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0.
(00 Days : 00 Hours : 00 Minutes : 22 Seconds since he's been shot)
Harry lives. He's alive and he knows it.
Because he can feel the scorch of the Kentucky sun as the gravel dug into the stab wound in his shoulder. The sharpness of the pain was all too present to indicate that he wasn't dying. But at the same time even though he was aware he was paralyzed. Harry could only lay there--his right eye, something had happened to his right eye--as the sun slowly eclipsed his vision. His heart was thundering in his chest because he was falling into the light unsure if he was going to land in a hospital bed or a grave. And then he faded out.
1.
(19 Days : 15 Hours : 35 Minutes : 08 Seconds since he's been shot)
When he wakes at the all too familiar sounds of ventilators he has to admit he almost relishes the feeling of choking on the breathing tube, because he is alive. Harry then realizes that he only sees half the room when he blinks his eyes open and sees Eggsy holding his left hand although he can feel his right arm being held lightly at the wrist as the doctor measures his heartbeat.
Harry begins to wonder what being "alive" entails now.
2.
(19 Days : 15 Hours : 55 Minutes : 21 Seconds since he's been shot)
He makes sure his first words to Eggsy when he wakes up are, sounding as dry as death, another set of words at the tip of his tongue: "I am so proud of you."
And Eggsy's are, voice almost as rough as Harry's: "I love you, you bastard." Eggsy brings his hand up to his lips and kisses his knuckles.
Harry's unsure if his heart has ever felt this full.
Eggsy had become Harry's Eliza. His fair gentleman. When he tells Eggsy such. Harry's unsure if Eggsy's crying because of his laughter or laughing because he's crying.
3.
(21 Days : 05 Hours : 31 Minutes : 01 Seconds since he's been shot)
When Harry is finally able to stand and move around he makes sure to shoo Eggsy away to go shower and eat. Eggsy goes reluctantly and leaves Harry's glasses (fixed on Harry and with Merlin's voice softly coming from them) behind as insurance. Harry precedes to then lock himself in the bathroom.
And he can't stand to look in the mirror.
Because where his right eye was before is a horrid mass of scar tissue. It looks as if a star has burst in his eye socket. Then behind the phantom of his right eye he can remember the burst of the blonde bigot's head when he had turned around and without thought, the gun is in his hand--
He punches the mirror, he's unaware that he's screaming until Eggsy's arms around him and they're under the warm spray of the shower. His mouth is gasping as the shower's spray rains on him. Harry's hands are a mess of mirror shards, soap, and blood. He had been trying to scrub them clean.
This is the first indication to Harry that coming back to life is going to be difficult.
Before the doctors and nurses can discover the mess Eggsy makes sure they are "discharged" and within the hour Eggsy has Harry, bound in blankets and in a nurse's uniform, en route to London. This is when Eggsy slowly ties a leather eye patch over his eye socket, hand resting on his cheek for 36 seconds. He counted.
4.
(25 Days : 10 Hours : 04 Minutes : 23 Seconds since he's been shot)
When Eggsy and Harry got off the plane at the Kingsmen Mansion Harry was in a daze. He vaguely remembers hugging Merlin, his brother in arms for more than twenty years, to the point his bones creaked and clasping hands with Roxy, the new Lancelot and his heart still aches at the thought. He's told the other Kingsmen are running amok, attempting to reset order to the world. Harry's glad he doesn't have to face them, he squirms at admitting this to himself.
Then when Eggsy isn't looking, he runs away. Is in the tube to the tailor's shop before anyone can protest.
Harry will never be sure how he got home from the tailor shop, but he is in enough presence of mind to initiate the lock down. Steel covers the windows, every signal and form of communication is stone walled, and Harry is left in a timeless dungeon of his own creating.
He wanders as a specter in his own home. Although he walks by his closet, filled with his pristine suits and robes, he makes no attempt to change, to reveal his own body to himself. He doesn't want to see how he's atrophied by his own eyes. His hair is a nest of madness from the tugging of his hands because when he walks around in his own space, a place that had been his and safe his whole time as a Kingsman, he flinches at the mere creaking of wood because the residual crack of Valentine's gun rings in his ears.
He's bruised all over his body from running into tables and chairs and tripping over rugs and coffee tables. His dead eye a constant reminder as it's death took his depth perception and balance. Harry soon begins to kick things out of his away, smashing furniture he had once lovingly chosen when building a home, growling under his breathe. He wants to tear everything apart. He's disintegrating in his own darkness.
He leaves his office alone, those red walls too much for him now.
To his mounting frustration the first night when he attempts to go asleep (ignoring the pounding at his door) he wakes up screaming. The blurred images of that damned Kentucky church, of Valentine giving his lisping monologue, and the blinding sun haunt him to wakefulness. When he goes to the den he attempts to pour himself scotch, determined to drink himself into unawareness.
But his hands shake so much that not even an ounce of scotch, a beautiful 200 hundred year old gold, makes it into the tumbler.
The next devastating truth of what Valentine has taken from him thunders through him: He'll never shoot a gun again.
Valentine has taken away his very definition: a Kingsman. Because what Kingsmen can't shot?
Valentine has marooned him, even in death. He feels nauseous from the want to maim Valentine washes over him. Another part feels relief at knowing he's incapable of holding a gun again--Kentucky--he'll likely be unable to hold a weapon proficiently again--Kentucky--but then how will he be a Kingsman--who is he now--
The scotch breaks spectacularly against the wall.
5.
The whole time he's locked away from the world all he can think about is Eggsy. His father was long dead. His mother half aware with a saturated liver probably continuing her seasonal visit in the Caribbean where she hasn't thought of children since they left her womb. His once beloved brother, after failing the Kingsmen exams for Galahad's position to his own brother, was probably with his family in Italy--his family that he's refused to let Harry see and Harry respectfully didn't.
All he could think about is how Eggsy had risen like a phoenix from the ashes of Harry's "death". The fierce cut of him in his suit with his glasses and umbrella, a true knight. He thought of how Eggsy would tease him, how he seemed to be enlivened by their banter. Harry remembered how he was content to slow himself to Eggsy's pace, he remembers how he felt every time their eyes met since that day at the police station.
But all his thoughts always disintegrate into how he's happy that he did not tell Eggsy "I love you" when he woke up. Because he cannot allow Eggsy to come closer--cannot let Eggsy to become chained by his words.
Harry's a ghost. When he wakes up screaming, howling into the dark house. He's sure it's the world's (not God, never him) way of telling him he should have stayed in the dark.
6.
(27 Days : 23 Hours : 02 Minutes : 55 Seconds since he's been shot)
One day, he's unsure which anymore, there's a tentative knock on his door.
Rising from his nest of wreckage in his den (the drapes had been torn down, the coach gutted, the bottles behind the bar smashed as he had run around his house in blind rage) he peers out the door.
It's Daisy.
Harry vaguely remembers Eggsy telling him excitedly how he was able to move next to Harry's house, able to give his mother and sister a proper house. Paralyzed he sees how she peers up at the door. He thinks he should move, away from the door, back into the dark of his house.
Her next knock frees him, but instead of moving away he finds he's punching the code into the security by the door. He does it twice, his hands still shaking. Next he's opening the door. The breeze of rain filled air brushes against his face. He can feel the staleness of his own skin.
"Hello, mister," Daisy's voice is the honey sweetness of a young child, "I was wondering if you have a cuppa of sugar? My mommy and I are making cake!" She points to the left, "We live right there!"
Harry flounders.
"Um," he winces when he hears his own voice, "L-let me go inside and see." He makes a heel motion to Daisy as if she was a little beast, "J-Just give me a second." He doesn't know why, but he feels his face attempt a fractured smile (if feels fractured) and tacks on, "Madame."
He can hear her giggle as he turns back into his house.
Quickly he walks into the kitchen, almost tripping over the destroyed table. The light that filters in from his drape-less windows, the lock down shutters gone, make him wince. Soon he begins to bang around in his cabinets sure he left the sugar--He freezes.
Arms bracket around him, caging him against the counter. Harry turns to face him.
His mouth is dry when he says, "Using your own sister to infiltrate my home? How shameful."
"You left me no choice," Eggsy's mouth was a sharp line of disapproval. His eyes crawl over Harry and Harry is mad at himself how much the stare makes him want to squirm. He bloody taught Eggsy that look.
Eggsy's next question startles him, "Do you love me?"
Harry in such a short span of time once again flounders. Before he can make any move to answer however Eggsy barrels over him.
"Because I love you." Eggsy declares, "I liked you that moment in the bar when you tore through those men like a lion. I was infatuated with you the moment when you gave me the chance to be a Kingsman. But I knew I loved you the moment when you were shot." He leans closer, his breath washing over Harry's face. Clean shaven cheeks so strange against the bristle of his cheeks, "So when you woke up I permitted you to run away from me. I left you alone." His lips dance across Harry's, "But I won't let you hide forever, because you are mine. Time gave me another chance with you and I am not letting anyone, even you, take it from me."
Then he's gone and Harry collapses against the counter, his heart pounding so hard he's sure his ribs are close to fracturing. Turning back to the counter looking for the sugar he instead finds a leather eyepatch, the Kingsmen insignia embossed in gold across it.
7.
(28 Days : 05 Hours : 47 Minutes : 24 Seconds since he's been shot)
The next day Harry shaves. He nicks himself three times on his right check, he promises himself the next time it will only be two. He fights the tremor in his hand. Buttoning his shirt takes two times and it takes ten minutes to style his hair just right with the struggle of the eyepatch to consider.
Staring at his face, the Kingsmen insignia framed by his spectacles Harry cannot help the sweat that gathers in his hands as he takes in his gauntness. Sees how much he was not the man he was before. It takes him another ten with briefcase and umbrella in hand to gain the courage to open the door.
After he locks the door of his house he turns to see Eggsy leaning against a car alongside the curb. Forcedly sedated he walks towards him. Eggsy goes as far to open the passenger door for him when he approaches, his grin big enough to split his face when Harry frowns at him. Thankfully he makes no comment on how Harry clasped his hands firmly in his lap to diminish the shaking.
Eggsy helps him from the passenger's seat again in front of the tailor shop and laughs at Harry's huff of frustration. They go to the Fitting Room and when they get out of the tube Merlin is waiting for them. And Harry pauses, is unsure of how they stand. Will he be greeted as, "Galahad" or "Mr. Hart"? Will he be told to gather his possessions or--
"Arthur," Merlin greets and Harry freezes for a second. His mind quickly winds through what the title means. A small part of him knew this would happen. A large part of him is grateful: he's still a Kingsman. A tight knot in his chest loosens some what.
"Merlin," he nods and Eggsy's hand is heavy on his shoulder. It doesn't leave his person even as they sit a the round table, all the knights visages visible though the lens over his left eye as they toast him. When Eggsy leaves to meet the recruits, Harry makes sure not to place his hand over where Eggsy's hand been. Even when he is alone in his new office, which he takes great joy in erasing the previous Arthur's presence.
But he cannot deny the fissure of pleasure he felt when leaving HQ and Eggsy's hand returns onto his skin and stays on his person until he leaves him in front of his door that night.
He doesn't comment on how his house has been cleaned and the food in the fridge as been restocked when Eggsy invites himself over less than an hour later with Daisy on his hip and ready to make spaghetti. His hand on Harry's elbow as he helped him steady his shaking hands as he stirred the noodles.
Later, he lays in his bed with a full stomach and remembering how Eggsy, Daisy sleeping on his chest, kissed Harry's cheek in farewell. The imprints of Eggsy's hands burns him throughout the night.
8.
(45 Days : 19 Hours : 27 Minutes : 01 Seconds since he's been shot)
Harry's physical therapy is going well. Harry knew he was never going to be back on the field, the ability to adapt to the loss of his eye and be at the same level of competence is impossible. He was adapting to being one eyed, a "Cyclops" Eggsy teases him. Eggsy had even helped him rearrange his house to accommodate the change in vision. His inability to return to the field was highlighted when he locked himself in the Mansion's shooting range for an hour and ended up with being sick in a bucket full of bullet casings. But it was not an excuse to let himself become weak at his new "desk job." Although he felt grimy after dancing with politicians and bureaucrats his work still held him strong because he cared about his Kingsmen, his family much longer than his family by blood.
Even his therapy therapy was going well. That is once the mandatory therapist had complained to Eggsy about Harry just staring at her unblinking until each session was over. He's still unsure how she knew of their... particular acquaintance, but then Kingsmen were known to gossip.
After speaking to him in Arthur's/Harry's office Eggsy had kneeled before him unabashedly even though Harry had flushed to the roots of his hair, worried some would walk in on the display. Eggsy traced the small scars over his hands, asking him to try the therapy. To truly try. Harry had stood firm against Eggsy's beseeching, fiddling uncomfortable with his eye patch, until Eggsy had omitted that he could hear Harry scream and cry at night in his bed next door.
As a man of violence he usually believed in ignoring the emotional problems and to bury them. Therefore Harry was reluctant to admit that the therapy had helped when he became an active member. He had even had a streak of three days without nightmares as an result.
The nightmares fluctuated. For some days at a time they seemed to be diminishing, their faces fading like an off focus camera or smudged lens. The pleasure in his body at killing and maiming those innocent people (as much as they were bigots) was leeching out of his body's memory. He was growing to accept that he could not help what he had been forced to do.
But then one night he woke aching and hard. Arousal and adrenaline coursing through him. His eye socket aching to the pulse of his heartbeat as he could remember with both of his eyes, the images as clear as day, how he tore through those disgusting people ruthlessly. How it had been a dance of adrenaline and knives and his body buzzed in a way that it never had and never will again.
He bite his lips bloody trying to contain his sobs. Shakily he reached for his phone and dialed a number his muscles could dial without prompting.
"I need you," was all he said before hanging up. He tried to curl as tightly as he could in his sheets to gain warmth.
Downstairs he could hear the door open (only one person had those keys), the creak of his bedroom door. The sound of a body sliding into the sheets behind him was an booming echo in a drowned cave. The arm that wrapped around his waist, hands gently stretching them from their cramping paralyzation, the feel of a mouth pressing against his neck sent him spiraling into dead sleep. There were no nightmares.
That gentle touch lead him to dreams that broke like fine spiderwebs when he woke up.
9.
(52 Days : 08 Hours : 45 Minutes : 58 Seconds since he's been shot)
Eggsy slept in his bed every night since Harry called. Harry hadn't had any nightmares for the past week. When Eggsy gone as far as to clear a drawer for himself Harry had simply helped him instead of stopping him. He ignored how brightly Eggsy smiled, teeth and all, when he found that Harry had purchased him a toothbrush and particular toothpaste.
Merlin, it seemed, had a compelling need to comment on it.
"You're looking better there, Arthur," Merlin said, mixing his tea. "Less of an impression of a panda nowadays."
Arthur continued on will his paper work, ignoring his old friend. Tea with Merlin had become a habit in his more sedentary job. He didn't even flinch when Merlin put his feet on his desk, although he grimaced.
"I hear body pillows are all the rage nowadays," Merlin added, snorting into his tea.
Harry placed his pen softly on the desk. Rested his chin on the diamond of his hands. What Harry said was: "Do we need to speak of proper privacy protocols of the glasses again?"
What Harry didn't say was: "I know how Eggsy looks in the morning when he's just woken up. I know the feeling of his warmth against my back reminds me that I am alive and not under that Kentucky sun anymore. I know how Eggsy gets ready in morning, how he sleepily shaves and brushes his teeth. I know how Eggsy is so affectionate, hands grabbing at me as if he cannot resist. How he kisses my eyelid, my forehead, and cheeks, how he worships the scars over my eye socket as the sunrise and moonlight dances on our skin."
Merlin gives a smirk, "Nope."
Arthur returns to his paper work. And freezes when Merlin says, "There's a mission for Galahad. In America."
Arthur keeps his face as stoic as he can when Galahad comes in rambling on about the misadventures of the new recruits and announces, "You have a mission."
10.
(53 Days : 23 Hours : 23 Minutes : 03 Seconds since he's been shot)
Eggsy is promptly sent to America. Harry refuses to acknowledge that this is his first mission that is abroad and more than a day.
Harry struggles to be stable without him there. Harry almost didn't realize how paramount Eggsy had become to his everyday routine until he is gone.
He makes more breakfast than he needs to and rushes more in his morning routine in the bathroom although there is no one waiting for him to finish up. His drive to the shop is more quiet and his day has no lighthearted interruptions aside from Merlin. Harry forgets lunch. Returning home is a quiet affair. At dinner he makes the same mistake as he did at breakfast, packaging the extra food besides cold eggs and sausage. He lays in bed at night for half an hour before he fully realizes that it'll only be him tonight. That he was waiting for someone not even there.
The nightmares sink their claws and tear through him that night.
Shame grows in him when he wakes up, sweating and twisted in sheets. He's never been this reliant on someone before. Wasn't even this coddled or needy with his own mother, that had foisted him on nannies as soon as he could take formula. He doesn't quite know what to do with himself. Has never faced this kind of dependency or love in someone not blood related. He loves Eggsy. His love for Eggsy has replaced the marrow in his bones. But he can't help question how long will Eggsy be here. Because he knows that Eggsy....
These thoughts haunt him the whole time Eggsy is gone.
11.
(57 Days : 07 Hours : 34 Minutes : 12 Seconds since he's been shot)
Love for Harry had changed throughout the years. Before it was explosive and bombastic, an enviable whirlwind of passion and sex. Love was the same as the rock and roll that played on the radio, unbeknownst to his parents, as he was driven to school and hid in his room from his parents. It was rolling hips and flying tits; drugs in the bathroom and skin hungry hands.
But as he aged he began to think it more simple and sophisticated, it became slow passion with fine dining and diamond necklaces proclaiming possession. Love became the puzzle pieces of a red dress and tux for a night at the gala or ball, being the paramour of a target, being the sweetness of a honeypot. Harry did love all his targets in someway, missed the the fleeting picture perfection he made with them.
But after that Day, the day he meet Eggsy, to Harry love became engagement. It became the excitement of sharing space and sparring with words. Love had reawaken to be something electrifying for him and recalling the zest and lust of his twenties. In the back of his mind Harry wondered if love with Eggsy would ever transform to sharing the quiet together and kisses with no goal of coitus. Or if everything with Eggsy was a sordid affair. Harry knew his age, knew his appeal to the young was limited and with a clear expiration date. That's why he was withholding the truth from Eggsy.
But after V-Day Harry realizes love is how Eggsy touches his hands to steady them and how Eggsy curls around him at night no matter if the sheets are slowly roasting them as if he's sheltering him from everything. Love has become the dent in the right side of the bed, closest to the door, and the second pair of shoes In the foyer. Harry realises love is how Eggsy slides his hand to caress Harry's right cheek and Harry doesn't flinch.
Harry has fallen for Eggsy so much that he's reach the center of the Earth and he cannot keep the burning question from himself: Is this the love Eggsy wants? A quiet that may not be the brashness of a tornado but hasn't Eggsy heard how the beat of a butterfly's wings causes mountains to crumble? But he doesn't ask. Because he doesn't want the answer just yet.
12.
(64 Days : 09 Hours : 59 Minutes : 05 Seconds since he's been shot)
He keeps forgetting to eat.
Merlin starts bring him lunch alongside his tea. Merlin doesn't attempt to lecture him anymore simply leaving paper notes under the plates with the words "GIT" or "WANKER" written across.
Harry absentmindedly will pick at it silently listening to to Eggsy and Merlin sass at each other the comm link.
Eggsy will always say: "Good morning, Harry." and "Good night, Harry." each day. And that is the only way Harry is able to keep track of the days.
He doesn't speak because he knows all that would come out is: "Come home, come home now."
13.
(72 Days : 01 Hours : 03 Minutes : 39 Seconds since he's been shot)
Harry startles awake when he feels an arm wrapping around his waist, exhaustion so strong that his body does not rouse until someone is in his bed--he's reaching- for the knife under his pillow but a hand is grasping his and threading their fingers together--
When Eggsy's voice, against his ear, goes, "Shh, darling, it's me," Harry breaks into sobs.
Harry's never cried this much in his life. Gone is the strong Galahad to leave this weak visage of a man whose hands shake and cannot make it through a night alone. No matter how long he was in the field being shot at, tortured he's never had his body act this way. Lord's sake, he didn't even shed a tear at his father's funeral, who would have abhorred such a display. His stomach is heavy with humiliation to be reduced to this at his age, a needy, tear stained thing. He continues sniveling even as Eggsy turns him in his arms and kisses at his tears from his one eye.
"What's wrong, darling," Eggsy soothes, worry thick in his voice, "What's wrong?"
He's crying so hard he's gasping and the words as flooding against the dam in his throat until they burst out, disgusting and slimy. Burning the roof of his mouth.
"I love you," Harry's voice cracks. "I love you so much I can't even function without you. And I don't even know when I fell in love with you." Harry's hands twist in Eggy's shirt as if he can rip a piece of Eggsy all for himself. Hands shaking like leaves in a hurricane. He hides his face in Eggsy's neck where his scent is heavy. "I'm an old, selfish thing. I want you so much although I know you should be with someone your age, with their whole life in front of them. Not a man with his eye gone," He brushes a hand agains the white scars that cover his eye socket. "Not a man wracked with nightmares every night. Not a man whose hands can't handle a bloody gun anymore, who can't protect you. Not someone so disgustingly weak."
He breathes against Eggsy's tear stained, wishing he could swallow him whole, "I won't face the indignation as you watch me wither from time." Harry lets his lips mouth against Eggsy's baby smooth skin, "Time is a unbridgeable gulf between us."
"I love you," Harry repeats, his tone rust. "And I love you enough to ask you, beg you, to leave me."
But Eggsy ignores his warnings. Kisses his lips, kisses his eye patch. Eyes soft and loving as he chants, "You love me. You love me. You love me." His voice is a mixture of bewilderment and excitement and another emotion Harry had never truly acquainted with before.
Harry feels helpless to these emotions and can only respond, "I do. I do. I do." as Eggsy digs his fingers into him, as Eggsy thrusts into him, craving himself into Harry as deep as he can. All Harry can do is gasp and cling to Eggsy, let him have his way with him.
"I love you," Eggsy growls in his ear. "I'll love you till we're both dust. I love'd you til death and now I'll love you for the rest of our lives."