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The small intimacies came back naturally, as if the time he was gone had never passed. His big fingers carding through your hair gently as you sit between his legs on the floor, your head resting against his knee, idly watching the news, languishing in the uneasy calm that had finally settled between the two of you after his return.
The bland voice of the newscaster was doing nothing to keep your tired eyes opened, talking about public transit delays and municipal services changes. You snag the remote from the coffee table's glass surface, flicking over to a pre-saved entertainment channel where you know a rerun of Super Hunter S is airing. Gaudy colors and artificial battle noises fill your quiet apartment and you nudge your temple against Caleb's knee.
"You ever watch this show anymore?" The long-running adventure series had been airing for years, and you both had enjoyed watching it together as kids. The action-packed TV series had been a non-zero factor in your decision to become a hunter, even if the glamor of fame and fortune had lost it's appeal before you'd even made it to hunter training.
His right hand gently sweeps some of your hair aside, over your shoulder, giving him better access to a lock that his left hand was toying with.
"This is a good episode, it's the season finale from last fall. Super Hunter S has to fight the Luminovore even though he's been stabbed through is ribs after an ambush. He's still trying to figure out which of his colleagues betrayed him."
You feel Caleb's gentle hands still. You don't feel the tremble that whispers across his calloused fingers, and you can't see his expression with your back to him now, but you feel the air grow heavy. An almost imperceptible shift in the gravity between you. It had always been his tell.
"The new episodes should be starting up soon, but I don't think it was one of his coworkers," you give his knee another little nudge, intently requesting he move his hands through your hair again. His hands stay infuriatingly still. "There was a love interest introduced a couple seasons ago. I think it was them. They kept trying to keep Super Hunter S from going on missions. But it's not like he can just stop doing his job, who's going to protect people if he doesn't?"
It was the one thing you two hadn't had a chance to hammer out in this new, tenuous warmth you were trying to rebuild together.
He had said he wanted to keep you. Like a pet. A bird in a cage. A cat in a collar. You refused to be kept.
You ahd made it perfectly clear that he wasn't allowed to lie to you anymore, but honesty came with it's own set of problems for the two of you.
The first argumetn had been about an assignment of his — he wouldn't, or couldn't, elaborate on what exactly he would be doing and when he would be back, so instead he had chosen to stay silent. Your questions were heard, but he wouldn't respond.
You had wanted to bite him as he wrapped his arms around your shoulders, pulling you close and pressing his lips softly to the crown of your head. You hadn't wanted comfort, you had wanted answers.
You still think you should have let your teeth sink into his bicep as far as the muscles in your jaw would allow, but that was your secret to keep in your heart.
Then came your turn for a covert mission, working with the Arctic hunters to try and cull a nest of rare and especially powerful wanderers that had started ekeing their way into human territories. The operation had called for radio silence, your personal phone left locked in your apartment for 9 days while you had exhausted yourself tracking your enemies through leagues of snowy mountains and rocky terrain.
When you had finally made it home, you unlocked your door to find Caleb, sitting despondently on the couch in your tiny livingroom, his blood-shot eyes glued to the news station that reported the names and heroic deeds of hunters killed in action. Two days after he had collapsed on top of you, from relief or exhaustion you still weren't sure, he had finally told you that he hadn't slept for over 52 hours when you'd found him.
You hadn't forgotten the grip he held on your arm when you had rushed to his side, apologizing, but not being able to explain.
His fingers began to nimbly untie the braid he had started, a series of gentle tugs on your scalp as he undid his work and smoothed your locks back down again.
"Pipsqueak," he started, his voice so strained you could hear the grimace on his face in it. "That isn't fair. This isn't the same… It's not…"
You bumped your temple against his knee one more time before turning to face him. "My work is important." You cross your arms over his thighs and rest your chin on them, looking up from your seat, not allowing him to avoid your gaze. You concede, just a little, "yours is too."
Not knowing the extend of his missions, the danger he had a habit of putting himself in, weighs on you. He has to know this, you need to make him understand. He can apologize all he wants, but apologies weren't going to fill the whole he had left in your heart for a year.
You tilt your head to one side. Taking him in from this angle wasn't entirely new to you — he had always been tall, an unshakeable pillar of stone looming over you, peak unattainable. But the ache that shows in his eyes, the steely set of his jaw as he tries so hard to meet your gaze when you challenge him on the only thing he has asked from you, sends a sick warmth pooling into your stomach. You let yourself savor it for just a moment before tapping your fingertips against his knee, catching his attention away from his thoughts. A warm smile, the one you reserve just for him, the one he can never say no to, slips onto your lips.
"Caleb, it's okay. I'm not going anywhere without you. So don't you dare go anywhere without me again, okay?"
His hands come to rest on either side of your face, letting his thumbs trace your cheekbones gently, forcing your gaze to stay on his. The awkward angle of him holding you there, searching your expression for the lie or half-truth he thinks you're telling him, twinges in your neck, but you let him search. You aren't lying to him. It's not a falsehood or half-truth. You can't lie to his sunset-colored eyes, and you truly think you never would. Not about this. When his gaze softens and his jaw flexes away from it's bone-shattering clench, you receive a toothy grin, a balm for your soul as you let your own smile broaden.
"It's a deal then?" It's not a question, and he knows it's not, but you ask it anyway. Saying it out loud would make it real, unbreakable.
He nods at you, reassured by your unwavering trust in him, and you let yourself enjoy the way his freckles are highlighted by the clash of colors on the TV he's now ignoring. Unfolding your legs from your seat on the floor, you climb up onto the couch. His hands leave your face, but never lose contact with you, helping you ease down into his lap, his arms wrapping you into his warmth.
"You said this was a good season finale, Pipsqueak?"
"Yeah, Super Hunter S saves the day, but there's a new mystery to be solved in the next season. What do you think? Should we watch it together this year?"
When you had found him, those months ago in Skyhaven, that stranger wearing Caleb's familiar face, you had been angry. You had wanted to run, to leave the monster who let children be captured and killed behind. It had only become clear to you weeks later, waking up from nightmare after nightmare every day, that if even a shred of Caleb still existed in this same world as you, you could never leave him behind. And now he knew, he wasn't allowed to leave you behind either.