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The door slides shut behind them with a soft, whirring click as the magnetic lock activates. It is a sound that Hanzo has grown used to, over his time in Overwatch. Some days he finds himself nostalgic for the old fashioned sliding doors of his family estate, or perhaps more for the catharsis that came with closing them by hand. He misses the sense of satisfaction after a long day of training and evening studies, the finality that came with wood pressing hard against the doorframe. For as innocuous as it was, to Hanzo, it signaled the small bit of privacy afforded to him in a schedule that was out of his hands.
Or, he allows privately, he is just getting old and sentimental.
McCree is already milling about the tiny dorm, tossing his things this way and that – a boot smacks the left-hand wall with a thud, his serape discarded in a messy bundle on the floor. One thing about moving in with the man was having to deal with his messes. Hanzo purses his lips, giving the cast-off articles a weary glower. Normally he would bully his partner into putting them away, but the energy is lost on him.
They both had returned from a messy operation in Europe, bone-tired and grim-faced as they stepped off the transport. No one was fatally injured, thankfully, but it was a very near thing. Morrison was reluctant to call for a retreat when it meant losing the target to Talon. Hanzo had simply grit his teeth and kept silent. Until the Reaper showed up, that was.
“You alright, there, Han?”
Hanzo looks up at the sound of McCree’s voice, thoughts breaking off in favor of the present. He finds it difficult to concentrate when he realizes that McCree has shrugged out of his shirt – currently straddling the edge of their modestly sized bed – and is frowning at him. The partial nudity is not what captures his attention, no. While he doubts he could ever shake off the elation of such a privilege he holds, it does not distract him nearly as much as it used to in the infancy of their relationship, when everything was new to him.
There is a large square of gauze, stretched taut over McCree’s shoulder, where a few stray pellets from one of Reaper’s shotguns had grazed the gunslinger as he rolled for cover. Hanzo does not need a mirror to know he is scowling. It is nothing compared to the verbal lashing he gave Morrison for putting off the retreat just for a few outdated documents from before the recall.
“Fine,” he manages. Sharply, but the blade’s edge is not pointed at McCree’s throat.
Jesse just raises a brow at him, but says nothing. He makes a noncommittal noise and turns back around, rifling through a dresser drawer for some sleepwear. They know each other well enough to recognize that neither is convinced.
Hanzo looks down at himself with a sigh. Most of his gear has already been safely stowed away in the weapons lockers, leaving him in his kyudo-gi and hakama. It takes him a bit to work his legs out of the snug combat boots, but years of practice and training have left him with enough balance to at least not make a fool of himself as he tugs them off. He has seen McCree, on the other hand, nearly fall flat on his face enough times while removing his own boots that Hanzo has begun to lose count. Pointedly, he places his boots next to the door, sparing a half-hearted glare at his partner’s lone shoe spotted out of the corner of his eye. Tomorrow, he tells himself. He will deal with McCree’s messes tomorrow.
A sudden hiss has him whirling around, startling at the sight of Jesse struggling to put one arm through a well-worn t-shirt. The fabric is bunched up around his face and left shoulder, McCree huffing behind the cotton barrier currently obscuring his vision.
Relief wells in him, although Hanzo is not entirely certain why. There is little risk in serious injury within the walls of their dormitory, except perhaps for early morning mishaps with cramped quarters and stubbed toes on too-close dressers. He chalks it up to post-battle nerves.
It takes him all of five steps to cross the gap between himself and McCree, shaking his head in a mix of relief and amusement. A breathy laugh, barely audible, pushes his chest in the rhythmic manner of amusement he has grown to loathe a bit less since meeting Jesse. At this proximity, it is a feeling that Jesse can feel, ghosting warmly across the exposed skin of his chest. Gently, Hanzo leans upward, extricating his cowboy from the black tee’s awkward hold. McCree’s expression, now revealed, is sheepish. There is a soft tinge of red working up his tawny neck. “Why did you not put your right arm through first?”
Jesse shrugs one shoulder, watching Hanzo strategically bunch up the t-shirt between his hands. “Wasn’t thinking, I guess.”
Hanzo’s scoff is as much an answer as any string of words. When do you ever? The unspoken implications that he often leaves between them, that McCree has miraculously grown fluent in. And rather rapidly, at that. His laugh suggests that he knows, even without having said a word, that Hanzo is merely teasing him.
Together they make quick work of Jesse’s shirt, Hanzo assisting him in tugging it down his torso without exacerbating his injured shoulder. Once completed, McCree peers down at the shorter man, smoothing his hands over Hanzo’s broad shoulders, half in appreciation and half appreciatively. “A little overdressed for bed, don’t’cha think?”
Hanzo grunts, arching a brow. “Perhaps if you could manage to dress without the need for assistance, I would have time to take care of myself.”
“Yeah, yeah,” McCree grumbles, already tugging at their comforter.
Preparing for sleep takes Hanzo a bit longer, if only because he actually bothers to put his clothing away properly. There is something soothing about going through the motions of untying his cloth belt, pulling away the intricate knot that kept it wrapped securely about his waist. With the sash undone, his kyudo-gi falls open. This, too, he strips off. His hakama follow in short order.
There is a slight prickle along his bare skin, starting at the neck. An assassin’s instinct that lets Hanzo know he is being watched. Normally he would be concerned, but he knows that they are alone. More than that, they are both too exhausted to care about seduction. McCree watches him for want of having nothing better to do. Or, perhaps, he watches for the ever-present appreciation he seems to have for Hanzo’s form – but in these moments, with a mere anatomist’s innocence.
Everything gathered, he places these in the hamper (brought over from his room, because apparently McCree could not be bothered to purchase one), giving a pointed look to the man now settled under the covers of their bed. McCree merely grins, unabashed.
Hanzo slides under the covers on the opposite side of the bed. The standard issue mattresses for the agents were serviceable for individuals, but for two men of their size, the fit was tight. Not that Hanzo has reason to complain – pressed against Jesse’s side, warmth radiating against his bare skin, the soft cotton of his boyfriend’s bedclothes…he cannot imagine any better way to spend his nights. And to think, not long ago, he had consigned himself to a life of near-asceticism. He often catches himself wondering how he could have ever deserved such kindness after all he has done.
And yet there is a fragility to this, he knows. Today was just one reminder, with many more to come, how easily this could all be taken away from them.
McCree hums when Hanzo pulls the ribbon from his hair, returns the indulgent smile that Hanzo cannot keep from his face when the man immediately begins running his hands through the dark strands. Hanzo folds the silken strip of cloth with near reverent care, placing it next to McCree’s discarded prosthetic on the low nightstand. With that done, he presses in even closer, allows himself the luxury of resting his head on McCree’s uninjured shoulder as they lean back against the headboard and thin pillows.
A thumb brushes underneath the cut of his jaw, ticking the sparse hairs there. It is a quest for attention. Tiredly, Hanzo takes the proffered bait. “Mm?”
There is just a moment of hesitance. Hanzo watches the question catch in Jesse’s throat, how he has to stutter his breath as it is finally forced out. “You wanna talk about it?”
“No,” Hanzo admits. He turns his face into McCree’s neck, nose brushing against his steady pulse, lurking somewhere beneath the warm layers of sun-kissed skin. They sit in silence, Hanzo pretending that he is not still fuming, while Jesse waits patiently to see if he can coax anything out of his reticent archer. But tonight, it seems, is not a night for words. A rarity as is on a good day; he should have expected no less. Hanzo is as far from verbose as they come, unless sufficiently intoxicated. And that, as McCree has learned, comes with its own set of weepy difficulties.
So McCree settles for resting his head atop Hanzo’s, pressing a soft kiss into the other man’s dark hair. Hanzo sighs contentedly and sinks into the welcome comfort that comes from Jesse’s proximity.
He has nearly dozed off despite the awkward angle when McCree speaks up, breaking the comfortable silence between them. “You ever think about retiring?”
Hanzo raises his head as much as he can with Jesse’s laying atop his, eyeing him strangely.
“Once this is all over,” he clarifies, lifting his head so that they can make eye contact more easily. “Just…to stop with all the fighting and let someone else worry about cleanin’ up whatever mess is left?”
Hanzo frowns deeply, expression shifting rapidly from startled to guarded. His eyes slide to the lump just beneath McCree’s shirt on the opposite shoulder, a reminder of just how many hard reminders they have had of their mortality. When he looks up, his eyes are hard, trying to convey some of that truth that apparently has not stuck in McCree’s brain. “Men like us do not get to retire.”
“Oh shush,” Jesse says. With a chuckle, he smooths his hand over Hanzo’s shoulder blades, kneading at the knotted muscles of his neck. Hanzo had not realized he had gotten so tense until McCree began to untangle them. McCree leans closer, pressing his forehead against the archer’s with a fond smile. “You never considered it, even a little?”
“A little,” Hanzo concedes, albeit begrudgingly. It would be a lie, to claim that he had not considered what life would have been like if he had met Jesse under different circumstances. But the last thing he wants to do is encourage flights of fancy. Their relationship works because they are both realistic enough not to make promises that they cannot keep. “Though I do not see the point in making up such…stories.” Desiring what cannot be had is a danger, he knows this. And they do not have the privilege of normalcy.
“Indulge me a little, honey.” McCree gives him one of those smiles that tugs painfully hard at his heart. The wily devil has used it on more than one occasion to con Hanzo into many things – attending team movie nights, sharing childhood memories, accepting the offer for dinner that started them down this path they walk together. He would despise it, were it not for the fact that he so closely cherishes any smile Jesse so much as aims in his general direction.
Hanzo looks away with a deep frown. He has told himself a hundred times over not to even think about such things. It is not for a man like himself to hold. If there is one thing he has learned, it is to be ever wary of promise – those by word and of blood. They always turn the sweetest things sour.
But then, he said the same in those early days of his infatuation with the gunslinger. That he was undeserving of the man’s attention, that Jesse deserved better. And as always, all of his self-imposed rules were left shattered on the floor around him when he took that first tentative step toward dating. With a sigh, he gives a little more ground up. “What…did you have in mind?”
Next to him, McCree hums thoughtfully. His hand meanders slow, lazy circuits around Hanzo’s back, dipping carefully down the slope of his spine and back up again. “Thought about buying a house, maybe somewhere out in the country. Nothin’ fancy, just the two of us. Something we could really make our own.”
The thought of himself and McCree trying to renovate a house is so absurdly foreign to the image he had in his head that Hanzo’s snort is practically involuntary. “With what money? We hardly make good salary as vigilantes.” It is so far from any absurd expectation that he had braced himself for that Hanzo forgets, just long enough, that this is meant to be a fantasy. “And any legitimate real estate agency would be smart enough to do a background check on—”
McCree shushes him before he can really get started. “It’s not supposed to be practical, Han,” he chuckles, apparently amused by the critical look on Hanzo’s face. “It’s just for us. A little somethin’ to think about.” His knuckles knead circles in the thick nexus where Hanzo’s shoulder and the column of his neck meet.
An indulgence. Hanzo sighs, coming back to the realization that he has no reason to criticize. He murmurs a quiet apology, leans back into Jesse’s warmth. For all that McCree fails to respond, it may as well have never happened.
“You’ve gotta have something,” McCree wheedles.
Hanzo thinks about this for a moment. The few times he has allowed himself to fantasize about domesticity with McCree have been short, vague things in passing – a setting, rather than a focus, for his escapism. He never lingers long in those fantasies.
Softly, Hanzo suggests, “We could get a dog.”
As a child he had always wanted one. His father disapproved of the idea from the very start of young Hanzo’s request, dismissing it as a mere distraction from his heir’s studies. Not to be deterred, Hanzo continued to make pleas with his father – from the researched presentations of an enterprising youth to the simple, emotional entreaties of a child. After the fifth, his father had lost his patience, and the very mention of a household pet became taboo.
Perhaps it was too simple a thing to suggest for this particular fantasy, Hanzo thought, suddenly nervous.
As it would turn out, he has no reason to fret.
McCree turns to look at him, an odd grin pulling up the corners of his mouth. It is as though he can gauge Hanzo’s feelings on the topic, that odd predictive capability that Jesse is blessed with. For the life of him, Hanzo does not understand how McCree can read him so easily. Judging by the gunslinger’s response, he finds the idea just as enticing. “Babe, you can have all the dogs you want. There’d be plenty of space for ‘em!”
Hanzo finds himself snorting once more, but this time, it is not with the derisive air he had given at the start. The sound gives way to a quiet chuckle. “You may regret that, given time.”
A small jolt runs through his body, leaving stunned silence in its wake. As if recognizing the shift in Hanzo’s expression, how he fumbles for a way to school it toward something less vulnerable, McCree’s hand still on his back.
This was all well and good when it was just a game. When Hanzo could pretend that it was just a fantasy, it was safe, the notes of desire kept at bay by the implication of some immovable distance between then and now. But what he said? That was too close to an admittance of wanting it to be a reality. Too close by far. His breath comes a little shorter.
But Jesse’s smile seems to brighten, if anything. As though he did not recognize Hanzo’ little slip-up as a dreadful thing, like their dream could not be shattered by the guilt of wanting an impossibility. “I doubt I could.” The soft look in his gaze steadies Hanzo, soothes away the creeping tension threatening to overwhelm him.
Before long McCree extricates his hand from its resting place on Hanzo’s back, flicking the lights off. They slide down to rest fully against the bed, turned in toward one another with tangled legs. The last of his anxieties retreat with the press of Jesse’s lips against his own, a bit of softness in his life that Hanzo had once written off as an impossibility.
“Ten dogs,” Hanzo whispers. The grin feels endemic as it emerges, foreign and uncomfortably out of place no longer. Jesse brings it out in him.
McCree stifles his laughter into Hanzo’s temple. “Anything you want, darlin’.”
Perhaps, Hanzo thinks, it is not so terrible a thing to indulge every once in a while.