Work Text:
1.
What the hell was he thinking?
He wasn’t, that’s the problem. He never does when it comes to Robert. He’s always just reacted, let his heart and his dick and the stupid, never-ending pull between them tighten over his ribs and lead him around like a leash. He’d known this would happen the minute Robert stepped foot back in the village, all swagger and smirk and agenda, he’d known, and he’d still ended up exactly where he promised himself he wouldn’t.
The guilt’s already sitting heavy in his throat, making him want to heave. It feels like everyone he passes knows, can see the shape of Robert’s hands and lips and unbearable love all over him.
He’d just wanted—
God.
He’d just wanted to help. To stop Robert ripping Vic’s house to shreds with his bare hands, to get rid of the blank, terrified look in his eyes that made Aaron’s teeth ache. He’d just wanted Robert back, not the shell of the person he was when no one was looking.
The last thing either of them needed was to fall back into old habits, even if Aaron’s veins had lit up with it, everything feeling new and familiar and too much all at once. It was a stupid mistake, and Robert’s easy romance afterwards only made that all the clearer.
Aaron’s married.
He’s married and he’s happy and this was just another way of him blowing up his own life. Same old Aaron. Nothing more to it.
He wasn’t thinking.
He won’t make that mistake again.
2.
It was a dream.
It was a dream or a nightmare or sommat because his alarm goes off and it’s the 18th. He has to check three times, but even BBC News says so.
It felt so real, and the guilt’s still settled in his throat, but it loosens as he realises none of it happened. It’s okay, Aaron’s okay. So he had a dream he shagged his ex; his therapist’s always said there’s no such thing as thought crime, and it’s not like Robert’s not always there, everywhere Aaron looks.
So he got horny and nostalgic in his sleep. Nothing to panic about.
“Y’alright?” John asks, rubbing a towel through his hair. He’s wearing the same thing as he was in Aaron’s dream, but then he wears the same thing most days. Nought wrong with that.
“Yeah,” Aaron says, coughs until it comes out less scratchy. “Weird dreams.”
“Shouldn’t have cheese so late at night then, should ya? I’ve told ya—”
“Yeah, yeah,” Aaron says, waving him off and stretching his arms until his shoulder clicks.
(Robert’s mouth pressed against his collarbone, the warm heat of his breath as he muffled his groans, Aaron sweating as he felt the strain in his arms keeping him up, older now and less agile but just as desperate—)
Just a dream.
He’s not done anythin’ wrong.
He’s gotta be stronger than this.
It happens like a play that Aaron’s rehearsed the lines for already; Robert throws the vase at the mirror. Aaron holds him until he collapses, sobbing. They go downstairs and Robert breaks Aaron’s heart with how defeated he sounds, how un-Robert. He talks about moving away and Aaron feels twenty-two and helpless again.
“I’ve missed ya,” he says, like he doesn’t know the gravity of those words. Doesn’t know exactly what he’s doin’.
Robert kisses him. Aaron kisses back.
The sex is as good as he remembers from something that was meant to be a dream, and from every time before, real and imagined.
“Let’s make this last a bit longer,” Robert says when Aaron tries to leave, and the choking guilt is already there because it has lasted longer. It’s lasted one dream and now another.
Whatever cruel joke the universe is playing, it can fuck right off.
3.
It starts again. Alarm, BBC News, John towelling his hair.
Aaron grits his teeth and skips breakfast, takes a scrap run off Vinny’s hands, ignoring the bafflement he’s met with. Drives an hour each way and eats lunch at a roadside caff nowhere near Emmerdale. The burger’s overdone and the chips are cold, but it’s still better than—
(Okay, no, not better, he can stop lying to himself about that. It’s not better but it’s safer and that’s the important part. If he’s eating soggy chips at a sticky table some place he’s never been then he can’t be blowing up his life yet again.
It’s the right choice, he knows it is.)
He drags the day out, tryin’ not to think about Robert smashing up the box room, about him fallin’ apart alone.
It’s not Aaron’s problem.
(It’s not.)
He gets back after five, knows John’ll be home by now and Vic’ll be cooking Harry’s tea. It’s too late for anything to happen that shouldn’t, so he risks heading to the Woolie for a quiet pint, and instead walks into a wall of gossip.
“Catatonic”, Kerry’s saying, though she doesn’t sound happy about it.
“God”, Bob says, looking guilty. “Poor guy.”
“What’s happened?” he asks Mary as she hands him his beer.
“You didn’t hear?” she says, wiping up the condensation under some empty glasses. “Robert, the poor lad. Had a breakdown and was carted off in an ambulance.”
The glass slips in Aaron’s hand, hitting the bar with a thud.
4.
Aaron can still see the tear tracks on Vic’s cheeks when he wakes up this time. She’d sobbed into his shoulder, sputtered about inpatient care and psychiatric help and how scary it’d been to find Robert staring at nothing surrounded by the wreckage.
John had talked to her softly, something about medication and it being a better place for Robert, and all Aaron could think of was Robert’s soft sigh as he’d kissed the spot beneath Aaron’s eye, gentle and worn out but there, real in Aaron’s arms.
“Y’alright?” John asks, rubbing the towel through his hair, and Aaron rushes past him and only just makes it to the loo before he’s throwing up the burning bile that tastes like too many kinds of guilt.
“Shh,” John hushes, rubbing his back. “Go back to bed. I’ll bring you up some tea.”
Aaron doesn’t want tea. Aaron wants the bar over his chest to loosen so he can breathe. Wants to know that Robert’s okay — sad and angry and hurt, yeah, but there.
He wants this day to stop fucking repeating.
“I’m okay,” he says, coughing up the last of it and reaching for his toothbrush. “Cheese before bed, eh?”
John hums, unconvinced, but he lets it go. Says he’ll stop by the pharmacy after work, and Aaron grins and kisses him with minty breath, sees August 18th light up his phone when he gets a new text and wants to smash the damn thing with a hammer.
He stays a little longer, until Robert falls asleep.
It’s stupid. Of course it’s stupid. He should’ve stayed away again, should’ve called Vic and told her he’d take Harry, that she should stay home just in case. Hell, he should’ve sent John over; at least he’d know what to do except hold Robert close and use his body as a distraction.
He can still see Robert’s empty eyes through the hospital window, though. Gaunt and blank, like he wasn’t there anymore, like maybe he never had been.
“Let’s make this last a bit longer,” Robert’d said, and Aaron hadn’t been able to say no. He’d drunk in the soft smile on Robert’s face, the way he spoke about the future like there was one (talked about patience like it was a skill he’d ever even heard of before Aaron) as Aaron ran the pad of his thumb over the hair on Robert’s arm, their legs tangled together beneath Vic’s old, thinning duvet cover.
The guilt’s still there, ice burning at the base of his throat, but it feels familiar now.
Besides, anything’s better than those blank eyes.
5.
He’s not helping.
Aaron tells him he’s missed him and Robert kisses him, and then it’s nothing but the frantic tugging of clothes, taking in bodies they’ve missed for six years and counting.
It’s hot and desperate and terribly, horribly brilliant, and it’s not helping.
Robert’s broken, hurting in ways Aaron thought he understood but doesn’t, and all Aaron’s doing is hurting him more, hope like a carrot on a string when he can’t stay.
He’s married. His husband’s somewhere a stone’s throw away helping people whilst Aaron’s getting lost in his ex, trying to kiss away pain that’s buried too deep to reach.
He’s not helping so he sends Liam instead.
It could be a mistake. Liam’s Liam: good at his job but awkward about it, and Robert’s never been much good at doing what he’s told.
Aaron loiters outside with his long-cold coffee, wearing away the same stretch of street and watching the box room window. He must look crazy but it’s not like it matters. He does have to duck ‘round a corner when Vic and John appear, having a conversation at the gate that sends Vic off again and John almost at the door before Cain’s calling his name.
Did this always happen? Was John always right there every time Aaron—?
Fuck.
It doesn’t matter.
It’s just Liam and Robert, it’s okay, it’s fine. Even if John walked in now it’d be okay.
It’s fine.
It’s fine.
Aaron throws his coffee cup at the wall when he hears the sirens.
“You did the right thing,” Liam tells him later, pulled apart from Vic’s sobbing and John’s quiet placations. Aaron’s mum’s somewhere, getting them tea and hating the fact she’s having to make gentle noises about Robert of all people. “He needs more help than Vic’s able to give him.”
He needs me, Aaron thinks viciously and hates himself for it immediately.
He doesn’t. Robert needs doctors and therapy and medication. Needs someone to formally call it what it is so he can move forward with his life.
He doesn’t need an ex-husband who’s living the same day over and over again and never managing to actually do anythin’.
“Yeah,” he says, because Liam’s waiting and ‘cause Aaron’s not supposed to care this much. Can’t have Liam going back to his mum and her pecking at his head. “Thanks for trying.”
“Of course,” Liam says, patting him awkwardly on the shoulder.
Aaron’s too angry at himself to even pull a face.
6.
He goes ‘round. He holds Robert as he cries. He brings him water and listens to him talk about himself like he’s nothin’, and then he sits next to him on the sofa and tells him he’s missed him.
The same lines in the same play.
“I can’t—” Aaron says, turning his face so Robert’s lips press against his cheek instead, going off script.
“Sorry,” Robert says immediately, sitting back. He looks ashamed, can’t meet Aaron’s eyes, and that’s no good either. Aaron’s not trying to make things worse.
“C’mere,” he says, wrapping his arms around Robert’s shoulders until Robert’s nose is smushed against his collarbone. Robert freezes for a long moment until he finally melts, sinking into Aaron.
He smells different these days. Some cheap body wash that’s maybe supposed to be strawberry. Probably sommat Vic’s had stored at the back of the bathroom cupboard for years. It’s disorientating. Aaron’d kept a bottle of Robert’s aftershave in the back of his bedside drawer for the first two years he’d been inside, refusing to take it out until the grief became unbearable and he just needed some proof Robert had existed.
It got lost somewhere between the moves, and he suddenly misses the musky, woody scent like a punch to the chest.
“Please,” Aaron says, when his arms have gone numb, “talk to someone, Robert. I hate seein’ ya like this.”
“I know,” Robert says, muffled against Aaron’s chest. “M’sorry.”
“Don’t apologise,” Aaron snaps, has to take a deep breath to centre himself ‘cause it’s not Robert he’s angry at. (It is, a bit, but he’s been angry at Robert for six years and it’s dull and well-stoked and a part of him now.) “You’ve done nowt wrong.”
Robert huffs out a laugh, disbelieving and humourless which is fair given it’s all he’s heard since he’s been back. Aaron’s had his reasons but it doesn’t make ‘em better. He’s stopped saying it, the thing about Robert not making it easy to like him, because it’s not true, not really. He’s just trying to make it through each day while everyone’s telling him to do one, and the Robert of old would’ve done ten times worse without blinking.
Robert’s not been easy to like ‘cause no one’s wanted to give it a go. They’d made up their mind the minute he was out of sight, when Aaron’s pain had been all that mattered.
Yesterday and six days ago, Aaron would’ve agreed with ‘em.
He’s still furious, still wants to shout at Robert about all of it, but he’s seen it now, what prison’s actually done to him, and the thought of everythin’ he’s been through, completely alone…
He may’ve done it to himself, but Aaron knows shitty mental health, and he’s had six repeats to sit with the awful realisation that maybe — maybe — Robert needed him back then more than ever.
God.
And now he’s back and alone, Vic struggling with this new, broken version of him, and Aaron gone and married to his brother like he hasn’t always known what that would do.
(He didn’t marry John to piss off Robert. He didn’t. He married John ‘cause he loves him and they have a life together and John’s a good, solid bloke. He married him ‘cause that was his life now.
…And he married him ‘cause Robert stood on that bridge wearing the mask of his former self and told Aaron what the future looked like, as if Aaron wasn’t gonna immediately balk at being told what to do.)
Robert’s fighting a battle from every direction and no one’s made it easy. Aaron’s not made it easy.
“Promise?” he asks again, and when Robert sighs and agrees it almost sounds honest.
7.
He really thought it’d been enough. Thought dragging a half-earnest promise out of Robert would let him finally wake to a new day havin’ done the responsible, right thing.
Aaron’s never had that sorta luck, he’s not sure why it’d start now.
“Y’alright?” John asks, rubbing at his hair.
No, Aaron thinks.
“Yeah,” he says. “Just not feelin’ great is all.”
John expression goes soft and he drops the towel on the chest of drawers before coming over to the bed and placing a hand over Aaron’s forehead.
“You feel a little warm,” he says. “Maybe you should stay home today? I’ll pick up tea later after I run by the pharmacy.”
“Yeah,” Aaron says, feeling that guilt rear it’s ugly head for the first time in a while. “Yeah, that sounds good. Cheers.”
“Of course,” John says, running his fingers through Aaron’s hair and crouching down to press a kiss where his palm was. “It’s my job to look after you.”
His eyes glisten as he says it, and Aaron digs a small smile up, tryin’ to remember how to be normal.
John. He needs to start thinking about John.
It’s been so easy to slip back into only thinking about Robert — it’s Aaron’s default state after all — but it’s not Robert he’s married to now, not Robert who’s there day in, day out, making sure Aaron’s alright and looking out for his family and being there for Vic.
Which isn’t a fair comparison but Aaron’s so tired of living this stupid day. Nothing he does is right, and it shouldn’t be his problem anyway, not when he’s got a life, one with a new marriage he’s meant to be makin’ the most of and people who’ve been there when Robert hasn’t.
Aaron doesn’t deserve all this. John definitely doesn’t.
Aaron should be thinking about his husband, not his ex.
It’s that easy.
“Let’s make this last a bit longer,” Robert says, and Aaron’s bored of hating himself.
“Yeah,” he says instead, the first time he’s agreed, and it’s like a weight’s been lifted. “Okay.”
Robert’s smile is as soft and beautiful as always.
Aaron should be thinking about his husband, yeah, but he thinks the problem is his heart’s never quite caught up in the change of circumstance there.
He’s a terrible person, probably. All it took was a week.
8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
He does try.
He talks to Vic. He talks to Manpreet. He turns his head on kisses he wants to drink, and he tries to be there in all the ways that don’t involve cheating on his husband. On one memorable occasion he even talks to John, which is…weird. John’s eyes go dark and then brighten, and later in the hospital he looks a little too happy as he tells Vic that a Psychiatric Unit is the best place for Robert right now given how volatile he is, a danger to himself and others. Aaron points out that another locked room won’t help, trading one cell for another, and John smiles at him like he’s five, reminding him that he’s the one with the medical knowledge, he knows best.
It’s the first time Aaron feels a little unsteady, like maybe the ground under his feet isn’t as solid as it seemed.
Other days he doesn’t fight it. The smashed vase, the tears, the kiss, the sex. He lets it all happen and tells himself he doesn’t crave it. Every time Aaron doesn’t go, Robert ends up in hospital, and it’s easy to convince himself that it’s for the best; he may not be helping in the long run but he’s helping right now, and that’s something at least.
He’s just so tired of fighting it.
There’s a lesson here somewhere — movies have taught him that, at least — but God knows what it’s meant to be. He can’t help Robert. He’s tried everythin’ he can think of and it’s all been useless.
He’s useless.
On Day 13 he calls Liam again and goes back to bed.
14.
“Aaron?” John says. He’s looming over Robert’s shoulder when Aaron lets himself into Keepers, and both of them stare at him in surprise.
“What’re you doin’ here?” Aaron asks before John can. He hadn’t expected to see his husband here any more than John’d expected him, and now they’re at a standstill none of ‘em are prepared for.
“Came to see Robert, check in,” John says like it should be obvious, and Aaron’s gaze skips over to Robert.
He looks blank, eyes red and shoulders around his ears.
John smiles tightly.
Aaron feels the ground shift.
“Vic needed some paperwork for the Hide,” Aaron lies, heading for the sitting room. “Promised her I’d pick it up whilst she dropped Harry off at his club thing and pop it in on my way to work.”
“I coulda done that,” John says, even though work for him is a hop, skip, and a jump over the road. Aaron ignores him and searches aimlessly through the piles of stuff on the coffee table before picking up a stack of letters about car insurance and Harry’s itinerary and folding them up before John can see.
“No problem,” Aaron says with a shrug. “Aren’t you late for your house calls?”
John’s jaw clenches and he looks back at the kitchen where Robert’s still standing stock still, staring at nothing.
“Yeah,” he laughs eventually, fake and breathy. “Yeah, time got away from me. I’ll see ya at home later, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Aaron says. “Dinner at the pub?”
“Great.”
He leaves with one last look at Robert’s back, and Aaron knows he’ll be seething all day. Probably call Aaron in an hour to make sure he’s at work and not still anywhere near Robert.
It’s a normal reaction given everything. It should be a normal reaction.
Robert’s still staring at the wall.
Aaron has a sinking feeling he knows what’s triggered the attack to come.
“Robert?” he says instead, gently, not moving too close too fast.
“Aaron?” Robert says eventually, swiping at his eyes with the sleeves of his hoodie. “Did you need sommat?”
Aaron watches as he tries to get the mask to sit back in place, sees it slip and slide, never quite catching. Robert’s trying so hard.
“Fuck it,” Aaron says, dropping the papers back on the table. “Come on.”
Robert follows him upstairs in a confused daze, hovering in his own bedroom door as Aaron kicks off his shoes.
“What—?” Robert asks, looking at Aaron like a dream. Aaron knows the feeling.
“I’m so tired, Rob,” Aaron admits, letting the exhaustion of the endless days seep into his voice. “I just wanna have a nap. Here. With you.”
It’s an admission he’s not allowed himself up ’til now, how much he’s needed these moments with Robert. It was easier to let the guilt rise in his throat. Easier to think about what Robert needed. Easier to let the days pass thinking about all the things he’s done wrong or all the things he shouldn’t want or all the ways he’s letting other people down.
All Aaron wants — all he’s wanted since Robert burst into his wedding and back into his life — is to hold him and remember how to breathe.
“Okay,” Robert says, small and vulnerable and hopeful. Aaron holds out his hand, tugging Robert down next to him. “What about—?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Aaron says, even though Robert could be talking about a million things. It doesn’t matter. None of it does. Aaron’s had too many days to realise that.
Nothing’s ever mattered except this, him and Robert holding each other and knowing it’ll be a hard road but okay in the end. Better than okay.
Robert went to prison for fourteen years and came out in six, and now he’s carefully folding himself around Aaron on top of the covers, scared to move too quickly and break the moment.
Everything else is pointless compared to that.
“Stay?” Aaron says, tugging at Robert’s arm until he’s comfortable.
“I think that’s my line,” Robert huffs, joy catching in the space between them.
Aaron can’t fix Robert any more than Robert can fix Aaron, but maybe that’s never been the point.
He’s gonna buy Robert some new aftershave. He’s gonna drag him by the arm to a therapist and sit outside the door so he can’t escape. He’s gonna shout at him about the divorce and apologise if he ever felt abandoned, and he’s gonna shield him from every nasty word coming their way from people who really should know better.
Aaron can’t fix Robert but he can look after him.
He thinks maybe that’s enough.
1.
Aaron wakes before his alarm. The shower’s running upstairs, and he’s kicked the blanket off the sofa in the night.
His phone says August 19th, and he sticks on the News just in case.
John’s probably wondering why Aaron came home so late, why he ignored all his calls, why he’s not already complaining about Mack or a hangover or anything except the truth Aaron’s sure he’s played out a dozen times since Robert walked back into the village.
Aaron should feel worse about that.
Vic answers the door to Keepers when he gets there, still in yesterday’s clothes. He won’t admit he doesn’t mind when they smell like Robert and the shitty strawberry-wannabe shower gel.
“Hiya,” she says, “did I know you were coming?”
“Nah,” he says. “Actually, I’m here to see Robert. He around?”
He is, of course he is. Aaron had only left last night because Robert made him, worried about Aaron of all things.
Vic lights up a little. Behind her, Harry’s colouring across the abandoned paperwork on the coffee table.
“He’s still asleep,” she says, pleased as punch. “First time since he’s been back he’s slept through the night!”
“That’s amazing, Vic,” Aaron says, meaning it.
“Come in,” she says, opening the door wider. “I’ll stick the kettle on and you can entertain Harry so he doesn’t go bounding into Uncle Robert’s room.”
They drink tea, and Aaron draws dinosaurs with Harry, and the TV quietly airs episodes of shows Aaron miraculously hasn’t seen yet, and then Vic’s ushering Harry quietly out the door and only giving Aaron a mildly confused look when he says he’s gonna stay.
He slides the bolt after they leave, doing the same on the back door, just in case.
Aaron knows he’ll have to talk to John soon. Knows it’s gonna be one of the worst things he’s ever done. Robert’s still confused at Aaron’s change of heart, sudden and out of nowhere, and Aaron knows that’ll take time, too, until he believes Aaron’s serious.
They’ve not made any promises. Two weeks is a long time when you’re stuck in the same day but it’s still nothin’ in the grand scheme of things. Aaron knows how he feels — the same way he’s felt since he was twenty-two and falling without a parachute — and he doesn’t doubt that Robert feels the same, but it’s worth treading carefully.
(Or, as carefully as they’re able given they are who they are.
Aaron’s not stupid.)
Robert blinks awake when Aaron sits on the edge of the bed, hushing him gently so he doesn’t startle.
“Aaron?” he asks, like maybe he’s still dreaming. “You came back.”
Aaron knows the feeling.
“That’s my line,” he says, and kicks off his shoes to stay.