insistent, "Where did you put it?"
Withnail's mind could make no sense of the question in his drowsy, post-shag state, and so he simply stared back. Marwood shook his head and laughed briefly, a sharp sound that cut through the otherwise silent room.
"The letter, Withnail. Where did you put my fucking letter?"
"Oh." His higher functions of thought came flooding back, and he remembered the letter slipping off the edge of the bed when he'd thrown it. He told Marwood so, and his flatmate grumbled as he slid off the covers and inspected the floor.
"So who's the letter from anyway?" He peered over the side of the bed at Marwood. "I didn't know you knew anyone in Watford."
Marwood froze. Withnail wondered if the sex had quite literally blown his mind, or something about the letter struck him as odd.
"Watford? Ring any bells, luvvie? The place just outside London?"
"Oh, fuck me."
"What do you think we were just doing? Having a bit of a rough-and-tumble, were we?" Withnail snickered.
"No! No, not that." Marwood waved his hands (and the letter) in the air, near enough to Withnail's face that the corner of the envelope caught his cheek. "And I think it's best we, uh," he gestured to the bed frantically, trying to convey whatever he was feeling about what had just happened there, "in a bit."
Withnail would rather fall off a cliff than sincerely talk about what had just happened, mostly because the likely outcome would be Marwood shutting himself off for the foreseeable future. In any case, he nodded impatiently, curious to hear more about the letter.
"I do know someone in Watford." Marwood paused, and Withnail had no idea if he intended it for dramatic effect or just because he could barely fathom the words that would pass his lips. "That someone is my sister."
"A sister!" Withnail crowed, delighted. "How come you've never mentioned her before? Do you not get along? Is she as handsome as you?"
Marwood turned to him, irritation splashed across his face. "That is precisely the reason I didn't tell you—you'd ask ridiculous questions like that and I'd have to stop you from trying to sneak into her bed! Although," a smile quickly flickered on his lips as he nodded to the bed, "that doesn't seem much like a priority to you, really."
Withnail grinned obnoxiously, and replied, "Wouldn't leave it off the cards, luvvie." His smirk spread wider as Marwood's expression turned to that of despair.
"Anyway," Marwood shook his head, "I have no idea why she'd contact me, of all people. It's been three years since we last spoke to each other! Something might have gone wrong! Withnail," he gasped, panic grabbing him, "she might be in trouble! I should find her at once!"
Withnail reached out and placed his hand on Marwood's shoulder, then tugged him towards the bed. Marwood followed his guidance and rose to sit back next to him, trembling slightly as worst-case scenarios ran through his head.
"Perhaps try reading the letter before jumping to hasty conclusions," Withnail suggested, before wrapping his arms around Marwood's shoulders.
Marwood seemed to calm slightly at the contact, and nodded before opening the letter. His eyes scanned the page for several seconds, before he let out perhaps the most pathetic sound Withnail had ever heard in his life.
"She wants to come and stay here next month!" Marwood wailed. "She can't come here—the flat's a tip! I can't even let her inside, never mind stay a few days. Last time I saw her I told her I was doing brilliantly on the West End. She'll see right through me–"
Withnail decided this time was as good as any other to capture Marwood's lips in his again. Perhaps even better, as Marwood immediately sunk into him, tension leaving his from as suddenly as a rubber band breaking. I could use this to my advantage, Withnail mused. I could calm him down from his usual panic easily! Only a touch on his lips and it's over—finally, no more uncontainable hysterics.
"We'll sort it out before she gets here, it'll only take a day or two," Withnail murmured into his mouth. "In the meantime, I believe there was something we were doing that might warrant our attention again."