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Chapter Text

Rotelli’s arrival home was announced by one half of a phone conversation in rapid Italian, growing sharply louder as the door opened and then slammed shut. His voice, expressive but usually cheerful, was shaded with a tone of mixed frustration and exasperation which sounded unnatural and uncomfortable on his tongue. 

This had become a common scene over the last several days - certain aspects of his seemingly endless but close family had been less than pleased by the news that he had a boyfriend. With whom he had a very real and very gay relationship. 

Professor watched him kick off his shoes from upside-down, his head hanging over the back of the couch. He frowned at Rotelli’s expression as he approached, gravitating towards his boyfriend almost as naturally and thoughtlessly as breathing, almost as unnoticed by the both of them.

They shared an upside-down kiss in greeting, close enough that Professor could hear the shrill rant of an angry aunt on the other end of the phone and pick out some of the sharp words she hurled down the phone. He wished in those moments that he could take the jagged edges of those words on Rotelli’s behalf, shield his kind and loyal heart from their sting as easily as he could touch him.

‘I love you’ he mouthed, shaping his lips deliberately around the words. Pleasure curled warm and thick in his stomach at the way Rotelli’s face lit up in response, smiling bright enough to make the sun dim in comparison. 

Moments later, whilst Rotelli’s hand curled beneath his jaw to urge him into another kiss, the phone screamed at no-one from the safe distance of the couch cushion.

Chapter Text

Stu’s bedroom has for the last few days been dominated by the miserable heap of blankets on the bed. Somewhere within them was Stu himself, his existence proven only by frequent fits of harsh coughing and the occasional twitches of the blanket as he tried to burrow his way out of existence. 

Mitch set the painkillers and mug of soup he’d been carrying down on the bedside table, hesitating for a few long moments before gently shaking at the pile of boyfriend and fabric occupying the bed. The guilt twisting in his stomach for disturbing Stu only intensified when the pile groaned sleepily and curled tighter in on itself.

“Hey, sweetheart” he coaxed, voice quiet, tugging gently at the edge of the blanket closest to him.

“Mitch?” The blanket pile croaked. A hand emerged from somewhere, followed by an arm swamped in one of Mitch’s oldest and softest hoodies, and then Stu’s face emerged, flushed with fever, a few strands of hair sticking to his damp forehead. He smiled weakly at the sight of his boyfriend and shifted to make room for him in the blanket nest.

Mitch climbed into the bed carefully, settling into a tangle of too-warm limbs and kissing Stu’s hair as he curled up against Mitch’s chest, face tucked against his neck. The weight of him was more a comfort than an inconvenience, a physical reassurance of his presence which put him within delightfully easy reach to care for him (not to fuss over him as Stu would probably claim). 

“I brought you some soup” he offered, the words murmured into the sweat-dampened forest of Stu’s hair. He received a whiny sound of complaint in response.

“Painkillers?” He tried, wrapping Stu up more firmly in his arms and frowning a not entirely unconcerned frown at the top of his head. “I got them specially from your druggie housemate.”

“Don’t call him that.” Stu grumbled, too tired to put any real heat behind his words. He reached to snag the painkillers off the bedside table, swallowing them dry (not something healthy Stu would approve of but he’d had enough of his stomach rejecting various flavours of soup) and settling back into his nest of blankets and boyfriend with a sigh. “I love you.”

Chapter Text

The club was a wild beast, its heartbeat the music blasting through the speakers loud enough to vibrate through the floor. Its heaving flank was the writhing mass of students crammed inside, christening Christmas break with dancing and fighting and many far less legal celebrations.

Rotelli was on a mission. A brilliant and vitally important mission: he needed to kiss all of his friends. 

He’d already caught Cohen and Czechowski, made out with Professor at least twice (and really, that in itself was a fantastic idea - his best friend was so kissable) and kissed at least three girls who were probably his friends and definitely very pretty. 

So that was why he was hunting down Mitch. Mitch definitely needed kissing. He spotted him with Becky (he couldn’t see his face but the tall, shirtless boy dancing with Mitch’s girlfriend was a pretty safe bet) and threw himself at him with a triumphant sound to dramatically bestow him with a kiss. 

“I love you!” He shouted over the music, kissing Mitch’s surprised face again for good measure, then released him and dived back into the crowd to find Tennessee. 

Rotelli reflected with no small amount of satisfaction that he really did have the greatest friends.

Chapter Text

4:27. The time glared up accusingly at Stu from the too-bright screen of his phone. He sighed, rubbing a hand across his tired eyes and mentally cursing whoever had decided that 6am was an appropriate time for yank!’s article submission deadline.

He was struggling with a particularly stubborn sentence ending when Artie appeared, looking the most human Stu had seen him in the whole couple of months since they’d met with his clothes in an exhausted (rather than sexy) state of disarray and his expression sleepy and almost soft in the glow of Stu’s laptop screen.  

“Here.”

Stu eagerly took the mug of fresh coffee offered to him - he’d been running solely on caffeine for the past few hours - and practically inhaled it as Artie flopped into his own chair with a dramatic groan. 

“Do you think I could fuck another deadline extension out of the editor?”

“I love you” Stu offered by way of thanks for the coffee, voice coloured warm with gratitude even as he ignored Artie’s comment with practiced ease. 

He was too absorbed in sketching out the skeleton of a fresh paragraph to notice the startled concern that flooded Artie’s expression, or to count the number of moments that stretched out before he turned back to his photo editing with stunned hesitance. 

Chapter Text

Stu made his way through the rowdy bar as quickly as possible, tripping over stools and legs as he kept his eyes fixed to the ground and his shoulders hunched in an effort to make himself invisible. He hated places like this, the crowds of middle-aged drunks who might be tempted to grab at him, to call him doll or darling or kitten. To call him a girl. He hated the fear that one day it would be out of recognition rather than ignorance, he hated himself for not being braver, and right now most of all he hated Mitch for making himself so difficult to reach. 

There. Stu made his way gracelessly to the dark corner of the room where Mitch was sulking alone, his only company the couple of empty beer bottles sat innocently on the table before him, and the near-empty flask in his hand betraying what he’d actually been drinking. 

“Mitch.”

“Leave me the fuck alone.” He didn’t even look up to utter the words, though they were filled with icy venom. 

“Mitch.” Stu repeated, his tone sharpened with steely determination as all of the hurt and frustration that had carried him to this point bubbled up and solidified in his chest to form something hard and unyielding. “This has to stop.”

“You have no idea how it is.” Even from across the table, Stu could see the anger in the way Mitch’s jaw tightened, his fingers curling to a white-knuckled grip around his flask. He could hear it in the way Mitch’s voice rose against the background roar of the bar. “Every single day I’m putting myself through hell for you-“

“And you’re putting me through hell too.” Stu cut him off. “You think I don’t know what it’s like-“

“You have no idea what it’s like!”

“You think I don’t know what it’s like” Stu repeated, his tone calm with all the precise focus of a man driving every word home like a dagger to the heart “to be actively despised for existing. To be dismissed even by family and friends because they can’t be bothered to understand. To be constantly afraid that someone might look at you and know and that someone might just do something about it. 

“I have been surviving all of those things and more since before you ever considered them because I am a fighter, Mitch, and I love you but I can’t do this unless you fight too.”

He spun and stormed a path back through the heaving bar, ignoring the sudden frantic note to Mitch’s voice as he called out after him.

Chapter Text

The warm air blowing through an open window brought with it the smell of midsummer and cigarette smoke; almost the smell of home. Rotelli stretched, cat-like, but put off getting up for another snatched handful of lazy seconds. 

From somewhere nearby came the murmur of voices roughened by hangovers and sleep, impossible to distinguish from one another or to indenting by their accents. Not that he would ever admit it as a proud U.S. citizen, but they did all kind of sound the same. 

He startled semi-upright as a sharp bang sounded from nearby, bringing sudden and unwelcome life to the headache that had begun thudding fully between his temples.

Apparently, he’d made it no further than the couch last night, where he’d crashed in a tangle of limbs and bare skin with someone he assumed was Professor. Most of their clothes didn’t seem to have even made it that far. 

Czechowski and Cohen were sat on the coffee table, cigarette smoke curling in wisps from between their fingers. Tennessee was unconscious on the floor. Another sharp, unpleasant bang came from the general direction of the kitchen, followed by an explosion of sharp, mean words. That would be Mitch then, probably arguing over the phone with his girlfriend. 

Rotelli untangled himself from the couch to grab at the open packet of painkillers and one of the half-empty glasses on the coffee table, before Mitch and Becky’s argument could escalate any further. Czechowski seemed to be recounting a story about some fight the previous night, though he trailed off as Rotelli set his glass down and gestures with his cigarette in the direction of the couch. 

“What the fuck happened with you two? When we got back your clothes were all over everywhere and you were passed out all cozied up on the couch! Isn’t that a bit, uh,” his gaze flickered momentarily towards the kitchen, though Rotelli couldn’t imagine why, “gay?” He finished, the word hushed like a curse. 

Rotelli’s brow crinkled in confusion. “Gay?” He echoed in disbelief. “Not possible. We both like, ah...” he trailed off as the word he was searching for escaped him, reaching absent-mindedly to tap Professor and prompt a reminder. 

“Screwing.” Came the muffled, mostly-asleep response. It was Rotelli’s current favourite English word, and as such he was constantly forgetting it.

“Screwing!” He declared triumphantly. “We both like screwing girls. I love you” he told Professor, accompanied by a friendly pat to the chest “but the ladies love me more!”

Czechowski laughed and slapped him on the back, and Professor smiled as warm as the sunlight glowing in his hair. 

Chapter Text

“Men are trash.” Scarlett declared, tossing his head as he kicked his feet up to cross them delicately on the coffee table. 

“Belle, darling, he doesn’t deserve you!” India chimed in, drawing Stu further into the perfumed mass of shaved legs and painted acrylic nails that had come storming into his (well, Artie’s) house as soon as the news had reached them, invading the lounge with all the subtlety of a herd of elephants. 

They were momentarily distracted from their comforting mission by squabbling over the large bowl of popcorn Melanie had just brought in from the kitchen, wriggling and smacking each other and making noises of pain and protest as the tangle of people on the couch was rearranged to accommodate one more. Then came the fight over which film to watch and then, inevitably, silence settled over the room. Stu could practically feel the sadness that was consuming him stretch out and settle in every nook and corner. 

“I don’t want to talk about it.” He mumbled in response to the air of expectancy radiating from the others. “He’s back with his ex-girlfriend.” He added after a few seconds’ pause, his voice catching, his hands rubbing quickly at his eyes before the tears gathering there could spill over. “But I’m totally fine! It's just...”

A perfectly-plucked eyebrow arched in Stu’s direction, and he choked on a sound halfway between a laugh and a sob. 

“I’m not fine.” The words were scarcely more than a whisper, lost almost immediately beneath the flood of sympathetic and reassuring words and caresses and offers of popcorn they provoked. 

“I love you guys.” He announced sincerely, many minutes later when he’d run out of tears to cry and the popcorn bowl stood empty.

“Of course you do, honey.” India agreed absent-mindedly, running long fingers through his hair. 

“We love you too.” Melanie added from somewhere down the other end of the couch. “Almost as much as we love Beyoncé.” 

A collective sigh of agreement rose from the couch, and Stu smiled slightly in spite of himself. Perhaps he could be alright after all. 

Chapter Text

Stu was surrounded by warmth between the blankets tangled around his limbs and the sleeping boyfriend pressed against his back. He was warm, and utterly exhausted from working until four in the morning to rework an article to the editor’s satisfaction, and had absolutely no reason to even be awake after having finally met that deadline. All in all, it should have been a fairly perfect lazy morning. 

He hadn’t factored in his phone’s loud and obnoxiously cheerful ringtone shattering the peace shortly after 8am. Christ, he was so tired he could have cried. 

He blinked open his eyes, the same unpleasant texture as peeled grape beneath his eyelids, and squinted blearily at the bedside table as he felt around there clumsily for his phone. This proved significantly more difficult than he’d expected as Mitch seemed to take offence at his wriggling and wrapped himself more firmly around Stu, drawing him further away from the edge of the bed with a sleepy sound of displeasure. 

Finally managing to grab the offending phone after several seconds of it tantalisingly brushing past his fingertips, Stu stopped struggling against Mitch’s stubbornly strong embrace. He was rewarded with a sleepy kiss to his shoulder and a face tucked snug against the back of his neck, and perhaps it was almost worth being awake despite the ungodly timing of it all. 

“Hello?” Stu answered the phone around a yawn. 

“Good morning, darling!” His mother’s voice chirped, incomprehensibly bright and cheerful.

“Mom? Is everything alright?” He frowned, rubbing tiredly at his eyes, and Mitch mumbled something completely unintelligible against the top of his spine. Stu wasn’t totally convinced that it had been intended as any form of words, but he paused for only a moment before adding “Mitch says hi.” 

“When will you boys be up?” The words barely registered; Stu could have easily fallen asleep listening to the sunshine in her voice. “I stopped by for breakfast as I’m in town on business, and your lovely friend offered to fetch you but I didn’t want to trouble him.” 

“Morning, Stu!” Although the voice was distant through the phone, there was no mistaking that particular terrible smug tone of Artie’s. Shit. 

“Isn’t he delightful?” The worst of it was how genuine she sounded. 

“I’ll be down in a minute.” Stu replied before she had the opportunity to start heaping misplaced praise on Artie Goldberg of all people. He hung up the phone, bracing himself to get out of bed and perform some much-needed damage control in the kitchen. 

Behind him, Mitch made a particularly unhelpful sound of protest. 

“I know” Stu sighed, extracting himself from the bed with a carefulness born from guilt. “I’m sorry. I love you?” He pressed a quick kiss to his forehead as an extra apology, then set about hunting down at least enough clothing to not give his mother a heart attack. 

The attempt at keeping Artie under control didn’t last long. By the time Mitch stumbled downstairs to find Stu, less than half an hour later, he was curled up fast asleep on the couch, removed from the murmur of voices and the rich scent of coffee drifting from the kitchen. It took very little effort for him to persuade himself to drag over a blanket and join him. 

Chapter Text

It was, by all measures, a ridiculously hot day; the type reserved by all sane people for lying naked on the floor in the company of every working fan they owned and eating impossible amounts of ice cream. 

That would be precisely why Rotelli had spent all afternoon in the kitchen, wearing shorts and a fully-buttoned-up shirt, singing old pop songs and baking cookies. Baking. As if any activity involving more heat could be anything other than a terrible idea.

“I love you, but you will be fat and lazy if you carry on like this.” The madman in question warned from the kitchen doorway. After a moment’s consideration, Professor rolled over onto his back so that he could appreciate the way Rotelli gestured with the wooden spoon in his hand as he spoke (and the way his entire face crinkled towards a smile despite his words, and the brief flashes of paler skin around the edges of his sleeves that showed where the Midas fingers of the sun hadn’t reached).

“Too bad you already agreed to marry me.” Professor waved the ice cream spoon in his general direction. “Want some?” 

The smile spread at that, happiness writ large across Rotelli’s entire face, and he bounced over to steal a kiss (welcome) and the ice cream tub (less welcome), and then promptly invite himself to use Professor’s stomach as a seat (significantly less welcome).

“How is it that you haven’t melted yet?” Professor complained, picking at the buttons on Rotelli’s shirt with one lazy hand. 

He received an expressive shrug in response, one that sent droplets of melted ice cream flying from the spoon. “I am wondering the same every day. Perhaps I’m too used to being so hot?” The wink-and-eyebrow-wiggle combination accompanying his suggestion made Professor laugh, his irritation at the heat of the day slipping from his chest like an itchy blanket shrugged off onto the floor, chased away by sweet kisses from ice cream-cooled lips. 

Chapter Text

She’d only left her bed to get a glass of water, bare feet silent on the thick carpet of the stairs. Light poured through the open kitchen door into the peaceful dark of the hallway, carrying with it the quiet murmur of the old radio with its slightly blurred sound quality. 

As the smooth voice of the radio host faded into music, something old and jazzy, it was cut through by hushed laughter and quiet voices. Sounds of life private enough to make her hesitate, then creep forwards more carefully. 

The kitchen came more fully into sight as she tiptoed down the stairs, two pyjama-clad figures in motion by the table. She sat, cloaked in shadow and hidden behind the banister, and watched her son in love. 

Stu and Mitch were dancing, her son making a devoted but admittedly tragic attempt at mirroring his boyfriend’s abundance of natural grace as they swept around the kitchen. At least nothing had been broken yet. 

“Like this?”

“Sure, sweetheart.” A moment’s pause. “It would be even better if you could stop treading on me every other step.”

“It would be even better if you could stop putting your feet in the way.” Stu grumbled in response. A moment later Mitch visibly hopped backwards out of the way as Stu made a particularly clumsy spin and almost bashed into the table. By the time he’d caught his balance back he looked significantly more apologetic. “Sorry.” He amended, expression sheepish even as Mitch moved to wrap him up in his arms and buried his face in Stu’s already-messy hair. 

The display of affection caught her by surprise, its easy familiarity so far removed from the image of a charming but emotionally closed-off young man that had been presented to herself and her husband. Here, in her kitchen on a late Saturday night, she could finally see clearly the same love that her son wore so openly. 

“I love you.” The words were barely loud enough for her to hear, clearly not intended for any world beyond that precious bubble of light and radio music. Looking at the two men there, sharing precious whispers of kisses and breaths and private conversation where they now swayed on the spot rather than threatening her poor furniture, she wished that world every blessing. 

Chapter Text

The moon was low and bright like an overripe fruit weighing down the entire forest of stars it hung from. It glinted off of the packs of equipment and barrels of guns heaped a few feet away, a mirror image of the sleeping pile of soldiers they belonged to. 

Only a few months ago, the idea of sleeping like this for comfort would have been laughable to any of them, but the war had a way of changing that. After seeing a man’s face as he took a human life, as he watched a fellow soldier’s intestines eaten by wild dogs, knowing how he reacted to food rations running out between bases after he hadn’t slept in forty-eight hours? It wasn’t such a big deal. 

So that was how Mitch knew that the obnoxiously loud snoring somewhere near his knee was Czechowski, that Cohen had the sharpest elbows, that Tennessee talked in his sleep and always woke with the sunrise and that Rotelli slept like the dead. And that the absence of weight on his stomach, the very same stomach Professor had been using as a pillow when he fell asleep, was probably related to the quiet sobbing breaking up the silence between Czechowski’s snores. 

He was tempted to shut his eyes, gritty with exhaustion as they were, and go back to sleep. The middle of a still night provided one of very few moments of privacy in a war zone, privacy that really wasn’t his to intrude on. More selfishly, besides his exhaustion he was sick of handling his own emotions, let alone those of other people. But then what if by the time morning came his squadmate had taken it upon himself to flee, or to blow his own brains out with his rifle? It was all too common for men to crack up under the pressure of the front line. 

Mitch heaved a sigh and picked his way out of the tangle of sleeping bodies, tiredly rubbing a hand across his face. He could just make out Professor in the moonlight sat against the packs, his silhouette hunched over into a ball, shoes glinting dully in the silvery blue light. 

As he approached, Mitch could make out fragments of whispers between the sobbing, gasped apologies and love confessions to someone who wasn’t there. Christ, why couldn’t someone else have woken up to deal with this? 

“Hey buddy” he murmured as he approached. Just like talking to a skittish animal or a frightened child. A frightened child with ready access to six loaded rifles.

Professor startled, his head snapping up, and hastily wiped at the tears on his face.

“You ok?” Mitch tried, easing himself down to the ground next to him. 

“No.” Professor choked out a bitter laugh that was, somehow, less reassuring than his usual giggle. When he continued, his tone was too casual, giving way to the anger brimming beneath it in a matter of words. “I got a letter yesterday. You know in the air force they have a limit on the number of times they gotta go up? My brother’s plane went down on the way back from his final mission last week. Two goddamn years in the Air Force, and he’s blown up just before he can come home. I wish they'd let me have at the whole Nazi army."

Mitch felt sick, in the same way he felt sick with every grim story and blown-off limb and sticky mess of guts the war had presented him with so far. Sick with anger and grief and worry. No-one was safe in a war zone. “Christ, I’m so sorry.” He offered, several beats too late, into the heavy silence that hung between them. 

Professor said nothing in response but shifted closer to bump their shoulders together. When Mitch glanced up at him his head was tilted back, and his damp eyes were full of stars.

Chapter Text

The picnic had not been Artie’s idea. It was scorchingly hot for early spring, bright and dry and cloudless, and somehow that had led to his current situation: sitting in a park, surrounded by straight people and pretending to watch a group of laddish students playing some improvised variation on cricket. Fun. At least most of them were shirtless.

Marcia had already abandoned him in favour of a group of boring girls nearby; Stu was being unbearably mopey between his cold and his new, obsessive secrecy over his phone; Rotelli and Professor were chatting animatedly with some college pal, all three of them a tangle of limbs and baseball caps. Ugh. 

“Who are you texting?” He leaned over Stu’s shoulder just in time to watch him hastily lock his phone. “Is this still Mitch-who-found-your-dick-under-the-sink?”

“No-one!” Stu insisted, his tone a little panicked. God, he was such a terrible liar. “I wasn’t texting! I was just, uh-“

As he was busy scrambling for an excuse, an incoming text lit up Stu’s phone screen from one Mitch Adams. A text that very definitely wasn’t appropriate for a mid-afternoon picnic. Artie raised his eyebrows very deliberately, utterly delighted, as Stu rushed to cover the screen far too late. 

“Hey, Stu!” Stu froze momentarily at the call from Rotelli, and Artie made a(n unsuccessful) snatch at his phone. “Do we have any ice cream left?” 

Because he was completely heartless, Stu stuffed his phone into his bag and sat on it before checking the coolbox he’d been voted in charge of, by which time Rotelli had made his way over. “What kind?”

“Hey, Rotelli” Artie began, expression sly. “Why don’t you invite your pal Mitch over for an ice cream? I’m sure he’d love a bone.”

Stu choked and accidentally slammed the coolbox lid down on his own fingers. 

Rotelli’s brow crinkled in confusion. “You mean a cone, Artie? Stu, are you alright?” 

“Something like that.” He purred.

Stu nodded unconvincingly and handed out an ice cream cone from the box.

“Ah, my favourite!” Rotelli immediately looked far less concerned. “I love you, Stu!” 

Artie leaned back, checking out the nearest cricket player and cheerfully ignoring Stu's murderous expression.

Chapter Text

He never writes to Stu. From the occasional mentions in Rotelli’s letters he knows that Stu is well, that Stu is happy, that Stu has a charming and delightful roommate (who Mitch can’t help but suspect might be more than a friend. Not that it’s his place to care any longer). That knowledge in itself, the very idea that Stu is somewhere out there building a life without him, twists within his chest in a pain unfathomably deep and fierce.

It’s not like he hasn’t tried, either. For some stupid, sentimental reason he keeps all of his abandoned attempts, half-finished letters written with painstaking care in a wobbly, messy hand (he’s never quite had the patience for actually learning to write left-handed, but these words are far too personal to entrust to Becky and her flawlessly neat script) on scraps of carefully-folded paper, locked in a small wooden box in the back corner of the attic.

Dear Stu,

How’s ‘Frisco? Rotelli says you’re doing well there. Becky and I have moved house. I couldn’t bear to live somewhere that should have been

Dear Stu,

How are things? I’m visiting family in your area next month, any chance you’ll be around? I miss you so much that it’s driving me crazy and your dumb jokes.

Mitch

Sweetheart,

None of the guys ever mentioned it after you were arrested. I thought it was because they were too disgusted to think about it. It’s taken me five years to realise they were trying to respect your memory. Maybe even our privacy. Do you know we all thought you were dead? Sometimes I think I deserve to be.

Christ, we all love  loved you so much, kid.

Mitch

Stu  Stubie  Sweetheart

I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you

Stu,

Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like if we’d run away together that day in the hospital. We could have gone anywhere, built ourselves a life up out of nothing, just the two of us. We could both find work and be terrible at cooking and cleaning and you could get a cat and name it something dumb. Sometimes, when Becky leaves notes around the house, I still expect them to be in your handwriting.

Did you ever publish the journal?

Do you still think about me the war?

Love always,

Mitch

Stu,

I can’t live without you. Getting married was the worst decision I’ve ever made. Do you know I haven’t stopped thinking about you once in the last ten years? I can’t sleep, I can’t work, I can’t breathe without your face and your voice and all the stupid things I’ve tried to forget filling my head. I can’t do this any more. Do you know what? I would be okay with the whole world hating us if it meant that I could have you. Sometimes I can’t believe that I wasted my second chance on that beach. Do you remember that? The moon and the waves and the radio? I wish I could have that chance back. I’m so ready to try.

I miss you more than I could ever say, kid.

Forever yours,

Mitch

Chapter Text

“Never”  Stu hiccups, tries to sit up straighter and fails spectacularly, accepting his defeat after a moment and sinking back gracelessly against his human cushion. “Never have I ever-“ He hiccups again, presses his face into Artie’s shoulder and starts giggling helplessly. To Artie’s utter delight, this evening he’s proven to be just as much of a hopeless lightweight as he was when they first met (which is really quite some achievement). 

Stu is making a third attempt at the sentence when the front door rattles, a key scrapes in the lock and Artie barely contains himself from making a disgusted sound as Mitch appears. Typical of him to show up and ruin all the fun. Marcia at least has the decency to roll her eyes even as Professor and Rotelli call out enthusiastic greetings and Stu cheers, actually cheers, and reaches over the back of the couch in vaguely the right direction (or wrong direction, for anyone with a shred of self-respect). 

“Mitch!” He calls, as though he doesn’t already have everyone’s attention, beaming when Mitch drops his bag and approaches the couch, expression disgustingly soft with affection and concern. 

“Hey, sweetheart.” Mitch presses a kiss to the side of Stu’s head and flops down on the other end of the couch, because of course he does. At least he’ll be easier to wind up from close range. Stu follows after him with all the elegance of a lost puppy, and Artie doesn’t miss the nuisance of his warm weight pressed all along his side. Really, he doesn’t. 

Mitch’s gaze flickers over to Artie for a brief moment, suspicious, as he wraps his arms around Stu. “What have you done to my man, Goldberg?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” Artie replies coolly, wrapping long fingers around his glass and raising it to his lips with deliberately easy elegance. Mitch looks set to say something more, and Artie has at least a hundred sharp comments prepared for the moment he’s finished drinking, but then Stu whispers something to Mitch that snatched his attention, breaks the tension of the moment. It’s a real shame. 

After a few seconds have stretched on and it’s apparent that no argument is about to happen, Marcia sighs and offers in a masterfully bores tone. “Never have I ever had a threesome.” 

Mitch and Marcia are the only two who don’t drink. 

The look on Mitch’s face as Artie hands Stu his glass and urges him to drink up is priceless.

Chapter Text

The drive to the airport was, frankly, horrendous. Four fully grown, very hungover men running on less than 12 hours of sleep between them, crammed into Czechowski’s ancient, semi-functional car for several hours of terrible traffic, the whole experience topped off by Rotelli occasionally attacking other drivers in sudden outbursts of furious Italian and the two unplanned emergency stops by the side of the road to prevent Czechowski’s ancient, semi-functional car from becoming Czechowski’s ancient, semi-functional, puke-decorated car. 

“Why’d’ya have to book an early flight?” Czechowski groaned as he stood by unhelpfully to watch Tennessee drag his unreasonable heavy bag out of the boot. Really, it was his own fault for not packing light. 

“Maybe early for you city pussies.” Tennessee snapped. “Would’a been fine if you weren’t all a bunch of lightweight fags.” 

Evidently only catching the very end of Tennessee’s sentence, over the car roof Czechowski saw Rotelli glance in their direction and hastily put out his cigarette. Cheeky bastard could at least have shared. Professor must have wandered off to find a luggage trolley. Or coffee. Please, god, let it be coffee. 

It was in fact coffee, much to everyone’s delight, though it (and Professor) only appeared as they were waving Tennessee off at the check-in.

“You’re a goddamn saint.” Czechowski told him, utterly sincere, between gulps. “If my mouth wasn’t so busy I could kiss you.”

Rotelli did in fact kiss Professor (more enthusiastically even than Czechowski might have done) but then Rotelli often kissed Professor. A bit too often, perhaps. Not that Czechowski had any problem with it if they were queer (though he was fairly sure they weren’t), but there were some things that really should be kept just for private.

“Bye, sweetheart!” He called after Tennessee, feeling alive enough post-coffee to wave frantically after him.

“Missing you already, handsome!” Professor blew a kiss at him for extra effect, though personally Czechowski thought it would have been more convincing if he didn’t have his other hand tucked into the back pocket of another man’s trousers. 

“I love you!” Rotelli clutched one hand to his heart and reached after Tennessee like something out of a romance film. Or a horror film.

Tennessee, still in a mood, flipped them off over his shoulder. 

Chapter Text

The blanket of snow covering the garden, as smooth and perfect as a sheet of icing laid down by an expert baker, had been utterly destroyed since the cold fingers of sunrise crept over the horizon. 

The centrepiece of the chaos (naturally) was the massive dick Artie had spent the afternoon lovingly sculpting, which was currently caught in the crossfire of a vicious and terribly unfair snowball fight. Initially, it had been more well-matched, but Rotelli had retreated inside as the sun began to sink and the temperature dropped (Artie sending a snowball down the front of his shirt in a moment of spectacular aim also probably had something to do with it) and Marcia had left to meet her girlfriend, leaving Stu to face Artie and Professor alone.  

He was currently far less well-hidden than he thought he was behind the bins at the side of the house, stocking up on fresh snowballs and keeping an eye on the enemy camp in the corner of the garden from where Professor was pelting him with snowballs of beautiful shape but mixed accuracy. 

What Stu failed to notice, at least until a few stray drops of snow hit the back of his neck, was Artie’s stealthy approach behind him, sneaking down the side of the house with a pile of loose snow gathered in his arms all ready to drop down Stu’s unguarded back.

Moments later there came desperate begging, breathless with laughter, from down the side of the house. 

“Please Artie please no don’t you- I love you I love you I-“ the rest of Stu’s fruitless begging was lost to less than dignified shrieking as Artie, maliciously gleeful, dumped the load of snow over his head.

Chapter Text

He’s at the table when Becky pads into the kitchen, her very existence grating in his nerves. Christ, does she have to shuffle around in those slippers like a fucking pensioner? 

She doesn’t greet him, even though he didn’t come to bed last night and it’s eight in the fucking morning and he’s sat at the kitchen table in his leather jacket and tightest jeans with a couple of beer bottles lined up before him, stinking of booze and bars and cheap perfume (he had to trek out to the closest 24/7 store to buy it just over an hour ago, practically drenching himself in it to cover up the scent of another man’s cologne. Let her think anything she wants of him, as long as it isn’t that). She’s probably angry with him. He doesn’t care. 

So she goes about making up her breakfast, and he goes on drinking, and they both go on ignoring each other for a couple of blissful minutes. Really, this is what their relationship should be like all the time.

He doesn’t lift his eyes from the table, but he can still pinpoint the exact moment she turns around and catches sight of the hickeys on his neck. Even now, he doesn’t bother trying to hide them. After he’s let the tense silence sit for a few seconds, he raises his head with a sigh and an expectant glare. 

“Yes?” He grits out. The shock in her expression annoys him more than anything. Why does she expect him to be some kind of fucking saint? 

“Mitch Adams,” she hisses, the venom in her voice almost surprising. He’d half-expected her not to put up a fight, to take this like the good housewife she pretends to be. God, she makes him sick. “Where the fuck were you last night?” 

“Out.” He snaps. “Is that a fucking problem?” 

She chokes out a bitter laugh, an ugly parody of happiness. How fitting. “Is that a problem?” She echoes, her voice already a touch hysterical. Christ, she’s so- so feminine. “You tell me! Is it a problem when my fiancé spends all night with some cheap whore, comes home at eight in the morning, spends all his pay on alcohol and won’t even look me in the eye while he does it? I wouldn’t know if there was a problem, Mitch, because I don’t fucking recognise the man I’m engaged to!” 

He knows he should back down, knows he should say something nice and offer to take her out and make his usual round of empty promises. But her words have burrowed beneath his skin, wound him tighter and tighter and he’s just about set to explode.

“If I wanted a cheap whore,” he spits the words at her, “I would have stayed home and fucked you.” 

“How dare you-“

“How dare I?” He shoves away from the table, one of the bottles tipping over and smashing against the tiles as he stands up. He’s so mad he’s shaking with it. “You want to know where I was last night? You want to know what my problem is, huh?”

She starts to say something again, and he cuts her off before she’s managed the first syllable. “I was with a guy last night.” He can see that the words don’t immediately sink in, but he pushes on relentlessly. “There. There’s something to cry about. Bet you’re real disgusted, huh? Your fiancé, the fucking queer. Do you get it now, Becky? I can’t love you. I can’t even stand the sight of you.” He’s shouting now, loud and raw and ugly, tears in his throat and his voice and gathering like ab oncoming storm in his eyes. “I have never been in love with you and I never will, because I’m a broken fucking freak.”

He doesn’t wait for a response, doesn’t even wait to see her reaction to his words. With a spin on his heel and several long strides, shoes crunching a little over broken glass, he’s out of the house and slamming the front door behind him.

Chapter Text

Somewhere near his head a phone was buzzing, blasting out a slightly unreasonably cheerful ringtone for - Rotelli fished it out from under a pillow to check the time - 5:17am. He knew exactly who it was before he even checked the caller ID, tired irritability settling into something warmer in his chest as he flopped back against his mountain of pillows and hit answer. 

Professor’s face filled the screen as the video chat connected, sunburnt and grinning and beautiful against the crisp white sheets of a hotel room. 

“Hey!-“ he began brightly, then cut himself off as his brow wrinkled in confusion at the impenetrable pre-dawn darkness undoubtedly filling his screen. “You there, doll?” 

Rotelli made a sound of agreement, reaching blindly to switch on the bedside lamp. He fingers knocked into something that toppled and shattered on the floor, and he hesitated for a moment before deciding that it sounded very much like a tomorrow problem and ignoring it. A moment later he had the room bathed in warm orange light, and in the corner of his phone screen his own half-awake face and messy hair appeared. “Ciao, bello!”

“Hey, handsome.” The smile returned, tenfold, brighter than the sun and all the stars in the sky. Half a world away. “I miss you like crazy!” 

“I miss you too!” He rolled over, wriggled deeper beneath his pile of blankets. “You’ve been gone forever! How was the, ah, dig?”

It was so easy to talk to him and know each others’ minds, so refreshing after ten days with no contact, such a pleasure to listen to Professor chatter away enthusiastically about his trip and ancient bones and rocks and pottery, his face bright with excitement. 

Rotelli couldn’t tell how much time had passed when he was startled by a sudden, indignant noise. His eyes shot open and hey, when had he closed them in the first place? 

“You falling asleep on me?” Professor’s accusatory tone dropped away quickly as guilt shadowed his expression. “Say, what time is it over there anyway?” 

“I am listening!” He protested even as a massive yawn snuck up on him. 

There was a moment’s pause. 

“I love you.” Professor’s face was familiar and fond, soft even through the terrible quality of the phone camera. How, Rotelli wondered absently (and not for the first time), had he managed to win the love of the most beautiful man in the world? 

“I love you, too.” He replied, a beat too late. “But only if you bring home souvenirs.” 

He swore he could hear Professor’s laugh in person, even from half a world away. 

Chapter Text

Stu hadn’t been sure that inviting his new boyfriend to film night would be a good idea - even without Marcia present, even if Artie kept to his word and stayed on his best behaviour all night, there was still Mitch’s intense personal privacy and mean, prickly fear of pda to be contended with. 

This, however, dozing on Mitch’s chest as he stretched out on the couch in a lazy sprawl of limbs, feeling the occasional almost-purr through his chest as he laughed at the trashy horror film they were watching or made some remark to Professor and Rotelli on the other couch, held close and careful like something to be loved, like Mitch couldn’t get enough of touching him? This was pretty perfect. (He was almost, secretly, guiltily glad that Artie and his sharp tongue had pulled out at the last minute). 

“You smell nice.” He murmurs, sleepy and not quite on purpose, the words slipping through his mouth like silk. 

“Yeah?” Mitch’s voice is low, warm, falling just short of amused. Christ, how is it possible for someone to have such a hot voice? 

Stu lifts his head to smile sleepily at him, leans into the touch as Mitch’s hand slips from playing with his hair to cup his cheek, to brush a thumb across his cheekbone. He presses a kiss to his palm, hums in delayed agreement and curls closer. 

He’s not quite sure when he falls asleep, doesn’t notice it happening until he jerks awake at a sudden loud noise some time later. There’s a moment where he has no idea where he is or what’s going on, still relaxes instinctively at the press of lips to the top of his head, the warm voice in his ear. Home. Safe. 

“You’re fine, sweetheart. I’ve got you.” 

Stu trusts him unquestioningly, unthinkingly. The noise, he realises, isn’t even the film - Rotelli and Professor are catcalling the monster on the screen with increasingly crude language and filthy sounds. 

“Go back to sleep, kid.” Mitch’s voice is warmed by laughter. I love you, he wants to say. He would, too, if he wasn’t so sure it would freak Mitch out. 

It’s alright, he tells himself as he settles back to sleep. He has all the time in the world to wait.