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Vander doesn't understand his luck.
When he first met Silco his fists had been dripping red with gore, sheets of blood down his face, matting his hair to it, nose broken, lips split. He must have been a sight, standing over his opponent's dead body. He isn't called the Hound for nothing. The scrawny then-stranger had even taken a step back, eyes blown wide with fright, hand fluttering to the hilt of his knife.
It's how they met, so how is he here now, with Silco sitting between his knees, head tilted back, humming a song? Vander combs his dark hair, mesmerised by the way the silky strands course between his fingers, marvelling at the softness of it—that he lets himself be touched at all, with these selfsame hands...
Silco leans into his caresses—a mystery beyond Vander's power to solve, just one he has to accept.
'I think,' Silco says, hands running down Vander's legs to pull at the laces of his boots, 'that we've been on the floor long enough.'
'Why are you undoing my laces if you want us to get up?'
Vander knows why, he simply enjoys the blush that creeps over Silcos' face as he tries to explain himself, all casual-like.
'I was thinking more along the lines of a... relocation?'
Vander engulfs him in a hug, ignoring his surprised protests.
'What are you—' Silco laughs under Vander's kisses, twisting and slapping his knees.
Ever since he grew a beard, kisses to Silco's neck have been a revelation: he's ticklish. A fact Vander suspects only he knows.
'Vander, stop—we can stay—aah!'
Silco's laugh is also unexpected, bright and high, with the odd ungraceful snort. He laughs like a kid—another secret for Vander to keep.
'We can stay on the floor!' he gasps. 'If you want!'
Vander hums and buries his face in Silco's hair, pretending to consider his offer.
'No, I like your idea better.' He rolls forward, passes a hand under Silco's legs and stands from his squat, carrying him up. 'Relocation to the bedroom it is!'
Silco huffs and slaps his chest. 'Take off your boots then! You're gonna track grime on my carpet!'
'Ooh, what a little wife you are!'
'Vander, I will fucking kill you!'
'I love you too.'
That shuts him up. He flops on the bed, looking up shocked at Vander with these teal eyes that always seem to see right through him. Have they not seen this feeling before? Has he not recognised the devotion for what it really is?
'Did you—do you mean that?' he asks, voice small, almost shy.
Vander cocks an eyebrow and carefully steps out of his boots before kneeling on the bed over him.
'I don't know when I started,' he tells him, smiling. 'One day I just realised I couldn't get any luckier, because I had you, right there—'
Even if it makes no sense. Silco's handsome, fuck the idiots who don't see it. He's sharp and cunning. Like a silver-fish, always in movement, always ahead of everyone. He sees far, dreams even farther. He's got more vitality than Vander ever had and all packed tight in that lithe body of his. And then there's that secret side, that laugh, just for him.
Vander doesn't get it. He's big, violent, dangerous. He's got a reputation. For the longest time he had no goals and no future. Everything worth cherishing in his life is something Silco gifted him, so why chose him too? Why laugh just for him?
Why wrap his arm around his neck, bring him down for a kiss? Why look at him like that? Whisper— 'Me too, I love you.'
Vander never did anything to deserve this, but he won't question it.