Chapter Text
It’s the first weekend when it really hits Robert hard. Aaron’s not coming home. The pub seems so empty without him, and Robert doesn’t even have the distraction of work as it’s Saturday. Yesterday Aaron called, but Robert missed it, because he called the pub. He spoke to Chas which Robert knows he shouldn’t feel bitter about, because Aaron’s last twenty four free hours were most definitely about him getting to be selfish with Aaron. He shouldn’t feel bitter, but he does. They’re supposed to be on their honeymoon, not separated like this and it hurts so much. No amount of preparing could ever prepare Robert for this empty loneliness. And the fear of what Aaron’s going through inside.
“What’re you doing?” Robert asks Chas in the back room. There are empty bottles everywhere, on every surface and a haze of dust in the air. She looks like a woman possessed.
“Cleaning out the cellar,” she says. “So much tat down there, really should get rid of it.” Robert knows a distraction technique when he sees one and he doesn’t argue. However, one clear bottle catches his attention. It’s huge, probably used to distil cider or something like that. He remembers seeing something like this up at the farm when he was younger. If he put a coin in, one for each day that Aaron was away from him, lonely and afraid, how full would the bottle get? The size is about a gallon, and three hundred odd coins so… halfway? Less? When Chas disappears to the cellar again, Robert takes the glass bottle and puts it in their bedroom. Or his bedroom he supposes now, because Aaron’s not here to share it and he won’t be for a while. Robert gets out his wallet and, feeling more than a little stupid and crazy, gathers his lose change. He puts one coin in the jar, and it makes a rattle that is slightly satisfying. But then it fades, because Robert realises it isn’t enough.
One coin for every day would imply that he only thinks about Aaron once a day and that’s not true. He thinks about Aaron once a minute, or more. The loss, the ache is so clear that he wants to curl up and scream, but he can’t. Because he’s got Liv, and she as good as said that he’s all she’s got now. He promised Aaron he would look after her so he cannot afford to fall apart. Robert sticks another coin in the bottle. It doesn’t really help, but one things for sure. It doesn’t hurt either.
Aaron has all this time and nothing to fill it with. He can’t talk to anyone, there’s no one to talk to about the thoughts that are crowding in his head, begging to get out. So much has happened this last week. He was happy, he got married to the love of his life, then he ended up here. Even though he’d known it was going to happen, it did not make it any easier. He missed the feel of Robert’s body already. He’d got used to it. The warmth of him, the strength that made Aaron know that even when he himself fell down, Robert would be there for him. To help him. And now… he’s trapped without that.
He understood why Robert did their wedding day like that. It was a way of showing Aaron that he’d be there for him, no matter what, and no matter how long. And Aaron appreciates that more than he’d ever be able to find the words to tell him.
It’s Saturday and he’s counting down to visiting on Wednesday already. Is this what his life will be like? An endless cycle of silence with his thoughts clambering to get out of his head, living for those precious half an hour of contact he’ll get with his family each week? And it won’t be the same because he won’t be able to touch them, he won’t allow himself that.
Prison is not the place to be openly gay, and he won’t risk it, because he wants to get home to his husband in one piece. Which means he won’t get to touch Robert for a year. He doesn’t get to feel his husbands skin for an entire year. The thought makes him feel sick and he doesn’t know how he’ll cope with that. Let alone pretending to be straight. He’s not hidden his sexuality for years, if someone has an issue with it, it’s their problem not his. Since he became comfortable with himself, he always felt that, but here…
Prison’s not fun, it’s not meant to be, but it’s the separation from the people in his life that will hurt him the most. And he can’t even verbalise how much he misses his husband, because he doesn’t want to risk having several teeth knocked out. Right now, he’s alone in his cell and he wants to talk to Robert. But the queues for the phone are huge and he doesn’t want to stand with a bunch of other strangers, most of whom are probably violent and just as desperate to talk to their own loved ones. And violent desperation is not something he wants to mix with, so he stays in his cell and instead picks up a piece of paper and a pen before lying back down in bed, thinking. Paper is one thing they are allowed without much persuasion. What damage can inmates do with pieces of paper?
Back when he’d had a counsellor, Aaron knows he would be proud, actually considering writing down his thoughts instead of hurting himself over them, over the agony that they sometimes cause him. It takes a while for him to make any mark on it, and when he does, all he does is write the letter R. He doesn’t want to write Robert’s name in case anyone finds this, R could mean anyone.
I miss you. Aaron writes that down, then feels that is so inadequate because just missing him isn’t how he feels. It’s a hole deep inside his heart that Robert should fill, a part of him that's missing. But words were never Aaron’s strong point, he usually expressed himself better with his fists, which is why he was in this situation in the first place, he reminded himself. And it’s not like anyone other than him would ever read this, so he bravely carries on. I took my wedding ring off. They’ve got it with my personal effects which’ll be released when I get out. But I feel so bad for losing it, and I keep rubbing the skin where it should be. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that. It’s one thing of yours that I have and I willingly gave it up? Aaron looks at the words, pen hovering over them, almost itching to scratch them out. He didn’t do emotion like this, but his finger on his left hand was starting to itch, he’d been rubbing at the bare skin so much. He had to stop that, he knew, because continuing to press against sore skin was only one small step from self harming, and if he did that so soon, he’d never get out of here.
You thinking of me? That he does cross out. It’s still legible beneath the line, but it feels wrong, too desperate too quickly. Four days until I can see you. I want you to make me laugh again because I haven’t smiled since our wedding day. Aaron stops, dropping the pen with a sigh. He rereads what he managed to get down and it’s almost laughable. Disjointed and broken, pathetic. But something inside him doesn’t allow him to tear it up. It helps to almost know that Robert is feeling the same. Is he feeling the same? Aaron folds up the sheet of paper and sticks it under his mattress. No one can find that.
On his visit, he asks Robert to send him an empty note book. Because he has no one to talk to in this place except himself, and his thoughts are rushing to get out. Robert looks curious, but agrees.