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Barnaby walked into the apartment and headed straight to the couch, where Kotetsu was watching TV, and collapsed flat next to him. It had been an unexpectedly draining night, and he was very tired.
"Hey, Bunny." Kotetsu set a hand on his head and tugged fingers through Barnaby's hair. "Welcome home."
Barnaby took off his glasses and set them on the coffee table so he could more comfortably mash his face into the couch cushions while Kotetsu played with his hair.
The low-level noise from the television shut off—presumably Kotetsu had recognized that Barnaby wanted his attention now. "Did you have a good time with Ryan and Mattia?"
"Ryan thought I was going to ask him to be my best man," Barnaby told the couch cushion.
Kotetsu's hand stopped moving. "Oh hell."
"Don't stop."
"Bossy," Kotetsu muttered, but he started petting Barnaby's head again. "So uh. How'd that go?"
Barnaby turned his head to the side, partly so he could breathe better and partly so Kotetsu would pet a different part of his head. "It went okay. He looked like I'd kicked a puppy when I told him I'd already asked Mattia, but then Mattia said he'd been hoping Ryan would help him. They were planning a bachelor party when I left."
"I thought you didn't want a bachelor party." Kotetsu sounded like he was smiling.
"I want whatever will make Ryan stop looking like a kicked puppy. If that means I let them drag me out for whatever he deems an acceptable bachelor party, so be it." Barnaby finally lifted his head so he could look at Kotetsu, who was gazing down at him with an expression that was half-amused, half-fond. "Are you having one?"
Kotetsu laughed. "Antonio said we're too old for that and besides, he threw me one already. We're going to get drinks and he said his present would be not telling me to shut up when I talk about how pretty you are."
"Does he normally tell you to shut up?" Barnaby asked.
"Yes."
"Do you?"
"Of course not." Kotetsu gently tugged his ear. "He knew what he signed up for as my best friend. What kind of bachelor party are they planning?"
Barnaby sighed. "I have no idea."
He'd only heard the first part of the conversation before he'd bowed out; Barnaby had thought the three of them were just having dinner together, and then Ryan had sprung the best man thing on him before they'd ordered appetizers. It had taken most of the meal to smooth things out, and he figured it would be easier for Mattia and Ryan to sort details if he wasn't there.
He tugged on Kotetsu's arm and Kotetsu, obligingly, rearranged them so that he was lying behind Barnaby instead of sitting upright. As soon as Kotetsu's arm settled around him, Barnaby felt a final bit of tension eke out of his shoulders, and he melted into the couch.
Kotetsu nuzzled the back of his head. "You know, you can have two best men if you want. I don't mind."
"We agreed on one each," Barnaby said—they were trying to keep the wedding small, after all; Kotetsu had already done this once and both of them would rather spend the money on other things. "Who else would you get?"
"My brother, who else? I stood up for him twice. He can return the favor."
"Your brother has a wife, three children, and a business, which was the entire reason you didn't ask him in the first place," Barnaby reminded him. "It's fine. It sounded like Ryan mostly wants to plan the bachelor party and give a speech at the reception, and I'm happy to let him do both of those things."
"Heh. He knows there won't be video cameras at the reception, right?"
Barnaby poked Kotetsu's arm. "I made that clear."
Kotetsu absently ran his hand over Barnaby's arm. "Well, I'm glad it worked out okay."
"Mm." Barnaby closed his eyes again so he could focus on Kotetsu's touch. Lying on the couch like this had become one of his favorite routines since they'd moved in together, second only to lying in bed together on days they didn't have to get up for work. He hadn't realized how safe and loved it made him feel, how much easier it was to talk about anything when Kotetsu was holding him close.
"I didn't realize Ryan would care," Barnaby admitted. "That I would ask Mattia instead of him."
Kotetsu huffed, and the warm breath sent a shiver down Barnaby's back. "He's your friend. Of course he would care. Your friends want to support you, Bunny-chan."
The way Kotetsu said it sounded so...obvious, like it was a conclusion any reasonable person would have drawn. But it wasn't something that had occurred to Barnaby, that someone would be upset about not being asked to stand up for him at his wedding. "Do you remember what you said to me when we first met?"
Kotetsu laughed, and it rumbled through Barnaby's back. "I said a lot of things to you when we first met."
"No, I mean the first day we were really working together." Barnaby squeezed his arm. "You said, 'You don't have friends, do you.'"
"Ah, Bunny—"
"You were right," Barnaby continued before Kotetsu could start apologizing; that wasn't what he was looking for. "I didn't have any friends then, and I hadn't had friends in a long time. I was too focused on revenge. But now..."
He trailed off, not quite able to find the words.
Kotetsu nuzzled the back of his neck. "You have a lot of friends, now."
Barnaby turned his head into the couch cushion, even though Kotetsu was behind him and couldn't see the smile. "I don't know if three counts as 'a lot,' but—"
"What do you mean, 'three'?!" Kotetsu pinched him lightly. "The whole First League counts! And Kaede would be sad you left her out of that."
"Kaede is thirteen."
"She's going to be your stepdaughter," Kotetsu said. "That counts for something, doesn't it?"
Hell. It did. Barnaby stared vacantly at the opposite wall, revising the mental categories into which he sorted his relationships and, in fact, reindexing which people he had relationships with. Apparently it was more than he'd thought. "I...suppose I have friends and a family, now."
Kotetsu snuggled him hard. "Mm-hmm."
It was something he hadn't had since he was four years old. And, if he were being completely honest with himself... "I didn't think I ever would."
Behind him, Kotetsu stilled. "You didn't think you'd have friends? Or a family?"
"Either." Barnaby's throat tightened. "I didn't think it mattered for the longest time, I didn't think I wanted anything but revenge, but—"
His throat tightened, and he couldn't speak anymore. He'd been lonely; he'd been so desperately lonely and angry and grieving and he'd used the anger to distract himself from the other two. And it had worked, for a time, and then Kotetsu and the others had come into his life and Kotetsu, at least, had not once been deterred by anything that Barnaby had said or done to him.
And now he had friends, he had a family, and while it would never replace what he'd lost, it was more than he'd ever thought he'd have again.
Kotetsu rubbed his arm. "Hey, Bunny, look at me."
Barnaby hunched away instead, even though Kotetsu couldn't see his face. "Why did you bother with me?"
He hadn't meant to ask; the question just slipped out. He'd wondered it so often, why Kotetsu had kept reaching out over and over when all Barnaby did was smack him away. The others, perhaps, would have left him alone after he'd shrugged them off one too many times, but Kotetsu never had, either because he felt he had to or because he wanted to annoy Barnaby or because he just cared about people, wholeheartedly, and Barnaby had somehow become a person that Kotetsu cared about despite all his attempts to stop it.
Kotetsu continued to hold him close, trailing fingers up and down Barnaby's arm. "Well, huh, let me think. It was a long time ago, and I'm old, you know. My memory's spotty."
Barnaby laughed weakly.
"First it was probably because Lloyds threatened to fire me if I didn't. And I didn't really want to get fired over some smartass punk just out of the academy."
Barnaby could hear the smile in his voice, the hint of a lift that said Kotetsu was mostly joking.
"Then you saved Kaede when I couldn't." His voice lost its teasing lilt. "You let me talk to the kid, instead of just arresting him. No matter what you said about points or how you acted, you really did want to help people, too. And—" He cut himself off with a soft curse. "C'mon, Bunny, look at me."
Something in his voice tugged at Barnaby's heart, and he rolled over. Kotetsu's eyes were shining, and he took Barnaby's hand in his and kissed the knuckles. "You're my partner, Bunny-chan. As long as we've known each other, you've been my partner. Of course I'd bother with you. I always will. You're worth it."
The love Barnaby felt for this ridiculous man surged in his chest, and he kissed Kotetsu then, trying to say with his body the things that were still so difficult to get across with words. Kotetsu kissed him back just as fiercely, sliding a hand behind Barnaby's back to pull him close.
"I—" Barnaby started.
Kotetsu kissed the corner of his mouth. "Mm?"
"I realized earlier that I...like my life now," Barnaby whispered, some irrational part of his mind terrified to say the words aloud. "And that's because you're in it."
Kotetsu's face softened, and then he leaned in to kiss Barnaby's neck. "Ah, Bunny. You'd have gotten there, even without me."
Barnaby highly disagreed. "I don't think so," he said. "And if I did, it would have been a much slower process. You make everything brighter, Kotetsu."
Kotetsu kissed him in such a way that meant words were superfluous now, and Barnaby let him, sinking as fully as he could into the moment, holding on to it all as tightly as he could. One of a thousand precious moments in his life now, all the more so for being one he never thought he'd have.
But he had friends now. He had a family.
And most importantly, he had Kotetsu.