The Touch Of His Hand The Touch Of His Hand by dustandroses Title: The Touch of His Hand Work In Progress: Part One Author: dustandroses Beta: Rowan Fairchild Notes: Written for the HardTime100 FlashFic Challenge: The Plot Thickens Pairing: Alvarez/O'Reily Rating: PG13 Warnings: Vague mentions of sexual situations and slash Summary: Miguel Alvarez and Ryan O'Reily discover unexpected advantages to working together. Disclaimer: I don't own them, but sometimes I think they own me. Feedback: Yes, please. You can e-mail me at dustandroses1984@yahoo.com Website: Breaking Parole (my OzFic LiveJournal) http://www.livejournal.com/users/breakingparole/ Thanks to Rowan for her encouragement and for being a wonderful beta. *smooches* THE TOUCH OF HIS HAND Ryan O'Reily leaned up against the stair rail and examined the quad, as Alvarez casually sauntered in his direction - nothing to indicate that the wall next to O'Reily was his eventual destination. He's smooth, I'll give him that. O'Reily thought, as he watched him stop and talk to a couple of his homies, standing hip-shot, one hand touching his mid-section lightly, pushing his short black sleeveless t-shirt up over his well-defined abs in the process. O'Reily shook his head...who's he trying to impress - no chicks in here to go all weak in the knees over him. Alvarez reached O'Reily, eventually, and he leaned against the wall next to him, his back to the TV screens. O'Reily could tell Alvarez was worried about their plans for the shipment of blotter acid he had coming in the next day. Obviously he`d had a few frustrated customers recently, reminding O'Reily that he should never had told Alvarez to let people reserve theirs in advance...that had almost guaranteed they would have bad luck and the shipment would come in later than planned. "Hey, come on, man...I told you the shipment would be here tomorrow, didn't I?" Alvarez nodded, his anxiety showing, "Yeah, but..." "Then it'll be here tomorrow - stop worrying, ok?" O'Reily kept his eyes on the quad all the time, noticing the escalating argument between a biker and some homeboy that was happening just 20 feet away. "It had better be, man, that's all I got to say. I got people waiting, you know?" "You can trust me, hermano...have I ever let you down?" O'Reily turned away from his perusal of the quad to look directly in Alvarez' dark eyes. "Have I?" He held Alvarez's eyes for a moment to push his point home, but Alvarez just snorted, turning his eyes skyward in an expression of exasperation. O'Reily sighed, turning his head back around to the quad once again, and noticing immediately that the earlier argument had obviously turned more heated. The biker was now holding one of the blue chairs that dotted the quad over his head, as several CO`s converged on him. The homeboy, now standing only a few feet away from the two of them, ducked quickly as the chair was heaved in his direction. With a shout, O'Riley fell to the ground, shoving Alvarez back, out of the way of the flying chair. Alvarez fell backwards, and his head cracked hard against the floor as the chair bounced off the spot on the wall where the two men's heads had been just moments before. Alvarez lay on the floor, stunned, as O'Reily sat up and watched a couple of hacks drag off the two angry men - still spitting and yelling at each other. Murphy showed up about then, and squatted down next to Alvarez. "You ok, Alvarez? Looked like you hit your head pretty hard, there. Here, sit up, let`s take a look at that." Murphy helped pull Alvarez into a sitting position, and turned his head to examine the back of his skull. "Well, there's no blood, that's a good sign - but you should probably go to the Infirmary. That's gonna be one hell of a bump." Alvarez blinked rapidly, shaking his head like he was trying to clear it. "Nah, man, I'm ok...just let me sit here for a minute, all right?" The crowd that had begun to gather around the fallen men dispersed slowly, voices rising around them as they began the ritual process of turning the small incident into the mini-riot status the episode would claim by the time it hit the prison grapevine tomorrow. O'Reily noticed Murphy eyeing a couple of bikers hanging out at the currently un-manned guard station, as he headed for the stairs. "I'll let you sit here for a few minutes, Alvarez, but I think you need to let the Infirmary check you out, all right? I'll be back for you in a bit." He slapped O'Reily on the shoulder as he left, "Good reflexes, there, O'Reily...that could have been pretty messy for both of you." O'Reily moved up to sit on one of the stairs. "Hey, man...you gonna be ok, there?" He stared at Alvarez, who was holding his head, gingerly touching the back, wincing. "Sorry `bout that. I guess I shoved you kinda hard, huh?" "Yeah, well...it could have been worse. When I turned and saw that chair leg aimed at me, all I could think was 'Man...that's gonna go right through my forehead, and poke out the back.'" He started to laugh, but stopped abruptly, wincing again, and put his head in his hands very carefully. He moaned softly. "I got one hell of a headache, man." "Maybe you got a concussion or somethin', you think?" "I dunno, man, but I think Murphy's right, I should definitely check out the Infirmary. My head is pounding like crazy." O'Reily stood and put his hand out to help Alvarez up. Alvarez grasped his hand, and O'Reily pulled him to his feet. But as O'Reily watched, the color drained out of his face, leaving him pale. "Woah, man, I need to sit down," Alvarez exclaimed with a panicked look on his face. He grasped for the railing and O'Reily helped ease him down onto the stairs. "I'll get Murphy - "O'Reily started, but stopped as Alvarez grabbed his wrist, keeping him there: "Nah, man, not yet - just give me a minute or two to recoup, ok? I'd rather walk out on my own...I don't want to go out on no stretcher, or some bullshit like that, you know?" O'Reily nodded, of course he understood...weakness was not acceptable here in Oz. He noticed Alvarez still had hold of his wrist and was unconsciously, lightly, rubbing his thumb over the soft inner surface. At least, O'Reily thought it was unconsciously. He felt a blush spread over him, starting with the heat Alvarez' thumb was generating in the blue-purple veins of his inner left wrist, rapidly covering his entire body and pooling in his groin. He looked up at Alvarez' face, but he had his head in his other hand, elbow resting on his knee. His eyes were closed, and it was impossible to tell if he even realized what he was doing. But O'Reily knew he had no idea what this was doing to him. He was stunned - he struggled to think - standing there with his foot up on a step, leaning in to Alvarez, his leg and body hiding their hands, and the growing stiffness in O'Reily's crotch. He felt betrayed by his body, but at the same time, he wasn't about to pull away. This surprised him more than anything else. He didn't want this to stop; as a matter of fact, he realized with shock, he wanted more. "O'Reily! O'Reily!" He realized he'd been hearing his name for a while, now. He looked around to find Murphy staring down at him from the guard's station. "How is he? Is he ready to go?" O'Reily turned around as Alvarez looked up, letting go his wrist to put his hand on the rail as he twisted to look at Murphy. The shock he felt when Alvarez let go was almost too much, and he gasped, softly, as Alvarez called out, "Yeah, all right, I'm ready." O'Reily stepped back, to let him get up. He held out his hand to briefly take Alvarez' elbow, as he got shakily to his feet. Alvarez held onto the wall for a second, then nodded and headed off to the gate to meet Murphy - O'Reily walking next to him, but not touching - the memory of that thumb on his wrist, burned into his flesh and his mind. He watched through the bars of the gate, as Murphy and Alvarez walked up the hallway and turning the corner, disappeared in the direction of the Infirmary. O'Reily turned, doing his best to hide the huge shit-eating grin that kept trying to spread over his face, and headed back to his pod - to ponder exactly what all of this meant, and figure out a way to make that touch happen again, but this time, without giving Alvarez a concussion. Please send feedback to dustandroses.