Work Text:
It takes six months for Aaron to feel completely comfortable in his own skin again.
He steals his father’s credit card (either he’s going to hell anyway or he isn’t, and Heavenly Father can forgive him this too) and gets on a plane back to L.A. There is no tearful goodbye at security this time. No one tells him they’re proud of him. He makes his way through the little airport, sits down at the gate, and realizes he is proud of himself.
He hangs on to that feeling. Every time he’s in the grocery store with Christian and someone looks at them a little too long, when Christian drags him out to a club and he feels like every guy in there is undressing him with his eyes, when he goes to a church down the street on Sunday morning and it’s unfamiliar and wrong, when he and Christian have sex and he can’t completely quiet the voice that tells him he’s doing something perverted. He is taking control of his own life; he relies on that thought to get him through the hard days.
Two weeks after he gets back to L.A, Christian makes him dinner. Well, Christian brings home dinner from Lila’s, but he sets the table, takes the food out of the to-go boxes, and lights some candles so it’s suitably romantic. When Christian sets a glass of wine in front of him, Aaron’s not sure what to do at first. He stares at it through the first half of dinner before he gets the courage to take an experimental sip. Once again, the world doesn’t end when he flouts what he’s been taught his whole life. He finishes the glass.
He slowly builds a life for himself. He finds a church that feels right and starts to make some of his own friends there. He loves Christian’s friends, but it’s nice to have people like him for him, not because he’s Christian’s boyfriend. He gets a job at a bookstore. It’s not glamorous, but it gives him enough money to help with rent and put some in savings. Eventually he wants to go back to college and finish what he started before his mission.
Six months after he leaves, his sister comes to visit. He takes a day off from work and spends it cleaning the apartment. He tries to lay out clothes for Christian to wear to the airport, but they are ignored. Despite what Christian is wearing, Susan hugs him as soon as she meets him. Aaron lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. When they get home, Susan pulls a bag of chocolate chip cookies out of her suitcase and hands it to him. There is a post-it stuck to the top that says, “Love, mom.” Something inside him snaps when he read that. Aaron brings the cookies to the kitchen and takes a moment to steady himself.
He starts to push Christian away in bed that night; he wants Christian but his sister is right in the next room, sleeping on their couch. Just as Christian is about to acquiesce, roll over, and go to sleep, Aaron gives in. They quietly come together, touching and kissing, completely entangled. When they are finished, Aaron peels himself off Christian and realizes the judgmental voice is gone. Everything in his head is finally speaking in one voice. This is right.