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Having lived in Port Charles his entire life, Cameron by now had a pretty good sense of when the shit was about to hit the fan. This list included, not at all exhaustively: weddings, births, taking the highway, funerals, baby showers, wakes, vacations, Christmas, Halloween, midwinter, any and all Metro Court-catered functions, Carly Corinthos in general, and the slimy smirk on Spencer Cassadine’s face.
Unfortunately, Christmas was over, and Kelly’s wasn’t a particularly rainy biome.
“Whatever it is,” Cam began, leaning over the counter, “Not interested.”
His cousin, rival, nemesis, and occasional buddy cocked an eyebrow in his usual too-arch-for-this-establishment manner, “Now, not to harp on procedure, but you’re supposed to ask me for my order and then I get to say I’m not interested.”
“Well, then, consider this the first shot in the class war.”
Spencer’s smile narrowed only just, “It’s so precious when you act persecuted, Cam. I can almost believe you work in the coal mines and have only recently discovered shoes.”
“BLT on rye, hold the L?”
“Because someone has to,” Spencer nonetheless seemed to appreciate that Cam had remembered the order, “Seriously, though, I bring good tidings of great joy.”
Cam looked at him warily, “Spencer, I’m really not in the mood.”
“I know that,” Spencer rolled his eyes, “You understand we live in the same scandal-breeding petri dish?”
This wasn’t exactly a ‘friendly’ comment, but Cam could tell when Spencer was putting in an effort, and so decided not to rebuff him, “Who told you? Trina?”
“My grandmother.”
Cameron pulled a face, “ Grandma ?”
“ My grandma. Don’t make it weird.”
“How does Laura know?”
“Your Mom told her.”
“Oh my God.”
“It couldn’t have been the most uncomfortable conversation on the all-time tracklist.”
Cameron ran his hand through his hair, “Well...that’s fine. It’s...it’s okay. The sooner everybody knows, the sooner it will be over.”
“That’s the spirit. Stiff upper lip, etc.,” he smirked, “Yanno, I always did say you and Joss were bad for each other.”
“You also said Engleburt Humperdink was romantic and Port Charles is cursed by a sea monster living in the lake.”
“Two out of three isn’t so bad,” he rapped his knuckles lightly on the bartop, “Anyway, so goes the purpose of my visit. You are in a depressing mood and, as kinsman and companion, I offer a reprieve.”
Cam sighed, “Spencer, I’m not in any mood for hijinks.”
“I don’t do hijinks, as you well know,” Spencer clucked imperiously, “I’ve long since graduated to schemes.”
“I’m not doing those either.”
“Well, obviously not,” he rolled his eyes, “You’re much too sincere to get away with anything on your own. It’s a woeful character flaw, and you’re not going to amount to anything until you’ve been sufficiently corrupted.”
“What’re you trying to say? That I’m too nice?”
“Not in so many words,” Spencer closed his hand into a light fist, propping his chin up on it, “But from the perspective of an ex-con, you do come off as painfully naive.”
Cam wrinkled his nose up, “Thanks, man. I appreciate the boost.”
“I haven’t given you a boost yet,” Spencer spread his arms, “Can you accept I am attempting to be friendly?”
He hesitated, looking Spencer up and down across the counter, “I can accept attempting goes a long way with you.”
Spencer beamed, “See? We’re hardly strangers. And, in that spirit, I have something for you.”
“You have something?” Cameron repeated dubiously, “What, like a job?”
“A gift , Cam. Who do you take me for?” but he paused, presumably reflecting, “Right. Fair. But, yes, a gift. Trust me, I’m not keen on making out checks to you.”
“Aw,” Cam put on a smirk of his own despite himself, “I wouldn’t want you to answer to me either,” he propped his elbows up on the counter, “You got me a breakup gift?”
“Don’t call it that . It’s cloying and sad.”
“Well, you didn’t get it just because, did you?”
“It’s very middle class to need an occasion to give a gift, Cameron,” but he sighed, “But, in the spirit of your recent rejection...”
“Ow.”
“...look, I’m serious,” he met his eyes, sounding, indeed, about as sincere as he ever was, which was still less than the average person but getting there, “I got you something.”
Cameron looked Spencer over, “You didn’t have to.”
“What a revelation.”
“Seriously, Spencer, it’s just a breakup. I’ll be fine...”
“Look, man, if you don’t accept, I’ll just give it to myself, so if that’s how it’s gonna be...”
“Alright, where’s the gift?” Cam interrupted, unable to keep a guilty smile from his lips. Spencer reciprocated, taking a furtive look up and down the counter, casting a disingenuous grin at a pointy-browed matron waiting on her coffee as if to reassure her there was nothing untoward going on before turning back to Cam, “When do you get out?”
“It’s called a ‘9:00 to 5:00’ for a reason, Spencer.”
“Yeah, but with you it always ends up being 6:00...”
“5:30,” Cam clarified, “I’ll text you.”
“Forget that,” Spencer scoffed, “You’re not running out on my boundless charity. I can wait. And in the meantime...”
“BLT, no L, and a napkin folded like sailor hat for some reason...” Cam rattled off the order as he made his way to the kitchen.
“That was one time,” Spencer called after him, “And it was just to bust your chops!”
“Your speciality,” Cam retorted, not letting the door hit him in the ass on the way out.
True to his word, Spencer hung around Kelly’s for two hours, eating at a rate roughly proximal to continental drift, as he bitched at glorious length about his favorite subjects: his father, his stepmother, the October Revolution of 1917, and whether or not Cam really believed the Cassadines were responsible for climate change or if that was just something he’d said to sound smart/wound Spencer’s feelings when they were eight.
“I dunno...” Cam muttered off an answer to this last one, turning the key in the door to lock it, “A little of both?”
“Because, if you think about the implications, global cooling would’ve been counterproductive to global warming and, actually, it might have been more good than bad.”
“They should give you the Nobel Prize.”
“I’m just saying!” Spencer threw his arms into the air declaratively, in the same motion unlocking his car, “Sometimes, you don’t know a good thing until you blow it up.”
“Believe me, I get it.”
Spencer gave him a conspiratorial wink, sliding in behind the wheel, “I’m really very good at this. How don’t I have more friends?”
“It really is a mystery,” Cam agreed, taking his phone from his pocket as he got in beside him.
“Who’re you texting?”
Cam gave him a look, “My Mom.”
“Dude, why?”
Spencer pronounced the word ‘dude’ like it was a strange foreign word he’d encountered in a book and had adapted into his vocabulary despite being too obstinate to look up the translation for it.
“So she knows where I am?” he posed it as a question.
“Are you not in college?”
“Well, yeah, but sometimes Aiden makes, like, cake or something, and my Mom makes a family event out of it and...”
“Has he made you a breakup cake or is that the call you’re waiting on?”
Cam grimaced, “You are such a tool.”
“Better a tool than a fool,” Spencer sounded quite pleased with himself for that one as they got underway, “One of the guys in prison said that to me.”
“You did make friends in prison?”
“No, that was a colorful response to a less than intelligent remark I made. We were not friends.”
“Oh,” Cam paused, “I’m sorry.”
Spencer shrugged, “I look back on it as a character building experience. Just as one day, maybe very soon, you will look back on Joss leaving you for a felonious scoundrel with a silly name.”
“Don’t be mean,” but Cam couldn’t suppress a guilty chuckle, “It is a stupid name, isn’t it?”
“Which, from the likes of you and I, must be bad.”
They laughed together, and Cam allowed himself to get more comfortable, watching the streets of Port Charles blur by beside them. It occurred to him that Spencer was actively being friendly, and it wasn’t even the first time lately that he had. Not that Spencer, for all his chatter, was prone to talk about his motivations, but Cam decided they’d done each other enough solids by now for there to be no strings on their friendship.
Which was undeniably nice.
“So, where are we going anyway?” Cam asked lightly, noting with some small trepidation that Spencer was taking them toward the highway out of town.
“No place special. Just the old family cabin.”
Cameron gave a double take, “Your family cabin?”
“The very one.”
“ That one. Where the...”
“Well, the sheets have been washed,” Spencer protested, “What, are we supposed to never use the damn thing again because...”
“Because your psychotic ex staged a sex tape between you and my ex?” Cam prompted.
“And think of all the things that have happened since then!”
“Exactly!”
“Exactly,” Spencer repeated, in a firmer cadence, “Anyway, it’s private and out of the way, baggage notwithstanding.”
“And what about this gift is so special you have to give it in a private, out of the way place?”
Spencer gave him a look, “I’m going to poison you and bury your body in the foundation.”
“Alright, be stubborn,” he folded his arms, “But Spencer, if there’s any funny business...”
“Funny business? Cameron, I swear to God, one of these days I’ll learn you use a swear jar...”
“I appreciate you trying to make me feel better, if...that’s what this is. But the secrecy isn’t a good look. I’m kind of tired of secrets.”
“Brother, I think you’re in the wrong family for that,” but he gave a small concession, running his tongue contemplatively over his teeth, “It’s a gift meant to be shared.”
“Ah,” Cam nodded slowly, “By, uh... who , I wonder?”
“Look, if you’re too principled to accept, I can always turn around...”
“Hey, I didn’t say that,” Cam smiled, “Actually, I feel better knowing you’re getting something out of it too.”
“Aw, shucks,” Spencer beamed before Cameron continued, “If it’s for you too, there’s less chance it explodes when I open it.”
Spencer made an imperious expression, eying the radio dubiously, “You still listen to the Top 40?”
“Do you still listen to Gregorian chants?”
“It was a phase ,” he grumbled, tuning to some pop-saturated station, “How’s the music going anyway?”
“The music?” Cam shrugged, “It’s...going. I haven’t really had time.”
“Well, you should have plenty more now.”
“Dude,” he scolded and Spencer grinned indulgently, just as quickly grimacing at the radio, “I mean, I know it’s your genre , but you can’t possibly be worse than this crap.”
“‘This crap’...”
“Swear jar!”
Cameron proceeded, unabated, “...is certified seven times platinum.”
“So there should be nothing stopping you. Hell, keep growing your hair out, you can challenge her in the looks department too.”
“Pfft,” Cameron fussed with his locks in the rearview mirror, aware of Spencer’s cocksure grin out of the corner of his eye.
“Wait!” Spencer declared, “Social experiment.”
“Social what?”
But Spencer had already launched into a rote and particularly unfeeling singalong, “ She wears short skirts, I wear tee-shirts/She’s cheer captain... ”
“ ...and I’m on the bleachers, ” Cam finished automatically.
“Oh my God, it totally worked!” Spencer exclaimed, “It’s like catnip.”
“Shut up,” Cam laughed, his face heating up, “Anyway, she’s reinvented herself, like, four times since then.”
“And if she could do it,” Spencer pointed out with a careless air, “Why couldn’t you?”
The Cassadine cabin was well-appointed and absent of character as ever, but Cam couldn’t deny it retained a sort of cozy charm despite everything. Spencer swaggered about the place, turning the lights on with lazy finger flicks. In his other hand, he held a long, thin package, neatly wrapped in silvery paper, that he had retrieved from his car’s glovebox once they’d arrived.
“Is that for me?” Cam asked tentatively, shedding his jacket and fumbling with a hanger from the closet. Spencer, who had already shed his too-school-for-cool peacoat over the sofa, gave him a wink, “Nice try. There are certain ceremonies that must be performed first.”
Cam blinked, “You aren’t really gonna poison me, are you?”
“Remains to be seen, but I doubt it,” he patted the sofa, “C’mon, sit. You want a drink?”
Closing the closet door, Cam crossed to join him, “Coke’s fine.”
“You are so unimpeachable. I’m beginning to feel bad.”
“You keep talking like you’re about to pull some big trick,” Cam observed, “Spencer, I don’t think I have to tell you I’m really not in the mood.”
“Which I understand. I’m not completely heartless, you know. I promise, Cameron...if you don’t want the gift, you can refuse. But I’d like it very much if you did want it.”
Cam looked at the package, now set down on the glass-topped coffee table, “Is that my cue?”
Spencer shrugged, “Now or never, and never by definition doesn’t exist, so...”
He took this as an invitation, picking the gift up and experimentally shifting it from hand to hand to test the weight of it. Some mental voice that sounded alarmingly like his mother prompted him to ask, “You didn’t spend a lot of money, did you?”
“Middle-class, Cam. Resist the plebian impulses. Indulge me and, in indulging me, indulge yourself.”
“Whatever that means,” and, figuring he’d stalled enough, Cam unwrapped the box, which proved to be a neat, black number, of the kind one might keep a necklace in.
“Not jewelry?”
“You have started wearing it,” Spencer indicated the faux-gold chain around Cam’s neck, “A bold choice, by the way. Very daring. But no.”
Whether ‘no’ was meant to indicate the contents of the box or the success of Cameron’s fashion risks, he didn’t bother to press the point, taking the lid off to reveal, at last, the much ballyhooed contents.
“You’re kidding.”
“Not for love or money.”
“Spencer!” he set the box down on the table with a decisive thud, “It’s weed .”
“I think after a certain price margin, you have to call it cannabis.”
The familiar green hash had been neatly partitioned into twin plastic pouches, roughly the size of what would, on the street, be dimebags, though from Spencer’s remarks, the slang name didn’t quite apply here.
“You bought me weed?”
“I bought us weed,” Spencer insisted, “What, you partake, right?”
“Once!” Cam insisted, “And that didn’t really count. I was buying some, like, medicinally. Joss and I had this friend...”
“Cameron, this compulsion you have to relegate yourself to the Greek Chorus of your own life is precisely the reason you are in this situation. Have you, or have you not, smoked pot?”
Cameron opened his mouth to say something to this but could produce little more than a series of anemic squeaks before finally forcing himself to nod, “...yes. Yes, I did. But...”
“But nothing. It’s fine. There’s no danger. Quite the opposite. You know, it’s legal now.”
“Spencer...”
“And this is boutique stuff,” he pointed at the box, “Came highly recommended.”
Against his better judgment, Cam palmed one of the pouches, looking sideways at Spencer as he did, “Recommended by who ?”
“Some guy I knew in prison.”
“Beautiful.”
“He was arrested on possession a while back. A horrible injustice. He got out around the same time I did and he’s working on setting up his own dispensary. I promised I’d be one of his first customers. This,” he pointed at the box, “Is a custom order.”
Cam’s lips twitched into a guilty smile, which Spencer must’ve noticed, “Something funny?”
“Just...you helping out some guy who was unfairly arrested. Kinda surprising from the guy who used to believe in the Divine Right of Kings.”
“I’ve cultivated some libertine sentiments in my maturity,” he paused, “With help from some dedicated friends.”
Cam chuckled, “Well...Spencer, I dunno. I haven’t smoked in a while...”
“Which is why I’m here!”
“Also, you want to get high.”
“Pragmatism is not evil and, in fact, is an important evolutionary skillset I am determined to help you realize. Cassadines and Spencers possess it in abundance, as you have learned through hard experience. I see no reason why the Webbers should be left out.”
Not long ago, Cam would’ve found such a comment self-important and asinine, but it wasn’t as though there wasn’t some truth in it.
“We do get jerked around a lot,” he said at length, “Family curse, I guess.”
“One best broken now, while you’ve got youth on your side,” Spencer said easily, “Anyway, this is the very best stuff. Which you should know already, since I spent money on it...”
“When you say ‘very best stuff’...”
“I know a thing or two.”
“How many times have you smoked?”
There was a short, but noticeable silence. Spencer blinked a few times, clearing his throat, “Well...”
“Spencer,” Cameron interrupted, smiling, “Wait a second...”
“It may just be possible you have done some things I haven’t.”
“But you shouldn’t...Spencer, you shouldn’t have spent any money...not a lot of money...if you don’t even know...”
“I don’t need to be some bigshot pothead...”
“Wow.”
“...to know I’d get better results from better spending. Or, what, is it accepted orthodoxy in the weed-smoking community that you get a better buzz from common ditchweed?”
“Common ditchweed...” Cam stifled a laugh behind the back of his hand, “Dude, I...” he composed himself, just enough, “What is it anyway? I mean...the strain? What’s it called?”
Spencer, looking relieved to have encountered a question he could answer, straightened up importantly, “Like I said: custom made and a custom name to go with it. I asked my friend for something strong, but subtle...potent, but comfortable. Fierce, but strangely elusive...”
“That’s just a bunch of adjectives.”
“...it’s called,” Spencer interrupted boldly, “The Chupacabra Strain.”
At which point Cam could contain himself no longer, and burst into a peal of laughter. Spencer joined him, throwing his head back as Cameron, shoulders quaking leaned back against the couch, impulsively reaching out to grasp Spencer’s hand, meaning to sort of high five him, but forgetting himself halfway through.
“Dude,” he said again, blinking away tears of mirth.
“I know,” Spencer said, a little uneven, “Typical princeling behavior. Can’t hunt the monster yourself, so just pay for the pelt and say you caught it. But, you know, money’s gotta be good for something. So what do you say?” he picked up his own bag from the box, hefting it up and down in his palm, “Ready to reap the spoils of the hunt?”
Cameron insisted that, if they were going to do this, they would do it the right way. Spencer, it turned out, was a woeful naif as it came to this stuff, and looked on in a somewhat reluctant fascination as Cameron demonstrated the proper way to roll a joint, using the papers that had been neatly slotted into the bottom of the gift box.
“I still can’t believe this,” he commented as he worked.
“I don’t know what’s so unbelievable about it,” said Spencer, who had joined Cam on the floor beneath the sofa, boots lazily kicked off near Cam’s sneakers under the coffee table, “I wanted to do a nice thing and I did it.”
“You’re telling me you got this after Joss broke up with me?”
Spencer blinked, “...you know there is an expression about looking gift horses in their mouths? Namely: don’t.”
Cam gave him a look and Spencer sighed, “Well, if you’re going to press it...”
“It’s fine if you got it for yourself. I mean, I still think you spent too much money for a guy who never smoked before...”
“...no,” he said bluntly, “It was already your gift. This...breakup stuff was just an excuse.”
They looked at each other for a short time. Spencer made a series of uncomfortable expressions, drumming his fingers against his knee.
“You visited me,” he said finally.
Cameron smiled awkwardly, “Of course I did.”
“Don’t assume an ‘of course’. I wasn’t guaranteed any visitors, but I got them and you...were one of them. And that was...not expected.”
This seemed to be the most Spencer was willing to say, and Cam admittedly wasn’t sure he wanted to make him squirm by saying more, so he just nodded like this made a lot of sense indeed and said, “Well, I appreciate it.”
Spencer smiled, “All you had to say.”
His work concluded, Cameron held up the freshly-rolled joint, “Alright, I’m gonna show you how to light it.”
“Wait,” Spencer interrupted, “What about mine?”
Cam paused, “What do you mean?”
“You didn’t roll one for me.”
It was a rare thing for Cam to be in a position of knowing more than somebody else, which he supposed was another nice thing about this gift, whether or not Spencer realized it.
“Spencer, you’ve never smoked before, and if the ‘Chupacabra Strain’ is as big and bad as you make it sound, one roll is more than enough for two.”
“What, you mean we’re going to share? What kind of communist nonsense...”
“It’s fine.”
“For you , sure. You’re Taylor Swift flavored Joan Baez...”
“It’s called shotgunning.”
“That does not reassure me.”
“I’ve done it before,” but he’d gotten carried away, revealing too much. Spencer brightened up, forgetting his distress to look self-satisfied, “I knew it.”
“We don’t all have money for fancy boutique weed. It’s totally safe...even if it’s ‘middle class’,” he put on a husky approximation of Spencer’s voice.
Spencer’s brows knit together, but he shrugged, “If you say so.”
Cam retrieved his lighter from his pocket, striking it, “So, what’s gonna happen is I’m gonna light up, and you’re gonna sit there and...” realizing he didn’t exactly have the language, he put words into actions, reaching out with his other hand and gripping Spencer’s wrist.
Spencer gave him an uncertain look, “You’re going to make me regret this?”
“Not if I regret it first,” he couldn’t deny getting a kick out of the puckish expression on Spencer’s face as he manipulated his hand into a tight circle, fingers closed into a sort of tunnel, “Okay, hold that.”
“For what ?”
“You’ll figure it out.”
“Cameron!” Spencer looked briefly primed to protest, but whichever part of him had orchestrated this whole thing to begin with must’ve won out because he left it at that, letting Cameron press his hand against his, mimicking the tunnel shape. Awkwardly, Cam touched his lighter to the joint, hoping Spencer didn’t notice the trouble he had getting it to catch.
Let him think he was good at this kind of stuff. Let him pretend, even for one night, that he was capable of being indulgent, edgy, excessive. There wasn’t...there couldn’t be?...anything dangerous about this, really, but for him even the suggestion of danger was nearly the real thing.
He hadn’t been exaggerating, though, that he’d only ever smoked the one time, with and because of Oscar, who had been on edge about trying the stuff.
Not that it did any good to think about that now. Just a lot of trouble for very little reward. Story of his life, or his family’s, if Spencer’s diagnosis of the Webber family’s generational problem held.
“Ready?” Cam prompted.
“Are you...” Spencer began “Wait, are you going to...”
“It’s fine,” said Cam, as if he knew things, “Just...hold it when you get it.”
Spencer didn’t seem at all convinced, but he nodded anyway and Cameron took his first hit.
The Chupacabra Strain may well be a lot of adjectives, most of which Cam had already forgotten, but it did make an impression. The smoke had a heady, sweet sort of flavor, warm and weirdly soft. Cam felt his eyes watering as he held it in his lungs, and blinked the wet away.
He opened his eyes to regard Spencer, who was watching with a weird apprehension. He could very easily be cruel here...it would be very nice to be cruel to someone , even if just once. But Spencer had spent a lot of money and, loath as he was to use the exact words, he clearly meant well.
Making eye contact to make sure he was ready as he would ever be, Cameron pressed his mouth to the tunnel they’d made with their hands and, seeing Spencer reciprocate, exhaled.
Spencer inhaled wetly, loud and graceless, sucking the smoke into his lungs, too quickly as it turned out. He sputtered at once, coughing harshly, smoke puffing out of his mouth in odd increments like a cartoon dragon with a head cold.
“Hey, hey, easy ...” Cam laughed, putting a hand on Spencer’s shoulder to steady him, “God, you okay?”
It was a short time before Spencer recovered the words to speak, hoarsely as if he’d just come out of a coma, “The hell was that?”
“A lot of money, apparently,” Cameron smiled guiltily, “See, this is why you start with the cheap stuff.”
“That is absolutely not how it works,” he coughed some more, looking ruefully as Cam half-sincerely patted his back, “Except with...wine, maybe. And escorts.”
“What do you know about escorts?” Cam cocked an eyebrow.
“That my Uncle Victor keeps them very busy.”
This seemed like a statement that both needed and would be ruined by elaboration, so Cam ignored it.
“You just have to hold the smoke in your lungs. It’s easy once you get used to it. C’mon,” he handed him the joint, “Try me.”
Spencer winced, “This seems less than sanitary.”
“I’ve been around worse at Kelly’s. And you’ve been in prison.”
“Touché,” Spencer granted, “You sure you trust me?”
“Weirdly?” Cam smirked, “Yes. Just...don’t deliberately hack something up.”
“Please, I can be a dick in much more elegant ways. And like you said...” he smirked, “It’s my money,” he took a hit off the joint, his eyelids fluttering as he breathed in. Cam watched Spencer square his shoulders, clearly struggling not to expel the smoke as he had before.
“That’s good,” Cam reassured him, “Just...hold it like that and, when you’re ready...” he made a tunnel out of his hand again. Spencer kept the smoke in, though, even as his face began to pink and then to redden.
“Spencer?” Cameron prompted, “You can probably...”
Spencer shook his head and Cam rolled his eyes, “What, are you trying to prove something now? Dude, if you choke...”
Spencer threw his mouth into Cam’s hand and exhaled just as Cam was speaking. He barely had the time to guard himself as the smoke entered his lungs, his body shuddering in surprise before he remembered to hold the smoke.
Spencer laughed, face bright, brushing a sweep of hair out of his eyes, “That was fun . I can see why you recommended it.”
Cam had the presence of mind to give Spencer the finger, which delighted him, “That’s for the swear jar. It counts... oof !” as Cam pulled him forward by the shirt, pressed his hand to Spencer’s mouth, and gave the smoke back.
He was pretty sure you weren’t supposed to do that, but a good argument could be made he wasn’t supposed to be doing any of this, so why get all uptight now?
Spencer let out a stifled little laugh, evidently impressed by Cam’s audacity, before breathing the thinned plume out, “I’ll get you for that, Webber.”
“I bet,” Cam plucked the joint from his hand again, taking another hit.
“I mean it,” Spencer said languidly, “I can be a nice, upstanding guy all I want, but at a certain point, I’ve got to remember my dignity, you know....”
Cam leaned in, making for Spencer’s hand, but he was gesticulating in his usual grand manner, and moved his hand away at the critical moment. He lost his balance, grabbing onto the edge of the coffee table. Spencer realized what was happening at the last minute, leaning forward with the beginning of another laugh.
Cam breathed out, and into Spencer’s open mouth. Their lips touched, first just barely, but then settling onto each other once Cam breathed, the smoke passing from one to the other, thick and hot and fragrant. He felt Spencer’s mouth move beneath his, going from instinctively closing to opening to accept the fumes. Their lips sort of rubbed against each other, warm and soft. Cam thought briefly of pulling away, of how embarrassing this was, but it was a ghost of a thought, and didn’t merit articulation. The smoke was sweet and heavy and he was heavy in response, if maybe too sweet for most tastes.
Spencer’s upper lip brushed Cameron’s lower; Cam could smell, beneath the Chupacabra, the suggestion of some overpriced gentlemen’s cologne. He’d just shaved. A weird thing to notice...he, who couldn’t grow a beard for love or money, might’ve been disarmed. He might’ve been a lot of things, if he could think of them, if he wanted to.
He didn’t. Couldn’t. One or the other, it came to the same.
He felt a hand over his on the table. Spencer, with a sudden urgency, pulling himself back. Their brows parted, somewhat stickily, and still hovered a hair’s breadth apart. They stared at each other, eyes wide and stricken, breathing raggedly into each other’s faces, smoke swirling around them, on their breath and from the joint Cam was still holding limply between two fingers.
His face was hot, and his eyes heavy. Every breath was sweet and sour and strong and strained. He began to move his mouth, to issue an apology or an explanation, mortification beginning to creep back into his private arsenal...
Spencer laughed: a short, spurting giggle, like a little kid amused by a crude joke. Everything Cam had been struggling to say sputtered out in a laugh of his own. They fell against the sofa, hooting and hollering in glorious unison, careless and unmotivated and light.
It was good to feel light.
“Do you remember...”
“No,” Cameron answered automatically.
“Shut up,” Spencer scolded, “You’ll make me forget.”
Cam regarded him lazily from the periphery of his vision, “It won’t be me making you forget,” as he accepted the joint from Spencer’s loose fingers, for his turn.
They had gradually lowered themselves down onto the floor, lying on their backs, the tops of their heads roughly adjacent as the poshly appointed cabin steadily filled up with what Spencer had at one point termed ‘Chupacabra musk’ to Cam’s mingled disgust and delight.
Delight came much easier now, not that he was in any hurry to concede this.
“I was saying ,” Spencer continued peevishly, “Do you remember when we went Chupacabra hunting?”
Cameron snorted, “ You went Chupacabra hunting. Em and I were humoring you.”
“As you should have. I was the only one making life interesting back then.”
“Back then?” Cam repeated, “Not now?”
He didn’t exactly expect an elaboration of what Spencer meant by that, and so he wasn’t miffed when he didn’t get one, Spencer instead continuing, “We thought the big bad beastie was living in the, um...that little annex...”
“Dude, just say secret room.”
“...under the stables. Who was it...Faison? No,” he decided, “No, that was another time, I think...”
“Heather,” Cam answered languidly.
“Right! Yes! Heather...” he trailed off, lost in thought, “Webber. Wait, you two are related?”
“You didn’t know?”
“You did ?”
“I guess it’s not that important, but...” he racked his brain, passing the joint back to Spencer, whose fingers grasped somewhat comically for it before finally succeeding in reclaiming it, “So, Heather used to be married to my grandpa, way...way back.”
“But she’s not your grandma?”
“Oh, God no. My grandma is...” he paused, “Um.”
“We digress.”
“...Heather was married to my grandpa and they had, um, a baby together.”
“Not Elizabeth?”
“Not my mom , no...my Uncle Steve.”
“You have an Uncle Steve?”
“Yeah, Steven Lars.”
“Steven Webber, surely?”
“Yeah, Steve Lars Webber.”
There was a short silence before Spencer snorted, “Talk about names.”
Cam laughed lightly, “So, from what I remember...Heather told my Grandpa Jeff that Steven Lars died in the hospital.”
“Well, how come he didn’t know that?”
“They were separated or something. I think maybe he was with Monica Quartermaine?”
“Jesus Christ, when does the Rokeby Venus show up?”
“Dude, you asked ,” he reached to whack Spencer lighty about the head, but his limbs were slow and sluggish and he ended up just lamely resting his hand somewhere over Spencer’s collarbone, which had gotten quite warm along with the rest of the room and, Cam supposed, the rest of them.
“Well, I’m invested despite myself,” Spencer prodded, not making any move to brush Cam’s hand off, “She said the baby died...”
“And she sold him on the black market. And he was adopted, uh, by these people they knew. I can’t remember. And they didn’t know the baby was Steven Lars, and meanwhile my Grandpa Jeff was so sad about the baby dying that he got back together with Heather and they were going to have another baby. And Heather was the nanny for Steven Lars, and she was getting really attached to him, so these people...”
“How do you know this story but you don’t know these people’s names?”
“I don’t know...it never came up. People don’t go out of their way to talk about it, I guess. I sort of...picked it up in pieces over time.”
Spencer was quiet, blowing smoke into the air contemplatively. Cam, feeling a bit of pressure, realized Spencer was pressing the joint into the fingers of the hand he’d rested on his chest. He accepted, taking a hit and, somewhat provoked by Spencer’s silence, turned himself halfway onto his side, “You okay?”
“Just thinking,” said Spencer slowly, “It’s pretty incredible, isn’t it?”
“What is?”
“How things happen.”
Cam smiled involuntarily, “It is, yeah.”
“We found that woman...the Chupacabra ,” he enunciated the word, high dramatics, taking the joint back from Cam and touching it to his lips, “And we had no idea that, if things had gone a little differently, she’d be your grandmother.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works.”
“But it is! But it happened so long ago, in another time, and another place...”
“Well, it was still Port Charles.”
“But so long ago it might as well be another place,” said Spencer, sounding as if he were on the verge of some great discovery. He put a hand on Cam’s shoulder, eyes red and wide and wild, “All those people and all their lives and all the things they did and said to each other, they happened so remotely from us that it might as well have never happened at all. But of course it did , because we’re here now, and we’re here because of the things they did. You wouldn’t exist if your Grandfather and this Heather woman worked things out, and I wouldn’t exist if Joss’s grandmother hadn’t hated my grandmother enough to sic her brother on her. The Cassadines would never have known she existed. So they happened, and it’s so important that they happened, but does anybody really remember that they did? Or are all our elders just...swapping ghost stories? These...these vague impressions of a folkloric past, drenched in myth. The people who were there, really there, can remember, but even they weren’t there for all of it and everyone has reasons to tell their own version of the story. Nobody will ever really know what happened with...with Heather and Jeff and Steven What’s-His-Name and Monica and whoever those people were who adopted the baby because it happened once and only once and it will never happen again. And time passes and people forget the truth and this...this new myth takes its place, and it becomes history, and time and time goes by until, finally, Laura and Jeff and Monica and all of them have little grandchildren chitter-chattering to each other about Schronginer’s Chupacabra under the trapdoor, never once imagining they only exist because of her. That she is history, and they owe their lives to her,” his lips spread slowly into a broad smile, though his words had gotten tremulous, “Do you understand what I’m saying?”
Cam blinked, “... are you okay, Spencer?”
“Yes,” Spencer grinned, his eyes simultaneously shimmering with weird, ecstatic tears, “I’m just really stoned. Now answer my question,” he gave the joint back to Cam, as if this would help him get to his point.
Cam, however, had the presence of mind to put the blunt aside, setting it into the little crystal ashtray Spencer had brought out onto the table. Spencer didn’t look miffed, but clearly he expected an answer and, for all his protests to the contrary, Cameron couldn’t deny he was thinking about it now.
“It’s like...we think the past...like, history...is this public thing. Like...a museum!”
“Inelegant, but proceed.”
“Don’t be a dick, I’m trying,” but he laughed, lowering his head to think, “But the past is really...it’s really pretty private. History isn’t, but history also isn’t the same as the past, not really. History’s just what we accept really did happen, but there’s so much else that we can’t really know, like...little things that happened. Or the ways people felt when they did the things they did. Nobody can ever really know that...except the people who felt those things.”
“And even then,” Spencer nodded, “Maybe not.”
“Right,” Cam breathed, “Right.”
“So you see?” Spencer leaned in abruptly, brushing a sweep of Cam’s hair from his eyes to look right at him, “It’s...it’s all about perspective, Cameron. Back then, 40-50 years ago, whenever, it was the end of the world what Heather Webber did. The choices she made, when she was upset and angry and sad, they must have felt absolutely Promethean!”
“..Prometh...”
“Very hard.”
“Got it. Go on. Please.”
“But, no matter how consequential as they were in the moment, with the passing of time they’re just...echoes. Little vibrations on a pool. Echoes and whispers of a time that changed the world but will never be known again. And that...” his eyes were bright, tears escaping onto his cheeks, “That’s still true. Cameron, it’s still true now. The things that feel so terrible and so painful now, the things that feel like they will change history, and might...Joss betraying you, my father burning all his bridges...”
“Spencer...”
“...they will fade with time. And, no matter what you or I do, in 40 or 50 or 60 years we will only be as real to whoever survives us as the Chupacabras they name us in that moment. Time will pass and the world will change and maybe we will have a big part in changing it or maybe we won’t and nobody will remember anything but our last names, but we will be free ,” he let out a shaky breath, halfway between a laugh and a sob, “People will only remember what they want to remember, and some things they will never be able to remember because nobody there will want them to know and feelings and thoughts are unknowable. Does...does that make sense?”
Cam considered, feeling Spencer’s urgent breath on his face. He couldn’t look away from the tears on his face, which Spencer didn’t even seem to realize he’d cried.
“I...think so,” he said finally, “I think it makes perfect sense.”
He moved still closer to brush the tears from Spencer’s face. Spencer, who might normally have tensed or flinched away from such a thing, made no motion but to lean a little closer, as if to make it easier for him.
The kiss happened fluidly. Cam couldn’t even say which of them moved first. Time, as if offended by Spencer’s casual diagnosis of it, seemed to have spitefully shut off. They were close, Cam knew, and then closer, and then touching, their lips connecting again, with full purpose this time.
The smoke had closed in around them, a perfect, gauzy shroud, shutting out the world but for themselves. Spencer put his hands around Cam’s middle, surprisingly firm. Cam could feel Spencer’s fingertips through the thin fabric of his shirt, digging into his skin almost desperately.
Desperately...yes, desperately, because there was something wrong about this, some strange and unusual that he really should be able to name.
“S-Spencer...” he forced himself to whisper the name into his lips, “Spencer...”
“Later,” low and resonant, urgent yet oddly comforting; Cam realized they were only as lost as each other, “Please...please, later.”
Cameron didn’t have the heart to disagree. Or, he might later admit, the will. He nodded, pressing himself against Spencer, putting his hands in his hair for purchase. He could feel his heart beating urgently against his chest, and found himself wondering how much was the weed and how much was just him .
It was horrible, it was disgusting, it was almost sick...but if he was able to make someone, anybody, feel that way just by being near him and being with him and pressing their lips against his...
There was a kind of beauty to it too, and an impossible relief.
“You’re okay?” he whispered, first as a question but, when Spencer tightened his grip on him, pressing him deeper and deeper against the base of the sofa, as a fact, “You’re okay, you’re okay...”
Spencer’s lips worked their way down Cameron’s neck, to his chest, stopping over the chain he wore there, as if put off by the sudden cold of the metal after the warmth of his body. Still, he took the chain into his mouth, sucking as if for relief. Cam felt it pull taut around his neck and let out a short, choked breath of surprise. Spencer’s eyes met his and he felt something give in him at the flicker between awareness, concern, and that familiar shitgibbonish mischief to show that, whatever else, it was still him.
Cam pushed back, putting the small of Spencer’s back up against the side of the coffee table. Spencer let out a short cry and a laugh and something scarily like a purr, letting Cam’s chain fall back to his chest, wet and cool.
“Am I hurting you?” he asked awkwardly, as if only just remembering he was supposed to be a well-bred blueblood.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” said Cam between ragged breaths, “Us townies are made of stronger stuff.”
“He says, golden locks a flutter around his hot and bothered breast,” he cupped Cam’s face in his hand, “Cameron...”
“I know,” he cleared his throat, which had gotten very dry.
“This was not the plan.”
“I know,” he said again, “B-believe me. I know. But...” he didn’t know how to proceed with this, and Spencer seemed well in agreement, nodding in concert.
“It...isn’t the worst plan I’ve ever come up with.”
“Far from it,” Cam agreed, kissing him again, pushing him back against the glass top of the table. Spencer let out a short groan, gripping the hem of Cam’s shirt. He felt his breath hitch, a shudder slicing through him as Spencer rutted against him, pulling him over him on the table. The air was warm and heavy, fragrant and stifling.
“So hot...” Cam rasped involuntarily. Spencer, hearing this, pulled on his shirt, tugging it up and over Cam’s head. He yelped at the suddenness, shuddering at the exposure. Spencer was looking up at him, a weird smirk on his face, “Better?”
Cam grinned, “Lots,” and tore at the buttons of Spencer’s shirt. He let out a cry of protest as at least two buttons went flying off in opposite directions.
“That was Armani!” Spencer protested delightedly.
“Then why did I see the same one in seven colors in Windham’s last week?”
Spencer paused, before grinning guiltily, “Worth a shot,” he helped Cam shuck his shirt off behind him, “I’m trying to live modestly.”
“Except for the fancy weed?”
“ That ,” Spencer reminded him, tugging him by the chain again, “Was a gift.”
Cam gasped, but prepared himself this time, “G-good investment.”
Spencer shifted beneath him, so they were laid out, side-by-side on the table, their legs just hanging off either end. Cam felt the glass, cold but warming beneath them, “W-what about the table?”
“It’ll hold.”
“No, I mean what if we break it?”
Spencer made a face, “My father can afford to lose some tables,” before kissing down the length of Cam’s neck, over his chain, to his sternum.
“Spencer...” Cam breathed, “God...”
He left it there, because protesting at this point would be nothing less than hypocrisy. Whatever this was they were doing, he wanted it as much as he was afraid of it.
“Just...just us,” Spencer told him, “For now...it really is just us. Unless we don’t want it to be. Schrodinger’s Chupacabra.”
“Whatever that means,” Cam agreed, helping Spencer with his belt as Spencer worried at his jeans.
“Christ,” Spencer grunted, “What’re you, a 10-inch waist?”
“Shut up,” but Cam realized why Spencer was having such trouble. Spencer, in fact, couldn’t be oblivious to how, er, top heavy Cameron had gotten since they’d begun. Spencer, for his part, was quite obviously a little heavier than he’d been too: his jeans were noticeably tented, and Cam heard him let out a low hiss as he pulled them down over the crucial spot.
In time, with soft tugs and pants and the kicking of stubborn limbs, they’d both shucked their jeans. Some little voice in the back of Cam’s head was still insisting this wasn’t going where it clearly wanted to, that they were just testing each other, pushing and pulling, baiting and retreating, goading and barbing and sniping and laughing by turns, the way they’d always done.
“You’re okay?” he asked again, just to make sure.
“Yes,” Spencer answered immediately, “No. I don’t know. Does it matter?”
“Yes,” Cam repeated, “I think so.”
“If it does and if I’m not,” Spencer braced himself against Cameron, one leg hitching between Cam’s; Cam let out a little whine despite himself...a sound he never thought he was capable of making. Spencer must’ve liked this, his eyelids fluttering as his fingers dug into the waistband of Cam’s boxers as he continued, “Not going through with this won’t make it any better. Cameron...”
He anticipated another out and moved to intercept it, “You’re right.”
Spencer laughed throatily, squeezing Cam’s ass, “Knew I’d get one of those out of you one day.”
Cam moaned softly, “You never knew any of this was going to happen. If you did, it wouldn’t’ve.”
“Fair enough. Come on, I...I want to...”
He nodded, “So do I,” and felt the truth of it become real as he said it, their new history crystallizing around them, inch by fitful inch, as they gave each other permission to give and take in equal measure.
Spencer let out a sigh of relief as Cam got his boxers down, letting him out, painfully hard and...well, Cam must’ve been staring. Spencer cocked an eyebrow, “Don’t look so surprised .”
He shook his head, letting Spencer help him off with his own. Spencer’s breaths were low and urgent, almost pained, as his hand errantly brushed Cameron’s cock. Cam stifled a moan, gripping onto his arms, “I want...God, Spencer...”
“Don’t beg,” Spencer told him, “We’re not doing that anymore.”
“Jesus,” Cam breathed, “You are stoned.”
Spencer made a little noise in his throat, “Swear jar...ah, God...” he rubbed up against him, their cocks bumping against each other, red and wet and primed, “Cameron...”
Cam met his eyes, feeling almost relieved, “You too?”
“I’m usually better than this...”
“What, you’re gonna blame the weed?”
“I should, but at the same time, I’m told taking responsibility for things is an attractive...” his face changed, his fingers suddenly stabbing into Cam’s chest, right over his nipples, “ Ah !”
Cameron came in the same instant, letting out a shriek that would’ve been mortifying if he had room left that for that kind of thing as he let loose over Spencer, the table, and himself.
They clung to each other as their bodies shook, convulsed, and released. One or both of them must have moved too far, because the table began to tip. Cameron reached wildly with one hand to steady it, but Spencer intercepted him.
“Got you...” Spencer rasped hoarsely, “Got you, I’ve got you...”
By the time Cam could see clearly again and think reasonably well enough to go over what had just happened, they were hanging off the sofa, seeming to have somehow transferred from the table, which had tipped over onto its side.
Cam looked at the slimy mess that had been made of the glass top, and the joint guttering out in the overturned (mercifully not shattered...maybe chipped) crystal ashtray on the floor. He turned to Spencer, splayed out next to him, his cock on Cam’s thigh.
He could feel something, or the threat of something, the way you realized a dream was about to end in the moment before waking. He leaned into Spencer, to forestall this, “I got you too.”
Spencer gave him a look, but a slow smile appeared on his lips, “I know.”
They sat together, warm and basking and at peace, until the smoke cleared.
Spencer leant him a pair of sweats and a teeshirt, which seemed like an unthinkable sentence 12 hours ago but now seemed like the most obvious progression. They took turns showering...Spencer giving Cam first go, ever the gallant...and dressed without much talk.
After setting it back upright, Cam asked if there was some Windex or anything for the table and Spencer gave him a smirk, “I dunno. I sort of like it.”
Cameron shook his head, noticing Spencer’s eyes lingering on his chain, “It... does have character, doesn’t it?” he paused, “Spencer...”
“Before you start, I don’t think there’s a return policy,” he crossed to the liquor cabinet, “On the weed.”
“I’m serious,” he padded over, watching Spencer pour some amber spirit into two shot glasses, “What just happened...” he moistened his lips, “I don’t know exactly what it was or...what happened to us.”
“Well, I think the mechanics are fairly easily explained...”
“I don’t regret it,” he paused, “Even if I...don’t understand it.”
Spencer looked him up and down, the muscles of his throat working. Finally, he set the decanter down, “Agreed. But...”
“But,” Cam nodded, “There are...”
“There are extenuating circumstances,” he passed Cam a glass, “Cameron, I didn’t mean for it to...”
“I know.”
“It would be very easy to say I wasn’t thinking, but that’s a ridiculous thing for anyone to say because nobody can stop thinking...”
“Well, maybe there’s nothing to think about.”
Spencer looked at him like he’d gone nuts, “Well, I don’t know about you, but that was a little more than nothing .”
“I mean...Spencer, stoned or not, I think you were getting at something there.”
“Sure,” he said at once before adding, “Remind me.”
“About...about time and people and...places and all that stuff. There are things that happen to us that may feel like the most important things when they happen...but overtime it matters less and less until it’s almost like it never happened. So if something feels scary or upsetting or painful, that’s fine because one day it’ll be your grandkids and mine or...whoever’s and it won’t matter to them what we did. They’ll just make up their own version, if they care. And they’ll move on, and they’ll make their own trouble.”
Spencer was quiet for a while, “No points for style, but I doubt I said it much better.”
“But you get it, right?”
“Pretty well. And, really, no hard feelings, it’s probably for the best...”
“No, Spencer, I mean...” he ran a hand through soap-slick hair, “The chances anybody remembers Joss and me breaking up in 50 years are, like, microscopic. Just as much as anybody remembers what happened here tonight.”
“...right?” Spencer cocked an eyebrow.
“So it won’t matter to them one way or the other because...everything ends up being less real anyway if I was sad or betrayed or angry...or if I was happy and laughing and confident. But it does matter here and now...where I get to choose.”
Spencer blinked, turning his glass around in one hand, “And you’ve made your choice?”
“With some help,” he smiled and Spencer, after some hesitation, smiled back.
“Generally speaking, you shouldn’t put much stock in the ramblings of some stoned blue blood with limited resources of life experience.”
“Maybe not,” Cam shrugged, “Spencer...you know I really love you.”
Spencer’s lips twitched, “Despite everything?”
“I think because of everything,” he leaned against the drinks’ cabinet, hip-to-hip with him, “And I’m not even talking about tonight. I just...I love you. And I’m in your corner, no matter what.”
“And I love that,” Spencer granted, “Even if I don’t understand it. But Cam, this...if we did ...”
“Do you want to?”
“I’m not sure what I want. Which is very annoying. Usually, I’m pretty goal-oriented,” he took a drink, “But...I wouldn’t mind trying. As long as it didn’t...complicate things. Our...” he cleared his throat, setting the glass down, already drained, “Friendship. Which, for all my bluster, means a hell of a lot to me, Cam. I hope you know that.”
“It means a lot to me too. Spencer, this is new for me as it is for you,” he bit his lip, taking a tentative drink, which burned, forcing him to stifle a gag. Spencer casually clapped him on the shoulder, looking smug.
“And, yanno, probably it will complicate things. Seems like a given. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t. At least to try.”
“There’s probably a lexicon of family stories with precedent for why we shouldn’t ,” Spencer pointed out, “But stories are just stories after all,” he picked up his empty glass, raising it in a mock toast, “To trying?”
“To trying,” they clinked glasses, Spencer winking as Cam took another drink and winced.
“For what it’s worth,” Spencer continued as Cam ambled over to the end table where he’d set his phone down what felt like hours ago, “This attempt should provide no end of good content.”
“What, for the documentary?”
“For your album,” Spencer grinned, “We have to shed that ‘girl with a guitar’ image you’ve got, though. What about Pop Princess?”
“In your dreams.”
“Never before, but it’s an increasingly valid possibility.”
Cam rolled his eyes, flipping through his notifications, “Aw, crud.”
Spencer, to his credit, didn’t mention the swear jar, “What’s up?”
“Mom replied to my text. Aiden made me breakup cupcakes,” he chuckled, “I’ll make it up to him.”
“They’ll be good tomorrow,” Spencer shrugged, “I’ll drop you off...in return for a cupcake, of course.”
Cam met his eyes, smirking, “Natch.”
There would, of course, need to be conversations. What, if anything, anybody was going to know about what had happened here tonight. It was gratifying enough to know they were on the same page, whatever page they ultimately settled on.
It was gratifying to know he was loved. That he could, if he wanted, with the right people, make more good memories than bad.
“Oh,” Spencer, as if just remembering, “Don’t forget this,” he picked up a little green lump...the extra dimebag, “Valuable commodity, you know.”
Cam smiled, “You hold onto it. For...” a flush crept into his cheeks, “For next time.”
“Next time,” Spencer agreed, “Cameron...may I consider you corrupted?”
“It was a long time coming,” he grabbed Spencer by the wrist, pulling him closer, “I owe you big time.”
“Forget about it,” Spencer fussed with his chain, “We’re even.”
Their fingers closed around the last little bag of the Chupacabra Strain, holding it between them. Yet again, unbidden, they laughed at nothing and everything, privy to a joke only they could understand.
It was a good feeling...one Cam believed he could very quickly get used to.