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“Sure, I’ll drop those off by your tent once they’re ready.” Was what Charles had told Arthur as he handed his gang-mate a bottle of moonshine in camp that morning. Arthur had seen him working on a new project - fire arrows - and with Charles being the victim of an unrequited fancy, he felt bound to offer a batch to Arthur. And so he made the arrows to the best of his ability, tempering arrowheads with the highly flammable moonshine and carefully assembling them, making sure they were of an impressive quality to perhaps bring Arthur’s attention to his craft just for a moment (or at least he hoped).
As Charles approached Arthur’s tent he was hit with a pang of jealousy - the sleeping quarters that stood in front of him were by far much more comfortable than the rolled-out sleeping mat he slept on every night. Although, Charles did question whether he was jealous of the bed for its coziness or rather the fact that it carried Arthur’s body snugly every night. Perhaps the latter. He thought grumpily as he took the arrows out from his sash and laid them carefully on the end of Arthur’s cot. Sitting next to where he had placed the arrows was a button-up shirt that he’d seen Arthur wearing the day before. It had been carelessly thrown over the edge of the bed, no doubt by Arthur in a dozy state of eagerness to get to sleep. Charles pictured the sight of Arthur tearing off his shirt and union suit to reveal his strong arms and muscular torso, leaving a flurry of butterflies in his stomach. Charles liked Arthur very much - too much - especially given the fact that Arthur was entirely focused on anything other than Charles at the moment. The image of Arthur’s toned figure plagued Charles’s mind, and, in a zoned out state of delirium, he picked up the shirt and held it to his face, taking in the leathery, musky smell, and sighing contentedly.
This is very wrong. Charles told himself in his head. But he still stayed there, the oh-so-recognisable scent of Arthur making him feel loopy and content, closing his eyes and continuing to picture the other man in varying levels of decency. Wrong, wrong. Repeated Charles’s mind, but in his desperate state of touch-starvation, he lingered. Charles’s need for touch wasn’t just any old platonic hug or the feeling of a woman’s soft hands, like many other men would crave, no. He needed to feel the calloused fingers of Arthur running against his chest, his back; the warm breath on his neck; strong yet steady hands weaving through his hair; he needed to feel the assertive touch of Arthur, it was what he yearned for so desperately and so hopelessly-
“Hey, Charles?”
Charles was thrown back into reality by a voice behind him, and at once he felt a pit in his stomach emerge, feeling similar as to being dunked in icy waters. “You- shit, fuck, I’m, I-“ Charles was not usually the man to stutter and this only reinforced that he was now in deep shit. He turned around, still foolishly clutching the shirt, and locked eyes with Arthur, who had an expression of complete bewilderment.
“What you doin’ sniffin’ my shirt?” Arthur asked, and to Charles’s surprise, a hint of humour in his voice.
“Arthur, I, actually I was just-“ Charles became a blubbering mess, a major contrast from his usual serious disposition, and he could feel his cheeks flooding with colour in furious embarrassment.
“Go sniff your own shirts. This one’s mine.” Arthur walked over with an incredibly casual demeanour, one hand resting upon the buckle of his gun holster and the other reaching out to nab the shirt Charles was clutching. “You brought those arrows?” He threw the shirt in a lazy manner back to where it was originally and picked up a single arrow, inspecting it with great interest. “This is a good piece a’ work.”
Charles didn’t respond, in great fear of releasing some incoherent nonsense if he dared to open his mouth to speak, so he just nodded briskly.
Arthur let out a hearty chuckle, “You look like a damned deer in the headlights.”
Their proximity to one another was awfully close, and Charles could see Arthur scanning him carefully - making Charles painfully aware of how unkempt his hair was, the ragged holes in the shirt he was wearing, how unsightly he probably looked… After a painful few seconds of expectant eye-contact from Arthur, Charles let out a forced laugh that sounded more like a whinny, “I, uh, should get going, Arthur.” He muttered quickly before turning round to exit the tent. However, as he went to wring an arm around the side of the tent-pole, he felt Arthur’s hand clasp onto his left shoulder.
“Thanks,” Arthur said.
Charles whisked around quickly to face Arthur, his stomach once again fogged up with butterflies and his mind immediately wandering, “For what?”
“The arrows, you dumbass.”
Charles had completely forgotten about the damned arrows.