Tim stood in Armie’s bedroom, still entirely naked,

Still drenched in baby oil and sweat,

Still enduring the faint tingle at the end of his manhood.

He quietly placed his hands behind his back as he acknowledged the press still present deep within him, after Armie’s index finger had —

“—It’s ready,” Armie announced.

Tim glanced down at the carpet as curls of brown littered his face.

Keep cool, he thought.

It’s just Armie.

Nothing’s changed. You’re still just best friends.

Tim lifted his head and walked slowly towards the bathroom.

He peered in, sliding both hands through his hair at the same time.

Armie knelt by a giant marble bathtub, now full with boiling water and mountains of bubbles.

He twisted the cold water off, after taking some time to cool down the bath’s temperature.

A large window looking out into New York City stood tall and shining behind the tub.

Rays of sun beamed onto the pristinely clean tiled floor as Armie got to his feet, with two open beer bottles in hand.

He offered one out to Tim.

Tim eyed the beer hesitantly.

“Isn’t it a little too early in the morning for that?” He asked.

Armie smirked, taking a swig from his own bottle.

“We were down there for longer than you think.”

Tim chewed the bottom of his lip in thought.

How long had the edging session lasted?

Had Tim lost all sense of time, whilst taped to the X, surrounded by nothing but tickle tools, candle light and the basement’s maddening darkness?

Tim took the beer and shoved a glug down his throat, in an attempt to silence the thoughts currently bouncing about within his brain.

Armie smiled and took a step aside.

“Climb in…”

Tim wiped fizz away from his upper lip and handed his bottle back to Armie.

Then he took careful steps towards the tub.

His knees still ached, his thighs still throbbed.

He could still feel the pokes and jabs from Armie’s fingers, running up and down his hips and stomach.

Tim tested the water by dipping the toes of his right foot through the bubbly surface.

“Ooft, that’s ... That's pretty hot,” Tim spoke with a croak to his voice, after such an intense few hours.

Armie took Tim’s hand, as he helped him climb into the tub.

“Your muscles have been pulled and stretched for longer than they’re used to - the heat will help.”

Tim sat down slowly, allowing the boiling water and fluffy bubbles to engulf him from the waist down …

… And then, a few seconds later, his entire upper body, an upper body only recently ravaged by tickle torture.

Tim closed his eyes and let out a long, heavy sigh.

He leant his head on the back of the tub, his toes popping out of the bubbles at the other end.

“Feel good?” Armie couldn’t help but smile as he watched Tim take relief in the warmth of the water.

Tim nodded slowly, “I needed this, after … That.”

Armie chuckled, taking both beers with him as he sat down beside the tub.

“And how was … ‘that’?”

He handed Tim his beer.

Tim kept his eyes closed as he curled his fingers around the cold bottle, placing the glass against his forehead soon after.

“I know I say this often, with you and the … The things you do,” Tim cleared his throat, “But, that was the most intense feeling I’ve ever experienced.”

Armie felt a tug beneath his trousers.

He sat dressed in smart chinos and a baggy t-shirt he had thrown over himself, shortly after the edging session had ended.

Armie opened his mouth, ready to speak, but to his surprise, Tim continued to explain himself.

“… The way you got me so close, and then would stop, just at the right moment …” Tim took a swig of his beer, enjoying the buzz it created a the sides of his head, “… Man, I had no idea I could feel that way …” Tim glanced over at Armie, “… Where’d you learn to do that?”

Armie smiled as memories trickled back into his mind.

Memories where Armie might’ve been in a similar situation to Tim, many years ago.

“That’s a story for another time,” Armie brushed away the chance to walk through the past, “Is it something you’d like to do again?”

Tim sensed Armie’s quick attempt to avoid talking about his own experience.

He looked up at the bathroom ceiling in thought, his hair now wet with sweat produced from the water’s boiling temperature.

Yes, thought Tim.

The answer came to him almost immediately.

Why wouldn’t he want to experience such an incredible orgasm for the second time?

A third, fourth, fifth time too, maybe …?

Tim slid his toes back under the bubbles.

The real question was: 

Could he continue to handle the feeling, with such intense tickling between?

Tim didn’t answer.

Instead, the thought of the tickling and the torment, the invasive pinch of the pinwheel and Armie’s fingers brushing through his armpit hair …

… It all reminded him of one dreadful fact …

“… I said my safe word twice,” Tim mumbled into his beer.

Armie continued to admire Tim’s relaxing state as taxi cabs beeped their horns thirty feet down in the streets below.

“Well, three times. In twenty four hours, actually. You built up an impressive amount of chances,” Armie nodded, “But yes, now you’ve used them all. That doesn’t mean the safe word can’t be used again. Only next time, you have just the once … Unless you can resist the urge. And then—“

“—And then it’ll be carried over,” Tim’s voice echoed into the neck of the bottle as he spoke.

Armie smirked.

“You’re learning. You’re getting used to the process.”

Tim flexed his toes, allowing warm water to fill the in-betweens.

“Well, it’s kinda hard not to,” he said.

Armie stood slowly, whilst keeping his eyes on Tim.

He then turned away, in an attempt to give Tim some privacy.

He might not get the answer to his question so soon anyway.

Tim sat up, allowing some bath water to splash over the edges of the tub.

“Wait, where, where are you going?” He asked.

Armie paused and turned back round to face Tim.

“I … Thought you’d want some time alone … After, such a uh, such a … ”

Tim shook his head with a frown.

“Are you serious? Get in.”

Armie raised his eyebrows.

“Get in?”

He looked at Tim, then at the tub, then back at Tim, “As in, in the bath … With you?”

Armie could feel the control slipping through his fingertips, second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour …

Fuck this boy.

What has he done?

Tim acknowledged Armie’s confusion.

“Yeah, in the bath, with me…” Tim spoke carefully, “…What, you can do what you just did downstairs, but you can’t sit in a tub with your best friend?”

Armie felt a pinch of relief in his stomach.

Best friend.

Confirmation, clarity …

... And insecurity, demolished with two simple words.

“Sure, o-okay …”

Armie placed his beer on the bathroom sink and began to unbutton his trousers.

Tim leant his chin on the edge of the tub as he watched Armie undress.

He felt no nerves as Armie grew more naked.

He had experienced so much with this man over the past week and two days as his ‘lee …

… That sitting in a bath with him would be simply tame, at the very most.

Armie took his beer, as well as his tall, structured and now naked frame, over to the tub.

Tim gathered his legs towards him as Armie climbed in at the other end.

His feet slid down by Tim’s sides.

Tim’s feet went to do the same at Armie’s end, but Armie made sure they left the depths of the water and instead sat perched on either side of his shoulders.

Armie had the best view;

Tim’s face at one end, sipping a beer, poking out of bubbles and steaming water…

… And the soles of Tim's feet, inches away from his face, glistening and wet, thanks to the baths boiling relief.

Armie kissed Tim’s left foot with his lips.

Tim cupped some bubbles with his hand and then carefully placed the white cloud on the top of his own head.

“You really do love feet, don’t you,” Tim found himself grinning as he stated a fact in the shape of a question.

Armie kissed Tim’s other foot.

“I love your feet.”

He then closed his eyes, instantly regretting using the word ‘love’ so soon, so nonchalantly.

Tim could see the regret flush over Armie’s face.

In an attempt to move on from such sensitive wording, Tim cupped up a ball of bubbles with his free and and then blew the tuft over at Armie.

Armie opened his eyes just as the glittery cloud landed over his chest.

Both young men laid in the bath in silence as the city below continued it’s bustle.

They both sighed at the same time.

Being here, together, so closely, in a new, erotic stage of their friendship felt surprisingly right.

This outcome, this moment in time, it had taken years of development.

And by chance, Armie had the opportunity to introduce Tim to his own darkness.

A darkness Tim seemed happy to be a part of.

For now.

Armie wondered if Tim lay opposite him because of the money.

Did he agree to an edging session because of the ten mil?

Is he doing this because of lockdowns, because he can't see his friends, because there isn’t anything else to do?

Does he even like me anymore?

He said you were still his best friend.

Still.

His best friend.

His feet are on your chest.

What more clarification do you need?

Armie’s insecurities were overshadowed suddenly, by Tim unexpectedly revealing some of his own.

“If ... If I do choose to do … That … Again …” Tim’s voice echoed into his beer bottle, “… With you … You gotta promise to not just leave, like, like you did earlier … Okay?”

Armie held his beer with one hand and Tim’s left ankle with his other.

He felt a sense of relief and happiness as Tim answered his original question quicker than he thought, whilst also crushing nagging thoughts at the same time.

“I’m sorry,” Armie swallowed down the guilt as soon as it arrived, “I didn’t meant to do that.”

Tim hovered his beer under his lips as he kept his eyes on Armie.

“Why did you do that?”

Armie took in a slow breath through his nose.

He wasn’t sure if it were the baths boiling water, or Tim’s comments that were making him sweat.

“I … I often find … After an edging session, especially one like the one we experienced this morning … That, feelings and emotions, physically and mentally, they can be …” Armie took his eyes away from Tim and glanced at the brightness coming in from the bathroom window, “… They can be heightened.”

Tim felt himself sink lower into the tub.

“I thought you might want it,” Armie continued, “The, need to… To kiss you, it felt mutual…”

Armie got close to asking,

Was it mutual? Do you feel the same?

But in an attempt to maintain his leader position, he went on to explain himself further.

“Leaving like that, it was a way of keeping control. A decision, made by me, that left you either wanting it, like I thought you might, or, without it, either way.”

Did you want it? Thought Armie.

Say it, just say it.

“I don’t know,” Tim mumbled his reply, as if reading Armie’s mind.

Armie’s eyes trailed over Tim’s perfect toes.

“You don’t know?”

Tim took a swig of his beer, embracing the cool liquid that travelled down his insides, under the boiling bath water.

“I … I don’t know,” Tim repeated, “And I think it’s okay… It’s okay to not know.”

Armie nodded slowly in understanding.

“You aren’t you, after a moment like that.”

Tim looked into bubbles as he smiled, “I guess. L-Like you said, everything is heightened. Everything is…” Tim frowned as he tried to find the words to describe how it feels to be edged for so long and then to be given an orgasm like the one he had just experienced, “… Everything feels electric and important and hazy and—”

“… — Do you feel that way now?” Armie interrupted, finally giving in and allowing himself the chance to ask a question filled with such vulnerability.

Armie expected another ‘I don’t know’.

He readied himself to sigh.

Tim shook his head.

“No,” he bobbed his beer over the surface of the steaming water, whilst glancing up at Armie, careful not to make him feel any less after the ‘you were my best friend' comment.

Armie wanted to take his eyes away from Tim, but the boy had widened his mouth and had sat up a little in the tub, as if ready to announce something important.

“I did, though. I did … I, I felt, fucking … On fire…” Tim watched the bubbles floating around him as he used his hands to explain himself, “… Like, you had complete control over every inch of me a-a-and I’ve, I’ve never … Nobody has ever …” Tim swallowed down emotion, …”l, I… I felt so, fucking reliant on you, and then so glad that you … Allowed me to…” Tim bit his upper lip, “I know it’s just an orgasm, I know I sound fucking crazy right now, but, but … Damn, I’m sorry,” Tim shook his head, his eyes filling with tears, “… Man, I’ve never had to describe this, this kinda stuff before …”

Armie tightened his grip around Tim’s ankle.

“Don’t apologise,” he whispered, “Take your time.”

Tim smiled a little as he nodded into the steam rolling up around him.

“I could’ve kissed you,” Tim announced, with a sniff, “Not like, when we used to, on set. But, a kiss…” Tim shot his eyes up at Armie, catching his icy-orbs in a stare, “… A real kiss.”

This moment, this talk, this expression between them both made Armie feel something he hadn’t felt in a long time.

He felt intimidated.

Go for it.

Keep doing this, keep exploring … This, thought Armie.

“Why didn’t you?” Armie asked.

Tim, far less educated than Armie in controlling his actions, shifted his glance away from the thirty three year old at the end of the tub and took his eyes towards the glass of the window.

“Well, you uh, you kinda walked off before I had the chance,” Tim smirked.

Armie laughed into his beer bottle.

He knew that wasn’t the reason.

He knew Tim wasn’t ready to kiss another man, in such a way.

And that was fine.

He allowed Tim the chance to avoid his truth.

He gave him his moment to deflect.

“Listen, kid …” Armie wanted to kiss Tim’s left foot again, but he decided, with strong reluctance, to resist painting this picture with continued intimacy, and instead chose to introduce logic for a moment, “… This whole set up, all of these things, the tickling and the bondage … It’s all new to you. How you felt before we started is different to how you felt last Tuesday, and you’ll feel different by next Friday, and, who knows, by the end of all of this…” Armie tilted his head, still not ready to acknowledge the end of their Agreement, “… By the end of all of this …” he spoke through clenched teeth, “… Who knows how you’ll feel …”

Tim blinked slowly as he took in Armie’s words.

“… Until then, just do as I say. Lean in, let go, and, most importantly…” Armie lifted his bottle of beer towards Tim, “… Let’s just both try to enjoy ourselves.”

Tim looked down at his beer as he wondered how much he could ‘enjoy himself’, when the whole point of this was that he shouldn't enjoy himself …

… He’d spent the past week and a bit hysterical, screaming, laughing and begging ...

... There’s a reason it’s called tickle torture, after all.

With that considered, Tim knew deep down that he’d be lying if he said he hadn’t enjoyed Armie’s company, that he wasn’t curious, that he didn’t sometimes feel …

… Excited.

Tim lifted his beer towards Armie’s.

“I can drink to that,” he said.

Both young men clicked their bottles together in cheers.

Armie finished his beer with two big glugs.

“Speaking of drink,” he wiped his jaw clear of booze, “I’m gonna get us a few more.”

Tim lifted his other hand out of the bathtub, where he punched the air in celebration.

“No reservations from me…”

Armie chuckled as he climbed out of the bathtub with a splash.

“You’ve changed your tune…!”

Tim pressed his bottle of beer against his lips as he watched Armie walk out of the bathroom door, across the carpet and past the king sized bed Tim had been strapped to only yesterday morning.

I most definitely have, thought Tim.

***

Armie returned with four bottles of beer - two tucked under each armpit.

Tim raised his eyebrows as he leant over the tub and placed his empty bottle down on the tiles.

“You trying to get me drunk?”

Armie climbed back into the bath and handed Tim a bottle.

He then lined the rest in a standing position on the floor, “Not the hardest thing to achieve …”

Armie watched Tim hide blush behind his beer.

Flirting had now become commonplace between the two of them, even if Tim tried harder than Armie to not let naturally charming comments slip out.

As Armie returned his feet to either side of Tim’s waist, he blew a large tuft of bubbles away from his jaw.

“Why are you still resisting?”

Armie picked Tim’s feet back out of the tub and returned each of them to his chest and shoulders.

Tim appeared offended.

“I’m not!” His protest came out high pitched, the repeat a little more down-toned, “… I’m not.”

Armie remained silent as he took his blue eyed gaze away from the bubbles of the bath and up to Tim’s face.

Armie’s stare, just like his fingers, broke Tim immediately.

“I’m… I’m allowed to be overwhelmed, right?” Tim pressed his lips against the neck of his bottle, “Even though we’re best friends, this is … All of it is … It’s still taking some getting used to, that’s all.”

Tim couldn’t help but think back to the basement earlier this morning …

… The candle light, the tape, the arousal he felt when —

— Tim looked at Armie’s index finger, curled around his bottle.

He felt himself grow more nervous.

How can something as simple as a finger make him feel so,

So…

So—

“—Only a few hours ago, you didn’t seem so sure on if I were even still your best friend …” Armie took a swing of his beer, aware of the punch he’d just actioned.

Tim took the punch, gratefully.

If anything, he felt relieved that Armie had asked something so awkward.

At least it distracted him from the invasive memories of his edging session.

“L-Listen, man …” Tim dug his heels gently into Armie’s chest as he shuffled up the bath, his naked body squeaking against the marble, “… When I said ‘were’, I think I just… I guess I was just … Subconsciously referring to us, how we were, before, well, this…”

“This?” Armie pressed.

Tim rolled his eyes.

“You know what I mean.”

Armie smirked.

Another swig.

Another buzz at the side of his head.

“I want you to say it,” Armie announced.

Tim shifted his eyes from left to right as he rested his beer over the water.

Another taxi horn down below, another coo from a nearby pigeon perched on the stone columns outside Armie’s apartment.

“… This … Arrangement. Your… Your thing.”

Armie rolled his neck slowly, clicking out some pressure.

“My ‘thing’ …?”

Tim pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration, overly conscious to not disrespect such an important part of Armie’s personality.

“Your tickling fetish,” Tim articulated quietly.

Armie kept his beer under his jaw as his free hand curled around Tim’s left foot.

“It’s more than a fetish, Tim…” Armie sent a glare that shot straight through the twenty three year old at the opposite end of the bath, “… It’s an obsession.”

Tim felt Armie’s eyes penetrate him, almost as intimately as his index finger had a few hours before.

“You’re … You’re not obsessed with me …” Tim shook his head in disbelief as he took in the scent of beer, “… You’re just obsessed with the ticklish part.”

Armie kept a neutral expression as he spoke.

“I don’t remember suggesting otherwise.”

Tim felt embarrassed and rejected, all at once …

… Whilst still feeling overwhelmingly important.

Another mixture of emotions, flooding in, senseless and unexpected.

Another weight of things to try to figure out, just like yesterday and the day before, and no doubt like tomorrow.

Tim sighed heavily.

Impatience and frustration riddled his lack of understanding.

“So…” Tim gulped before trying to speak, “It’s that intense, that, that it overrides the person it’s based around?”

Armie shot a look to the ceiling as he tried to gather Tim’s words into a structured question.

He admired the boy for wanting to learn, for wanting to flesh out what he, as a ‘lee, had to deal with, in his own phrasing, ‘both mentally and physically’.

Armie returned his gaze to Tim.

“Sometimes, yes. This is the first time the fetish, the obsession, has… Grown…” Armie narrowed his eyes, “ … No, evolved … And, I think that’s because of you. You are an important part of this, as a person, in your own physical self … Because I know you, because I’ve known you. Because, having you, in this way, it’s always been a want for me, an unachievable fantasy, something I never quite thought would materialise …”

Armie took a breath as he finished off his attempt at explaining the very core of what made him tick this way, “… With all of that considered, ultimately, your extreme levels of ticklish-ness overall, well, that in itself is powerful enough to overshadow everything entirely…” Armie exhaled his concluding words, “… My thoughts, my motives, my gains.”

Tim took a sip from his beer slowly as he widened his eyes.

“Whoa,” he whispered.

Armie chuckled, taking a swig from his bottle.

“Basically, Timmy, this’ll be something I will never forget…” his gentle laugh faded into a monotone moment of realisation, “… Something … I’ll want again and again, long after it’s ended.”

A beat of silence hung over the bath bubbles between them.

Three and a half more weeks.

Damn.

“… Three and a half more weeks …” Armie's thoughts left his lips in a whisper.

Tim burped quietly into the back of his hand.

“D-do you sometimes wish you…. You never had it?” He asked.

Armie swayed his palms through the depths of the hot water as the bubbles continued to float over the baths surface.

“Why do you ask?”

Tim took another swig as a passing cloud hid the shine from the Sun outside.

“Well, does … Does being controlled by something so powerful make you happy, I guess is uh, is what I’m asking …”

Armie leant his head back against the edge of the bath.

“I could ask you the same thing.”

Tim pursed his lips in thought.

“It makes me feel good,” he answered quickly, confidently, “Knowing someone feels that way, a-about me… Even if it comes with, with being tickled and physically pushed, I uh … I still feel like a sense of, of …” Tim frowned as he found himself landing on the word, “… Joy, I guess.”

Armie nodded slowly in understanding.

“I’d change nothing," he declared, "I love that I have it, that part of me. I love how it makes me feel. I love my urges, my wants, my desires. I give into the fact they control me. Because what they give me, ultimately, is worth the sacrifice of having complete control.”

Tim licked booze off his top lip.

Armie finished his second beer and placed it down on the tiles.

He returned both hands to the bath, where one curled around Tim’s right ankle.

“For example … This foot, right here… I can continue to try to describe how it makes me feel, with words, but words simply wouldn’t do it justice.”

Tim hid his smile with his bottle of beer.

Armie continued, “This foot … Knowing how, utterly ticklish it is, knowing how having it tickled makes you feel … Knowing how sensitive it is … How vulnerable it makes you … It creates an overwhelming need to not just tickle it in general, but to hope above all else that your reaction will be beyond perfect…”

Armie trailed fingertips over Tim’s sole, without physically touching it.

Tim clenched his teeth, readying himself for attack.

Armie spoke carefully, slowly, in a tipsy drool, “And, that’s why for me, you are a dream come true in all this, because, your reactions are so viscerally real, so genuine…” Armie ever so gently pinched Tim’s right Index Toe, “That’s why this is more than a fetish. That’s why this is an obsession.”

Tim kept his mouth open wide as Armie actioned his pinch.

“I’m just, I’m just … Ticklish, man … I, I don’t know what uh, what else to say…”

Armie admired Tim’s silky smooth soles, wrinkled wet thanks to the bath, covered slightly by bubbles.

“It’s not just ‘ticklish’, Tim. It’s worthy, it’s capable. It’s true. Us tickle fetishists, we can clock a faker a mile away. You’re the real deal, kid.”

Armie un-pinched Tim’s Index Toe and then took his own pointing finger down Tim’s sole, this time touching it, this time applying pressure.

Down it dragged, all the way to the plump of Tim's heel.

Tim twisted his foot in Armie’s grasp.

Armie repeated the movement again, this time up, and down, up, and down…

Tim’s toes scrunched as he reached forward with one hand and attempted to block his sole, careful not to drop his beer into the water.

“Fuck, stop!”

Bubbles spilled over the edge of the tub.

Armie dropped Tim’s foot back into the bath with a splosh.

Tim’s foot slid back towards him with a submerged squeak.

His other foot remained hesitantly on Armie’s shoulder.

“See,” Armie smirked, leaning over the tub to pick up another two beers, “The perfect reaction.”

As Armie handed Tim his third beer, Tim caught a glimpse of his Tickler's hardened erection poking out through the water.

Steam rolled off the arousal, beneath a still hot depth of bubbles.

Tim took his next beer whilst placing the empty second back down on the tiles.

He then laid back and glugged down some comforting relief.

He sighed after, hiccuping just the once.

“Man, I feel … A little drunk,” he announced.

Armie laid one arm out over either sides of the tub, his hand dangling his bottle over the edge.

“Good. You deserve it.”

His other hand toyed with Tim’s foot, right by his face.

He pinched at Tim’s big toe, whilst sending his fingers fluttering down past Tim’s arch.


Tim winced and sat back up with a splash.

“Armie! Come on…”

Armie’s fingers left Tim’s sole and then curled around his ankle, keeping it in place.

They soothed his calf and ran over his leg hairs.

“Okay, kid. I’ll try my best…”

Armie resisted the urge.

Tim witnessed Armie attempt to control the power controlling him.

An inner battle Tim had only just started to understand.

Tim flexed his toes in an attempt to stretch out the ticklish sensation still running down his sole.

“You, you said … ‘Us’…” Tim took a quiet sip from his new bottle of beer, “… There’s more, like you?”

Armie took Tim’s foot closer to his face and breathed in it’s scent.

“You think I’m the only one on the planet with knismolagnia?”

Tim clenched his teeth.

Even Armie’s upper lip hair pressing under his toes felt sensitive.

“I’d…” he hissed as Armie ran his tongue over Tim’s toes, “… Fffff … I, I’d never heard of the official t-t-term before…”

Armie licked his lips and tenderly laid Tim’s foot back down on his chest.

“There are thousands, if not millions, of other people just like me.”

Tim shook curls of wet hair away from his eyes, “Yeah, I, I get that, obviously. But it sounded like, like you knew them.”

Armie reached his hand back under the water where it curled around Tim’s hidden foot.

“Of course. I have friends who share the same interest. In fact, there’s an event coming up this week but I …” Armie laughed at the idea of even considering introducing it to Tim, “… I didn’t even think to tell you about it, it’s too far removed from anything we’ve—“

Tim had started to get used to interrupting Armie, especially after a bit to drink.

“—An event?”

Armie slowly sat up in the bath, his lifting chest taking Tim’s feet with him.

“Yes…” Armie pulled both of Tim’s feet closer up towards his face, so both soles sat neatly together in clear, perfect view, inches away from Armie’s mouth, “… It’s called ‘Tickle Fest’…”

Tim curled his toes as Armie’s breath puffed between them.

“Wait, you, you guys have a … A damn festival, for tickling?”

Armie began to kiss Tim’s toes, starting with his far left little one.

“Well,”

*kiss*

“It’s more of a convention,”

*kiss*

“But yes. People, like me, attend and …”

*kiss*

“... And we discuss our experiences, we play and we—“

Armie curled his lips around Tim’s left Index Toe.

He sucked on it softly.

Tim felt Armie’s tongue slide around the length of his ticklish digit as he asked a question he himself didn't expect to ask.

"D-do you, w-want to go?" Asked Tim.

Fucking beer.

Armie blinked.

Did he just ask that?

Is this really happening?

Armie kept Tim’s Index Toe between his lips as he spoke.

“Of course I want to go…”

Say it.

What have you got to lose?

“… With you, by my side,” Armie took the toe back inside his mouth.

Tim jerked his foot a little as he shot a look at the bathroom window.

“Sure,” he said sarcastically, “I’ll uh, I’ll think about it.”

Once again, Armie's arousal hardened beneath the bubbles.

The idea of Timothée, at Tickle Fest …

How would the organisers handle it?

Some processes would need to change …

… Tim’s presence alone would cause mass hysteria …

No, this won’t happen.

Get a grip, Armie.

Don’t get ahead of yourself.

Armie needed to understand this surprise further

“Why are you so comfortable with this?” He asked, taking his sucking habit over to both of Tim’s big toes.

Tim took his stare away from the window as Armie’s tickling tongue became almost too much to bare.

“You … You …” Tim winced, “F-fuck, that tickles…” He held onto the edges of the tub for support, “… I, I mean, you … You just asked why I’m resisting,” he smiled at Armie, “This is me, t-trying not too …”

Tim had no choice but to pull his big toes out of Armie’s mouth.

Armie followed them with a hungry jaw.

Tim shifted his feet out of the way, using the strength of his ankles.

“But …” Armie arrived at a compromise but pausing on toe sucking and instead opting for foot massage, “… You’re Timothée Chalamet, you’re famous, you’re… You’d… You’d seriously go with me?”

Tim took a big swig of his beer, relaxing his shoulders as Armie massaged both of his feet.

“For a day,” Tim spoke sternly, “No longer. And, I’m wearing a mask, shades and my cap … And, I’ll say this right now, I’m am not getting tickled, by people I don’t know. But …” he smiled as he watched Armie’s face light up, “… Yeah, I’ll go.”

Armie’s skin hummed with excitement.

The fact he might get to share an experience like that with Tim filled him with overwhelming anticipation.

Once again, he had to control the power controlling him.

Something that Tim had unknowingly made far harder, in the past few minutes alone.

***

The bubbles had faded from the bath water’s surface by the time Armie and Tim had got to the end of their final beer.

Armie could now see all of Tim’s naked body, rippling in wobbling shapes from the waist down.

Both young men took pleasure in the buzzing roll of calm that came with the booze they had lapped up since climbing into the bath.

Tim rested his head over one end of the bath, eyes closed, mouth partly open, whilst Armie did exactly the same at the other end.

He continued to massage both of Tim’s feet quietly, unable to take his hands off them until he physically had to.

Every now and again, between the firm massage, Armie would sneak in a gentle scratch and tickle.

Tim splashed his arms down by his sides.

He bit his lip but kept his eyes shut.

“You can’t help yourself, can you?”

Armie smiled as he returned a firmer grip to the sides of Tim’s feet.

“I told you, it’s all consuming …” his hold kept Tim’s jerking feet in place.

Tim breathed in through his nose and then exhaled out through his mouth.

“Can I ask you a question?”

Armie smirked, his index finger gliding down Tim’s arch.

“You’ve never asked that before all of the other questions you’ve asked. What makes this one so different?”

Tim’s slippery feet rubbed against each other as they endured Armie’s cheeky attacks.

“H-have you e-ever … Ever been tickled, the way that you’ve tickled me?”

Armie rolled his fingertips over all of Tim’s right toes.

He allowed the beers bubbling in his stomach to help him be more honest.

“Yes,” Armie spoke in a whisper as he tugged at Tim’s toes gently, “Many times.”

Tim arched his back a little.

With a growl, he leant forward, taking a splash of bath water with him.

He held onto Armie’s hands, hands still wrapped around his feet.

“Either massage them, or don’t massage them at all.”

Armie liked that Tim’s words felt like a warning.

Armie promised internally to continue rubbing Tim’s feet without any tickles.

Tim laid back down, keen to learn more about Armie’s past.

He had, over time and perhaps without realising, been educated to a point where he had started to become interested in the thing deep within Armie that made him reach for the leather restraints and feather …

… The thing that made him spend millions of dollars on hiring a friend to be tied and tickled for four weeks straight.

He wondered why Armie stood as the Tickler, instead of the Ticklee.

“Would you ever let me tickle you, like that?”

Tim felt the massage around his toes suddenly stop.

He glanced down at Armie, just as Armie slowly sat up in the bath, his thighs squeaking against the insides of the tub.

Armie carefully placed Tim’s feet back into the lukewarm water.

“No,” Armie said, firmly.

Tim sat up too, some wet curls of hair hanging past his eyes.

“Why not?” He asked.

Armie’s brows straightened into a blunt frown.

“That’s not how this is going to go, Tim.”

Tim held his hands up in surrender as droplets of water fell down to his knees.

“Listen, I, I don’t want to do it b-because, because I’ve got kingsolamania, o-or whatever it, it—”

Armie held onto Tim’s hands, bringing them gently back down beneath the water as he read the boy almost too perfectly.

“—You want to feel how it feels, to be me, doing what I do?”

Tim nodded slowly, attempting to pull his hands away from Armie, but Armie tightened his grip.

“I’m … I’m h-here for another… Three weeks…” Tim felt pinned down by Armie’s strengthened intimidation, “… This, ‘what you do’ … It’s, it’s my life, right now, till you pay me, till it ends. I want to experience all of ‘what you do’, to the fullest. And if that means swapping roles, just once, then—“

“—To the fullest?” Armie pressed, his upper body and stiffened cock now overshadowing Tim, “Does that mean I get to push you further and further, harder and harder, more so than I have before? Does that mean I get to make you feel things that the likes of this morning will be seen as a simple appetiser?”

Tim avoided Armie’s girth staring him right in the face.

“F-fuck, no, that’s … That’s not what I meant. I just meant—“

“—Okay, Tim,” Armie’s overpowering height lowered down, where he levelled out with the boy.

He popped his ‘lee’s face up, with his fingertips, so that Tim felt able to look him in the eye.

“Like you, and how you feel about the convention …” Armie took in a breath of air, “… I'll 'go'. I'll allow it. But, just once, with a safe word, and only when I feel the time is right. Entirely on my terms.”

Tim felt transfixed by Armie’s tone, his stare, the press under his chin.

“No,” Tim tried to shake his head but he couldn’t move it, “This, this isn’t a ‘I get this if you get that’ situation. This, this isn't one of your compromises, where you, you make me do shit to even out something else. I, I can easily leave tickling you. It, it was just an idea, just me thinking out loud …”

Armie shuffled in closer to Tim, water sploshing either side of their naked bodies.

“You can have it, Tim. Even if we don’t go to Tickle Fest.”

Tim looked down at Armie’s lips as he felt unexpected excitement brush over his chest.

“R-really? Only if you’re, you’re c-comfortable…” Tim spoke breathlessly, his voice filled with nerves, “… I, I just want to understand how you feel, w-what you feel when you, when you…”

Armie stared at Tim’s neck and jaw as he murmured out words filled with the scent of beer.

“… When I tickle you, beyond your conceived comprehension?”

Tim nodded slowly, his mouth opening gently.

“Y-yeah …”

Armie kept his hold on Tim’s chin.

“Like how I’m going to make you feel tomorrow morning, once you’ve eaten dinner and had a good nights rest?”

Dread filled Tim’s stomach.

Another session, so soon?

The roles reversed, if only for a second.

Tim nodded slowly, “I… I guess …” He closed his eyes, “Wh… What are you g-going to do?”

Armie kept his hand under Tim’s jaw, his mouth inches away from Tim’s.

His other hand travelled through the depths of the water, like a shark.

His fingers hovered around Tim’s thighs, where they trailed over his stomach, his waist, his hips…

Tim squirmed in Armie’s grasp.

The friend became ... This ... In the blink of an eye.

“I want to explore your upper body further. An entire session, dedicated to your stomach, your waist, your hips, your underarms …”

Armie’s finger left the water and darted up to Tim’s left armpit, but Tim clamped both arms against his sides before Armie could finger his way in.

He tried to pull his face away from Armie, he tried to blink, he tried to move …

“Y-you’ve done those places so much already … ” Tim thought he trembled because of the now cold water he sat in, but it became suddenly clear to him that it was more down to the anxiety of how being tickled in such a sensitive area, non stop, might feel.

Armie shook his head.

“That was a test,” he said.

Tim wondered if this would be where they’d kiss.

He wondered if he felt ready for it, if he even wanted it to happen …

Armie sensed Tim’s ‘It’s okay not to know’ exterior, spoken without words, and simply by just ‘being’.

Armie’s fingertips slid away from Tim’s chin as his lips moved away from Tim’s mouth.

“Tomorrow, I send you into oblivion.”

TCTLR continues in Chapter Fifteen - ‘Oblivion’ …