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“Where are you going again?” Reese asked for probably the fifth time, trying to sound nonchalant. He knew of course, he just wanted to hear Harold say it again.
“One of Harold Crane’s businesses has a research facility located in Fukui Prefecture. Unfortunately, about once a year I need to make an appearance for the board and review the research being conducted.” Harold stood at the door, suitcase at his side, hat on his head. “I’ll be back in a week Mr. Reese.”
John nodded, trying not to look as despondent as he felt.
“Oh John. Come here.”
John walked over until he stood before Harold, his head tilted down and looking at Harold’s shoes. Harold’s hand came up to cup John’s cheek. He pulled John down until their lips touched in a brief kiss.
“It’s only a week. You can call me if you need me at any time.”
John nodded. “I know. I’m fine Harold.”
“Of course you are.” Harold agreed. He kissed John again. “Don’t feed Bear table scraps.”
“I know.”
“If any numbers come up, make sure to enlist help.”
“I will.”
“And do try to keep yourself in one piece.”
John’s smile was weak at best. “For you Harold, I’ll try.”
Harold nodded. Then, between one moment and the next, he was gone, the door to John’s loft swinging shut behind him.
A whole week without Harold. John would be fine. He absolutely would be fine.
---
John was not fine.
As soon as the door closed the apartment was yawningly empty, like Harold had taken whatever light and air there was with him. It was unbearable. John needed out.
He whistled for Bear. “Wanna go for a walk?”
Bear’s ears quirked up enthusiastically at the word ‘walk’ and he ran for his leash, claws clacking like castanets on the hardwood floor.
John led them on a twelve mile loop, purposefully choosing a route that he knew took them past the most pay phones. Now would be an ideal time for the Machine to give them a number just complicated enough to give John’s mind something to latch on to.
Luck – or violent criminals – were apparently in short supply because not one payphone rang as they passed. Eventually John was forced to concede defeat and return to the loft. By the time they made it, Bear’s tongue was lolling out of his mouth, limp and swollen with thirst and fatigue. John wasn’t much better.
He took care of Bear, watching with distant amusement as the dog managed to get more water on the floor than in his mouth, then hopped in the shower, trying to numb himself and absolutely not think about Harold.
After his shower he trimmed his beard, his hair, even the hair in his nostrils. He dressed. He watched Bear chase a ball around the apartment. He ate a protein bar.
By 1:30 John was out of things to do.
Harold was the event coordinator out of the two of them and John was perfectly happy for things to be that way. He knew how to keep himself from going insane locked in a room with nothing to look at other than a blank wall. What he wasn’t really sure of was what he liked to do other than rescue innocent people, kneecap assholes, and spend time with Harold. He’d spent so long living by rote that he was pretty poorly equipped to have the freedom to do whatever he felt like.
In the end he settled down with a book. It was one of the dozen that Harold had been reading last week and John was hoping that they could maybe talk about it when he got back.
It was – a really boring book.
John made a valiant effort, making it a full fifty pages into the dense prose before getting stuck on the same page. After he read a single sentence four times in a row he tossed the book away, dropped his head back onto the couch, and groaned at the ceiling.
He pressed his hands over his eyes until he saw stars. Harold had been gone less then twelve hours and this week was already on the fast track to being the worst this year – including the week when he was kidnapped back in February.
When had being so completely reliant on another person become normal for him? Attachments were dangerous. Jessica – and Grace for that matter – were proof enough of that.
But with Harold it was different. Entrusting himself to Harold had been as easy as breathing – easier. Harold was infinitely careful with John from the very beginning, even when the unshakeable trust hadn’t been there. John’s needs were always seen to – anticipated – before he even thought of them himself.
John returned Harold’s care with utter devotion. John would die and do a thousand worse things if Harold needed him to.
Except spend time apart apparently.
He whiled the day away putzing around the apartment, too bored to sit still but too restless to settle on any one task.
At the earliest possible respectable time, he retired to bed with relief. One day down, only six more to go. All he had to do was shut his eyes and let sleep take him.
Of course, it couldn’t be that easy.
Before Harold had more or less moved in with him, John had been content to be an insomniac. Spending fifty percent of your life looking over your shoulder in one way or another did not lend itself to baby-safe sleeping.
Harold was the most important person in his life by far. Having his warm body in bed next to John, feeling his fingers card through John’s hair and hearing his gentle murmur of ‘It’s alright John. You can rest now.’ Allowed John to fall more deeply and peacefully asleep than any other time in his life.
The heat, the touch, the quiet words were gone now and John was left starkly awake and staring at his ceiling into the wee hours of the morning, when even New York quieted down.
Some time between midnight and dawn exhaustion finally pulled him into a light doze.
---
John woke up and stretched, rolling across the bed until he ran into Harold’s warm body next to him. Vertigo met him at the edge of the bed. He pinwheeled his arms and managed to keep from landing face first on the floor.
Harold wasn’t here. Harold was halfway across the world and John was here alone.
Tangled in their sheets, John groaned into Harold’s tower of pillows. The pillows still smelled of Harold – obviously. He’d been gone less than a day.
If Harold were here he would either be already awake and working on his laptop or grumbling sleepily at John for waking him up. In either case though, he would also be stroking a hand through John’s hair or pressing a kiss to his cheek.
That was how mornings were supposed to go. That was what John had to look forward to every morning – Harold’s sweet, steady companionship.
He suddenly desperately wanted to hear Harold’s voice, reassure himself that the last year and a half wasn’t some crazy fever-dream. He had the phone in hand, finger poised over speed dial 1 when his brain caught up with him.
What was he doing? He couldn’t call Harold. Harold was busy with important things. Harold was trusting John to hold it together while he was gone.
John put the phone down, though it hurt his teeth to do it.
Feeling a tiny bit fractured and craving something comforting, John dragged himself to the kitchen and picked one of his cookbooks at random. He wound up with a baking book that he recognized. Harold had bought this one for him because it had a recipe for pain au chocolate that used the appropriate amount of butter.
For a second John considered putting it back, feeling the burn in his chest, the craving for Harold’s voice, even just over his earpiece.
Bear followed him into the kitchen, hoping for handouts. John scratched his head, using his other hand to flip to a random page in the cookbook. He tilted it so Bear could see. “What do you think?”
Bear whuffed and settled at John’s feet.
“Blueberry muffins it is.”
John took a detour to feed Bear, but soon enough he was elbows deep in baking. The rote work of measuring was soothing. It let John focus on one step at a time and when that step was completed he moved on to the next one. Mixing the ingredients together built up a pleasant burn in his arm and shoulder and by the time the muffins went in the oven John was feeling more centered, satisfied with the minor accomplishment.
Thirty-five minutes later John took them out, remembering at the last minute to put on oven mitts. They smelled great and they looked even better, golden brown with the sugar crackling on top.
John tipped one out of the tin and let it cool as long as he could stand before taking a bite.
He promptly spit it out.
“What the hell was that?” He asked Bear, who tilted his head.
John flipped back through his cookbook, looking for anything that would explain what happened.
“A teaspoon of salt.” John found his measuring spoons in the small mess on the counter. The tablespoon measure had a few grains of salt sitting in the bowl. “Dammit.” How had he screwed that up?
Maybe something simpler? Like drop cookies – or a jelly roll.
He added too much sugar to the cookies – who knew that could be a bad thing – and he burnt them which was definitely a bad thing. The jelly roll – he didn’t want to think about the jelly roll.
It all came back to Harold. When John baked, nine times out of ten Harold would be sitting quietly at the island or on the couch, reading or working. They wouldn’t talk, usually, but just having him there gave John a sense of calmness. Harold was safe, Bear was safe, so John was safe.
Except now Harold was out of his sight. Without him there, John was off-kilter and unsettled and it was bleeding over into everything he did.
This was the nightmare that happened when John was off his game. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that he didn’t have a number since he’d probably just get them killed.
The kitchen was a hazard-zone and John was at the end of his rope. He left the dirty dishes and ruined pastries where they were, too disappointed to bother cleaning them up.
For dinner he sat on the floor and shared a banana with Bear.
---
He went to the library expecting it to be a comfort. Even more than their apartment, this was Harold’s place. Being there could only help John feel closer to Harold.
Plus it served the extra purpose of ensuring their secret lair remained uncompromised in Harold absence.
He made it to the second floor and took one look at the shadowed room, the darkened monitors and vacant chair, and hightailed it out of there.
He stumbled back out into the open air, slipping into the alley next to the library half-blind. Memories collided with reality and John took several deep breaths, air in and air out, measured, repetitive, reminding himself that Harold was safe, he hadn’t been taken, that John had saved him before and that everything was fine now.
When his heart felt less like it was about to leap out of his chest John shook his head to clear it. This was not good. He needed a distraction. Half a block of walking yielded, unsurprisingly, a Duane Reade. Two minutes got him a pack of gobstoppers and a book of Sudoku.
The gobstoppers were good. The Sudoku was not.
Either too easy or completely impossible, there was no middle ground. He gave up and left it on the floor for Bear to turn into confetti with a tiny spark of vindictive satisfaction.
Revenge against a puzzle book was not a sign of mental problems.
(LINE BREAK)
He called Fusco and Carter out of desperation. If he didn’t talk to someone he was going to crack and call Harold – and probably beg him to come home early.
He arranged a meet at a local diner, conveniently sidestepping Carter’s questions about who was in danger. Then, because he was being diligent and not because he was halfway to booking a ticket to Japan, he got there twenty minutes early.
He waited on the other side of the street, watching the diner with one eye and looking out for threats with the other.
Ten minutes into his wait he swore he saw Harold in the crowd, a man on the shorter side, with spiky hair, in a nice suit. John actually tailed him for three blocks before catching his reflection in the window and realized that no – of course – it wasn’t Harold and he was very close to losing it. John suppressed a fairly desperate whimper and turned around.
By the time he made it back to the diner Carter and Fusco had already taken their seats. Both had a steaming mug of coffee in front of them and there was a third waiting on the table.
“Hello John.” Carter nodded at him as he strolled towards their booth.
Fusco raised an eyebrow. “Hey Mr. Sunshine, you got someone new in trouble?” He took a loud slurp of his coffee.
“Not today Lionel.”
“Then what’chu call us out here for?”
“I can’t meet up with two friends for coffee?” John asked, slipping into the booth.
Fusco snorted. “Friends?” He did a double take, looking closer at John. “You look like crap. You sick or somethin’?”
“Just not getting a lot of sleep the last few days.”
“Why not? You runnin’ something without us?”
“It’s Finch isn’t it?” Carter – too perceptive as usual, was watching John with soft compassion on her face. John wanted to melt into it – let someone comfort him – but instead he stiffened, half pushing up from the booth.
“Nevermind. This was – I’m fine.”
“John.” Carter’s voice had a snap that only a mother could manage. “Sit down.”
John sat.
Carter’s eyes were gentle. “Do you need anything?”
Normally John wouldn’t ask, wouldn’t dare to show this kind of vulnerability, but – “Do you have anything I can work on?”
Carter grimaced. “Things are weirdly quiet down at the precinct.”
“Yeah, unless you feel like helpin’ out with my paperwork – “ Fusco offered, shrugging.
“I’m sorry John.” Carter said.
John nodded. “If anything comes up – “
“We’ll call you first.” Carter promised.
---
The more John ran the less effective it seemed to get as a distraction. That didn’t mean John would stop trying. He was nothing if not stubborn. Harold could attest to that.
He left Bear in Leon’s care for the morning, not wanting to overwork the dog just because John was a glutton for punishment. Besides, it was good to put the fear of God in Leon every now and again and Bear was uniquely qualified in that department.
He ran, not paying attention to the distance and instead feeling the rasp of air in his throat and the fiery strain in his calves and thighs and abdomen.
He saw Harold in everything today. The street corner where they had spent eleven hours in a car staking out a number and talking about baseball and classic literature. The café that had the crepes that Harold had complimented. The abstract statute that Harold always paused to look at. The memories burned like lemon juice in a paper cut.
Noon had come and gone by the time he made it back to Leon’s place and, from long experience he estimated that he‘d run close to twenty miles. His feet would be blistered, maybe even bloody. Good. Disinfecting and bandaging, not to mention the lingering burn, would be another thing to focus on, a stopgap at best, but better than nothing.
Leon was waiting for him outside, Bear’s leash in his hand and a disgruntled expression on his face. “When you said you were going for a run I thought you’d be back in twenty minutes. It’s been hours man! Hours of your dog growling at me and giving me funny looks.”
“I’m sure Bear’s very grateful Leon. He’s maybe even starting to like you.” Bear lifted his lip at Leon, who looked dismayed, before maturely glaring back.
John swiped the leash and turned on his heel. It was rude, but John had a limited tolerance for Leon on the best of days and this was not the best of days.
His shower was cursory and cold. He felt dazed, like he was halfway between sleeping and awake, but the icy water didn’t wake him up.
His damp workout clothes he added to the growing mess on the bedroom floor. Normally John was fastidiously clean, a habit born first in the army and reinforced by the CIA.
A little mess was fine, a book left on the end table, some dishes in the sink. They were markers of life, just like the new, organized clutter in John’s apartment.
Harold relished buying him things. Hardly a week went by that Harold didn’t bring home some trinket or rare book for John. But more than anything, John’s wardrobe had exploded under Harold’s influence. He could probably go months without doing laundry.
John was both grateful and warmed that Harold wanted to fill his life with things – with belongings that served as tethers to the world, markers that John was here – and so even if it hadn’t already been habit, he would have made a concerted effort to take care of them. His suits were always hung up, the books carefully shelved out of Bear’s reach.
Now it seemed like too much effort.
Just like everything else. He cast a glance at his comb before using his fingers to swipe his hair out of his face. He didn’t bother with boxers or a shirt, just slung on a pair of sweatpants to protect Bear’s virgin eyes. Then he went and sat on the floor, arms wrapped around his folded legs, and let the room slowly get dark around him.
---
John lay on his back on the couch, knees bent, holding his phone in front of his face and staring at it. He should go – for a run or to get takeout. He should get up, go take a shower, shave.
Or he could call Harold.
He could just dial Harold’s number and then hang up and it wouldn’t be like he’d broken, not exactly.
And then Harold would see John’s number on the missed call list and call him back – and John would answer of course. Better that than worry Harold.
It wouldn’t even be John’s fault if Harold called him and then he could hear Harold’s voice, listen to the rhythm of his breath over the phone. Even just a few minutes and John would be refreshed.
All he had to do was press one little button.
With a yell he surged upwards and hurled his phone against the wall. It hit the floor in a pile of shattered plastic and silicon.
“Fuck!”
He scrambled over but before he even dropped to his knees he knew there was no salvaging the phone. He rubbed his face. “Fuck.”
He realized he was spiraling, and pretty pathetically too, but rather than fight it he opened himself up for it. If this was how he felt without Harold, at least there was even that tenuous connection between them.
He let the ache fill up his chest instead of tamping it down into a controlled burn like he’d been doing for the rest of the week. He relished the tightness, the shortness of breath and let the fears and doubts and insecurities that still lived at the back of his mind wash over him.
What if Harold had to extend his trip, or leave again and for longer this time? John would have to ask to go with him, especially if they didn’t have a number. John would beg if he had to. Pride was overrated when the alternative was being separated from Harold.
Even worse, what if Harold didn’t come back?
What if, one day, they got into an argument or a number went badly awry and Harold just up and – disappeared. He’d done it before, though not since John had known him, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t ever happen. Harold was a master of covering his tracks. John would never find him again, not if Harold didn’t want him to.
The bleakness of such a future closed John’s lungs. His chest felt like a hollow tree, empty and bleak. He stared sightlessly in front of him imagining it, letting that despair wash over him.
He wouldn’t survive that kind of loss.
If Harold didn’t want him – there wasn’t much worth living for anymore.
A cold nose pressed into the side of John’s neck. Combined with Bear’s whine, it jolted him free of his dark musings. He shook his head vigorously. No. Harold would never do that to him. John would trust in that much.
That didn’t stop him from ripping all the cushions off the couch and making a nest for himself in the corner of the apartment furthest from the bed.
He slept there that night, curled up alone on the floor, rather than smell Harold’s fading scent on their sheets.
---
John’s dreams were full of shadows and wraiths. They plucked his clothes and shoved at his shoulders and knees, trying to make him fall into the endless emptiness below his feet. They screamed at him in voices that were both familiar and unknown, telling him all his darkest fears about himself.
That he was worthless.
Useless.
Irredeemable.
Unlovable.
John slogged through them towards a distant light, his body heavier with every step, his mind questioning why he even bothered. If he was going to fall anyway, why not let it happen?
Loneliness and failure yawned in his chest like a gaping wound. The wraiths hung on his body, weighing him down, shrieking in his ears where he couldn’t escape them. The light coalesced into the shape of a man. John squinted to see his face, his breath catching when Harold’s familiar back came into view.
John tried to call out to Harold but his voice was drowned out by the shrieks and castigations of his tormentors. John lifted his foot to take another step nearer to Harold but, with a great yank, the wraiths overbalanced him.
Harold turned, startled, his eyes widening in terror when he saw John.
John fell, too stunned to even scream.
---
John woke with a jolt, for a moment still seeing Harold’s despairing face before his eyes cleared. It was still dark out, that blue-grey haze right before the sun came up. His body thrummed with adrenaline. He either need to shoot someone or –
His arms and legs were uncoordinated, but he managed to make it to the kitchen. A frenzied rummage through his cabinets netted an unopened bottle of whiskey that John had bought months ago – just so he could know he had it. He had the cap off and splashed some in a glass before his brain caught up with him.
He stalled like a car at the starting line. His arms were braced on the counter, triceps and deltoids corded with tension. He stared down the amber liquid, winking at him like an attractive woman, on the cusp of going to a place he’d sworn never to return.
A chime from his computer drew his attention to the date. It was Sunday. It was Sunday again.
Harold was coming home today.
John felt like he’d been zapped with a cattle prod. Suddenly the whiskey was the furthest thing from his mind. He was both frozen and electrified at the same time. He took in the apartment in silent horror. It didn’t look too far off from some of the bombed out buildings in Fallujah.
The remains of his abortive attempt at baking were strewn like fallen soldiers in the kitchen. The couch was disassembled, half-eaten frozen dinners speckled the apartment accompanied by John’s discarded running clothes that, now that John was paying attention, were actually giving off a faint odor as they worked together en masse.
He could only imagine what he himself looked like.
Bear was the only thing in the apartment in good condition and he was watching John with attentive eyes.
A frantic glance at the clock pointed out that Harold wasn’t just coming home today, his flight had gotten into JFK almost twenty minutes ago. Harold would be home in a half an hour – and that was the best case scenario.
Harold couldn’t come home to – to this. He didn’t deserve to see this. Selfishly, John didn’t want Harold to know what a wreck he was without him.
With a curse that he learned in a bar in Marrakesh, he lunged for the trashbags. He did a comical little shuffle, trying to decide where to start first – then realized it didn’t really matter.
Anything that could be thrown out got thrown out with a pretty wide margin for error. The muffin tin may have wound up a casualty. Maybe if he could just move quickly enough, Harold wouldn’t have to see –
“John?”
John froze, stack of desiccating frozen dinner trays hovering over the trash bag in his hand. “Harold.”
Harold was looking around in dismay. “What happened here?”
If John were a dog, his ears would be flat to his head and his tail would be between his legs. “I - .
Harold took in the apartment, then took in John. John knew he had to be seeing the similarities there, the neglect, had to be putting the pieces together. John couldn’t even stand to look at him, didn’t want to see that moment in his eyes when he knew how pitiful John was.
It happened anyway.
“Oh John.” Harold’s hand gently pried the garbage bag from John’s hand and set it somewhere outside John’s peripheral vision. Then Harold’s palm was on his back guiding him gently forward. “Come with me.”
Harold led John out of the apartment with a murmured "Bear, hier." John knew a highly paid cleaning service was likely already on its way.
“I can fix it Harold.” John whispered.
Harold patted his arm. “I know you can. But you don’t have to do it alone. And you certainly don’t have to do it today.”
John shut his mouth and compliantly followed Harold.
Neither of them spoke in the car, though Harold didn’t once let go of John, petting John’s arm and stroking his hand rhythmically. John couldn’t help but lean into the touches, just a bit. He didn’t deserve them, but he’d been dying for this for seven whole days. It would take a stronger man than him to pull away from Harold now.
The car didn’t take them to a hotel like John expected. Rather it took them to a nondescript brick-front row home. John recognized it as Harold’s favored safehouse. Other than the library or the loft it was the closest thing to home they had.
They went inside, Harold holding him by the hand, their fingers intertwined, and using his arm like a leash to guide him forward.
John followed, his mind thick with self-recrimination. Harold deserved so much more than this limpid version of John. John’s resolve should have been better. John should have been more than capable of going a week – just a week! – without Harold. Before Harold it wouldn’t even have been a question and now – John was no better than – John was a liability.
He came to a hard stop in the middle of the living room, inadvertently yanking Harold to a halt since their hands were still intertwined. John kept his eyes on the ground, more ashamed than ever by Harold’s quiet understanding.
“I’m sorry Harold.”
“Whyever would you be - ?”
“I let you down. I should have been better or stronger. I’m – “ John swallowed, “I’m pretty pathetic.”
“Don’t you dare think that.” Harold was incensed, though he didn’t raise his voice. His thumb stroked gentle circles onto the top of John’s hand. “You are fine just the way you are. If anyone should apologize, it’s me.” He’d turned back so that he was standing in front of John, his other hand resting on John’s waist.
“That’s not – “ John protested.
“No.” Harold’s voice was final. “I could have called you. I wanted to call you and knew it would probably be helpful to you as well. But I allowed my pride to get the better of me. I – didn’t do well without you either.”
“You can’t have been that bad.”
“I purchased some sort of steamed octopus dish because it reminded me of you.”
“How?”
“I honestly have no idea.”
John’s lips twitched in approximation of a smile despite himself. Harold smiled back. “Now, here’s what we’re going to do. Tomorrow, or maybe the next day, we’ll go back to the loft together and we’ll clean things up. But for now you’re going to let me take care of you.”
In the second it took for John to parse the words, Harold already started to lead him towards the large bathroom. John balked. It sounded too much like a reward to have Harold fuss over him. He stopped again.
Harold turned back once more. “What is it John?”
John twisted his hand in Harold’s, but Harold refused to let go. “You should be angry at me. Not – whatever you’re planning.”
Harold’s eyebrow twitched with a hint of annoyance. “I most certainly will be angry at you if you don’t stop blaming yourself for missing me.”
“I didn’t just miss you Harold – I fell to pieces. That’s not a good thing.”
“No, it’s not.”
John nodded. “I should be better than that.”
“I understand how you could think that. I’ve found myself thinking along similar lines. That I’m too reliant on you, that my affection for you is risky and dangerous. What I think we both need to remember is that we don’t live in a vacuum anymore. We, John, are no longer alone. In light of how long we each spent alone, how difficult it is for us to trust, and how deeply we each care for each other,” Harold quirked a brow. John rolled his eyes, saying ‘of course’. “I would say this kind of reaction is entirely natural.”
Harold let John turn this over in his head. It was true that John hadn’t looked at things quite that way. And while it didn’t mean John shouldn’t work on his weaknesses where Harold was concerned, it did make him feel a little bit better.
Harold watched for the minute relaxations in John’s shoulders and around his mouth that showed Harold’s logic had gotten through to him. “Now will you stop arguing?”
John’s grip on Harold’s hand firmed up again and his lips quirked into a slightly sheepish smirk. “Whatever you say Harold.”
Harold undressed him slowly, with hands full of care. It was impossible not to be aroused, but it was a low simmer in the back of John’s mind. Most of his attention was on the fact that Harold was here, in front of him, with his full focus turned on John.
Harold clothes followed Johns until two neat piles were folded on the countertop. The shower was already running and warm in the background and Harold led John into the expansive enclosure.
All of this was done in silence, just John drinking in Harold as Harold did the same to John.
It was only when John was limp and soporific under Harold’s hands, the fresh scent of Dove soap in his nostrils, that Harold spoke again.
“I’m not doing this entirely for you you know.”
John cracked his eyes open. “Hmm?”
“Like I said, I missed you quite desperately too. Can’t you see how, in light of that, it might be soothing to touch and care and reassure myself that you’re – here?”
“Harold.” He came willingly into John’s embrace, resting his cheek on John’s chest and running his fingertips up and down John’s back. “I thought I was the only one who worried this was all just a dream.”
“Yes well, you constantly fail to remember that you’re too good to be true.” Harold said. His voice was petulant, but John’s chest felt overfull at his words.
“You might be biased.”
“Maybe.” Harold pressed a kiss over John’s heart, then pulled away. “Now then, I think we’ve been in here long enough. Get rid of that terrible beard and then come to bed.”
John rubbed his cheek against Harold’s neck. “Come on Harold. You like the beard.”
Harold recoiled, shoving John’s head away and glaring without anger. “If you don’t shave that beard I will grow a mustache – see how you like it.”
John quirked an eyebrow, a slow smirk growing.
Harold blanched. “Forget I said that. You’ll do it now just to be contrary.”
“Would I do something like that?”
Harold nudged him impatiently. “Go. Shave. The bed will be ready when you get there.”
Harold slipped out of the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his hips. John watched him go. “Leave the door open!”
Harold paused, then nodded.
While John shaved, Harold turned down the bed and slipped under the covers, not bothering to get dressed. John followed his example as soon as his cheeks were clean, eager to feel skin against skin after so long apart.
Harold welcomed him into bed with open arms, letting John settle himself against Harold, his head in its customary place in the crook of Harold’s neck.
It was blissful.
Warm and cared for, with Harold in his arms, all of the discontentment and anxiety of the last seven days sluiced away like water. John’s exhaustion began to make itself known. He yawned into Harold’s skin, nuzzling closer. Still, Harold was warm and naked and here, and John was nothing if not determined. He still made an attempt, reaching down to run his palm over Harold’s soft cock.
Harold stopped him with a hand on his wrist. “I’m jet-lagged and you’re likely suffering from extreme self-induced sleep deprivation.”
John blinked sleepily at Harold. “So?”
Harold twined their hands together and pulled them up to rest on his chest. He pressed his lips firmly to John’s. John happily melted into his kiss. Harold sighed contentedly into his mouth, but kept it sweet, with no urgency behind it, just deep affection.
They separated slowly, Harold finally pressing one last kiss to John’s forehead. “Go to sleep John. I’ll still be here in the morning.”
John subsided without argument, sinking into the bed and Harold, finally at ease. The best part?
The pillows smelled just right.