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When the sun touched Bones’ skin, it didn’t just warm it and colour it, it brought out a dusting of faint freckles across the bridge of his nose and speckled his arms with sepia toned blotches. His shoulders would be covered in clusters of freckles and they’d space out ever so slightly as they crawled down his spine towards his hips if he’d been laid out in the sun.
Eve would often make jokes that Bones must’ve been kissed by every one of heavens angels twice for him to have that many freckles because after all, that’s supposedly what freckles were; soft, gentle and sweet kisses from God’s favourite winged beings.
Whilst Bones often forgot or often disregarded his freckles, Jim was completely captivated by them. On their last shore leave, he and Bones had spent time at the beach and Jim had studied every freckle that sat on the curve of his spine and carefully, with the tip of his finger, touched a droplet of water to each one when he’d returned from his swim.
Bones’ freckles provided a proficient distraction however when Bones was either very mad with Jim for doing something he shouldn’t have done, or when he was sufficiently hacked off with Jim’s latest tactics, but Jim would just stand and stare, arms crossed and cerulean eyes focussed on his face and not his hazel eyes that were scrutinizing his every move. Bones would notice that Jim’s eyes would dart across his face, before they seemed to settle and move slowly across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose and as Bones watched him, his brow furrowed and his eyes narrowed, crinkling at the corners.
“Don’t do that,” Jim frowned as he shifted his stance slightly. “You made me lose count.”
And when Jim said that for the first time, Bones was too surprised to carry on being mad at him for whatever reason he’d been mad at him for in the first place.
But it was the mornings when Jim fully appreciated the dusting of freckles that covered his partner’s skin. He’d lie for hours before Bones awoke, watching as the morning light crept up the bed and warmed Bones’ bare back as he laid face down in the pillows with the sheets resting just above his hips.
He’d study his shoulders like they were star maps, trace lines across his back like he were joining stars together to create constellations that were for his eyes only and when Bones woke, bleary eyed with sleep, Jim would press a gentle kiss to each prominent freckle upon his neck before Bones settled back down and squirmed slightly under the gentle brush of Jim’s fingertips as they went back to joining the stars upon his back.