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The sound of the door opening alerted Alex to Darren’s return, and he turned his head in the direction of the door.
“Hi baby,” he greeted with a lazy smile.
Said smile slipped off his face when he saw it was not mirrored on the other man’s.
He stood up from the couch, confusion on his face.
“Did something happen? What’s wrong? Darren?”
Darren said nothing. He crossed the room and pulled Alex into his arms. His forehead dropped onto Alex’s collarbone, and his arms wrapped around his neck.
The northerner was stunned for a split second, before he moved to return the embrace, his right hand coming up to catch the back of Darren’s head, his left resting on his back.
Alex slowly swayed them side to side where they stood, saying nothing.
After a few seconds, the tense quiet was cut by a single sniffle, which alerted Alex to a growing wet spot where Darren had laid his head.
He pressed his hand tighter to the back of Darren’s head, gently running his thumb up and down the skin behind his ear. He slipped his left hand underneath Darren’s shirt, rubbing the smooth skin of his back.
Pressing the side of his jaw against the back of Darren’s head, Alex shushed him quietly, continuing his gentle ministrations against the soft trembling of his lover's body against his own.
After what must have been a few minutes - but felt simultaneously like both seconds and hours - he felt Darren’s tears slow. Alex continued rubbing his back and smoothing the back of his head all the while, his head tipped against Darren’s.
Eventually, Darren untangled his arms from around Alex’s neck, pulling back while wiping his eyes with his right hand.
Alex kept his own right hand on the back of Darren’s neck and after a beat spoke quietly.
“What happened, angel?”
Darren pressed the heels of both of his palms to his eyes, shaking his head a bit.
“I don’t know.” He responded, his voice a bit thick the way it tends to be after crying.
“I just… fuck.”
He finally pulled his hands away from his eyes, tilting his head up to look at Alex.
His cheeks were pink, and his blue eyes were red rimmed and wet.
Alex’s hand, still on the back of Darren’s neck, tangled itself in the hair on the back of his head.
“Are you okay?”
Darren blinked, swallowed, and looked away from Alex, forcing his hand off his head in the process.
Alex repositioned his hand on Darren’s head, placing his thumb on the side of his face, in front of his ear, preventing him from turning his head away.
“Hey. Are you okay?” He repeated.
Darren paused for a second, then, taking a deep breath, he nodded a few times.
“Yeah.” He breathed out.
Alex stared at him for a few seconds, taking him in, before he pulled him closer and pressed a kiss to his forehead.
“Are you sure?” He asked as he pulled away.
“Yeah, just a hard day.”
Later that night saw Alex wide awake on his back in bed, Darren stretched out on his stomach beside him.
Being with someone with a past like Darren’s - full of abuse and violence and guilt - meant that there were a lot of things about him that Alex wasn’t sure he would ever understand.
He didn’t - and would never - regret falling in love with Darren. He loved everything about him and the life they had together. But he’d be a liar if he said he didn’t wish that there weren’t so many landmines in their relationship - so many things they could never ever truly speak on.
They had spoken a bit about some things - about the violence in the Lynch home, the love he still carried for his mother, his guilt for leaving his siblings behind. Very sparingly, he had dropped bits about his stint in foster care, and although Alex knew vaguely what had occurred (Darren had warned him prior to their first time together) many of the intricacies were lost to him. Darren had clinically explained the broad details, the foster house, the move back home, the corrective surgeries.
None of this, however, helped him wade through his partner’s emotions. When he got the way he had earlier - clearly upset but not sharing anything pertaining to the why - it got to Alex. He loved Darren like he’d never loved anyone else before, and knowing that there was a storm waging within him - and being unable to help - broke his heart more and more the more he thought about it.
“Stop thinking so loud. I can hear you from here.”
He turned his head to the side, catching Darren’s open eyes. He was still on his stomach, his arms wrapped around his pillow and his face turned to the left, facing Alex. He was shirtless and Alex took a second to appreciate the way the moonlight caught the planes of his muscular back. Some 7 years out of hurling, and he still had yet to lose the lean physique it had earned him.
“I thought you were asleep,” Alex whispered to him in the darkness.
Darren let go of his pillow, propping himself up on his elbow to better continue their low conversation.
“I probably was. I’ve been in and out all night.”
“Because of whatever happened today?”
Alex was careful with his wording, ensuring that an accusatory formation of sentence did not dilute his statement.
“Nothing happened. Just a bad day. Personally.”
“And tomorrow will be one too if you don’t go back to sleep.”
Darren smiled, catching the hypocrisy in the statement.
“You first.”
Alex huffed a laugh, shaking his head a bit.
“You’re the one with the white collar 9 to 5. I don’t even work tomorrow and you know that.”
Darren’s smile widened, and he hung his head, shaking it a little. Alex would never be able to tell you who had had the habit first, three years was more than enough time for them to absorb traits from the other. (His best guess would be Darren, given his tendency to shake his head when emotional, something Alex himself didn’t do.)
Darren lay back down, mirroring the position he’d been in earlier that night, but Alex had a feeling that he wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep at all on his own. It was a common theme amongst nights like these, when Darren seemed just a little out of reach, lost amidst his own memories and feelings.
Alex turned onto his side and shifted closer, so that he was almost touching Darren. He reached out, resting his hand on Darren’s upper back, just between his shoulder blades.
Darren’s eyes opened, and he looked at him, confused.
Alex shook his head, whispering, “Close your eyes.”
The confusion remained until, a second later, Alex began gently scratching his back.
Understanding seemed to wash over Darren, and he smiled and rolled his eyes, probably thinking Alex a bit ridiculous, but he closed his eyes nonetheless.
Alex continued to scratch his nails over his back, migrating from just between his shoulders down to his lower back, down to the waistband of his pajama pants, then back up to his shoulders, then down again. Occasionally, he would pause the scratches to rub circles over his back, reminiscent of how he had rubbed his back earlier in the day. After an unknowable amount of time, he pulled himself back to the present - and Darren’s deep, even breathing. The continuous movement had relaxed Alex himself, and closing his own eyes, he found himself pulled to sleep instantly.