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It’s 3am at Monmouth Manufacturing and, as usual, Gansey’s wide awake. He’s currently situated on the outskirts of his cardboard replica of Henrietta, on Elm Street, painstakingly gluing little elm trees on each side, for which the street had earned its name.
Gansey’s gotten used to the drowsy sort of quiet that comes with the early hours in Monmouth: occasional humming sounds from the A/C unit, the gentle shaking of the window panes if there’s a misplaced gust of wind, and, on certain nights (when Kavinsky’s around, he thinks darkly), the screeching of tires against the tired pavement.
Sometimes, when Ronan can’t sleep, either, he’ll join him. Sometimes they sit in silence, Ronan watching Gansey add another block to his Henrietta. Sometimes, Gansey’ll watch Ronan put loud music on his headphones and pace back and forth across the length of Monmouth. Sometimes they share what’s been keeping them up at night; sometimes, they’ll go out and get some orange juice.
But tonight, Ronan’s gone off to God knows where-- Bitterly, Gansey thinks, Kavinsky, of course I know where-- and Gansey’s alone.
Or so he thinks. The gentle creak of a door opening and a slight breeze across Gansey’s face lets him know deep down that something else is going on in Monmouth at 3am, something out of the ordinary.
Gansey’s head whips up to scan the outskirts of the darkened room. He squints, although his eyes are already well adjusted to the dim light.
Nothing.
Heart beginning to hammer in his chest, he sets down the mini elm tree carefully and adjusts his wire-rimmed glasses. He makes to stand, but invisible, cold hands gently grab onto his face. A voice that’s more like a feeling than a sound ghosts over his ear.
Breathe.
He blinks. It’s just Noah: his kind and unnerving eyes seeming to see into his very soul. Gansey blinks again.
“Oh.”
“Something wrong?” Noah cocks his head a bit, oddly reminiscent of a dog. Gansey shudders at the sense of quiet that Noah seems to be shrouded in tonight.
Noah seems to notice this, and visibly wilts, and a sudden surge of shame courses through Gansey at Noah’s expression.
“I-- Sorry,” he falters, and slides his glasses down enough to pinch the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger.
(Unbeknownst to Gansey, a hint of a smile quirks the corners of Noah’s mouth upon being granted an apology from Gansey.)
All Gansey sees are Noah’s wide eyes staring at him imploringly, as if waiting for him to elaborate. It works. Gansey folds.
“Ronan,” he says simply, waving his hand half-heartedly around the emptiness that is Monmouth Manufacturing at 3am.
He wants to say more. He wants to tell Noah about how Ronan’s been pulling away from him recently. Or maybe he’s been pulling away from him for a long time and Gansey’s only noticing now. He doesn’t tell Noah that his worst fear is losing Ronan in any capacity: not only to death, but to Kavinsky, because that would be admitting that he does play favorites, in a way. He doesn’t tell Noah that he is so irreversibly fused with Ronan and that Ronan spending time with Kavinsky has been igniting something deep within him that he had thought he had doused long before Noah and Adam and Blue came along. He doesn’t tell Noah that when he dreams, it’s of Ronan’s lips on his own, his hands on his skin, his eyes returned to their brightness, the hint of his old curls present on his buzzed head.
He doesn’t admit that he’ll take any fragment of Ronan that he can get, that he’ll always ache for more of Ronan, but any sliver of him is more than enough for Gansey, because ultimately, Ronan is his.
Helplessly, Gansey lets out a deep sigh and places his head in his hands.
Noah seems to understand, to some level, as he always does in that all-knowing, omniscient way of his. He places a cool hand on Gansey’s shoulder, and a wet laugh is wrought out of him at the whole situation.
“I know,” Noah says simply, and with his unnaturally solid fingers, wipes away the tears that Gansey had somehow collected in his eyes. Noah’s gentle murmur rises to his ear again.
Breathe.
Noah’s so close to him, Gansey realizes then, and he doesn’t think that he’s ever noticed the small scar at the corner of Noah’s mouth, or the way that a few strands of Noah’s fine hair appear to be sweatily plastered to his forehead.
Noah grins then, and too late, Gansey knows he’s allowed himself to blush; he ducks his head away.
Gansey busies himself with screwing the glue cap back on to the bottle and packing up his craft supplies.
“Why were you awake, then?” He asks. Although it’s not as though Noah ever sleeps, he thinks. He just… rests?
Noah doesn’t seem to view the question as peculiar in any way. Instead, he sighs and lies down on his side on the floor, his elbow propping him up as he gazes at Gansey’s concentrated face. He shrugs as well as he can in the odd position, and reaches a hand out to clasp Gansey’s.
Gansey’s breath hitches, and despite his better judgement, he glances over at Noah’s lips.
Ronan, Noah mouths the word, knowing that Gansey’s looking, and he shivers as Noah grins. “And you,” he adds, squeezing Gansey’s hand once before letting go.
“Oh,” Gansey says for the second time in the dim light of Monmouth that early morning, and pink tinges his cheeks. He’s seen how Noah acts with Ronan: how whole they both seem together. In the beginning, Gansey had expected to have been deeply jealous, but he hadn’t been: he’d only felt warmth in his chest when he saw the two of them interact together, and had never been able to place why.
He thinks he knows now, but doesn’t dare to speak it aloud. It would change absolutely everything he’s ever known about himself, about Ronan, about Noah, about how he picks and chooses the people he wants to be friends with.
Friends.
What a stale word to describe what he shares with all of them.
Noah breaks him out of his reverie by placing a surprisingly firm hand on his chest, and Gansey startles, meeting Noah’s eyes with his own.
He’s almost shocked by the openness of Noah’s expression, how vulnerable and self-assured he seems in this moment, and Gansey has half a mind to lean over and press his lips to Noah’s before the door to Monmouth creaks open and heavy footsteps enter the room before pausing audibly.
Gansey wrenches himself away from Noah then, his jackrabbiting heartbeat barely audible in the stillness.
“Hey,” he finds himself saying, his voice coming out rougher than usual.
Ronan wordlessly closes the door behind him and steps further into the room. There’s a tense set to his shoulders that Gansey’s become achingly familiar with: a sort of… frustration that Ronan’s become abundant with each time he returns from whatever the hell it is he does with Kavinsky. Gansey eyes the way he holds himself and wants nothing more than to be both the cause and the cure of his current predicament.
He’s cruelly wrenched out of his fantasy by Noah’s hot breath in his ear. “Why so thirsty?”
Gansey flushes red. Noah looks up at Ronan from his place on the floor and grins widely, eliciting a slight quirk of the lips from Ronan.
“Hey there, stranger,” Noah teases.
Gansey watches as Ronan suppresses a smile. Every part of Gansey feels as though any second now, he could become alight with flames.
“Come join us,” he says thickly, and Ronan doesn’t need to be told twice; he strides over to Gansey and Noah as if it’s what he had meant to do in the first place.
Ronan kneels down in front of Gansey-- as if that doesn’t send all sorts of ideas swirling through Gansey’s brain-- and flicks Noah’s wrist with a nimble finger. Noah playfully frowns and flicks Ronan’s forehead in retaliation. Gansey observes this curious interaction with an air of fondness; warmth settles pleasantly in his heart.
“Where were you?” As soon as Gansey asks, he knows he’s ruined it. But he couldn’t be paid to keep his mouth shut right now: the desire to know if Ronan had been safe overrode his urge to preserve his contentment.
Noah sighs. Ronan’s mouth twists into a scowl. “Where do you think?”
“Kavinsky.”
Ronan throws his head back, baring his throat, and laughs. It’s a beautiful image, one that Gansey could look at forever, but there’s no joy in it; therefore, it’s been tainted.
“Ding-ding-ding! You win the prize,” Ronan snarks, and Gansey watches Noah place his head in his hands out of the corner of his eye.
Almost every part of Gansey wants to argue with Ronan, to question him, interrogate him as to what he and Kavinsky got up to, where they went, why Ronan would even deign to spend time with Joseph Kavinsky, and how he even thought it was okay to throw his whole life away like that.
Almost every part of him.
The other part just wants Ronan to want him.
“I wish you’d been here with me instead,” Gansey says, his voice soft, but his tone firm. He glances at Noah’s still form. “With us.”
Clearly, Ronan isn’t expecting this, because he clenches his jaw and turns away from Gansey’s honest gaze. “Well, I wasn’t,” Ronan says after a short while, and the silence afterwards is almost palpable.
Gansey wishes Ronan would say something more, but he doesn’t. He’s almost admitted defeat when Noah speaks up.
“You’re here now,” he offers, and Ronan exhales long and slow through his nose before curling up on the floor in front of Gansey and closing his eyes.
It’s a deferential position, a vulnerable one, one wracked with apologies: I’m sorry, please trust me again, I’m tired. You know I’m yours.
Gansey feels as though the gift of speech has been stolen from him at this moment in time. So he does the only thing he can think of: he joins Ronan and Noah on the floor, lying curled up so that he faces the two of them. His heart slowly burns with swirls of affection for the two of them as he takes in Ronan’s worried eyebrows; Noah’s inquisitive, teasing eyes.
Ronan opens his eyes and Gansey sees him startle slightly as he realizes that Gansey’s chosen to lie down with him. His eyebrows begin to furrow in confusion, but Gansey just smiles at him tiredly. Ronan takes that as an invitation to relax, and closes his eyes again.
Gansey does the same, taking off his wire-rimmed glasses and setting them down next to his careful pile of unused elm trees. He’s surprised at how comfortable the hardwood floor seems then, at how he hadn’t realized just how tense he himself was until this moment.
“I could fall asleep here if I wasn’t dead,” Noah murmurs, breaking the comfortable silence, and Gansey hums contentedly in agreement. Well, not to the dead part.
It unsettles him when he’s reminded that Noah can’t partake in human things like sleeping anymore, and that he never has as long as Gansey has known him. Ronan clearly feels the same way, because Gansey cracks an eye open and takes note of how one of Ronan’s capable hands has taken Noah’s. Before he can think not to, Gansey takes Noah’s other hand, and watches, pleased, as a warm smile overtakes Noah’s calm features.
Tiredness has finally found a grip on Gansey, and the last thing he registers before he slips into his dreams is the feel of Ronan’s hand slipping into his own.