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If Liam is being honest, there’s something about walking through the winding streets of Mykonos that just erases every single ounce of stress from his shoulders or that’s what he tells himself, at least.
The midday sun shines above him and rests delicately on the back of his neck as he stops against a wall and closes his eyes just feeling the heat glide across his face and reddening cheeks before the sound of a child’s squealing and the sound of sandals slapping against the ground opens his eyes for him.
Liam pushes himself off the wall and politely dodges the little girl spinning around in a striped sundress who almost collides with him and he walks down a couple of steps with the intention to head to the beach to make the most of the sun before it becomes too crowded.
Once he feels the soft sand underneath his shoes, he looks around the beach for a spot away from vacationing families with his hand shielding his eyes but no matter which direction he moves, there’s a brightly coloured towel laid out on the sand or a half built sandcastle and everywhere he looks there’s children.
He settles for sitting on a wall at the edge of the beach, legs swinging back and forth as he digs his palms into the rough stone. The sun, despite the temperature does little to stop the shiver that Liam has as he lifts one hand to rub across his bicep to take away the chill that comes out of nowhere.
It doesn’t take much longer for Liam to feel restless despite having nowhere to be, nothing to do and with an island full of exploration over the next few days at his disposal so he gets up and leaves the beach walking across the edge until he moves through a small crowd outside of a bar. He heads towards the stairs pulling his sunglasses from the top of his head and sliding them on before allowing an elderly woman to pass him before he’s jogging up the stairs with the sound of the waves quieting the restlessness in his head.
“Liam?”
A voice calls out his name just before he takes the last step, stopping him so abruptly that he has to press his hand against the wall to stop him from falling flat on his face.
A voice that Liam hasn’t heard in years, a voice that drags him back to a time he’s tried so hard to forget.
Theo.
Tentatively, Liam turns around and stands at the top of the stairs looking down at Theo staring back at him with an unreadable expression on his face, barely three steps apart but they couldn’t be further from each other.
“Theo.” Liam breathes out and the sheer sound of Theo’s name in his own voice causes his chest to clench. “What the hell are you doing here?”
If the question takes Theo aback, he doesn’t show it - in fact, he barely quirks an eyebrow in Liam’s direction and just shrugs.
“What are you doing here?” He asks instead and moves to the side so that he’s leaning against the wall, watching Liam for his response over the top of his sunglasses.
Liam opens his mouth to respond but closes it just as quickly once he decides that he doesn’t need to tell Theo why he’s in Greece and why he seems to have pretty awful timing too because of course, of fucking course they’re in the same country at the same time.
Theo is infuriatingly patient in waiting for Liam to come up with something to say in response, leaning so casually against the wall like he has all the time in the world for Liam to engage his brain into coming up with something sarcastic or worse still, bitter in response.
“I don’t need to tell you that.” Is what Liam eventually comes out with and the embarrassment that follows almost has Liam running for the hills because what in the petulant child kind of response is that.
“You’re right.” Theo says to him, once again, voice steady and frustrating to Liam.
“You never answered my question, why are you here?” Liam asks, a hint of desperate force in his voice as he clenches his fists at his sides before releasing them.
“You told me about this place once.” Theo answers like it’s the most obvious thing in the world.
Suddenly, it’s almost a decade ago and Liam is standing merely inches from Theo confused after he’d just went off on a spiel about the winding streets of Mykonos when he sees that stupid smile on his face listening to Theo telling him he’s impressed and feeling himself falling for him even more than he already had.
If the sight of Theo had Liam’s chest clenching, the answer has his heart pounding against his chest despite how quickly he tries to calm himself down.
They’re silent for a moment before Liam coughs and backs up the final step looking around for somewhere to go,
“I have to go… I have - uh - a thing, yeah.” His words come out stunted and he doesn’t dare look Theo in the eyes before turning around and hurrying away. “Theo fucking Raeken.” Liam mutters when he deems himself far enough away to stop and take a minute.
If there was ever a time that Liam craved the effects of alcohol on him, now would be perfect.
***
The afternoon is a haze of wandering through the streets looking for any kind of distraction, the restlessness in his head worsening with every passing moment and looking around any of the street corners hoping that he doesn’t catch sight of Theo not wanting to engage in another awkward conversation.
Liam stays out until he sees the sun laying low on the horizon and gives up, wanting to be back in the confinement of his hotel room and away from anybody and everybody’s eyes and able to brood in peace.
Stepping inside the elevator, Liam leans back against the mirrored walls and exhales deeply before pressing the ninth floor and starts to hear the doors closed before they abruptly stop and open again.
Liam barely opens his eyes ready to politely smile at whoever he’s now sharing the elevator with but the smile doesn’t reach the corners of his mouth when he realizes Theo is now standing in front of him.
“Give me fucking-” Liam starts but stops himself just as quickly,
Theo hits the button for the sixth floor and hovers to Liam’s left as the doors take an age to close.
The silence surrounds them as they watch the floor number change from first to second to third to fourth before Theo attempts to break it except he doesn’t say anything and instead just catches Liam pointedly staring down at his shoes.
He sighs as the elevator stops on the sixth floor and he gets out wordlessly. Liam lifts his head and watches Theo walk down the hallway and stop at a room, pulling a keycard out of his pocket only looking back just as the doors shut.
“Fuck.” Liam grumbles when it starts moving again.
Standing underneath the shower head, the scorching hot water glides down his back, Liam screws his eyes shut tight enough to start seeing stars as Theo’s name runs mockingly around his head getting louder each time.
The water burns his shoulders, Liam not knowing how long he’s been standing underneath it until he eventually slams it off and turns to rest his forehead against the tiles, the water droplets from his hair hitting his face as he tries to regulate his breathing, to quiet down the noise inside his head.
Wrapping a towel around his waist, Liam reaches up to wipe away some of the condensation on the mirror and looks at himself but he gets a shock when he sees his teenage self staring back at him, the same teenager who was so helplessly in love and unsure of how to deal with it.
At least healthily, Liam did deal with Theo a lot of the time, a lot of broken noses and punches thrown and words shouted but he misses the quiet moments. He misses the stolen glances, he misses the quiet words whispered into the darkness when Theo would pull up in a secluded spot and kill the engine and they’d talk.
He misses the way Theo made him feel, how he wouldn’t have to do a lot but he’d make Liam feel worth it, like he was worth Theo’s time and attention.
Liam misses Theo but like hell he would ever admit that.
The door to the balcony is still open when Liam clambers onto the bed and lies down on his side looking through the curtains billowing in the breeze and through the white railings, Liam can see the shadow of the beach underneath the stars.
Liam’s damp hair soaks through the pillow case as he rolls onto his back, an arm slung over his stomach and his other behind his head as he stares at the ceiling in the dark room, just breathing in and out slowly and trying not to think about Theo three floors beneath him.
When he does fall asleep, his head is clouded with an image that he can’t push away.
***
It’s long after the sun has risen by the time that Liam wakes up in the morning, rubbing sleep out of his eyes and feeling the knots twist in his shoulders as he pulls himself up to a sitting position, the sheets pooled around his waist.
Stifling a yawn, Liam blindly scrambles for his phone to look at the time and notices that it’s closer to afternoon than morning, he drops his phone to the bed and flops back down dragging a hand through his tangled hair that’s still slightly damp.
It’s hotter than yesterday, if that’s at all possible when Liam leaves the hotel and immediately feels himself start to sweat underneath the sweltering sun. It's busier too and that’s when Liam decides to turn around and go on a spontaneous hike up to the windmills.
Hands in his pocket, Liam kicks up a pebble and a cloud of dust as he walks up a winding hill and feels the life of the town slowly sink away to distant noise. The countryside comes into sight, trees blowing in the gentle wind, Liam’s feet sinking into soft grass and a gravel path as the windmills come into sight, still a way off though. A bus full of tourists passes him, the driver beeping his horn causing Liam to jump out of his skin and move to the side to let it through.
He keeps walking until he finds himself falling into two different tourist groups and tries his best to escape them until he’s alone again walking across the grass towards a different section of the walkway when he stops.
Theo is sitting on one of the stone walls in front of the windmills and their eyes meet for the briefest of seconds before Liam looks up and away squinting in the sunshine and beating himself up for forgetting his sunglasses on the bedside table.
Liam thinks about deliberately avoiding Theo but something inside him won’t let him do that and he finds himself walking towards him, being pulled to him like a magnetic force without realizing and definitely before he can attempt to stop himself.
“Do you know there’s fifteen thousand permanent residents in Mykonos-” Liam starts in lieu of a greeting as he scuffs his foot into the gravel.
“- Okay?” Theo mumbles, the confusion evident in his voice.
“There can also be up to a million tourists during summer.” Liam continues undeterred.
“Liam what-?” Theo tries
“- So why have I run into you for two days in a row?” Liam asks although the question is rhetoric because the last thing Liam needs is to hear some fateful bullshit that he has no interest in.
Liam sits down anyway making sure he keeps some distance between the pair of them so that even their knees couldn’t touch even accidentally.
Liam eavesdrops into some of what the tour guide is explaining about one of the windmills behind them and looks through the group taking photos and posing in front of the windmills for pictures and just hopes that he isn’t in the background of any of them because he doesn’t feel like ruining anybody’s vacation pictures.
“Yesterday…” Liam breathes out before breathing in through his nose and out slowly. “Yesterday, you were going to say something… in the elevator?”
Liam dares to tilt his head to the side to catch a glimpse of Theo and there’s a smile breaking at the corners of the latter’s mouth as Theo runs his tongue across his bottom lip before scrunching up his nose and shaking his head.
“Not important.” Theo shrugs it off, the smile fading away in an instant like it was never there.
A moment passes before Theo gets to his feet, dusting off his hands and making a move to walk away but Liam’s already asked him where he’s going before he could stop himself.
“Hiking.” Theo deadpans and points past the windmills to the rocky hills leading up and away from the trail. “Why? Want to come?” He dangles the offer in front of Liam, expecting him to say no and almost amusedly smiling at him when Liam says yes a little too quickly.
Liam trails a distance behind Theo as they walk past the windmills towards the hills and fall into a silence that isn’t completely uncomfortable but one that would definitely be ruined by someone breaking it.
Liam wants to break it and clenches his fists so tightly that he thinks he’s piercing the skin so that he doesn’t, he wouldn’t even know what to say despite the thousand different questions stirring around in his head, to delve into unfinished business, conversations that were cut short.
Liam doesn’t even realize that Theo is miles ahead of him and already halfway up the hill when he pulls himself out of his thoughts and has to break out into a run to catch up with him. Theo hasn’t noticed just how far behind Liam is and he’s already climbing up onto a broken rock wall, easing up to stand up as Liam trails after him.
Liam moves to climb up onto the wall but catches the heel of his shoe in a rock and hits the ground trying to wiggle his foot free. He manages to get out but still misses the rock when his other foot slips leading Theo to the edge and for him to hold his hand out for Liam to take.
Liam scowls and tries again to pull himself up but fails miserably,
“Take my fucking hand.” Theo pushes, extending his hand further to Liam who begrudgingly takes it as Theo pulls him up. “Was that so hard?” Theo asks, a sarcastic bite to his voice.
Liam pulls his hand away once he realizes they’re still joined together and wipes it on the hem of his shirt before starting to walk leaving Theo behind although not for long.
They walk in unison and once or twice their shoulders knock together as they continue walking higher until they reach the top. Theo flops down and lets his legs dangle over the edge as he looks at the island, at the windmills and the gangs of tourists still gathered around, across to the beach and the bright blue water that melts seamlessly into the brighter blue sky.
After a moment, Liam joins and sits down cross-legged, pulling at the collar of his shirt and twisting his lips into a frown as the sounds of their breathing mingles into one.
“You cut your hair.” Theo says seemingly out of nowhere.
“What?” Liam asks, furrowing his eyebrows as he glances at Theo before back to the small rock he’s cradling in his hands.
“In the elevator - I was going to say you cut your hair.” Theo repeats though his voice is quieter, like he’s embarrassed by the comment. “You swore you wouldn’t, that’s all.” Theo laughs and tries to brush it off.
He tries but it twists in Liam’s stomach uncomfortably. Something about Theo remembering that he swore he wasn’t going to cut his hair sits heavy, it was a small comment he made years ago but Theo remembers.
Liam opens his mouth to respond but he can’t think of anything to say, turning away and screwing his eyes shut to try and erase the feeling of familiarity that is encompassing him but all it does is push it deeper, cementing the feeling of comfort that Theo used to give him.
I hated the way I looked without you.
I hated the way I could still feel your hands in it.
I hated the fact you weren’t fucking there anymore.
“I wanted to change it… I hated the way my long hair looked.” Liam laughs sadly, pulling his knees up to his chest, he rests his head atop of them.
Theo presses his lips into a thin line and swallows but he doesn’t reply.
Liam focuses on Theo, staring at the way his shoulders rise and fall and how his tan disappears underneath the white shirt he’s wearing, dragging his eyes across Theo’s shoulders and how his hair curls slightly at his nape.
“I like your short hair.” Theo comments absentmindedly,
Liam raises his eyebrows, “but not as much as my long hair?”
They catch each other’s gaze and for a second they just stare before Theo quirks his lips slightly,
“Not even close.”
***
Liam groans as he pulls one of the pillows from the other side of the bed over his face and stifles a scream into it, clutching at it so tightly that for a second he considers suffocating himself before ripping it away from his face and throwing it halfway across the pitch black room.
Opening his eyes, Liam stares at the ceiling with a scowl firmly set on his lips as he drags his fingers through his hair repeatedly until he just holds them there, tugging at the longer strands and feeling his chest heave with every breath he takes.
“Fucking - I’m going to regret this.” He mutters half-heartedly to himself as he pushes the covers off him and climbs out of bed stumbling through the dark towards the room door, pulling it open and stepping out into the hallway. “Definitely going to regret this.” He mumbles, dragging his feet towards the elevator.
When it stops on the sixth floor, Liam hesitates before getting out and instead stands inbetween the doors swallowing thickly and wondering whether he should just run back to the confines of the comfy hotel bed and try to sleep.
He doesn’t.
He walks slowly down the hallway counting the rooms before stopping at the fourth one hoping that his lucky guess doesn’t end up with him having to explain why he knocked on the door of a elderly couple whilst shirtless to security.
He lifts his hand to knock on the door and winces when he hears the rapping, he almost runs.
Almost.
The door opens before he can and Liam is met with a sleepy Theo leaning against the door looking at him through bleary eyes and him raspily saying his name - which in turn, only makes it so much worse.
“Liam? What do you want?” Theo asks, his voice deep, husky and definitely making Liam regret this.
“Shut up.” Liam huffs and pushes Theo into the room, hands fumbling around in the dark as he presses his palms to Theo’s cheeks and kisses him. “I really need you to just not-”
Liam is interrupted by the sound of the door shutting but neither of them know who closed it. Theo’s hands find Liam’s waist hovering just above the waistband of his shorts as he pulls him impossibly closer.
There’s a thousand and one reasons why this is nothing short of an absolutely disastrous idea but Liam finds himself with little reason to care for that when Theo flips their positions and crowds him up against the closet, trailing kisses along his jawline.
Dropping his head back against the closet, Liam feels his eyes flutter between open and closed with every single touch of Theo’s hands against his body igniting a burn that he so desperately craves. Theo’s hands are like fire, roaming up and down Liam’s body trying to pull a reaction.
Liam nudges Theo and grabs his face and for a moment he just tenderly holds Theo’s face in his palm gently brushing his thumb across Theo’s jawline before he snaps out of it and kisses him feverishly.
Liam thinks he might be dizzy, overcome and lost in the way he feels, the way this feels, the way that Theo traps his wrists together above his head, how Liam can feel Theo’s smirk against his collarbone as he tries to wrestle free.
Theo drops Liam’s wrists from the iron-tight grip and pulls him forwards through the room, Theo kicks something out of the as he feels for where the edge of the bed before spinning them around at the last second so Liam falls onto the bed as soon as the back of his knees make contact with the bedframe.
Theo hovers over him, sliding his hand up Liam’s arm until he can link their hands together above Liam’s head, breathlessly, Theo closes the gap between the both of them once more.
Liam loses himself in the feeling, trying to ignore the magnitude of what this means, what this doesn’t have to mean and what he wants it to mean that weighs heavy on his chest because when Theo trails a line of kisses down his stomach every rational thought he’s ever had disappears.
“Theo…” Liam’s whine comes out broken, desperately trying to pull him closer, needing the friction.
Everything falls away underneath Theo’s touch.
Liam rouses when he feels the sun seeping in through the windows, the sound of Theo’s heartbeat underneath his ear is the next thing he registers when he slowly opens his eyes adjusting to the light in the room and the fact that he’s curled up in Theo’s arms, the chimera barely stirring at the movement.
Liam’s arm is slung across Theo’s stomach and Theo has his arm locked around Liam’s shoulders.
He should care about this, he should be panicking and trying to get back to his room as quickly as possible, he should be proclaiming that last night was a mistake but he doesn’t move, he doesn’t even attempt to.
That scares him. It downright petrifies him.
Liam doesn’t know what time it is but he assumes it’s early, too early to begin the argument between his head and heart about the pros and cons that come with spending the night in Theo’s bed.
Liam doesn’t fight the warmth of Theo’s body as it starts to lull him back to sleep.
He doesn’t want to. He’s sick of fighting it.
Liam is almost asleep when he swears he feels lips graze his forehead.
(He definitely doesn’t wake up much later into the morning with the sheets twisted around him and the faint sound of the shower running on the other side of the wall kickstarting him into action of clumsily falling out of the bed, grabbing his clothes and rushing out the room before Theo can stop him).
***
If you were to ask Liam if he was actively avoiding Theo on the same island that they seem to be unable to stop themselves from seeking the other out, accidental or otherwise, he’d say no.
He would be lying, of course.
Settling onto the cliffs, Liam watches the water sparkling in the sun in glistening arrays of blues and greens as it ripples under the effects of the cliff jumpers further down from him. It’s clearer than Liam ever thinks that water could be, even from the height he’s sitting at he’s certain he can see his own reflection in it and he almost wants to jump in and feel the weightlessness of floating away from everything.
He doesn’t; he cliff jumped once as a dumb twelve year old with wild ambitions and spent three hours in a Spanish hospital receiving stitches and scolding from his mom that had been laced with worry, relief and wondering just how wilder her son was going to become.
“Theo, I can hear your fucking heartbeat from here.” Liam says with a sigh as he whips his neck around to look at the chimera standing a few rocks up from him.
Theo has the decency to at least look unsteady for a moment before regaining all of his composure and lowering himself down the rocks until he sits down a little further up from Liam.
“You left.” He acknowledges,
Liam raises his eyebrow, confused by the notion that Theo sounds like he wanted him to stick around.
“What? Did you want to get breakfast together?” Liam shoots the question at him quickly, trying to see if he can catch the chimera off-guard, like it’s some kind of challenge.
Theo barely smiles but amusement flashes through his eyes.
“Dinner, actually.”
Instinctively, Liam grabs onto a piece of rock to his right to keep his balance as he gives Theo the best incredulous look he can muster at the suggestion.
If Liam had even an ounce of common sense, he’d laugh off the suggestion and wonder where the hell that Theo got the idea from and why it was a good one,
Except, Liam doesn’t do that and instead he just about catches himself uttering the words what’s the worst that can happen?
***
The restaurant is small and hidden away in one of the back streets, a small number of tables are set up on the patio outside and even less are inside. It’s family-owned, Liam thinks, it has to be from the moment he steps inside the door shadowed by Theo’s figure.
There’s music quietly playing behind the bar that carries across the restaurant, waiters that dodge the tables laid out in small spaces and Liam barely notices anything else until Theo is nudging him in the back and pushing him outside into the warm evening air.
The table is at the edge overlooking some of the cliffs, lights hung from the bar across from them illuminate the table they’re given in a golden glow.
His eyes move across to Theo on the other side of the table, his hands curled around the top of the chair as he pulls it out, the soft light bouncing off the waves in his hair, streaks of light gliding across his face delicately.
“This is romantic.” Liam points out, gesturing to their surroundings, lips twisted into a frown as he narrows his eyes in Theo’s direction like he’s trying to figure something out.
“It’s a restaurant in a beautiful location, you don’t need to overthink it.” Theo diffuses Liam’s attempt at detective work.
They skirt around mentioning the night before - at one point even resorting to talking about the weather and how warm it is. It feels tactical like they both know whoever caves first and starts to talk about it is going to open a can of worms that they both know they can never recover from.
They politely smile at the waiter who brings two glasses of red wine that he sets carefully on the table in order not to spill it, Liam looking between the glass and Theo twice before the waiter is out of sight.
“Seriously-” Liam grumbles, lowering his voice to a hushed whisper “- you know I can’t get drunk.”
“Yeah” Theo agrees as he leans back in the chair “but it looks good.”
A touch of a smirk plays at the corners of his mouth as Theo lets his eyes trail down from Liam’s eyes to the glass before glancing at Liam’s lips and looking away.
Liam digs his heels into the ground underneath the table to hide the blush that’s creeping out from underneath the collar of his shirt.
They’re experts in avoidance or so they discover when they make it to the end of the meal without letting the conversation dip out of small talk territory and Liam is stubborn enough to make sure that the line isn’t crossed as they leave the restaurant side by side subconsciously making their way towards the beach.
“You know we’re going to have to talk about it some time.”
Liam stops dead, balling his hands into fists in his pockets as he shakes his head looking out across the dark sand that he kicks up.
“You had to go and ruin it.” Liam laughs, digging his teeth into his bottom lip before running his tongue across the teeth marks. “We don’t need to talk about anything.”
“What happened was-”
“- Nothing.” Liam interrupts, laughing nervously as he spins around to face Theo. “It was nothing.”
“It was… something.” Theo argues but there’s no maliciousness in his voice.
It does little to stop Liam though, he can feel the burning in his chest and the tips of his ears turning pink as the conversation steers in a direction that makes him uncomfortable.
“Why does it have to mean anything?” Liam asks, his chest rising and falling quicker as he tries to regulate his breathing but to little avail. “It can just be a - I don’t know.” He knows he’s panicking now as he tries to come up with anything, anything that can halt this conversation.
Despite the evident panic as Liam looks around in a haze, Theo edges closer to him.
“No.” Liam coughs out, “don’t come closer.”
“Liam-”
Liam stumbles backwards and falls to the sand, his hands sinking into it as he looks up through blazed eyes at Theo standing above him.
“No.” Liam repeats, scrambling to his feet and taking off as quickly as he can leaving Theo wordlessly behind.
It almost works.
Liam is just about to put his keycard into the slot in the door when he feels a hand wrapping around his elbow stopping him and Theo is pulling him around until they’re facing each other, breathless.
“How-?”
“- I ran up the stairs.” Theo answers for him, holding his hand that’s not keeping Liam in place above his head as he catches his breath.
“You shouldn’t have followed me.” Liam grimaces as he wrestles his arm out of Theo’s grip easily, slotting the card into the door and pushing it open.
“Why not?” Theo asks him but Liam doesn’t respond.
He tries to shut the door but Theo sticks his foot in the way jamming it
“Why not?” Theo asks him again, keeping the door open despite Liam trying to push against it.
“Just fuck off Theo.” Liam mutters as he walks into the middle of the room and stops, his hands clenched at his sides, the noise in his head becoming too much to handle-
“Why can’t you just admit your feelings for me?”
A question so simple yet comes with the most complicated tangle of answers that Liam couldn’t begin to try and unravel. A question that Liam knows the answer to but is scared of saying aloud because admitting that he’s a fucked up mess who has been in love with Theo since he was a teenager would only make things worse.
“You don’t get it, do you?” Liam asks, his voice remarkably steady for how unsteady he feels on his feet.
“What?” Theo asks him, motionlessly shifting his weight from foot to foot, arms crossed over his chest “what the fuck don’t I get, Liam?”
“... If you don’t get it now… you’re never going to get it.” Liam tries to avoid answering, tries to stop himself from falling apart.
“Liam, stop with the cryptic bullshit-”
“Me!” Liam shouts, the word tearing from the base of his throat as he feels blood trickling down his palms. “It’s me!” He repeats, voice deeper and angrier than the first time, “I can’t do this to you, I can’t let myself admit that I love you because I’m no good for you, I’m no good for anybody!” Liam roars and deliberately moves towards Theo, rage flurrying through his entire body and he lifts his arm to swing-
But Theo is quicker. He stops Liam’s arm midair holding it in a grip as they stare at each other, breathing heavily as Theo struggles to keep Liam’s fist away from making contact with his own face.
“Liam…” and there it is again, that fucking softness that comes out in Theo’s voice when he says his name, the hand on his shoulder follows and the desperate gasping for breath from Liam comes after.
Liam drops his head staring at the white tiles on the floor of his hotel room, trying to pull the oxygen back into his lungs as he feels the heavy weight of Theo’s hand still curled around his shoulder. His other hand falls limp at his side, blood drying and sticking to his palm as he feels his legs wobbling underneath him.
He barely registers falling to the floor or the way he automatically brings his knees to his chest, his arms locked around them.
“Get out.” Liam says, voice void of any emotion. “Get out, Theo.” Liam says, swallowing thickly.
The words echo around Liam’s head as he listens to Theo’s retreating footsteps and the sound of the door clicking open and closed - and as soon as it does, Liam breaks.
The noise inside his head is screaming at him as the sound of his shaky breaths melt into the sound of the tears that he can’t stop, the fury in himself shakes in his hands as he tries to get them to stop but another choked sob tears from the back of his throat and he can’t.
Liam knew this would happen, he’s known it was going to happen since it all ended; since he pushed Theo one step too far and was the one left all alone.
“Liam?” Theo’s voice comes from outside the door.
If Liam had the energy to scoff, he would but he just lifts his head back and stares through glassy eyes at the blurred image of the door in the darkness. He closes his eyes and feels the pounding in his head as he futilely tries to stop another onslaught of tears.
Liam sinks deeper until he falls onto his side, his arms wrapped around him as he stares at the door to the bathroom, his chest clenching, unclenching and his heart breaking at the same time.
***
Liam wakes to the crick in his neck as he sluggishly pulls himself up to a sitting position as he feels his entire body heavy with the flooding of words thrown, of Theo stopping Liam from hurting him, of everything that Liam can no longer take back.
Dragging himself to his feet, Liam stumbles into the bathroom and fumbles around in the dark to turn the cold water of the shower on and shoving his head underneath it - cold, crisp and grounding.
He stays underneath it until he can’t anymore, blindly reaching for a towel to dry his face and lean against the bathroom wall until he feels clearer although that’s a stretch to how he actually feels.
Liam slowly moves through the room until he’s at the hotel door and with a swift turn of the handle, he pulls it open to see Theo sitting against the wall beside the door half asleep and looking up at him through hazy eyes.
Liam doesn’t even have the energy to respond and instead he just stares at Theo, lips parted and exhausted.
“Why didn’t you leave?” Liam asks although it takes up the last of his energy.
“Did you want me to?”
Honestly, Liam never wants Theo to leave him again but the words he shouted at him are haunting every inch of Liam’s head and the entire situation is dizzying enough that if Liam never saw Theo again - he’d be okay with that. Or, he’d try to be.
“You’re wasting your time.” Liam sighs as he drags his hand through his soaking hair, turning and walking back into the room. “You heard me, you know exactly what I said… I meant it, I’m not going to let myself hurt you-”
Theo grabs Liam by the wrist, fingers curling and resting against his pulse feeling it accelerate under the touch.
“- Who says you’re going to hurt me?” Theo asks, “you’re saying you will but… you don’t know that.”
Liam laughs at Theo, looking at him like he has lost every shred of sanity that he has left.
“You don’t know that.” Theo repeats, his voice reaching a level of sheer fucking tenderness that even Liam didn’t think he could. “Stop thinking, I can hear your internal panicking from here.” Theo grumbles, his grip on Liam’s wrist loosening but never fully releasing it.
Liam thinks now would be a good time to run, that he should leave, that they can just leave this moment in the room and Liam can run until he’s thousands of miles away.
He doesn’t move though, he doesn’t move when Theo cautiously takes a step closer, he doesn’t run when the words tell me to stop are murmured into the space between them. He doesn’t run when Theo touches his cheek and closes the gap between them.
Part of him wants to push Theo off him and scream that he doesn’t know what he’s getting into, to punch him and make him leave to avoid getting hurt but the other part of him wants the moment to never end.
For once in his fucking life, Liam ignores the irrational side.
***
It’s late into the night when Liam finally feels human again, sitting on the side of the bed closest to the balcony door, Theo is sitting on the other side with his back to him and neither of them have said a word in minutes.
From frantically making out to the quietness of the room around them, Liam tilts his head to the side and watches Theo’s figure in front of him and he can hear the sound of the chimera’s heart beating, it’s slightly sped up.
“I should go.” Theo announces and it comes out of nowhere
He stands up but stops and turns around to Liam, his hair is disheveled and he’s looking into Liam’s eyes like he’s waiting for a reason not to.
“Don’t go.” Liam gives him the reason. “Don’t, I don’t want you to go again.” It feels like a desperate plea, Liam can’t say he’s thinking straight in the slightest but if Theo walks out of the door, Liam isn’t sure he’ll be able to call him back.
“Okay.” Theo whispers and he climbs into the bed beside Liam.
***
The morning comes in a blur and it’s only the brightness coming in through the open balcony doors that has Liam opening his eyes, his head heavy and the events of the night coming back in a fearful flurry but when he flips over, Theo is still sleeping soundly beside him.
He didn’t leave.
He’s still here.
“I didn’t push him away.” Liam murmurs, careful not to rouse Theo from his slumber, not wanting to ruin the moment for what is coming next, destroying it all.
Climbing out of bed, Liam stretches and glances out of the window before shuffling his feet across the tiles and walking into the bathroom turning the shower on and getting a shock at how cold it initially feels against his skin.
Liam stands underneath the shower for minutes letting the steam fill his lungs and the hot water to cascade over his skin until his entire body feels like it’s burning, the water eases the aching in his muscles until it starts to feel cooler and he takes that as his cue to get out.
He wraps a towel around his waist but before he can leave the bathroom, he presses his ear to the door to try and gauge whether Theo is awake or not.
“Will you get out of the fucking bathroom, I need to use it.”
The answer comes from Theo calling out on the other side of the door and the door swings open to Theo stifling a yawn and messing up his hair, a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth.
***
Once dressed, Liam walks out onto the balcony and holds onto the railings looking across to the beach across the street and exhaling a deep sigh, pressing his tongue against the roof of his mouth as he listens to the shower running in the bathroom.
Liam stands on the balcony for a while just basking in the sunshine of the early afternoon when he feels Theo’s presence behind him and how he’s twisting the hem of Liam’s shirt between his fingers.
“Shouldn’t we talk about this?” Liam asks before wincing at how small his voice sounds.
“We should.” Theo agrees, pulling at Liam’s shirt “we definitely should,” he echoes his own words “but… we can talk later?” He suggests, gazing at Liam through his eyelashes.
“Later.” Liam hums in agreement, anything else he’s wanting to say swiftly disappears when Theo kisses him and pulls him back towards the bed.
***
They know they can’t avoid the situation forever, especially when Liam gets a reminder about his flight a little later in the afternoon - which in hindsight is funny considering they’ve spent years avoiding this entirely.
They agree to meet at the top of the cliffs that they were at the day before, the water calming and eases some of the tension and knots in Liam’s shoulders as he waits for Theo, legs bouncing and looking across the water for the line where it meets the sky.
“Can I trust that you won’t push me in?” Theo asks in lieu of greeting, raising his eyebrows.
Liam turns around and shields his eyes from the sun as he shrugs, “I wouldn’t.”
Theo sits down beside Liam, their knees knocking together before they turn to each other, tripping and getting stuck on their tongues as they wait for the other to break the silence.
Liam, with a sigh, breaks it. “I meant what I said - I’m not good, not for you, not for my friends, my family and definitely not for myself.”
“Why do you think that scares me?” Theo asks “why do you think you’re going to scare me away?”
“Because that’s what I do.” Liam nods before daring to meet Theo’s eyes, willing himself not to get lost in them. “After the war, after everything, I couldn’t let anybody near me and I didn’t want to let you near me because I was scared of me, I was scared of what I’d do.”
Theo clenches his jaw but doesn’t cut Liam off.
“You pushed me away to save me?” Theo warily guesses after Liam falls silent.
Liam’s lack of a response is enough for Theo to know he’s right and it sits heavily in Theo’s stomach as he angles his body to look at Liam better, reaching up and touching Liam’s jaw gently.
“Don’t say that you didn’t need saving or some other bullshit because I know you’re thinking it.” Liam rushes out,
“I’m not - you’re probably right, I don’t think any of us knew what we were capable of.” Theo agrees, “but that doesn’t mean I think you made the right one.” Theo laughs and pulls at the longer, wavy strands of hair at the front of his face. “I needed you, so much more than I ever wanted to admit.”
Liam pulls himself upright and stares into Theo’s eyes determined to see a flicker of something that tells him he’s lying but there’s nothing, Theo’s looking right back at him and Liam doesn’t think he’s ever seen the man in front of him so clearly before.
“Liam… we can make this work.” There’s something about the affection in Theo’s voice that has Liam’s head spinning as the reality of them settles in.
He’s still scared, god, he’s terrified if he’s being completely honest but he’s also ready to not run away for once and that feels different, it feels like something Liam can be okay with.
Reaching forward, Liam kisses Theo and it feels like the first time.
“Oh - I forgot to tell you, my flight home is tomorrow.” Liam admits sheepishly, scratching at the back of his neck.
“Midday flight, right?” Theo nods, “same for me.”
***
It feels oddly familiar walking through the airport in Athens after a nauseous ferry trip from Mykonos with Theo beside him, a backpack slung on his shoulder and he’s sliding his suitcase along the tiled floor.
Liam is pulling his suitcase with one hand and twisting his fingers in his hoodie strings with his other as he slows and starts to trail after Theo. He stifles a yawn and stands on one of his laces almost tripping up in the process, having hardly slept - there is nothing he’s looking forward to more than his own bed.
They check their bags, go through security and find seats away from the crowds in the departure lounge ready to relax before their flight when in bright red letters the word DELAYED appears beside their flight number.
“You’re fucking kidding me.” Liam groans and throws his head back narrowly missing the wall behind.
Theo doesn’t seem that concerned with their flight delay, busying himself with his phone but Liam is agitated and unable to sit still as he glares at the screen and focuses in on the delayed glaring at it wondering if he could shatter the screen.
“What? Liam, what is wrong with you?” Theo asks, placing his phone on his lap and turning to him.
Liam has his hood pulled up and he’s staring off into the distance now but at nothing in-particular, chewing on his bottom lip as he hears Theo say something else to him but doesn’t actually listen to what he’s saying. Breathing in and out slowly, Liam continues to chew on his lip until he feels blood and stops immediately, exhaling when he feels Theo’s fingers gently touch his on the armrest they’re both leaning on.
“What if it doesn’t work?” Liam asks but doesn’t make a move to look at Theo, he’s still staring off into space and the words feel foreign on his tongue as he asks.
“What if what doesn’t work?” Theo pushes, trying to coax Liam into looking at him but it falls flat and Liam stubbornly doesn’t move his head. “What isn’t going to work, Liam?” Theo asks, gentler this time.
“Us. Back home. What if it feels good now but in a month we want to rip each other’s heads off and all this was for nothing?” Liam asks and the description of ripping each other’s heads off causes Theo to grimace slightly. “What if it doesn’t work?” Liam repeats the question and the insecurity is obvious in his tone of voice, it’s nervous and small.
Liam turns to face Theo and holds his hands out, his claws aren’t there but both of them look down at his hands.
Undeterred, Theo covers Liam’s hands with his own and lowers them down,
“If it doesn’t work-” he starts calmly making sure that Liam is focusing on him “- then we break up, you break my nose again and we go our separate ways.”
Liam makes a sound that sounds not too dissimilar from a choked laugh before meeting Theo’s eyes,
“I mean it, punch me - whatever you want but maybe, it’ll work.” Theo reassures him.
“I hate hope.” Liam sighs, “so do you.”
Theo just shrugs in the way that he knows frustrates Liam and drives him insane but he doesn’t argue, he just thinks about the word, hope, the worst word in the world.
Their flight is still delayed two hours later and when Theo slumps against Liam’s shoulder, his chest rising and falling evenly, Liam nudges their fingers together until he can slide his hand underneath Theo’s and tangle them together loosely against the armrest.
It’ll work. Liam rests his head atop of Theo’s and for a moment he thinks it’s okay, he thinks he’s okay, he’s happy and that’s all that matters.