Work Text:
“Does it bother you that we’ve never really had sex?”
Miles raised a single eyebrow at him in question, looking up from his book. He laws handsome in his glasses.
“We’ve had sex before, Wright.”
“I mean as a couple. You know, officially.”
“Regardless. We haven’t been abstinent, if that is your point. Sex is sex.”
“It was stress relief at best, back then.”
Wrong thing to say, apparently, if the downward twist of Miles’s lips was anything to go off of. He wondered how many of the details the other man actually remembered.
Of the cab ride back to his apartment and then to Phoenix’s after he’d checked him out of the detention center.
Of the awkward standing around while Phoenix rummaged to scrape something together for them to eat even though it was far too late for dinner by the time they got home.
Of how they’d managed to fall onto Phoenix’s shitty twin-sized bed and into each other pants for the whopping three and a half minutes of escape from the last eighty-something hours of hell.
Of how before any cleanup could be done afterward, Miles was clinging to him tight enough to bruise and heaving great sobs that shook his whole frame and too entirely exhausted and desperate for comfort and familiarity to give Phoenix shit about not opening a window before they shared a cigarette.
Of the fight they’d had the morning after when Phoenix had returned from the corner store with breakfast and a refill on his birth control that Miles had then apparently attempted to reimburse him for, to which Phoenix had said something along the lines of if this was him paying him for sex, he could kindly get the fuck out and not come back. Which he did.
It was a wonder they had ever gotten together at all, he thought idly, after how so briefly terrible they had been to each other before that trial… after how terrible he had been to Miles for a good while after he’d gone and come back from the dead, childhood friendship and redemption arc be damned.
Oh – he’d gone quiet. Miles had probably said something to him, having put down his book and glasses at some point and rolled over onto his side so they were facing each other.
“Where is this coming from, Phoenix?”
Even after almost a decade of marriage – holy shit they were married – and longer still of unofficially-official a thing, being first named was still a rarity. This conversation really was headed all the wrong ways.
He shrugged one shoulder noncommittally.
Miles chewed his bottom lip in thought.
“Larry asked about us again when you visited earlier, didn’t he.”
“You know he means well. He worries about us and he’s always been good with kids and his daughter’s growing up all too fast. Kay and Truce and Pearls are gonna be dragging her along on their adventures pretty soon enough.”
“Then we hardly need a fifth terror to add to the collection, adopted or not.”
“He likes being the doting uncle.”
“And that is relevant to this case how? Maya and Franziska like being doting aunts. You said yourself he means well; Larry simply has little concept of proper boundaries and is being a pest. Neither you nor I are under obligation to anything but our jobs.”
They were both quiet for a moment.
“So is this your roundabout way of saying you don’t mind?”
A wry grin settled on Miles’s face. “Believe it or not, Wright, I have tried several times quite blatantly to initiate such acts in the past. You either weren’t receptive of them or simply were too dense to notice, and they passed without issue, did they not?”
Phoenix flushed at the teasing lilt in his voice. “You could have just asked.”
“Precisely – I could have just asked, but the times you actively turned my advances away were clear enough on their own and I was more than capable of taking care of things myself. I enjoy it, particularly with you, but that never has and still does not have any bearing on our relationship.”
They lapsed into silence again as Phoenix mulled over his words. He wondered how many of the details he himself had unintentionally set aside in favor of wallowing in guilt for the past.
How many lazy mornings they had spent in bed on days they could work from home doing not much but enjoying each other’s company.
How many late nights they had spent in Phoenix’s office or on Miles’s couch or at their kitchen table pouring over case files, and how many recesses they had spent together in the window nook outside Courtroom 3 desperately piecing together evidence and testimony when their witnesses had gone and lied again.
How many times case discussions had devolved into throwing increasingly wild theories at each other and bickering for the sake of some levity and the chance that maybe, just maybe, some crazy idea would end up sticking like it usually did.
How many times they had arrived home at different times after long days and tried to surprise each other with a home cooked meal or takeout from their favorite place, often at the same time.
How many times they had sat in the ridiculously uncomfortable chairs in waiting rooms of hospitals and therapists and airport terminals and prisons and offices for the sake of being the first to know, the first to be there.
How many times they had sat in the corner booth at the karaoke place Miles and his sister would always go to after their victories in court, watching their friends and junior partners belting out some pop song, legs pressed together hip to ankle beneath the table.
How many times over their lives together they had explored each other and kissed each other in the privacy of their bed in their home until they were breathless and laughing and in awe because even if this was all there was to being in love, the thought had never once crossed their minds to ask for more.
It was infuriating how one memory seemed to take up so much more space in his mind than hundreds more, much nicer ones. It was infuriating how he had failed so badly to remember that things were fine – great, even – between him and his husband, how none of this had even mattered before one small conversation brought it all down.
Miles must have interpreted his frustration as doubt and reached over to pet through his hair, tracing the incoming gray streaks as he so frequently did these days.
“We can go get your little magic rock if you need evidence, but I love you, Phoenix, and I’m more than happy with things exactly as they are. Alright?”
Phoenix wriggled closer, wrapping his arms around Miles’s middle for a proper cuddle. “Would you still love me if I said not technically since you didn’t take my last name?”
The other’s expression stuttered as he tried to figure out what exactly he was talking about, before settling on a weary sigh.
“I wouldn’t push your luck.”