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Eames wakes up with his head resting against the door pillar, neck aching at the uncomfortable angle. Arthur is still driving, off-road tyres loud on the smooth road surface. The sky is inky and studded with stars, the radio turned down low enough that it is little more than a low buzzing, impossible to hear what anybody is saying but just loud enough to be irritating.
His whole body hurts, the pain in his leg concentrated a few inches above his knee, a deep throb with the edge taken off by whatever painkillers Arthur had shoved down his neck the last time they stopped. He’d been very lucky that the bullet had only caught the outer edge of his leg, clipping the muscle and leaving a ragged tear. It could have been a lot worse.
Eames looks at the clock. The display on the dashboard says it’s quarter past three in the afternoon, which is clearly bollocks, and his disorientation isn’t helped by the groggy feeling the painkillers have left him with. He swallows, throat clicking unpleasantly.
“What time is it?” he asks.
“A little after midnight,” Arthur replies quietly, not taking his eyes off the road. The dirty yellow glow of the headlights catches the wings of large pale moths, briefly illuminated as they pass by in the darkness.
It was light when Eames closed his eyes against the setting sun, claiming it was only to keep the glare out of his eyes. Arthur hadn’t bothered to correct him, just grunted like he knew that wasn’t true.
“Where are we?” Eames asks, clearing his throat to try and cover up the groan he lets out as he sits up from the uncomfortable slouch he’d adopted in his sleep. He eases his leg out as straight as he can, wincing at the pain.
“Nebraska,” Arthur says, voice little more than a murmur, rolling his shoulders with a grimace. He reaches for the coffee cup sitting in one of the cup holders, scowling when he shakes it and finds only dregs before dropping it on the floor behind his seat. He rests his hand on his thigh, tapping his thumb.
“That’s not very specific,” Eames says around a yawn. He watches Arthur reach up to run his fingers through his hair, then lean forward again to snatch a crumpled cigarette box from the other cup holder. The click of the lighter in the quiet seems louder than it should, the flint reluctant to spark.
“Fuck’s sake,” Arthur mutters, jabbing at the lighter on the dashboard, still clicking the disposable plastic one while he waits for it to heat up. He gets it just as the one on the dashboard pops out, the flame bright in the dark as he holds it up to his face.
He looks exhausted in the brief glow of the lighter, hair dishevelled and in need of a wash even before he started running his hands through it. Eames doesn’t think he’s aware that he does it as often as he does, when he’s nervous or anxious or self-conscious, or just when he wants a fag and isn’t letting himself have one.
“Besides, specifics are a little difficult, it all looks the goddamn same round here,” Arthur says with a slight uptick in volume, dropping the lighter back into the cup holder. He takes another drag on the cigarette and winds his window down slightly before he blows smoke out through his mouth. “Somewhere north of I-80. We went through a city called Broken Bow a while back.”
He’d not expected Arthur to elaborate, but maybe he’s as aware of the silence as Eames is, needing to say something or he’ll be left with only his own thoughts going round and round in futile circles in his head.
Eames looks out at the dark sky. There is something mesmerising about the night here, all wide open expanses and dusty plains, the gentle rise and fall of the ground visible as areas of darkness that are devoid of constellations. The distant stars look almost close enough to drive to, like they’re hanging there no further away than the horizon, something enclosing rather than almost infinite.
“Difficult to imagine a city round here,” he says, glancing back at Arthur.
Arthur quirks a tired smile, and the answering jolt Eames feels in his chest seems entirely over the top. Maybe the painkillers are giving him heart palpitations. That or it’s an as of yet undocumented side effect of Somnacin, jury’s out.
“I guess ‘city’ probably doesn’t mean quite the same thing as you’re used to,” Arthur says, stubbing his cigarette out in the ashtray. “The population probably isn’t above three thousand.”
“What makes it a city then?”
“I think it depends on the state.”
“Pedant,” Eames says, trying not to smile. “Obviously I meant this state.”
“It might surprise you to know that I am not familiar with the technicalities of what defines a city from one state to another, just that it differs.”
Eames snorts quietly. “On balance, I’d be more concerned if you did know.”
They lapse into silence again. The radio is still buzzing on the edges of Eames’ hearing like a winter-slow insect trapped in a closed room, the tune just out of reach. The reflection of Arthur smoking in the window is transposed against the dark sky, the hot glow from the remainder of the cigarette looking like a huge comet amongst the constellations. There is something about the juxtaposition of distances that seems significant; poetic, if Eames was given to that sort of thing, that Arthur is little more than two feet away but the distance feels like it might as well be measured in light years.
Eames grimaces slightly to himself in the window. Never mind poetic, pathetic might be a more fitting word for this overcooked pining. If anybody asks he’ll blame it on the tramadol.
“Do you think we’re still being followed?” he asks, the silence suddenly feeling loud again.
“No, I’ve bought us to bumfuck nowhere for fun,” Arthur replies, sarcasm dripping from the words.
“Hm, yes, bit of an odd choice for a getaway destination, we don’t exactly blend in with all the other traffic.” They’ve not seen another car since Eames woke up. He says it to fill the silence, slipping into the familiar cadence of the conversation, but Arthur doesn’t seem to want to play the game Eames thought he did.
“Fine, I get it. You would have done it differently. We can’t all be as clever as you,” Arthur bites back, the sudden switch in tone jarring.
“That isn’t—” Eames snaps his teeth closed around the attempt at explanation, not feeling up to the task of tackling Arthur’s unpredictable belligerence in his current state. “Is there anything to drink?” he asks instead.
Arthur doesn’t reply, leaning over and reaching behind the seats. His shoulder bumps against Eames’, the angle strained where he’s trying to keep his eyes on the road at the same time. Eames hears the crumple of paper and the rustle of polythene before Arthur deposits a bag on the floor by his feet, swinging it wide of his injured leg.
“There’s also food, if you’re hungry,” Arthur says. “Best I could do at the time, but you should eat something.” He leans forward to rummage one-handed through the contents of the bag. “Plus it’s been a few hours, you can have another two by now,” he says, holding a bottle of painkillers out towards Eames without looking at him.
Eames takes the bottle off him, peering at the name on the prescription label. “Who’d you pinch these off?”
“An alias,” Arthur replies shortly. “Just take them.”
It’s all slightly confusing. On the one hand Arthur is being considerate; he didn’t have to remind Eames of the painkillers. But on the other he’s being an arse, and Eames is feeling just woozy enough that the combination is difficult to navigate.
“Where are we going?” Eames asks, willing to wind Arthur up if it means he doesn’t have to sit in silence with only his thoughts for company.
“West,” is all Arthur says.
“And do we have a destination in mind, or are we just going to drive and see what happens?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know.” In the low light Eames can just about make out the clench of Arthur’s jaw. He runs his hand through his hair again. “I was hoping once we got to Colorado we could find somebody to look at your leg.”
“Do you think it’s a good idea?” Eames asks. Explaining the injury might create another problem, one that they could do without right now. He flexes his leg slightly. It hurts like buggery, but as far as he can tell it seems fine, wrapped in layers of bandage and gauze. He feels a bit out of it, but it’s probably more to do with the combination of exhaustion and opiates than the onset of infection.
“I trust your field surgery is up to your usual standards,” he tells Arthur. It wasn’t something he would have said ordinarily, but sometimes Arthur needed the reassurance that he’d done a good job.
“I still think you should get it looked at,” Arthur replies, running a hand through his hair again.
For some reason the action is irritating. Arthur isn’t listening to him, not willing to take his responses at face value, as if Eames can’t be trusted to know what’s best. “I’ll rephrase my question; do you think it’s necessary? We’re not exactly here on a jolly, there’s still the little problem of Jones and his ilk. I would have thought fannying around looking for a doctor that won’t talk was pretty low on the list of priorities.”
Arthur looks at him. Eames can just about see the way his mouth has fallen open slightly.
“Any more stupid questions?” Arthur snaps, which seems a bit over the top. It isn’t a difficult question, Arthur is normally pragmatic when it comes to these sorts of things.
“You’re delightful when you’re like this.”
It says something that Arthur doesn’t bite his head off for pointing it out, doesn’t reply with a whipcord retort to the criticism, but Eames is too tired and sore to untangle the details. He shifts in his seat, trying to find a position where his leg doesn’t ache so much, but it’s a futile effort.
Arthur doesn’t say anything, a tight frown on his face when he glances at Eames every now and again, seemingly trying to make it appear that he isn’t looking at all.
“Sorry,” Arthur says after a while, reaching for the packet of cigarettes again and sticking one into his mouth. The sudden brightness when he clicks the lighter gives him a ghoulish appearance. “I’m exhausted,” he says, before blowing out smoke. He rubs his eyelid with the thumb of the hand holding the cigarette.
Eames considers pointing out that at least he’s figured out how to work the lighter, but thinks better of it.
“Then stop for a bit,” he says instead, risking something approaching honesty in response to Arthur’s apology. Sometimes Arthur required a bit of chivying when it came to his own needs, willing to swallow his own discomfort if it meant he could focus on the things that needed doing.
“I’m the only one who can currently drive,” Arthur points out, as if the obvious needed stating, something that sounds like stroppiness edging back into his voice.
“Well I’m sorry I got shot,” Eames retorts. “How careless of me, I will endeavour to keep all my limbs out of harm’s way in future.” The mock sincerity might be slightly overdone, but Arthur isn’t the only one who’s tired.
Arthur’s frown shifts into an embarrassed grimace, just discernible in the dark, but he doesn’t say anything else. He takes a drag on his cigarette, the end glowing an angry orange.
Eames swallows, throat dry. He still hasn’t had a drink, the bottle of painkillers sitting forgotten in his lap. Rather than trying to come up with another retort he swipes at the carrier bag by his feet, hooking his fingers through a handle and pulling it towards him whilst trying not to jostle his leg.
He swallows two of the pills with a mouthful of lukewarm water, not even commenting on the fact that the other bottle in the bag is a bottle of Mountain Dew, half empty. He’s not really hungry, but pulls whatever it is out of the paper bag, biting down and tasting cheese and beef and what he thinks might be cabbage. He tries to reason that he’s eating because the pills will work faster if he takes them with food, but it’s only half-convincing at best.
Arthur’s chagrined silence is worse than his usual… Arthurishness. Eames would rather he was pissed off than feeling guilty, especially as he has nothing to feel guilty about in the first place; it’s not his fault Eames got shot. But then, Arthur did have a tendency to shoulder the blame when things went wrong.
“Have you had anything?” he asks. It’s a fairly benign question, but knowing Arthur it will probably irritate him in some way.
“I ate when we stopped,” Arthur replies quietly.
“And you thought Mountain Dew was a sensible choice to hydrate with?” Eames continues, holding up the bottle in question.
He can see the way Arthur pulls his mouth to one side, almost shrugging with it. “I have bad taste,” he says.
The acquiescence is… somewhat disappointing. Arthur still sounds more guilty than galled, apologetic rather than argumentative in response to the slight; clearly Eames needs to kick it up a notch.
“Where did you grow up?” Eames asks.
He’s pretty sure it’s the sort of question Arthur would be irked by, the fact that it is out of the blue even more so. It’s also the sort of question that Eames maybe wants to know the answer to. It would certainly make useful leverage material, but this justification doesn’t fit well when he tries it on for size; he's acutely aware that it isn't the reason for him wanting to know.
“I’m not sure that’s a question you should be asking,” Arthur says. The look of distaste on his face almost makes Eames smile.
“Why not? You know where I grew up.”
Even in the dark Eames can see the unimpressed curve of Arthur’s mouth.
“I know the story you told Kim when we were doing that job in Seoul, and I know it’s complete bullshit,” Arthur says.
Eames grins without showing any teeth, feeling rewarded for his efforts. Then he surprises himself by blurting out a question he didn’t think he would have the guts to ask. “Do you want to hear the real version?”
He waits with bated breath for the answer. If Arthur wants to know then it means he is at least curious. Curiosity was better than contempt. It was also better than indifference, and the longer the silence stretches the more uncomfortable it feels. Eames wishes he’d never asked, wanting and not wanting to hear the concealed sentiment in Arthur’s response.
“I want to hear it if you want to tell it,” Arthur says eventually.
It isn’t an answer to the question Eames asked, but it also doesn’t feel dismissive. Arthur’s tone is carefully tactful, and it feels like a consideration, like Arthur is trying to take Eames into account rather than just satisfying his own curiosity. He sounds like he’s testing the firmness of the ground with his answer, trying to navigate a safe path between the location of two truths Eames isn’t quite up to pinpointing right at the moment.
He deliberates, the silence stretching while he tries to decide just what Arthur meant with the remark, and in the end Arthur answers for him.
“I’m going to have to stop for a bit,” he says, blinking. “I can’t keep my eyes open.”
Arthur pulls off the highway and they head down a slip road, low scrubby trees appearing out of the darkness. Ten miles an hour seems so slow after whatever speed it was Arthur had been going on the main road, the moths swept harmlessly over the car rather than hitting the windscreen. There is a noticeable change in the air temperature, cooler as they drop down through the dunes, and when they round a bend in the road the river comes into view, moonlight glinting on the water. The tyres crunch over gravel as they pull into a car park, the light of the headlights catching a sign partially obscured with faded stickers.
“Dismal River?” Eames asks, glancing at Arthur as he slows the truck to a stop. “Is that a noun or an adjective?”
“I always thought it was a bit of a misnomer,” Arthur says quietly after he’s turned the headlights off. “It’s really not.”
Eames tries to make out his expression in the darkness. Even with the stars as bright as they are it is impossible to see anything beyond the vague outline of his features, but Eames can tell Arthur is looking at him.
“You’ve been here before,” Eames says. It isn’t a question, and Arthur doesn’t reply, but his silence is answer enough.
Eames considers asking how, or why, or when. He considers asking if this means Arthur is from Nebraska, or whether he just happened to have passed by this way before, maybe the last time he was trying to outrun a bunch of dream criminals his esteemed co-worker had managed to infuriate.
Instead he asks if he can pinch a cigarette.
“You never normally ask,” Arthur points out, fumbling for the box and dropping it into the footwell of the passenger seat.
They both reach for it at the same time, knocking against each other in the dark. Arthur pulls his hand back like he’s afraid the box might bite, and Eames hears him tutting to himself quietly.
“Sorry, don’t seem to be quite as coordinated as normal,” Eames says. “Probably the tramadol, always did make me a bit spacey.”
“That’s not— It’s okay,” Arthur replies. He reaches for the lighter, managing to get it to spark on the sixth try and holding it up so Eames can touch the end of the cigarette to it.
“Still got the knack,” Eames tells him.
“Knack for something, yeah,” Arthur mutters, turning to face his window and tilting his head to look up at the sky.
They sit in silence for a while, the night air drifting in through the open windows. Arthur’s quiet presence almost feels like a comfort now, and Eames can’t put his finger on why. The stars are even more brilliant now the headlights aren’t interfering, the band of the Milky Way stretching away towards the horizon. The quiet night air doesn’t feel nearly so oppressive anymore, filled with the sound of nocturnal birds and the burble of the river.
It’s almost jarring when Arthur speaks again.
“Come on,” Arthur says. “You can’t come out here and not do some stargazing.”
“Small problem of being shot in the thigh,” Eames reminds him.
But Arthur insists, getting his shoulder into Eames’ armpit and trying to take more of his weight than necessary. All the same, climbing into the back of the truck is easier said than done when he can’t put any weight on one leg, and by the time he flops down on the pile of coats that Arthur has dumped in the truck bed he’s breathing like he’s just run a fast mile.
They arrange themselves as best they can, but even with the assorted blankets and coats Arthur has put down as padding it isn’t that comfortable. Eames tries propping his leg up on one of the wheel arches but quickly decides that putting his knee at that angle is a bad idea.
“This had better be worth it,” he grumbles, trying unsuccessfully to fashion a pillow out of a rolled up jumper.
“It’s pretty good,” Arthur says noncommittally, settling back and putting an arm behind his head. He yawns.
Eames turns his head to look at him. “I thought you were tired.”
“I was,” Arthur says, looking straight up into the darkness. “Am. Overtired maybe.”
“Then why are we out here instead of trying to sleep?”
Arthur glances at him. “Just shut up for a minute and look up, will you?”
Eames grins in response, and does as he’s told, at least temporarily.
“I know sod all about stars,” Eames says after a minute.
“Astronomy.”
“Yeah that. Never sure I’m going to get it right, you might have thought I was talking about horoscopes.”
“Which part of ‘shut up and look up’ was difficult to understand?”
“Oh I understood perfectly, I just like annoying you.”
Arthur grimaces, and Eames feels a wave of affection ripple through him. He’s very glad it’s dark, because it hopefully hides the soppy smile he can feel spreading across his face at Arthur’s tetchy response.
He does shut up then, suddenly aware that if he doesn’t then the next thing out of his mouth will probably be something he can’t take back, something soft and damning and honest. He shuts up for a good five minutes, and it feels like the longer he looks up the more stars appear.
“Not this far west,” Arthur says abruptly, like the words have finally built up enough of their own momentum to get out of his mouth. “And I left as soon as I was old enough to enlist.”
Eames tears his eyes away from the sky, looking over at Arthur in the dark. There is an awful lot that he could ask questions about, but he doesn’t.
“Hertfordshire,” Eames says, looking away again. “There’s not much to say. Then I ran off to join the Navy.”
“Then,” Arthur says, having pinpointed the precise location of everything Eames didn’t say, all the things that can lurk in the space between the end of one sentence and the start of the next.
Eames stares up at the vast open sky above them and thinks about distances. Not with any finesse, his brain feels like it’s wrapped in cotton wool, the triple whammy of tramadol, adrenaline crash and lack of sleep making it feel like he isn’t really here.
There is something bothering him about the way Arthur asked if he had any more stupid questions, like Eames is missing a vast and obvious point. He thinks about the way Arthur’s mouth fell open slightly when Eames asked why they would bother to find a doctor, the way his brow furrowed slightly.
Some clarity pierces the fluff around Eames’ brain. It occurs to him, belatedly, that Arthur is worried, and it’s not at the prospect of being caught. It seems so obvious all of a sudden, but at the same time Eames can’t quite believe it, not quite willing to trust his judgement.
He’s wanted Arthur for years, loved him for longer than he is brave enough to admit. He’d be a liar if he said he’d never tried to imagine it, but he’d never quite believed it was possible.
“Can I kiss you?” Eames asks, another out of the blue question, but this time it’s himself that he’s managed to surprise. The thudding of his own heart is appalling, the question thrown out in a casual tone that is apparently completely at odds with reality. He was almost certain he would have asked if he could suck Arthur's cock, if he asked anything of that nature at all, a question he could pass off as superficial if the answer was no. Asking if he could kiss Arthur was not superficial in the slightest, his heart lurching into his throat as if it is diving after the words to try and stop him saying them, but by then it’s too late, the question hanging in the air like a soap bubble, fragile and vulnerable.
He gives in to the urge to glance over at Arthur. It is easier to see the expression on Arthur’s face out here, but Eames isn’t sure what the tilt of his mouth means, what the weight he can feel in Arthur’s attention signifies.
Arthur shuffles closer, the movement clumsy because he doesn’t bother to sit up, just rolls towards Eames as best he can, and maybe this is an answer and maybe it isn’t, Eames can’t quite tell anymore. All he can say with any certainty is that his heart has decided that his throat is a good place to take up residence.
Then Arthur kisses him. It’s hesitant, a soft brush of dry lips. His breath shivers against Eames' face, shallow and tentative like he's trying not to be found out, like this matters to him too, and maybe that's an answer but it still feels like he's trying to hide something, a hidden inference Eames isn’t quite on the ball enough to identify.
“Any more stupid questions?” Arthur asks quietly, leaning back on one elbow.
Eames thinks about it. “Kiss me again?”
The corner of Arthur’s mouth quirks up. “That’s the most sensible question you’ve asked all night.”
“Piss off.”
Arthur smiles at him, but this time it’s easy to see what he means, and Eames is helpless against it. He reaches over, pressing his thumb against Arthur’s chin, just brushing against his bottom lip. His heart is doing something weird, crashing against his sternum, and this time Eames can’t get away with blaming it on the painkillers.
He’s thought about this, how it might go if it ever got to this point, and it turns out he was almost entirely wrong. The angle is awkward, Arthur’s unshaven jaw rough against his thumb. It’s not the frantic fast thing Eames imagined it would be. He can almost feel Arthur’s questions in the hesitant way he puts his fingers on Eames’ elbow, as if Arthur is asking for clarification, that even though Eames was the one to ask in the first place Arthur still isn’t sure of the parameters, worried about putting a foot wrong. When he leans back slightly it is written all over his face, asking for reassurance that he’s done the right thing.
“There’s no wrong questions, you know,” Eames says.
Arthur’s nose wrinkles like he’s about to argue, but then he snorts slightly. “Maybe not, but asking whether it’s a good idea to bother getting your leg looked at by an actual doctor is definitely a stupid one.”
“I am admittedly not quite at my best,” Eames offers, caving to the urge to smile when Arthur laces their fingers together. There is a question that is almost on the tip of his tongue, something vast and infinite and terrifying. And maybe there are no wrong questions, but there are questions he doesn’t feel bold enough to ask, questions he’s not quite sure he has managed to map out yet. There are questions he isn’t up to articulating, and he can’t blame that on the painkillers either; that’s just him, afraid of the answers.
Arthur’s fingers tighten on his.
“Don’t fucking get shot next time,” Arthur says against his mouth, warm and damp.
Then Arthur kisses him, slow and soft and curious, a kiss that is a question, and it is nothing like Eames thought it would be but everything he’d not dared to hope it could.
He hasn’t asked the question, but, Eames thinks, leaning in for another kiss, this might definitely be an answer.