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Adam’s fork clinked against the plate a few times, macaroni half pushed around the light blue plastic. Lucas looked up from his meal, intent brown eyes flickering across his partner. Adam had never been particularly quiet, though his thoughts came across differently as most people’s might. His lips twitched downwards— he’d barely touched his food, let alone not spoken the entire meal. Lucas set his fork down.
“Do you want to finish the rest of this later?” he asked, not wanting to corner him into sitting at a dinner table with him. And it was only a yes or no question, on purpose, this time.
Adam looked up, dark curls fallen over his forehead, eyelashes beautifully thick above blue eyes. He dropped both hands to the table, then, pushing his plate away from himself with the fork set over it.
Lucas gave a nod, then, standing to put the leftovers away, standing at the stovetop before he took Adam’s plate, too, dishing the rest into a blue snap container before putting away his own, as well, in a matching one of red. He could have finished his own serving with ease, but it worked better for them both, he knew, as rare of an occurrence as it was, to both eat their leftovers later. Dinner with Adam was important to him, and he was important to Adam.
He shut the fridge, bulleted lists and Polaroids of the couple at the planetarium pinned to the appliance, before turning around.
“Pajamas?” he wondered, gauging where the man might be in his desires for the evening, finding it a good place to start. Never urging Adam to do as suggested, but always asking, and once confirmed, always doing it with him.
The couple made their way to the bathroom, two basins set into the counter, easy for them to do their routines side by side without encroaching on each other’s space, Adam’s products organized neatly to the right side of his sink, Lucas’s pulled from the cabinet beneath. Adam washed his face, taking care to use a toner and serum before moisturizing after. His skin always glowed, and Lucas loved nothing more than the soft, shining red glow of Adam’s face after his night routine.
They brushed their teeth in tandem, toothbrushes coded in red and blue, and they wiped down the spaces around the sink, after, never leaving water or toothpaste foam to dry on the countertops. Lucas had found it tedious, at first, but by now it was a constant he was grateful for, loving to watch out of the corner of his eye the way Adam ran the rag side to side over the surface area and then up and down, so opposite the way he wiped down in counter-clockwise circles.
Their pajamas were folded at the end of the bed, always set out after dressing in day clothes each morning, Lucas’ pajama pants striped in a cream off-white and red, his sweater thin but cable-knit. Adam pulled his on with the buttons already done, a matching satin blue with a collar at the shirt.
Adam pulled their top cover off of the bed, one large enough for two, and went to the living room. Lucas smiled, familiar with what it meant, and he pulled the sleeves of his sweater down to curl them in his fists as he followed, tucking himself up into the corner of the couch.
Adam turned the lights off and sat to his left, legs tucked up and weight leaned into his boyfriend. His best friend. He adjusted beneath the blankets, making sure there was enough for both after he passed the remote to the older man, hair ashen blond and reflecting light from the tv there as well as in the lenses of his glasses. He sorted through streaming services until he came across Disney +, clicking down to the National Geographic section to find them something about space.
He muted the documentary, tonight, captions turned on in white at the bottom of the screen. Lucas relaxed, some, from the weight of the day, and it didn’t take long for Adam to press himself insistently into Lucas’s side, asking for him. For more. Lucas turned, some, to face him in the slightest, wrapping both arms around him beneath the bundle of their covers, pulling him close, and warm. Adam rested his head on the man’s chest, eyes fixed on the screen and expression unreadable. It wasn’t difficult to know that it had been a bad day. Or maybe a bad moment. Or a bad thought. Or perhaps just an overwhelming one. A night meant for quiet.
Lucas’s hand reached up to tangle in dark hair, fingers twisting softly and threading through soft curls as he watched the tv, expeditioners suiting up silently on screen. There was a faint scent of moisturizer around them, Adam’s cheeks rosy and skin clean, nothing fresher than newly brushed teeth and a closely followed routine. It was his favorite thing, Lucas thought, a lightness in his chest that was never felt anywhere else, the lights off and the tv on silent and Adam curled into him like his personal domestic heaven. The brunette turned to bury face in his chest completely, after a while, nose and forehead pressed firmly into sweater, clinging.
Lucas held him tighter, an arm wrapped around his low back and curled around the curve of his ribs, his other hand rested softly at the back of Adam’s neck, fitted there just the same, and grounding, before he slid it up through thick hair to let fingers tangle in it, the bitter scent of a dandruff shampoo gentle and underlying as his hand disrupted the pattern of curls laying over his head.
He was quiet, the tv light changing in brightness and tint across Adam’s back, and his curls, projecting shapes onto the rectangle lenses of Lucas’ wire glasses as they sat there, silent. Adam held onto him, this evening, tucked as closely into the safety of his boyfriend’s chest as was physically possible. If he thought he might be able, he would have climbed into the warm space behind Lucas’ ribcage, he was sure, curled around his heart as literally as he was already symbolically there. He was safe, there, and Lucas’s arms drew him closer to the planes of chest, heart beating softly against the front of curls as they pressed to his sweater.
This was the best of it, to Lucas.
This was the whole of it, to Adam.
A love existed between them, and it was as vast as the universe and as silent as space.