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(three months, two weeks, five days, and one morning, drenched in sunshine)
“Michael!”
James didn’t sound alarmed—amused, in fact, or maybe rueful—but the lure of that voice reached out into the kitchen anyway, and caught him and dragged him away from the beginnings of coffee and down the hall into the bedroom.
“What? Is something—what do you need?”
“You didn’t have to run.”
“Yes, I did. And you didn’t have to shout. You’re not supposed to strain your voice. You know that. They said.”
“They said I was healing remarkably well, and that I should try not to strain my voice.” James grinned. “Which I didn’t. Nothing hurts. Better?”
“Maybe.” They’d taken James in for that follow-up appointment, the day before. A scheduled check-up, not anything else, or anything worse.
James had been very quiet, beforehand; worry, Michael’d thought, about being touched and tested, or maybe only about the possible results. He’d asked; James had answered, thoughtfully honest, “Mostly the second one, but…” and Michael had nodded and held his hand the whole way through.
But everything had been fine. Better than fine. Surprisingly so. Scars, of course, and James was still too thin for everyone’s liking, but, physically, almost fully healed. Recovery, Michael’d thought, and watched the expression, in those blue eyes, at the welcome news. Yes.
James had been exhausted, afterward, which they’d both known enough to expect—it was never going to be anything less than an ordeal, being so exposed to relative strangers, no matter how kindly professional they’d been—but had smiled at him, when they’d come home and Michael’d installed them both on the couch, handed him a pint of pistachio ice cream, and turned on classic Star Trek reruns.
“I love you.”
“I know.” He’d put an arm around James. Who’d smiled again, and started feeding him ice cream.
“I bought that for you.”
“And it’s delicious. But I can share. I like sharing with you. And I’m all right, I think. Just tired. Are we watching the one with the Horta? Because I’ve always liked the Horta. She’s a good mother.”
“James,” Michael’d said, helplessly, “what the hell is a Horta?” and James had started laughing and then attempted an earnest and lengthy explanation of silicon-based alien life-forms, and Michael’d not heard any of the words because he was too busy watching James be happy.
James had stopped halfway through a lecture on mind-melds and telepathic communication, and raised an eyebrow. “You’re not listening to me, are you?”
“Um…no. I think you lost me around the laying-thousands-of-eggs-in-one-go part. Which sounds horribly uncomfortable. But you can keep talking. I love you talking. I love you.”
“Hmm,” James’d said, “that does sound uncomfortable, and I love you, and now start it again so we can actually watch the episode and you can learn about rock-shaped aliens who are secretly just good parents. And spit acid.”
“Sounds like a perfect evening.”
It had been. Unquestionably so.
He’d thought that James might still be tired, this morning. Had been entirely prepared to spend the day on the couch again, complete with ice cream and Vulcans and that solidly contented weight in his arms. Anything James wanted.
Apparently what James wanted now involved the excavation of what had to be every item of clothing he owned, flung across the bed and the floor in cheerfully disastrous abandon.
“Ah…did your closet decide it was time for an explosion? Or is this some sort of bizarre revenge for me eating the last piece of pizza last week? I didn’t know you wanted it.”
“No, and no, and I didn’t really mind. Besides, you bought me ice cream. But, um…I need new clothes.”
“You…what?”
“Nothing fits.” James looked up at him, then at the clothing-strewn and stoically silent bed, and sighed. “My jeans fall off. When I put them on.”
“That’s because you need to gain weight.” He didn’t want James to have to buy new clothes. That admission felt like failure somehow. Like a surrender to the fact that things had changed, and James wasn’t the same shape any longer.
Maybe he should just try feeding James more ice cream.
“Michael,” James said, pathetically, “my ThunderCats shirt is too big now.”
“I’m…sorry?”
“I love that shirt.”
“I know. Why is this important? I mean in general. All the clothes.”
“Because…” James sighed again. Wandered over to Michael’s side, and took his hand. “If I’m—if we’re—going to start going out places, in public, again…well, it’d be nice if my pants stayed on of their own volition.”
Michael very nearly answered I’d prefer it if your pants didn’t stay on. Bit his tongue before the words could escape. They weren’t there yet. They might be, someday. He was beginning to have hope, very cautiously, that that could be true. But not until, and unless, James asked.
Besides, the other part of that statement was demanding his attention. “You…you want to…go out. Places. In public?” With other people around?
“Was that a question, or did you just feel like repeating every word in my sentence…?” But James was smiling. At him. “I think so, yes. I could see us going out for dinner, or something. Not, y’know, anything too crowded or intense, but…”
“So,” Michael said, after a second of delighted shock, “you’re really just trying to get me to ask you out on a date, aren’t you,” and James laughed. “Possibly yes? Is it working?”
“Yes. Tonight?”
“Um…yes. But only if we get to go shopping before then. I mean it.”
“So you want me to buy you clothes and dinner? I’m starting to feel exploited, James.”
“Oh, sorry. Can I make it up to you? Would you like to kiss me now?”
“I would like to kiss you always,” Michael told him, and then leaned down and touched their lips together, the two of them standing close in the pale morning sunlight beside the bed, surrounded by merry heaps of clothing and messy domesticity and the scent of coffee drifting in, companionably, from down the hall.
James smiled, after. Even warmer than the sunbeams, where they brushed against his skin. “So…feeling less exploited?”
“James,” Michael said, truthfully, “I would buy you an entire shopping mall, if you wanted me to, just for that,” and James grinned. “Probably not necessary. Though I have always kind of wanted my own escalator.”
“…really?”
“They’re like stairs, but they move.”
“James,” Michael said, and then found himself laughing so hard he could barely stand up, at the words, at the excitedly conspiratorial lifted eyebrows, at the flood of sheer heartfelt relief. James was smiling, too. Of course. And Michael could still taste those lips, that smile, on his skin.
“I fucking love you.”
“Oh, I know. Weren’t you making me coffee? Because I might let you kiss me again if you bring me coffee. While I try to find something I can wear out of the house without looking like I’ve stolen Bruce Banner’s wardrobe. I didn’t know I even owned purple sweatpants.”
“Superhero jokes? Seriously?”
“If the Incredible Hulk fits,” James said, and grinned, and Michael actually ran down the hall for coffee, and then ran back, just so he could ask to kiss James again before that expression went away.
And the day kept on being better, from there. Michael hadn’t thought that that could happen; he’d been convinced that the morning—he’d been able to kiss James twice!—had been the most flawless moment in recent memory. But he was finding that he also had room for other moments, among his favorites. James wandering out of an aisle of clothing and holding up vividly pink and uncannily skinny jeans, and then doubling over with laughter at the look on Michael’s face. James emerging from a fitting room, because he’d had to give up and try things on to figure out what size he was, in much better jeans and a blue sweater and a hesitant smile, and Michael finding himself utterly speechless, because all he could do was stare.
James had grinned, looking far too pleased with himself, and vanished back into the fitting room and come out again in slightly tighter jeans and a grey button-down shirt, pushing up his sleeves, and Michael’d had to sit down.
He’d also had to cross his legs. And think very determinedly about other things. Cold water. Icicles. Sandwiches. Kevin Bacon. At least that last one’d worked.
James had been a bit disappointed at the lack of ThunderCats-related apparel, but had cheered up when Michael’d found him both a vintage Star Wars t-shirt and a Voltron shirt. He’d ended up changing into and wearing the Star Wars shirt out of the store, while Michael had a very hasty discussion with the manager about how easy it’d be, given enough financial incentive, to find something with a certain specific design. He was quietly looking forward to James getting a delivery, by the end of the following week.
After a while, he’d realized that he’d been getting hungry. Had checked his watch. And then had dragged James off to the closest restaurant he could think of that met the not-too-crowded and not-too-noisy criteria, and ordered practically everything on the menu.
“There is no way on this or any other earth that we’re going to eat all that.”
“I’m not. You are.”
“And then I won’t be able to fit into all the new clothes.”
“Then I can buy you more. How’re you feeling, by the way?” He had noticed, once they’d finally sat down, that James seemed a bit worn out. The normally expansive gestures had grown a little smaller, less animated, when the fingertips sketched illustrations in the air.
“Um…honestly, I’m probably done for now. We can go home after this.”
“We can go home right now if you want, we don’t have to stay—”
“No, this is fine. I’m fine. I love you. Only kind of tired. Food will probably help. Though not this much food. You could feed ten of me with this much food.”
“Am I still taking you out to dinner tonight?”
“I think so, yes. If we can go home for a while first. If you don’t mind.”
“Of course I don’t mind. Is this okay, though? This place?”
James glanced around. At the wide windows, the white tablecloth, the sunlight falling over their table and catching on the shine of a fork, the gleam of a water glass. “Yes. Thank you.”
“You don’t have to say—”
“Not only for this, I mean. Not only today. For today and everything.” One more smile, outshining the sunbeams. The light didn’t even try to compete. “Just in case you wanted to hear it again.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
“I—”
“James? James! And Michael!”
They both looked up, at the interruption. James blinked, eyelashes flickering over the quizzical blue. “So, that sounded like—”
“Oh my god that’s you!” A very lively Benedict Cumberbatch came flying in their direction, dodging tables and a perilously slow waiter. Flung his arms around James. Enthusiastically.
James flinched. Everything, even the hair, tensed in place.
Michael, without even a second’s pause for thought, jumped to his feet and put one hand on Benedict’s shoulder and pushed him away and wrapped the other arm around James, pulling him closer, putting his own body in between shocked blue eyes and the intruder. A barricade. A shield, if James needed that.
He had no idea what his expression looked like, but it must’ve been impressive; Benedict took a step back, eyes wide. “I’m so sorry—”
“You—”
“It’s fine,” James interrupted, no doubt because he’d also been looking at Michael’s expression. “I promise. I don’t mind, you can touch me, you just surprised me. That’s all. I’m fine.”
Not true. Not from the way James was leaning into him, barely enough to be noticeable to anyone else, but enough to proclaim the need for support. Michael tightened the protective arm around those newly-shaken shoulders. Scowled.
“James,” Benedict said, and held out both hands, open in front of him, as if trying to display their harmlessness, empty of anything that might be used for pain. “I didn’t mean—I didn’t even think—that was incredibly stupid of me, wasn’t it? I’m really sorry.” That last was addressed to both James and Michael; Michael just glared, unwilling to be placated. Held James even more closely.
James, on the other hand, sighed, and shook his head, and found a smile from nowhere at all, plucking it out of the air and the sunlight like a magician’s illusion. “Honestly not your fault. And I suppose I should get used to this, shouldn’t I? At least it’s only you, and not someone legitimately intimidating.”
Benedict now looked like he might want to laugh, but wasn’t certain he’d be allowed the response.
“You can still smile,” James told him, “it’s not like I lost my sense of humor, too,” and Benedict took a deep breath and said, “As if you ever even had one, I remember you thinking that hiding condoms in my espresso machine would be hysterical,” and James grinned. “I saw your face, when you realized, and it was. Stay for lunch? Or are you going somewhere?”
Michael opened his mouth to object—he was glad to see James relaxing again, of course he was, but inviting company for an entire meal when said company had just caused James unwanted pain would be something else completely—but Benedict shook his head, regretfully.
“Um…I have a meeting. About the next Lord of the Rings thing. Sometime soon, though?”
“Excellent.”
“James…I, um. I’m glad you’re…you know. Okay. I mean…you look…”
“Still alive?” But James said it with a smile; turning the idea into humor, Michael thought. Transmutations, lead and tears reshaped as gold and laughter. Suddenly he didn’t have room to be annoyed with Benedict any more. He just wanted to stand there and smile at James, who was still alive. And smiling, too.
Extraordinary, he thought, very clearly. No other words, for the man currently at his side.
“You,” Benedict said, half-laughing, and shook his head again, and from his expression, Michael guessed that they might be having some very similar thoughts. Not that he was planning to forgive the idiot any time soon, regardless. “All right, I do have to go, but I’ll phone you tomorrow, yeah?”
James agreed, and waved him off, and then glanced up at Michael. “Why’re you smiling, then?”
“Because,” Michael told him, “you’re fucking amazing,” and then said it again, when James blushed, and held onto an eloquent and freckled hand, because James let him, all through lunch, and all the way back home.
Back at the house, Michael tossed shopping bags in the direction of the bedroom—he’d not wanted James to carry anything, and had put up with the affectionately frustrated eye-rolling as a result—and then came back down the hall in time to see James stop leaning against the closest supportive wall and open his eyes.
“James?”
“Oh, sorry…I was only thinking. About some things. And I did tell you I was tired. I put all your leftover food in the refrigerator. I think we have lunch and dinner for tomorrow. Or for the next month.”
“Please go sit down. Or lie down. In bed. I can come hold you in bed, if you want that. Though I might have to move some of your clothes. Tell me if you want me to move your clothes.”
“No, you don’t have to. I was just…the couch is fine. But yes to you being there too.” James wandered over to the welcome of the fluffy cushions and sturdy legs, and curled himself up in one corner, pulling his knees up and hugging them, contemplatively. Michael hesitated, and then sat down beside him.
“Everything all right?”
“I think it might be.” James smiled at him, a little distantly. Didn’t move.
“Can I touch you? Or—”
“Oh, sorry. Of course yes. You can.” The depthless waters of those eyes now looked surprised, and a touch apologetic. “Here, is this better?”
“Much better.” He held the offered hand in both of his, gently running thumbs across the thin wrist, smaller than his own. Connecting all the isolated freckles with imaginary lines. “I’m sorry about earlier. About letting him startle you.”
“Oh…that’s not…It’s not as if you could’ve stopped him. Benedict is more or less a force of nature. Or a giant puppy. Or some other tremendously affectionate metaphor.”
“I’m sorry anyway.”
“I know. It’s all right, though. To be honest…I’m mostly surprised that I wasn’t more surprised. That I’m not horribly traumatized or shocked or whatever I should be feeling. That’s all, really.”
“You’re not?”
“Like I said. Surprise.”
“Maybe that’s good, though, right?” The freckled fingertips felt warm, in his. He remembered all the times they’d been cold, instead. He never wanted them to feel cold again.
“Possibly yes. Michael?”
“I love you. What do you need?”
“Love you, too. Do you remember…you know it’s been…you know I kissed you. Three weeks ago today, actually. In the bathroom.”
After James had tried, or not quite tried, or thought about, killing himself. He remembered. Always would. He’d thrown away all the stupidly treacherous razors and scrubbed every centimeter of the tiled floor until his hands hurt, and he’d still always remember.
Some nights he wondered why James had kissed him, then, at that moment. And whether James would ever feel safe enough to try anything more.
The hand he was holding wasn’t the arm with the scar, but he knew what it looked like. The way that line split a small irregular cluster of freckles in two, over the vulnerable side of James’s wrist, and then an inch or so further, along the soft skin of that forearm. It wasn’t even a terribly big scar. And it’d started to fade, though it probably never would, completely.
He’d kissed James since that day, of course. Because James had said he could, given enough forewarning. And they’d both been loving those little victories, touches of skin against skin like reclaimed stretches of previously war-torn ground. He knew they had. Beyond any doubt.
He’d been careful to ask, every time. Couldn’t stand the thought of frightening James, or seeing those glorious eyes flinch at his approach. But if he asked, James looked up at him and smiled, and those eyes reflected agreement and excitement back at him, and Michael always waited for the yes, and it came. Every time.
James smiled while being kissed. He might’ve known that, before, but he was discovering it again. He adored that rediscovery, too.
But James hadn’t kissed him. There was a difference between kissing and being kissed, initiation and acceptance, and James hadn’t taken that initiative. Not since that terrifying and beautiful afternoon.
Sometimes he thought he understood why; sometimes he caught James glancing at him, eyes thoughtfully bright, as if considering a certain possibility. He tried to always ask, and follow the question with the kiss, in those moments.
Sometimes he had the impression that James was waiting for something, but neither of them had, as of yet, worked out what that might potentially be.
Right now, what James appeared to be calmly waiting for was an answer, eyes resting on his face. Blue as hyacinths in spring, wet with April showers. Poetry, he thought. T.S. Eliot. Wastelands and lilacs seemed appropriate, somehow.
“Um. I do. Yes?”
“So…if I wanted to kiss you again, just because I felt like it…”
Michael stared at him and forgot how to answer and James started laughing and uncurled himself from the pensive ball and slid across the last inches of space between them, eyes dancing. “You’re not going to say yes?”
“…yes!”
“Are you sure?” Still laughing. Michael’s grip on his hands had to hurt, it was so tight, but James didn’t seem to care.
“Yes. Yes, please, you can kiss me if you want to, you can do whatever you fucking want with me, James, anything—”
James raised both eyebrows at him. “Whatever I fucking want? Interesting invitation.”
“I—I don’t think I meant—” Unless James had somehow wanted him to mean that. Could James genuinely be wanting him to mean that?
“You didn’t? Because I might have to be disappointed.”
“You—”
But that protest died away, as James moved even closer, practically in Michael’s lap now, and he was about to embarrass himself completely, because even the thought, the idea that James might possibly miraculously be able to want him, would be enough to make him erupt on the spot, if James touched him, or smiled at him, or just looked at him with those superheated blue eyes one more time.
James didn’t need to feel that, he thought, desperately. Didn’t need any pressure, physical or emotional. He tried to retreat more deeply into the couch, an endeavor doomed to absolute failure since he was already sitting down, with James more or less on top of him.
James raised an eyebrow. “Seriously? Am I that terrifying?”
“No…”
“Good.” And James leaned in, and up, and brought their lips together, not forcefully, but decidedly sure.
After the first second, there was a brief pause while James glanced at him, as if checking to make certain everything was acceptable; Michael managed to say “Oh my god,” and then James was kissing him again, sweet and intense and pure as desire, white-hot enough to burn all the darknesses away.
James swung one leg over him, and settled comfortably into place. Leaned in closer, and licked his way along Michael’s bottom lip, tasting, exploring. Michael might’ve made a completely inadvertent, and extremely high-pitched, whimper, at that. Not his fault in any way.
James grinned. “Really?”
“Um…pretend I said words? Because I can’t remember any.”
“None at all? Not even my name? I think I like you saying my name in bed. Or, um, on the couch. You know what I mean.”
“James…” That was inadvertent, too. Mostly because James was kissing his neck, now, lips wandering up to the line of his jaw, over to his ear, breath hot against his skin.
“You taste interesting. Like soap. And a little bit like sweat. Warm, or just nervous?”
“Not just. Very nervous. Can I kiss you, too? More, I mean. Other…oh, god, okay, do that again…other places?”
“That? And yes. You can.”
“Yes that. And, all right…” He started with the corner of that mobile mouth, where lips curved tantalizingly upward. Always on the verge of a smile, he thought. James tasted like happiness, too. Like the best thing, the only thing, he’d ever really wanted in his life. Like the head-spinning sweetness of reprieve, the return of oxygen to his lungs.
He let his lips drift lower, over the hint of ginger stubble that meant James hadn’t bothered to shave, and James made a sound, and tipped his head back.
“Good?”
“Yes…”
He’d started pressing kisses into the graceful line of that throat before his brain caught up to the movement, at which point he paused. James didn’t seem to be objecting, but…
“I’m not…this isn’t…hurting you, or anything, right?” Physically. Emotionally. Memories that might float ghostily back up to haunt them, bruises and silences and wounds.
“No. You’re not.” James sat up a bit more, and looked at him. “Actually, I think…”
“What?”
James hesitated, but only for a second. Then smiled again, brilliantly determined, and reached out, and tugged at Michael’s shirt until it fell loosely out of his pants. And slid one hand up, beneath it, and rested fingers against naked skin.
“James—” He didn’t know what he was going to say. What words, what sounds, could encompass that sensation. Perfection wasn’t enough. “I love you.”
“Michael,” James said right back, “I love you, too,” and then, after a moment’s consideration, moved the hand lower. Flicked open the button of Michael’s jeans.
“Oh god—are you sure you want—”
“Well, you seem to want.”
“I do—I very much do—but not if you—please don’t do this just because you think I want to—”
“I’m not.” The fingers were still busy. Michael sucked in air, wondered why that felt so good, and then realized he hadn’t been breathing for a while. “I’m doing this because I want to. I want you. All right?”
“Yes—absolutely yes—can I—?” He’d been frantically clinging to the couch, both hands buried in cushions, in order to keep himself from clutching at James. Who looked at him, smiled again, and lifted expressive eyebrows.
“You can, go on…”
“Thank you—!” James actually laughed, at the forcefulness of that reply. Michael laughed, too, not really embarrassed—no room for embarrassment; he got to touch James—and then set his hands on tempting hips and tugged them closer.
“Mmm. You like me on top, then?”
“James,” Michael told him, honestly, “I like you in every single way either of us can imagine,” and then, because James had continued to laugh, leaned forward and kissed him, in the midst of all the amusement.
James parted his lips. Arched his back, when Michael’s tongue traced its cautious way into his mouth, and rocked his hips forward, bringing certain very interesting discoveries to light.
“James, you—”
“I did tell you I wanted you. You didn’t believe me?”
“You’re fantastic. Can I touch you…there, too?”
“Well, this will work a lot better if you do.”
“Would you take this seriously,” Michael said, and James tipped his head to one side, offered, “I am,” and then picked up Michael’s right hand and transferred it to a very specific spot.
They both stopped moving. Just stared, as if drawn by a magnet. James breathed out, very slowly; Michael whispered, “All right?” and then, as soon as he got the answering nod, moved his fingers, carefully.
James shivered. Pushed his hips forward, just a little, into the caress.
They were both still almost fully dressed, tangled together on the couch in the golden glow of mid-afternoon. The material of James’s jeans was rough under his hand; he hadn’t even tried to touch bare skin. But the heat, and the want, were very much present. Michael’s fingertips tingled, memorizing the feeling, forever.
He wrapped the hand a bit more firmly around the inviting hardness, through all the worn denim. James gasped.
“More?”
“Yes please.”
Strokes, increasing in pressure, in speed, when James moaned, when Michael heard his own name buried in the sound. And dampness was collecting, spreading through the fabric, under his touch. The wetness of desire. James, wanting him.
James whispered his name again, and then seemed to remember that he’d been doing something, earlier, and slid one hand into Michael’s pants, and curled freckled fingers around aching arousal, and those blue eyes were looking down, watching the motion, Michael’s cock slipping through the welcoming circle of that warm hold. Michael got out, “James, I’m—” and James looked right at him, at the words, and then he was coming, helplessly, entire body shaking with it, lost in astonishment and release and blue eyes and joy.
He could barely remember how to breathe, but he did see James smile, the oceans of those eyes lighting up like fireworks at sunset, and he pulled James more closely against him and moved his hand in that particular way, the one he remembered James liking so much, and James gasped again and shuddered and collapsed against him, pulses of wet stickiness spilling out through the jeans into Michael’s waiting hand.
For uncounted minutes, while the sunlight traveled smoothly across the couch and fell off onto the floor, neither of them moved.
James had ended up nestled securely in his arms, face tucked into the curve of Michael’s neck and shoulder; the legs, always so disproportionately long for someone that height, were folded up on either side of Michael’s own hips, and all the hair was tickling Michael’s left ear, and the world was brighter than it’d ever, ever, been.
He moved a hand, cautiously. Rubbed James’s back, gently, through the brand-new shirt he’d not gotten around to removing. Reassurance, he thought. James hadn’t looked up at him yet, seemingly content to stay put in their embrace.
James made a tiny pleased noise, at the gesture. So he did it more, and James trembled suddenly against him; Michael froze in place, heart thundering to a halt, air dying inside his lungs; and then he figured out that James was laughing. Again.
“Oh, wow…I can’t believe we just did that…”
“I know. I know. You—I love you, so much, you were incredible, that was—are you all right, please be all right, are you—?”
“I’m wonderful. And so are you. And I honestly only meant the fact that we’re still all…dressed. With all the clothes. And on the couch. In the middle of the afternoon. I love you.”
“You are wonderful.” He kissed James again, letting his eyes, his expression, ask the question first; James laughed, and wound a hand into his hair, and kissed him back, unhesitatingly.
“Regardless of our respective states of, um, wonderfulness—is that a word? It should be a word—I think I should probably change pants now. And maybe shower. Since we are going out later.”
“James…you…it's not a word, but that's okay, it can be one if you want...really all right? I mean…you did say you were tired. Before. Earlier. And—”
At which utterly inappropriate point his mobile phone, sitting on the table, buzzed at them demandingly, and then fell off onto the floor. And buzzed again.
James cracked up. Tumbled off Michael's lap and onto the couch next to him, and lay there amid plushly amused cushions and laughed. “Seriously?”
“Oh, fuck—sorry, I’m sorry—!”
“No, no, answer it, I really want to know who it is—!”
“I don’t!” But James was still laughing, sprawled cheerfully out on the couch, even the hair shaking with merriment, and Michael, torn between an absurd need to join in the laughter and a equal amount of unparalleled annoyance, managed to grab the phone and demand, “Hello?”
“Michael?”
“Ian! Sorry, sorry, we were—ah—”
“Bad time?”
“Not exactly—”
“Who—”
“It’s Ian,” Michael said, to inquiring sapphire eyes, and then, “Hang on, let me—” and happily switched the call to speakerphone.
“Are you certain this isn’t a bad time? You sound a bit—”
“It’s a fantastic time!” James said, from the couch, not bothering to sit up.
“James! You sound positively wonderful! I’m sorry we couldn’t stay out there any longer, how have you been?”
“Oh,” James said, grinning mischieviously at Michael, “definitely wonderful,” and Michael shook his head and sat down on the floor next to the couch, and James leaned over and kissed him.
“You do sound very much better. Of course you do, though; we never believed you wouldn’t be all right.” James’s smile turned a bit rueful, at that; Michael reached up and took his hand, and James squeezed his fingers in response.
“In any case, we were wondering whether you’d be around, next week? We’ll be in the area—Patrick has a speaking engagement at a Star Trek convention—”
“And you have publicity to do for The Hobbit. Hello, James!”
“They like you better,” Michael murmured, “they say hello to you,” and James snickered, and Patrick said, “Of course we do, he’s much more adorable than you are. Hello to you as well, Michael. How are you?”
“Also wonderful. Sorry about not picking up right away. We were…comfortable. On the couch.” James started laughing again, not exactly silently, at that. Well, he hadn’t specified what’d made the couch so comfortable.
“Oh, not a problem. You can certainly go back to…whatever it was you were comfortably doing on your couch.”
“Patrick,” Ian said, patiently, “not everything has to be an innuendo,” and James looked at Michael, and smiled. Wickedly.
“Actually, that one was.”
“Oh! Really? Oh, that’s marvelous, don’t let us keep you, then!”
“James,” Michael said, plaintively, but he had to laugh, too. Because the couch, and the world, and James, were all marvelous. Simply, magnificently, true.
“We’ll be quick—though we hope you won’t be—”
“All right, you’re no longer permitted to say anything about my innuendos, but yes, agreed—”
“Dinner next week? If you might feel up to company? Anything you want.”
James nodded, when Michael glanced up at him for confirmation. “Yes to dinner, then. Here, if you want to come over. You haven’t even seen the house, yet. At least not with our furniture in it. And I promise James will clean the couch.”
“Hey!”
“Thank you for that.”
“No…thank you.” James still sounded half-amused, but more serious now, too. Sincerity, threaded like gold through that gorgeously restored voice. “For everything you two did, that night, and after…for being there. I don’t think I ever said. But it meant—means—a lot. To both of us. And I can say it now, so, thank you.”
“Oh, James…we love you, you know. Both of you. And we are here. For whatever you need.”
“Except for the sex. You’ve got Michael for the sex.”
“Yes, we’re hanging up the phone now. You two have a lovely time.”
“Lovely? Did you just tell them to have a lovely time?”
“Well, what adjective would you have—”
At which point someone hung up, which was a very good thing, because James’d had to put a pillow over his head in a doomed attempt to keep the laughter from escaping. This was proving to be wholly ineffective anyway, so Michael got up, tossed the pillow away, and kissed him again.
“Mmm. Am I actually cleaning the couch? Because I can, if you want. I have been—”
“I know you have been. I have noticed you cleaning. And cleaning less, lately, too. And, no, we’ll worry about it later. Or not bother, because they might deserve that. And now I know you’re tired, so please—”
“Fine. Bed. But only if you hold me. And then dinner. Because you bought me new clothes.”
“Then we have a date.” He offered a hand; James took it, and let himself be pulled up from the friendly cushions and into Michael’s arms.
“Thank you. Michael?”
“What?”
“…I did have a lovely time.”
“Oh, god,” Michael said, with feeling, but James was leaning against him as they walked, fitting their steps together, and so he admitted, blissfully, “So did I.”
“You know…I think I could…we could have a lovely time again, I think. Not right now—I am tired, now—but soon. Very soon. And, um, more. I mean…a lot more. If you’d like that too.”
“I love you so damn much. And yes. Of course yes, if you think—but only if you feel up to that, if you’re sure you want—”
“I very definitely want.”
“Then…very definitely…so do I. Whenever you say you want to try.”
“Whenever,” James said, and curled up into offered arms, in the center of the bed, one hand coming to rest on Michael’s chest, over his heart, “might be sooner than you think. Possibly even tomorrow. And, um, one thing…”
“Anything. What?”
"As much as I like Patrick and Ian, and I do, I'm hiding your phone first, next time."