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He couldn't tell you when it began, but it's ritual now. The barely there kisses to his parted knees and along the soft line of his belly before Callum pushes gently inside.
Years of variety, different bloke, different body everytime and he thought it'd get old; that the thrill up his spine every single fucking time would fade, but it never does. It's connection of the deepest kind, security, belonging in a way he's never had, and when he forgets, when he's distracted, when Ben can't find the words for what it means, he finds himself guiding his head down to remind him. There's comfort in ritual.
He did it tonight, same place, same touch, same gentle man who holds him like he's something precious, kisses like he knows what he needs, and how can he doubt him. How can he think there's anything to fear entrusting his heart to those hands. But alone now, in the dark, there's something he can't shake.
Does he do that for her?
He's been here before of course, and it's disconcerting how quickly that feeling floods back. The knot in the pit of his stomach, the bile rising in his throat, but this time its different. It's so different. It's fucking terrifying.
Last time he had nothing to lose. He could push it down, try to convince himself the man lying next to him now wasn't as elemental to life as the air around him. He had no claim, no right to be jealous, no real notion of how it felt to love him and lose him, but this time?.....This time. Fuck.
God. It's all there isn't it. The texts, the taxi, the lying about where he goes, and it makes all the sense in the world and yet no sense at all. And yeah, maybe he's jumping ahead of himself, seeing things that aren't there, he's done it before, but the ring?.....The Ring.
What was it he'd said?
Next time I wanna do it right.
Sleep won't come, how could it, and closing his eyes doesn't help. He pictures them together, clear as day, and its nothing he hasn't seen before. Months of lying awake with his head under the pillow, screwing up his eyes until they ached, desperate to drive out images of the most beautiful man he'd ever seen moving above her. Making her moan.
But it's worse now. Infinitely worse. Now that he knows the exquisite bliss of having Callum inside, the smell of his skin after sex, the sounds he makes when Ben tightens around him.
Before it was hypothetical, the product of a fevered imagination, all too easy to convince himself Callum was nothing special in that department. That he didn't gather her up in strong arms and cradle her between his legs while she shook. That he didn't seek out damp skin with soft lips until her heart rate slowed. That his fingers didn't trace patterns over bare skin while he hummed nonsense soft and contented in her ear.
Now he knows different. God, does he know different. For a second he entertains the notion that he wishes he didn't, but Fuck, who's he kidding. Knowing it's a privilege. An honour bestowed, and the best thing he's ever learned. Right now though? Right now it feels like a curse.
He's shaken out of his thoughts, mercifully, by movement in the bed next to him, and if they've learnt anything from sleeping on an air bed it's that if one moves they both move. He's wriggling, restless in his sleep like he has been for days, and Ben wants to reach out, the urge to soothe and comfort all consuming, but something stops him. That in itself is heartbreaking.
He rolls and comes to rest, eventually, head on Ben's pillow, face inches from his own, and he jumps a little when a familiar hand finds it's way to the back of his head. It's cradling, secure, and Ben wants to reach back and hold it there like the weight of its presence could stop the thoughts spinning through his head. But as he relaxes back into sleep the cool metal of his wedding band slides down the heated skin of Ben's neck, and he shivers. Contact lost.
He's beautiful like this, close enough for Ben to see clearly even in the halflight. The pink blush of sleep, the perfect curve of his closed eyelids, the wisps of freshly washed hair falling over his forehead. Ben reaches out to brush them away, to reveal and map out the tiny scars he adores like he's done a thousand times before, but something rises and pools in his throat and he swallows hard against the saliva flooding his mouth.
Did she watch him like this?
Does she still get to watch him like this?
Does he let her?
He's up then, as quickly as rising from the floor allows, and running to the bathroom to empty his stomach into the toilet bowl. He should rinse his mouth, take away the bitter taste, but if only it were that easy. Once it's there it's hard to shift, and hasn't he learned that the hard way. Acid burns his throat but its distracting at least, a different kind of pain, and strangely reminiscent of the cure....of what used to be the cure.
It's still in the bag - the expensive bottle of single malt bought duty free at the airport - tucked beside the toaster on the kitchen counter. It's survived three weeks intact - a metaphor for their marriage perhaps, or a testament to how happy he's been depending on how he chooses to look at it - but he can't think of that right now. Seems as good a time as any to crack it open.
The first swig burns, harsh and unforgiving on his raw throat, and it strikes him how quickly the body forgets what it once relied on. It used to run warm through his veins, calming, empowering, lightening the load, a little at least, but the second swig, the third, the fourth and nothing eases this burden.
Truthfully he's had no use for it of late, body and mind soothed elsewhere, and it bypasses his veins to go straight for his head. It's intoxicating yes, but not in the way he craves. Not in the way his husband is. His remedy these days is soft and mellow, six foot something and hanging off an air bed feet away. There are some things his body could never forget.
He pulls out a chair at the breakfast bar, and thinks momentarily about turning it around, facing away to the solace of a blank wall.
Maybe if he can't see him, he can't doubt him.
Maybe if he can't see him, he can't hurt him.
Maybe if he can't see him, he can't be breaking them from the inside out.
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
In truth though, he's never been able to take his eyes off him, and if time is short, if they're fracturing around him, he'll take every second to commit him to memory. There's a lifetime to get through without him.
The bottle's half empty now, seconds or hours could have passed and nothing's changed. Nothing's settled the dull ache and rising panic but still he raises it to his lips, metronomic. There's comfort in ritual, right?
Callum's moving again, and his eyes snap up from the counter top to take him in. He's stretched an arm over Ben's side, where he knows he should be, his head curled over the ghost of Ben's chest, nosing at the sheets right where he belongs. A faint smile blooms on his lips and then fades, and how can he doubt him? How can he think this man wants to be anywhere but here?
Five weeks. Five weeks and five days since he stood in the Mitchell kitchen and begged Ben to marry him. Five weeks and five days since he laid his heart out and trusted Ben not to stamp all over it. Things change, people fall out of love, but it isn't that. It can't be that. He knows it isn't that.
Five weeks and five days.
Don't do this to us Ben, please.
But there's something, isn't there. Something's going on in that beautiful head.
He's distant, quiet, evasive, excusing himself for long periods at strange times. It's the only thing that makes sense, and the one thing that makes no sense, but maybe Ben was arrogant to think he wouldn't look elsewhere. It isn't like he hasn't got form. There's the texts, the taxi, the lying, the ring. The fucking ring! Some things can't be explained away.
He'd seen it, the cheap plastic tat of last time - no effort for no conviction, that's what he'd told himself, a trinket for the ultimate trophy wife, but maybe he should give his husband more credit. Saving his cash perhaps while he sussed out his options. An elaborate plan to keep both plates spinning while he made his choice.
Ben went with women partly to prove to himself he was gay, maybe Callum went with Ben to prove to himself the opposite. Maybe he's had this wrong from the start, had him wrong from the start. Maybe Ben was the experiment, and now he's making his move. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe
Next time I wanna do it right.
But this is Callum. It isn't who he is, who Ben knows him to be in every sense that matters. He's loyal, faithful, sincere...and gay. Beautifully, perfectly, thank-his-lucky-stars-for it fucking gay.
Two years.
Two years, and he's fought for them all the way hasn't he? Held them together when Ben lacked the strength to do it himself, or the conviction he was something worth fighting for. Why would he do that? Why would he go through all that if he didn't know in his bones they belong together. Ben knows.
So what then? Cheap thrills? The spike of adrenaline that comes with sneaking around? Nah, that's not Callum. If it was he'd have had him spread out in his bed fucking sooner.
When I sleep with someone it's gotta mean something.
Huh, ain't that the truth.
Is he bored? Is he missing something? Is there something he needs that he feels he can't ask for, that Ben doesn't, or can't, give him. That she gives him. He can't think so. Ben's never been able to hide that he's weak for Callum, that he'd give him anything if he only asked.
The sex is sublime. A revelation to both of them since the very first time and every time since, and he knows, he knows it isn't just him. He feels it, in the way they move together, the way his husband's body reacts under his touch, and he tells him, he fucking tells him how right it feels. How everything that went before felt wrong. Nothing's changed. He'd never cried after sex before Callum, but he wasn't crying alone.
Callum loves sex, and he's blooming now, comfortable with his desires and confident to ask for what he wants, but it wasn't always like that. He came to him shy and awkward, but a glorious fucking natural, and while he didn't ask, didn't want to know, he got the impression sex had been a rare event, devoid of the fire Ben drew out of him from the very start.
Callum loves sex yes, but he loves sex with Ben. Only with Ben.
He can't think of him with her, truthfully he can't think of him with anyone, but with her? He's been there, done that, and he can't go through it again. It's too much to think that he wants to be with her, easier somehow to think that he no longer wants to be with Ben, but it doesn't ring true. Not for a second. None of it equates to what he knows of Callum, what he sees and feels and hears everyday, and it doesn't make sense...none of it makes any fucking sense.
And yet here they are.
A glance down and he's surprised to find the bottle three quarters empty and no recollection of it going down. It hasn't helped. Fifty quid's worth of Speyside's finest and it's barely registered against twenty minutes staring straight at Callum, the only thing in his reality that does make perfect sense.
There's no comfort in the bottle now, only in the face and presence of the man he shares his bed with. He's still here, still real, and Ben needs to hold him, to make damn sure it stays that way. Drink's a crutch for when the world blows up in his face, but it hasn't, not yet. And Callum? Callum's full body armour.
When I'm with you I am better.
He wriggles off the chair, unsteady on his feet and stumbles to the bathroom to seek out the mouthwash, swilling away the prop of the past and rinsing it down the sink. He hears Callum shout out. It's muffled without his processor, but it must be loud, tone frantic, and he hears just enough to recognise his own name. He lurches around the door frame, blinking fast and willing his eyes to adjust to the dark until slowly, mercifully, he comes back into view. He's calm but he's reaching out, skin shining with sweat and he can't get there quick enough. I'm here, you need me, I need you.
He slides in beside him and instantly he's gathered up, pliant in his arms until he he has him where he wants him, head resting flat against his racing heart. His fingers dig in, insistent, pressing at his back and on his scalp and he wants this. He knows he wants this. Nothing else makes sense but this.
His chest rises then and falls, a deep rumble travelling through his ear, and he can't hear it, but he doesn't need to. The length of it, the tone, the telltale kiss to his crown. He knows what was said. It's like Morse code, their own language just for them, and finally the fear subsides.
"I love you too babe, always."
Tomorrow he'll confront this, whatever this is.
Tonight? Well....
Tonight there's comfort in ritual.