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It started off as simple touching. A shoulder pat, hands accidentally brushing when they both reached for a file at the same time. Ryan always shrugged it off. Mike was always around. It was inevitable that they’d end up touching each other at some point. Of course, things didn’t escalate much beyond that. Of course they jumped the gun a little after Mike got stabbed, but Ryan figured special circumstances warranted a bit of a cheat. And if he pressed a kiss to that perfect hair, well, who would be the wiser? Mike certainly wouldn’t complain.
Ryan would have been lying if he said he didn’t want to see more of Mike. He found himself getting distracted every now and then. He found himself actually staring and that hadn’t happened since Winslow. But Mike was…well, Mike. He got overexcited about things and he talked to fast and he wore these unfairly revealing shirts that managed to drive Ryan completely crazy. But that was before the attack. Before Mike was moulded into some kind of…soldier.
He still wanted Mike, of course, but it was accompanied by the fear that maybe Mike wouldn’t want him back. Still, Ryan couldn’t get the thoughts out of his head. His fantasies of a life with Claire were slowly replaced by fantasies of Mike, and not all of them were entirely G-rated.
I’m getting too old for this shit.
At least there were plenty of opportunities for touching when Mike got out of the hospital. Ryan didn’t even know how they let the kid back into the field. He could tell Debra thought the same thing, though she didn’t say it out loud. She had a job to think about after all. Ryan, on the other hand, had absolutely nothing to worry about. He wasn’t technically employed by the FBI. So when he grabbed Mike by the collar of his jacket and dragged him into an empty room, he felt no guilt whatsoever.
“What the hell, Ryan?”
“Look,” Ryan said, pushing Mike up against the wall. He tried to ignore how close they were, how warm Mike was, how solid. Mike winced, looking down at Ryan’s hands. “I get that you’re upset. But if you’re going to come back into the field before you’re fully ready, you have to deal with the consequences. And you don’t go smacking people around just because you don’t get your way. You’re not a child, Mike. Stop acting like it.” Mike wrapped his hands around Ryan’s wrists, breaking his grip. Ryan noticed that Mike didn’t let go.
“Stop treating me like a kid. I’m not a child.”
“Then prove it, because we’re about ready to take you off this case. It’s been four days, Mike, it’s understandable if you’re not ready-” Mike suddenly moved, almost too fast for Ryan to fully see. The next thing he registered was the feeling of lips on his. Ryan almost pulled back in surprise, but Mike still had a firm grip on his wrists. Instead, Ryan let himself be moved.
Mike’s lips were chapped, and Ryan could taste blood from the place where his split lip had reopened. The kiss was far too short, in his opinion, but Mike’s eyes were a little brighter when he pulled away. He dropped Ryan’s wrists, instead bringing a hand up and toying with Ryan’s tie. Their eyes didn’t meet for a long time. Ryan wasn’t even sure what to say. But when Mike finally looked up, there was a hint of a smile on his face.
”Would a kid do that?”
”You’re being impulsive. You could get yourself hurt like that.”
”Then I guess you’ll have to look after me, won’t you?”