#huh so it's not a different spelling for Ernesto

[jovieinramshackle]

Sorry guys I actually like "Ernesto Foulworth and Gino" please don't come at me/j

[pengychan]

[Coco] Mind the Gap, Pt. 2

Title: Mind the Gap Summary: Modern Day AU. Tired of Ernesto’s snide remarks, Imelda decides to put him in his place and her husband is more than happy to help. It was supposed to be a one-night deal. Things quickly get out of hand. [OT3, mostly porn and humor. Plenty of instances of Ernesto being Dramatic, Imelda getting Sick Of His Shit, and Héctor trying to be the peacekeeper. Don’t expect anything serious.] Pairings: Ernesto/Héctor/Imelda Rating: Explicit.

To see the version with art by Dara, check it out on Ao3.

Tag for all parts up so far.

A/N: this was supposed to have a point, but it mostly turned into an explanation as to how they ended up all in the same bed in the first chapter. Plus more porn.

But really did any of you expect anything different.

***

Imelda wakes up first.

It is one of the unchanging facts of their married life. Héctor falls asleep first, sleeps like the dead, wraps his limbs around her like a boa constrictor at some point through the night and hardly, if ever, awakens before her. That morning is not an exception.

Imelda rises on one elbow - Héctor stirs, but only barely, when his arm slips off her - and gazes down at her husband with a smile. They haven’t bothered to pull the sheets over themselves, because the night has been much too warm, and she’s treated to the very pleasant sight of his lean body against hers. She runs a hand over his side, smiling a little when he shivers and sighs, until it rests against his cheek.

Under the mop of unruly hair, Héctor’s sleeping face couldn’t look more serene. She’s always liked how long his eyelashes are, although she rarely mentions it; last time she did Héctor started batting them ridiculously often whenever he decided she was being too serious over something, like picking the flowers for their wedding, and on a couple of occasions she laughed so hard she almost thought she would never be able to breathe again. But now he’s asleep, and she can admire them at her heart’s conten--

A slight snorting sound snaps her from her thoughts, and the smile forming on her lips fades; still sleepy and in Héctor’s arms, she forgot they are not alone on the bed. Imelda tears her gaze from Héctor’s face and raises an eyebrow towards Ernesto, ready to throw in a few sharp words, but there is no need to: he’s still asleep on the other side of the bed, a gap between him and Héctor.

He’s on his stomach, head resting in the crook of his arm, that stupid hair he always keeps checking in every available mirror tousled, the sheets bunched around his ankles. His back rises and falls regularly with his breathing, and Imelda’s eyes go to the marks she’s clawed across it, to the faint bruises on his shoulders Héctor’s grip caused and the more marked ones she’s left on his hips.

Overall, she finds the sight… satisfying, for the lack of a better word. Worth the annoyance of his presence, because she got the satisfaction of knowing she has won.

She planned nothing of what happened that night, of course; had anyone told her the previous afternoon that she’d awaken the next morning with her husband’s insufferable friend with them on the bed, she would have laughed. She can hardly bear having him in her home - and he is always in her home, as though he doesn’t have his own apartment at the ground floor of the same building. He’s always around Héctor, behaving all the world like she’s just there to pick up the dirty glasses and dishes they leave around.

Héctor is usually the one to clean up any mess and say that Ernesto means nothing by it, of course; Ernesto is just like that, hardly bothers to pick up after himself, “you should see what his place looks like!”

Imelda has precisely no intention to set foot in his apartment and find out what it looks like. Unlike Héctor, who seems in blissful denial, she can see the truth exactly how it is: Ernesto resents her, and is trying to get on her nerves because it’s about all he can do.

It wasn’t always the case: back when they were all children in Santa Cecilia, when the boys were inseparable almost from the crib and she was only a girl who hung with them from time to time, he hadn’t minded her. They butted heads sometimes - he’d downright pouted when she’d beaten him at skipping stones - but overall, they got on reasonably well; never quite friends, but good enough acquaintances.

When they had moved to Mexico City to pursue their musical career she’d missed Héctor from time to time, but rarely thought of Ernesto. And then, when she moved to Mexico City as well a couple of years later and they ran into each other, it soon became clear that things had changed; it was as though, in that short time, the boy Héctor was had grown into a man. He was still the person she’d known, and yet so different. They’d talked over drinks, laughed, talked some more; for a time both had forgotten that Ernesto sat at their same table.

She had known right away that Ernesto wasn’t especially pleased with the direction things were taking; in their childhood days, she’d been the third wheel… but suddenly it was him, and Ernesto really hates it when something isn’t about him.

Maybe he could have coped with it, had it been a one-time thing, but as things changed - as she and Héctor met again and again without him in the picture, as it progressed to dating and engagement and finally marriage, putting an end to their days as two carefree bachelors - Imelda could tell he was growing more and more frustrated; she could tell that his cutting remarks were not jokes at all and she knew, although Héctor never told her anything about it, that he had tried to talk his friend out of getting married. Unsuccessfully.

When their wedding day had come Ernesto had been impeccable, all laughs and smiles and pats in the back in his role as Héctor’s best man… but Imelda could tell he was playing a part. She could see the frustration behind that smile, the anger and maybe - that was something she’d wondered about once or twice - downright jealousy.

His best man speech had been hardy anything noteworthy - no wonder Héctor was the songwriter between the two of them - and she had known that, beyond the light-hearted jokes about his best friend getting ‘tied down’, there was something much deeper: a resentment that had been growing for the past months and years and that Ernesto knows better than to spell out clearly.

He knows that if he ever does, Héctor will take her side. He knows that if he’s ever forced to choose, he’ll choose her. Ernesto has lost a competition she’s never wanted or agreed to, and he hates it.

That knowledge, and the no small amount of smugness she gets out of it, is usually what keeps her from snapping. She knows that Héctor doesn’t want to be forced to choose and that losing his best friend would hurt, so she ignores the remarks behind his jokes. They’re nothing but a pathetic attempt at lashing out at her, not worth a thought.

But of course, in the end she reached the boiling point. Last night’s boasting about his conquests - like men and women who fall for his dubious charm are nothing but that to Ernesto, to be used and discarded the next morning - angered her; his snide remark on how Héctor probably should count himself lucky if he got a kiss those days made her furious. So she marched in the bedroom, grabbed their strap-on and threw it before Ernesto, with no small satisfaction when he choked a little on his drink.

Lucky to get a kiss, huh? You wish you had what he has, pendejo. You wish.

She threw the challenge in his face with a sort of savage triumph and hardly any thought at all, fully expecting him to get up, mumble an excuse, and leave with his tail between his legs - possibly embarrassed enough to never show at their door again, if she was lucky.

She didn’t expect him to stay. Didn’t expect him to look at Héctor, look at her, and take that challenge. But he did and she could have called it off… except that she would have never lived it down if she did and gave Ernesto a reason to get smug. Except that she’d looked at Héctor’s face and the desire on his features was all that it took to decide.

She’d thrown the challenge, she’d seen it through, and she’d come out on top in more ways the one; the way Ernesto had come undone beneath her had been very satisfying.

Which reminds her, he took that dildo far more readily and easily than she expected; maybe Héctor was especially good at getting him ready, but she suspects Mr. Manly is not, after all, always the one on top as he likes to claim. And the eagerness when he took Héctor in his mouth… how long has he wanted to do that?

Well, that is one thing I can’t blame him for.

The thought makes Imelda smirk, and she turns away from Ernesto’s sleeping form to look back at Héctor. She leans down,  hand slipping down to his groin, her mouth pressing against his temple. When he awakens with a startled mumble, Imelda nibbles at his earlobe and shushes him. 

“Ssssh… quiet. Come shower with me.”

He does, grinning sleepily at her. For a moment as he sits up he seems startled to see Ernesto sleeping on the other side of the bed - Imelda can see his face and ears especially turning crimson as he remembers what happened the previous night - but he just nods at her, and slides silently off the bed and out of the room with her, towards the bathroom.

Nothing’s better than a nice shower to start the day right.

*** 

When they bought the apartment - with some help from Imelda’s family, truth be told - both of them had agreed on three very important things: there would be a room she could use as a workshop to make shoes she then sold online, one spare room they could turn into a nursery one day, and a very large shower in the bathroom.

Right now - pressing Imelda against him, water rushing over them and hair in his eyes, trying to get a good grip on her soapy skin while she squirms and laughs - Héctor is inclined to think that the latter was the best idea of them all.

“Careful not to slip,” Imelda chides him when they tumble through the stream of water and against the tiles, her laughter echoing in his ears. Héctor manages to get a hold of her and hold her tight, her back against his chest. He presses a kiss against her neck, spits out a mouthful of wet hair, and she laughs again. “Maybe I should cut it,” she muses aloud.

“No, don’t,” Héctor murmurs against her shoulder. He’s sure Imelda would look divine even with a dead fish on her head, but he loves her hair - the thick braid she usually wears, the loose curls he can run his fingers through when they’re down, the tight bun she ties it in when there is some serious work to do and she needs to focus. “I’d hate to see it go.”

One of his hands reaches to palm Imelda’s breasts, the other slips down her soapy stomach and to her sex, and she’s not laughing anymore. She leans back against him with a pleased hum, rests her head on his shoulder and closes her eyes. One hand clutches at his arm; the other reaches back to grasp Héctor’s hair, and he groans just a little. His fingers slip in her easily, she’s already so wet and he’s growing hard, pressing against the slick skin of her lower back. There is little friction, but it is enough to make him shiver.

“Did you take your guitar in the shower, or…?” Imelda mutters, and Héctor laughs again into her hair. He curls his fingers, making her moan and feeling more than a little lightheaded. There is nothing he doesn’t love about this, nothing he doesn’t love about her.

“You were amazing last night,” he mumbles, pressing his thumb against her clit, shifting his hips to get some friction against slick skin. He smiles. “He never stood a chance.”

“Of course not,” Imelda says, gasping, hand clenching tighter on his hair. He can almost hear the smirk in her voice. “It was about time I shut him up. Though it was mostly you to take care of that part,” she adds, and bucks her hips to get his fingers deeper in her just as Héctor kneads her nipple with a thumb and lets out a chuckle.

“Hadn’t really planned to do that,” Héctor breathes, blushing a little. He’s already achingly hard against her wet skin and the memory of how his cock just disappeared in Ernesto’s mouth - the stretch of his lips over the base, the heat of it - is not helping matters. “I was going to just watch.”

“Like he was going to let that happen. I knew he’d seize his chance to get a piece of you,” Imelda says, and gasps when he twists his fingers, tossing her head back. “I-- ay, yes, like that, do it again - I told you he would, if given the chance. He must have wanted you for years. One thing we can agree on.”

“I never realized,” Héctor mumbles, and it is true. He’s known for a long time that Ernesto’s sexuality can be summed up with ‘yes’, but he had never thought it could possibly include him until Imelda had pointed it out to him as though it was something obvious. Looking back, he probably should have realized the remarks towards his wife weren’t just friendly banter.

“Oh, Héctor. I love you, but you can be so unobservant,” Imelda sighs now, leaning back against him, and Héctor can almost see her rolling her eyes. The hand on his arm lets go to reach back, and she squeezes his cock gently, stroking him in a way that matches the movement of his fingers in her. Her thumb brushes over the tip just as his own presses over her clit, and he moans. Imelda’s chuckle makes her tremble against him.

“Want to see who can make the other come first?” she asks, her voice a bit hoarse. She tilts her head back, places a kiss on his jaw. “The loser checks on that idiota.”

Héctor smiles, and takes the challenge knowing full well he won’t win. Unlike Ernesto, he doesn’t mind losing. 

Victory is nice but Imelda can make defeat taste very, very sweet, too.

*** 

He wakes up to  stinging back, a sore ass, and a raw throat.

And to laughter, too. Imelda’s laughter, a few rooms over, immediately followed by Héctor’s as well. Sounds like they’re having a great time. Good for them, Ernesto thinks sarcastically, holding back a groan as he rolls on his back.

Jesus Christ, it feels like he’s been ran over by a truck. Everything is sore and there is no way he can hide that; he’s not even sure he can walk normally. Imelda will notice for sure, and be insufferable about it. Maybe he should try to get dressed as quickly as he can and make a dash for the door. If he makes it out of there before she notices him--

“Oh, you’re up! Well. Awake, at least.”

Too late. Ernesto turns to the door to see Héctor standing in the doorway, wearing a shirt and shorts, hair damp and looking pretty damn pleased. Which he should be, really, given the blowjob Ernesto treated him to. His throat definitely feels that now - no singing for a couple of days for him - so he better be grateful for it, Ernesto thinks, purposefully keeping himself from glancing towards Héctor’s groin. He just lets out a grunt and lets his head drop back.

“We’re going to make breakfast. Well, almost lunch at this point, but still. Food,” Héctor speaks again, walking up to the bed. Somewhere in the back of his mind Ernesto is vaguely aware of being naked, but what does it matter now? It’s nothing he hasn’t seen before, having grown up together, and now he’s also seen him on his hands and knees, taking him down his throat while his wife fucked him raw with a strap-on.

He suspects they’re slightly past the point where modesty means anything.

“Will get there,” he says hoarsely. “In a minute.”

Héctor quirks an eyebrow. “Sore throat? Caught a cold, amigo? Need a scarf?”

“Chingate.”

“Imelda did. In the shower,” Héctor quips, gaining himself a glare than turns into surprise when he sits at the edge of the bed, pulling something out of the pocket of his shorts - some kind of ointment. “I assume it’s not just your throat.”

It is not, in fact, just his throat - but he’s not about to admit as much. “I’m perfectly fine.”

“As if. I’ve been on the receiving end of what thing too, amigo,” Héctor points out with a shrug, nodding towards the discarded strap-on on the floor. The mental image very nearly causes Ernesto's breath to catch in his throat.

“Ah,” he says, and Héctor laughs, lifting up the tube in his hand.

“I find this helps a lot. At least give it a try,” he says, and Ernesto sighs. May as well, the thinks, and he holds out his hand for the ointment - but instead of handing it to him, Héctor tilts his head on one side. “Need help to put it on?” he asks innocently.

Except that he’s not being innocent at all; through his stunned surprise Ernesto can see it in the glint in his eyes, in the faintest trace of a smile beginning to curl his lips.

Absolutely not, Ernesto wants to say, but he does not. His eyes flicker to the ointment and on the hand holding it, on those long fingers that can coax melodies from of of any out-of-tune guitar and that, just last night-- the thought of having his fingers in him again--

His face seems to catch fire, and Ernesto lets his head drop back on the pillow, staring at a spot on the ceiling, a small crack in the white paint. This would be the moment to refuse, but he finds he doesn’t want to. “... If you must,” he rasps.

Please, he thinks.

There is a chuckle, but it doesn’t feel like he’s being mocked and that helps. Héctor’s finger pokes his side and he turns on his stomach, knees bent and legs spread, biting back a groan when his back protests. It makes him feel so exposed it’s almost terrifying, but then Héctor’s hand is rubbing his back in slow strokes, fingers gently tracing the marks Imelda’s nails must have left on it, and Ernesto buries his face in the crook of his arm.

“You’re tense, amigo. You should relax,” Héctor says casually, and Ernesto hears the sound of a bottle being opened, of something being squeezed out of it. He feels the heel of a hand rest against his ass; the other hand is still on his back. “Gonna feel a bit cold at first.”

It does feel cold, and Ernesto bites back a hiss when Héctor’s finger, coated in ointment, presses lightly against him. Héctor doesn’t try to push in and just rubs the lotion in small, circular movements. It is soothing, yes, but most of all it makes blood rush to Ernesto’s groin and he’s suddenly very, very happy that he’s turned on his stomach. Maybe, if he plays it cool, Héctor won’t even notice and… is he humming now? Really?

“What are you--” Ernesto starts, his voice faltering and face on fire, but trails off with a gasp when Héctor presses a finger in him and leans over his back to talk closer to his ear.

“Relax,” he repeats, and he probably should, but he’s making it so damn difficult. His ass is sore but the ointment is soothing, Héctor’s movements are slow and thorough, and he wishes he’d be less gentle, he wishes he’d just fuck him, press him down and make him take it like Imelda did. He wouldn’t mind the soreness, then… not too much, anyway.

He’s had worse. He’s bled. When he was still in his teens, figuring everything out and terrified of being caught - people in the spit of a town they were born in talked and talked; even when he went out of town he feared being spotted, feared he'd return home to his parents sitting in the living room, waiting, knowing - quickies in back alleys or cars were the norm. It was fast, sometimes almost brutal, often with far too little preparation. It left him hurting more than it sated him, but he’d told no one that, not even Héctor. He’d been too ashamed and Héctor too young, then; the four years between them had felt like a chasm.

Things are different now: Mexico City is different, the crowd he hangs with is different, and he has long since learned to take what he wants without shame. Most of the time, at least; he’ll curl up into a hole and die before telling Héctor what he wants, especially with Imelda within earshot. So he clenches his teeth, tries to relax and ignore the heat in his groin.

He struggles to keep his breathing even and he can manage… until Héctor shifts forward to place a kiss on his bruised shoulder and his finger curls, pressing down against his prostate. That tears a moan out of his throat, his hips rock back, and words tumble out of his mouth with no thought at all. 

“Ay, Héctor, por favor, por favor--!” he chokes out against his arm. He feels Héctor smile against his skin, feels his free hand petting his hair.

“It’s all right,” he’s saying lightly, like they’re having a chat over a glass of tequila, like his finger is not pressing against his prostate and massaging it in small circular movements, like Ernesto is not hard and leaking in the sheets of his and Imelda’s bed. He doesn’t even feel the soreness anymore. “Let me help you out. Amigos help their amigos.”

This is not how amigos usually help each other, Ernesto thinks, and lets out noise that is both a laugh and a moan. It is hard to think, it is hard to breathe, and in the end he just surrenders. Not in a million years he would have thought this could happen - Héctor, he’d thought, was someone he could never have; he’s his best friend, would never look at him that way, is married - but it is happening and oh God, he doesn’t want him to stop.

Héctor is murmuring something, but he’s rubbing harder against his prostate and even if he could understand a single word Ernesto still would say nothing: his mind fails to form a single coherent thought, let along to come up with an answer. He just moans, arches his aching back, and opens his eyes.

And sees Imelda.

She’s not really in front of him: he’s looking at her reflection in the full-length mirror along with his own, skin flushed and hair tousled and mouth open. She’s at the door, leaning against the doorway and wearing a bathrobe, the very picture of composure as she watches her husband turn him into a trembling mess.

And she’s smirking, that that smirk he hates, still damp hair sticking to her cheeks.

Ernesto wants to say something scathing, but he thinks back of how her hair stuck to her face and neck the previous night too, of her grip on his hips and her breasts pressing against his back, of that one moment he understood why Héctor chose her, and his mind draws a blank. Only a whine leaves his mouth, and it turns into a moan when Héctor rubs harder against just the right spot, when her eyes find his through the mirror and their gazes hold.

Her smirk turns into a knowing smile, Héctor’s finger twists inside him, and that’s it. He comes with a long, drawn-out moan, burying his face in the pillow between his clenched fists. Héctor doesn’t stop massaging his prostate until it has passed, until he’s too spent to even move, too tender and overstimulated to withstand it. He lets out a whine that is almost a sob, and Héctor understands; his finger pulls out of him, still slick with the soothing ointment.

For a few moments Ernesto just pants, face buried into the pillow, thinking of nothing. There is a touch on his head, and Héctor is petting his hair.

“Better?” he asks. Ernesto jerks his head in a nod, still gasping for breath. There’s a chuckle, a kiss against his temple.

“Told you that stuff is good. There’s still enough hot water for a shower, if you’re quick about it. We’ll wait for you for breakfast,” Héctor says, then his hand leaves Ernesto’s hair and hears him getting off the bed. Ernesto turns to see him pause at the door, glance back at him over his shoulder, and grin. “You see, married life isn’t that boring. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you’re having trouble keeping up,” he says, and laughs at Ernesto’s glare.

As he leaves the room, Ernesto lets his head drop back down and realizes, belatedly, that Imelda is no longer there either; she must have left right after he came, probably with that insufferably smug smirk still on her face, the same he’s sure he’ll find himself facing in a matter of minutes. 

She hasn’t said a word but, to his chagrin, Ernesto knows she doesn’t need to; they both know she has won.

This time.

***

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