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Jayce sometimes wonders if Viktor picked this place on purpose.
The sound of rain patters against the roof of their home, slides in little rivers down the window panes. It’s massively inconvenient, really, the kind of weather they get around here. The garden is muddy all of the time, dirty and wet and never quite drying up. Much of their time is spent indoors out of the rain, boots kept by the front door, water-logged laundry hastily brought inside at the start of a deluge, clouds making the days dark and quiet. Jayce relishes waking up to the sun streaming through their bedroom window, but those days are few and far between.
He wouldn’t trade it for anything.
The rain helps Viktor sleep.
Propped up on one elbow, Jayce lets his eyes roam over the body lying next to him, fingers trailing slowly up and down Viktor’s arm in feather-light, lazy patterns. Every so often he bends to place a reverent kiss to one of the faded runes.
Sleep pulls heavy at Jayce’s eyelids but he barely notices, wrapped up completely inside this quiet, perfect moment, drinking it in like the parched and sunburnt man he knows he is.
A lock of hair falls across Viktor’s forehead as he shifts in his sleep, and Jayce gently tucks it back behind his ear, heart aching.
He nuzzles along Viktor’s exposed collarbone, drifting up to kiss his earlobe. “You’re beautiful,” he whispers. His chest tightens with the truth of it - the reality of Viktor lying here in his bed, alive and warm and perfect next to him. The dimmed rays of light wash through the parting in the curtains, highlighting Viktor’s pale profile. His sharp cheekbones, the still-weary draw of his face.
That familiar protectiveness punches through Jayce’s insides, stealing the air from his lungs.
It still scares him, from time to time, this feeling. The depth of it. The weight of the knowledge of every terrible, terrible thing he would do to keep Viktor safe, keep him in his arms. Keep him protected from anyone and anything that may want to hurt him.
Jayce seals himself to Viktor’s back, arm curling around his slim body, nose buried in the hair at the nape of his neck. “Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine…” he chants to the air like a ritual, as if this alone might be enough to convince the wide world to leave them be, together and untouched.
Viktor stirs in his arms. “What are you doing?” he mumbles, voice soft and slurred with sleep. “You are far too warm.”
“Liar,” Jayce counters easily, trailing kisses down to Viktor’s shoulder, content and unhurried. “You always say I’m your own personal heater. You wouldn’t know what to do without me.”
Viktor chuckles quietly, the sound vibrating through Jayce’s ribs. “That is true.” His hand finds Jayce’s on his bare stomach, intertwining their fingers. “I might simply die.”
“Don’t say that,” Jayce urges him. He lays his forehead against Viktor’s neck and squeezes him a little tighter. “Don’t say that.”
“I am only joking, my love,” Viktor sighs, exasperated, but his thumb moves over the skin of Jayce’s knuckle in reassurance.
“I need you,” says Jayce. “I’ll always need you.”
“And I you,” Viktor tells him. “I am not going anywhere, Jayce.”
There’s a lump in Jayce’s throat, making it hard to swallow. A tiny part of him feels like a fool every time he lets his fear get the better of him, tucked away in their little home as they are, far away from troubles of the world. But the parts of him that matter feel no shame at all in laying bare his thoughts, his all-consuming need, his one true purpose.
“Mine,” Jayce repeats, pressing his lips to the corner of Viktor’s jaw.
“Yours,” Viktor agrees, tilting his neck in invitation.
Jayce nips along his jaw, down the long column of his throat, bestowing gentle licks and kisses in reparation as he goes. Worshiping the body under him, as it deserves. As it was always meant to be.
Viktor sighs contentedly in his arms, brings their joined hands to settle at the center of his chest against his thudding heart. They stay like that for a long while, just holding and touching and listening to the soft patter of the rain. Jayce is as tempted as he always is to move his touches lower, to hold Viktor, heavy and perfect, in his hands - in his mouth. To work him open under his fingers with slow and attentive devotion. He’s already half-hard at the mere idea, but he dismisses the thought easily. He doesn’t want to disturb this moment, a pure and naked intimacy all its own.
Viktor hums as if hearing his thoughts. Or more probably feeling Jayce pressing against the curve of his arse. “Are you never able to tame that thing?” he teases.
“Not when you’re around,” Jayce rumbles, unapologetic. He rakes his fingers through Viktor’s hair, presses his other hand into his ribs.
Viktor cranes his neck to look at him finally, his eyes softening in a way Jayce still isn’t sure he deserves. He slides his hand up and rests it lovingly against the side of Jayce’s face. The tip of his thumb caresses the tender skin under Jayce’s eye. “You are tired, my love.” He moves as if to roll onto his back, and Jayce shifts to make room. “Come.”
Viktor eases him down until Jayce’s head is resting on his stomach. Viktor’s arms come around him, tugging the covers up, hands settling warmly on the muscles of his back and in his hair. Viktor’s fingers move, strong and deliberate, rubbing at Jayce’s scalp in a way that’s guaranteed to reduce him to a heap of mush in a matter of minutes.
“Rest, Jayce,” Viktor whispers to him. “Sleep. I will watch over you. I will be here when you wake up.”
A breeze blows through the cracked open window, bringing with it the scent of petrichor and meadowsweet.
Viktor’s hands press into his skin, a silent promise.
Jayce sleeps.