Chapter Text
T he sun is warm across Chase’s face. He basks in it, for a moment; it’s been a good night, apparently. He doesn’t remember waking up once, and his limbs are loose, and relaxed, in a way that he doesn’t remember happening for… months. Years, maybe.
He shifts to stretch lazily, and the warmth at his back shifts; he hums in contentment, turning towards it. A soft huff of laughter shakes him, something hard digging into his side.
Wait, what?
Chase cracks open an eye, blinking several times to clear the haze of sleep out of it. The edges of the room are still fuzzy in a way that sets his teeth on edge, and out of the corner of his eye, he can make out a pale arm looped around him, keeping him close. There’s a laptop open on the coffee table, forgotten as some podcast drones on.
He freezes. This isn’t his bedroom. He didn’t remember passing out on the couch.
The warmth at his back sighs quietly, and Anti murmurs, “you couldn’t have stayed asleep for a couple more hours?”
Pushing himself away, Chase scrubs a hand over his face to clear the remnants of sleep out, sizing up the room sharply. Anti doesn’t move from where he’s curled around Chase’s back, dark eyes unreadable.
“I didn’t crash on the couch,” Chase says, and he doesn’t mean it to come out as accusatory as it does, before the rest of the situation hits him. There’s no sun to warm him, this far into the living room; the windows are all on the far side of the room. No blankets, he’d been good about his meds, so there’s no reason for this grogginess– he nearly trips over his next inhale as he looks down at his wrists, catching the barest hint of light winking around them.
It can’t be past ten, and he’s already been under. He doesn’t remember going under in the first place, it’s been barely two months, he can’t be slipping that fast–
A cool hand curls around the back of his neck, and without really thinking, he leans into the touch, words falling away from his tongue. It quiets the fluttering panic of his heartbeat, but not his thoughts. Anti rubs his thumb in slow circles, and Chase nearly shudders at the gentleness of it all.
He knows the strength in those hands, remembers prying pale hands off of Henrik’s throat not half a year ago. Anti, either unaware of his thoughts, or paying no heed to them, seems content to gently knead the tension out of the base of his neck.
“You were having a nightmare,” he says, and there’s only a bit of his usual rasp harshening his words. “Figured I would let you get a few more hours of sleep.”
Anti’s clearly at ease. He’s not skipping words, stretched out like a big cat in the early morning. Chase should be feeling at ease, too- he’d forgotten just how drowsy the strings had made him, how easy it was to relax into them.
That was it, though. He’d forgotten, because it’d been so long since Anti had tried to use the strings on him, that now– now, it just rubs against his nerves, and he’s in no mood to even try to play at offering gratitude.
He throws Anti as vicious a side-eye as he knows how to, and he knows it’s a mean one, enough to make even Marvin sit up and pay attention. Anti stiffens, and slowly, unwinds his arm; Chase suppresses the thrill of fear, and disentangles himself thoroughly.
“I’ll give you three guesses what nightmares tend to be about these days,” he says, tightly, and Anti raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t move yet. He’s holding himself very still, actually; if Chase were feeling charitable, he’d say it’s to not spook him further.
He’s not, so he watches for the pounce.
“You’re picking fights early,” Anti observes, resting his cheek on a hand draped over the back of the couch. Chase has to bite back the irritation at how charmingly domestic it looks on him. He’s not some tamed cat to coo over.
“You’re making stupid decisions early,” he snaps back, rubbing thoughtlessly at his wrist. It’s not like it hurts, but now the warmth makes him want to go dunk his head under some cold water. “Trying something new out?”
Anti doesn’t roll his eyes, but Chase can tell he thinks about it. He doesn’t think too hard about how he knows what that flicker of the eyes means.
“Is it so much to ask for,” Anti says, the edges of his words sharpening, “that you’d be thankful for a good night’s sleep, instead of throwing it back in my face?”
“You could’ve woken me up,” Chase fires back. “You clearly weren’t fucking sleeping.”
Anti slowly rolls his neck, grimacing, and then unfolds himself, slowly. Chase wonders if he, somehow, managed to pull something in his neck over the course of the night. “I was hoping that continuing your run of decent nights would improve your mood, but apparently it hasn’t. You weren’t hurt, and you- I didn’t make you do anything. What do you want, Chase? You came here on your own.”
Chase clamps his mouth shut against his next words. Anti stares at him, and it’s only once he shakes his head does Chase realize he was waiting for an answer.
“You came here on your own,” Anti says, and Chase– he knows what Anti sounds like when he’s making a threat. Knows that Anti holds himself like he’s the most dangerous thing in the room, hand flickering to his hip, like he’s waiting to pull a knife. He’s just– standing there, though, and ice creeps down the back of Chase’s neck as he realizes he has no way to predict these next few minutes, as casual as Anti sounds. “You offered to stay of your own accord. I agreed.”
He steps forward, and Chase tenses, but he only moves around him, to the doorway of the room. Which is– in itself, baffling yet again. He doesn’t flicker in and out of existence, now, he moves where Chase can track him, and the novelty of it grates against him even more.
“You should probably think on that some,” Anti says, again. “What our deal means to you.”
Which is hilarious, isn’t it. Because Anti knows that Chase knows that there’s nowhere left for him to go. He can’t go back to the egos, to put them in danger. He can’t outrun Anti. Warm or not, the strings are still strings.
He watches Anti’s retreating back, irritation and uncertainty prickling up his arms and down his back, and turns on his own heel.
– – –
Thank whatever god looks out for idiots and wash-outs, they’re not out of milk, or eggs. If Chase had to deal with other people on top of his already stellar mood just to get some fucking groceries, he genuinely thinks he might’ve had to restrain the urge to start biting.
As it is, he sets out the butter to warm. Flour on the counter, don’t break his neck reaching for the yeast that he keeps on the top shelf for some fucking reason. The dough will have to come first, he thinks, distantly. While it rises, he can make the kotleti, and that should be enough time on its own.
If he doesn’t do something with his hands right now, he’s going to climb up the walls and out the window, and… that’s not the most productive thing to be doing with his time. He can hear Henrik sighing at him, and– no, he’s not going down that road, not right now.
Measure the yeast and water. Add the sugar. Don’t kill the yeast, Jamie cautions, some years ago, it’s a living thing as much as you are. Don’t make the water too hot. Wait. Find the mixer.
He stares at the mixture, and tries very hard not to think.
The house is dead silent, but not unnaturally so. He can still hear the podcast playing faintly, and the hum of the refrigerator. Anti’s out of the house, but he hasn’t left the usual thundercloud of distaste behind, he’s just– left.
The yeast’s covering the surface of the water. When he flicks on the mixer, he winces a little as the racket shatters the silence. He’s not used to it, if he’s being honest; their house being what it was, they usually mixed by hand. Henrik always jumped, or that one fateful time Marvin nearly set the stir-fry on fire–
“Great job at not thinking,” he says into the air, and the homesickness does nothing to ease the irritation bubbling in his chest. He’s harsher than he needs to be with the dough once he sets the mixer aside. It sticks to his fingers, and he has to keep making sure he has enough flour to knead it into one chunk, and all in all, it’s honestly not the worst way to rip his thoughts away from that particularly dangerous track.
Pisses him off, though, which he pushes into his movements. Knead, fold, knead, work that irritation into every movement. The house is quiet, and there’s a bird singing through the closed window- a cardinal, if he’s remembering his birdcalls right. It’s the season for them to start flying back in, the days stretching longer.
His next fold is sharper, and he swears as he unsticks a glob of dough from between his fingers. Jackie would’ve laughed his ass off, flicking flour in his direction– I’m helping, Chase, can’t you see – and he would’ve pelted him with a clump of dough in return, and instead…
He’s working it in an empty kitchen. Because he can’t figure out what the fuck Anti is playing at, but walked in here anyways, and might’ve just fucked it all up either way by opening his goddamn mouth at the wrong time.
…He’s not enjoying the quiet as much as he thought he would’ve.
The dough, mercifully, doesn’t stick to him as badly when he coaxes it into a bowl, and wraps the film over the top. Bowl and whisks go in the sink, and he turns to the fridge again.
Chase doesn’t know what had possessed him yesterday to set out the ground beef to defrost, but now he’s… glad. Was he planning to cook it today? Hell if he remembers; his memory’s been getting better, but it’s still patchy on the best of days.
He eyes the carrots doubtfully, before deciding that a wilted top of greens is the least of his worries. Everything’s in date- it’s fine. They get cooked, anyways.
He doesn’t have any homemade bread to soak, so he leaves out the last of their loaf to soak in milk instead, pouring out a plate of flour, and letting the pan warm up on the stove with a thin coating of oil. He will have to make a grocery run after all, just… later.
There’s no point in being surprised when he tests the edge of the knife he pulls out against the carrot, and it cuts through like butter. He wonders, for a moment, as he chops it up, trying to mince it as fine as he remembers Henrik’s. Does Anti sharpen these knives? Does he not worry they’ll be used against him– or does he trust in his own endurance, his own strength?
First the carrots go into the bowl, and then the onions- he blinks away the water in his eyes. Jackie usually did this part, despite the fact that onions made him cry worse than Chase. The handful of sad, sad parsley that they have left. A pinch of salt– not too much, and more pepper than Henrik liked to add, because Jackie had zero spice tolerance, but Chase likes his food to have bite.
Crack in the eggs. The bread. Knead the meat in, slowly, methodically. The slimy texture barely makes him grimace; he welcomes the cold worming its way under his nails instead. It’s a refreshing pace from the warm daze that he’s still shaking off, even now; he works out a chunk of partially-frozen meat with renewed vigor at the reminder.
…He’s still irritated. He pokes at the feeling as he shoves the plate of flour closer to the stove, and picks up his first handful of spiced meat, roughly shaping it and rolling it in the flour. Anti’s not wrong; the extra sleep was nice. And of all of the things that he could’ve done, making sure that he stayed asleep was… relatively tame.
The beef hisses as it hits the roiling oil, and he’s careful to stay clear of the popping bubbles. No point explaining to Anti why the fuck he’s covered in oil burns on top of everything.
Because Anti would… genuinely mind. Because he’s been, on some occasions, too close for comfort, and sometimes Chase wishes he could turn around on his way to work and not worry about seeing Anti in his shadow, but at the same time– it’s not a great city that they live in. Chase carries his gun for more reasons than just Anti.
He hasn’t had to worry about that for weeks.
His mouth thins. He carefully flips the patty over, eyeing it critically to make sure he hadn’t flipped it too early. At least it wasn’t charred, like the one time they’d let Marvin do the cooking. Slowly, he adds the next one to the pan.
Chase had walked in here, fully knowing that Anti had full reign. And Anti had… honored his word. Hadn’t really… done much.
Think about what our deal means to you, Anti had said. It’d meant their safety, Chase had thought. And it does, because for all that Anti might wind himself around Chase like a particularly possessive cat, or know how to carefully work the tension out of his shoulders before it sparks a migraine–
Chase still remembers the eagerness with which he’d summoned his knife to his hand the first– and last– time that Marvin had showed up at their door, fire licking at his feet.
He wonders, now, at how quickly Anti had accepted it, though.
Chase flips the kotleti, and plates them, the motions mechanical and a little stilted, and he wonders.
– – –
By the time that Chase feels the faintest prickle of static against his skin, everything’s already cooling, and he’s staring darkly into the reflection of the tea in his mug.
It’s not the chipped one- that one’s in the sink, because apparently at some point last night, Anti had used the other one while he was… under, and he can’t stop running his thumb over the smooth finish on the handle.
The door swings shut in the other room. He doesn’t look up, tracing the warps in the mug’s glaze. There’s a faint tinge of ozone to the air, and he finds himself taking in a deeper breath, savoring the clean bite of it. Sometime over the past few weeks, it’d become such a regular that he had started to… notice its absence.
Joy.
He can feel, more than see, Anti coming to a stop in the doorway. It’s not hard to guess that he’s trying to puzzle out the scene; when the weight of his gaze becomes too heavy, Chase finally glances up, sipping at his tea as he does.
Anti looks… wary. So he’s learned what a sudden cooking spree means. Great. Chase wonders what his own expression looks like; if it’s just as cautious.
He can’t see any blood on Anti’s clothes. He’s not spinning his knife, a tic that Chase has learnt to recognize as it having seen recent use, clean or not. He doesn’t even look that irritated, so Chase leans back in his chair, and cocks an eyebrow.
“Went out?”
“You looked like you would bite off my head if I stayed another minute,” Anti says dryly, and steps into the kitchen to eye the countertop of bread and kotleti.
“Because you were being an idiot,” Chase mutters under his breath, and: here’s the thing.
Like understands like, right? Chase knows that Anti’s incapable of not picking at an old scab because he can’t stop himself from doing the same; has to worry at the seed between his teeth ‘til either it’s out or he cuts his tongue.
Like understands like, so Chase can see the moment where Anti’s shoulders tighten with frustration as he understands where Chase is going, at the same time that he intimately understands that Anti is reaching some limit.
Anti’s laugh is just this side of wild, as he hops up onto the edge of the counter, and Chase is wildly, wildly relieved to not see him track any stains onto the wood floorboards. “Guess that makes two of us, then. You walk in here with open hands, and I try to make it worth your time.”
Chase can’t help the snort, as he shoves his chair back, standing. He knows he probably shouldn’t leave, expose his back to Anti so early, but he can feel the familiar heat prickle up the back of his ears, and he’s just– he’s tired.
“Is that what you think it is? Making it worth my time? Anti, I can’t even see my friends. You won’t let me see my fucking friends, and you tore me away from Jackie. We can agree that this is a deal, but you can’t delude yourself into thinking I’m going to be happy about it. That’s not what we agreed on.”
The spring in his chest is winding tighter, notch by notch, and he watches as Anti ratchets into himself the same way.
“They,” Anti says slowly, enunciating in a way he only ever does when he doesn’t want to risk his words looping back onto themselves, “were nothing but trouble. Jackie brought nothing but danger to your doorstep. You carried a fucking gun on your hip because you weren’t sure which idiot from the black market would wind up at your door. Henrik would’ve offered you up to IRIS if it would’ve caught me with you. Marvin doesn’t see you as anything but a particularly interesting anomaly. They didn’t care for you. I’m not stopping you from going out; live your life as you please, do your work. But you come back here because it’s safer for you. They don’t touch you, because they’ve proven they can’t be trusted.”
Chase stares him down; Anti meets his eyes unblinkingly. He’s folded his arms, almost protectively. It’s not the first time Chase has caught this particular maneuver.
It’s not the first time he’s heard this argument.
He’s beginning to wonder about what, exactly, Anti is protecting. He’s not in the mood to ask, not now. Not with the salt on the back of his tongue and with Anti looking like he’s moments away from unwinding in one burst.
Chase pushes his chair back in, and nods to the kettle, not bothering to mask the exhaustion in his movement.
“There’s tea in there, or whatever.”
He doesn’t think he mistakes the way that Anti starts for him as he turns his back and walks out of the room.
The movement stays with him for the rest of the evening.
– – –
It’s well and truly nighttime by the time that Chase realizes he never had dinner, and– well, he’d been doing good about making sure he got a solid three meals a day. There was a healthy amount of padding over his ribs, rather than the lean cording of too-thin muscle.
When he pads out into the hallway, holding his breath without particularly realizing it, the only thing he can hear are the cicadas, well underway into their nightly orchestra.
The kitchen light is still on, and Chase has to pause for a moment. Anti’s there, poking at something in the fridge; normally, he realizes, belatedly, this would be a moment for panic. Maybe even reaching for the gun at his hip, but…
…Well, Anti had hit the nail on the head. He doesn’t take it out unless he’s heading for work. His hip is oddly light, these days. Sometimes, on the off days, it leaves him feeling vulnerable–
But other days, it’s just… nice.
Chase shakes his head, and heads in to take a slice of bread. He’s not too hungry for anything heavy, so some of that bread, and butter, and a dash of pepper- it’d be enough to sate him for the night.
There’s already a chunk of bread missing, and the kettle’s been set aside in a way that means it’s empty- and clean. The sink is empty.
To quote Henrik: hm.
He warms the bread properly– toasts it with a little butter, and then spreads some more, dashing the pepper on. It’s good, and it warms him down to the core, loosening something in his chest.
Anti watches with a raised eyebrow. He raises an eyebrow back; when it becomes clear Anti won’t say anything, he sighs, and waggles the toast a little.
“It’s better than it looks.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” Anti says slowly, almost dubiously. His eyes are narrowed, flicking between Chase, and the bread. Chase rolls his eyes, and takes another bite.
The tension is thick enough to cut with a fucking knife.
He waits until after he’s made his way through most of his toast, and Anti’s started quietly chugging from the carton of orange juice, which– he makes sure to raise an eyebrow, Anti flipping him off without breaking stride.
Once Anti sets down the carton, Chase leans against the counter, folding his arms loosely.
“I don’t get you,” he says finally. Anti hums, and shuts the fridge, clearly waiting. “You spend years haunting our doorstep, and now you’re– what, happy to settle for this? You say that Henrik, Marvin, Jackie, James– they’re not good enough to be worth knowing, but somehow I am.”
Anti shrugs easily. “Because they don’t get it. Well, Jackson might, conniving little bastard that he is. But they’re never going to get what it’s like to not have anything to call their own, are they? Jackie’s got his city. Henrik’s his… research, and Marvin his magic circle.”
He manages to put a nearly impressive amount of disdain into his words, because fundamentally, Chase thinks he attracts bitchiness like a fucking magnet. Well, like attracts like.
Propping his chin on a hand, he cocks his head. “And you think that we…”
Anti tosses the carton- empty, apparently, Chase is going to give him so much shit tomorrow- and leans down next to Chase, thinking over his words. Chase lets him- Anti doesn’t put off heat, but there’s something grounding about the prickling of his presence, anchoring him to the moment.
“I know that you know what loneliness looks like,” Anti says, staring down at him, gaze oddly intense. “You know what the difference between loneliness and solitude is.”
Chase mulls this over, lightly tapping his heel against the counter, and picks at the corner of a nail to look away from Anti’s expression. “So you’re saying it’s quieter.”
Anti shrugs. “That’s one way to put it.”
The thing about Anti is this: he doesn’t lie. He spins things, to hurt or to sweeten the pot, but he doesn’t say something without thinking it through. Chase has learned that much over the past four years and two months. More? Time is fuzzy for him, these days.
Anti has no reason to lie here. Not with Chase having no-one to tell- not who matters, not when he can tighten the strings until Chase drowns in drugged ecstasy.
He remembers the early days, Anti winding himself into a knot, tighter and tighter, around Jack, first– then Henrik, then him, and so it goes. Remembers the way he wound himself around Jack until he couldn’t pick the two of them apart if he tried, and then Jackie.
Chase knows what loneliness looks like, alright.
Homesickness prickles, bitter and sharp on his tongue. He’d made his bed here. There’s nobody he can tell about the revelation that settles over him like a cool blanket.
But he thinks he understands why a little better.
He nods after a moment, and pushes himself off of the counter to crack open the kitchen window, letting the fresh night air flood in with the chorus of crickets. The scariest thing is already in his house, anyways.
“At least don’t keep us on the couch,” he says, dryly. “I don’t know about you, but my human bones can’t take waking up like a pretzel. The bed is plenty fine.”
It could be worse. It could be better, but it could be so, so much worse.
…He never liked waking up to an empty bed, anyways.
Anti raises an eyebrow, parsing his sentence, carefully. Chase watches understanding settle over his face, minute flickers that very nearly pass him by.
And when he heads down the hall, Chase is barely half a step behind.