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Eight months, twenty-three days, and just about seven hours.
Not that Merlin was counting, or anything.
Not that he had a daily reminder set, or anything.
No, it wasn’t like he was so madly and hopelessly in love with Arthur Pendragon that he knew, down to the hour, how long it had been since Arthur had first asked him to be his boyfriend.
They’d been college roommates years ago, and then they moved out together into a flat in a quiet area of the city. It had lots of windows (per merlin’s request) and easy access to the tube (per Arthur’s) and enough space for them to host a weekly game night with friends (a shared requirement because they had many, many friends). Having been attached at the hip for so long, they hardly noticed when their relationship became something more intimate, something that felt almost like romance. Not soon after, Arthur had taken the leap and asked Merlin out.
It changed absolutely nothing, Merlin realized, months into this new thing that they had – nothing except for the fact that Merlin could now kiss Arthur senseless when he was being annoying or let Arthur hold him in bed when the night got too chilly. The only thing that did change was how Merlin viewed their relationship after the startling realization that he’d been in love with Arthur for years: probably even since they first met.
And. Well. There wasn’t much else to do about it except tell Arthur, only Merlin’s brain to mouth filter hadn’t been working ever since his revelation and he ended up saying “I love you” at the end of a phone call.
Which was possibly the worst way this could have gone.
“Arthur?” Merlin said quietly, when he only heard silence and the faint ticking of Arthur’s fancy watch through the phone. Arthur hadn’t disconnected, which was a good sign, but he also hadn’t said anything, which was quite possibly what was going to send Merlin into early heart failure.
Finally, Arthur said, after a strained breath, “I’ll see you for dinner yeah?”
“Yeah,” Merlin croaked, and then the line went dead.
________
They didn’t talk about it during dinner.
Merlin was too busy spiraling mentally to really pay attention to the conversation, anyway.
What if Arthur didn’t love him? What if this was just a casual thing? What if Arthur had planned on breaking it off anyway because Merlin wasn’t good enough for him?
He could barely sleep that night, despite Arthur’s warm chest against his back and his strong arm slung around his chest, hand over Merlin’s heart.
It felt like a lie.
If Arthur truly loved him, why couldn’t he say it back?
________
A week passed and they didn’t revisit the “L” word again. Merlin made sure he didn’t slip up again, made sure he didn’t panic and spill every fear that had mounted in his head since that call, made sure that, if this was truly the end of them – if Arthur didn’t love him and they were doomed to break up anyway – that he took advantage of every last moment they had together. He knew Arthur could tell, though. He may be emotionally constipated, but the man wasn’t stupid. He’d been shooting him funny looks all week when Merlin would fake a laugh or sit quietly on his own for long. And then, damn him, he kept doing little things for Merlin like washing his clothes for him or baking the little shortbread cookies that Merlin loved so much and it was so utterly baffling that Arthur could act so like he was in love but refuse to admit it out loud.
With mounting dread, Merlin resigned himself to their inevitable doom. This wasn’t going to work. He would eventually have to move out. Maybe he’d find somewhere in the country, a quiet little shack that no one knew about. He could become a baker, maybe, or learn some trade that kept him far, far away from people. And Arthur. Oh, but what hell that would be.
Maybe he could visit – Arthur would surely keep the flat. Well. Not visit, per se, but wander around the area until he saw that Arthur was fine and then he would go back to his hobbit hole in the woods like the perfect little recluse he was. It most definitely wouldn’t be stalking , that would be ridiculous–
Merlin nearly jumped out of his skin when his phone rang. He hurriedly set down his tub of ice cream and patted himself down for his phone, only to realize it wasn’t his that was ringing. Arthur’s phone in its sleek gray case was inching itself off the kitchen table with every impatient vibration.
Arthur was at work, Merlin realized, as he threw himself across the room to grab it, and he’d left his phone by accident and was probably just barely keeping it together without his veritable lifeline. Holding it like one might hold a live grenade, Merlin glanced at the caller ID. It was Morgana, Arthur’s sister, and another old friend of Merlin’s. Why she was calling Arthur at a time like this was a mystery likely known only to her, and maybe somewhere deep down Merlin regretted throwing Arthur to the lioness’ den for not picking up her call, but he really couldn’t be arsed about that when he was now faced with another realization:
Merlin was a private person. Arthur was not.
Merlin locked every single device he owned. Arthur did not.
Merlin respected privacy.
Correction: Merlin normally respected privacy.
Arthur’s phone was something of a disaster, with only the home page neatly sorted for work appearances and the rest filled with an amalgamation of random apps. Idly, Merlin sifted through his home screens, snorting at the frankly absurd number of games Arthur had apparently installed. Not that Merlin hadn’t seen him play any of them, but it was truly hilarious to know that Arthur was just as swayed by shitty advertising as he was.
In stark contrast to the messy home screen, Arthur’s photo gallery was neatly organized into albums. At least fifty of them sorted memories down to years and who was in each photo. Merlin felt himself beaming uncontrollably at the sight of the folder labeled “First Date” with an endearing assortment of heart emojis following. The pictures showed their evening spent at home, just like every other evening, except between bouts of chaotic food fights (and one memorable moment in which Merlin dared Arthur to eat an entire sprig of basil) there were also shots of them kissing, interspersed with little video clips of Merlin’s back or the side of his face as he cooked. He hadn’t known Arthur took those. He’d only seen the ones where they were intentionally posing for a photo.
Intrigued, Merlin scrolled through more albums. Some were filled with photos of holidays, some with birthdays, some filled entirely with things that had made Arthur laugh (half of which he recognized from the times Arthur had held out his phone and said “Merls, look” while trying not to choke on his laughter), and there was even one dedicated to a pigeon Arthur swore up and down had stalked him through London proper.
But most startling of all was one that read “love of my life <3” and Merlin could only stare in shock at his own sleeping face on the album cover.
Hundreds of pictures, all of him. Hundreds of pictures that captured tiny moments in Merlin’s life in Arthur’s presence. He’d taken screenshots of times Merlin had fallen asleep on FaceTime, or of when he was laughing so hard his eyes crinkled and his cheeks dimpled in the way Arthur called hilarious but apparently was so in love with that he’d wasted what must have been far too much storage space on his phone taking duplicates of those very moments.
By the time he got to the bottom, he was in tears. Tears that Arthur could care so much, that he’d been hiding all this time that he loved merlin, truly and wholly loved him, loved all the times he woke up gross and smelling like shit, or when he had food on his face or when he was clumsy and did something stupid. Arthur loved all of it.
Arthur loved him.
“Merlin?”
Arthur’s soft voice snapped Merlin out of his head and he glanced up through blurry eyes at his boyfriend who he hadn't even heard come in, standing there with his briefcase and looking so utterly flabbergasted that Merlin couldn't help but crack a wobbly smile.
“You do love me,” Merlin breathed.
Arthur looked between his phone and Merlin’s teary face, and Merlin could see the realization dawn on him.
“Oh,” he said quietly. His briefcase slipped from his fingers as he made his way to the couch where Merlin sat. “Is….is that why you've been acting like a kicked puppy all week?”
Merlin shifted a little to make way for Arthur, who hesitantly took one of his hands and then dug a goddamn handkerchief out of his jacket pocket. “I thought you might have noticed,” he told him instead of answering.
“Merlin,” Arthur said slowly, a tinge of desperation to his voice, “explain it to me?”
Merlin wiped at his eyes with the handkerchief. “It's stupid, really, I should have known you loved me but I’ve been so damn stressed about it for the past week–”
“Of course I bloody love you!” Arthur said in disbelief.
“Then why didn't you say it back?”
Arthur’s face fell. “I don’t….I don’t really know. Maybe because I was scared? It’s a big step, and it’s not that I wouldn’t have meant it, but saying it aloud? Makes it more real, you know.” His hand was slowly gripping Merlin’s tighter, so Merlin stroked the back of his hand with his thumb. “And, erm, also because I thought maybe you didn't mean it, or if you did that you weren't really serious about.... us .”
Merlin felt himself unable to stop the shaky smile on his face. “I've always been serious about you, and about us. And also you're really quite thick if you thought I wasn't.”
Arthur grinned back. “That must make you an idiot, then, to think I didn't love you in the first place.”
Merlin snorted and buried his face in Arthur’s shoulder, sighing when Arthur’s arm came up to wrap around him. “We're both idiots then.” Arthur pressed a kiss to his hair, chuckling. “I can't believe you let me fret for a whole week over this.”
“It’s not my fault you're a worry-wart. And a massive snoop to boot.”
Merlin faked a dramatic gasp and dug Arthur’s phone from the couch cushion. He pressed it into his boyfriend’s chest with a pout. “It was unlocked, you prat .”
“That doesn't mean I meant for you to look through the entirety of my photo gal– Shit! Why didn't you tell me Morgana called? Dammit, I completely forgot we had dinner plans!”
Merlin felt his heart sink. “You have to leave, then?”
Arthur did a double take at the look on Merlin’s face. “Hmm? What? No! Bloody hell, no, I’ll reschedule, tell her I'm busy.”
Merlin blinked. “Busy doing what?”
“You,” Arthur said with a grin, and Merlin threw his head back and laughed with relief, laughed at how stupidly cheesy the line was before pulling arthur in for a sloppy kiss.
And Merlin realized, home wasn't this apartment, wasn't back in Wales, wasn't some reclusive cottage in the woods; it was Arthur, wherever he was and wherever he went, because they were idiots but they loved each other, wholly and truly.
“Say it for me?”
Arthur's eyes crinkled as he smiled. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
Yes. Arthur was his everything .