Title: Transactions
Fandom: Romeo + Juliet
Rating: R
Word Count: 500 words
Characters/Ships: Mercutio/Tybalt
Notes: Counting towards Fall/Drugs/Family.
Summary: Mercutio had never meant to fall in with Tybalt.


Mercutio never meant to fall in with Tybalt.
He'd always been closer to Romeo and Benvolio than the Capulet family, but in the end, he was sensible enough to back off of Romeo, who didn't want him as much as Mercutio would have liked; and off Benvolio, with whom the situation was the opposite.

He never turned down a party; never cared who was paying as long as there was willing flesh to be had and a bit of buzz to get in the mood and soften the blow of inevitable morning-after regrets.

It started with small, white circles, traded under the table in one of Verona's seedier bars, embellished with devil faces and love hearts.
Mercutio paid in cash at first - a simple monetary transaction, a fleeting touch of hands around paper and plastic, and then off they went in different directions.

Until that one night, when Tybalt arrived with his usual merchandise and a special gift - an invitation to a party at the Capulet house. The pill that night was decorated with a kiss and Mercutio thought then that he'd got more than he'd bargained for.

There was something hungry about Tybalt as he looked at him - not predatory, like Mercutio saw him on the streets of Verona all too often, but downright needy for Mercutio's acceptance of the invitation. His hand was on the table, covering the pill.

Mercutio blinked and looked at him with new eyes.
"I'll come," he said. He put his hand on top of Tybalt's.
"There's a price," Tybalt said and gripped his hand.
"Isn't there always, " Mercutio said. His lips curled into an amused smile as Tybalt leaned over and kissed him, hard, on the lips.

He'd been expecting it for a while, and wasn't surprised when the kiss was only the first thing to be demanded.

***

Tybalt had never meant to fall in with Mercutio. He'd sell anything to anyone, as long as the price was right, and only partake himself on rare occasions. It wouldn't do to patrol the streets under the influence, other Capulet boys' ideas about this notwithstanding.

Mercutio was a free agent in the city, related to neither of the two big families but easy with both; not wealthy but flamboyant enough to make impressions.

He tried his best to keep things on a transactional level; a favour for a favour; but deep down he knew he was only fooling himself by pretending he wasn't in way over his head already if the price Mercutio could pay with lips and teeth; with his hands on Tybalt's hips; was not-so-secretly more welcome than any sum of money he might have paid instead.

It would be fine, he told himself, as long as the family didn't find out, as long as Mercutio kept his trap shut; and he trusted Mercutio would, and that anything he might say might be chalked up to the man's tendency to embellish things.

Still, the one secret he kept from himself was that he knew that a different kind of fall altogether was imminent.