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By the time Trucy had left his hospital room, Phoenix felt a million times lighter. The worries of the past week had melted away, and it was as if a crushing pain had been lifted from his shoulders.
Unfortunately though, a rather different pain was beginning to make itself known and his ability to ignore it was quickly fraying.
Turns out getting shot in the head hurt.
“What part of ‘Press the button if you begin to feel worse’ managed to fly over that remarkably thick skull of yours?”
He allowed himself a grimace at Miles’ words, as a nurse dutifully increased the dosage of his meds.
“Hey, this thick skull saved my life, thank you very much.”
The drugs thankfully began to take effect rather quickly, a sigh escaping him as the pain lessened behind a light fog.
“And we’re all supremely thankful,” Miles deadpanned, “But don’t go finishing the job by neglecting sound medical advice.”
A soft chuckle came from the nurse, who was evidently not trying too hard to hide her amusement at their exchange. After contributing her own lecture of ‘Listen to healthcare professionals, especially after suffering a brain contusion’, she adjusted his pillow for him before taking her leave.
And then the two were alone.
Miles was drumming his fingers along his elbow, a typical sign that the man was either puzzling through a great feat of logic or trying to parse through dreaded feelings of dubious necessity. Finally he let out a sigh before moving closer to the bed.
"Phoenix." There was a warmth in his voice, and something in Phoenix eased at the sound.
"Miles." He returned, with what he was sure was a pretty dopey smile. They had him good and drugged up, sue him.
They stood looking at each other (well, one of them stood, while the other sat back against his pillow like a bedridden old man) until Miles cleared his throat with a gesture that was so familiar that Phoenix somehow felt a pang of homesickness.
"Only you would have the gall to get shot in the head while simultaneously possessing the audacity to wake up fine a few days later."
"What can I say, " Phoenix shrugged, "I might have bad luck, but I've got plenty reasons to stick around."
Miles scoffed.
"'Bad luck' he says. Doctor Hale hasn't been able to stop waxing poetic about your miraculous prognosis since your surgery. If I didn't know you as well as I do, I'd say you've used up your good luck for the year."
He had a point. Phoenix cringed. Even with everything he'd managed to walk off over the years (see: swallowing glass, getting tased, blunt-force trauma, falling off a burning bridge, getting hit by a car), a gunshot to the head was still pretty crazy. He made a mental note to donate to charity at some point. Maybe help an old woman cross the street.
"At least she's leagues more professional than my last doctor. Why aren't I at Hotti Clinic, by the way? I thought it was the closest to downtown."
"The ambulance was originally on route to Hotti when they contacted me. I requested that they change course to Verity General. Though both were practically equidistant from the ambulance’s location, I did have them confirm the extra minute or so wouldn't be further detrimental of course.”
Phoenix attempted to raise an eyebrow but quickly gave up when his stitches pulled uncomfortably.
"Why?"
"Well, not only has my sister never stopped bemoaning the abysmal care she received at that excuse for a clinic, but I also knew Verity had the more accomplished neurosurgeons. Though I hadn’t met her personally, Doctor Hale was previously recommended to me by a friend. Though she can be rather... enthusiastic, I knew you'd be well cared for in her hands."
Huh.
"Huh." He said eloquently.
"And what does that mean?"
"Nothing, " Phoenix added, "Just thinking you must really care about me is all."
The series of indignant splutters that left the prosecutor's mouth were hopelessly endearing, and a drugged-up Phoenix allowed himself the simple enjoyment of watching.
"O-Of course I- how could you even insinuate- you- " Miles cut himself off with riled frustration that slowly bled into an apprehensiveness as he took a seat next to the bed. Phoenix tensed at the change in demeanour.
"You know I..."
The words hung in the air between them with impossible weight. As Miles struggled to finish his sentence, Phoenix allowed himself to impossibly fill the gap.
"...Still?" He asked, his own voice as quiet as he'd ever heard it.
Silver hair had never aged Miles as much as the weary expression he wore then did.
"Of course," he rasped. “I never… Of course.”
His hands fluttered for a moment, gesturing like they wanted to reach out, held back by a thin leash.
"I'm aware this is not the ideal time to discuss this. But after years of dancing around the subject, I'm afraid if I don't do so now, things will continue to remain unsaid. And I want them said."
Oh, Phoenix breathed. They were having this talk.
"I've been a damn fool, " Miles started, which in and of itself would've been cause for a spit take. Even mild swears were usually far removed from the man's vocabulary, despite Kay's best efforts. "For so many years now, I've considered you my equal in every way. The light that pulled me out from my darkest moments and set me back upon a righteous path. A pillar in my belief of the justice system, even in the moments where it had turned its back against you. The one who challenges me like no other and knows me better than anyone. My most adept courtroom rival. My best friend. I was under the assumption that I was content to carry on with our current state of affairs. I was mistaken."
Phoenix felt his eyes widen.
"But... that time in Berlin-"
"I know what I said before." Miles interrupted, tone laden with a quiet guilt. "And in retrospect I stand by it. That… It wasn’t fair to either of us. Not in the long run."
He was right, though Phoenix couldn't help but feel a wistful resentment at the fact; the echo of a years old heartache making itself known.
Part of him had always considered it his fault for getting his hopes up after Hazakura. In the aftermath of everything, the two had fallen into the kind of steady friendship that Phoenix had always dreamed of them having. A kind of ease and comfort that fed into a hope he had never quite fully convinced himself to abandon. A hope for something more.
That version of himself had been doomed from the start. Heart rich with an idealism that it turned out didn’t fit with the version of him that didn’t wear a badge.
The disbarment put strain on both of them. For Phoenix, it was raising a child alone. Convincing his landlord he’d be able to cover the month’s rent if he just had an extra couple of days. Convincing Kristoph Gavin that he believed in the smile aimed at him across the table at dinner each week. Convincing himself that plain old grape juice was just as good as the alcoholic kind.
Phoenix buckled under the weight of everything.
Miles buckled under the weight of Phoenix.
It was on one of the occasions where Miles had flown him out to Germany to consult on a case unofficially. He figured it was less so because his help was truly needed and more to do with keeping him from giving into the monotonous haze that had begun to fill his days whenever Trucy was at school.
He was quite never sure who had made the first move. Maybe it was the dim lighting in Miles’ elaborate study. Perhaps it had been a simultaneous choice to give into years of unspoken tension. Either way, when Phoenix had woken up in Miles’ bed the following morning, the heavy static that normally fogged his brain had been missing for the first time in… a while. It wasn’t how he’d ever envisioned getting together with the love of his life, but he’d wanted it for too long to complain.
The next few days were a blur of investigations, stolen moments and quiet words exchanged in the early hours of the morning.
The inevitable caught up to them by the end of the week.
With a kid waiting for him back home and a plane to catch the next day, it had been unavoidable that they would’ve had to talk things through. Try as they might, they couldn’t live in a moment forever and reality wasn’t kind enough to stop time for them to figure things out.
It was Miles who acknowledged the reality of things first.
Both cared too much to indulge in occasional casual sex, but anything more required compromise and vulnerability.
Without his badge it felt like the world had stripped him bare and flayed him alive, wounds still open and raw. Vulnerability was a weapon Phoenix couldn’t trust to be raised against him without that armour.
Vulnerability was a learned weakness that, after a lifetime of taught repression, Miles wasn’t prepared to face alone.
Neither of them was in a place to commit to emotions they weren't equipped to face. But neither willing to compromise on them either.
The argument that ensued was one of the worse they’d had. When the word 'mistake' had been thrown in, it had broken something they'd never quite gotten back. Something he hadn’t since dared to dream they could get back.
The pair had proceeded to spend nearly the next decade paralysed in what could’ve been and unwilling to lose what was. Sure, the awkwardness had persisted for a while, but the two remained as present as they could be in each other’s lives while living an ocean apart. Things had shifted for the better after Miles had returned to LA to become Chief Prosecutor. And shifted once more after Phoenix passed the bar for the second time.
“I don’t need to tell you that we’re in a different place than we were then,” Miles continued. “On an individual level, we are not the same people. A far cry from who we were when we met. Changed from the two who reunited in court. And better healed from the wounds we both bore in the years after.”
He wasn’t wrong.
Nowadays, they were in a better place than ever. They met up regularly for lunches at nice cafés – or, when it was Miles' turn to pick, restaurants that were way outside Phoenix' budget (It was a good thing they took turns paying too.) Ever since Miles had returned to LA, he’d been a frequent audience member for Trucy’s performances, always seated beside Phoenix close to the stage. Whenever either of them had an issue, be it personal or professional, they both knew they could share it over the phone – or, if the situation called for it, in Miles’ office with a shared pot of Earl Grey. (Well, sometimes the situation didn’t call for it necessarily, but it was still nice to catch up over a game of chess and hear his friend’s laugh when he recounted whatever travesty had occurred in court that week.)
It wasn’t as if Phoenix were under some sort of delusion that what they shared was a normal platonic relationship for two grown men.
More than friends.
More than lovers, in a way.
But still falling short of some secret third thing that he craved with a vehemence that scared him.
“I can’t undo the things we have both been through in years gone past,” Miles reasoned, face earnest, “But I almost lost you this week. And the reality that I was made to consider, the one where you weren’t around, was the worst thing I’ve ever had to fear facing.”
His voice caught. He cleared it before continuing.
“If you’ll let me, I’d like to purge those regrets. To make the most of our present. Our future… together.”
Things were better than ever between them.
A decades-long friendship.
A strong, ineffable bond that neither had fought to label.
But Phoenix agreed. It wasn't enough.
"Well?" Miles cleared his throat once more; his face dusted a flattering rose hue that almost matched his tailcoat. "Say something, Wright."
Words were hard, he thought. The painkillers definitely weren’t helping. In lieu of any passionate verbal declaration of lifelong adoration he simply grabbed a handful of cravat and pulled.
It wasn’t their first kiss, but it might as well have been. There was a tender sweetness in the way their lips brushed against each other; softly at first but more insistent as they settled into each other. The world around them seemed to disappear, until all that existed was Miles’ hand on his face and their mouths pressed together.
It was like the first breath of air after a lifetime spent under water. The first ray of sun at dawn.
It was like coming home.
Thoughts coalesced in his mind through the light haze and one idea crystallised into perfect clarity.
He grinned as he pulled away.
Then he asked a question years in the making.