Work Text:
“...Nick?”
He looks up from where he’s lying on Charlie’s bed. Charlie’s staring at him from across the room. He’s got a funny little look on his face, like he’s a bit worried but isn’t quite sure what he ought to be worried about.
“I’ve called your name three times. Where’d you go?” He smiles.
“Just thinking.” Nick rolls over on his back.
“About tomorrow? About your dad?”
“Yeah. That.”
“Are you nervous?” he asks. Charlie comes down to sit next to him. The bedroom door’s open and his parents are downstairs; although Charlie’s parents have been a bit more relaxed about things lately he still probably won’t risk getting much closer than that, although Nick’s starting to think that a hug would be something he’d really like right about now.
Because he’d told Charlie earlier that day that he’d decided to come out to his dad when he saw him tomorrow night, and now he was wondering if he was really up for it after all.
There’s a lot to tomorrow night he’s not sure he’s up for...
“I haven’t seen him for so long,” Nick says, trying to put into words what he hasn’t been able to fully explain to himself. “He’s my dad, but I feel like...I don’t know him? I feel like...I have no idea what kind of person he is or what he’ll say. It makes me feel like I’ve not any solid ground to stand on.”
Charlie reaches over and takes Nick’s hand in his.
“It will be all right, love,” he says.
Nick wants to believe him.
“But how do you know?” Nick whispers.
Charlie squeezes his hand. “We won’t let it be not all right,” he says.
“What do you mean?” Nick stares up at him.
“I just mean…” Charlie looks off into space for a moment. “I just mean...however things turn out, we won’t say, this is good or this is bad...we’ll just say, okay, this is how it is, and then decide what we’ll do next. Where we’ll go. There will always be somewhere to go.”
Always somewhere to go. Yes. Nick can work with that.
“I won’t be afraid to go anywhere, if you’re with me,” he says softly.
And Charlie says, “Nick...I’ll always be with you.”
And Nick feels like there’s a bubble in his chest swelling up until he can hardly breathe. So he just nods.
Charlie looks at him, and then says, “Was there anything else?”
Nick can’t ever hide anything from him. It’s like Charlie’s got some kind of superpower that comes out whenever he knows Nick’s talking rubbish.
“It’s just…” he hesitates. He really doesn’t want to go there. Not now. Not with Charlie here and looking so sweet. He doesn’t want Charlie mixed up in ugliness.
“Is it David?”
Got it in one.
Isn’t it always?
"He’s going to be there tomorrow night, there’s no getting around that, and...you know how he is, Char. You know. I’ve been getting...just this feeling from him all week...it’s like something’s building up inside him…”
Nick sometimes imagines what it would be like to be Charlie, to actually love your siblings, to know they love you and want you to be happy.
All he’s ever had from David is this...anger.
So much anger.
How fucking messed up is it that he can’t even trust his own brother, his own fucking brother ...if Nick was ever hanging off the edge of a cliff and reached out a hand to David to pull him up…
Nick honestly doesn’t know what would happen.
In fact...some days Nick thinks he knows exactly what would happen.
How fucking messed up is that?
“I really think...he hates me. Really hates me.”
Nick isn’t going to cry, he’s not going to, but it’s so hard…
And he hates you too, he thinks, but can’t say, because he knows I love you. And that’s enough reason to hate you. Because you’re something that makes me happy.
“What did I ever do to him, Char? What’s...what’s wrong with me?”
“You didn’t do anything! Don’t you ever, ever say that!” Charlie grabs Nick’s face in his hands and looks at him with this...Nick doesn’t know what to call it…this fierceness. Like a mother cat who’s seeing someone threaten her kittens.
But the next minute he just looks so, so sad…
“Nick...you’re such a good person...it’s like you don’t even know…”
And Charlie forgets - or doesn’t care - about his parents being in the house, and he burrows into Nick, flinging his arms around his boyfriend, and Nick’s a little alarmed but still very grateful that he’s somehow managed to get that hug after all. Trust Charlie to just know.
He always knows.
Superpower...
“You’re my favourite person in the world, Nick,” Charlie whispers into his neck.”And I think you’re quite perfect the way you are. So if you think there’s something wrong with you, then you must think I’m not very clever. And,” he says, lifting his head and looking at Nick with just a little smirk on his face, “we both know that’s not true.”
“You’re not at all full of yourself, are you?”
“Rude.” Charlie pokes Nick in the stomach, and Nick giggles. So Charlie does it again. And again. And before long they’re both giggling, and Nick’s feeling better, and he thinks Charlie’s probably feeling better, because now he’s smiling and not looking so sad.
And Charlie’s hand is lying on Nick’s stomach, and he’s looking down at Nick now like he’s seeing something so incredible that he can’t quite believe it…
And Nick says, “Char…” very softly.
And Nick puts his own hand over Charlie’s, and he swallows hard, and he has to keep thinking his parents are home his parents are home but that still isn’t quite enough, and his other hands slips up behind Charlie’s head and pulls him down towards him, and then Charlie’s mouth is on his, and oh, if Nick could just stay here forever and never think about his father or David or…
“You two should really think about shutting the door if you’re going to do this.”
Nick leaps up so violently that he loses his balance and falls backwards off the bed onto the floor with a thud and a muffled cry. In the process he manages to fling Charlie in the opposite direction and into the headboard, where he bangs his head, yelping loudly.
Tori’s standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame, sipping her lemonade. She raises her eyebrows.
“Good reflexes, anyway. Probably comes in handy playing rugby. And for other...sports.”
Charlie’s mother’s voice drifts up from downstairs.
“What was all that noise? Everything all right?”
Charlie grumbles and rubs his head. Nick peeks up over the edge of the bed like a nervous rabbit popping out of its burrow.
“All good,” Tori calls back over her shoulder. “Just...something fell. No worries.” She looks back at them and rolls her eyes. “Honestly.” Then she walks away.
*****
Nick’s in the bathroom with the fan on and the water running so no one will hear him as he retches miserably over the toilet.
David’s been stalking around the house all afternoon looking like...well, Nick’s just glad there aren’t any cliffs near their house. He’s not feeling like the odds would be in his favour in the event of any unfortunate accidents.
And his father...Nick just has no idea. He’s been acting like he’s a TV presenter and Nick’s his special guest - asking about what subjects he likes in school, what his hobbies are, what Nellie and Henry are like to take care of…as if he’s doing an impression of what he thinks a good father is, but has no experience to base it on. And so Nick feels like he’s talking to someone else altogether.
He wipes his mouth, steps out of the bathroom and heads into the kitchen.
“All right, love?”
He forces a smile for his mother. Oh, his mother…
She’s been so good. She couldn’t have been better.
He can’t blame her for David. She isn’t responsible. No matter how horrible David’s been about everything, about Charlie, Nick can’t blame his mother. He knows David’s behaviour has upset her. She’s tried with him. She’s tried. He’s her son, the same way that Nick is.
He can’t bring her into any of this. How can he ask her to take sides?
There’s the doorbell, and he’s got to -
“Doggies!”
He wishes happiness could come to him as easily as it does to Oliver.
But maybe it can.
Because there’s Charlie standing with his parents and Tori, and...well, there it is.
Funny, that.
*****
Nick can’t help but sneak looks at Charlie during dinner.
He knows Charlie told him not to worry about him, to let Charlie worry about Nick for a change, but Nick can’t break that habit easily. He’s gotten used to worrying about Charlie, especially over the last several months. It feels like the natural thing to do. Like what he’s supposed to be doing.
Not that he exactly wants to worry about Charlie...not that he wants Charlie to give him reasons to worry. God - if he could do anything, anything, to make Charlie’s life easier, he would do it. Charlie can have anything he wants from Nick. He already has every piece of Nick’s heart. Nick would give anything and everything. He would - he would -
Oh, God, he loves Charlie so much.
He watches Charlie stare at the food on his fork, watches him breathe, watches him eat. All around them everyone is talking, laughing...does anyone notice, does anyone know how brave Charlie is?
Or how strong he is.
God...he’s so strong. Charlie’s thought the opposite about himself for so long, but Nick’s always known the truth.
Charlie is the strongest person he knows.
And Nick is amazed, for about the thousandth time, that someone like that loves him.
He looks over at that moment and meets Nick’s eyes.
“You okay?”
All this to deal with, and still all Charlie can do is think about Nick.
Nick wishes he was that strong.
And Nick starts to think that maybe everything’s going to be okay. Charlie’s here, and his hand slips into Nick’s under the table...
And then David opens his mouth, and…
It’s enough. Nick’s had enough.
*****
It ends here. He’s had enough.
Something inside of Nick just...clicks. Like a bit of him’s just finally slid into its proper place.
Like the time he’d sat in an (almost) empty ballroom, figuring out how to answer a boy who’s just asked him the most incredible question.
Like the time he’d stood on a sidewalk, shoeless and wet, staring at a boy who’s just told him something amazing.
And once again, it’s time for Nick to say what he has to say.
*****
And so. That’s that, then.
Was that all he’d had to do, all along? Incredible. And ridiculous.
Nick’s spent most of his life not saying what he wanted to say. But it seems that, once again, when he did, that’s what made all the difference.
Maybe this is something he needs to keep on doing.
Maybe the world’s going to have to get used to hearing from Nick Nelson more often.
He looks over to where Charlie is, so far unsuccessfully, trying to separate Oliver from Nellie and Henry.
So strong. So much strength in him that he’s got it to spare. And Nick thinks that tonight he gave a little of it away. And Nick’s so grateful.
Everyone’s getting ready to leave, and Nick’s not really paying attention, he’s glowing a little, at Charlie’s father’s kind words, but then, from above -
There’s a thud, and a crunching sound, followed by David’s petulant whine cut off by what sounds very much like Tori’s voice lowered in that way that signals when she, too, has had just about enough.
He decides it’s really best if he doesn’t know. Leave Tori to it. Whatever’s happening, he figures: she’s got this.
*****
“So where are we gonna go?”
And tomorrow things won’t have changed that much. He’ll still have to sort things out with his father, and he knows there’s some hard work still to be done there.
And David will still be a piece of shit.
But right now, they’re just two boys who love each other, sitting in a car, deciding where to go next.
And neither of them would rather be anywhere else.