Title: Foolish Games
By: saras-girl
Rating: Hard R
Pairing: Nick/Greg (CSI: Vegas)
Genre: Angst/Romance
Wordcount: ~6,500 (oneshot)
Spoilers: None, but set S6 (Man, I love the floppy hair)
Warnings: Flangst. First person narrative (Nick's -- I/You). Greg smokes.

This is a really old fic. But I felt like posting an old fic, and have subjected it to a suitably heavy edit beforehand.

Heavily inspired by Jewel's song of the same name (hence lyrics at the beginning) but please don't run away screaming, this isn't a songfic.

**~*~**

 

You took your coat off, stood in the rain. You were always crazy like that.

I watched from my window. Always felt I was outside, looking in on you.

You were always the mysterious one, with dark eyes and careless hair

You were fashionably sensitive, but to cool to care.

You stood in my doorway, with nothing to say, besides some comment on the weather.

 

Well in case you failed to notice, in case you failed to see.

This is my heart, bleeding before you. This is me down on my knees.

These foolish games are tearing me apart.

And your thoughtless words are breaking my heart. You’re breaking my heart.

 

**~*~**

 

I’m not sleeping, even though it’s late afternoon and that’s exactly what I should be doing. Instead I’m lying full length on the couch, listening to the rain. It doesn’t rain often in Vegas, which is a shame, because I actually quite like it. Everything feels somehow cleaner; refreshed after a shower, as though the fall of water can cleanse away the darkness that sticks to the streets.

 

I can’t see it, because the blackout blinds are pulled down tight, cloaking the room in darkness, but the sound is reassuring against the window. I just listen, lacing my fingers together beneath my head, and try to relax my aching back into the worn leather cushions. I love this couch, the way it moulds to my body as if it’s just an extension of me. The leather is soft and cool under my feet as I drag them in, flat to the cushion, bending my knees. The rhythm of the rain is soothing, but not enough to make me fall asleep.

 

I will not sleep, because I have this feeling that you are going to turn up at my door, and when it comes to you, I’m hardly ever wrong.

 

You had a bad case last night, we both did. Two fifteen-year-old boys stabbed on the way home from school. The look on your face when one of the kids we interviewed said that they deserved it, that they were faggots... that look was one of pure pain. It was quick, and I don’t think anyone else noticed it, but I did. I noticed. I always notice you.

 

You went straight home as soon as shift was over. I stood back for you in the corridor and watched you almost trip over Warrick in your scramble to get to your car. You are so afraid of letting anyone see your emotions. It feels sometimes like you’d rather no one knew you had any at all; as if they would have more respect for you as a CSI if that were true.

 

I suspect that the only person who gets to know when something affects you is me. And not because you tell me in so many words. You won’t say ‘That case really got to me today, Nick’ or ‘I could use someone to talk to’, but you will tell me, in your own way. Without words, usually, or using as few as possible.

 

There is a place for some words, in this comfort you seek from me. For words like ‘god’ and ‘now’ and ‘please’. The words that tumble from your lips as you kneel up on this couch and push yourself back onto me harder, throwing your head back, hair heavy with sweat and fingers gripping the leather until your knuckles turn white. More expressive still are the soft moans and hisses that seem to be dragged from somewhere deep within you, drawn out by my touch on your heated skin. By me, driven deep inside your body, hard, until we cannot get any closer.

 

Sometimes it’s the other way around, and you are equally intoxicating when you are on top, especially when I can see your face, when I can stare up at you and watch your changing expressions, the way your dark eyes widen and then flutter shut when you get close. You pound into me, fast and relentless, as though any moment the whole thing might be gone, as though someone is going to take it away from you.

 

Mostly though, you insist that I take you, and though it might seem to an observer that I’m the one in control, that’s simply not true. You demand me, and I give it to you willingly. It’s in those moments, the ones when you ask for it; that’s when it’s written all over your face how much you are hurting, or weary, or frustrated, and you don’t need words.

 

**~*~**

 

I almost can’t remember how all of this started, which is stupid because it hasn’t been that long; even though sometimes it feels like this is the only way it has ever been. The first time, it had nothing to do with work at all. We were drunk, or at least you were. We’d been out for Catherine’s birthday, to some club I had never been inside before. Catherine, knocked off balance by the cocktails we’d been buying for her all night, insisted that everyone dance with everyone at least once.

 

It’s a little hazy now with time, but I remember watching you as Catherine stood beside Warrick and I on the dancefloor. Catherine giggling helplessly at our attempts to dance whilst trying to demonstrate that we were still men, not wanting to make eye contact or touch each other but determined to get through at least one fast song to humour her. Warrick didn’t – still doesn’t – know that I’m gay, and I prefer it that way.

 

You were dancing with Sara, or trying to, at any rate, Sara’s never been particularly at home on the dance floor. You were trying, though, grabbing her hand and spinning her around, trying to get her to move her hips. Several beers had thrown you slightly off kilter but not enough to compromise your natural rhythm, the smaller movements fluid beneath your skin. I remember thinking you looked striking under the lights, all angles and strong lines and contrasts.

 

I couldn’t take my eyes off you, and I was surprised, because up until that point I hadn’t realised I was attracted to you at all. The feeling hit me with force, and stole my breath from me. When the song was over, you looked straight at me, and I knew you knew I wanted you. You just smiled, the same smile as you’d been giving me for years, but this time it made my mouth turn dry and my cock twitch.

 

Suddenly everyone was leaving, Catherine tugging at my sleeve haphazardly whilst Warrick tried to hold her upright. The others were around, too, making their way to the exit, but all I could think about was that I never got to dance with you.

 

I lost you somewhere as we moved through the crowds, and by the time I got out to my car and waved the others off into the night, I had decided that it was a good thing you were not around because you looking the way you did, and me feeling the way I did was a recipe for disaster.

 

Not that I complained when you emerged from behind my car and pushed me against it, swaying only slightly but out of control as you kissed me. I kissed you back, pulling you hard against me with both hands, surprised that the force of your need seemed to match mine. I had had no idea you were into guys as well as girls, much less that you would find me attractive.

 

I think what happened that night surprised us both with its intensity, and for me; brought about the relief of a tension I had previously been unaware of. I wondered, as I lay there afterwards with you practically passed out and draped across me, whether I had wanted you all those years and not known it.

 

You felt good in my arms and I fell asleep with one hand stroking the smooth curve of your back, the other twisted into your damp hair. When I woke up, you were gone, as I had half-expected you to be. I didn’t know whether I was disappointed or not. I didn’t love you, but you were my friend and we had just had loud, frantic, desperate sex with each other, and it was incredible, at least for me. I was unsure of what was supposed to happen next.

 

We never mentioned it, though, just worked together as if nothing had happened. I could cope with that, and I could cope with how dangerously attractive I suddenly found you. I tried not to look or touch too much, but it was a constant challenge.

 

The first day you knocked on my door, I was sleeping. When I eventually opened the door to you, I was wearing only old trackpants and a t-shirt, and I had a feeling my hair was sticking up in ten different directions. My eyes were sleep-clouded and I rubbed them with the back of my hand, staring at you, the tension etched into your face and tightening fingers that wrapped around my doorframe.

 

Your voice was rough and harsh when you asked simply if you could come in, and after a moment I stood back for you. When the door clicked shut, you leaned against it with your whole weight, head on one side, eyes huge and locked on mine, freezing me to the spot. My desire for you was mixed with confusion and the best thing I could think of to do was to offer you a drink – beer, coffee, soda…?

 

You shook your head slowly and grabbed the front of my t-shirt, hauling me close. I lost my balance as you pulled and shot arms out, ending up with hands at either side of your head, braced against the door, inches apart.

 

You were barely breathing, and I could feel the heat of you through your clothes. Confusion died when I felt you hard against me and pushed my hips against yours, eliciting a soft moan from you that passed a shiver through me. I saw the plea, the request burning in your eyes and I only waited a second before I closed the distance and kissed you.

 

We didn’t make it to the bedroom that time, neither of us could stand to let go of the connection for long enough to move. In the end, once enough of your clothes had found their way to the floor, I spun you around and pushed you back into the door, one hand steadying you, gripping your hip as I thrust inside you, the other covering yours as you braced yourself again the doorframe, crushed face-first into the wood, not caring, crying out and urging me to keep going, and ‘more, please Nick.’

 

You tightened around me when I bit down into your shoulder, spilling onto your own hand with a strangled cry. It was rough and didn’t last long, and I thought I might combust from the intensity of it, the relief that flooded my veins warm and almost painful as I emptied myself into you.

 

When we slid to the floor afterwards, tangled, sticky, breathless, neither of us said anything for a long time. You leaned your head back against the door and slid soft, sleepy brown eyes to mine. Stretched long arms above your head momentarily and then let them fall, legs thrown over mine, bare feet rubbing against the rough hall carpet.

 

“Why do people do things like that? I just don’t get it,” you asked quietly, and I wasn’t sure if I could give you an answer, but I was starting to understand something at least.

 

Everyone’s first child abuse case affects them in different ways. I know that Warrick went to the Palms and blew a month’s wages. Me, I stuck with tradition and got very, very drunk. It seems that your instinctive response to this particular trauma was to get fucked up against my front door.

 

Eventually, you cleaned up and left, and I was left with my thoughts. Honestly, I didn’t know what to think. The spreading hum of contentment under my skin was tempered by anxiety and a spike of excitement. Because I wanted it, I hadn’t stopped thinking about you since the club; you made me hot like no one had in a very long time. But still, you weren’t just any guy, you were Greg, and I didn’t quite know what to do with that. We were careful, because you had come prepared, and that was a strange feeling – that you were so confident I would want you. Not that it mattered, because you were right.

 

The next time you turned up, you looked on the edge of tears, and that time I managed to get you all the way into my bedroom before your lips touched mine and we both lost it.

 

Six months on, it’s still sex, and you still barely say a word until afterwards, but it isn’t just bad cases that drive you to my door. The job is your main focus, like mine, it has to be. But you care about other things too, even though the others seem to be quick to forget.

 

They didn’t even seem to notice how subdued you were when your Papa Olaf was ill a few weeks back. I know you were worried sick, because you were here almost every other night for a while. I pretended I didn’t notice that we were seeing each other more frequently, and I never asked you to stay. I knew though, how afraid you were. You even talked about him a little, and I listened, trying to offer support without crossing that line.

 

You aren’t using me. I wouldn’t allow that, and besides, that would suggest I was getting nothing from the situation. It isn’t like that, and I believe – I want to believe – that you’re not like that, anyway.

 

Our relationship, for want of a better word, is a two-way street. I know I could stop it at any time, just say the words, and things could go back to the way they were before any of this started, before we crossed that line. Or at least, as close to that as possible, I’m not naïve enough to think that we could ever get back that easy banter and playful teasing that once characterised our relationship, but we would be ok. We are both grown men, professionals, and we could do it.

 

But we won’t, because you need comfort and you don’t know how to ask for it any other way. And because I couldn’t bear to give you up.

 

I wonder sometimes what people who know us both would say if they knew what we do. It’s irrelevant, I suppose, because no one will ever know. It’s been the unspoken agreement between us since right after the first time you found your way into my bed. At work the next night, when I walked into the break room and saw you talking to a worse-for-wear Catherine, you caught my eye and the look we exchanged was explicit. We didn’t need words. This was, and still is, between you and me.

 

At least, it’s mostly just between you and me, and I didn’t break the rule on purpose, it just happened. It isn’t my fault that my baby sister knows me better than I know myself. I wasn’t aware how much I mentioned you, how your name would come up in our conversations that you had nothing to do with; at least not until she called me on it. I tried to defend myself, but she wasn’t having any of that ‘macho bullshit’ as she calls it, about sex being sex, and no more. She thought I was falling in love with you, and I denied it.

 

I can appreciate sex for just what it is, I really can. And with you, it’s incredible. You make me feel things I did not know were possible. I don’t want to know where you learned some of things you know how to do, the things that make me breathless and out of control, and that drag this voice from me that I had never heard before you. It’s low and pleading and I use it to beg you, something I never thought I would do, but sometimes I want you with such an intensity that I don’t even care.

 

I love every little thing about how I fit into you, and you fit into me, it’s perfect. The way your lean muscles tense under my fingers when I touch you, the way the ridge of your cock feels under my tongue, the way you taste. The way you dig blunt nails into my back and look right into my eyes when you tell me how good it feels. The way you never stop moving, except for the few minutes after you come, when I lick sweat from your chest up the side of your neck, brushing lips against damp curls and feeling you smile, just for a second.

 

At first, you would leave straightaway; one minute you’d be lying flat on your back, flushed and struggling to get control of your breathing, the next you would be sitting up, pulling your clothes on and preparing to leave. Sometimes, you would sit there for a moment or two, fully dressed on the edge of the bed or the couch, regarding me in silence.

 

I never made a move to get up or cover myself because it was my house, and anyway, I can’t recover after sex as rapidly as you do. You used to tease me about getting old, back before everything changed. You used to smile more then, too. I didn’t get to kiss you or feel every inch of you under my fingers back then, but it was less complicated, and the games we played were of a much less risky variety. No one gets their heart broken from flirting.

 

I told myself not to care when you threw me an awkward half-smile, told me you’d see me at work, and left. I also ignored the almost undetectable question in your voice when you said it, because that sliver of insecurity could mean worlds to me if I let it.

 

The first time you turned to me, halfway through dressing, and asked if I had any coffee, I just stared at you. I was unnerved, to say the least. I was curious, too, so I allowed you to stay, let you rummage through my kitchen cupboards wearing just your jeans. I watched you, from my seat at the kitchen table, watched the muscles in your back tighten and stretch under the splash of scars laid out across your shoulders and spine. You were beautiful. You still are.

 

That’s just what we do now, sex and coffee. After that day, you stayed every time. Sometimes I make the coffee, though we both know it’s better when you do. I almost bought some of the expensive stuff you like, once, but I put it back on the shelf because that’s the sort of thing that a boyfriend would do, not whatever I am.

 

Whatever we are.

 

I hate all the words for it. I’m not a prude, either, I’ve had flings, one night stands, too. I just never expected it with you, I never expected any of it.

 

Sometimes, after we’ve both drained our cups, your glance or mine will flare and we’ll end up back in the bedroom, or however far we get before we have to choose between walking straight and kissing frantically.

 

More often than not, though, we just sit and talk. You hold your cup in both hands, resting elbows on the table, looking at me over the rim. Sometimes you smoke. You like menthol cigarettes, I notice, and it’s just one more pointless and surprising little detail about you that I file away in the box with your name on it inside my head. You flick ash lazily into a chipped saucer and listen to me talk about my cases, and my family, and anything that doesn’t prompt awkward questions about what exactly we are doing.

 

Mostly you let me talk, and the way your eyes fix on me as you listen is almost enough to make me believe that you’re hanging on my every word. Your stare is so intense that it feels as though you’re draining every last drop from what I say. Like you need it, somehow. Perhaps hearing me ramble on about my mother and father and sisters is part of your healing process.

 

I like to watch the shape of your lips as they purse to blow hot steam from the top of your coffee toward me. You look as though you’re concentrating so hard, and it’s all I can do not to take the cup out of your hands, pull you out of your chair and into my lap so I can get a closer look at you; so that your skin is touching mine again.

 

I won’t do that, though, because there are rules about random acts of intimacy in a game like this. I just watch you and press my fingers flat against the hard wood of my seat, tuck them under my thighs so that I’m not tempted to reach for you.

 

Even though these moments are the most difficult, I think maybe I like them the best. Sometimes you forget to replace your emotionless mask after the sex and you sit there opposite me, shirtless, hair everywhere, smiling at me, so open.

 

Those days, your posture is more open too – you don’t push your elbows out in front of you like some kind of shield, but sit back, one foot drawn up onto the seat, your cup balanced on top of the bent knee, pulled in tight to your chest. Your free hand idly running through the unruly waves at the back of your head.

 

I used to leave the blackout blinds closed right up until it was time to leave for work, but when you’re here, I open them. When you wander into the kitchen to make coffee, I walk around flinging them all open, letting the evening sun flood the place with soft, blunt orange or gold. I don’t know if it’s because sitting in the dark with you feels oppressive and heavy, or because I think you prefer to see the sun, but either way, I do it. And you look wonderful in the light, your pale skin glows and every angle of your face and body throws a shadow across it.

 

Sometimes, when you’re talking, I’m looking at you instead of listening to what you’re saying. It’s just that now I’ve started looking, Greg, I can’t seem to stop. It soothes my soul.

 

I know you’re the one looking for comfort, but I need it, too. I seem to have this image with people, this core strength that people see in me and use as an excuse to lean on me. I don’t mind, most of the time. I like being there for people, and I will admit there’s a part of me that believes that shit about men not needing comfort or reassurance. I suppose I shouldn’t expect you to be any different. The comfort I draw from those moments is so easily shattered, though, because you cannot allow it.

 

I wish you wouldn’t say those things, but more than that, I wish that hearing you say them didn’t clench and twist at my insides. Those things about girls you want to date, or girls you’ve met in clubs. I know you’re not like me, I know that you like women too, but still.

 

You’re so casual with it, so careless, as if you and I are sitting there in my kitchen under other circumstances. As if we’re just two guys who work together, drinking coffee and hanging out.

 

Certainly not as if, just minutes before, we’d been fused together, naked, dripping, your hands gripping mine on top of wrinkled sheets as you urged me to go faster, harder, dragging me deeper into you and moaning my name as you came.

 

I’m not sure if you know you do that, because it seems so intimate to me and I want to ask you about it, but I won’t, because I don’t want to scare you away. It feels like we’re constantly treading this whisper-thin line between nothing and everything. I wonder if you do it consciously; mention those names to remind me that you don’t belong to me.

 

Do you tell me about Jenna, and Laura, and Rachel, and those others, so that I know where I stand with you? So that there’s no confusion over my role as fuck buddy and comfort blanket? And I hate those words, but at this moment I don’t have any better ones.

 

Or do you not even think, does it not even cross your mind that I might care about you? That I might be hurt by your words.

 

I’m tired of this game, Greg, but still I can’t bring myself to call you and tell you not to come around any more. Maybe there’s a part, a very small part, of me that dares to hope you’re sick and tired of playing it, too.

 

It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Because I do love you. I don’t know how it happened, and I never asked for it to happen, but it did. I’m locked into the play, because it’s what we both signed up for all those months ago, but it isn’t what I want any more.

 

**~*~**

 

I think now, as I lie on the couch and wait, about how it’s possible to feel so strong and so powerless at the same time. I know you have feelings, even if you don’t want anyone else to see them, and I want to see them. What worries me is if you show me those feelings and there’s nothing in them for me, beyond your regard for me as someone who turns you on and can take away your pain by making you come.

 

I sigh and shift heavily, my eyes sore and gritty with tiredness. I’m uncomfortably aware that what I want the most right now is for you to just come to bed with me. And I don’t care how it sounds, because no one can hear me. I’m tired, body and soul, and I just want to hold you until we both fall asleep. I want to feel safe, and close my eyes, knowing you’ll be there when I wake up. I can’t help but wonder what you’d think if you heard that, whether you’d laugh. Not that I’ll ask you to stay, because that would be breaking the rules, the ones that we never made.

 

When the knock on the door comes, I’m not in the least surprised, though I will admit to the tiny current that fizzes between the pit of my stomach and my thighs as I pull myself to my feet to go and answer it. This space is mine, with my unmatched furniture and cups in all the wrong places, but as soon as you’re in it, everything becomes uncertain. If I can admit it, I suppose I want it to be your space, too.

 

You don’t wait to be asked in this time, and I don’t stop you as you whisper ‘Hi’ and walk to the bedroom, shrugging off your jacket and already unbuttoning your shirt as you go. I sigh and close the door, following you.

 

It doesn’t have to be this way, I know there are other ways I can take your pain away, if only you’d let me.

 

I stand in the doorway watching you, and my heart aches. You look lost. In your eyes, where earlier today I saw an inferno of rage and pain, there is nothing, and that scares me more than I care to admit. You’re sitting on the edge of the bed, still trying to unbutton your shirt but not quite managing it, because your hands are shaking and I don’t know why. It’s the same shirt you were wearing to work, white with green stripes, and I wish you’d just leave it alone because you don’t have to do that.

 

“A little help?” you ask at last, keeping your tone light.

 

You turn to me and flash a nervous smile, the one you used to give me when I came into your lab for results; back when, despite all your brash confidence, I knew you were trying to impress me. When I think of that Greg, and this one sitting on my bed, I feel inexplicably sad; the need to protect you somehow lashing at my insides.

 

Instead, I sit down next to you and still your hands, slowly undoing your buttons and pushing the shirt back from your shoulders. The shirt and your skin are damp and cold from the rain I’d almost forgotten about. You shiver as I press soft kisses to your neck and I’m painfully aware that I’m being more gentle than usual and that you’re bound to notice, but I’m struggling to care.

 

“The world’s a horrible place, Greg,” I offer at last, answering the question that you chose not to verbalize last night as we drove away from the school. I run my hands down your arms and kiss you. “That’s why you have to have something real to hold onto.”

 

I shouldn’t have said that, in fact I shouldn’t have said anything, but I’m tired, and so are you, and I’m already thinking about the moment when you’ll leave. The air in the room feels heavy on my tongue suddenly, and colder, and I pull you to me instinctively. Skin against skin, your mouth open against my neck as I take you by surprise.

 

You recover yourself and slide palms firmly down my back, hooking fingers under my waistband and tugging at my sweatpants, pulling them down. I’m painfully hard underneath them and I know you know that, too, just from being near you, but I don’t want you to touch me like that any more. I don’t want to lie here and get each other off and then sit in my kitchen, talking about who you’re taking out for dinner at the weekend.

 

I want you, Greg, I want it all.

 

I reach out and grab your wrists, stopping you from taking off my clothes and you pull away from my neck and blink at me, surprised. I’ve never pushed you away before. I start to say your name but the words catch in my throat and there are tears pricking hotly at the insides of my eyelids. I blink them away, knowing that whatever happens now, this game is over.

 

Something shifts in the atmosphere and the tension hums between us like it hasn’t done in a long time. You seem to sense it, and shuffle away from me a little, drawing your legs up onto the bed and picking fitfully at the sheet.

 

“Don’t do this, Nick.”

 

You speak before I have a chance to, and you sound cold and exhausted.

 

“Do what?”

 

“Whatever it is you’re going to do, to change things. I get it, I just…” you trail off into silence and shake your head. Your hair falls across one of your eyes and you reach up to brush it away, irritated.

 

You look tired and angry and like you haven’t slept properly in days. And yet I feel as consumed with love for you as when you sparkle and charm and flirt. And that’s why, I suppose, I can’t do this any more, this existing in shades of grey, where you’re mine for moments only.

 

“I’m sick of this,” I almost spit, and the intensity of my tone surprises both of us. “I’m sick of doing this with you, whatever we’re doing, and still having to listen to you talk about dates like none of it matters to you.”

 

You stare for a moment, something sharpening in your eyes for a split second, then disappearing. You reach behind you and grab your shirt, sliding your arms into it awkwardly, not meeting my eyes.

 

“Sorry,” you mumble, doing up your buttons with slightly surer fingers than before. Your exhalation is long and controlled, as though you are trying to gather yourself before you stand up and look around for your coat.

 

This isn’t how it was supposed to go. You were at least supposed to hang around long enough to listen to my reasons, god knows you’ve spent enough time listening to me talk about much less important things for the last six months. A little part of me wants to just let you leave, let you walk out so that I don’t have to take more of a risk than I have already.

 

“It’s fine. Yeah. No problem, I’ll just go and… yep. Cool. Where’s my fucking jacket?”

 

I drag my eyes back to you because you’re pacing and muttering to yourself, so tightly wound, I can feel the tension pouring off you. You aren’t talking to me, not really.

 

I get up and hand you the tangle of soaked denim you dropped on my bedroom floor some minutes ago. You shrug it back on and bolt for the door. I watch you from a few feet back as you open it, looking out over your shoulder at the rain still falling to the ground, cleansing away everything that shouldn’t be there. I love you, and you’re running away again.

 

“Stop fucking running, will you!” The words are out of my mouth before I can smooth them over and you stop dead, halfway out of the door and turn to me. “I’m not playing games with you any more, Greg. I don’t want anyone else. I don’t want you to want anyone else. I love you.”

 

And I close my eyes, then, because it wasn’t supposed to come out like that. At all. We were supposed to have a conversation, like grown ups, not me shouting after you as you try to escape from my house. There’s nothing but silence in the hallway, all I can hear is my own pulse and the scratching in my throat as I rub my eyes, fully expecting you to be gone when I open them.

 

To my surprise you’re still there, you haven’t even moved. You’re holding onto the door handle like it’s stopping you from falling down, and you’re chewing on your bottom lip, eyes narrowed and guarded. The rain is coming in through the half-open door and for some reason I want to tell you to close it, because the carpet is getting wet.

 

‘Don’t just stand there, you’re either in or you’re out.’

 

My mother says that all the time and it echoes around my head now, out of place, as I watch you.

 

Finally, you move. With some effort, you peel your damp jacket off once more and drop it on the floor. Hope sparks in my chest, and you’re moving towards me, slowly and deliberately, anticipation filling the small space and prickling all over my skin. You grab my hand and pull, hard, yanking me behind you and out onto the doorstep.

 

The rain is falling hard as we stand there, inches apart, and you don’t let go of my hand. You’re getting soaked; your thin shirt was already wet and your coat is once more on my carpet. I’m confused, and you are smiling, running your free hand down my chest and reminding me that I’m wearing even less than you are.

 

The wet stone is cold under my feet and the drips running down my back are enough to make me shiver, though that may be because of you, too. I don’t ask what we’re doing standing on my doorstep in the rain, because you’ve always been a law unto yourself, and I wouldn’t change you.

 

“Love,” you say at last, frowning slightly. “It was easier not to fall for you. Love is...”

 

“Scary?” I offer, because you don’t seem to be able to finish your sentence.

 

Dark eyes flick to mine, intense, before you kiss me. It feels soft and contemplative, if a kiss can feel that way. I think your kisses can. Your hand is resting on my hip now, and when you pull away your face is defiant.

 

“I don’t get scared.”

 

And I laugh, because I know you don’t really believe that, and I wonder if it’s me or yourself that you’re trying to convince.

 

“Everyone gets scared, Greg.”

 

You smile, first with one small corner of your mouth, your eyes searching mine for an answer. I know the moment you find it, when your smile flashes into life and changes your whole face. Just for a second, you look vulnerable, your raw delight exposing you, and I take the opportunity, lifting hands to slide thumbs over cold wet cheekbones and forcing you to maintain your eye contact with me. I repeat my words, hoping to get through.

 

“Everyone, Greg. I love you.”

 

Your breath catches and you don’t even blink. The hands now wrapped around the tops of my arms are tensed, gripping my muscles so tightly.

 

“Don’t hurt me.” Choked, a whisper, and the plea is so out of character it takes me by surprise.

 

I shake my head, feeling the water flick out from my saturated hair as I do. Fuck. I’m freezing, but I won’t move from this spot.

 

“I didn’t know you wanted more,” you say softly, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. I move closer to you and slip my hands under your wet shirt to trace a well-worn pattern on your back.

 

“You never asked.”

 

“No. I didn’t. And they say I’m supposed to be smart.” The smile is small and self-deprecating and I kiss the edge of it without thinking. Feel the smile widen under my lips.

 

“Just you and me?” I have to ask, to make sure. I’m still feeling like this might not be real, and I’m not about to risk it all on a technicality. “No more games?”

 

You’re grinning now, and I can’t control my face all of a sudden.

 

“Yes, to just you and me.” You kiss me briefly. “No, no more games.” You flatten my wet hair against my forehead with your palm and look at me, head on one side. “I love you.”

 

Your words swirl around me and I’m no longer cold. The dull ache is melting from me, and I realize I have been holding my breath for a long time. I let it out in a rush, tearing my eyes away from you to look at the grey sky.

 

The rain is still falling as I pull you back inside the house and close the door. I can hear it tapping on the window pane as we undress unhurriedly and creep into the bed. I let the rhythm of it anchor me as we touch, so slowly in the darkness and rediscover ways to make one another twist and sigh and shiver.

 

It’s heavier now, as I hold you against me, your leg thrown over my hip and your head against my chest. The drumming beat of the downpour that’s more somehow than just water on glass. This time, I allow it to pull me into sleep because I know that when I wake up, you will be here.

 

 

**~*~**

 

You took your coat off, stood in the rain. You were always crazy like that.