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Don was still awake, sitting on the sofa with a coffee mug in hand like a worried parent, when Joe came stumbling through the front door, the limp in his stride more exaggerated than usual thanks to the bottom shelf whiskey he’d been pickling himself in for the better part of four hours. It was going on half-past one, and Joe could see the exhaustion in Don’s face plain as day.
“Didn’t have to wait up for me,” he slurred, the consonants falling off the ends of his words as they stretched and contracted, slipping into each other and ricocheting away again.
Don frowned at him, shoulders curving in like he was trying to make himself smaller where he was wedged into the corner of the ugly floral sofa they’d inherited from one of his numerous relatives when they decided to make the trek up to Portland a few months back.
“My grandmother always told me not to go to bed angry,” he shrugged.
He’d changed into his pajamas—a pair of soft flannel pants and a tight white undershirt that clung to his arms and the gently padded plane of his belly, highlighting the way he’d filled out over the last few years. It didn’t take much for Joe to conjure memories of a younger, greyer Don Malarkey, strong frame made lean through fear and lack in the unforgiving winter they’d spent in the Bois Jacques. He shook his head to dispel the thought, wincing and grabbing for the wall when the motion made the room rock precariously around him.
“Still angry, then?” Joe asked. There was the familiar lilt of a brogue in his voice, summoned as it always was by too much indulgence of an evening.
Don sighed, setting his coffee down on the end table, and scrubbed his hand over his face.
“I was for a while,” he admitted, pushing to his feet. He shuffled across the cramped little living room and came to stand in front of Joe where he was lingering in the shallow nook around the door. It was too short to be considered a proper hallway but yearned toward the distinction even so, with framed photos of him and Don hung there like a gallery—the two of them standing side-by-side in their jumpsuits at Toccoa, lounging in their class-A’s at the back of a bar in London, bare-chested and sunburned on the banks of the Nehalem with a few bottles of beer cooling in the mud at their feet. Don crossed his arms over his chest and gave Joe a pointed nod, eyebrows raised. “Mostly just wanted to make sure you got home okay.”
“Well,” Joe announced, sweeping one arm down his person even as he kept the other braced against the wall for balance, “here I am. You can go on to sleep, now, Malarkey.” He effected a sloppy salute and added, “Dismissed.”
Don rolled his eyes. “You can't dismiss me, I outrank you,” he said, and gingerly curled his fingers around Joe’s elbow.
Joe yanked his arm back, gut lurching at the sudden, wounded look that flared across Don’s face.
“Don’t need your help,” he grumbled, and shouldered his way around Don, who threw his hands up with a soft, exasperated huff but gamely stepped back to let Joe pass.
Joe plodded through the tiny kitchenette, skirting the two-top table they’d shoved under the window and resting his weight against the back of one of the chairs as he went. The bedroom was at the end of a short hall, door open. Don must have laid down at some point, at least for a little while. The sheets on his side of the bed were mussed, while the sheets on Joe’s side were still tucked over the edge of the mattress with their neat military corners intact. One of the bedside lamps was spilling golden light across the duvet and Joe flopped down into the glowing puddle with a grunt, burying his face against the quilted cotton.
He lay there for a second, just breathing, letting the stress of the night and the not inconsiderable measure of alcohol sloshing around in his stomach settle some before he mustered the energy to flip himself over so he was on his back. He kept his eyes closed, bringing one hand up to cover them as he panted shallowly toward the ceiling.
“Need me to bring you a bucket?”
Joe spread his fingers and cracked an eye open just wide enough that he could see Don where he was leaning in the doorway, hip cocked with his arms crossed over his chest.
“No,” Joe said, raising his other hand into the air and making a grabbing motion in Don’s general direction. “C’mere.”
Don sighed, but heaved himself up off the doorframe and meandered over. He stopped a foot or so away and Joe spread his legs and beckoned again, crooking his fingers until Don huffed and stepped in so he was standing between Joe’s thighs. He still had his arms tucked in tight against his abdomen but there was a familiar softness tugging at the corners of his mouth.
“Hey,” Joe murmured, letting one arm drop to his side and extending the other so he could brush his fingers under the hem of Don’s shirt, searching for the heat of his skin just above his waistband. Don’s stomach twitched at the contact, breath stuttering for a half-beat, and Joe smiled at him, small and rueful but sincere. “I’m sorry.”
Don took a slow breath through his nose and sighed it out, shuffling in a little closer as he dipped his chin in a nod.
“Me, too.” He unfolded one arm and dragged his knuckles in a soft, affectionate stroke over Joe’s thigh on his bad side. “Irish temper got the better of me,” he teased, mouth quirking.
“Got the better of us both,” Joe agreed. He leaned up on his elbow, tipping his head back and tugging at Don’s waistband just once, quick. “Give us a kiss?”
Don rolled his eyes again, but leaned in with a smirk. He curled one hand over Joe’s thigh and pressed the other flat against the mattress up by Joe’s head, angling his face so he could buss a chaste little peck against Joe’s cheek.
“Bastard,” Joe cooed, and slipped a hand around the back of Don’s neck before he could escape. Don was laughing when Joe sealed their mouths together and the sound warbled into a moan when Joe licked his way past Don’s teeth.
“You taste like a brewery,” Don murmured a few long, languorous minutes later, forehead warm and very slightly damp against Joe’s. His voice was thin, breath shallow, and he had his eyes closed. Joe tilted his face, nose grazing Don’s cheekbone, and was struck with the sudden concern that he might have smeared the freckles peppering Don’s complexion.
He wiggled until Don raised his head with a curious grunt, brow furrowing over his dark eyes. Blemish free, Joe was relieved to discover. He abandoned his grip on Don’s neck in favor of stroking the stubbled plane of his cheek.
“We’re all right, Donny,” he said, low and rough. His voice felt thicker in his throat than usual, eyes stinging.
“Yeah,” Don agreed immediately, pressing in to kiss him again, firm but quick. “We’re all right.”
“Come to bed?” Joe asked, even as Don straightened up.
He nodded, rapping his knuckles against the knee of Joe’s prosthetic in a gentle one-two.
“Let’s get this off first,” he coaxed, lowering himself to his knees with a surprising measure of grace, given that he was obviously exhausted and had very little room to maneuver. “You know you can’t sleep for shit with it on.”
“I can think of a few other things you might do while you’re down there,” Joe grinned, reaching out to brush a wayward curl back against Don’s temple.
“Don’t press your luck,” Don warned in a good natured growl, and Joe laughed and laid back, arms sprawled up over his head.
Don made quick work of Joe’s slacks, tugging them down his legs and tossing them haphazardly onto the timeworn reading chair they kept shoved into the corner of the room. He took his time with Joe’s prosthetic, unlacing the cuffs and rolling the suction sock and liner down to tuck them under his arm. He delivered the prosthetic and its trappings to the chair cushion as well, though with markedly more care, and then put his fists against his hips and arched an eyebrow at Joe.
“Think you can handle your shirt on your own?”
“Rather you handled something else of mine,” Joe offered, wagging his eyebrows and grinning with all his teeth.
“I’m going to get you a glass of water and a couple aspirin,” Don reprimanded with a smirk, swatting at Joe’s good knee with the back of his hand. “Try to get out ahead of the hangover you’re going to have in the morning.”
“Irishmen don’t get hangovers,” Joe protested as Don disappeared down the hall.
“I’ll be sure to remind you of that when you’re prostrate on the porcelain throne,” he hollered back.
Joe shimmied out of his shirt, as instructed, somehow managing to ruck his undershirt up well above his belly button as he did so. He dropped it over the side of the bed and then closed his eyes and settled back into the mattress.
Even though Don couldn’t have been gone for more than a minute, Joe had already sunk into a doze by the time he returned. He startled back toward consciousness with a yelp when fingers brushed up over his forehead and back into his hair.
“S’all right,” Don soothed. “Just me. Scoot up a little, will you?”
Joe obliged, groaning when his head found a pillow. He rolled onto his side, letting an arm flop out in Don’s direction. He opened his mouth to ask if Don was going to join him in the bed anytime soon, but what came out was a muffled, drowsy, “With me, Donny?”
“Yeah, Joe,” Don promised, while Joe sank back down into the warm depths of sleep. “Always.”