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Jack wakes up in a patch of sunlight and rolls over to find his husband on his phone. Tweeting. Because of course he is. “Good morning, Bits.”
“You forgot to buy eggs,” Bitty responds without looking up from his phone. “There were literally three things on that list and you bought me roses instead of eggs.”
He’s not really angry, Jack can tell. Still, Jack flushes and nuzzles into Bitty’s hip. “Sorry.”
“I’m married to the most romantic scatterbrain on the planet,” Bitty sighs out and puts his phone down. He runs his fingers through Jack’s hair. “It’s fine, though. I've still got a few, I'll just need to run to the store before I make that angel cake for your mom's birthday. I made biscuits if you want to eat.”
“Why are you up so early?” Jack looks up at the clock on the bedside table. It’s actually…not early. It’s past eleven.
Bitty is a bad influence on him. Jack never used to sleep past eight.
“Had a call with publishers at seven,” Bitty says around a yawn, “couldn’t sleep after that.”
He’s trying to sound casual, but Jack can tell that he’s excited. So Jack asks because Bitty wants him to, “Oh? What did they say?”
A small smile sneaks onto Bitty’s face and Jack thinks I am so in love the way he did five years ago when he went down to Madison for the first time. “My book is going to be on shelves next March.”
Jack scoots up into a sitting position and cradles Bitty’s face with his hands. They’ve been struggling with the publisher for so long on getting an actual release date for Bitty’s book for what feels like ages. This time, Bitty’s smile isn’t secret or small. It’s unbridled and brilliant. “Bits, that’s amazing.”
Bitty leans forward to press his smile against Jack’s. “Can you believe it?” He mumbles against Jack’s mouth.
Jack pulls back and furrows his eyebrows. “Of course I can. I always knew you could do this, Bitty.”
Bitty responds by smacking Jack on the pec and rolling his eyes. He’s bad at taking sincere compliments and they both know it, but Jack lets it slide today. “Oh shut up. And go brush your teeth, your morning breath is truly ungodly.”
Jack breaths into Bitty’s face pointedly, earning him a wrinkled nose and another playful swat, before rolling out of bed and heading toward the bathroom. “Have you called your mom yet?”
“Yes, dear. Who do you think I am?” Bitty laughs and pads over to wrap his arms aroud Jack’s waist. “She says hello and she’s excited to babysit her grandpuppy next month.”
“Grandpuppy?” Jack asks around his toothbrush.
Bitty laughs and presses his forehead to Jack’s bare back. “It’s what she calls Ella. Woman’s so desperate for grandchildren, I swear. You should have seen her face when I told her we were waiting to adopt any kids until you retired.”
Jack spits and rinses. He straightens back up with Bitty still plastered to his back and reaches around to give him a very awkward hug. “It’ll only probably be about five more years. She’ll be fine.”
“I know, but the way she talks, you’d think she was on her deathbed.” Bitty pulls away for a second to stand in front of Jack this time and place his hands on his pectorals. “You look good today, baby.”
“You say that every day,” Jack responds, but still leans down to kiss Bitty, who’s waiting on his tiptoes.
“Mm and I’ll say it every day until I die.” Bitty bites playfully at Jack’s bottom lip as he pulls away and it takes everything in Jack not to pick him up and throw him on the bed like they’re newlyweds again. They have things to do today.
“Breakfast?” Jack hopes that distracting Bitty with the prospect of cooking for Jack-his proclaimed favorite hobby-will give Jack some time to cool down his visceral reaction to every moment he spends with Eric Bittle. His stomach growls right on cue.
Bitty smiles softly and runs his hand down Jack’s arms. He grabs Jack’s hands in his own. (And maybe Lardo wasn’t wrong when she called them ‘completely and totally disgusting’ but Jack doesn’t care.) “I made biscuits like I said, but I could rustle up some gravy or eggs. But I feel like I should mention that it’s hardly breakfast time anymore, sleepyhead.” He releases one of Jack’s hands to pat his cheek.
“Brunch, then,” Jack says around a yawn, scratching idly at his stomach. “Whatever meal it is, I’m starving.”
“You’re not, but okay.”
Jack follows Bitty to the kitchen, still holding his hand, but lets go when Bitty starts going through the fridge to grab some food. He once tried to keep holding onto Bitty while he cooked, and was treated to multiple smacks on the ass with a spatula in a very not sexy way.
So he sits at the counter and picks apart a biscuit while Bitty makes what looks like omelets, chattering away. The sunlight comes in through the window and illuminates Bitty, looking absolutely perfect in his baggy sweatpants and one of Jack’s shirts. Jack would take a picture if Bitty wouldn’t kill him for capturing such a ‘lazy outfit, good lord.’
Jack would take a picture of every moment of his life with Bitty if he could.
“-And then Sheila tried to bring up the Bake Sale fiasco of 2009, which was not my mother’s fault and I swear, I have never seen my dad get quite so angry,” Bitty is regaling a tale of his most recent visit to Madison with a grin. “He made sure that woman remembered that it was her unlabeled nut brownies that brought the whole thing down, not my mama’s planning skills.”
Jack pops the last bit of the fluffy biscuit into his mouth and leans forward on his elbows. “Oh?”
“You should have seen the look on her face. I swear, that woman is so vile, it was a moment of pure triumph for the human race.”
Jack smiles at his husband’s antics, at the way that his accent gets thicker when he tells stories about home, at the way he smiles automatically when he meets Jack’s eyes. Something warm and pleasant settles in Jack’s stomach. This is it. This is happier than he ever thought he would be.
“Hey Bits?”
Bitty hums absently while he flips the omelet in the pan. “What is it, honey?”
Jack inhales how wonderful that name sounds when directed at him and exhales, “I love you. So much.”