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After a long mission with a few close calls, all Ghost wanted was a bourbon. That sweet warmth to burn his throat, to clear his mind, to errode the name that had been delicately carved into his heart, deeper than any wound he’s sustained.
It had become harder to ignore the tightness in his chest when he sees that persistent supportive grin, those blue eyes.
Maybe all he wanted wasn’t just a few sips. He wanted it all, to be submerged and baptised in that lake, to drown and drink every last drop until he was reborn.
He’s used to being a soldier, a lieutenant, a killer. Is this what it feels like when he’s the one being choked? To be at the mercy of another, gasping for a spec of air, struggling in their grip?
Ghost was in the palm of Soap’s hand, and as hard as it was to breathe, he wouldn’t dare ask for anything else. He’d let the man poke and prod at his mangled heart, to grind the already shattered shards so that it was completely inoperable.
Yet he never did.
Sharing a bottle, listening to the Scot yap about whatever. The incentive to forget got weaker and weaker.
Ghost wanted this etched in his mind, a matching scar to the one he’d unknowingly carved into his heart.
Closer. Nudges, laughs sweeter than the whiskey. The night felt longer than the gruelling mission they’d returned from.
The rest of the night was a blur, but Ghost could recite it all. Every word, touch, glance, probably every breath if he really tried.
Soon those moments concealed by the moonlight would vanish, stay hidden in the depths of his mind. Johnny would be gone by the morning, call it all a mistake, rip out what is left of Ghost's heart and finally tear it to shreds.
But he was still yet to do it.
Ghost, as perceptive as the man is, couldn’t understand. Even when he found himself up, finding the thing still beating in his chest. To find the one he fears beside him, peaceful. Johnny sleeping as if he was beside anything but a hellspawn.
He watches him sleep in awe. At how Johnny can be so at ease with him. Mesmerised by how the suns golden rays cast a spotlight on him, casting a halo on the angel before him.
An angel.
Ghost, a spirit of the dead, an entity that’s never seen the pleasantries the afterlife has to offer. Witnessing an angel for the first time. He’d only ever encountered monsters and demons, some worse than he. Was a being like this truly real? Surely he must be lost, soon the darkness would seek him and keep him constrained in his prison. Perhaps punish him for even considering admiring the ethereal being before him.
He'd deserve to be punished.
Yet after all Ghost’s endured, he’s never willingly risked the pain.
Reaching out a scarred hand, hesitant, hovering over the curve of Johnny’s cheek. Those hands have held guns, knives, corpses. All cold. Not once have they touched another in this way.
He doesn’t make contact. His hand floating just above the angel resting beside him. Not afraid of being pushed away, but of harming it. How easy would it be to wrap that weapon around his throat? To crush him until that body goes cold like everything else in his life?
His hand shakes. Too afraid to touch, yet too far gone to pull away. Keeping an invisible barrier between them until, movement. A sun-kissed hand reaching out, determined, gently wrapping around the one that as cold as stone and placing it on his cheek. Johnny.
Ghost's mind finally blurs.
Warm. Had he felt warmth before? The whiskey from last night was warm? No… it burned. Soap's laugh was warm. His smile. And so was his touch.
The people in his world have never felt like this. They’re cold, sharp, but this… Johnny’s never been like them. Under all that hard muscle he’s soft, and his skin warm. So warm.
Ghost can’t stop himself, like a moth to a flame, seeking more. Another cold hand reaching out to cup the man’s face, his other hand desiring to feel that warmth too.
The sun streaming in through with window feeling insignificant, incomparable to the angel in his arms. Basking in the warmth of his sun, his angel, his Johnny.
He wants more he needs more. To drown in the lake of those blue eyes, to bathe in the sun that is him. The warmth seeps through his hands, slowly thawing the ice that is Ghost. The warmth defrosting the shattered fragments of what’s left of Simon.
Both Simon and Ghost in collective agreement that Johnny could do whatever he pleases with their disfigured heart, as long as he stays their sun, and them his Icarus.
Yet all Johnny does is show them warmth. Show them heaven, salvation. Allows them to indulge in the love he shows both sides of him. Encourages it with that persistent grin.
Forever he promises.
And he never broke it.
That is until a bullet snuffs out that light. The warmth turning cold like the countless bodies he’s touched before. He’d expected Soap to destroy his heart but never like this. To have his guiding light, his angel, his sun ripped away from him. To fall from the heaven those eyes took him to. To leave his heart more disfigured. The anguish is unlike anything he’s ever felt.
Scouring the wasteland of the earth for a lick of that warmth to no avail. Having to settle for the burn of his bourbon to keep Ghost from freezing to death. To rest alongside Johnny and Simon.