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Harvey Specter doesn’t believe in guilty pleasures. No, he believes in owning what he enjoys. Revelling in it. Flaunting it, even.
Or at least he did.
But that was before one Michael James Ross (and there’s one pleasure he wouldn’t mind owning. Revelling in. Flaunting.) crashed into his life and changed it in so many ways it makes Harvey’s head spin just thinking about it.
After that fateful first meeting he definitely began to feel a bit guiltier about not just this newfound pleasure in human/puppy form, but about most of his pre-existing (pre-Mike Ross, let’s tell it like it is, Harvey thinks, knowing fine well that his life is now split into two very distinct categories; pre- and post-Mike Ross) ones as well. Mainly because they were now all wrapped up in his feelings for his young (younger, that’s all, he reminds himself) protégé.
Take bantering, for example. Harvey has always enjoyed fencing with someone who could keep up with him. Someone with a rapier wit, who could give as good as they got, adept at the back-and-forth, the teasing, sarcastic thrusting and parrying and verbal ripostes. Even better if it was someone who understood both the law and Harvey’s pop culture references alike.
Donna was smart and quick, but she didn’t understand the law like Mike and Harvey did.
Jessica did, but fencing with her was liable to turn into a knife fight, and Harvey wasn’t looking to get cut. She didn’t mind fighting dirty when she had to, always preferring to go straight for the jugular, but not afraid of planting the blade firmly in someone’s back if that’s what it took to come out on top.
Louis? Well, Louis was so easy to bait, fencing with him was almost no fun. Almost. It certainly wasn’t a challenge.
There was Rachel, of course. But Harvey and Rachel didn’t have that kind of friendship before Mike came along and Harvey didn’t want them to have it after the puppy bounded into both their lives and affections. He could be civil to her, keep his jealousy (mostly) in check, for Mike’s sake, but he couldn’t handle a real friendship with her.
No, other than Mike, Scottie was the closest Harvey had to a worthy sparring partner. Unfortunately, while perhaps not as cutthroat as Jessica could be from time to time, there was always that undercurrent of competition - real competition, not just the friendly rivalry like with Mike - running through the barbs Scottie tossed his way.
She was constantly trying to prove she was better than him, smarter than him, more prepared to do whatever it took to get the win than him. Maybe she had to be that way to survive and thrive and get ahead in what was still very much a man’s world, no matter what anyone said, but Harvey was tired of the relentless one-upmanship component to their relationship. It certainly wasn’t the basis for a healthy relationship of equals. And, deep down, that was what Harvey wanted now. But there was only one person he wanted it with, and that person wasn’t Scottie.
With Mike the banter had flowed effortlessly, spontaneously, from the moment they met. Harvey was well aware that if either he or Mike were female most people would call their ‘banter’ a different name. They’d call it ‘flirting’. Those with a less heteronormative view of the world already did. Harvey went along with the ‘joke’, making quips about how Mike would never put out, etc., and tried to tell himself he’d get over it. Eventually.
Of course, he knew he was kidding himself. How could he get over it when everything he did, everything he enjoyed, had previously taken pleasure in, sent his heart and his mind skipping straight back to Mike Ross?
Every time he watched a film he remembered all the quote-offs and movie marathons they had engaged in. Every time he went to René to get fitted for a new suit he found himself wondering if Mike would like it, and immediately dismissing anything he thought he wouldn’t. Eating at his favourite restaurants made him think of all the times he’d taken Mike out to eat - and all the times he hadn’t, but wished he had. And all that good food just sent his mind into overdrive, thinking about what parts of Mike’s body he could eat it off.
Even music, his hitherto saving grace, his deepest love and source of both greatest joy and solace alike before fate had stepped in and dropped a blue-eyed wunderkind in a cheap suit with a briefcase full of weed in his lap (if only) had turned traitor on him. Now all the songs reminded him of the one who had become his true saving grace, deepest love and greatest source of joy and solace. And wanting.
As for his love of fast cars, and even faster lovers, well, they had both fallen somewhat by the wayside ever since Mike had come into his life and virtually took ownership of it just by virtue of being.
He knew Mike was terrified of losing him to some fiery wreck, even if he never said so in so many words. It was written all over his face every time Harvey mentioned taking one of the cars from the exclusive car club he was a (now lapsed) member of out for a spin. Hardly surprising given how his parents had died (okay, lost to a drunk driver and not a speeding one, but Harvey understood that made no difference in Mike’s mind), but Harvey found himself unable to enjoy the indulgence of the wind in his hair and his foot on the gas when he knew it was causing Mike worry.
He couldn’t remember the last time he had got his kicks letting loose out on the road. He found he didn’t miss it much when he was looking into blue eyes that were full of life and light and laughter rather than worry and fear and bad memories.
The fast lovers part, well, Mike had been the cause of Harvey’s dwindling interest in them too, even if he didn’t know it. It wasn’t that Harvey’s libido had dwindled (far from it, as looking too long into those smiling eyes was wont to remind him), but even the softest skin felt like sandpaper against his when it didn’t belong to Mike.
All of which had led him to where he was now, torn between guilt and pleasure, as Mike’s lips crashed into his the way he had crashed into his life six years previously; completely unexpectedly, but wholly irresistible. Harvey’s hands found their way under the soft cotton of Mike’s T-shirt, scrabbling to touch the even softer skin underneath, even as words like can’t, shouldn’t, what about Rachel fought against want, need, mine.
Eventually, though, guilt won out and he broke the kiss, reluctantly but firmly. His resolve almost wavered when he looked into those eyes, the beloved blue almost completely eclipsed by black, Mike’s pupils dilated with a need that seemed to mirror Harvey’s own, but as much as he wanted this, he wanted it to be right.
“What about Rachel?” he managed to get out, voice barely a whisper, afraid of both what the answer would be and of his own response to it. Would he really be able to stand firm in his principles with Mike pressed against him like that, his breath warm and sweet against Harvey’s lips, his own lips already kiss-swollen and a mere hair’s breadth from Harvey’s?
“Is that the only thing holding you back?” Mike whispered back, face painfully hopeful, but fear of rejection writ large across it. Harvey nodded.
“It’s a good thing I broke up with her then,” Mike replied.
And, really, Harvey thinks he should probably still feel guilty for how quickly, and how eagerly, he is prepared to step into her place by Mike’s side and make it his own, make it as if there was never anyone else there to begin with. Mike’s next words make him think that maybe there never was.
“It’s you, Harvey. It’s always been you.”
“Yeah?” Harvey aims for a cocky grin, but knows it comes out more hesitant smile.
“Yeah,” Mike grins in return, happy, honest, right. “So if you’re done feeling guilty can we get back to the kissing part now?”
“With pleasure,” Harvey purrs, drawing Mike to him, feeling himself own, revel in, and flaunt his love with every look, every kiss, every touch. And somehow he knows Mike feels it too. No guilt, just pleasure. Just sheer, unadulterated love from here on out.