Archive of Our Own ^beta

On an innocuous Thursday morning, Hal wakes up in Heaven. Which would maybe pose cause for concern, were he still the host of the Spectre, but given he's pressed between the warm bodies of the loves of his life, is simple cause for contentment. He’s unaware as to why he’s woken, as peaceful as it is, until Ollie slips out of bed beside him, having jostled Hal awake in his exit.

Hal blinks at Ollie in confusion, unsure why on Earth he would willingly get out of bed, when it’s so fucking nice in here. Ollie winks back at him, creases forming across his face like valleys eroded, and presses a finger against his lips, shushing Hal. Hal makes a face at him. Ollie, in turn, makes a shooing motion with his hands, frowning. Go back to bed, being his intended message, Hal guesses. Ollie turns, and starts to leave the room, still having said nothing. Asshole. 

Hal rolls over, facing away from Ollie’s leaving, reaching towards the blonde mop of hair to his right. Dinah looks back over her shoulder, blinks one eye open, lazy and blissful, and beckons him closer, tipping her chin. Hal curls closer to her, enmeshing their bodies. He can feel the muscle of her back flush with his rib cage, the curves of their bodies aligned like tectonic plates. Her presence, her proximity, a welcome balm to the sheets beside him, growing cold in Ollie’s absence. Hal feels a smile growing on his face, entirely happy to spend an eternity here, next to her. His eyes slip closed.

Without warning, Dinah elbows him in the stomach, hard. Hal gasps in not-quite pain, “Why—” he wheezes. She murmurs, dry with humor, “Your feet are cold, Hal. Get them off. Fuck’s sake.” 

Hal smiles at her back, scheming. “Sorry, baby.” he whispers, and wraps his arms around her torso in a facsimile of apology. Then, body gone rigid with the anticipation of unfurling revenge, he curves the frigid arches of his feet around her ankles. She gasps, and launches her body forward, twisting out of his grip, and landing on top of him, hand jutted into the joint of his shoulder, knees either side of his hips. She shifts again, pulling back to allow herself the room to raise her hand from shoulder to wrist. Hal, almost entirely pinned to the mattress, grins at her, sly. He winks.

Picking the most inopportune time to barge in, as he is often to do, Ollie knocks the door into the wall with his hip, and stares at the scene in front of him, eyebrow cocked, mouth wide. Hal can feel his cheeks heating, white skin browbeaten into a light pink by Ollie’s gaping. He’s being dramatic, staring like that. Ollie’s certainly been part of more embarrassing morning ventures. Dinah doesn’t turn her head, unlike Hal, but her eyes are drawn to Ollie’s entrance. He’s magnetic, in that way.

Hal bucks his hips, taking advantage of Dinah’s momentary distraction, and gains himself enough leeway to free his hand. He strikes her ribs, soft, but enough to shock her, and rolls out from underneath, towards Ollie, in a fruitless venture for his defense.  

Dinah falls to the bed, supine, and nuzzles back under the comforter. Apparently, done with Hal’s shit-stirring. From under the sanctity of the covers, eyes barely visible, she grunts, “Lucky shot.”

“Yeah.” Hal agrees, sighing, “I know.” A little in awe, as he is every time Dinah does—well. In all honesty, most things. She’s an amazing woman. Hal’s knee twinges in pain, making it exceptionally clear how little his body appreciates action this early in the morning. He exhales, hard.

Dinah turns her back to the both of them, with an air of indignation. Her hair, bottle-blonde, a halo framing her face, barely visible under the bedding. 

“C’mon, Hal.” Ollie calls, “Leave the lady to her sleeping.” Dinah snorts. Hal chuckles, throat a little hoarse, and clambers out of bed, reaching for Ollie’s outstretched hand; grasped in the following second. The callouses of Ollie’s palm, some sort of reassurance. Though for what, Hal doesn’t know. Ollie pulls him up-right one-armed—damn if that isn’t a bit of a turn on, after the morning he’s had—and grunts.

 Hal sighs, all reproachful, and says, “Geez, Ollie. You’re gonna pull your shoulder out of its socket again. You’re supposed to be rehabbing that thing. ” 

Ollie tuts, shaking his head, “Oh, fuck off Hal. You think I can’t lift you? You’re overestimating yourself.” Dinah snorts, again. Ollie widens his eyes, shaking his head in pantomime of offence, exclaims, “It’s everyone against me today. Both of you? Really?”  

“Hell yeah, baby. We’re unionizing.” 

Ollie chuckles in spite of himself, and very suddenly pulls Hal flush with his body, very nearly subluxating Hal’s shoulder, and plants a kiss on the corner of his mouth. The scratch of his goatee against Hal’s bare cheek; so familiar it makes him ache. Ollie, oblivious, continues, “Well. Can’t dissuade you from unionizing. Hardly be—Y’know what, never mind. Come downstairs, C’mon.” 

Hal lets Ollie pull him all the way downstairs, Ollie, talking the entire time,  somehow saying nothing at all. Just warming the air, recycling oxygen. His running commentary, complementary of Hal’s awkward, chatter-less ambling. Hal’s leg, the aching pain reverberating through his knee, leaches his focus, and he can’t make himself—Ollie seems excited, is the point. Ollie flings himself around the banister, pulling on Hal’s arm, and what sort of man would Hal be, if he didn’t let Oliver lead him along wherever he deemed fit? Not one Hal would recognize, that’s for sure. The fact that Hal doesn’t recognize himself in the mirror, most days, is completely irrelevant to this. He follows Ollie, regardless.

It’s the landing, where Hal hesitates. Where he starts to smell something suspiciously familiar. Hal groans as they pull into the kitchen, seeing two dented pots sitting on the stovetop, the both of them nearly large enough to hide bodies in. A stack of canned kidney beans and tomatoes, piled so high they nearly reach the rangehood, sit beside the stove, practically taunting Hal. The unfortunately distinct scent of peppers, onion, and chili permeate air so thick it’s hard to breathe. God, the house is going to smell for days. Ollie, the bastard, laughs outright. 

“Oliver.” Hal tries to be harsh in tone. He does. "You know, you don’t have to make chili, every single time the kids come over.” 

Ollie hums, completely unbothered. “They’re expecting it now, Harold. It’s practically tradition.” 

Hal lets it go. He refuses to debase himself by clinging to the point. The undersides of his nails will remain ivory white, this morning. the hyponychium, intact, unblemished. Today’s battle is lost, has been lost since Ollie’s waking, and this is a war that even Dinah hasn’t won. It may well be a hopeless cause. 

Hal wonders distantly, whether this was what he had in mind, when Parallax had rebirthed Ollie. When he’d built his body, atom by atom in a younger man’s image. Had he envisioned, foreseen, the pain he would cause Hal, through the unending production of chili no one can bear to eat? The raw flesh of the roof of his mouth? Perhaps his plan all along, breaking him down with a war of attrition, that Hal could never bring himself to win. Bastard.

Ollie smiles, completely unaware of Hal’s thoughts, and thus unrepentant in his stirring of both chili bases, simultaneously, which, Hal privately remarks, is among the worst possible uses for his ambidexterity.

Hal stalks over to Ollie’s pretentious fucking espresso machine, and starts on coffee for the three of them. Over the noise of grinding beans, Ollie hums the Robin Hood theme. Well, he’s nothing if not consistent. What feels like thirty minutes and twenty buttons later, three mugs sit on the bench, steaming.

Behind the both of them—her presence betrayed solely by the creaking steps of the stairs Ollie swears he’ll replace himself, someday, he will—Dinah wanders into the kitchen. Hal notices, as he turns, leans against the bench, that she looks very, incredibly beautiful. He is abruptly reminded of how lucky he and Ollie are. To  have a girl as great as Dinah, loving them so entirely. 

Dinah sweeps Ollie into her arms, tearing him away from the chili, and kisses him on the cheek. “Good morning,” She sighs, and then, over her shoulder, she calls, “Hal? You lonely over there?” 

Hal smirks, picks up the mugs and drawls, really leaning into the accent, “Oh, only a little, baby.” His eyes so bright with adoration, they’d appear naked suns, inset into his skull.

Dinah turns from Ollie, still entwined, and snakes an arm out. She grabs her mug. Hal puts Ollie’s and his on the kitchen counter. Hal allows himself to fall into Ollie and Dinah’s embrace, laying his head in the crux of their necks. He allows himself to lean on them, to trust them to take his weight. His knee, relieved of the duty of holding his body upright, grows less painful. Not painless though. He's gonna have to slip a couple Clonacs, if the thing won't let up on the pain. Or pull out a cane. He lets those thoughts fall to the wayside, in the warmth of their bodies.

“Love you.” Hal mumbles into Dinah’s shoulder. 

She grins. “Sap.” 

Ollie barks out a laugh, and then covers his mouth, remorseful. He smacks a kiss on Hal’s cheek, in apparent apology. Dinah huffs. Moments after, leaning in real close, lips on the shell of his ear, she whispers “You too, baby.” 

Hal smiles, entirely content. He wouldn’t trade this for the world.