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At least it wasn’t raining. That would’ve been a bit much, even for someone as prone to melodrama as he was. Besides, the drink was plenty enough to soak his senses and leave everything as blurry as it would’ve looked through a water-speckled window. Ill-shed tears had nothing to do with it.
The news had come as a shock, but Morse hadn’t paid them much thought after, not with their frantic search for the kidnapped girl who, as it turned out, hadn’t actually been kidnapped at all. He’d only actually started thinking about it on the drive back to the station, after he’d dropped off Thursday, and returning the car and walking home hadn’t been much of a distraction. Jakes, as was for the best, had left as soon as the arrest had been wrapped up, undoubtedly because there was still much packing to do. It wasn’t the sort of rank-pulling that had given cause to Jakes’ shorter shifts in the past - although he’d become much fairer about it after Morse’s return - but something else entirely, something that most of their superiors would understand, Thursday especially. A man needed to think about his wife and family. Of course Morse knew it as well - how could he not have - but it cast a stark contrast against his own hopeless romanticism. It was just him and his record player, and it was a state of affairs that often made him happy, except when emotion came in waves too dark to be weathered by clinging to a vinyl raft. Hence the liquor, and the letter that was probably a horrifyingly bad idea.
What could he possibly achieve through words alone? It wasn’t as if he could beg Peter to stay, to reconsider his happiness and join Morse in his misery instead. He’d known from the start that what they exchanged, the dance of mutual catch-and-release, couldn’t last forever. For a moment it had been him that pulled back from the tension and pretended it hadn’t been there, because he’d fallen in love with Monica, but that had ended for him as unhappily as the rest. He hadn’t expected to return to what had been with Jakes after he’d come back to work, and yet again he’d been surprised - only to be surprised again when the news of the engagement broke.
He’d crumpled up two drafts already. One he’d thought too sentimental, even though he’d nearly run out of words - a detective constable had little reason to declare his warmest affection for a sergeant that, in the eyes of the rest of the station, had at most grown to tolerate him - and the other had read too much like an evaluation report on Jakes’ skill as a detective. No doubt it would make for satisfying reading on the flight over the Atlantic, but it wasn’t what he wanted to convey, and Jakes’ bride-to-be certainly wouldn’t thank him for further inflating that ego.
There was a knock (or crash, given how sloppy it sounded) at the door, and blearily, Morse got up. He was in over his head no matter who it was - he knew he should’ve turned the music down when he’d still had the sense to keep track of the time, and he was in no state to placate a tired upstairs neighbour now. He wasn’t sure how anyone he actually knew would know where he lived, given that he still hadn’t completely finished unpacking. It would’ve felt somehow presumptuous to tell anyone that he’d moved given that there was very little reason for anyone to know.
The door opened to reveal Peter Jakes, still in his suit and tie, but looking considerably less put-together than he had in the daytime. His bravado was gone, too - he wasn’t exactly slouching, but the way he was leaning on the wall with one hand didn’t look very stable, either.
“Why are you here?” Morse asked, even though he suspected Jakes himself knew as little about his reasoning as Morse did.
“Are you drunk?” Jakes countered, stepping in. Morse let him and closed the door behind him with a sigh - the answer to that question was quite obvious to them both, and he knew himself that he should’ve put a cap on the whiskey by now.
“No”, Morse scoffed. He narrowed his eyes at Jakes’ rumpled shirt. “Are you?”
“Not any more than you are.”
“If you’re here about that drink -” Morse started, about to admit that there probably wasn’t enough to last them both that occasion and his own weekend plans, but he couldn’t get the words out before there was a soft mouth on his.
He tasted cigarettes and champagne before pulling away.
“You can’t do this”, Morse said, avoiding Jakes’ eyes. He would’ve walked away had it not been for the insistent hand around his wrist. It wasn’t unlike the many other times he’d been pulled in for a kiss, and that was what made it so painful.
“Please”, Jakes said, almost whispered, and when Morse finally met his ice-blue eyes, he saw that the gentle desperation in his voice was genuine. “Don’t tell me I’m making a mistake, I know.”
“Then why are you here?” Morse asked, frustrated that despite himself, he wanted to stand close to Peter, to hold him and be held, believing that come next morning, everything would be the same as it had been before.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do without you”, Peter said, and this time it was Morse who pulled him in for the kiss, breathless and filled with longing. Peter let go of his wrist, tangling their fingers together instead, and they moved like ebb and flow, the last of Peter’s sticky pomade spread over Morse’s hands and stubble against his chin and neck when Peter’s lips moved down, pinprick-hot and still so soft and sweet.
They fit together in Morse’s bed like they always did, and it was intoxicating to realise that by now they both knew how to make the other come apart with the simplest touch. There hadn’t been any others for Morse in a long while - he didn’t want to think about Peter and his future wife, but thankfully, it seemed like Peter didn’t think of her either as he drew his name from Morse’s lips and let Morse’s name slip in return.
“If the world was different”, Peter said after (almost directly after, still breathless and perhaps too bold because of it), “it could be like this forever. I’d - of course I’d still take care of her, it’s what I want to do, but we could explain why -”
“Don’t”, Morse said, and Peter fell silent as he tugged the covers over them. Morse let Peter rest his head on his chest - he wasn’t angry, not at the situation or the fact that Peter had brought up dreams that would never be - but they didn’t speak any further, because it would’ve eventually dissolved into a recitation of one of Morse’s soppier drafts of the letter, and it wasn’t something Peter needed to hear on his last night in Oxford.
The night slowly turned into morning, and Morse waited for the inevitable only a little lonely. Peter fell asleep in his arms eventually, warm and snoring softly as he often did. Before, Morse hadn’t thought himself capable of letting someone cling to him all night like that, but he found himself treasuring it, feeling the steady rise and fall of Peter’s chest and trying to get his own restlessness to melt away in the embrace.
In some way, it was both better and worse to know that this was the very last night they’d ever share. He was still offended that it had taken Peter so long to tell him - perhaps he’d have had time to get over the heartbreak earlier on, and he could’ve been strong enough to say no when Peter turned up at his door. But at the same time, he wasn’t sure what he would’ve felt if he’d known for a month, or from the day they first met after Morse returned. He didn’t even know how long Peter had known this girl of his, and in light of what he and Peter had done that night, he was probably better off ignorant.
He woke Jakes up eventually, before the sun rose, because he didn’t want to be the reason he went to his fiancée looking like… well, like he did right now. He didn’t tell Jakes as much, but he was pretty sure it was apparent in his eyes. Jakes got dressed in silence, seemingly a little stiff from the cramped sleeping conditions, and Morse couldn’t stop himself from wishing this was just one night among many, when one of them had to leave the other’s flat in time to make himself presentable before work. The worst part of it, really, was that the routine was no different - and yet everything had changed.
“Get out”, Morse said softly, not harsh, but firm. Jakes met his stare with one of his own, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.
“I don’t regret it”, Jakes said, looking very much like he wished he did. “Do you?”
“No”, Morse said, letting out a long sigh as he laid back, claiming his bed for himself. It’d take a long time to get the smell of cigarettes and pomade off his sheets. He didn’t know yet if the reminder would be a sore spot for him or make him grateful.
Jakes looked at him one more time before grabbing his coat. He fumbled with the door - Morse hoped from the bottom of his heart that he wasn’t still drunk - and it took a while before the hinges creaked open. It was an oddly final sound, or rather, a prelude to one - it paved way for the very likely possibility of the crash and click of the door being closed. Maybe that musical understanding of things was what made him act so rashly in the end.
“I love you”, Morse said. There was a pause - a breve at the very least - but Jakes didn’t turn around to look back at him before stepping out and shutting the door behind him. He heard it all the same.
Despite the guilt and shame he felt, Morse finished his letter, if something so brief could be called finished at all. He felt like he was obligated to, out of some misplaced loyalty for a woman he didn’t know. When he left for the pub with the envelope burning a hole in his pocket, he knew that Peter would know what the words meant as soon as he folded the letter open, and that they’d both be better off leaving other doors firmly shut and even unacknowledged.