Archive of Our Own

It’s 2 AM and the white light spilling from beneath the bathroom door wakes you, and you blink rapidly at the harshness of it. You prop yourself upright on your elbow, muscles aching and your mind sluggish. Despite the sliver of light under the door, the room is still full of shadows, and it takes a moment for your eyes to adjust. When they do, you realise with sudden panic that your lieutenant’s bed is empty. The sheets are ruffled, the pillows dented, but there’s no sign of Ghost.

Swinging your legs out from beneath the covers, you sit on the edge of your bed and wait, straining to hear any noise: the sound of the faucet running, the shower, or maybe the flush of the toilet. There is only a steady silence, heavy enough that it starts to ring in your ears. The panic has subsided now that you’ve been awake for longer than a minute, and logic and reasoning has returned.

You climb out of bed, and the coldness soaked into the floorboards is still noticeable even through the fabric of your socks. You pad somewhat briskly towards the bathroom door, warmth slowly leaking from your body, and you steel yourself with a quick inhale. You knock on the door, softly.

“Ghost?” you call out, your voice thick with sleep.

You hear nothing in response, and you question whether or not you should go back to bed. Maybe he’s doing something private—exactly what, you don’t want to find out—and it’d be better if you just leave him be. Besides, your muscles are aching, and so is your face. The thought of warm and cozy blankets are terribly enticing.

Just as you’re about to turn away and slink off to bed, there’s a shuffle from inside the bathroom. The door creaks open partially, and you’re greeted with Ghost’s masked face.

For a moment, you’re completely mute.

“What?” Ghost practically grunts, his accent pulling at his voice.

You blink, then ask tiredly. “What are you doing?”

Ghost stares blankly at you. “Go back t’bed, Sonnet.”

“… Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“Then what are you—”

Ghost sighs deeply through his nose before opening the door wider. He moves further into the bathroom and you take that as permission to follow him inside. A dull pain pulses behind your eyes at the bright fluorescent light. The air is devoid of hot steam and the shower curtain is dry, and your confusion settles even further, the frown on your face deepening.

You watch as Ghost picks up a box from the ceramic sink and holds it up to you. Swallowing back your awkwardness, you squint at the print on the front of the box.

“This is bleach,” you state.

Ghost nods, large hands turning the box over as he looks at it. “There’s not enough of it,” he says. “Otherwise I would’ve used it t’night.”

You stare at him, connecting the dots despite the haze of exhaustion. Surprisingly, you don’t feel as shocked about your lieutenant dying his hair as you thought you would. You feel more perplexed at his timing.

“So you were gonna dye your hair… at two in the morning.”

It’s less of a question and more of a statement.

Your lieutenant places the box back onto the sink and takes a seat on the toilet lid, looking comically large. His black hoodie does nothing to hide how immense his stature is.

“Yeah, was,” he confirms mildly. “So jus’ go back to bed, Sergeant.”

You regard him silently as he pinches the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger, the black fabric of his balaclava shifting beneath the ministration. He seems bone-tired, and you’re sure that you mirror that same exhaustion. It’s only been a day since your return from Siberia with the rest of the 141, and it’s taking a while to recover from the strain that was felt during the last two weeks.

Glancing at the box on the sink, you chew your bottom lip, and curiosity gets the better of you.

“Do you have any developer?” you ask.

“Probably not.”

You sigh and crouch down to open the cabinet beneath the sink. Everything is neat and tidy, as the two of you usually keep it, but you frown when you don’t find any developer. Standing upright, you scratch at your cheek and look at Ghost questioningly.

“So… did you just use bleach last time and no developer?”

You’re certain that Ghost is sick of your presence and your questions, but he humours you and nods (which is what you feared). What you don’t expect is his large hand reaching up to grip the top of the balaclava to tug it off. His hair springs up a little, somewhat grown out from the usual buzz-cut, but not at all long. You stare in disappointment at the top of his head where mousy brown hair turns into a brassy orange, as if copper dust had been sprinkled all over the top of his head.

“And these are the results,” you conclude with a stifled yawn.

Ghost clutches the balaclava in his lap and runs one hand through his orange-y hair.

“Came out like utter shite.”

“It’s not that bad.”

The look your lieutenant gives you in nothing but withering, and you hold up your hands placatingly. You listen to Ghost as he speaks, crossing your arms over your chest and pressing your back against the sink.

“The bleach didn’t work properly last time,” he says. “An’ now it’s grown out like this.”

“Well, that's because you didn't use developer.”

“Why should that matter?”

Ghost glares at you, but you can tell he’s not as clued in about this hair stuff as you are. You breathe out a soft sigh, your spine pressing into the sink.

“Developer is what you add to bleach so that it works, L.t.,” you explain, a hand rubbing at your temple. “Which is why your hair only turned into this weird… dull orange colour. The bleach just stained the hair, it didn’t lift the colour off.”

The man grunts, the pale scars along his jawline shifting. Without the mask on, the fatigue rolling off his shoulders is as obvious as ever. The cold and calculating glint to his dark brown eyes has softened into silent frustration, and you wonder if he’s just as sore as you are.

Your blunt candour turns into a twinge of pity.

“Ghost,” you say, voice a little quieter. “There’s a 24-hour store nearby, let’s grab some stuff there.”

You expect your lieutenant to swiftly decline your offer and send you straight back to bed, but you’re left surprised (once again) by his silent nod. He stands, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Yeah, all right.”

***

The 24-hour store is small and quiet, with large square windows that spill pale light across the glossy carpark. Its neon sign flickers against the twilight, its brightness burning away the few stars visible in the sky. The streets surrounding it are black with sleep, houses locked up for the night.

It’s not a large town by any means, but you’ve always noticed a strong sense of patriotic character in its quaint, slightly rundown appearance. British flags wave in the slight breeze from their slanted poles nailed above store fronts and some are tied to the metal gates leading to suburban homes.

You find it a bit strange to see the place swept clean of its usual noise and hustle, and reduced to the quiet sounds and movement of nightlife. There are only a few cars sitting in the carpark, and after killing the engine, you can hear the eerie whooping from owls and crickets chirping noisilyin nearby gardens.

“C’mon,” you say, unbuckling your seatbelt.

The moment you and Ghost climb out of the car and into the winter air, you shove your hands deep inside your pockets. Your lieutenant wears his balaclava, and you silently envy the fact that his face is not being needled viciously by the sharp breeze.

Ghost gestures for you to hurry up with a jerk of his head, and you slide up next to him with quick steps. Reaching the front of the store, the glass doors slide open with a quiet whirring noise, and there’s a rush of warm air and the smell of baked goods from the bakery section. Instantly, your mouth waters.

“Um… all the hair stuff is in the toiletry aisle,” you tell Ghost, distractedly.

He glances at you, eyes seemingly bored. He doesn’t say anything, but instead picks up a shopping basket and starts walking purposefully towards the opposite end of the store. You follow loyally beside him, taking larger steps to keep up with his stride. There’s very few people in the store with you, most of them wearing scrubs or uniforms, all looking as tired as you feel. Some of them look like weary travellers grabbing a bite to eat before hitting the road again.

It doesn’t take long for the both of you to find the toiletry aisle. Looking down the narrow hallway, you’re met with an assortment of different products gleaming beneath green-tinted lights. Yellow tags stick out beneath marked down items.

It all seems very serious when Ghost silently makes his way down the aisle, sharp eyes trained for bleach and developer.

Your own gaze languidly slides along the different products, hands stuck in your pockets while you stroll behind the lieutenant. You pass the shampoo section and mentally take note that you should grab a bottle before you leave. Ghost suddenly stops at the end of the aisle, and you stagger back a step to keep from colliding into him, hearing the squeak of your trainers against the tile as you do. You scowl at the back of his head, then peer around his shoulder. A long section of hair-dye stretches down the shelf, most of which feature boxes with women on the front, all with different coloured hair.

“Oh, good,” you chirp, scanning the different products.

Leaning back a little, as if to get a wider look of the row, your searching eyes snag on boxes of bleach below the coloured dye, and you wordlessly point at it. Ghost crouches to look at the different boxes, setting the basket down next to him. He hums low in his throat, the sound devoid of any detectable emotion.

“Which one am I supposed t’get?” he asks gruffly.

You blink, momentarily confused as to why he’s asking you, seeing as he had bought bleach before. It takes only a small second to realise that he’s probably asking because you know more about hair products than he does (which you feel proud of, in a sort of ridiculous way for such a mundane thing).

“Whichever one you want,” you answer amiably, rocking back and forth on your heels. “But try and look for one that’s got a ‘bonding agent’.”

You watch with tired but amused eyes as the lieutenant’s shoulders stiffen with confusion.

“What—in the bloody hell—is a bonding agent, Sonnet?”

You hold back a chuckle. “Just some fancy thing to keep your hair healthy.”

Ghost mutters a curse beneath his breath, his large hand settling over his jaw as his eyes flick across the multitude of possible options. For an intimidating SAS operator, it’s laughable how out of his depth he is.

“I’m gonna go get something else, L.t.,” you tell your lieutenant with a soft smirk.

He grunts, like the beast that he is, and you take that as permission to wander off. You retreat back down the hallway to the shampoo section, shoulders loose as you browse. The marked down shampoo is what you would usually look at, but after the last gruelling two weeks, you feel like treating yourself to good quality and nice smelling shampoo. You had unfortunately been forced to use Ghost’s shampoo last night, when you realised, mid-shower, that you’d run out of your own.

It wasn’t so bad, but the 2 in 1 Head & Shoulder’s shampoo doesn't work so well with your scalp, and the smell just seems a little too much like… Ghost.

Without paying attention to whether or not there are other people in the aisle with you, you hum a disjointed tune as you pick up different bottles, popping the caps on some of them and taking careful sniffs, before putting them back on the shelf. You pick up a pomegranate scented shampoo. Sniffing the sweet white scent, you tilt your head to the side contentedly, and decide that you'll settle for this one.

Just as you’re about to turn around, you feel the looming presence of someone standing behind you.

“Stop singing,” Ghost chides, voice flat and terribly close.

“I wasn’t singing,” you say, spinning slowly to face him. He stands with the basket hanging in one hand, and the other tucked into his hoodie.

“I was humming,” you correct.

“So that’s why they call you Sonnet.”

You huff, both annoyed and entertained by his confidence. “A sonnet is a type of poem, sir. Though I s'pose some songs are sonnets.”

You know that you're sound a little rude. Ghost has never been one to pry into personal matters, you know that, but his statement felt pointed, and divulging your callsign’s origin story will only ever be for a later date, and only after you die peacefully in your sleep. Or violently in the field. Whichever comes first.

Tossing the bottle of shampoo into the basket, you feel the heavy weight of his dark gaze on you.

“Did you get the bleach?” you ask, changing the subject and feeling weirdly nervous. With Ghost’s proximity, you have to crane your neck back just a little. You ignore the way your stomach twists, confusing it for hunger pangs.

“Affirm. Got the developer, too.”

A slow grin spreads across your face. “Well, look at you—ow.”

The flick against your forehead was deserved.

***

After searching for toner and taking a detour to the bakery, it’s nearly 2.45 AM when you both silently cross the carpark, stepping around puddles to reach the car. Ghost carries the plastic bag with all of the products, while you clutch a brown paper bag close to your chest.

Even in the cold frosted air, you can smell the brown buttery scent of the two croissants your lieutenant had purchased moments ago.

“I’m driving,” Ghost announces as he chucks the plastic bag into the boot of the car, before slamming the door shut. He doesn’t give you time to protest as he rounds the side of the car and climbs into the driver’s seat.

You frown, somewhat taken aback, but you don’t stand in the cold for long. You slide into the passenger seat and place the paper bag on the dashboard. Once the click of your seatbelt resounds in the warm space of the car, Ghost reverses out of the carpark, his palm flat against the wheel.

For several long, drawn-out minutes, neither of you speak. When the paper bag slides a little, you grab it before it can fall and place it in your lap. The radio seems to take up all the space between you, the old-timey song crackling and hissing.

“You are going to let me bleach your hair, right?” you suddenly ask, realising that you might simply get back to base and be sent to bed.

Ghost scoffs, eyes stuck on the road. “We’ll see.”

You resist the urge to roll your eyes, but accept that your assistance might not be needed when you get back. The quiet settles again, and the hum of the engine surrounds you comfortably. The roads leading to base tend to bump you around in the seat of the car, but your preoccupied mind doesn’t notice it as much this time.

Your voice comes out light, even a little soft, and your head stays turned to watch the wet streets pass by.

“Why did you wanna drive, L.t.?”

Ghost glances sideways at you, and just before you think that you'll go unanswered, he says in a level, almost soft, tone.

“Cause you’re exhausted, Sonnet.”

***

It’s about half past three when you make it back to your shared room. The indigo night is hidden behind a cover of clouds that move like a thin black avalanche across the sky, and you can hear the soft pattering of rain against the bedroom window.

Inside the bathroom, the space seems even smaller than before. You’re leaning back against the sink, brushing the residue butter on your fingers against your pants, then crumpling the paper bag and throwing it into the rubbish bin. Ghost devours the last bite of his croissant as he sits on the lid of the toilet. A plain tea towel is draped across his broad shoulders to protect his shirt from the bleach, and his balaclava hangs over the towel rack.

The exhaustion you had felt when you first woke up has made its return, and the fluorescent light above you is starting to strain against your eyes. You blink back the dull pain and pour one measurement of bleach into a small plastic bowl (stolen from the REC room), and then two measurements of developer. You push a yawn into your elbow, before stirring the mixture around with a plastic brush.

Ghost watches silently from his seat, and you’re still slightly unnerved by the bareness of his face, the way his dark eyes flicker across your form like he’s constantly assessing you.

His voice sounds loud in the bathroom. “You don’t have t’do this for me, Sonnet. You’ve got training in less than two hours.”

You shake your head, pushing back the warmth that spreads in your chest. “It’s fine, L.t. I wanna help you with this.”

Ghost goes quiet, jaw clamped shut with tension that only comes from being awake for too long. Once you’ve stirred the paste thoroughly, you snap on a pair of plastic gloves.

“Alrighty,” you mumble, voice coming out smaller, “let’s get this show on the road.”

Your lieutenant obediently tilts his head this way and that as you start lathering the paste all along his scalp. You’re no expert, but you try to avoid the roots and focus on the more grown-out parts of his hair. You’ll have to do a second round, in which you’ll attack the roots, but for now, you concentrate on making sure everything else is saturated evenly.

Whenever you tell him to, Ghost remains as still as possible, eyes stuck somewhere behind you. The rain begins to pound harder, and you hear the squeak of someone’s shoe in the hallway outside your shared room. You wonder if someone was woken up by the deluge outside.

“Shouldn’t be out of their room,” Ghost remarks, as if responding to your inner thoughts.

You smile faintly, eyes narrowed on the crown of his head where you gently smear bleach into his hair.

“What if it’s Johnny?” you say.

The man huffs, one large hand coming up to fix the tea towel from where it had slipped off his shoulder. “Then I’ll give him a hard time later.”

“But then he’ll ask why you were awake at this time.”

“And then he can piss off.”

You chuckle lightly despite the ache at the back of your skull. You step forward, moving into the small space between Ghost’s legs as you lean halfway over his shoulder to reach the back of his head. You note the red tint to your lieutenant’s ears as you dab bleach behind them, and figure that it’s just the chemicals irritating his skin.

Strangely, the quiet din of the rain and the hum of the pipes in the walls itches at you, and you feel that you have to say something. You swallow, and ask delicately.

“Why do you bleach your hair, Ghost? I mean… you don’t have to have a reason—

“Sure as hell don’t.”

“—But your natural colour is nice.”

You get the sudden feeling that you've stolen Ghost's ability to think, and for a long, aching moment, Ghost says nothing. Your heartbeat grows loud in your ears and regret floods through you. You had only meant it as a well-meaning question, as well as a compliment. Now, it seems like you said the absolute worst thing possible.

You stammer, staring hard at where the brush meets his scalp. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”

“It hides my identity.”

He says it without embellishment or unnecessary detail, and his voice is both far away and resolute. Your hand pauses, the brush hovering. You know that he uses his mask to hide his face, but why should he need to dye his hair if it’s not even visible? Tentatively, you continue to lather the paste into his hair.

“But you use the mask…” you say slowly.

“Yes,” Ghost says, the gravel in his voice softening. “But before I became Ghost, I was still Simon. An’ Simon had brown hair.”

You don’t think he’ll explain any further, but your heart pounds with the little information that he gives you. It means that he trusts you, enough that he gives you small pieces of himself to puzzle together.

You wonder if it means anything.

You lean forward even further, body tilted to the side to press globs of bleach into the hair just above the nape of Ghost's neck. Your pulse jumps into your throat when his fingers graze your hip as if to brace you, before retreating entirely. The shiver left behind by his fingertips is both a welcomed and terrifying thing.

“Well… " you clear your throat. "I like Simon’s brown hair, and I like Ghost’s blond hair.”

Ghost exhales through his nose, the sound more an amused huff than anything. “That right?”

You hum affirmatively, leaning back to look at him directly. Big eyes so brown that they’re nearly black stare up at you. They reflect confidence and solitude, and the curved image of your figure.

“Is that weird to say?” you ask genuinely.

Ghost regards you, and your skin crawls with apprehension. There is something both vulnerable and deeply hidden in his eyes, and you try to find it in the few seconds that you have.

“No,” he says decidedly.

You can’t help the timid grin that grows on your face, and Simon’s lips quirk upwards just a little.

The next few hours are spent in a sort of peace where neither of you want to speak much. Every breath feels weighted. Every move and every glance. But you successfully ignore whatever feeling has made its home inside you, and with a dance-like quality, you maneuver around the bathroom to rinse Ghost’s hair with the shower head, and then start the second round of bleach.

After that, you leave in the toner, and once that’s done, you wash it out. You try to insist on drying Ghost’s hair for him, but he ushers you out of the bathroom and sends you to bed. You’re dead on your feet and you only have about thirty minutes to get some sleep before you’re up for PT again.

“But what about you? Ghost, c’mon—”

“Bed. Now.”

You blink with heavy lids as the bathroom door closes with a soft click, and you bite back a muttered complaint. For a moment, you’re tempted to knock on the door and barge in, but you discard the thought almost immediately. You don’t want to push your lieutenant’s patience. This entire night has been unexpected and beyond unfamiliar, and you’d rather not ruin your chance of another mundane encounter with Ghost.

There’s something special about it, something you’d like to preserve.

Dragging yourself to bed, you note that it’s become lighter outside, with the dark clouds sending a grey haze seeping into the pale blue. You don’t bother climbing under the covers, but you manage to kick off your shoes before you slump onto the mattress.

***

The moment you register golden sunlight streaming into the room, you wake up with a start. Just as it had at two in the morning, your heart pangs inside your chest with panic, and you whirl around to stare at the clock beside your bed. It blinks an alarming 8.10 AM, and you shoot up out of bed, flailing about the room as you tug on your cargos and boots.

While straightening your shirt, you mentally prepare an entire speech and a range of excuses—trying to find the best and most believable one. You stumble to the door, only to be stopped in your tracks. With adrenaline coursing through your trembling fingers, you gingerly pluck the pink sticky note from where it had been pressed to the door. In slanted blocky letters, Ghost had written:

SLEEP IN TILL 9. WILL GIVE PRICE AN EXCUSE.

– S

The fact that Ghost is vouching for you and giving you a rare leniency isn’t lost on you, but you can’t seem to care too much about it. Instead, you’re entirely focused on the S at the bottom of the note, and you stare at it for a long time. You recognise Ghost’s handwriting, so there’s no doubt in your mind that it was him that wrote the note, but you know the S stands for a different name. Without a describable reason, your stomach twists with giddiness.

Maybe you have more influence on your lieutenant than you previously thought.

thank you for reading, God bless <33