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"Bye, love. See you in a week." Miles threw Phoenix one last smile, before walking off to the security Pre-Check line with his suitcase in tow. For the next minute, all he did was watch his figure recede, and he knew he probably looked like his heart had been ripped out of his chest. His hand was even reaching out at him, for goodness's sake.
"It's not like he's leaving forever," he muttered to himself, before finally turning away and making his way back to the parking garage. And really, it wasn't like Miles would be gone all that long. It was just a week. A week! He was just going to Europe to do something in France--he honestly wasn't sure what it was, but it had to do with prosecuting--and he'd be back home before he even knew it.
But will he really be home before I know it?
Phoenix already felt a deep sadness and pervading sense of loneliness seeping into his very bones, and it felt like the short walk to his (not just his car, their car) was a mile-long trek. When he finally got to said car, he almost burst into tears. He was going to drive Miles's stupid red sports car home but Miles wasn't going to be in it and Miles was always in it-
"I am not a lovesick teenager, I am twenty six," Phoenix said, before unlocking the car and getting inside. He managed to start it just fine, and was even pulling onto the highway before he got struck with another wave of longing; the car smelled like that stupid perfume Miles always used, kind of like cloves and something else sweet, and while Phoenix had always complained about it before, now all he wanted was for the person that smelled like that to be beside him in the passenger seat.
He's not dead, Phoenix! You're acting like he's never coming back! He's just in France for a week!
Phoenix shook his head and paid attention to the road, managing to focus himself for the rest of the car ride. He pulled up to the house, parked the car in the garage, and then stepped in the front door, immediately faced with the sight of a completely empty and dark home. Everything was exactly as he'd left it, but now the house was missing all of the life and sound it normally had. Reminders of Miles were everywhere as Phoenix kicked his shoes off and set the car keys down on the dish by the door; his winter coat hung by the door, and his row of perfectly-polished loafers were sitting in the shoe rack.
Oh, how he wanted Miles to be here. He wanted them to walk inside together, then go and cuddle in their bed because it was cold out and maybe Phoenix would make some hot cocoa because he was a useless sap and he wanted his boyfriend to have something nice to drink. Miles had always loved his hot cocoa, and now he wouldn't get to have any for a week-
What's he supposed to do without my hot cocoa? How is he going to feel warm?
All Phoenix wanted was to hold Miles close in bed, keeping him warm, but now he was in France, where it was cold and dreary; he'd checked the weather and it was thirty six degrees there! That was so cold! Almost freezing! Both of them were used to California weather at this point, so he was probably going to freeze to death!
Tears threatened to spill out of his eyes, and Phoenix blinked them away, because damnit, he was not going to cry about his boyfriend being cold in France. But that wasn't even the truth of it, was it? He was crying because he wanted to be the person to warm Miles, since he knew, by logic, that Miles would be plenty warm over there. He didn't want to be separated, that was the truth.
Phoenix went to take a shower, desperate to distract himself; he needed one, and it was the evening now, since Miles's plane was a redeye. He stepped into the bathroom, started the water, waited for it to heat up, and then stepped underneath, desperate to revel in the normalcy of the action. But the thought struck him that he'd rather have Miles's body around him instead of the phantom heat of the shower, have his hand rub the knots out of his aching shoulders instead of the water, and damnit.
Phoenix started to sing to himself and he lathered shampoo in his hands, putting his training in theater to good use. The song was one he made up on the spot, and it was totally devoid of any sort of chorus or anything, but it went a little something like this:
Oh Miles, I am so lonely without you
So sad and lonely and useless
I want to make hot chocolate for you and I want to cuddle with you in bed
I want to have a pillow fight and absolutely whip your ass
I want to watch the new episode of Steel Samurai: Rewritten with you
And I want you to not talk to me or do anything the entire time and just stare intently at the screen because the Steel Samurai is more important than conversation
And then I want you to tell me about how the Steel Samurai and the Evil Magistrate were definitely lovers based on the way the Steel Samurai is acting with him gone
Jack Hammer died and they had to cut him out of the show it's not that deep but I don't care it's fun anyway
Oh Miles, please come home
The French are not as important as me
I don't care what they're doing, they're probably eating baguettes or something I don't know what the French do
I don't even know what you're doing up there, actually, but I wish I did
I didn't want to ask because thinking about you leaving made me sad and it still does
Okay I'm going to stop singing now because I've used up the hot water and it's kind of cold in here now
Phoenix finally exited the shower, quickly drying himself before heading to his bedroom to finish getting ready for bed. He immediately zeroed in on one of Miles's old t-shirts and snatched it up; it had that weird cloves smell on it as well, but he could care less. He slipped it on and then clambered into bed, hating the sensation of emptiness. It was a large bed, king-size, and it was unfortunately very cold without his personal space heater--Miles--there to warm it and subsequently him up.
"Please come home soon," he whispered to himself, shutting his eyes so that he wouldn't have to see the empty spot where his boyfriend usually laid.
--
"Wow, Nick, you look awful. What happened to you?" Phoenix paused, lowering his coffee cup to look at Maya, who was standing expectantly in front of him. He'd gotten into work just five minutes prior and he was already getting badgered; that was just what he wanted.
"Didn't sleep..." he grumbled, and then dumped the rest of his drink into his mouth unceremoniously.
"Oh man, is it because..." Maya started to laugh, and Phoenix stared at her in silence for the next half minute while she tried to compose herself. "Is it really because Edgeworth went away on that business trip?"
"Yeah... hey! Do you think it's funny?"
"I do kind of think it's funny, actually. Like, you couldn't sleep because of him not sleeping next to you for a night? It's actually kind of sweet too, now that I think about it... oh, you're so hopelessly in love..."
"I..." Phoenix rubbed the back of his neck, looking down at his feet in embarrassment. Maya grabbed herself a cup of coffee after speaking, dumping an incessant amount of creamer and sugar into it before walking off to go lounge on the couch. Phoenix tried to get to work after that, but he found he had a hard time focusing, with his thoughts continually wandering off to think about Miles. He managed to get through the rest of the day, but not without a few comments from Maya asking him to stop staring off into space with that 'weird sappy look'.
But when he got back home, once again finding the house empty and silent, he was unable to deny his desire to see Miles in-person. He just stood in the kitchen for a while, holding a packet of ramen and thinking about him, about how if he was here right now, they'd be cooking together, listening to music and singing along and being stupid and in love and-
Maya was right. He was hopelessly in love.
He somehow managed to eat and get ready for bed, but quickly realized that he wouldn't be falling asleep tonight if he didn't do something besides just laying there, thinking about Miles and staring up at the ceiling. He took some melatonin and snatched up one of the long throw pillows from the couch to wrap his body around, and with the help of both of those things, managed to fall into a restless sleep.
--
He'd really hoped that he'd be over the whole "missing Miles" thing when he woke up, but the first thing he thought when he woke up was "I wish his arms were around me", and from there, he was miserable. Miserable and in love.
"Why does Miles need to go to France anyway? He didn't tell me why, even though I didn't ask... it can't be that important... he should just come home..." he muttered to himself as he entered his office. Maya showed up a few minutes later to find him sitting as his desk, coffee in hand, and doodling pictures of his boyfriend all over the front of the manila folder containing the autopsy report for his latest case.
"Woah, stop!" she shouted, snatching the pen from his hand. She also grabbed the folder, and stared at it for the next few seconds, a grin breaking out on her face. "You know you have to return this, right?"
"Oh..." he groaned, burying his head in his hands. He spent the next twenty minutes like that, first out of shame, but then because he started thinking about how funny Miles would probably find this whole situation, and god he wanted to hear his laugh...
"Seriously Nick, it's been two days. Two days. Stop moping around and get some work done, you aren't a tragic lover in a Greek myth or something," Maya quipped, brushing past his desk on the way to water Charley. He just sighed a long-suffering sigh.
"But what if I feel like I am? I miss him..."
"Yeah, I get that. Now stop pining. Like really, I'm sure if I looked up 'pining' on Urban Dictionary your name would be the first definition and it would have like a thousand upvotes."
"Shut up..." he grumbled, but lifted his head up and started to get back to work. However, all he could see was Miles's face in his mind, those beautiful gray eyes staring at him, those delicate hands reaching for him, caressing his cheeks... he once again drew his visage, but this time on a cocktail napkin that was laying on his desk. And then he drew a bust of him on the back of an old photograph. And then he drew him-
"How many times did you draw him? Jesus! That's like, every single paper scrap in the office!"
--
"Three days Nick, I can tell you still miss him just as much. Like, come on, you're one day closer to seeing him again! And plus, can't you like, call him or something?"
"I can, but it's not the same..." he leaned back in his chair, covering his eyes with splayed fingers to block out the glare from the fluorescent lights. He'd called him last night and they'd talked for a bit; Phoenix had said 'I miss you' about fifteen times, and he was sure his feelings of longing were palpable.
"Alright lover boy, you have a court case today, so pull yourself together."
He did indeed have a court case, but it was a very simple one, so he didn't have much to worry about. He went in and did it an hour later, getting an acquittal after a short trial; he wasn't completely out of commission, he just had a hard time focusing when the circumstances weren't dire. He could still function as a human being without Miles, of course. But after the trial, he stood behind the defense's bench and stared across at the prosecutor's one, where Miles stood when they were pitted against each other, memories of the cases they'd done rushing into his head and nearly making him collapse with the weight of them. He wasn't sure how long he was there, but he certainly would've still been there if it wasn't for Maya, who practically dragged him all the way back to the office.
Back at said office, he wrote a few cheesy poems on extra paper that all got crumpled up and thrown away, although Maya fished them out of the wastebasket and read them aloud while running away from him in terror.
"Roses are red... and violets are b-blue, I like the color of your suit, it's also red-" After that, she got tackled, and the paper was snatched from her hands, but the damage had already been done. For the rest of the day, Maya kept making 'rhymes', except for the second line always had the word red at the end, and it never ended up rhyming.
When he got home, she sent him a text that read "you are my friend and that is the truth, I like that your tie is red", and he blocked her number.
--
"What is that?" Maya glided over to his desk on the extra rolling-chair, and Phoenix rushed to shove the long, white fabric strip back into his pocket.
"Uh, nothing."
"It wasn't nothing, come on! Show me!" Maya flopped her arms on his desk, almost knocking his coffee cup over in the process.
"Hey! Don't knock over my coffee! I paid for that!"
"Well, if you don't show me, I will knock it over." Maya's hand started inching towards it, and Phoenix snatched it away, setting it on the other side of the desk. Maya adjusted her position and started reaching once again.
"Fine." Phoenix pulled out the fabric and set it on his desk for her to see. She stared at for a minute, obviously confused. "See? That's all."
"Yeah, but what is that?"
"Uh..."
"Hold on, is that one of Edgeworth's cravat thingies? Oh man, you really just took that with you to work? Are you doing okay, Nick?"
"I... I'm fine! I just miss him, and plus, this isn't a cravat, it's actually a jabot-"
"He's infected your brain! Oh no, you've got Edgeworth cooties now! 'It's not a cravat', like Nick, do you see how far you've fallen?" Maya was sent into peals of laughter, and Phoenix just levelled her with a glare until she finally calmed down enough to speak in between giggles. "Oh man, soon you're going to start saying things like 'posthaste' and 'vapid'."
"Where did you learn those words, anyway?"
"From Edgeworth, of course."
And while Maya walked away chuckling to herself, Phoenix found his mind wandering due to what she'd said. He honestly loved the way that Miles spoke, all prim and at odds to his own dialect. He remembered a time when, a few weeks ago, he'd said 'convivial' to describe him and Phoenix had lost his mind, much as Maya had, but now, he'd give anything to have him say something like that to him in person. When Phoenix would laugh at something like that, he'd look disjointed at first, but then, the corners of his mouth would upturn, and soon his shoulders would shake with silent laughter. He'd say something along the lines of 'you're insufferable', and then they'd make out or something.
And even just the thought of that made Phoenix fall just that little bit more in love with him.
--
Phoenix looked in his closet. It had been five days since Miles had left, and he was pretty sure he was going insane from pining so much, because his hand definitely wasn't reaching to grab one of Miles's suits, and he was not going to wear it because he wanted to feel closer to him-
He wore it. It actually fit him pretty well, and it just felt right, having it on him.
He meant to take it off, but for some reason, he found himself at work with it still on him, and he realized that he'd have to spend the rest of the day in it. And of course, Maya would laugh at him, because it was ridiculous.
She laughed at him. She laughed so hard she collapsed on the ground and had to drink some water while doing breathing exercises to calm down. "I cannot believe you... man, really? Wearing his suit? I thought the cravat thing was bad enough, but this?"
"It's not a cra-... never mind. I just wanted to do this, alright? I... I don't know!" Phoenix was defensive, but unfortunately, he didn't really have that much of a defense. He missed his boyfriend an inordinate amount for no reason, and he'd decided to wear his suit for absolutely no reason; this whole situation was so unnecessary!
Miles really needed to come home soon, or Phoenix was probably going to build a shrine in his memory or something, even though he wasn't dead. Although he seemed dead, with how little he called; Phoenix understood that he was busy, and only spoke to Miles when he called--he wasn't unhealthily clingy--but a selfish part of him wished that he'd talk to him more. Maybe just a text--but international rates could get expensive, so it was understandable.
Phoenix just needed to be patient.
--
"Oh, there you are!" Miles pushed through the crowd and rushed up to Phoenix, sporting a grin that was only reserved for him. Phoenix threw himself at him, not caring that they were in public. He could hear a clatter as Miles's suitcase was dropped, and then, the hug was reciprocated. "W-... how much did you miss me, exactly?"
"A lot," he mumbled into his shoulder.
"I missed you too, darling. I wish I could've called more."
"It's okay... you're here now, and that's what matters. I'm just... you've never gone on a longer trip like this before and I wasn't used to it..."
"So you missed me a lot, I take it?"
"Yeah... I was honestly a mess for no reason. It just..."
"It just what?"
"It kind of reminded me of..." And then, Phoenix realized it. The reason he'd missed him so intensely, and had felt so awful for some previously-unknown reason. "It reminded me of when you left."
"Phoenix... that was an incredibly moronic and rash thing for me to do, and rest assured that I will never do it again. I won't leave again, Phoenix."
Are you sure?
Phoenix almost voiced that thought aloud, but managed to keep it suppressed, because he already knew the answer. There was no way to assure he'd be able to stay by his side, but he'd try his hardest. That was the answer he'd given him when he'd asked the same question so many times previously. It was a question he hated, but one he always found himself voicing; he was insecure, despite how loud and proud he seemed in court, and he needed the confirmation.
"I... I know you won't."
"And I was in France for a reason, of course, I wouldn't just leave you."
"Why were you in France anyway?" His voice was shaky as he tried to recover from his emotions, and he took a few deep breaths after speaking to try and get rid of the embarrassing tremor.
"Well, I was doing some work for my job, of course, as you know, but there's a reason why I never explicitly stated what I was doing. The conference was only two days, and the other five days I was gone, I was busy doing some shopping."
"Shopping?" Phoenix asked stupidly. He wasn't totally sure what he meant by that; something about the way he'd emphasized the word was intriguing.
"Oh, you’ll see what I bought very soon, I’m certain,” Miles said mysteriously.
He proposed to him that evening with the most beautiful ring Phoenix had ever seen.