Archive of Our Own

Rafael lay alone in their bed—their bed in name only—staring at the ceiling like the plaster might crack open and offer him some reprieve from his own thoughts. 

The sheets smelled like Sonny and laundry detergent. 

The laundry detergent they used. Both of them.

They used. Past tense. 

Original Tide in the bright orange bottle, the detergent Sonny’s mother had used when he was growing up, first the powder, then the liquid. Sonny had tried making a switch four or five times in his life, but the alternatives had irritated his stupid baby skin, leaving itchy red blotches all over his body. 

Rafael had been witness to it once, right at the start of their relationship when Sonny had hedged his bets about sleeping on Rafael’s sheets for the first time. 

Sonny had woken up in the middle of the night sore and itching, inflamed red patches spanning across his ribs, down his legs, half his face where his cheek had been pressed against the pillow. Rafael steeled himself for the bad mood, for the annoyance and the exhausted snapping, but Sonny had just groaned. He’d complained for sure, but mostly he’d joked. Smiled. 

“That’s what I get for assuming love can overcome a lifetime allergy,” he’d said, then rolled his eyes, “Affection. Fondness. Whatever. Wanna shower with me?” 

Rafael had to resist the urge to pull the pillow over his face and breathe in deeper, to hold onto something that was already slipping away.

He replayed the night again. 

He couldn't stop replaying it.

They'd come home from his mother's house just after nine, the freezing night air making Rafael extra grateful for the warmth of Sonny's arm around him as they'd walked in from the car.  

Dinner had been lovely in the way his mother's dinners always were multiplied by a factor of Christmas Eve—pointed but well-meaning questions, eggnog that left Rafael pleasantly buzzing and loose-limbed, Sonny carrying a bag of leftovers in his free hand. 

By the time they'd stumbled through their front door, Rafael had been clinging to Sonny, letting himself be drawn back into the gravitational pull of his orbit, no longer tethered to the constraints of public decorum. 

He'd wrapped himself around Sonny in the entryway, face pressed into the curve of his neck, breathing in the scent of him beneath the lingering ghost of his mother's perfume from their hug goodbye.

Sonny had hummed contentedly, and guided them both toward the bedroom with Rafael still attached like a barnacle. They'd moved through the bare minimum nighttime routine that came out when they were too sleepy and too full, every step stripped down to its necessary parts.  

Rafael had been halfway under the covers, already anticipating the weight of Sonny's arm across his waist, the press of Sonny's nose against the back of his neck, when Sonny's voice stopped him.

"Hey, Raf? Can I talk to you about something real quick?"

The words had been casual enough, light even, but Rafael's chest had seized immediately. Can I talk to you meant bad news delivered gently, meant conversations that started with "it's not you, it's me” at worst, “my parents uninvited you to Christmas” at best. 

Rafael forced himself to sit up, to swing his legs over the side of the bed, to pad barefoot across the hardwood floor trying to school his face into something that wouldn’t betray the sudden thundering of his heart.

"What's wrong?" Rafael asked, before he could come up with something more neutral, less revealing.

"Come here," Sonny said softly, and Rafael had gone because he always went to Sonny, because even with dread coiling in his gut he couldn't imagine refusing closeness. “Nothing’s wrong. I just… I want to tell you something.”

He’d taken a deep breath and Rafael’s hands. 

"I love you," Sonny started. "I love you so much, Raf."

Rafael had opened his mouth—to say what, he didn't know, something to stop whatever was coming next—but Sonny had squeezed his hands gently and continued.

"You and me, we're such a perfect match in ways that… ways I didn’t know to expect. Hell, in ways I didn't even know to look for, ways I didn’t know were possible in real life until you showed up. You’re so good at taking care of me in all the ways I need. You just... you do it so naturally, like you were made for it. And I hope—god, I really hope—that I take care of you in the ways you need too.” 

"You do," Rafael whispered. He couldn't not say it, couldn't let Sonny doubt that for even a second.

Sonny's smile had been brilliant, transforming his whole face. "I've never been happier in my life, never laughed so much,” he said, his thumb tracing circles against Rafael's knuckles, “I've never felt closer to anyone than I feel to you. It’s like… the way you let me share every little thought that pops in my head, and you care. You care what I have to say, all the time. And you share back. You let me into that big brain of yours, and… Raf, there aren’t words to tell you how much that means to me.” 

Rafael swallowed hard, because… because now he had an idea of where this was going. 

“I don’t know which saint I was in a past life to deserve to find my other half,” Sonny continued, drawing Rafael’s hands closer against his chest. “It’s like I was missing the last piece of a puzzle, then you came along and just—boom. Popped it right in place.”

Rafael pressed his palms flat against Sonny’s chest, feeling his racing heartbeat. He needed to stop him. 

“But the thing is, that’s not even a good comparison,” Sonny said, his voice growing thick. “Because it keeps happening over and over. I keep thinking ‘okay, that’s it, everything is perfect.’ But then something happens, and I swear I hear another little snap. The big stuff for sure—saying ‘I love you’ for the first time, moving in together, how much my family loves you. But also… no, especially the small stuff. I love doing the crossword with you, I love that you talk through movies, I love that you’re so clean about brushing your teeth. I’ve never met anyone who is so frickin’ anal about not letting the foam get anywhere—do you have any idea how endearing that is?” 

Rafael needed to stop him. 

“And I know everything isn’t sunshine and smooth jazz all the time—” God, would this ever end? “—but even when things are hard, even when we’re fighting, it’s like we’re on the same team, you know? You just… you challenge me, you make me think. You make me better.”

And then, because earnestness always eventually gave way to the humor that Rafael loved so helplessly, “I figure it’s about time I wise up and lock this down before something better catches your eye.” 

Rafael had wanted to laugh at that—as if anything better existed, as if he hadn't been lost to Sonny long before they ever put a label on it—but he couldn’t.

Everything about it was perfect.

Too perfect.

Rafael had heard every word. He'd heard every single word as Sonny laid out a catalogue of love so specific, so perfectly tailored to Rafael's heart, that it had felt like being flayed open. 

Sonny had listened. He'd remembered every throwaway comment Rafael had ever made—complaining about reality TV proposals, scoffing at elaborate public spectacles being tacky and attention-seeking, the one time he'd said he didn't care for the whole kneeling bit. 

The night they'd been out to dinner and watched a man kneel in the restaurant, and Rafael had ranted the whole way home—not about the antiquated tradition, not about heteronormativity, but how a question so life-altering should surely be asked face to face, looking each other in the eye.

Sonny had listened. 

And he'd crafted something that addressed every single thought Rafael hadn't even known he'd articulated. 

They were in their pajamas, for god's sake, threadbare t-shirts and flannel pants, both of them barefoot on the rug they'd bought at an estate sale.

Nothing staged, nothing removed from their real life. 

Instead, it was steeped in it, drowning in it.

The couch where they'd had their first real argument and their first real reconciliation, the coffee table still holding their mugs from that morning, the throw blanket they always wrapped up in draped over the arm of the chair.

Every reason Rafael would want to spend the rest of his life with Sonny was there, in that room, in that moment, in the careful way Sonny had held his hands and looked into his eyes and offered him everything.

The evidence of their love was everywhere he looked.

Sonny pulled the small velvet box out of the pocket of his pajama pants. He opened it with fingers that trembled just slightly, and there it was.

A simple gold band, elegant in its restraint. Not too thick, not too thin. Something that wouldn't catch on things or feel foreign on his hand. Crimped indentations wrapped around the top and bottom edges, subtle borders that gave it character without ostentation. 

Rafael could see something etched into the inside, some inscription that was too small to read. 

Later, he thought automatically. 

He was supposed to read it later, after he said yes, when Sonny slipped it onto his finger then they took it back off to examine it together, crying, maybe laughing as Sonny explained why he’d chosen that engraving specifically.

"So," Sonny cleared his throat, smiled that devastating smile that had undone Rafael from the very first time he'd seen it. "Rafael Barba—"

Rafael's heart was trying to climb out of his throat.

"—will you marry me?"

Rafael opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it. 

"Why now?"

The question came out hoarse, wrong, not at all what he meant to say. 

Sonny blinked, then laughed—a surprised, delighted sound that made Rafael's stomach sink even lower.

"Why now?" Sonny repeated. "Raf, I've had this ring for months trying to wait for the right moment. But it’s kind of hard to evaluate ‘right’ when the person you wanna spend the rest of your life with wants the proposal equivalent of a Spartan soldier." 

The Christmas tree lights cast half of Sonny's face in soft gold, the other half in shadow, and he looked so beautiful it hurt. The earnestness in his eyes, the slight upturn of his lips, the way he was looking at Rafael like he hung the moon and scattered the stars.

"I figured… I figured the proposal part could constitute ‘special’ on its own,” Sonny continued softly, “Just us, in our space, on a night when we're already happy."

He looked so pleased with himself, so certain he'd threaded an impossible needle. Rafael felt his throat close up entirely.

"Sonny," he managed. "Sonny, I can't."

But Sonny's smile didn't fade. If anything, it warmed, took on that patient quality it always did when Rafael was being difficult for the sake of it. He'd seen this dance before, after all. Rafael pushing when things got too good, too real, deflecting happiness like it might burn him if he got too close.

"Raf, you can," Sonny said gently. "Unless you're the best actor on the planet, I’m pretty sure you're happy with me too."

Of course he was happy—deliriously so, happier than he'd ever been in his entire life. How could he not be? Everything Sonny had just said was true. They were perfect together, they fit in ways Rafael hadn't known people could fit, ways that had rewired his understanding of what he could expect from another person.

But even that had limits. 

"I..." Rafael started, then stopped. Tried again. "It's not 'can't.' It's 'won't.' I don't want to."

The color drained from Sonny's face completely, like someone had pulled a plug and let everything vital drain away. The ring box dipped in his hand, forgotten.

"Okay," Sonny said, his voice remarkably steady for someone who looked like he'd just been gutted. "Okay, I get it. Just… is this a 'things are going to stay the same, I just don't want to get married' no, or is this a 'nice knowing you' no?"

Rafael wanted to be sick.

"You want to get married," he managed. It was wooden, rehearsed, like he was reading from a script he'd memorized badly. "You shouldn't waste any more time… here. With me. You should focus on finding someone who wants to marry you."

The words were cruel, Rafael could hear it as they came out of his mouth. But they were also true. 

Sonny shoved the ring back into his pocket—roughly, carelessly, so unlike the reverence with which he'd pulled it out—and grabbed Rafael's hands. He yanked them hard against his chest, pressing them there frantically, like he could recapture the hope and happiness he'd been harboring just before Rafael had taken a wrecking ball to it. 

"Rafael, I don't want to marry someone, I want to marry you," Sonny pleaded. "Jesus Christ, did you hear anything I just said? You are that person. You're—"

He stopped abruptly, like he’d heard how that sounded—too forceful, too much pressure, doubling down when he was supposed to be doubling back.

Rafael watched him physically pull himself back from the edge of panic, watched him force his breathing to even out. 

"It doesn't have to be all or nothing," Sonny said, quieter now but no less urgent. "I swear, I can take a no on the chin. I can—we don't have to get married. Not ever, not if you don’t want to. I just thought—" He swallowed hard. "We can keep going exactly the way we are. Nothing has to change." Sonny took a deep, shuddering breath. “Just… don't tell me to go find someone else. Don't—fuck, Raf, please don't do that."

Rafael knew—he knew with absolute certainty—that Sonny meant it. That Sonny would swallow the rejection and never bring it up again if that's what Rafael asked for. That he'd pack away the ring and the dream it represented and just keep loving Rafael exactly as he had been.

"Are you unhappy?" Sonny asked, his voice climbing, words tumbling out in a rush. "I mean, is it something I'm doing or—or not doing? Or something else, like—I don’t know, the apartment? I know you wanted bigger windows when we were looking, or—" He gestured helplessly around them. "Whatever it is, if it's something I can fix, I'll fix it. I want to fix it."

"Sonny, stop." 

Sonny tugged gently at Rafael's hands, trying to guide him toward the couch. "Please, let's just—let's talk this through, okay? We can figure this out, we always figure things out—"

Rafael's feet might as well have been nailed to the floor. He didn't budge, couldn't budge, his body refusing to follow Sonny's lead for maybe the first time since they'd started this whole thing.

"Sonny." His voice came out flat, dead. "There's nothing to talk through."

Sonny's hands stilled, but he didn't let go. 

"We have different goals in life," Rafael continued, and each word felt like pulling shrapnel from his own flesh. "You've always wanted to do the marriage and kids and a dog in the backyard thing. And I can’t—” He sighed deeply. “I will not be the person who does that with you.” 

“Okay. Okay, maybe—maybe those are things I used to want. But, Raf, I haven’t thought twice about any of that in a long, long time." He pulled Rafael's hands up higher, closer to his face, like proximity might make the words more convincing. "There's no world where I want some potential nuclear family more than I want to be with you. None."

Rafael felt it happen. That endless well of desire to talk to Sonny—about everything, about nothing, about the minutiae of their days and the sprawling questions that kept him up at night—suddenly bone dry. 

He had no energy for this. 

No ability. No desire to explain that Sonny would change his mind. That in a year, two years, five—when Sonny was really edging out of a reasonable age to build that family—he’d wake up and realize what he’d given up. 

He’d say that, then Sonny would say something about trust—about trusting him, trusting that he knew his own mind, maybe how he’d never given Rafael a reason not to trust him before, not in all their time together. 

And Rafael would have to explain that trust didn't play a factor—because he did trust that Sonny believed what he was saying. 

But belief didn't make it true. Belief didn't stop people from changing, from waking up one day and realizing they'd settled, compromised, given up dreams they shouldn't have abandoned.

It didn’t change the fact that Rafael wouldn’t have a defense a few years down the line when Sonny looked him in the eye and said some variation of “I meant it at the time.”

Rafael couldn't stomach it—couldn't stomach signing up for a life where Sonny left him later, when they'd accumulated even more memories, even more happiness.

Or worse—so much worse—Sonny staying out of obligation. Because he'd made promises, said vows, slipped that ring on Rafael’s finger, pressing whatever that inscription said into his skin. 

They'd spend the rest of their lives stuck in the same apartment living like ships passing in the night. Sonny growing more distant, more resentful, while Rafael watched the light dim in his eyes and knew he was the one who'd extinguished it.

Sonny deserved better than that.

He deserved a better explanation too—a real one, thorough and honest. He maybe even deserved the chance to argue, to mount a defense, to try to talk Rafael out of what was so clearly a snap decision so he could say later that he tried everything he could. 

But Rafael couldn't give him that either.

Because the end result was the same no matter what, and it would be worse to prolong the inevitable. To rub salt in the wound by talking it to death, by letting Sonny pick apart his reasoning and try to find the weak spots.

"Rafael." Sonny's face had gone from pale to ashen, betrayal creeping into his voice. "Rafael, talk to me. Please."

Because Sonny had never dealt with this before. With Rafael shutting down. Not ever. 

Even when they'd fought—really fought, the kind of fights that ended with slammed doors and sleeping on opposite sides of the bed—Rafael had never had any qualms about saying exactly what he was thinking. 

About laying out his position like he was getting paid to do it, about defending his ground or conceding it when Sonny genuinely made a better argument.

This was different. This was Rafael with nothing left to say, and Sonny was looking at him like he was a stranger.

"There's nothing to talk about," Rafael said, pulling his hands free. “I’m sorry.” 

Tears pooled on Sonny’s lower lashes, and he tilted his head back just slightly, fighting gravity, refusing to let them fall. 

“Is there anything I can do to change your mind?” Sonny’s voice was thin, more defeated than desperate now. “Is this… is this a thing where I’m supposed to push to prove that I’m serious? Or—I don't know, the other way around? If you need space, I’ll—"

"Sonny," Rafael cut him off. "We both knew this had an expiration date."

"No." Sonny's eyes wide and wild. "No, Rafael, I clearly did not know that. How could I possibly—" He broke off on a hysterical laugh. 

"I shouldn't have let it go on this long," Rafael said quietly.

And there it was—the moment something shattered behind Sonny's eyes. He looked like someone had just died. 

Rafael felt the guilt lance through him, sharp and immediate, because… that was cruel too. 

That wasn't just breaking things off—it was casting a shadow backwards over everything that had led them to this moment. Every kiss, every laugh, every lazy weekend morning and late-night conversation, all of it suspect now. 

Sonny was probably already wondering how long Rafael had been sitting on this, if it had been there from the start. How long he'd been standing on thin ice he'd clearly thought was solid rock.

Sonny took a step back, then another, his hand coming up to rake through his hair. When he tilted his chin down, the tears finally fell—two clear tracks down his cheeks that caught the Christmas lights. 

"Okay." Sonny said, wiping away the tears quickly, roughly, like he was angry at them for escaping. "Okay, I'm—I think I'm gonna go to my parents’ place, alright?"

Rafael opened his mouth—to say that Sonny didn’t have to leave, that he shouldn’t drive when he’s so upset, maybe even that they could talk more in the morning. 

But the words died in his throat because… yes, Sonny absolutely had to leave. Of course he did. They couldn’t share air after what Rafael had just done, the way he'd taken every beautiful thing Sonny had offered him and ground it into dust.

Sonny paused at the door—in his pajamas, no coat, sneakers haphazardly slipped on without socks. 

"I'll call to work out the apartment stuff."

And then he was gone, the door clicking shut behind him softly.

Rafael should wash the sheets, he thought distantly, before Sonny’s smell faded completely. A detail he could control, getting rid of rather than losing.

He curled around Sonny's pillow and sobbed—great, heaving sobs that tore from deep in his chest, face pressed so hard into the cotton that he could barely breathe. His whole body shook with it, ribs aching, throat raw, fingers clutching the pillowcase like he might still be able to hold onto something that was already gone.

He hoped that Sonny wasn't crying like this. That if he was, he'd at least had the sense to pull over somewhere safe, that he wasn't trying to navigate through tears that turned streetlights into blurred halos, that he wasn't—

Rafael cut off the train of thought before it could complete itself. 

Before his mind could truly conjure the image of Sonny's car wrapped around a telephone pole, of flashing lights and twisted metal, of getting a phone call in the middle of the night that would make all of this seem like nothing.

The pillow was soaked through, a spreading wet patch where his face had been pressed, and Rafael dragged himself upright just long enough to blow his raw nose. 

Then he flipped Sonny's pillow over and collapsed back down, the exhaustion hitting him all at once—bone-deep weariness after an adrenaline crash, his body having wrung itself dry. 

Sleep took him fast and without mercy, a heavy, dreamless void that swallowed him whole.

Rafael woke to a sound, and several things hit him in succession. 

The crust in his eyes from crying, lids stuck together and burning. He raised a hand to rub at them, confused, disoriented. Then memory like a fist to the gut, the reality of why he’d been crying. And then the sound again, a jarring clatter that made his hackles raise and his spine go rigid.

Rafael turned over slowly, certain that some part of this was a dream, now or earlier, preferably both—

Fernando Barba stood at the foot of the bed.

Rafael's dead father stood at the foot of the bed, ever so slightly transparent, like someone had turned down the opacity on him by about fifteen percent. Wrapped around his waist, dragging on the floor behind him, was a chain made of glass—the jagged edges of broken beer bottles, green and brown glinting dully in the moonlight. 

A work boot was embedded in the tail, steel-toed and scuffed, the one his father had chucked at his head when he was twelve for talking back. A belt he didn’t recognize but had almost certainly met his back once or twice. The broken pieces of an ornament Rafael had painted in elementary school—how delightfully seasonal—that Fernando yanked off the tree and shattered on the floor along with about a dozen others. 

Rafael collapsed back against the pillow—not Sonny's pillow anymore, he'd flipped it—and gestured weakly at the chain.

"That's a little on the nose, don't you think?"

Fernando grimaced, shifting his weight, and the chain rattled. "I'm not thrilled about it either."

Rafael felt something wash over him, warm and terrible and far too close to comfort, because the voice was exactly right. 

The Cuban-accented English softened from decades of living in America. Scratchy from one more decade of cigarettes than that. Not the uncanny valley version of long-ago memory, but the exact timbre that made Rafael feel safe when he was very small, before running his mouth became his default state.

But Rafael just scoffed and looked down at his hands, a thing he vaguely remembered reading once, something about lucid dreaming and reality checks. 

He’d never done this before, had hyperrealistic dreams. Maybe it was the stress. Maybe his brain was fracturing under the weight of what he'd just done.

He counted his fingers. One, two, three, four, five. All accounted for on the left hand. One, two, three, four, five on the right. Ten total, exactly as many as he should have.

He wasn't sure if that accomplished what it was supposed to. He dropped his hands to the bed.

"It's good to see you, mijo," Fernando said softly. 

"Is it?" Rafael scoffed. "Out of everything, this is what my subconscious dreamed up? Let me guess—you're here to say you're sorry, perhaps even that you're proud of me."

"That's not why I'm here," Fernando said, and the chain shifted as he moved closer. "But I am. Sorry. And… I am proud."

Rafael felt a laugh bubble up, sharp and hysterical. "Good, very good. Christmas is saved." He waved his hand vaguely at the window, toward where the sun would eventually rise on December 25th. "Wrap it up, roll credits, we can all go home."

"Not yet.” 

Rafael groaned, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes until he saw stars. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"Yes," Fernando said. "And there's something I can help you with too."

Rafael let his hands drop, fixing his father—his dream, his hallucination maybe, his stress-induced mental break—with a flat stare. "Are you here to help me meet my deductible? Just say when."

Fernando flinched—just barely, but enough to make the chain rattle softly. "I'm not here to ask you to forgive me," he said quietly. "But I... I am sorry, Rafi. I've had a lot of years to think about the way I lived, and—"

"How faithful is this retelling?" Rafael snapped "Because I'm fairly certain that Marley was supposed to be Scrooge's mirror, and I don't think I'm in any particular danger of running up against that."

Fernando's mouth quirked. "Tu chico blanco flaco ran out of here crying. Could be something there."

"And yet you'll notice I didn't deck him on his way out," Rafael shot back.

"You think this is a dream,” Fernando said calmly. 

Rafael sat up sharply, sending the room tilting for just a moment. "How in the world can you tell?" 

“Because you wouldn’t talk to your father this way.” Something soft and sad crossed Fernando’s translucent features. "Even at the end, even after everything… you were still right there. You've always been a good son, Rafi. Better than I deserved."

Rafael threw the blanket off in one violent motion, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. His feet hit the floor—the hardwood cold and solid, remarkably, uncomfortably real. He flexed his toes against it, feeling the grain of the wood, the chill spreading up his calves. 

"Can we get on with your pitch so I can get some sleep?" Rafael said flatly. "I've got a long day of straight liquor shots ahead of me tomorrow."

Fernando's smile widened just slightly, and he reached down to pick up the tail of his chain. He rattled it deliberately, the broken glass clinking against itself, 

"I'm not sure how that's remotely comparable," Rafael said, nodding at the chain. "You were a violent drunk. I'm just… self-destructive at worst, slutty at best."

“No,” Fernando took a half step back, hands coming up in surrender, the chain clanking lounder. "No—don’t tell me any of that."

"So you're telling me the story beat about how you've been watching me didn't make the adaptation?" Rafael's eyebrow arched. "¿Nunca viste a mi chico blanco follarme por el culo? Nunca viste su—” 

"Enough,” Fernando snapped, sounding far more like the man Rafael knew, “I'm a far more patient man than I was in life, but I still have limits."

Hot, bitter anger surged up Rafael throat. "What are you going to do, hit me? Like you hit me when you caught me and Alex kissing in the stairwell when I was fifteen? Or do you even remember—" He cut himself off on an incredulous laugh. “Christ, what am I doing? I’m arguing with my own fucking dream.” 

Fernando shook his head. "You're arguing with your father. Swearing at your father, who is here to stop you from making yourself any more miserable. You've had more than enough of that in your lifetime."

"I wonder whose fault that is," Rafael snapped.

Fernando held out his hand, palm up, waiting. "You know the drill."

Rafael rolled his eyes. "Are you Marley or the first ghost? I'm getting the distinct impression of lazy writing."

Fernando smiled softly. "You've always had a smart mouth.” 

"A fact that you used to remind me of excessively," Rafael replied.

Fernando sighed, deep and weary, as he stepped closer and placed a firm hand on Rafael's shoulder.

There was no flash of light. 

No fade to black. 

No cinematic transition. 

One moment they were in Rafael’s bedroom, the next they were standing in Rafael's childhood apartment, the chill immediately settling into his bones like it always had in winter—Fernando’s perpetual drunken warmth keeping the heat low, and the need to keep the electric bill even lower. 

Real Fernando—not real, also-a-dream-but-alive Fernando, a much younger Fernando—was slumped in his recliner, asleep, and Rafael could hear quiet voices coming from the kitchen.

Rafael didn’t look around further than that. Didn’t try to catalog details or draw out memories, didn’t want to. 

"I don’t have a clear handle on how to make myself wake up," Rafael said flatly, “So if you’re so reformed now, could you do me the courtesy of getting me the hell out of here?” 

Fernando—ghost Fernando—just nodded his head toward the kitchen.

Rafael didn't intend to move, not until he heard the voices. His mother and himself. He hesitated one more moment before he found himself moving, one step, then another, until he was standing in the kitchen doorway with Fernando's ghost standing silent behind him. 

Rafael knew immediately which Christmas it was from his mother's sweater.

That sweater was burned into his brain—red cable knit with little white snowflakes, black trim, a zipper up the front—because, in a few minutes, it would have a trail of blood down the front. 

The Christmas of 1981, age eleven, the year they’d had no money. 

They always had some variation of no money, that was a given. But Lucia had always made holidays happen, squirreling money away, tucking bills into envelopes for Christmas and birthdays and little celebratory moments like Rafael winning his school’s spelling bee. 

But not that Christmas.

Fernando had been laid off his construction crew a week before Thanksgiving, and he'd been even more volatile than usual—drunk earlier in the day, meaner when he got there, the kind of angry that didn't need a reason to lash out, just an available target.

And Rafael was tuned into exactly why. So in the month leading up to Christmas, he’d been insistent about wanting one specific book, a fantasy novel that he couldn’t remember because he’d never ended up reading it. 

He'd thought he was doing the right thing. Being considerate, zeroing in on that one reasonably small gift so his mother didn't feel like she needed to stretch to get him anything else—or worse, feel the guilt of knowing what he wanted but not being able to afford it. 

But that year, he hadn't realized that no money truly meant no money.

No gifts had materialized all day—not at breakfast, not after mass, not in the strange dead hours of the afternoon when they'd all pretended to watch television. They'd gone to dinner at Lucia's parents' house—warm and happy, but no gifts there either. He’d gotten a few from his grandparents the week before, things he didn’t remember, definitely something like socks, a winter hat, maybe a ten dollar bill tucked inside. 

No one had ever said it out loud, but he assumed Lucia had preempted trying to avoid conflict if Fernando got a wild hair to take it as a slight to his already wounded pride. 

When they'd gotten home, Fernando had fallen asleep in his chair almost immediately.

Lucia had guided Rafael into the kitchen with a gentle hand on his shoulder, had closed the door quietly behind them even though Fernando could usually sleep through a hurricane.

Rafael snapped back to the present as Lucia turned and opened one of the cabinets, the one above the refrigerator that she needed to stand on her toes to reach, digging around behind her cookbooks. 

She was young and beautiful, and looked far more exhausted than the picture of her Rafael had in his mind. 

She pulled out a wrapped parcel—a vintagey patterned wrapping paper, cluttered with Santas and snowmen and little sprigs of holly, a slightly crushed bow on top from having been wedged in the cabinet. 

Lucia gently pinched at the bow, fussing with it for just a moment to give it volume, and Rafael watched his own young eyes light up as he gingerly took it from her outstretched hands.

He opened it just as carefully, slowly peeling back the tape. It took him all of half a second—just enough time to register the cover of the book—before he launched himself as his mother, hugging her tightly around the middle, the book clutched in one hand against her back, whispering "thank you thank you thank you" in a breathless rush against her sweater.

"You're welcome, mijo," Lucia murmured, and Rafael—adult Rafael, standing in the doorway like a ghost himself—could see the expression on her face that he hadn’t seen when it had actually happened, when his face had been pressed against her chest and his eyes had been squeezed shut with the overwhelming relief of not being forgotten, of still mattering even when money was tight and his father was cruel and the world felt like it was closing in.

She looked relieved, yes, but also bone-tired in a way that went deeper than just physical fatigue. Worry that carved lines around her eyes, fragility in the set of her mouth like she was holding herself together with spit and prayers and sheer force of will.

Lucia petted his hair—dark and thick, freshly cut by his abuela for the holidays—with her free hand, and when she spoke, her voice was barely above a whisper. "I'm sorry it's not more."

Young Rafael pulled back, and a stream of words tumbled out of him, a breathless litany of gratitude that Rafael could barely stand to hear, "Thank you so much, Mami, it's exactly what I wanted, thank you so much, it’s perfect—I'm gonna start reading it tonight, I promise I'll take such good care of it, thank you, thank you—”

Rafael heard the stirring behind him before Lucia and his younger self—the shift of weight in the recliner, the creak of old springs, the grunt of his father surfacing from sleep—and his heart dropped straight through the floor.

Because he knew what was about to happen. He'd lived it. Carried it. Let it carve out permanent space in his chest.

Young Rafael registered it half a second later—the sound carrying into the kitchen, cutting through his own voice mid-word. His mouth snapped shut. Lucia's entire body went rigid instantly, her hand that had been stroking his hair freezing in place.

They locked eyes, mother and son, and Rafael could see the calculation happening in real time—the split-second assessment of how much time they had, what could still be salvaged.

Lucia moved first, snatching the wrapping paper from the counter, wadding it up in her fist and hiding it behind her back.

Young Rafael looked around with sharp, jerky movements, panic written across his small face. His eyes landed on the nearest drawer and he lunged for it, yanking it open—

The silverware drawer.

Forks and knives and spoons rattled in their little plastic dividers, and Rafael stared down at it for one frozen, helpless moment, the book still clutched in his other hand. His eyes darted to the next drawer, but he was out of time.

Rafael turned just in time to see his father walk straight through him, and he flinched. 

But the sensation was nothing—no cold, no pressure, just the disconcerting visual of a solid body passing through his own like he wasn't even there. Because he wasn't. Not in this moment, not in this kitchen, not in anything besides a nightmare he’d need five minutes to shake off when he woke up.

Rafael spun to face the ghost of his father, his words sharp and bitter. “I’ve seen this film before, and I didn’t like the ending. I think we’re fine to head off now.” 

Fernando just shook his head, an unbearable sadness in his translucent features.

Rafael turned back, unable to look away even though every instinct screamed at him to close his eyes, to spare himself from having to watch this again.

Lucia still had the wrapping paper wadded up in her fist behind her back, but Rafael’s younger self was frozen—just standing there with the book in his hand like a deer in headlights, like maybe if he stayed perfectly still, he wouldn’t be seen.

Past Fernando's jaw was set hard, his eyes slightly unfocused, his eyes tracking from Lucia to young Rafael and back again. He nodded at the book. "That new?"

Rafael's eyes darted to his mother, a helpless, silent plea for guidance—should he lie, should he tell the truth, what answer would make this better instead of worse?

But she didn't give him anything, her face carefully blank, and Rafael remembered with sudden, visceral clarity how it had felt in that moment—the conviction that his father was omnipresent, that he could sense lies like sharks sensed blood in the water, that even if he didn't figure it out now, he would later. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, but eventually he'd know, and the punishment for lying would be so much worse than whatever was coming for telling the truth.

Young Rafael nodded, just once.

Past Fernando nodded back, almost conversational, then turned his attention to Lucia. "Is that gonna cost me a late fee on something?"

Lucia hesitated—just a beat, a fraction of a second too long, and Fernando took it as a yes. 

Hell, it probably was a yes—some bill pushed back, some payment only made in part, money scraped together from somewhere it was needed just to get her son a book for Christmas.

The backhand came fast.

But it was an unfortunate combination of poor coordination and wrong angle, the alcohol making his movements sloppy, his balance off. The back of his hand didn't connect with her cheek the way he'd probably intended. 

Instead, it caught her square in the nose.

Blood poured immediately, a steady stream that soaked into the red cable knit sweater, darkening it, turning some of the white snowflakes a deeper, wetter red.

Lucia's hand waved frantically but minutely behind her back, a clear, desperate gesture—leave, get out—and young Rafael hesitated for just a moment, his eyes wide and frightened, before he moved.

He gave Fernando as wide a berth as he could manage in their narrow kitchen, pressing his back against the counter, sliding along it until he could dart through the doorway. 

Fernando didn't even glance at him—his gaze was locked on Lucia, already stalking forward with a terrible, focused purpose.

Young Rafael made it to the doorway, hesitating one more moment to look back—

Fernando's ghost landed a hand on Rafael's shoulder.

As suddenly as the first time—no warning, no transition—they were back in his bedroom.

Rafael staggered slightly, the abrupt shift in location making his equilibrium tilt, and he pressed one hand against his nightstand to steady himself.

"Happy?" he bit out. "Got your money's worth out of that little trip down memory lane?"

"Did you?" 

Rafael barked a laugh. "I'm not sure exactly what I'm supposed to have gotten out of that besides—what, my subconscious conjuring this up to punish me even more? To drive home what a piece of shit I am? Because if that's the goal, congratulations, it's working beautifully."

Fernando's expression didn't change, that same patient sadness sitting heavy on his translucent features. "Mijo, you're ten times smarter than I ever was, and even I connected the dots. Apply yourself.” 

"Yes, Papi, it was pretty heavy handed," Rafael said, spreading his arms wide like he was presenting himself for inspection. "I push away good things because I learned early that they're always served with a side of pain. Gold star for my self-awareness. I could've told you that before that little adventure, saved us both the trip."

"What else?" Fernando pressed.

Rafael scoffed, throwing his hands in the air—a little dramatic, but warranted, he thought. "Is that not enough? What do you want, an affidavit signed in blood? A thirty-page analysis of my daddy issues complete with footnotes and a bibliography?"

"Is your Sonny not a good man?"

"Oh, you must've been on your smoke break earlier," Rafael shot back. "He's not my anything anymore."

"He would be if you hadn't kicked him out on his ass."

Rafael just stared at him, or maybe at the words—simple, undeniable, devastating in their accuracy—and Rafael felt something hot and acidic climb up his throat.

Fernando took a step towards him, gesturing like he wanted to comfort him. "Come on, mijo. You did good in school. This is basic English class stuff, I know you know how to connect the dots."

Rafael groaned, pressing the heels of his palms against his eyes. "Why, God? Why could I not just have a dream about being in a snake pit or—or getting hit by a bus? Why does it have to be this pseudo-intellectual trauma excavation at—" he pulled his hands away to squint at the clock, "—one-thirty in the goddamn morning?"

"Rafi." Fernando's voice was gentle, almost tender, and Rafael hated it. "If you won’t say it, then listen to me—the first man in your life you trusted to take care of you hurt you—"

"You must not be that sorry," Rafael cut him off sharply, dropping his hands from his face to fix Fernando with a hard stare. "You're talking about it like it wasn't you."

Fernando's jaw tightened, and for a moment he looked remarkably solid—remarkably alive—in his frustration. He took a breath, let it out slowly. "You trusted me to take care of you, and I hurt you."

"How hard was that?" Rafael bit out.

Fernando ignored him, pressing forward. "Now another man—a good man—wants to take care of you. And you don’t trust that he will, because you don't think you deserve it."

"'Deserve' isn't in the equation," Rafael snapped. "It doesn't matter what I think I deserve. It doesn’t matter what I think at all. The fact remains that when he changes his mind later, it'll be worse for both of us than if I just get it over with now."

Fernando spread his hands plaintively. "Does that not sound familiar to you?"

Rafael scoffed, rolling his eyes so hard it was almost performative. "Just because the rationale is superficially similar doesn't mean the situations are remotely comparable. You're conflating—"

"Rafi." Fernando cut him off gently. "You got out of el barrio. You built a life for yourself that's nothing like what you came from—a fancy job, a nice apartment, a white boy who looks at you like you can walk on water." He took another step closer. "But that scared little boy is still inside you, mijo. Don't let his fear run your life."

Rafael ran a hand down his face, exhaustion settling into his bones like lead. "Alright, that seems like a pretty solid conclusion. I'm going back to bed so I can try to wake up."

But before he could turn away, Fernando stepped forward and wrapped him in a hug.

Rafael stiffened immediately, every muscle in his body going rigid. The chain pressed into him, sharp and uncomfortable, the broken glass edges catching against his t-shirt. 

But the worst part, the part that made his throat close up and his chest constrict, was that he smelled the same. 

Menthols. Cheap cigarettes that Fernando had smoked by the pack, the scent baked into his clothes, his skin, everything he touched. And underneath that, a little bit of sweat from working outside in the heat every day, perpetual construction site dust that never quite washed out of his work clothes.

It felt so real. Too real.

Rafael hated himself for not shoving him back, for not telling him to go fuck himself, for letting a fucking dream—because that's all this was, his subconscious working overtime to torture him—recontextualize his father's touch as something gentle and loving. For standing here and accepting an embrace that his younger self would have given anything to receive without conditions, without the threat of violence lurking underneath it.

But he didn't push him away.

"I love you, Rafi," Fernando murmured against his hair.

Rafael scoffed, but it came out pathetic, half-hearted. Because apparently he didn't have the fortitude to override this, the feeling of being loved by his father, no matter how much his brain screamed that it wasn’t real. 

He'd been so sure he was over it, that it wasn't something he cared about anymore, let alone wanted, that he'd excised it like a tumor years ago and moved on with his life.

But in this moment, being offered it so freely—even conjured up by his own treacherous mind—he couldn't force himself to reject it.

Then Fernando pulled back, his hands gripping both of Rafael's arms. Rafael watched in stunned silence as the chain around his father's waist loosened, falling away with a clatter, hitting the hardwood floor in a cacophony of broken glass and metal. 

"Thank you, mijo," Fernando said softly.

Rafael blinked, something sharp lodging itself in his chest. "For what? None of this was particularly helpful, and I certainly don't forgive you."

"You don’t have to forgive me," Fernando replied, his smile small and sad and understanding. "But you did let me help you with something important, even if you don’t see it yet. And now I get to move on."

Rafael scoffed again, bitter and raw. "You think this little display was important enough to get you into heaven? A single conversation and a trip across town and suddenly you’re all good with the big man upstairs?"

"I don't know," Fernando said simply, and his transparency seemed to increase, like he was already starting to fade. "All I know is that I can't undo what I did to you in life. But I've done what I can to make sure the rest of yours is a good one."

And then he was gone, his chain with him. 

But the smell of menthols lingered. 

Rafael just stood there for a moment, breathing it in despite himself, then crawled back into bed. He pulled the covers up over his shoulders, certain that he wasn't going to be able to fall asleep—if it was even technically falling asleep when you were already in a dream—with the heavy ache in his gut, the self-loathing sitting on his chest like a physical weight.

But the exhaustion pulled him under almost immediately, dragging him down into darkness before he could even finish the thought.

Rafael was woken roughly this time—no gradual surfacing, no gentle slide into consciousness, but a violent jerk back into awareness as someone shook his shoulder like they'd already tried gentler methods and found them wanting.

"Come on, up, up," a woman's voice said, and Rafael cracked one eye open—crusty and protesting—to see another translucent figure sitting on the edge of his bed, her hand gripping his shoulder.

Good, his subconscious was committing to the bit. 

He rubbed at his eyes with the heels of his palms, trying to clear the gritty exhaustion, wondering dimly if this was technically the same dream or if this was a second dream that had done an impressive job of picking up the narrative thread from the last one.

The woman was still shaking his shoulder, and as his blurry vision swam into focus, Rafael felt his stomach drop.

Sonny's Nonna.

Rosa Marchetti, Sonny’s mother's mother, who Rafael had never met—she'd died two years before Rafael and Sonny had even crossed paths—but whose face he knew from the framed photographs that covered every available surface in the Carisi family home. 

Housecoat, pale blue with little flowers, the kind that zipped up the front. Slippers, practical and worn-in. Hair in curlers, for god's sake, like she'd been pulled directly from her own bed to come shake him out of his.

"Enough rubbing at your face, no wonder you have so many wrinkles," Rosa said. "Get up. We're going."

Her accent was outer borough filtered through Italian parents, vowels that stretched, some that punched, consonants that disappeared entirely. 

Rafael wondered if what his brain had cooked up bore any resemblance to what her real voice had been. If Sonny would recognize it, or if Rafael had just cobbled together a stereotypical approximation from every Italian grandmother he'd ever encountered. 

"Good morning to you too, Mrs. Marchetti," Rafael sighed, his voice rough with sleep.

"You call me Nonna," she said firmly. "Everybody calls me Nonna."

Rafael huffed a sleepy laugh. "I see where Sonny gets it from."

The pang hit him immediately, sharp and vicious, right in the center of his chest. At the casual way he'd just invoked Sonny's name like it was still his to use, at the way he no longer had any right to find Dominick “Call me Sonny, everyone does” Carisi Jr. endearing or exasperating or anything in between. 

Rosa, either oblivious to his pain or simply uninterested in indulging it, flung the covers off him roughly. "Up. I got dragged out of bed for this, I’m not standing around to wait for you to get with the program."

Rafael tiredly swung his legs over the side of the bed, his feet finding the floor with a dull thud. The hardwood was cold again, real in that same uncomfortable way it had been with his father. "What's the rationale behind you being my Ghost of Christmas Present instead of my grandmother?"

Rosa's face scrunched up in confusion, her translucent features bewildered, a little offended. "Your ghost of what? I don't know your grandmother, you’ll have to ask her." She paused, considering. "Does she play bridge? Or is she one of those canasta ladies?"

"Gin rummy," Rafael replied, and Rosa just hummed suspiciously.

Rafael sighed, rubbing at his face one more time before pushing himself fully to standing. "Alright, Nonna,” he said, a little more chipper at the company this time, if nothing else. "The sooner we get wherever we're going, the sooner we both get back to bed."

"You're a good boy," Rosa said, reaching out to pat his cheek. "Very thoughtful."

Before Rafael could respond, they were somewhere else.

Sonny's parents' kitchen.

The space was lit by just the single light over the sink, shadows pooling in the corners, the digital clock on the microwave glowing green but too far away for Rafael to read.

Sonny and his mother were sitting at the kitchen table, mid-conversation, two mugs of what was probably tea between them—Sonny's mother was a firm believer in tea for emotional crises, hot chocolate for festivities, and coffee for everything in between.

And Sonny's face looked wrecked.

Not crying-in-the-moment wrecked, but the aftermath—eyes swollen and red-rimmed, face blotchy, the kind of devastation that came from sobbing so hard and for so long that there were no tears left to cry. 

Before Rafael could say anything—maybe something about how Sonny would get over it eventually, how he didn't need to see this—Rosa's hand connected with his shoulder in a sharp slap that made him stumble half a step sideways.

She swept past him, walking right up to the table, planting both hands flat between the mugs. 

"How about you tell me what's going on here, eh?" Rosa demanded so loudly that Rafael half-expected Sonny and his mother to jump. "Gotta be your fault, or we wouldn’t be standing here."

"It's my fault,” Rafael confirmed quietly. 

"What did you do to him?" Rosa snapped. Rafael wanted to make a crack about how no one at the central office had bothered to brief her on the evening's events, but he could only watch. 

"You know, I never liked him anyway," Serafina said, much quieter than Rosa but just as sharp. 

Sonny huffed out a sad laugh. "Yeah you did, Ma."

"So what if I did?" Serafina shot back. "That was yesterday, when I thought he had more than half a brain in his head. Thought he was a nice Catholic boy with a good career who treats his mother right. Shows what I get for—"

"Ma, he is all those things," Sonny said, and the defense in his voice—automatic, immediate, even now—felt like a knife slipping between Rafael's ribs.

Rosa spun back to Rafael, her eyes narrowing dangerously. "Are you all those things?"

"The Catholic part is a little touch and go, but… I think so. In a broad strokes sense."

"Then what's all this about?" Rosa demanded, throwing her hands up.

"I don't know, Ma." Sonny said before Rafael could reply. "I feel like such an idiot. I was just so sure, you know? I thought—" He broke off, one hand coming up to rub at his face. "I thought he'd been dropping hints about it. Talking about what kind of proposal he'd like, what he thought was tacky. I thought I'd done everything right. Maybe I should’ve—"

Rosa gasped and her hand connected with Rafael's shoulder again, harder this time. "My grandson asks you to marry him and you say no?" she shouted. "What kind of a baccalà are you?"

"I don't know what that means," Rafael said, more tired than defensive, "but I'm the kind that wants him to be happy."

"Ah, a saint. We should light a candle," Rosa said as she made an exaggerated sign of the cross. "This is the problem with the gays—no woman, no common sense."

Rafael startled—because this was his dream, wasn't it? His subconscious conjuring up this entire production. Did he think that? Did some deep-rooted part of him—

But Sonny was still talking, his words forced out in that same dragging, defeated cadence. "I just don't know what the problem is. I mean, if I knew, I'd fix it. I'd fix whatever it was, I swear to god I would. I really thought—" His voice cracked. "I really thought he was happy."

"Sounds like he’s the problem," Serafina said, and there was no malice in it, not really, just a fact stated plainly.

Sonny huffed another sad laugh, shaking his head slowly. "I'm the problem. That's—that’s the only thing that makes any sense. People don’t just do things for no reason."

Rafael wanted to grab Sonny by the shoulders and shake him, to get it through his thick skull that he was perfect, that Rafael loved him so much it hurt, that the problem wasn't anything Sonny had done or failed to do or could possibly change. 

It was that Rafael didn't want to be the thing that held him back from having the life he really wanted, the life he deserved, the white picket fence and the golden retriever and the kids who'd inherit his smile and his capacity for unconditional love.

But he couldn't touch him. Could only stand there useless while Sonny white-knuckled his mug.

"I mean, I would've been sad," Sonny continued. "About him saying no. I’m not gonna lie and say it wouldn’t have hurt. But I could've gotten over that, you know? But him leaving, him saying we’re done, just like that? That… that came out of nowhere. Like I missed something huge, like there were warning signs I should've seen."

Rosa whirled on Rafael. "That’s what this is about? You don't wanna get married, so you throw the baby out with the bathwater?" Her hand connected with the back of his head—sharp and stinging, the kind of slap that was meant to knock in sense in rather than cause pain. "You tell me what's wrong with him. Right now, you tell me what's so terrible about my grandson that he's not good enough for you. That you gotta break his heart on Christmas Eve."

Rafael opened his mouth, but Sonny was still talking, his words spilling out in that same defeated monotone that made Rafael want to claw his own chest open.

"He said this one thing, right at the end," Sonny said quietly. "That I was supposed to know there was an expiration date. But Ma, I didn't know that. I didn't know that at all." His voice cracked. "I mean, we moved in together. We signed a lease together. We fought about what color to paint the bathroom and whether we needed a second bookshelf or if we could just donate a few things. Who does that when they’re not planning on sticking around?"

Rosa shook her head slowly, a gesture loaded with profound disappointment. Rafael suspected it had more to do with the living together without marriage, without commitment, without the sanctity of vows. 

Of course it had all gone to shit. What did they expect?

"We talk about things," Sonny continued, his voice pleading like he was trying to convince himself as much as his mother. "I mean we really talk, Ma. About everything. About stupid stuff and important stuff and—" He groaned, scrubbing a hand over his face again. "And he just said that like it was nothing. Like it was something he'd been thinking the whole time. Like all those conversations, all that time we spent just… like none of it meant what I thought it meant. Feels like I was living on this completely different planet, and I had no idea."

Rafael felt his chest constrict, felt the air leave his lungs in one punched-out breath.

That wasn't what he'd meant. That wasn't it at all. It was just… Sonny had to have known that this thing with Rafael was temporary on the way to the rest of his life. 

Sonny drew in a shaky breath. "I knew we were different going into it. I mean, of course I knew that—you can't exactly miss it, right? I used to be scared sometimes that he wanted somebody who wasn't so—” He gestured vaguely at himself, a helpless encompassing motion, “—rough around the edges, I guess. Somebody more… sophisticated, I don’t know, whatever word you wanna use.”

Serafina reached out, her hand covering Sonny's on the table.

"But we just—we seemed to fit so well together that all that went away.” He laughed, hollow and broken. "But that’s the thing that’s driving me so nuts, I don’t even know if that’s what did it. Was it big stuff or—or little stuff piling up every day? Like, was it my personality, or just that I play video games too much, you know? Did I—” 

He broke off, one hand coming up to press against his eyes.

"I got interested in the stuff he’s interested in too, it’s not like I made him sit around watching baseball all day," he continued. "We go to wine-tastings and plays, all that Lincoln Center-type stuff. And I liked it—that’s something else I thought was good. We both did stuff that we wouldn’t have done on our own, like… expanded each other’s horizons, or whatever. That whole time, was he sitting there thinking ‘god, I can’t wait until I don’t have to schlep to Staten Island every Sunday so this idiot can visit his family’?” 

Rosa looked like she absolutely had something to say about that, but Rafael was already shaking his head. 

“I think I clean up fine for the fundraiser things he gets invited to,” Sonny continued, “His mother seems to like me. I don't think I've ever done anything to embarrass him in front of any of his snooty friends. There's obviously something, I just keep coming up empty." He dropped his hand, looking at his mother with even redder, wet eyes. "And not knowing what it is feels so much worse, I mean… what if it's something I could change? What if I could fix it and he just won't tell me what it is?"

Serafina opened her mouth, and Rafael could see the words forming. Something about how Sonny shouldn't have to change who he was to be loved, how the right person would accept him exactly as he was, but Rosa talked over her.

"So what is it then? Is it the too much video games?" she demanded. "I agree, but that doesn’t mean you kick him out on his culo.”  

"It's none of that. I mean—it’s none of that, because it’s not him," Rafael insisted. "He's… he’s perfect. He's perfect exactly the way he is."

"One of you is lying," Rosa snapped. "And my grandson isn't a liar, so that leaves you."

"He makes me so happy, Ma. Like, I wake up every single day excited, knowing he’s gonna make me laugh before breakfast. I come home every night and it’s—god, I figured living with somebody would be better than just me and leftovers and The Great British Baking Show. But living with him?”

"I can't listen to this anymore," Rafael said, desperation clawing up his throat. "Please. I don’t—"

"I grew up believing in soulmates, right?” Sonny continued, “You and Dad, you’re… of course I believed in it. But the older I got, I wasn’t sure I’d ever get it. Then all of the sudden—” Sonny gestured vaguely towards the window, at Rafael somewhere across the city.  

Rafael gritted his teeth. “Rosa, I—Nonna, please can we just—” 

Rosa's expression didn't soften even slightly. "Fine," she said curtly. She slapped a firm hand against his chest—not a hit this time, but a solid press of her palm right over his heart—and suddenly they were back in his bedroom. "That was depressing." 

Rafael staggered slightly, the disorientation hitting him harder this time, or maybe he was just more tired, more wrung out. He pressed his fingers against his temples, trying to stave off the headache building behind his eyes.

A headache he’d hopefully wake up without. 

"Look," he said flatly, "can you just tell me what lesson I'm supposed to have learned so we can both get back to bed? I'm sure there's a Cliffs Notes version we can speed through."

Rosa planted her hands on her hips, radiating disapproval. "How am I supposed to know what lessons you need to learn? I don't know you. I never met you in my life." She took a step closer, her eyes narrowing. "Answer my question. Why isn't my Sonny good enough for you?"

"He's too good for me," Rafael said, automatic, reflexive, like he'd been holding them behind his teeth for so long they'd worn grooves there. 

"Yes, I'm starting to see that," Rosa nodded, "So what's wrong with you?"

Rafael felt a hysterical laugh bubble up in his throat. "I'm—Sonny is happy with me now, but… I'm a good chapter. Not a good ending."

"So you think my Sonny is stupid," Rosa snapped.

"What? It's not—"

"That's what you said." Rosa took another step forward, and Rafael took one back. "You think he's too stupid to know his own mind. Too dumb know what he wants, what's good for him."

"He knows now," Rafael said desperately, "but when he changes his mind later—"

"Why would he change his mind?" Rosa demanded. "What, are you gonna step out on him?"

"Of course I wouldn’t—"

“Hit him?” 

"God, no."

Rosa paused, her head tilting slightly. "Uh, what else is bad these days?" she muttered to herself. "Oh—abuse his emotions? Mess with his head, make him feel crazy?"

"I—no. Rosa, even if things stayed exactly the way they are, I can never be what he wants," Rafael said, "I can never be a sweet blonde lady who gives his parents grandchildren and—"

"Ah," Rosa interrupted, nodding her head. “That’s it—you think he hates his parents.”

Rafael blinked, the words hitting him sideways. "I—what?"

"You think my Sonny dragged his parents—good Catholic people, mind you—through coming to terms with their only son loving a man just for fun?" Rosa's voice climbed higher, gesturing emphatically. "You think that was a nice Sunday afternoon conversation? 'Hey Ma, hey Pop, pass the potatoes and brace yourselves.’”

Rafael opened his mouth, but Rosa wasn't finished.

"He did that because he had to. Because he wanted them to meet you. To—" She groaned in frustration. "To be part of his life, because you are part of his life, and he wasn’t planning for that to change."

"That doesn't have anything to do with me. I'm sure—I mean, other men have met his parents before, I'm not—"

Rosa only looked at him like he was the dumbest person she'd ever had the misfortune of encountering, living or dead. Rafael felt it click into place slowly, horribly, a key turning in a lock he hadn’t known existed.

"I'm… I’m the first man he's taken home," Rafael said carefully. "He came out to his parents because he wanted them to meet me. He never said—“

"If he wanted a wife, he could’ve skipped giving his mother a stroke," Rosa said, almost pitying. "You think he did that for somebody he was planning to trade in later?"

Rafael pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. "God, even in my dream his parents hate me."

"Ah, now you think my daughter is a liar." Rosa crossed her arms over her chest.

Rafael dropped his hands. "What?"

"Sera tells you she loves you every time you leave that house," Rosa said, jabbing a finger at him for emphasis. "Every–” Jab. “—single—” Jab. “—time. Kisses your cheek. Wraps up leftovers for you to take home. And Isabella? Forget about it. You—" Jab. "—are the only one making it a problem."

"Do you watch or do you not? I'm getting mixed messages about the level of surveillance involved in—"

Rosa rolled her eyes and laid her palm flat against his chest without warning.

Sonny’s parents’ living room, soft morning light filtering through the curtains. 

It was so aggressively, overwhelmingly homey that Rafael felt the loss of it in his bones, this room he’d never step in again. The Christmas tree dominated one corner, decorated within an inch of its life with ornaments that spanned decades. Presents spilled out from under it in a chaotic pile wrapped in mismatched paper, bows recycled from previous years, tags written in Serafina's sharp script.

It was warm. Not just temperature-warm, but that too. It was warm in that specific way that houses got when they were full of people loving each other, traditions and memories in every corner, every—

A knock at the front door interrupted the thought, and Sonny emerged from the kitchen a moment later. 

He was dressed—jeans and a red sweater, hair still damp from a shower, but looking exhausted, miserable. He looked like he hadn't slept at all, spent all night crying, and only recently managed to pull himself together enough to be vertical.

"Uncle Sonny!"

A small blur of motion as Victoria launched herself at Sonny, wrapping her arms around his legs. Sonny's face transformed for just a moment as he bent down to scoop her up, pressing a kiss to her curls. "Hey, Vic. Merry Christmas."

Bella stepped inside behind her, her arms loaded down with presents, Tommy behind her with even more. She managed a half-hug, pressing her cheek against Sonny's shoulder, careful not to crush the gifts between them, less careful not to crush Victoria. 

But when she pulled back, her eyes narrowed immediately. “You look like sh—awful.” She glanced at Victoria. “Yeah. You look shawful. That’s what I meant to say.” 

"Thanks, Bells," Sonny said, setting Victoria down. His smile was strained, not even close to reaching his eyes. "Merry Christmas to you too."

Bella dropped the presents under the tree, Tommy giving Sonny a concerned look but having the sense not to say anything. Victoria was already distracted by the presents, dropping to her knees to examine the tags, trying to sound out names.

"What's wrong?" Bella asked quietly. "Where's Rafael?"

Sonny's jaw tightened, and he glanced toward Victoria, then back at Bella. "Let's talk about it later.”

"Vic, go say hi to Nonna in the kitchen," Bella said, not taking her eyes off Sonny. "I bet she’s got cookies."

"The presents—"

"Oh, that’s right, I forgot you don’t like cookies anymore. I’ll make sure to have Nonna box them up to send to—"

“Noooo,” Victoria shrieked, jumping up to obey, her little feet pattering toward the kitchen. Tommy looked at Bella, then Sonny, then wandered towards the kitchen after her. 

The moment they were out of earshot, Bella grabbed Sonny's arm and tugged him toward the corner by the tree. "We’re talking about it now. What the hell is going on?” 

Sonny's eyes went watery immediately, his whole face crumpling. "Bells, please. Please just leave it."

“I thought you were the Ghost of Christmas Present,” Rafael groaned, “This is supposed to happen tomorrow. Ergo, future.” 

"I told you already, I'm not the ghost of Christmas presents. I think that's Santa Claus, no? With the sleigh and the—" She made a gesture that basically encapsulated 'reindeer.'

Rafael pinched the bridge of his nose. "If we're here to watch Sonny's family hate me, I got the message. Can we—"

Rosa linked her arm through his, tugging him firmly against her side. "Shush. Watch."

And then time started moving.

A stuttering fast-forward, a film reel spinning too fast—the front door opened and closed, opened and closed. Tess swept in with a casserole dish, pressing a kiss to Sonny's cheek that he barely seemed to register. Gina arrived moments later—or maybe it was longer, time had gone slippery—with an armful of wine bottles, her laugh bright, her eyes finding Sonny’s across the room and dimming. Mia, Alicia, then more family Rafael hadn’t met. 

Through it all, Sonny kept disappearing. He'd vanish up the stairs, then reappear with his nose red and his eyes redder, looking freshly cracked open. 

Rafael noticed them noticing—Bella's eyes tracking Sonny as he climbed the stairs for the third time, Serafina's hand reaching out to squeeze his arm when he passed, Tess exchanging a loaded glance with their father across the room.

Time kept skipping forward, the light through the windows shifting as the sun arced across the sky. Everyone settled in, bodies filling the couch and the chairs, kids cross-legged on the floor. 

The energy in the room should have been chaotic, joyful, but there was something muted about it, something carefully modulated like everyone had agreed without speaking to keep things gentle.

Victoria got her marching orders, throwing herself into the role of present fairy. She crawled under the tree, examining tags carefully, finger tracing the letters.

Wrapping paper exploded across the room in waves of red and green and silver. Someone—Alicia, maybe—brought a trash bag, but it was a losing battle. Victoria tore through her own presents with a single-minded focus, squealing over each new toy, each book, each too-big sweater that she'd grow into.

But every so often, she'd pick up a package and pause. Bella would stick out an arm, gently taking it without a word, adding it to a growing pile next to the couch. 

Mia sat on the floor, leaning against her mother’s legs with a pillow on her lap to cushion her new laptop, fingers flying across the keyboard as she set it up, only half-present to what was happening around her.

And Sonny was still leaving.

Up the stairs. Down the stairs. When he was present, he perched on the arm of the couch next to his mother like a bird ready for flight. 

Eventually—gradually, then suddenly—everyone started filtering toward the dining room, towards Serafina's breakfast spread that Rafael could see steaming on the table through the doorway. Scrambled eggs and sausages, French toast and fresh fruit, a breakfast casserole with layers of egg and cheese and breakfast potatoes that tasted so much better than it looked.

Everyone settled around the table, Dominick Sr. at the head, Serafina next to him, sisters and spouses and children filling in the rest. 

But the seat on Sonny’s left stayed empty, a gap in the otherwise crowded table that everyone seemed to navigate around, maybe by accident, probably on purpose. No one wanted to be the person to fill the space. 

Until Bella lifted Victoria and plopped her in the chair, barely pausing as she walked by. Victoria didn't protest, just immediately started chattering at Sonny. 

Rafael pulled away from Rosa sharply, stumbling back a step. "Okay, I get it. Sonny is sad. I'm the asshole who made Sonny sad. Can we please—"

"You think he's the only one?" Rosa interrupted, walking over to toe at the pile of still-wrapped presents next to the couch. She bent over slightly, squinting at them, humming and tapping one with her slipper. "Tag says Rafael." She kicked that one off the pile. "Rafael." Another present, another nudge. "And this one—’To Uncle Rafael, from Vic.’ How odd." Another. “Rafael.” Another. “Rafael. I’m starting to see a pattern.” 

"They're… just gifts," Rafael said dumbly.

"Very good," Rosa said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. She patted his arm. "And they all hate you so much, they got you—" She started counting on her fingers, lips moving silently. "At least, what, eight of them? Maybe they're all boxed up roadkill they scraped up on the way here, who knows? You’re not here to open them."

Rafael could only stare into the dining room, his eyes tracking across the crowded scene playing out in real time now—the layers of conversation, serving dishes being passed around, Victoria's storytelling punctuated by a hand gesture that nearly knocked over a glass of orange juice, Bella's hand shooting out to steady it without breaking eye contact with whoever she was talking to.

"Get a good look," Rosa said. "This is the last time you'll be seeing them, yes?” 

Rafael wanted to push back, to argue, to defend. But it was true. All of that was gone now. Voluntarily relinquished. Thrown away with both hands.

Rosa's hand landed on his arm, and the dining room was gone.

His bedroom materialized around them with that same jarring immediacy, the space that felt even colder and emptier than it already had without Sonny in it. 

"Alright," Rosa said briskly, dusting her hands together like she'd just finished a tedious chore. "That's my checklist finished. Off to bed you go."

Rafael huffed a bitter laugh. "That's it? No moral of the story? No parting words of wisdom?"

"You seem like a thinker," Rosa said, reaching up to pat his cheek with surprising gentleness after all the slaps. "You'll figure it out."

And then she was gone.The warmth of her palm against his cheek lingered for just a moment, and then that disappeared too.

He dropped back into bed without bothering to pull the covers up, pressing his face into the pillow that wasn't Sonny's anymore and willing himself to wake up, back to a world where he could open his eyes and find that none of this had happened. 

Maybe even that Sonny was still next to him, that there was no ring, there was no question at all.

Rafael jolted awake to someone snapping in his face. 

He groaned, throwing an arm over his eyes, trying to block out whatever fresh hell his subconscious had dreamed up this time.

"Rise and shine, Counselor," a familiar voice said, entirely too chipper for whatever-the-fuck-o’clock it was. 

Rafael forced his eyes open—sticky, protesting—and squinted up at the figure standing beside his bed.

Defense attorney Randy goddamn Dworkin.

"I saw you a couple of weeks ago. Did you die since then?" Rafael scoffed. "I'll send your family a condolence card. Does USPS deliver to the crocodile swamp you surely hail from?"

Dworkin looked down at himself—at his ill-fitting suit, his scuffed shoes, his transparent hands. "Oh, the meat suit? Nah, I don't think this guy is dead. I just picked an option off a list of people they gave me that you might listen to."

Rafael pushed himself up on his elbows. "That list includes a defense attorney I barely know?"

Dworkin shrugged. "What can I say? I work with what I'm given."

Rafael dragged himself fully upright, swinging his legs over the side of the bed for what felt like the hundredth time. “At least tell me you’re the last one.” 

"That's above my pay grade, buddy." Dworkin rocked back on his heels. "I’m just a freelancer."

Rafael huffed a laugh. "Right. Fine." He pushed himself to standing. "Let's get this over with."

"Oh, okay. Great," Dworkin said, his grin widening. "I heard through the grapevine you were being a little—" He cut himself off, waving a hand dismissively. "Never mind. Let's hit it and get it."

He reached out his hand like he was going for a handshake, like they were standing in the courthouse post-verdict instead of in Rafael's bedroom in the dead of night.

Rafael looked at the outstretched hand, then up at Dworkin's face, then back at the hand.

He took it.

He didn’t recognize the apartment. Not the layout, not the furniture, not the warm honey-colored hardwood floors that looked recently refinished. It was decorated for Christmas—obviously—a tree in the corner strung with lights that cast everything in soft gold, garland draped over doorways, five mismatched stockings hanging from a mantle.

And then his eyes landed on the couch, and recognition slammed into him like a punch.

Sonny—older now, his hair gone completely silver, visceral evidence of time he'd never get back. Laugh lines had carved themselves deeper around his eyes and mouth, but he still looked like Sonny. Still had that same easy posture, that same warmth radiating from every line of him.

Amanda was tucked into Sonny’s side under a thick knit blanket, her head resting against his shoulder. She was comfortable in a way that looked like years, not months—her body fitted against Sonny's like they'd worn grooves into each other, her hand resting on his chest, absently playing with the collar of his sweater.

The wedding bands caught the light from the tree—matching silver, simple and elegant, glinting softly every time either of them moved.

The room was covered in a layer of torn wrapping paper, crushed bows and tangled ribbons, cardboard boxes half-collapsed and shoved against the wall. Clothes spilled out of tissue paper, shoeboxes stacked haphazardly, toys in various states of assembly.

Two teenage girls were sprawled on the floor near the tree—Billie and Jesse, grown into their features, long limbs and Amanda’s blonde hair. Billie had a guitar across her lap, her fingers fumbling over the strings, producing a discordant twang that made her wrinkle her nose.

And there was another child.

Younger—seven, maybe eight. Dark hair that fell into his eyes, not like his… sisters? 

Rafael couldn't breathe.

Couldn't think.

Couldn't do anything except stand there and catalog every excruciating detail of Sonny's life—Sonny's real life, the one he was supposed to have, the one Rafael had always known he wanted.

Billie plucked at the guitar again, a slightly better sound this time, and looked up at Sonny with bright, hopeful eyes. "Dad, you’re for real gonna teach me how to play?"

Dad. 

Not in a way that sounded forced, or even new. It was casual. Natural. 

Amanda shifted against Sonny's side, tilting her head back to look up at him. "Yes, he is," she said. "And it's gonna save us a small fortune on lessons, so you better make good on it, Carisi."

Sonny smiled, and that hadn't changed either. Just deepened with age, with contentment, with the weight of being loved and loving in return.

"Dig around in that case," Sonny said, gesturing toward the guitar case propped against the wall. "There's a tuner in there somewhere."

Amanda turned back to Sonny, and her voice dropped lower. "You did good, Counselor."

The way it rolled off her tongue felt like glass shards working their way under Rafael's skin. Sonny was a lawyer now, and Rafael hadn’t gotten to see it. Or maybe he had, from a safe distance, without— 

Sonny's smile widened, something soft and besotted crossing his features as he leaned down to kiss her. Amanda's hand came up to cup his cheek, her wedding band catching the light again, and Rafael couldn't look away even though it felt like staring directly into the sun.

The boy stumbled suddenly, his foot catching on one of the shoeboxes, and he windmilled his little arms to catch his balance, nearly going down face-first into the coffee table.

Amanda pulled away from the kiss immediately, her hand shooting out in maternal reflex even though she was too far away to catch him. "Jesse, get your junk up off the floor before Nicky chips a tooth.” 

Nicky.

Dominick Carisi III. 

Sonny's child. His son. The evidence of everything Rafael had always known Sonny wanted. 

This was Sonny's family. His family. Kids calling him Dad, Amanda's easy affection, the wedding bands that screamed permanent and chosen and loved. An apartment they'd built together, filled with the evidence of their life—photos on the mantle he could just barely make out, a pile of coats tossed over a kitchen chair, backpacks carelessly dropped by the door nestled up beside a briefcase. 

Rafael felt bile rise in his throat, hot and acidic, his stomach churning with something that went deeper than nausea. Grief and loss and the terrible, crushing weight of knowing he'd been right all along.

Sonny was happy.

So obviously, devastatingly happy in a way that made Rafael want to double over, want to press his hands against the ache in his chest and hold himself together before he shattered completely.

Billie spun around, holding up a small electric tuner. "Found it!"

"Alright, bring it here," Sonny said. "I'll show you how it works, then we can do some basic chords if you want. You're gonna hate me about twenty minutes in when your fingers start hurting, but—"

"Don’t care,” Billie interrupted, settling back down on the floor with the guitar by his feet.

Nicky had abandoned whatever he'd been looking at and was trying to climb onto the couch between his parents, wriggling under the blanket. Amanda shifted to make room, her hand coming up to smooth down his hair.

Rafael felt like he was being flayed open, like every soft part of him was being exposed to the air, raw and bleeding.

"So," Dworkin's voice cut through the moment, entirely too casual for the devastation Rafael was experiencing. Rafael wondered if his fist would connect with a translucent jaw if he tried it. "What are we doing here?"

"Seems like—" Rafael choked. He swallowed hard, tried again. "Seems like we're seeing that Sonny is going to be just fine without me." He forced himself to keep looking, even though every instinct screamed at him to close his eyes, to block it out. "Better, actually. Better than fine. He got everything he wanted. Everything I couldn't—" He broke off, his throat closing up.

Dworkin tilted his head. "And that bothers you because...?"

"It doesn't bother me," Rafael snapped. "That's the whole point—that's what I wanted for him. That's why I—" He cut himself off, one hand coming up to press against his eyes. "That's why I ended it. So he could have this."

"Uh-huh," Dworkin muttered. "Sure sounds like it."

Rafael's jaw tightened. "What?"

"Nothing, nothing." Dworkin held up his hands in surrender. "Just wondering if you actually believe that."

"Believe what?" Rafael bit out. "That he's happy? I have eyes, I can see—"

"No, no—that part's obvious," Dworkin interrupted, waving dismissively. "I mean the part where you think this is better. Where you think you did him some kind of favor."

Rafael felt something hot and defensive flare in his chest. "I did. Look at him—"

"I'm looking," Dworkin said. "I see a guy who's happy. Got a nice family, nice apartment. Nice job, apparently." He paused, gesturing at the scene. "What I don't see is any evidence that he couldn't have been just as happy with you."

Rafael scoffed. "You're joking."

"Do I look like I'm joking?" Dworkin's expression stayed maddeningly neutral. "Enlighten me, Counselor. Walk me through the logic. What exactly about you made it impossible for this guy to be happy?"

"I can't give him this," Rafael snapped, gesturing sharply at the domestic tableau. "I can't give him kids, I can't—"

"He didn't ask you for kids," Dworkin pointed out. "He asked you to marry him. Those are different things."

"For now," Rafael shot back. 

"You know what I'm hearing? I'm hearing a lot of assumptions about what Carisi wants, what Carisi needs, what Carisi would feel. Not a lot of actual evidence."

"The evidence is right there," Rafael said flatly, nodding toward the couch where Nicky had crawled onto Sonny’s lap, Jesse having migrated over to watch the guitar lesson too. "Look at him. That's what he wanted."

"Maybe," Dworkin conceded. "Or maybe that's just what happened after you kicked him to the curb and he had to build a life without you. Doesn't mean it's what he wanted more." He shrugged. "You wanna know what I think?” 

“Not particularly.” 

"Here's what I think," Dworkin pressed on, "I think you looked at this guy—this guy who loved you, who wanted to marry you—and you decided you didn't deserve it. Not 'he deserves better,' not 'I can't give him what he needs,' but 'I don't deserve to be this happy.'"

"It’s not about—" Rafael tried again, but Dworkin talked over him.

"You’re so convinced that he’d change his mind that you decided for him. But tell me this—what if he didn’t?” 

"He would," Rafael insisted. “I’m just being realistic.” 

"You’re being a coward."

Rafael felt something hot and furious surge up his throat. "You don’t know anything about—"

"Hit a nerve?" Dworkin asked mildly. "Look, I'm not saying this to be cruel. I'm saying it because it's true. You’re dressing up this whole affair as some noble self-sacrifice bullshit. Not because you thought he'd be unhappy with you, but because you couldn't believe you deserved it."

"Who gives a flying fuck what I deserve? He’s—” 

“Carisi did. A lot.” 

“—happy. He has everything he ever wanted. I was right—he did want this more than he wanted me.” 

"Or," Dworkin said slowly, "he wanted you, and when you took that option off the table, he found a way to be happy anyway. Because that's what people do. They move on. They build new lives. Doesn't mean he didn't want it just as much." He paused. "Maybe more."

Rafael shook his head sharply. "No. This is—this is what he always wanted. He told me that, early on. Before we—" He swallowed hard. "He wanted this."

"And what did you want?" Dworkin asked.

"What?"

"You heard me." Dworkin's expression went gentle, which was worse than the needling. "What did you want, Barba? Not what you thought Carisi deserved, not what you thought you could give him—what did you want for yourself?"

Rafael opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.

Nothing came out.

Because the answer was obvious, wasn't it?

He'd wanted Sonny. He'd wanted the apartment they'd shared, the lazy weekends, the pretend arguments and the real ones, the way Sonny's face lit up when Rafael walked through the door. He'd wanted all of it, every mundane detail, every small intimacy, every moment of feeling like he'd finally found someone who saw him completely and loved him anyway.

He'd wanted to say yes.

The realization hit him like a freight train, sudden and devastating and completely overwhelming. His knees went weak, his breath catching in his chest, and he had to press one hand against his thigh to keep himself upright.

"I wanted—" he started breathlessly. "I wanted—god, I want to marry him so badly it scares the shit out of me.”

"There we go," Dworkin said softly.

"I can’t," Rafael pressed, desperation radiating from every syllable. "Because people leave. People change their minds. People—”

"And then what?" Dworkin prompted. "Then you get hurt?"

"Then I lose everything," Rafael whispered. 

"You know the funny thing about that, Counselor? You already did."

"I—"

"You talk a good game about protecting him, about making sure he got what he deserved," Dworkin continued, relentless now. "But really? You’re just a selfish bastard making selfish choices. Making sure you didn't have to risk being happy, didn't have to risk being loved, didn't have to face the possibility that maybe—just maybe—you deserved good things too."

"I don't—" Rafael's voice cracked. "I'm not—"

"What?" Dworkin challenged. "You're not worth it? You're not good enough? You're too broken, too damaged, too fucked up from your shitty childhood to think someone could love you, then keep loving you?"

Rafael’s breathing was shallow and rapid, the edges of his vision starting to blur. His hands trembled, and he pressed them flat against his thighs, trying to ground himself, trying to find something solid to hold onto.

"God, what the fuck am I doing?" He snapped. "None of this is even real. Why am I—"

"I hate to break it to you, Counselor," Dworkin interrupted, and his voice had lost all its levity, "but it's real."

"No." Rafael shook his head, backing away a step. "No, I'm done. I'm done with this. I'm going to—I'm going to wake myself up, I’ll throw myself out a window, I’ll—"

"Barba." Dworkin said, firm and unyielding. "Your father was real, Rosa was real, and I'm… well—" He gestured at himself. "Arguably. The point is, this isn't just your subconscious torturing you. This is an intervention."

"And smoking crack will do wonders to help me achieve my lifelong dream of a Supreme Court appointment," Rafael bit out. 

“You’re a stubborn son of a bitch, you know that? Has anyone ever told you that you'd be a good lawyer?” Dworkin shook his head. “Look, I really didn’t wanna have to do this. I was hoping that this—” Dworkin gestured vaguely at the room, “—would be enough to get through to you, but… there’s one more stop we have to make.” 

Rafael scoffed. “Let me guess—me, counting all my blood money in a Scrooge McDuckian vault while I cackle maniacally about how lucrative it is to defend rapists?” 

"Not quite," Dworkin said, and his hand closed around Rafael's arm.

The smell hit first—industrial cleaner trying and failing to mask the underlying scents of too many bodies in too small a space, old sweat, stale air that had been recycled through the same building for decades. 

They were in a prison.

Institutional gray walls, fluorescent lighting that cast everything in a sickly yellow-green, a sad little Christmas tree sitting on the guard's desk. An even sadder, littler menorah next to it.

Dworkin gestured silently, and Rafael's eyes followed the movement.

There—sitting alone at a table, separated from the other inmates by choice or circumstance or both—was him. Older, much older, his hair gone mostly gray, a beard covering the lower half of his face that did nothing to hide how gaunt he looked. 

Institutional food and constant stress, his prison-issued beige hanging loose on his frame, shoulders hunched as he bent over a tray of food. He wasn't talking to anyone, wasn't making eye contact, just eating with stiff, mechanical movements. 

"Prison. Really?" Rafael scoffed. "And that’s a metaphor about what? Being trapped by my own choices, or maybe how I've imprisoned myself emotionally, built walls to keep people from—"

"I like where your head's at," Dworkin interrupted, "but nope. Just regular shmegular prison. Twenty-five to life."

Rafael laughed sharply. "I'm so lonely that I take up credit card fraud to fill the void?"

"Eh," Dworkin said with a shrug. "Killed a baby."

Rafael laughed again, unhinged and hysterical. “Jesus Christ,” he managed, gasping for air, “I know my self-esteem could use some work, but baby killer? That’s—that’s where we’re landing?” 

“In about—what year is it?” Dworkin glanced down at his watch. “Oh, shit. Like, a month and a half.” 

Rafael's laughter petered out, leaving him breathless and dizzy. "Phenomenal. I say 'this is a hyperrealistic dream,' you say 'let me convince you by positing a point A to point B from sad and lonely to murdering a baby in a month and a half?’ I can see how that’s compelling to someone with a see-through brain.” 

"Well, there are different schools of thought on the murder piece," Dworkin said. "Lots of op-eds going both ways. Assisted suicide versus murder, quality of life, patient autonomy, yada yada. But, a jury of your peers landed on murder, so..." He shrugged. "Murder in the second degree, specifically. Fifteen to life, but you drew the short straw on sentencing."

“And I assume Dworkin showed up on your little roster of costumes because he defended me?” Rafael asked flatly. “And lost, apparently.” 

“You got it in one,” Dworkin confirmed. “But cut the guy a break—maybe he wouldn’t have had such a hard time if you hadn’t put on such a self-righteous song and dance on the stand. You were pretty bent out of shape that the kid would never see clouds, or something. ‘Slippery slope’ is only a fallacy when—” Dworkin cut himself off, pinching the bridge of his nose. “That’s not why we’re here.”

Rafael gestured at his future self. "It seems like it should be. A breakup kind of pales in comparison to murder, don't you think?"

"You didn't do it out of malice, Barba," Dworkin said. "There was a case. A kid. No brain activity, no quality of life, no nothing. The mother petitioned the court to let her pull the plug because the dad wouldn’t agree to it, and everything got a little—” He waved a hand vaguely, like the details were too tedious to recount in full. "You got involved. Too involved. And you just did it yourself.” 

"That's the most absurd thing I’ve heard tonight, which is really saying something."

"You thought you were doing the right thing," Dworkin continued. "Hell, maybe you were doing the right thing. Either way, you didn't think you had anything to lose anymore, so even though you knew you'd probably go to prison, you just—" He mimed pulling a plug with a sharp motion. "Pop.” 

"I don't know why my brain cooked this up specifically, but—" 

"Enough, Barba," Dworkin interrupted. "What difference does it make if all of this is a dream? You could learn the same shit either way. The lesson doesn't require the medium to be real, it just requires you to stop being such an obstinate ass for five consecutive minutes."

Rafael opened his mouth—something cutting about armchair psychology from a D-list defense attorney, which wasn’t even true—

"No." Dworkin held up a hand. "I don't wanna hear anything else from you."

His grip tightened on Rafael's arm, and the prison disappeared. 

"You ever heard the name Drew Householder?"

Rafael tried to think back, tried to dredge up some recognition. He'd skimmed plenty of directories in his life, saw names in case files in passing, crossed paths with hundreds of people in the machinery of the legal system. Could’ve been anyone, or no one, or just syllables that happened to sound like something else.

"Drew," Dworkin said firmly. "His parents are Maggie and Aaron Householder." He held Rafael's gaze for one more beat, making sure the names landed, making sure Rafael heard them. "Get some sleep. You've got a big day tomorrow, one way or the other."

And then he was gone.

Rafael stood there for a moment in the darkness of his bedroom, the names echoing like a bell that had been rung, reverberating directly into his skull. 

Drew Householder. Maggie and Aaron.

Every muscle ached, every joint protested, exhaustion caking into his bones like half-dried cement. He collapsed on the bed, more tired than he’d ever been in his life—not after the longest trials, not after the worst cases, not even after the night his father died and he'd stayed up—

Rafael woke to the muted blaring of his alarm, muffled and distant from the living room where he’d abandoned his phone last night along with everything else.

For half a second, in that blurry space before consciousness, he reached for Sonny. His hand found cold sheets.

Rafael pushed himself upright, his body protesting every movement. He felt hungover from far more than the eggnog, his head pounding, his mouth dry, his eyes still gritty and swollen. 

The alarm kept blaring from the living room.

Their alarm, the one they’d set together three days ago, Sonny reaching past Rafael to tap at the screen, his chin hooked over Rafael's shoulder as he'd said, "We should probably leave by nine to beat traffic, yeah?" 

The alarm meant to wake them both, meant to give them time for coffee and showers and the pleasant chaos of getting ready together before driving to his parents' house for Christmas Day. A day they were supposed to spend together, full of warmth and family and Sonny's hand in his.

Rafael stumbled toward the living room, feet heavy, each step requiring more effort than they were worth. He collapsed onto the couch, stabbing at the phone screen until it went silent.

The lock screen stared back at him.

Them. Together. Sonny's arm slung around Rafael's shoulders, both of them grinning at the camera—or no, Sonny was grinning at the camera, that thousand-watt smile that could light up a room, while Rafael was looking at Sonny with an expression so openly smitten that it made him sick to look at. 

Rafael figured this was the perfect time for a rum and coke. Maybe after a couple of straight shots, just to get the day moving along. Rafael’s thumb hovered over the screen. 

He felt the thoughts trying to form—don’t do this to yourself, don’t make this worse than it already is. 

But his fingers were already moving, unlocking the phone, pulling up the search bar. 

Drew, Maggie, Aaron Householder.

The first link was a GoFundMe page, the title "Support Drew and the Householder Family."

The thumbnail showed a small boy with dark hair and an oxygen mask. The fundraiser goal was astronomical, the kind of number that made Rafael's stomach turn because he knew what it meant—prolonged care, trying to buy time when time was the one thing money couldn't really purchase.

Below that was a description—everything Dworkin had said, laid out in heartbreaking detail. Drew Householder, two years old, born with a rare genetic condition that had left him with severe neurological damage. Parents Aaron and Maggie, who'd been fighting for any chance to help Drew, who'd exhausted their savings, their insurance, everything they had.

There was a link to a Facebook page, and Rafael clicked it before he could stop himself.

Photos loaded one after another—Drew in his mother's arms, wrapped in a blanket covered in cartoon elephants. Drew with Aaron, who had the exhausted, determined look of a parent who'd stopped sleeping properly months ago. Updates from Maggie about nothing good, about loving her son with everything she had even as she watched him slip away.

The most recent post was from three days ago. 

Drew had a rough night but he's stable now. Trying to focus on the fact that we get another Christmas with our baby boy. Thank you all for your continued prayers and support.

Rafael tried for all of two seconds, maybe less, to convince himself that he'd seen this before. 

That he must have scrolled past it on social media, or heard about it in passing, overheard someone at work mentioning a case with similar details. 

But he knew.

Bone-deep, marrow-deep, in the same way he'd known his father's voice was exactly right, in the same way Rosa's slap had stung real and sharp against his skin—he knew. 

He'd never heard of Drew Householder before Randy Dworkin had said the name. Never seen these photos, never read these updates, never encountered this family in any way that would explain how his sleeping mind could have fabricated such specific, verifiable details.

Rafael shot up off the couch so fast he nearly lost his balance, his phone clattering to the floor as he stumbled toward the bedroom. He stripped off his pajamas, yanking on yesterday's clothes. His hands fumbled with buttons, with the zipper on his pants, everything taking twice as long as it should because his fingers wouldn't stop shaking.

He lurched back toward the living room, toward the Christmas tree—their Christmas tree— toward the pile of wrapped gifts underneath it. The tags were written in Sonny's messy, nonsensical handwriting. 

To Gina, Love Rafael and Sonny. To Bella, Love Rafael and Sonny. To Victoria, Love Uncle Rafael and Uncle Sonny.

He shoved them all into reusable grocery bags from the hall closet, not caring about presentation, not caring about anything except getting them, getting himself, getting to Staten Island as fast as humanly possible.

His phone. Where was his—

He spotted it on the floor where he'd dropped it, scooped it up, and pulled up the Uber app. Christmas Day, Staten Island—the surge pricing was obscene, the kind of number that would have made him pause on any other day. 

He confirmed it without hesitation.

The car arrived in eight minutes, a small miracle, and Rafael threw himself into the back seat, the bags of presents spilling across the floor at his feet.

"Merry Christmas," the driver said cheerfully, glancing at Rafael in the rearview mirror.

"Yeah, yes. Merry Christmas to you too," Rafael replied, sounding exactly as manic as he felt. 

The driver pulled out into traffic, and Rafael pressed his forehead against the cold window, his knee bouncing with frantic energy that had nowhere else to go. His hands clenched and unclenched in his lap, his breathing shallow and fast, his mind racing through a thousand different scenarios.

What if saying no had sealed the deal? What if breaking Sonny's heart last night settled the conviction that Rafael wasn't worth another minute of his time? What if Sonny opened the door, saw Rafael standing there and just… closed it again? What if he'd already started the process of writing Rafael out of his life the way Rafael had demanded? 

Sonny might have decided  in the cold light of Christmas morning that Rafael had shown his true colors last night. And if that was true—if Sonny opened the door and told him to leave, to never come back, that he'd had his chance and he'd blown it—Rafael didn't know what he'd do.

The longest minutes of Rafael's life stretched by in the back of that Uber. 

His religion became a little more touch than go as he pressed his forehead harder against the cold glass, praying that Sonny had left the door open even a crack, that there was still some microscopic sliver of space for Rafael to wedge himself back into.

The driver took the Verrazzano at a geological pace, and Rafael wanted to climb into the front seat and take over, consequences be damned. His fingers drummed an erratic rhythm against his thigh, his entire body vibrating with the desperate need to move faster, be there already, fix this before it calcified into something permanent.

When they finally—finally—pulled up in front of the Carisi house, Rafael shoved a wad of cash at the driver, dragged the bags out after him, and stumbled out onto the sidewalk.

Through the front window he could see them—the whole family gathered in the living room exactly as Rosa had shown him, not quite settled yet, stockings hanging from the mantle that Serafina had lovingly embroidered with everyone's names.

 Everyone's names including his.

Sonny was about to slam the door in his face. Serafina would see him first and tell him in very creative Italian exactly where he could shove his Christmas presents. Bella would fucking kill him. 

Rafael forced his feet to move, one step, then another. He clutched the bags tighter and climbed the porch steps, each one feeling like scaling a mountain. He knocked—three sharp raps that sounded too loud, too aggressive, like he was demanding entry instead of begging for it.

Voices inside went quiet—everyone is already here, who could that be? Footsteps approached, then the door swung open to reveal Sonny.

He looked exactly—exactly—as he had when Rafael had seen him with Rosa. Same red eyes, same red sweater, same dark jeans. Same devastation written across every feature.

The shock that crossed Sonny's face was immediate, his expression cycling through confusion, hope even, before it got crushed under the weight of caution.

"Raf," Sonny said finally, his eyes tracking down to the bags, then back up to Rafael's face. "You didn't have to bring those. I would’ve—"

Rafael dropped the bags and grabbed Sonny by the front of his sweater, yanking him outside and pulling the door shut behind them.

"Rafael, what—"

"I was wrong," Rafael cut him off, the words tumbling out in a desperate rush. "I was so wrong, Sonny. About everything. About us, about—god, about all of it."

Sonny's eyes went wide, searching Rafael's face like he was being cataloged, inventoried, every micro-expression analyzed for signs of another imminent betrayal.

"Me saying no last night had nothing to do with you," Rafael continued. "Every single bit of it—all of it—was my own hang-ups, my own damage that I dumped at your feet without asking."

Sonny opened his mouth, but Rafael pressed on before he could speak, before he could offer the kind of gentle understanding that Rafael absolutely did not deserve.

"I said no because I was scared," Rafael said. "I thought—Christ, Sonny, I thought I was doing the right thing. That being with me could never make you happy, not long-term, not when you really thought about what you were giving up. I thought I was being selfless by ending it before we got in too deep."

Sonny’s breathing sped up a little, Rafael could see it cut through the bite of the cold morning air. 

"But that was bullshit," Rafael said, harsh, self-directed venom. "Because—because we’re in it. Mariana-Trench deep. And I was so busy being happy about it that I didn’t stop to think about what that meant, not until you offered to make it permanent.” 

“Raf—” 

“No, shut up.” Rafael raised his hands between them. “I need to get this out before I lose my nerve.” 

Sonny bit his lip like he was afraid to smile, afraid to speak, afraid to hope. 

“I thought I'd kicked all my fears from growing up in a house where love was conditional. Where nothing good stayed good. Where the other shoe always dropped and usually connected with someone's face." Rafael huffed out a bitter laugh. "But I hadn't. I still haven't.

"The idea of believing that I could actually keep you was terrifying, Sonny," Rafael admitted. "Every part of me feels like you'd see sooner or later that I'm not what you really want. You made that joke last night about locking me down before something else comes along, but I’m scared that—”

He broke off, the image of Sonny with Amanda slamming into him, the wedding bands, the little boy who carried his name. The truth of it, that it could be real, that Sonny could still have that if Rafael turned around and walked away right now.

“—that you’d realize you deserve better, that you could have better, if you weren’t stuck with me.” Rafael swallowed hard, thinking of the book, of telling his father the truth because he was scared of the consequences later. “I thought if I ended it now, at least it could be a controlled burn.” 

Sonny's eyes had gone bright with unshed tears, his lips parted like he desperately wanted to cut in.

"I was so sure that I was just a stopgap, a distraction, a… a something until the real thing came along. And instead of trusting you, instead of believing what you were telling me, I lit the match and decided for both of us."

The tears spilled over, tracking down Sonny's cheeks. Rafael's hands moved automatically to catch them before he forced them back down to his sides, not sure if that’s something he was still allowed to do. 

"All I wanted last night was to say yes," Rafael whispered. "To scream it from the rooftops, to—god, Sonny, I wanted it so much I could barely breathe. But I was so convinced that wanting it wasn't enough, that I'd be condemning you to a life of swallowing your disappointment when you realized you’d made a mistake. That the kindest thing I could do was set you free."

Sonny’s grin finally broke through, bright and blinding. “I think ‘if you love something, let it go’ is for, like, butterflies and—” 

Rafael huffed a surprised laugh. “No, Sonny, it’s not. The rest of that phrase is ‘if it comes back to you, it’s yours, and if it doesn’t, it never was.’ And you not knowing that ruined the next thing I was going to say, which was that I wasn’t setting you free, I was shoving you out the door.” 

“No, no, it’s good,” Sonny said, wrapping his arms around himself, maybe against the cold because Rafael had dragged him outside without a coat, or maybe to stop himself from touching. “Keep going, I didn’t mean to kill your momentum.” 

“Your family,” Rafael said, not sure that anything could kill his momentum now that he’d seen Sonny’s smile, “Your family is the most important thing to you in the world. And I thought… I thought that they just tolerated me as a temporary houseguest until you brought home the real thing. I never saw the ways they wanted me here, not until—” Rafael cut off abruptly, not particularly interested in spending Christmas on a 72 hour psychiatric hold. He pivoted. “I had no idea that you came out to your poor parents so that you could bring me home, that you wanted—”

Sonny’s brow furrowed. “Who told you—” 

Shit, not a hard enough pivot. 

"I'm sorry, Sonny," Rafael plowed on, "I know I hurt you and I know I can't just show up here and expect everything to be okay. But if there's any chance—any part of you that still thinks we could make this work—I promise I'll spend every day proving that I won't run again."

“Raf, you—” 

“Shush, I’m not done,” Rafael said, breaking their no-touching stalemate to reach for Sonny’s cold hands, pressing them into his chest in a mirror of last night. “I don’t know if you can forgive me for the things I said, for the way I said them. For making you think for even a second that you weren’t good enough, that you were somehow lacking when you're—god, Sonny, you're everything. I’m sorry for making you drive home crying on Christmas Eve because I was too much of a coward to be honest about what was really happening. I’m sorry for—” 

"Rafael, stop," Sonny said firmly, digging his fingers into Rafael’s chest. "Just—stop for a second and breathe."

Rafael tried, sucking in air that felt too thin, his chest tight with anxiety and hope and terror all tangled together.

“Are you done now?” 

“I—” Rafael paused, running through a very long list of very disjointed lessons learned, “I could probably keep going for a while.” 

“Think you could put a pin in it?” Sonny smiled, taking a step closer. “I want a turn before my fingers start falling off.” 

Rafael pressed Sonny’s hands more firmly against his chest, against his heart, and he nodded. 

“Raf, I didn’t know a lot of that stuff,” Sonny said. “I mean, I knew some of it, but I didn't know it went that deep. I didn't know you were carrying all of that around."

"I didn't either," Rafael started, already reaching for the next explanation, the next justification. "I didn’t—I thought I’d dealt with it years ago, I thought it was just background noise—” 

"Uh-uh—my turn," Sonny said, flexing his hands against Rafael's chest, his fingers spreading wider like he was trying to grab Rafael's heartbeat, trying to feel if it matched the frantic rhythm of his own. "I sat here freezing my ass off like a gentleman for yours, so now you're gonna stand there, and you’re gonna listen."

Rafael's mouth snapped shut, teeth digging into his lower lip.

"First thing’s first," Sonny started again, "I need you to hear me when I say you're not a stopgap. You were never a stopgap. From the first time we went out—hell, from before that, from the first time I met you in the squad room and thought 'oh, this guy's gonna be a problem for me'—I knew."

He paused, one hand sliding up to cup Rafael's jaw, his thumb brushing across Rafael's cheekbone.

"Maybe in some other life, I’d be happy with a house and a poodle and a—” 

“It’s a golden retriever.” 

“Doesn’t matter, because I don’t want it. I don’t want a wife who's always blonde in your head for some reason—” 

Rafael was going to have a hard time looking Amanda in the eye after this, but he slammed the door shut in her lovely blonde face for the moment. 

“—because the best thing I could ever have is standing right in front of me. You are what I want, full stop.”

Rafael’s eyes burned with tears he hadn't given himself permission to shed yet. “You don’t—”  

"Not done. Second—" Sonny's voice cracked, and he cleared his throat. "You think I don't know what it's like to be scared? You think I haven't woken up in the middle of the night wondering if you're gonna realize you could do better? That maybe you'd be happier with someone who… I don’t know, in my head, he’s rich and Bostonian and broad-shouldered and knows which silverware to use at fifteen course meals without having to watch you first."

Rafael pressed his cheek into Sonny’s freezing cold hand. “It’s really easy, you just start from the outside and work your way in.” 

“It’s not easy, sometimes it’s really hard to tell if you’re supposed to use a fork or a spoon, let alone if a knife should be involved. Then there’s the whole thing about where you’re supposed to put them when you go to the bathroom so they don’t steal your food, and the napkin—” Sonny’s other hand came up abruptly to cradle Rafael’s face completely. “Stop distracting me on purpose. I’m trying to say that last night, instead of telling me what you were actually worried about, you made a unilateral decision about what I wanted, what I needed, what would make me happy fifty fucking years from now.”

“When you’re dead.” 

“Wrong—men in my family live frickin’ forever.”

“So, when I’m dead.” 

“Exactly,” Sonny took another half-step closer. “Waiting for me to be buried in a matching plot, or our ashes to be stirred together or planted in a tree, whatever you want.” 

“That’s morbid.” 

“Yeah, a little,” Sonny pressed, “But it’s in service of driving home the point that ‘til death do us part’ is bullshit. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, I’m there.” 

Rafael thought about Fernando, about Rosa, and filed away afterlife postulation for later.

“When you're thinking stuff like this—when you're spiraling, when you're convinced you're not good enough or I'm going to leave or whatever other bullshit your brain is cooking up—you can talk to me. Not just 'it would be nice if I could,' not 'maybe I should.' You can, every time.” Sonny’s fighters tightened on his face. “No, scratch that—you have to. It’ll be in our vows.” 

Rafael felt something break open in his chest, painful and necessary. "You'd still want to marry me? After last night? After I—” 

"Yeah, Raf, what do you think this conversation is? You think this is me getting into an unnecessarily thorough post-mortem with my ex who broke my heart in the freezing cold on Christmas morning?" Sonny said. His face softened, the frantic energy bleeding out and leaving tenderness in its wake. “It wasn’t a one-time offer contingent on you not freaking out. I’m not gonna lie and say last night didn’t hurt, but I don’t care about getting a picture-perfect ‘yes,’ I care about getting a marriage. And before you say anything, I mean with you, not just in general. And if this is how it had to happen? Hell, I’ll take it. It’s a blip compared to the rest of our lives.” 

Rafael pulled Sonny closer—couldn't help himself, couldn't stand the space between them for another second—wrapping his arms around him and hauling him in until they were pressed flush. Sonny came willingly, his face tucking into the curve of Rafael's neck, breath warm against cold skin. 

"Half of all marriages end in divorce," Rafael said into Sonny's hair, because he was constitutionally incapable of not trying to talk himself out of a good thing. "For reasons exactly I'm scared of. People change their minds, they grow apart, they realize they wanted something different all along. And I can't—Sonny, I can't stand the thought of that being us."

“Did you listen to anything I just said? Did you listen to anything you just said?” Sonny pulled back just enough to meet Rafael's eyes, and whatever he found made him smile through the tears. "No, this is good. This is you talking. Give me a second, I wanna make sure my rebuttal is well-rounded.” 

Sonny squinted, staring over Rafael’s shoulder for a moment before he nodded. 

“Alright, for starters, the fifty percent thing is a misleading statistic, and I know you know that. You’re better than throwing around fallacious numbers without context, so try to refrain in the future.” 

Rafael felt a surprised laugh punch out of him.

"And even if it wasn't misleading, Gina and Tess have both been divorced already," Sonny continued, warming to his theme, "The quota is met. Bella and I are safe."

Rafael laughed harder, the sound catching in his throat, and realized he was crying too—not the desperate, panicked tears from last night but something cleaner, lighter. 

“Most importantly, we’re not statistics.” Sonny wiped at Rafael’s tears with his thumbs. "We're us, we love each other, we trust each other. And you can trust that I’ll always want to work through things with you, no matter what.” 

Rafael sniffed. “What if—” 

“Then we figure it out,” Sonny interrupted. “We don’t have to get divorced just because other people do. If all your friends jumped off a bridge—” 

Rafael laughed as he pulled away from their embrace and wiped away tears with the heels of his hands. “Where’s the ring?” 

Sonny's smile faltered, just slightly, the smallest hint of uncertainty creeping back into his expression. He reached into his pocket slowly, like showing it to Rafael might make him take back everything he'd just said, but pulled it out anyway. 

"Thank god, I was a little worried you pitched it off the bridge last night," Rafael laughed, holding out his hand. “Give it to me."

Sonny handed it over carefully, watching Rafael's face like he was studying a microscope slide. 

Rafael shoved the box into his pocket and bent to scoop up the bags of Christmas presents he'd dropped on the porch, then reached for the door handle.

"What are you doing?" Sonny asked, a laugh threading through his voice.

Rafael pulled the door open, the warmth of the house spilling out to meet them along with the sound of multiple conversations happening at once but not much else, the chaos of Christmas morning slightly muted. 

“I'm already going to be fighting an uphill battle with your mother for a while," Rafael said, tugging Sonny along by his arm. "The last thing I need is to compound that by proposing without a ring."

Sonny's laugh was breathless and disbelieving. "So you're gonna propose with your own ring?"

"Relax, you'll get one later. This is purely reputational," Rafael said, not slowing his stride. “You want your whole family to think that your husband is some kind of baccalà who’d propose without a ring?” 

“I—what?” 

Rafael swept into the living room with Sonny in tow, dropping the bags unceremoniously by the doorway. "Merry Christmas, everyone!" he announced, probably too loud, definitely too manic.

The room fell silent in waves, confusion radiating from most of the room—Mia sitting up straighter where she’d been sprawled on the floor, Dominick Sr.'s brow furrowing, Tommy's eyes darting between Rafael and Sonny. Like they all knew something was wrong, but didn’t know what. 

And then Serafina emerged from the kitchen, dish towel still in hand, and the look she fixed on Rafael could have stripped paint off walls. 

She didn't say a word—didn't need to. The set of her jaw, the tightness around her eyes, the way she was gripping that towel like she was considering strangling him with it—all of it screamed that she was deciding whether to give Rafael a swift kick out the door or let whatever was about to happen play out. 

"Mrs. Carisi," Rafael started. "Serafina—I'm so sorry for barging in like this, for—for interrupting your Christmas morning when you've worked so hard to make everything perfect. But there's something I need to do, and I can't—" His eyes found Sonny again, who looked shell-shocked. "I can't wait any longer to do it."

Rafael took Sonny’s hand and tugged him toward the center of the living room. He wrapped Sonny’s icicle hands in his, trying to infuse some of his adrenaline-fueled warmth into them, and dropped to one knee. 

The reaction was immediate, a wave of soft gasps and fumbling as people reached for their phones, presumably to record. 

Great. 

Rafael totally loved that this was going to be on video. 

"You and me," Rafael started, his voice steadier now, grounded by purpose, "we’re a perfect match in ways I didn’t know to expect, didn’t know it look for. Didn’t know existed in real life until I met you. You take care of me in all the ways I need, like you were made for it. And I hope—I really hope—that I take care of you in the ways you need too.” 

"You do," Sonny whispered, grinning wide at stolen words.

"I love you," Rafael said. "I love everything about you. I love everything we do together, the way we expand each other's horizons—” 

Sonny’s eyebrows shot up for a moment. 

“—the way you've made me a better person by letting me live in your orbit. I love that we push each other into things we probably wouldn't do on our own. Trying hole in the wall restaurants, botanical gardens, that one time Antiques Roadshow was at the Apollo—” 

Rafael’s throat tightened, words stacking up behind his teeth faster than he could organize them into something coherent. He was supposed to be good at this—words were his job, his tool by trade—but right now, staring up at Sonny's face, at the way his eyes had gone bright and wet again, it all dissolved into pure feeling.

"I didn't know I was looking for someone who would stop cold in the middle of the Met to look up why chiaroscuro remaining a defining characteristics of figure work through the baroque period, but why the preeminence of ideal proportions didn't, even though they're both in reference to the human form—"

Jesus Christ. 

He was getting away from himself, the proposal threatening to devolve into a rambling catalog of every small thing he loved about their life together. But Sonny's smile was growing wider, more brilliant, so Rafael pressed forward.

"—because you care about what I care about. Not because you have to, not to humor me, but because you're genuinely curious. Because you're attentive and engaged and you refuse to let us run out of things to talk about." He huffed a laugh. "And the other way around. I love that you take me to Mets games and explain what's going on like I didn't play baseball in high school."

Bella snorted from somewhere behind Sonny, loud and entirely unapologetic. It was a little mean, Rafael knew he didn’t exude ‘athlete,’ but still. 

"I've never been a morning person," Rafael continued, squeezing Sonny's hands tighter, grounding himself in the way Sonny's fingers curled reflexively around his own. "But it's hard not to be when I'm waking up next to you. I come home every night and it's—Sonny, you've made our apartment feel like home. Living with you isn't just better than living alone. It's everything I've ever wanted."

Sonny’s eyebrows furrowed at the phrasing, and Rafael couldn’t believe he’d just said that out loud in front of his entire family. Because, objectively, 'living with you is better than living alone' was kind of a jackass sentiment without knowing that Sonny had said the same thing last night twenty feet away.

Ah, well. 

"You're my other half, Sonny. You're my best friend, my—my person. My soulmate," Rafael said, the words both too big and too small. Every word was inadequate to capture what Sonny was to him, but those surely came closest. "You make me want to be the person you see when you look at me—the person who's worthy of your time, your smile, your perfect, generous heart."

His hands were shaking now, or maybe Sonny's were, or maybe both of them were trembling together from knowing what was coming.

Rafael fumbled in his pocket for the commandeered ring, nearly dropping it before managing to flip open the box with one thumb. The ring caught the tree lights—as rings were wont to do, Rafael had learned in the last twelve hours—those crimped indentations along the edges even more beautiful than he'd registered when his entire world had been imploding.

"Dominick Carisi Junior," Rafael started. He could hear the formality in his voice, and he hated it. "Sonny—will you marry me?"

For half a second, Sonny just stared—at the ring, at Rafael, back at the ring like he was afraid of what might happen if he lost eyes on it. His hands clamped around Rafael's arms and he hauled him upward with enough force that Rafael nearly lost his balance, the ring box still clutched in one hand as Sonny yanked him close.

"Yes," Sonny said, his arms locking around Rafael's waist. "Yes, of course yes, you absolute—" 

Whatever word he'd been going for got lost as the room erupted.

Someone—Bella, Rafael thought, or maybe Alicia—let out a shriek that could have shattered glass. Victoria bounced on her toes, clapping her hands at the excitement. Gina, maybe, started clapping, and then everyone was clapping, overwhelming and warm. 

"Should we—" Rafael started, his eyes darting around the room, trying to encompass the vague awareness that not everyone in Sonny's very Catholic family might be thrilled about watching two men kiss at ten in the morning.

Sonny's hand just slid up to cup the back of Rafael's neck, fingers threading through his hair, and then he was pulling Rafael in.

The kiss was soft at first, but then Sonny's other hand found Rafael's waist, and Rafael stopped thinking about who was watching. 

His hands came up to frame Sonny's face, feeling the wetness of fresh tears falling on his cheeks, and he kissed Sonny the way he'd wanted to last night. Like he meant it. Like he was never going to stop meaning it.

"Sorry I stole some of your material," Rafael murmured.

Sonny huffed a soft laugh. "Yeah, it was a little lazy. I’m glad you said something so I didn’t have to."

“I just—” Rafael's fingers gripped at Sonny's sweater. "I need you to know that everything you said last night? Don’t… don’t write that off. I feel the exact same way about all of it. About you."

Sonny grinned. "Now that you mention it, this does feel like stolen valor. 'Oh, who proposed to who?' What am I supposed to say? That my fiance recycled my speech and did it… I wanna say ‘better,’ but maybe ‘with greater verbosity’ is more—” 

"Do you want me to take it back?" Rafael interrupted. 

“Nah, I’ll get you back when you least expect it.” 

And then he was kissing Rafael again, and Rafael melted into it, surrendering to Sonny for just for another moment before they truly got pulled apart. 

“Wait,” Rafael pulled back abruptly. "What does the inscription say?"

“I… it’s stupid. I don’t wanna say it out loud,” Sonny huffed. 

"Do it.” 

"I went funny, and that no longer feels appropriate given—" Sonny gestured vaguely at the room, at the situation. "The gravitas."

"Just tell me,” Rafael pressed, “I'm going to read it in five minutes anyway."

"Fine,” Sonny groaned, tilting his head back like he was appealing to a higher power. "It says 'no take backs.’ Now shove it in your pocket before anyone asks to see it.”