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Oliver hasn’t been camping since he was a teenager. And, honestly, after the island, being in an environment like this is kind of… unsettling.
In all fairness, it had been Oliver’s idea, and the scenery is something to be marvelled at. A pleasant hiking trail within walking distance, and really, they couldn’t have chosen a better camping spot. The lake next to their tent is serene, and the water is so calm that Oliver’s starting to wonder if there’s something unnatural about it.
Barry is distracting, though. Long limbs spread out on a red cotton blanket (and where the hell did Barry even get that, anyway? He’s pretty sure they hadn’t packed it), green eyes fixed intently on the sky, and it’s one of the most beautiful things Oliver’s ever seen, really. He’s not sure he’s ever seen Barry look so peaceful.
After taking some time to admire the view from his fold-out chair – and no, he doesn’t mean the skies, he means Barry – Oliver finally wills himself to move over to the blanket, and Barry greets him with a wide grin that makes his heart do a little flutter in his chest.
“So… what are we looking at?” he asks, leaning in to steal a kiss before settling on his back, one hand tucked under his head and eyes on the sky.
“Orion.” Barry replies simply.
He’s not completely uneducated in Astronomy. He knows that Orion is the largest constellation, just as he knows that there’s a story behind it. One that Thea used to harp on about constantly when she was just a kid. But fuck if he can remember it.
A comfortable silence beats by, and Oliver feels himself relax. He clearly doesn’t know the skies as well as Barry does, but that’s okay – it’s nice to look at.
“Can you see it?” Barry asks, hand sliding into Oliver’s, rested between them on the blanket, and it takes Oliver a few seconds for his head to catch up with him, because one slight touch from Barry seems to be all it takes to get him off his guard.
That’s… concerning.
“Orion?” Oliver asks, looking for clarification.
“Mm,” is all Barry responds, and he takes it to mean yes.
He squints a little, trying to make out the patterns he’d been taught years and years ago. No such luck. He’d never taken an interest, really.
Barry, though, can read his silence easily, and he points upwards, drawing out the pattern with his fingers, and Oliver follows the motion with his eyes.
“That – right there. The biggest star? It’s known as Rigel. One of the brightest stars in the night sky.”
If you ask Oliver, they all look the same. Of course, some are brighter than others, some larger, some smaller, but really, they’re all just stars to him. But that wonder – that passion in Barry’s voice? That’s what keeps him intrigued.
Really, he could listen to Barry talk about the stars all night.
And he does.
Barry takes him through the constellations that can be seen from their location, explaining the mythology behind them and the most prominent stars as he goes. Orion, he knows now, is named after a hunter in Greek mythology, just as he knows that it’s one of the easiest constellations to find. Drawing a line through Orion’s Belt, Barry tells him that the star he’s pointing to is Sirius, the brightest star in the sky (although, Barry points out, it’s actually a star system, whatever that means) and is also known as the Dog Star.
Time seems to fly by after that, and it’s only when he catches himself yawning, eyes feeling heavy, that he realises how long he’s been out here listening to Barry talk about the stars – a subject that seems much more interesting, all of a sudden, now that he’s hearing it from his boyfriend.
It seems, though, that he’s not the only one starting to feel the fatigue. Barry, curled up into him now, head laying on his chest, nudges his jaw with his nose to get his attention. “We should probably move into the tent before we end up getting attacked by a wild animal.”
“Like a bear couldn’t claw its way into our tent if it really wanted to,” Oliver mumbles, but he forces himself to move, and helps Barry to his feet, both of them stumbling into the tent and collapsing instantly on top of their sleeping bags in a tangle of limbs.
“Sorry if I bored you,” Barry says quietly, nuzzling into him, and Oliver lets out a breath of laughter.
“You could never bore me, Barry.” And, really, it’s the truth. Barry shines brighter than any star in the sky, and Oliver’s just happy to be along for the ride.