Work Text:
BAZ
“It has to slow down at some point.” I pout at the clouds. “We’ll wait here and leave when it doesn’t look like the Great Flood anymore.”
Simon glares at me as if I’ve grown horns. His head tilts to the left and his nose scrunches up in that annoyingly adorable expression that has made my heart miss a beat every time for the last seven years.
“It won’t stop, Baz. It’s getting worse, and this tree,” he gestures to the canopy above us, “as big as it is, won’t protect us much longer.” He’s right. The wind’s pushing the raindrops sideways, and with every passing minute more water threatens to drench us. “And isn’t it dangerous to be under a tree during a storm? Because of lightning?” Christ, he’s right again. I’m surprised we haven’t been struck yet, knowing my luck.
“What are you suggesting, then?”
I brush back a strand of my hair that’s fallen on my face and examine our surroundings. Hills and fields run as far as I can see, the grey snake of the paved road slithering between them and curling towards the scattered farms that dot the landscape like miniature houses on a scale model. We’re on the top of a hill higher than the others, a hundred metres away from the road, and a huge oak is miraculously sheltering us with its wide branches, dripping water on Simon’s old bicycle that lies abandoned on the slippery grass. (Mine’s up against the tree, because I’m at least a bit considerate about my things.)
Everything’s green and lucid, washed as new. It’d be a pretty sight if I wasn't fearing for my life.
(I’m always fearing for my life, when Simon’s explaining his brilliant ideas.) (Last time he had a “flawless plan”, I broke my arm. He was more upset than me when I couldn’t play the violin for two months.)
“We go,” he shrugs. “It only takes five minutes, and then we can have a hot shower.”
I know he means we’ll take two separate showers, like people do, one after the other, but my stomach somersaults at the thought of us showering together.
We used to, when we were children and Vera used to throw us in a tub to scrub us clean after we rolled in the stables and climbed trees and played pirates in a sea of hills and goat-sirens and manger-sailing ships. Or when, during the most severe winters, Ruth made us share the limited amount of hot water and we ended up splashing it all around, dooming us to freeze when we had to wash the soap away. (Simon was a merboy and I was a lost pirate; we were never calm when water was involved.) (We almost drowned in the river when we were nine, and Father locked me in my room for two weeks while I recovered from a devastating cold – it was the first time Simon climbed up to my window.) (Because of course he was fine.)
But now I have to suppress my wandering shower thoughts with a shiver. Simon must think I’m shuddering from the cold, because he picks up his bike and gestures for me to do the same.
“Well, I won’t wait here while you freeze to death. You can come or not, I don’t care.”
He isn’t angry, just playfully annoyed, but I feel a wave of shame crushing me for ruining his happy mood. We were having fun. Just me and him, like old times. (When he was a captain with his tricorne and homemade telescope and wooden scimitar, and I would’ve followed him anywhere.) (I would still follow him anywhere.) For one last summer before everything falls apart. (Before I can’t follow him anymore.)
“It's just as likely I'd freeze while we go back, but fine, Snow. Have it your way.”
He mumbles something that could be “insufferable prick” or “I'd suck your dick” (no, that's just my rotten brain) (I'm disgusting), then hops on the bike and smiles at me.
“You coming?”
I definitely have the brain of a 12-year-old, because I'm hearing double entendre in everything he says.
“Yes, Snow. I'll allow you to get me killed by a fucking cyclone.”
He grins at me and launches himself on his bike down the hill, towards the paved road. I fight the urge to close my eyes – I don’t want to see his limbs strewn on the ground when he inevitably slips on the soaked grass – and when he reaches the road surprisingly unscathed I pick up my bike from where it’s leaning against the oak and start quite carefully walking down the hill.
“Baz! What the fuck. Just ride the fucking bike.”
He seems distressed. He always is when I don't imitate him in what he believes to be a “super fun and totally safe” activity. (When he jumps down from our old tree house saying the tree’s not so high now that we’re 19.) (When he dives in the river in the middle of December, because he doesn’t have a perpetual cold.) (When he climbs to my bedroom window even though he could just use the door.)
Just because he’s never died or lost a leg during his shenanigans doesn't mean my luck would hold. Just because nothing would ever dare to hurt Simon Snow Salisbury – I bet the Earth would like to swallow itself whenever he falls and scratches his knees, and mosquitoes probably self immolate after biting him – doesn’t mean I hold such power on Nature. I'd slide on the grass and explode.
(I’m not exaggerating. Simon lives a life of danger, and yet I am the one who still has a faint limp from when I broke my leg last year while we were “going on an adventure”.) (I don’t fancy repeating the experience.)
Simon groans as he watches me slowly making my way, and maybe he has a reason to do so – by the time I'm at the bottom of the hill we're both already drenched. That's fine. Totally fine. I'm absolutely not feeling the cold seep into my body to make home in some forgotten cell and never let me be warm again.
I sigh, and I’ve barely mounted my bike when Simon kicks the ground and he's off, pedaling fast on the left side of the road.
I follow him, sure I’ll lose my grip on the pedals and plummet to my death, but when I start gaining speed, the wind roaring in my ears, something shifts.
Just a second ago I thought the five minutes it takes to reach Simon's house – even less if we hurry up – would kill me.
Suddenly that's not enough time.
All my senses are screaming at me we’re in a terrible situation, and yet I’ve never felt more alive.
My clothes are made of more water than fabric right now, and I’m praying to all the gods I don't believe in that my backpack is truly waterproof. (My sketchbook hides years of doodles of Simon’s face and bad poetry.) (It’d kill me to find it ruined.)
I forgot to tie my hair, and now it's hanging around my face in dripping waves, some strands falling on my forehead and directing water right into my eyes.
Pulling my scarf above my nose and mouth seemed a good idea while I was freezing but dry under the tree, but now it's soaked through and forms a barrier of drenched cloth between my respiratory system and the air I have to take in – every time I breathe I'm basically inhaling and drinking rain.
I try to talk and my voice comes out muffled. I don't think Simon can hear me anyway, so I give up and watch him instead.
He's a few feet ahead of me, one arm stretched out to feel the rain. (As if there was any need to extend an arm for that purpose). His curls are matted to his skin, deep brown from the water, his t-shirt clings to his body in a way that should be illegal – I can see his muscles shift for the effort, every movement accentuated by the see-through fabric. (Of fucking course it's white.)
He’s so beautiful it almost hurts to look at him. To think in a month I won’t be spending every day with him anymore. To think he’s slipping through my fingers, and I never mustered the courage to tell him I’m desperately and irremediably in love with him.
When we were ten we promised each other that in thirty years, if we were still alone, we’d get married. We were sitting under the cherry tree in my front yard, my pristine suit a stark contrast with his muddy shirt and torn trousers. (His jacket had been MIA since just after the ceremony, when Fiona relieved him of his flower boy duty and he took it as permission to stop behaving like a civilised kid.) Music was coming from the field behind the house, where white tents billowed in the evening breeze and a swarm of adults drunk on champagne danced and talked too loud. We had escaped the scene after the twelfth unknown aunt had tried to ruffle my hair and pinch my cheek, but didn’t go far away. I was curling a scrap of white ribbon around my fingers when Simon asked me if I’d ever get married.
“I don’t know,” I answered, with all the seriousness of a 10-year-old who thinks they already need to have their whole future outlined. “Loving someone enough to marry them seems hard.”
Simon nodded, and laid his cheek on my shoulder. “Maybe we should marry each other,” he said. “When we’re old like your father and Daphne and we feel alone. I think I could love you enough.”
“In thirty years?” I asked. “Okay, Simon. Maybe I can marry you.”
He squeezed my arm and remained a whole minute in silence, then he jumped up and mischievously waggled his eyebrows. “Want to see the cake? It’s so full of whipped cream, I’m sure we could steal some and they’d never notice.” (I do notice, every time I look at the wedding photos.) (But of course I let him drag me in his evil plots. My heart and will already belonged to Simon and only Simon, back then.)
Now I tear my eyes away from him to glance around and almost stop in my tracks.
The sky and the fields and the hills in the distance are completely white. It was starting to get dark before the rain, but the mantle of fog that covers everything has caused a new surge of light, and white’s the only colour left. It feels like walking through an abandoned house where the furniture has been shrouded in dusty sheets to hide it from ghosts and prying eyes.
It’s magic.
The visibility is still high – it's not the kind of mist that only lets you see one inch from your nose – but I can't see anything anyway with the layer of drops my hair is depositing into my eyes. I try to blink them away, but they cling to my eyelashes and I can't do anything about it.
That's why I don't see the car before it's too late.
This road is in the middle of nowhere, and spotting a vehicle that’s not a tractor is usually harder than spotting a mythical creature. And yet one comes along right when the sides of the road have become Olympic pools.
I start to scream before it happens – a wave of dirty water crashes on us, raised by the tyres of the car. Simon screams too, but his yell rapidly melts into laughter. He's pedaling faster, and I accelerate to keep up with him.
Our bikes are flying inside puddles wider than the English Channel, I'm completely drenched, Simon's house is nowhere to be seen, and… I'm laughing.
I'm laughing like a mad man, like someone who decided to just let go. Simon is cackling too, his little squeals reaching me from ahead, and I need to see his face, to commit his joy to memory.
(My mind’s a scrapbook of Simon’s smiles.)
With a bit of effort I come up beside him and find him already staring, eyes squeezing to see me in the rain, lips open in a grin. His curls are plastered to his forehead, and the sight of his shirt that conceals nothing is even worse than from behind.
He's shining. He's blinding. I don't remember the last time he looked so happy. So in his element.
(I do. It was last October and we were picking apples in Ruth’s orchard. Simon tried to give me a lift with his hands to reach a too high branch and we toppled down in a heap of limbs and fruit. He brushed my hair away from my eyes and smiled at me like he had just cracked a code and found the answer to every question.) (The next day he told me he had gotten the scholarship, and everything began to sour.)
I turn my eyes back to the road only to be met by another gigantic puddle. I pedal straight through it, screaming again, this time because it feels like the right thing to do. As if not doing it would make me burst.
Simon imitates me, and we're laughing again, messy giggles that turn into screeches when we hit a puddle or when a second car decides today's the day to turn this road, usually abandoned by anything that's not wildlife and rusty tractors, into the fucking M25.
I don't remember the last time I laughed so much. The last time I let myself be, do something reckless and enjoy it. The last time I felt so happy and carefree.
(I do remember it. It was Christmas, and I dragged Simon under the mistletoe to kiss his cheek. We danced and sang and fell asleep in the same bed as we hadn’t done in months.) (The morning after he was gone and I was left with a little less hope once again.)
Simon's house is now visible in its white cloak, too close, too soon. I don't want this to end. I don't want to shower and wear the clothes I always leave at Simon's and get back to my dry and warm self. I want to roll in a puddle under the rain with him, like we did when we pretended to be pigs. I want to stare at his soaked curls and his useless t-shirt, recalling how he looked during the grape harvest two years ago, all purple and sticky and radiant. (I held out my hands to keep him away from my favourite shirt, and a second later I was wrapped in a grape-tasting bear hug.) I want to know what it's like to touch his shoulders right now. I want to feel his warmth against my freezing skin.
But he's already pulling into his garden and leaving the bike on the grass, stumbling over it like the bumbling oaf he is. He runs to the porch and waits for me there, still grinning, his slightly crooked teeth shining.
I want to stop time and fix this image forever, add it to my mental list of Simon Salisbury’s best moments.
(Like that time he decided to chase my father’s goats and found out too late that they are chaos creatures and way faster than you’d expect. Or when he made up an incredibly convoluted story – involving gnomes and elves visiting from lands far away – to explain why we had taken absolutely no part in destroying Daphne’s newly-planted flower garden.) (Like when we went to the school dance together the year he broke up with Wellbelove after dating her for two weeks, and he wore a green hat to match my tie because he had lost his bow tie. Or when he organised an entire picnic on a haystack and ran all the way home when he realised he had forgotten to bring scones.)
He's looking up at me as if I've hung the moon, his expression even more open and earnest than usual. Normally I'd be afraid of it. I'd launch into a devastating overthinking session and stress over the meaning of every breath he’s ever taken in my presence. I'd shy away and close off to protect my heart from my best friend. I'd put my mask of indifference back on and watch Simon's mild disappointment merge into his usual smile, not quite as big as before.
Not today, though.
Today I let Simon fumble for the keys and struggle with the lock. I let him usher me in. I watch him kick off his shoes and trousers. I do the same.
And I'm still laughing, we both are – a hand on our stomachs, ungraceful snorts filling up the air – as we get undressed on the welcome rug and spread a lake of water and mud around us. (Ruth will have our heads.) (Like when we stole the cake she had left on the windowsill like proper cartoon villains, and to punish us she did not bake another cake for two weeks. Two weeks. An excessive reaction, if I do say so.)
We've stripped down to our pants when it happens.
Simon's eyes haven't left mine since we got off our bikes. He's never looked at me this way. Or, rather, he has, but never when I let him without running away. Never when I stopped thinking and just waited for the moment to unravel.
His eyes are glowing, stray droplets still hanging from his eyelashes. He's beautiful. He's laughing. He's pressing me to the wall and pushing his lips against mine.
Simon Salisbury is kissing me. Simon. The best friend I've ever had. The scrawny kid who held his hand out to me that winter day I moved into my father’s childhood home, and didn’t lower it until I agreed to shake it. The only person I've ever loved. The person who taught me even I could fall in love. He's got my mouth open and his tongue licking mine. His hands are holding me at the waist. My hands are limp at my sides.
I'm dumbstruck. Paralyzed. Is this heaven? Should I start believing in otherworldly entities now?
Simon takes half a step back and looks at me with a questioning expression, and I know I can't let him think that he's got it all wrong, that I haven't been dreaming of this moment since I understood what wanting someone meant for me.
But I'm still more surprised than him when I take hold of his biceps and push him against the wall, my knee slotting between his legs and a moan escaping my lips as he ruts his hardening cock on my thigh.
I bite his bottom lip and he melts in my arms. “God, Baz,” he groans as my tongue slides against his jaw and I attack his neck with the intent and energy of a desperate vampire. I start sucking at the spot between neck and shoulder, determined to leave my mark, but his back is suddenly sliding down along the wall, dragging me with him and making me pull my lips off his skin. “I thought we'd never get to do this,” he says, his fingers trailing up my naked arm and cupping my cheek. I lay into his touch.
“I didn't think you wanted to,” I reply. He's sitting on the floor with his legs outstretched, and I'm kneeling between his thighs, my hands still holding his shoulders. I let them fall down and smile as his thumb wanders across the side of my face. I’m not even upset that we’ve stopped kissing after barely a minute. We're almost naked on the dirty floor of Simon’s house, and he’s caressing my jaw, and the ghost of a laugh is still hovering around us. And he's Simon. My Simon. And he wants to kiss me. Nothing could upset me now.
“Baz. Baz. Ba-az. You’re so beautiful,” he whines, as if it explains everything. As if my world isn't finally spinning in the right direction. “Of course I want to.”
I snort, and he has at least the modesty to look sheepish. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” he whispers, lowering his gaze until he’s staring at an undefined spot between my left knee and his right leg. “But I-”
“It’s okay,” I cut him off. “I didn’t tell you either.”
His eyes shoot back to bore into mine, and he grabs my hands as if he needs something to hold on to. “No. Let me say this.”
He closes his eyes and takes long deep breaths, and I wait. I’ve always waited for him to find his words, especially when we were kids. That’s why he was often a merboy when we played – merpeople don’t speak like humans do. He would chase me and gleefully shriek in his made-up fish language and we would have entire conversations like that, in non-existent words and verses and gestures, until he tackled me and said, “I’ve got you.” (Apparently he was able to talk the moment he touched me.)
“Baz, you know I'm not the best at… understanding feelings,” he starts, and I squeeze his hands. “And I’m shit at expressing them. The words get jumbled and I never manage to get them out as I want.” He sighs and drags a hand through his damp curls. His hair is no longer buzzed on the sides as it was when we went to school, after a year spent in the fields with only goats and me as company. (And cows. And chickens. And horses. And our relatives.) A bush of curls frames his face, and I can’t wait to sink my hand into it when it’s dry.
“But I know I've never felt for anyone what I feel for you.” My breath catches in my throat, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look away from his glowing blue eyes.
“It's so strong that sometimes I'm afraid I can't contain it all.” Of course you can, Simon, I think. Your soul’s so big that I could lose myself in it.
“You're so bright, Baz.” I almost stop him here. Because he’s the one who’s bright. Like the sun.
“That's why I never told you. Because I feel so much, and I was scared you'd think it is too much too.”
He’s a moron. A splendid moron, and I love him so much. I can’t resist it. I launch myself forward and wrap my arms around him, holding him tight. Hugging Simon has always been my personal source of stress relief, but now I just want to feel him in my arms because I love him. Because he’s solid and real and awkward and so, so lovely.
I press my face on his shoulder and kiss his collarbone before turning slightly so that my words don’t get muffled by his skin. I guess we’re confessing deeply buried feelings three seconds after kissing, and I can’t say I mind. Baring the more profound chambers of my heart to Simon has always felt so natural, as if talking to him is nothing more than talking to myself. (It is more, because he answers and his words blend with mine in a symphony of harmonies, but it’s just as easy and familiar as if we were two strings of the same instrument.)
“Simon,” I start, and I have to clear my throat before attempting to continue. “I've been in love with you since I realised I was able to love someone this way.” I’ve never said this out loud to anyone before. Of course I haven’t – the only person I could’ve told is Simon, and it would’ve meant confessing more than I was ready to declare. There was a moment, when Bunce came out as aromantic two years ago, when I thought I could try, but I didn’t want to steal her moment. I had had my coming out spotlight years before.
“It's hard for me to connect with people. I never feel what I'm supposed to be feeling. I love my family, and my friends, but…” It’s not like me to remain speechless, but I’m not sure I can explain this. If there’s anyone who can understand it’s Simon, and yet I’m afraid I'll never be able to put this into words. I’ll just continue chasing them until they fit in the sequence I’ve been trying to form all my life.
“I didn’t think I was able to fall in love. I’ve wanted you since we were twelve, but I wasn't sure I could feel for you what I thought I should feel.” I lift my head, and Simon’s still smiling, soft and kind.
“And then I did. I fell in love with you, and it was so scary. It wasn’t sudden, but it had slithered silently into me without notice, and when I realised… I didn’t know what I was supposed to do with all that… feeling I did not understand. I thought it was too much, too.”
I peck him on the lips and watch as he shines even brighter. “But it isn’t. It’s perfect.”
We remain silent for a long time after that, the heat of the first minutes dulled by the soft heaviness of our words. I didn’t think it’d go quite like this, if I ever kissed Simon. I pictured searing tongues and more body parts, less talking of feelings we’d never confessed to anyone before. But I guess it fits us, and our summer nights spent lying among Ruth’s rose bushes, shoulder against shoulder, Simon pointing at the stars as we whispered secrets and stupid anecdotes. Or our winter nights curled in my bed, Simon revising Maths rules and History until he got distracted and asked me to tell him a story. (Of princes reading huge books in a tower and half-dragon knights protecting them from the world.)
I’m lost in thought – a spiral of quiet marvel as I replay his sweet words and vague worry at the thought he’ll leave in a few weeks – when his fingers curl around my wrist. “You're freezing, Baz.” He stands up and pulls me with him. “Want to shower?”
I nod and follow him up the stairs, holding his hand. I never want to let go.
And I don’t, not even when he turns the water on and tugs at my boxer briefs to take them off. Not even when he does the same with his and steps into the shower, closing the door behind us.
It’s much more tender than I expected, sloppy and wet kisses under the warm stream, Simon’s soapy hands dancing on my body, mine rubbing his terrible 3-in-1 in his curls, fingers untangling the knots as his hot breath brushes my neck.
My eyes burn when he tries to wash my hair and ends up spreading soap all over my face, and my hand trembles as I wrap it around both our cocks and somehow manage to find a steady rhythm of strokes that leads us over the edge. He holds me tight, after, his lips pressed to my shoulder, my hands on the small of his back, and we sway gently as if we were dancing to an inaudible tune.
When the water threatens to turn cold we step out, fingers once again interlaced as we find towels and try to wrap them around each other, a fit of giggles overcoming us as we realise we should just let go for a second and get dressed. We leave a trail of wet prints on the floor as we sneak into Simon’s room, silent and secretive as if the house wasn’t empty.
He finally lets go of my hand to rummage through his drawers in search of my set of pyjamas and a mismatching selection of clothes for himself, and when we’re both enveloped in those and an enormous blanket we snuggle on the bed, facing each other.
My arm is under his body, one of my legs is slotted between his and the other curled around his thigh. Our heads rest on the pillow, lips mere inches apart, and I’ve never felt more comfortable. I could fall asleep now, but I feel like we have to talk. I don’t know about what, but the urge to just let the words flow is so pressing I can’t contain it.
“Simon…” I start, but he cuts me off with his lips, his fingers sliding into my (still wet, for fuck’s sake, I’ll get the umpteenth cold) hair and his knee moving up between mine. He tastes like butter and dreams come true, like bedtime stories and second chances when the first is not completely gone yet.
Once he’s sure I’ve forgotten all the words I’ve ever known, he takes a deep breath, and I guess maybe we’re on the same page once again. (We always are. I should’ve never doubted it.) Maybe he needs to let it all out too. “Baz… I don’t want to go.”
That’s… not what I was expecting. I almost tell him he can stay, but thankfully I remember we’re in his room. Of course he can stay.
“What do you mean?” I ask, but as I do the harshness of reality dawns on me and I huddle closer to him. I don’t want him to go either, but I know he has to. I know he’ll say that he has to. That he wants to, even.
“I don’t want to go to America. I want to stay here.”
“Of course you think so, Simon, change is scary. But you’ll do great.”
Despite all the concern swirling in my brain around this topic, my body’s betraying me – being wrapped in a warm bubble with Simon is drastically reducing my ability to not blurt out nonsensical clichés. I’d hate myself if I were more awake.
“I won’t, Baz, because I’m not going. I emailed the school yesterday.”
This snaps me out of my blissful state, and I sit up abruptly. “What?”
Simon sighs and rolls on his back, rubbing his eyes too forcefully with the heels of his hands. I take his wrists, gently, and interlace his fingers with mine.
“I really don’t want to, Baz. I’m not even sure I want to go to uni. I like it here, with the goats and Daphne teaching me to ride horses and your father destroying my ears with his endless lessons about planting vegetables. And grandma’s cakes. And you. I mean, you’ll be in London, but still closer than you’d be if I were across the pond.”
“Simon. You shouldn’t give up on a dream for us. We’ll still be here when you come back.” But as soon as I say it I know it’s wrong. I know the States have never been Simon’s dream. I feel a pang of guilt clawing at my chest when I realise I should’ve noticed this months ago. I should’ve seen my best friend feigning enthusiasm for a mirage that was never his. And instead I was too busy being sorry for myself at the thought that for the first time since we were five I would’ve lived away from Simon.
“Okay, this is bullshit.” I lie back down and curl against him, throwing an arm across his chest. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”
He sighs again, and I hug him tighter until turns on his side and relaxes against me.
“I hoped I’d warm up to it. It was my mother’s dream, and she couldn’t live it because… You know why.” I kiss his head. Simon’s felt guilt for his mother’s death since he was old enough to understand guilt. Even before that. “And grandma was so excited when I got accepted. I didn’t want to disappoint her.” He pauses, and shifts in my arms to look at me. “And you. I didn’t want to disappoint you. You were so happy and I felt like I’d let you down.”
“What the fuck, Snow. I was excited for you because I didn’t want to be the petty person who cries when their best friend leaves to live an exciting adventure.” I nuzzle his cheek. “I’ll never be disappointed by your choices, if you use your moronic brain to take them.”
He huffs. “Thanks for the encouragement.”
“I’m very serious. You’re one of the smartest and most mature people I know. Fuck it, you are the smartest. You don’t need to go to college to prove it. Lucy wouldn’t want you to. She’d want you to be happy, whether it entails studying boring stuff among Americans or learning cool farming tricks among goats.” He laughs again against my neck, and it’s good. Maybe we shouldn’t have stopped being reckless children, if it means spending an entire afternoon giggling. “Ruth and I think the same thing. And, egotistically speaking, I’m pretty sure we’d both love to have you here. If that’s what you really want.”
“It is,” he says, and it feels definitive. I rub my hand across his back and he mumbles something unintelligible, snuggling closer to me. He doesn’t add anything, but I guess we’ve gotten enough talking done for today. I feel lighter – elated at the prospect of Simon staying, vibrating with the energy of new beginnings when the end had felt so close – and heavy with sleep at the same time.
I plan on never leaving this bed, so I might as well get cozy and free the arm that’s pinned under his body and is starting to hurt.
“Simon?” I try when nudging him does not work. His eyes are closed and his breath is slow, but I don’t think he’s asleep yet.
“Mh?” he mumbles. “‘M sleepy.”
“Yeah, love, me too. I just thought we could find a more comfortable position.” He nods, but it doesn't look like he intends to do anything about it. “Want to spoon me?” I try again, kissing his nose.
This wakes him up enough, and he loosens his grip on me so that I can roll on my other side. He wraps his arm around my waist, fighting with the blanket to rearrange it over us, but gives up when it’s clear it’s too tangled between our legs and neither of us is willing to move.
I don’t care. Simon’s lips are hot on my neck, his fingers interlaced with mine above my stomach. He’s warm enough to make blankets useless for the rest of my life.
RUTH
The house is too silent when I enter, but it’s only a second of disorientation before I see what happened. Two sets of clothes are scattered next to the door in a muddy heap, and dirty prints signal a clear path up the stairs.
I shake my head and pick the clothes up, then retrace the menaces’ steps with a mop. Of course they’ve showered and devastated the entire corridor, but nothing can be expected from boys. From this special brand of boys, in particular.
I finish cleaning and tiptoe to Simon’s bedroom with a plate of sandwiches and carrot cake. The door’s ajar, open enough that I can take a look without feeling like I’m invading his privacy.
They’re fast asleep in the middle of the bed, my grandson’s chest pressed to Basil’s back, lips against his neck, their fingers interlaced over Baz’s stomach. A thick blanket half-covers them, messy around their tangled legs.
I smile and lay the plate on the desk next to the door, then close it, leaving them to their sweet dreams. It’s about time they got their shit together – we were afraid we would have to spell it out for them.
But I kept holding a little bit of hope. That Basil would stop running and Simon would show him how easy it is, sometimes, to be seen. (My boy’s never been afraid of being himself – he has the same earnest candour and the same fiery confidence my Lucy had.) That the stolen glances over rows of grapevines and the lingering touches as they herded goats would flow into a conscious pattern. (They think I don’t notice, sweet idiots.) That they’d figure it out before summer ended.
And I was right. Daphne owes me a tenner.