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The journey back from Europe is endless. Uncomfortable flight to England, eerily reminiscent of their jump into Holland, uncomfortable seats and not enough space. Then days kicking their heels, doing nothing, before they’re packed onto the boat. On the way out, they were all together, going to war together, they felt powerful and purposeful and invincible, and they were all together. On the return journey, Tab has had all the power and purpose sucked out of him by a long campaign, and all he has left to him are Babe and Luz.
He chain smokes across the Atlantic, for lack of anything better to do, and it takes him an embarrassingly long time to realise that part of the itchy, uncomfortable feeling tracking up the back of his spine on a near constant basis is the fact that it’s now been weeks since he’s seen Dick and Nixon. It’s the longest he’s gone without laying eyes on either of them since Toccoa and he misses them like a physical ache that he’s somehow mistaken for cigarette cravings. He realises this in the middle of the night and bites through his lip so that no one hears him laughing at himself.
Stuck in the middle of the ocean with nothing to do and only Babe and Luz to talk to, Tab finds himself with far, far too much time on his hands. There’s so much in his life that he can’t bear to think about, so much that he can’t even touch, that it feels like there’s barely anything safe to look at. It feels like there’s nothing safe behind him, so the only thing he can think about is what’s next.
New York is next. New York, an address written on a piece of paper still tucked into his pocket, a hotel room with two men in it, a room with a bed in it, a bed with a space for him in it. They’re waiting for him. They want him.
Tab lies in his bunk, surrounded by a hundred other men, and lets himself really think about it. He’s hard in minutes, touching himself silently under the blankets, slow and careful, turning it over in his head, trying to picture it. His memories of the study in the Eagle’s Nest are blurry, all heat and proximity and the overwhelming sensation of how much they wanted him. It’s more than enough to fill the gaps in his imagination. He wants, wants so badly that it aches, that it fizzes through his bloodstream, wants to get his mouth all over both of them, wants hours and hours of peace and a locked door and clean sheets and Dick and Nixon taking him apart. He strokes his cock, biting down on his lip as he tries to imagine how it would feel. He can’t. He wants it anyway. He wants it more than anything. He pictures Dick as he was in the study, pupils blown wide, mouth red and wet, fingertips digging in to his hips as they moved together, and he bites down so hard when he comes that he tastes blood.
**
“What are you going to do when we get back?” Luz asks him one afternoon, as they sit smoking on the deck.
Babe is asleep next to them, young in the sunshine, but his face is creased, mouth moving soundlessly. It’s not enough to count as a nightmare just yet but it’s not peaceful sleep. Tab is watching him carefully, knows better than to wake him, but doesn’t like the look of it. They all have nightmares.
“Hello?” Luz says, nudging him. “What’s your plan?”
Tab comes back to the moment. “Staying with friends in New York for a night,” he lies, sort of, “And then home to Kokomo to have my mother sob over me for as long as I can stand, and then I’m going down to California. Pat and I are gonna stay in San Francisco for while, help Chuck get settled. After that I’m not sure. What about you?”
Luz shrugs. “Pretty similar. Need to go see my folks. Then I thought I’d track down Toye. Bill’s got Babe and Fran and all his folk at home, but Joe’s pretty much by himself. Someone’s gotta make sure he doesn’t dig himself a hole of doom and live in it forever.” Luz pauses. “And as soon as I think I can do it without fucking howling, I’ll come back to New York and see Faye Tanner.”
It’s a name he hasn’t heard for a while. “Skip’s Faye?”
“Yeah,” says Luz, and his voice is small and quiet. “I feel like I should.”
It’s everything he’s been trying not to think about. It sinks into him like Smith’s bayonet, sliding into the soft parts of his soul and tearing, twisting, breaking. There are so many Faye Tanners.
“Tell Malark, when you go,” Tab manages, voice a little thin but not as bad as it could be. “He has Skip’s rosary. He might want to go with you.”
Luz nods. “I was so looking forward to meeting her, once upon a time. Sweet Faye Tanner. Probably more than half in love with her just from spending so much time with Skip, being so in love with her.”
“You and everyone else,” Tab says, and lights another cigarette.
Babe twitches next to them, and Luz lays a settling hand on his shoulder. He scrubs the back of his other hand over his face, smearing the dampness out of his eyes. Tab remembers all of a sudden why he isn’t going home. He can’t go home. They’re all fucking ruined.
**
The days blur together, a mix of dread and anticipation and grief and crippling boredom. It’s almost like the waiting periods between combat. He doesn’t have his weapon anymore and it makes him feel desperate and terrified and like at any moment something could be coming for them and he wouldn’t have any way to protect them. Some days he walks into the mess hall and doesn’t recognise any faces except the two at his back and feels breathless with fear. He scans the room and can’t find Speirs, he’s the first one he seeks out, doesn’t locate, panics, no company commander, no Lip, where’s Dick, where’s… and then reality ticks back round and he breathes again and Babe is at his six, George at Babe’s, and that’s as it should be, that’s all he’s supposed to have now.
**
New York looms out of the fog early one morning and the noise from every inch of the ship is deafening. Tab finds himself looking at a skyline he’s only seen once before and feeling a little like he might cry. A lot of the men are crying.
**
Six weeks, give or take, of Babe and Luz and no one else, has given Tab the deep seated need to be rid of the pair of them. He loves them, would die for them, has killed for them, bled for them, but would probably not have ever chosen them to be his sole companions for a month on end. He is desperate for space from them right up until the minute they step off the ship and stand on the dock, and he is faced with the fact that he has to say goodbye to them, his last brothers. He’s their Staff Sergeant, he was their First Sergeant, he should have something to say to them. He can’t find the words. It sticks in his throat, and all he can see for a moment is the pair of them in the snow in Bastogne, Babe holding Roe in the mud, Luz crawling towards Skip and Penk in the last minutes of their lives, and the sheer fucking miracle of them in front of him now in the sunshine on the docks in New York, amid thousands of screaming voices. In the end, he says nothing, pulls Luz in and holds him tight for a moment, then reaches out for Babe, takes him by the back of the neck and shakes him briefly, and then he lets them both go.
He lets them all go.
**
And then there is nowhere to go but forwards. He has the piece of paper still in his pocket, the name of the hotel written in Dick’s careful hand, and Tab is Dick’s soldier, to the bones of him. He has his orders. He’s a paratrooper.
He refuses to be nervous. He finds a map, navigates the city on foot, finds the hotel, and goes to the clerk and asks for Major Winters. The lady at the desk is the first American woman he’s spoken to in years, she’s got a perfectly made-up face and the sort of hair he knows takes hours, her smile is sweet and pleasant, the curves beneath her blouse are just what he’d usually like, he knows that if he leant forward and breathe her in she’d smell of something floral and familiar, and she holds no appeal for him at all. She gives him the room number, and Tab makes his way up.
He'd kept one uniform to one side, clean and untouched, the whole journey over, and put it on this morning, finger combed his hair in the window of the bar across the street, and refused to feel self-conscious about it. Tab stands outside the door, looks at the number, takes a deep breath and summons all the reserves of strength of combat, of jumping, of waiting to die, and knocks.
**
Dick opens the door, and for a moment they just stand there, looking at each other. Dick looks relaxed, soft around the edges in a way he hasn’t seen in years, shirt unbuttoned at the top and hair a little ruffled. The smile that breaks over Dick’s face when he sees who’s at the door is a thing that will live with Tab forever. It’s heartbreakingly beautiful. He’s wrecked for this man, helpless for this man, there is nothing he will not do.
“You’re here,” says Dick, and the words are suffused with warmth.
Tab feels a little echoing smile creep up across his face. “I had orders, sir,” he says, because there is nothing he will not do for Dick, and Dick told him to come to them.
All of a sudden, the warmth in Dick’s smile flickers. It’s not gone, but it drops, and Tab feels his stomach drop with it. He’s adept at reading Dick’s face, his life depended on reading Dick’s face, some days, and that, that little flicker? That says something.
But Dick has pulled the smile straight back up, very nearly as warm as before, and he’s stepped back to give Tab space to enter the room, a clear signal that they’re proceeding leaving that moment unaddressed. Tab lets him have it. He’ll come back to it. They’re not at war anymore. They don’t have to tolerate things that hurt anymore. Whatever it was, they’ll come back to it.
Tab moves into the room, crowding a little more into Dick’s space than is strictly necessary, because he knows the hallway is empty, and when Dick reaches round him to shut the door he allows himself the luxury of Dick’s hand brushing his hip. It’s such a slight touch. It feels like everything.
“Fancy seeing you here,” says Nixon, lounging on the bed behind Dick. He’s shirtless, loose and calm in the same way Dick is, and the sight of him sends something fizzing through Tab’s veins in a way that he’s so unfamiliar with after years and years of high alert.
“Captain Nixon, sir,” says Tab, even though he knows there’ll be trouble for it, because there is something light growing in him that feels a little like hope.
“No rank in bed, Bunny,” Nixon shoots back, smirking, and Dick hides a smile under the guise of checking the door is locked.
“We’re not in bed, Lewis,” says Tab, trialling the word.
Nix makes a pleased little noise in the back of his throat, and Dick moves up behind Tab, taking his bag from his shoulder, and stroking a hand down the nape of his neck, steady and sure. There’s something so impossibly fond about the gesture.
“Not yet,” Dick counters. “You’ve been on a boat for god knows how long. You’re going to have a bath, and something to eat, and then, if you like, we can go to bed.”
It’s so familiar and so alien, Dick laying out how things will be, and everything in Tab primes him to comply without thought, but this isn’t combat, isn’t war or seeing to the men or seizing an objective and so he allows himself the luxury of questioning an order. He’ll comply, of course he will, because it’s Dick, but he’ll allow himself thought.
In the end he doesn’t get a chance. Obviously the hesitation shows on his face.
“Let us take care of you, Bunny,” says Nix. Lewis. “It was a long fucking war, and we haven’t been able to give you anything good. Let us give you something good.”
Tab looks to Dick, who for a moment looks like the rug has been pulled out from under him. There’s not much of the Major left in his face, although the army is written all over his posture and will be for the rest of his life. For a moment, Dick looks just like a man, a man at the end of a long fucking war, a little heartbroken, a little tired. Longing for something good.
Tab wants to give it to him, wants to give him everything, which is why he ends up in the tub in the corner of the room, being handed a sandwich. It feels preposterous, after what they’ve been through, but the tenderness with which Nix scratches his fingers through his hair, rubbing the soap in soothing circles, overrides everything else. He sinks into the luxury for a moment, ignoring the crumbs falling into the water, and just lets them take care of him. He lets the heat of the water and the calm of knowing they’re both there, with him, slide under his skin and sit there, and drifts for a minute. There’s a sense of peace in the room, Nix perched next to the tub, Dick in the chair just a little way away, and Tab thinks they’ve never had this. There has never been peace.
It goes against every instinct he has, but he knows if he doesn’t address it now, they’ll start whatever this is with something hanging over them. There’s enough against them already.
“Dick,” he says, and his voice is soft, careful. “What happened, when you opened the door? You were happy to see me, and then there was just a moment, where something was wrong. What was it?”
To his credit, Dick doesn’t try to deny it. He just looks at Tab, gaze level and steady, and then leans forward. “You said, I had orders.”
Nix goes very still. Tab waits.
“There are no orders anymore, Bunny,” says Dick, and there’s almost a tremor in his voice. “We’re not giving you orders, you’re not here on orders, you can’t be. You can’t be here because you think that’s the mission you’ve been given, I… We want you here because you want to be here. You have to be able to leave, you have to be able to choose, it’s…”
Something rises in him like panic, and Tab shakes his head. He doesn’t know what to say, can’t quite put into words the difference between obeying orders from Dick and obeying any other orders. It’s not because it’s orders. It’s because he’s Dick. Somehow, he thinks this isn’t going to be a helpful thing for either of the officers to hear. Nix looks anxious, as if this is something he’d seen coming but hadn’t quite been able to mitigate. He’s not going to be able to find something to say that fixes this, and so he doesn’t try.
Tab stands up, stepping out of the tub, deliberately not self-conscious about standing naked and wet on the rug, and reaches for the towel, wrapping it quickly around his hips and moving across the room to stand in front of Dick, slotting easily between his legs, and leaning down to press his mouth against Dick’s, kissing him firm and sure and unquestionable.
“I am here,” he says, voice low, because he can give orders too, “Because this is where I am supposed to be.” And he means it. “I’ve had a bath, and something to eat, and now I want you to take me to bed. Please.”
**
Somewhere between standing in front of Dick’s chair, and ending up on his back against the pillows on the bed, Tab loses the towel. They flank him, trading kisses with a rhythm that is inexplicable and perfect, Dick licking into his mouth which Nix scrapes his teeth down over Tab’s throat and then swapping, the occasional moment where Nix tilts his head and kisses Dick instead, letting Tab breathe, eyes closed, aching, until someone turns back to him and gives him their mouth. It feels endless, perfect, the security of knowing that there’s no reason to stop until they want to, no reason to leave until he wants to, that this is something he can have, and have and have and have, with no end in sight. They’re both pressed against him, bodies heavy and perfect, and every single nerve in his body is alight with the knowledge that they’ll give him what he wants.
“This feels distinctly unbalanced,” he says hoarsely, turning his head so that Nix licks across his jaw rather than his lip, pushing one hand against Dick’s shirt, and resting the other lightly over Nix’s belt buckle.
Dick pauses, pulls back and looks at him very carefully. “You sure, Bunny?”
It’s not supposed to be a challenge, but it feels like one. Tab sits up, pushing Dick back and then crowding into his space, unbuttoning his shirt and reaching for his vest, pulling it up over his head before making a start on his belt.
“You forget,” he says, voice low again, because it worked so well the last time. “That even if I’m new at this, I’m not a virgin. You’re not going to hurt me, or break me, or scare me. You’re going to fuck me, and I’m going to like it.”
Dick moans, and Tab smirks, leaves him to finish undressing and turns to Nix, who already has his belt undone and is watching the pair of them with an identical smirk on his face. They’re naked in seconds, clothes falling to the floor as if there’s no chance they’ll need to find them in a hurry, and then Tab lays back against the pillows, presses a hand to the sharp cut of Dick’s hip and pulls him back down. The heat of him against his chest is searing, breath-taking, and Nix slots in next to them, gasping as they reach for him. Tab kisses him first, mouth open and wet, and lets Dick slide a thigh between his legs, cock hard against the ridge of his pelvis, moving slow and purposely. Nix presses in closer on the other side, covering him completely. Tab’s achingly hard, desperate for them, heart beating out of his ribcage as someone trails a hand down his chest, teasing, fingers ghosting over his stomach to brush against his length, making him jerk and whine into Nix’s mouth, sucking on his tongue before tearing himself away to meet Dick on a shared breath and it is so overwhelming, so much more intense than anything else he’s ever experienced before, and he knows it’s not just because there are two of them, not just because he’s never done this before. He’s never wanted anything this much, never been this hard or this desperate, leaking against his stomach as he feels far too much and not enough.
“Fuck me,” he says, breathless, “Dick, fuck me, please.”
“Yes,” Dick moans, “Yeah, Bunny, anything. How do you want it?”
He has no idea. “You’re the experts,” he says, and feels the little shudder of Nix’s laugh down the whole length of his body.
Nix kisses him once more, thorough and filthy, and then pulls away, pushing them lightly so they move over, and sitting back against the headboard, piling the pillows up behind his back and around him, before gesturing to the pair of them.
“On your knees, Bunny,” he says, patting the space between his legs. “Lean on me.”
Nix leans over, takes a little bottle out of the drawer at the side of the bed and places it on the sheets to his side, somehow steady when the other pair are wrecked. Tab takes his position just as instructed, smirks a little at the idea that obviously there are some orders allowed in bed, even if they’re not allowed rank, and then presses forward to fuck his tongue into Nix’s mouth, taking him by the back of his neck as he steadies himself with his other hand open and vicious on his hip. Dick moves behind him, lips closed and gentle at the top of his spine, just for a moment, followed by the slightest graze of his teeth as he moves down. There’s the sound of the bottle being opened and Tab forces himself to focus on Nix, mouth wet and pliant for him, hands stroking over his ribs, one sharp fingernail scraping a nipple and making him hiss, cock jerking against his stomach, still achingly hard.
Dick sweeps one hand down Tab’s side, down over his hip, and then slides that hand over his thigh to his knee, pulling out, widening Tab’s stance and tipping him forwards to rest his head against Nix’s shoulder. He’s braced for what’s coming, ready, but still jerks at the press of Dick’s finger slick against his arse, sharp breath pulled in. Nix makes a soothing noise, stroking through his hair, holding him still and steady as Dick presses into him.
It's an overwhelming, alien feeling, uncomfortable and promising and the room is completely silent apart from the harsh break of his breathing. Dick goes slow, pushing deeper ever so slightly, rocking, coaxing, other hand rubbing firm circles against Tab’s hip.
“Doing OK, Bunny?” he asks, and he’s breathless.
Tab shivers. “Yeah,” he says, “Just…” he needs something, unmoored and uncertain and so desperate for more.
“Yeah?” says Nix, kissing the tip of his ear, “What do you need?”
Dick presses deeper, finger sliding in all the way to the knuckle, and Tab shudders, moans.
“Talk to me,” he says, “Please, I…”
“Fuck,” Nix sounds wrecked. “Yeah Bunny, fuck, is that good? It’ll be strange at first, just relax into it, Dick’s going to make you feel so good, so good I promise, just, fuck-”
Tab pulls his head up and kisses Nix, sloppy and unfocused.
Dick moans behind them. “That’s it Bunny, I’m gonna give you another, just breathe, I’ve got you, let me give it to you, let me…”
Two fingers makes Tab whine high in the back of his throat, pressing his face back to Nix’s shoulder as he tips his hips back, asking for more even as it aches and stretches, and Dick makes a noise that defies definition.
“God, look at you,” he says. “Lew, Christ, I can’t…”
Nix laughs, soft. “Well done Bunny, you broke him. Do you like that? Want more?”
“Yeah,” gasps Tab, “Fuck, please, Dick more, please. I want your cock, please.”
Dimly, Tab’s aware of what he’s saying, aware that there’s some past version of himself who is horrified by this, embarrassed to the core to be begging to be fucked, but this version of him, the one who belongs to these two, just wants to feel it.
“One more,” says Dick, soothing. “Take one more and I’ll let you have it.”
Three is too much and not enough. Tab fucks himself back onto Dick’s hand, panting at the stretch as Dick scissors his fingers, and then he shifts and Dick crooks a finger and he’s set alight, blinding and sharp and perfect and he cries out, unable to stop himself.
“There it is,” Nix huffs a laugh, “That feel good sweetheart? Go on Dick,” he continues, “Give it to him again.”
Dick repeats the movement, quick and firm and relentless and Tab’s making an oh oh oh noise somewhere deep in his throat and trying to take more and Nix is laughing, one hand on his own cock, slow and simple, the other holding Tab in place as Dick takes him apart.
“Ready?”
“Yes, fuck yes, please, please…”
Nix reaches for the bottle and then reaches round Tab, slicking Dick’s cock with a practiced hand that makes them both gasp and moan and then there’s a moment where Tab is achingly, horribly empty, and then Dick presses into him.
“Oh, god, Bunny,” he whispers, barely audible, mouth pressed against Tab’s back. “God that feels so good, I love you, god I love you.”
Tab is speechless, split and full and flooded with sensation, lets Nix take his weight and just pushes back, forcing himself to take every inch as Dick gives him everything. It takes a moment, and then Tab exhales against Nix’s shoulder.
“Go on,” says Nix. “He’s there, fuck him, go on Dick.”
The first few thrusts are unsettling, overwhelming, and then Dick slides one knee out just an inch and changes his angle and all of a sudden it’s perfect, perfect, and Tab sits up, pushing back, fucking against Dick, riding down against each thrust and when he looks up at Nix he’s grinning, like this is something he’s been waiting for, like he’s been proven right, an unbearable smugness. Dick leans forward, taking a hand from Tab’s hips to take him by the chin, tilting until he can kiss him, slick and messy. The rhythm falters, he’s moving relentlessly, driving himself deep into the heat of Tab’s body as he licks into his mouth and then he reaches round again, fingers scrabbling at Nix’s thigh.
“Yeah,” Nix moans, “I’ve got it, keep going, I’ve got him.”
He shifts closer, sliding his knees between Tab’s spread legs and pressing him further back against Dick until he cries out again, and reaches down, wrapping one hand around both of their cocks, spreading precome over them both and sliding his fingers loose and easy up and down, teasing to start as if he can’t help it, playing the shocked, wanting noise Tab makes and the way he fucks up into the grip.
“Perfect,” he says. “Fucking perfect Bunny, oh my god. Look at you, holy fuck, look at you riding him, shit, he’s so close. Go on baby, fuck, you’re going to make him come, holy fuck.”
Tab’s dimly aware of the little punched-out moans ripping out of him as he jerks his hips between the hand around his cock and the cock in his arse, mindless, the whole room shrunk down to two points. He can’t breathe and doesn’t care. Nix moves his hand faster, tight and punishing and comes first, biting down against Tab’s shoulder to stifle the noise he makes, and that’s it, that pushes Tab over the edge, silent and blinded by the white behind his eyes, body clenching, forcing himself to keep to Dick’s rhythm even as he shakes, and Dick gasps their names, over and over, and comes harder than he has in his life.
**
Tab dozes, head cushioned against Dick’s shoulder, thoughts disorganised and hazy. Nix slides off the bed and comes back with a wet towel, cleans them up and then drags the covers up and slides in next to them. He hooks his chin over Tab’s shoulder, draped over his back, kisses the side of his jaw and then reaches up to kiss Dick too.
“Well,” he says, “I think that went well.”
Dick laughs - the sound is something clear and pure and unexpected, and it lights Tab up, filling him with unprecedented fondness. He tilts his head up, and presses a kiss exactly where Nix had a moment before.
“I love you,” Tab says, unable to help it.
Dick strokes a hand down his back. “I love you too,” he says. “Both of you. Christ.”
Nix makes a soft sound, and Tab turns to look at him, cold all of a sudden. It shows on his face, whatever it is he can’t quite understand that he’s feeling, but Nix smiles, open and easy.
“No hurry, Bunny,” he says, soft and simple. “I’ll get you in the end, I’m a very loveable man.”
Tab shifts in the bed until he’s lying against Nix, pulling Dick along til they’ve swapped positions, Nix on his back with Tab and Dick draped over him, one behind the other. Tab kisses him, as sweetly as he knows how, and tries to layer every second of it with the gratitude and affection he’s never getting past.
“I know you will,” he says, and means it.
**
They doze for a bit after that, peaceful and quiet, curled together even though it isn't quite comfortable, a little too warm, the significant weight of Nix pressing against Tab's chest in a way that makes it difficult to take a full breath. He doesn't care. Dick is on his side next to them, eyes closed, and Tab finds himself fixated by the length of his lashes, soft and delicate against his freckled skin. He'd thought he knew Dick inside out, but lying here he's aware of every tiny detail, brand new and miraculous. He slides his foot along Dick's calf where it's tangled with his, just because he can, and feels the rough star of the shrapnel wound from Normandy. It's jarring, the sudden reminder of combat, of being a street back and hearing Dick cry out. He pushes it resolutely out of his mind.
"God," he says, stroking his hand over Dick's back, "I'm so damn glad I'm not in the Pacific."
It’s a throwaway comment, but they're all aware of the weight of it. Nix shifts a little closer, presses his lips to the curve of Tab's throat.
"I never asked," Tab says, "But were you going to go?"
Dick hums assent, nods gently. "Couldn't leave Easy," he says.
"And you couldn't let him go without you," finishes Tab, tipping his head to look at Nix.
It’s a nothing of a statement, in the grand scheme of things, but it seems to spike something in Nix. The lax, content line of his body tightens, he curls away just a little, something quiet and hurt in every inch of his posture, clear even in the dark.
"Lewis?" The name still feels strange to Tab, almost a term of endearment of its own, after so long of rank and title.
Nix pulls himself away, and Dick sits up, waiting. It takes a moment.
"Sometimes," Nix says, and his voice is thick with bitterness. "Sometimes, I think everyone has forgotten that I'm Easy, too."
"What?"
"I was at Toccoa too," he says, "I ran Curahee with the rest of you, I was there, through the whole thing, I know I didn't fight with you but Jesus Christ, it was my goddamn company too! I spent the whole fucking war doing everything I could to know more than the next man on the offchance that it would make a difference, give you a better shot, keep you all a-fucking-live, because it was my goddamn company too! I didn't go to war for Dick fucking Winters. I went for Easy. And I know the name of every single boy we left there just as well as either of you do."
Dick and Tab exchange a look in the dark. "Lew," Dick says, voice a little hesitant. "We know that. I know that."
"You've always been Easy to us," Tab tells him, reaching out to pull him back in. "To me, and to the men. You've always been Easy to us. You were on the line with us, you dug holes with us and drank with us and drove with us, you've always been Easy. And we know what you did for us, how you kept us alive. We know that, Lewis, I promise."
Nix makes a soft noise and curls himself back into the pair of them, easy forgiveness silent through his skin.
**
"How long do you think you'll be in California for?" asks Dick idly, a while later, stroking a hand over Tab's chest in a way that could be completely innocent, except for the way it's got him half hard and wanting, the way he's always wanting.
"Not sure," Tab sighs, arching into the touch a little. "Months, probably. Maybe longer. However long Chuck needs us, really."
Nix makes a noise of displeasure in the back of his throat. "I'm going to be selfish here," he says, "And ignore the fact that I completely support what you're doing and that I think it's admirable, and so on, and I'm just going to say that I fucking hate the idea of not having this again for months, or maybe longer."
Tab echoes the noise of discontent, and Nix rolls up onto his elbow, leaning down to kiss him, slow and slick and full of promise, hand joining Dick’s on his chest. They move in tandem for a moment, Nix kissing Tab as Dick mouths the line of Nix’s jaw and they both play their fingers over his skin, one teasing over his nipples, the other skating quick and certain over the twisted knot of scar tissue from the night of the bayonet, so sure and familiar, so used to scars.
“I have the most to complain about,” says Tab, breaking free of a kiss with a gasp as Dick scrapes a fingernail over his chest. “At least you’ll have each other, I’m going to be out there alone.”
It’s not true, really, in the most basic sense, because he’ll have Pat and Chuck, and McClung is in San Francisco and so is Liebgott, though it’s not likely that they’ll see much of him, Tab isn’t going to be alone, but… He knows what’s his now, knows what he’s missing, knows how it feels to have them love him, tender and careful, knows how it is to have Dick fuck him, still tender but not careful at all, and he’ll sleep in a cold bed by himself while they’re tangled together on the other side of the country and he’s not able to pretend that doesn’t make him ache.
Nix looks at Dick over Tab’s head, eyes steady, communicating silently in the way they always have that used to be so reassuring and now is just annoying, now that he knows they’re talking about him.
“Bunny,” says Nix slowly, tracing a light trail down his chest, under the blankets pooled at their hips. “No one is expecting you to be a monk. We… It’s a long time to go without comfort,” he says. “A long time to go without closeness, and it’s been a long fucking war. We don’t need you to go without. We just need you to come to us when you can.”
Tab turns it over in his head, torn between the generosity of the offer and the way Nix’s fingers stroke over his cock, light and deliberate.
“I don’t need comfort,” he says, and finds that he believes it, rocks his hips up for more purchase, reaches for Dick. “I don’t need anything except this.”
Dick looks at him, solemn in the half light. “This is yours to keep.”
Nix tightens his grip a little and Tab moans, can’t breathe against the feeling, needs more.
“Remind me,” he says, dragging his mouth down Dick’s neck, twisting to press against him, instinctive. “Make me feel it, let me take this with me.”
He does.
**
“My train leaves first thing,” Tab says into the dark, breathless and aching as Dick eases him back down onto the mattress, well-fucked and dizzy.
Nix grumbles, “No talk of leaving in the bedroom,” as he rolls over on top of him, taking his weight on his elbows and leaning down to kiss him, rubbing his cock against the come cooling on Tab’s stomach as Dick follows, hands quick and thorough, careless with practice. “Not until Dick’s fucked me.”
Tab breathes out a laugh and lies back, carding one hand through Nix’s hair and reaching down to twine his fingers with Dick’s where they rest on Nix’s hip, holding him in place as he slides home, knocking the air from their lungs. “Bossy,” he says, still a little out of it.
Dick’s not listening to them, focused, brow furrowed, bitten off words fading into desperate, broken noises. “Close,” he says. “Lew, so close.”
“Go on,” says Nix, “Come on, fucking give it to me, come on Dick, oh, oh fuck, Bunny, I…”
Tab obliges, rocking his hips up, all pace and friction, pressing wet, dirty kisses against Nix’s neck, biting down as Dick cries out, coming deep and hard inside him, and rolling his hips with deliberate effect until Nix follows suit.
**
“My train leaves first thing,” he tries again, twenty minutes later, as they’re tangled together in the bed, a little sliver of streetlight coming through the curtains. “I need to be at the station in a few hours.”
Dick sighs, regret and resignation. “Do you want us to come with you?”
“No,” says Tab, and kisses them, Dick first and then Nix, chaste. “No, I don’t want to do anymore handshake goodbyes,” he tells them. “I want it to be real. I want it like this.”
Nix nods. “Alright,” he says. “We’ll stay here. But it’s not goodbye, Bunny. We’re not done.”
“I know,” says Tab. “I already said yes. You win.”
Dick smirks, he’s never looked more like Nix. “Damn right.”
**