Once More, With Feeling - Part 4/4
< Back to Part 3/4
(Colin, Saturday, June 13th, 2015)
It doesn’t take long for Colin to find himself in that headspace again--the one where lying on the couch in the same pair of sweats for days on end, watching game shows on TV, eating rubbish food and cultivating facial scruff seems like a perfectly acceptable way to exist.
He hasn’t been here in years, but it’s as comfortable as a warm blanket, as easy as falling off a bike and scraping off three layers of skin. You never forget how to do it so it hurts just right.Of course, he calls Meghan after the initial panic wears off. It takes three days for Bradley’s words to sink in, and by then, Colin’s ripe for all the guilt to galvanise his nerves.
This is important, Bradley had said. We can fix this. Please, he’d implored.
Shocked right out of his comfort zone, Colin had flung those words back in Bradley’s face like a handful of dead leaves. Bradley had been trying to tell him something he’d have killed to hear years ago. They could have talked, really talked for the first time. All the things which had eaten at Colin for so long, the questions and the resentments--all of it could have been brought out into the open. It’s a kick in the guts to realise it was his turn to miss his chance, and he’d taken it, brandished it in Bradley’s face as though it was some kind of victory.
Another couple of days are lost in self pity and then in trying to get up the nerve to put things to rights. So he calls Meghan, only to find out Bradley had beaten him to it--had come looking for him, had been persistent. Had gone away empty-handed.
Colin asks for details of the encounter and has never had more affection for Meghan than when she refuses to indulge him. He knows then that he really fucked up, or else she’d not try to save his feelings by telling him as little as possible.
The only thing left to do then, is to shower, shave and sit on his hands for most of the day before braving his own conscience and venturing outside.
His fisted hand hovers in midair for long moments before he knocks on Bradley’s door, only to find it hasn’t been Bradley’s for nigh on two years.
The bus stop bench is hard and uncomfortable, doesn’t help at all in fighting back the choking lump in his throat. He feels completely fucking disconnected and more desperately helpless than in all his bloody life.
It’s days later that he finally gives in and looks up Bradley’s mum, and days later still before he picks up the phone.
Except that when he finally, finally calls, it’s not Mrs James who answers. It’s--is that--
“Stephanie?” he asks, voice full of wonder. He hasn’t seen Stephanie in so many years, but can still see the look on her face, panning between Bradley and himself over a tableful of Christmas food, saying, how old are you two again?, shaking her head in fond exasperation at their ridiculous behaviour, antagonising each other with absurd relish.
“Speaking.”
“It’s Colin.” There’s a silence. To be honest, Colin hasn’t thought much further than this. He almost expects--he doesn’t know, really. For her to yell at him, maybe. To hang up. To call him every single name he deserves. It occurs to him she might not know anything at all, that Bradley never went home. Something coagulates in the pit of Colin’s gut because if Bradley didn’t go home, Colin has no idea, no idea, where he is. What he’s doing. If he’s all right.
“Is Bradley there?” He asks before he loses the last of his nerve. There’s a small sigh on the other end of the line and more silence. He’s about to say something, anything at all when Stephanie says,
“He’s pretty upset.”
“Oh.” Colin begins to tremble and sinks down on the floor in the middle of his hotel room. It’s the closest surface. “But he’s there, right? He’s, uh. He’s with you guys.”
“He is.”
“Okay, that’s--” The breath that shudders out of him is rough and Colin has to blink at the sunlight streaming through his window because his eyelids are stinging. “That’s good,” he goes on, nearly whispering. “I mean. Okay.”
There’s another sigh and as he thinks about just hanging up, giving up, he hears her close a door. “He told me everything, Colin.” Blood pools hot and shameful in his cheeks. “Everything. I can’t even--I can’t believe what you did. I really can’t. It’s like, I don’t even want to put it into words because it makes me so angry I’ll cry. He told me what he did too, and don’t get me wrong, I yelled at him for walking away like a coward all those years ago. But he didn’t deserve this. He didn’t deserve this at all.” She pauses and he can hear the tremor in her breath, wonders if there are silent tears running down her face, or if that’s just him.
“I understand. I do,” she tells him, quiet and a little apologetic. Colin knows he’s not going to like what comes next. He braces himself. “But I don’t think you can fix this. Not anymore.” The resignation in her voice strums his hurt like fingers on an old guitar.
“Stephanie,” he says, the word splintering on his tongue. “I need to--to try. At least. I’m in town.” He almost expects her to tell him to piss off, to keep away from her brother, but instead she sighs, sounding so tired that Colin swallows a sob.
“Okay,” Stephanie says. Colin hears her sniff, muffled as if she’s turned her face away from the phone. “He went out, though.”
Colin tightens his grip on the phone, feeling like he’s pushing his luck. “Just out?”
“He didn’t tell me where he was going. For a drink, maybe. I don’t know, I promise, Colin. I really don’t know.”
“Okay. Yeah, that’s--thanks. Stephanie. Thanks.” Colin rubs his face, is about to hit the end call button when he hears,
“Colin?”
“Yeah?” he says, bringing the phone back to his ear.
“Find him.”
There’s nothing he could say to that even if his throat wasn’t seized closed. He’s aware she can’t see it, but a nod is all he can manage. He hangs up.
He feels a momentary flush of panic at how impossible it’s going to be, but in the end it’s not all that hard. Once he figures out Bradley’s still hurting as much as Colin is--maybe more now, thanks to him--he knows where to go.
Years ago, after Merlin’s first season had wrapped and they were riding the high of their newfound camaraderie, Colin let slip that he wasn’t going home for Christmas. He’d treated his family to a holiday and it didn’t make sense for him to go since he only had one week off, so Colin had planned to stay in London. It hadn’t even taken Bradley a second’s thought to invite Colin over. (Are you sure? -- Yeah man, the house will be packed and my family is crazy so, you’ll fit right in.)
Side by side they slept in Bradley’s tiny single bed. There was no room anywhere else and Bradley wouldn’t hear of Colin camping out on the floor. (You’ll bruise the floorboards with those elbows of yours.) He’d woken up wedged tight between the wall of plaster and the solid warmth that was Bradley, with a faceful of hair that even smelled like sunlight.
On New Year’s Eve they’d gone to this club. With the music thick in his veins and Bradley’s imperfectly gorgeous smile around every one of their weirdly brain-aligned dark jokes, it’s where Colin really considered kissing Bradley for the first time. Where it had been more than a wouldn’t it be nice sort of fleeting thought. It’d still been easily dismissed back then, this latent desire, this pull he’d felt. Something to linger in, to drift on like a castle in the air.
It’s one of the last carefree memories he has of the two of them together. It’s not that hard at all to figure out that’s where Bradley might go. And if he’s not there, well. If he’s not there Colin will leave him in peace. They’ve haunted each other long enough.
All that resolve is put to the test though, when Colin finally shoulders his way past the funnel at the entrance and into the club, just after one AM. The place is absolutely packed. It will take more than a poke in the corners to spot Bradley, if he’s even here at all.
There are so many bodies, so many people, all moving like the pulse of the place is alive inside them. Colin stands in the midst of it all, the noise and sweat, the music so loud that his teeth vibrate with it. Ultraviolet light filters down to the floor, where it’s all glowing eyes and bra straps, everything white is an iridescent underscore.
He finds himself scanning the crowd for that golden head, but of course, under these lights, everyone glows blue, then dissolves into black from the neck down. How fitting, Colin thinks. We’re all black from the neck down if you look long enough to see past the glow.
Could Bradley really be here, losing himself in this crowd? The song is inevitably fitting, too, perfectly vivid, an unstoppable flick-book of heartbreak. A soul without a mind, in a body without a heart, he knows the words. He feels them. His blood rhythmically floods his veins in time with the complexity in those words, and he’s bereft at Bradley’s absence. He’s compelled, absolutely pushed to search now, to find Bradley and to eat away at this distance between them, to make all this right somehow.
The feeling of loss is crushing, and Colin doesn’t think he can live like this, with this horrible ache, the great hole in his chest where Bradley’s warm bulk should be, even if it’s only friendship he offers. Even if Colin can never have all of him but the parts he’s allowed.
Jostled on all sides, he can feel the desperation on his face, the crease between his brows becoming deeper with every minute of disconnection. He pans around helplessly, wondering how in the hell he’ll ever find Br-
Colin’s heart sputters to life like an imprecisely stuck match and his hands fold at his sides, clutching at hope where moments ago there was only despair.
In the vibrating throng, with a backdrop of the fluorescent light show, Bradley is a man apart.
Colin’s eyes snag on the familiar set of shoulders, the stillness, something he always thought of as Bradley’s solid strength. He’d always admired the way Bradley’s body moves so deliberately, so sparingly, every gesture considered, where Colin’s limbs sometimes whip out and flail around with no aptitude for elegance. He has always loved Bradley’s innate stillness.
Tonight though, Bradley’s stance looks heavy. Overwhelmed. Colin watches in despair as Bradley lifts his hands to his face, rubbing at his temples. Tiredness is etched into the tilt of his face and the ghost of the weight tethering him to the ground, to this loud and busy place where he looks so lost. Colin wants to yell out, to stop the gesture before it imprints itself on his brain, because it’s so wrong for Bradley to be this sad, this alone, but the music is too loud and his throat so full of his heart, he can’t so much as whimper.
Colin starts moving without volition, just following his heart into the crowd, letting it weave its way through the throng of moving, dancing people, pulling him to where Bradley stands alone like a pillar, like he’s holding up the ceiling with his shoulders. Colin watches the crowd milling around him, parting disconcertedly around the oddity of a man unmoving in their midst, and his throat constricts at the sight of Bradley’s dejection wrapped around his body like a threadbare blanket for everyone to see.
He’s more and more desperate the closer he gets, pushing his way through the crowd, elbowing people out of the way, bouncing up on the balls of his feet to keep Bradley always in sight. And then suddenly, Colin thinks he finally understands ...how can you have a day without a night... and what that even means, because Bradley feels him, must sense Colin nearing. He turns, eyes locking on target, and Colin doesn’t know how he lived for years without those eyes trained on him, watching him, seeing him.
Colin has been half a man for years, refusing to acknowledge the scar where the shape of his other half mists like a ghost, and if Bradley rejects him now, Colin doesn’t know what--he’d be completely--
People move between them in every direction, but Bradley’s eyes track only him, and Colin can’t breathe from the stifling heat and the press of humanity, from the weight in eyes made black by the fluorescents above.
He thought he’d feel relief at finding Bradley, but there is only a desperate silence in his mind and frantic tugging at his insides where his lungs are supposed to be filling with air. He’s right there, Bradley’s right there just a few feet away and somehow getting closer. If Colin didn’t know it was impossible, he’d think he was carried along by the sheer force of the pull between them.
Colin doesn’t feel the jostling, nudging people all around him at all; can’t hear anything except the roaring rush of blood in his ears, until they’re face to face. Bradley is so familiar, so real. Colin doesn’t know where to look, so he looks everywhere, takes in everything at once, from the three-day growth which frames Bradley’s face, to the accusing grief in his eyes.
He opens his mouth for I’m so sorry, and God, I’m still so in love with you, and if you walk away, I’ll eat at myself until I choke, but nothing comes out, and Bradley just stands there with this look in his eyes like maybe Colin isn’t who he thought he was.
And maybe it’s the desperate longing in the song, or a wild flash of courage, or maybe Bradley is true north just as Colin had always suspected, back when he still entertained dreams of a great love. Whatever it is, instead of saying anything at all, Colin slowly inclines forward, closes his eyes like in a story, and meets Bradley at the lips, leaving all the words behind for another day, or maybe for never.
Under his eyelids, the strobe lights flare fast and hard, while against his mouth, Bradley gasps so softly, Colin’s not sure it happened at all. He pulls away to look, and his knees weaken at the sight of Bradley’s guarded eyes, so full of grief and longing.
It’s me, Colin wants to say, it’s just me, who loves you, but he knows words won’t cut it. There is nothing but a litany of words behind them and a precipice in front of them, and Colin’s doesn’t even realise it, but he’s already jumping.
He leans in once more and presses his mouth to Bradley’s so firmly, there’s the hardness of teeth beneath the soft flesh. He stamps himself there into Bradley’s lips, brands his name just in case there was any doubt. And this time, God, this time, Bradley presses back.
They make a bridge of their bodies, touching each other only with a kiss until Colin can’t stand it anymore. He gives in to the yearning and opens his mouth and breathes Bradley in, closing around him with the kind of breathless awe which makes his stomach drop and his heart explode into beats to rival the bass beat. He lists forward to feel the heat of Bradley’s chest and almost laughs out loud with joy when Bradley grips his elbow to steady him, drawing whorls there with his fingertips. Draw your name on me, Colin wants to say, write your name on what’s always been yours.
With music deafening his ears and strobes blinding him, Colin’s a sensory creature at last. Sweeping aside everything that isn’t Bradley and now, he lays his love into the grooves of Bradley’s mouth, into each crease of his lips. He touches them with the tip of his tongue, and when Bradley inclines his head just so in invitation, he falls in with abandon, kissing Bradley like he can lick away the bitterness of all that wasted time.
And God, it’s hot in here, but not as hot as the way Bradley huffs urgent breaths through his nose and clutches greedily at the muscle of Colin’s hip. It’s overwhelming how quickly they fall into sync with each other, bodies moving together like it’s intrinsic.
Bradley’s desperate fingers dig into the small of his back and the rise of his shoulder blade, everywhere he touches. The neediness answers all of Colin’s questions, the ones which start with do you still want and will you always and can you forgive with such beautiful honest abandon when Bradley gathers him in, holding him tightly against his chest, where Colin remembers once feeling so secure.
Colin inches his hands up until his fingers are furrowed under soft hair against Bradley’s scalp and enfolds him within his arms, bracing them over Bradley’s shoulders and hugging for all he’s worth. His face wants to split at the seams when Bradley’s hand glides up, and fingers sink into the hair at Colin’s nape, worrying and tugging.
They kiss until Colin can’t breathe, until his lips feel bruised and his face is raw, razed by Bradley’s stubble. They kiss until he’s sure he’ll always find his way home.
“I found you,” he laughs, the sound immediately lost in the din, talking straight into Bradley’s mouth, still kissing, their lips clinging to each other. He’s unwilling to distance himself at all, and his arms are so full of Bradley there’s no room for uncertainty.
Bradley yells something right back against his mouth, which sounds a lot like a laddie pissed chew but Colin is almost sure is probably bloody missed you and it might be wishful thinking, but suddenly nothing is irreparable.
In his arms, Bradley’s the most solid he has ever felt, really here, really present. Colin throws back his head and laughs, loud and rich like he can’t hold it in.
(Bradley, Sunday, June 14th, 2015)
It’s not at all like Christmas. Sunlight streams warm and summery through the window, strips of it laying like ribbons across pale skin. Bradley squints his eyes to follow lazy dust motes, counting Colin’s steady pulse as it beats against his arm.
Bradley spent his teens here, and echos of him linger in the corners, past-Bradleys sleeping and studying and all the other things teenage boys do; this room has seen it all. Pinholes and oily tac marks have long since gone from the walls, but there’s a presence here, safe like a sleeping bag to roll up in.
He thinks the sensation of waking up in this particular room, different from all the rooms in all the world, will never cease feeling like home. He knows the sounds of this room, the smells, the slant of light on his face. Knows it so well, it’s like a haven, deep in his marrow.
This tiny bed isn’t big enough for him anymore, let alone the two of them, and Colin’s wedged between Bradley’s chest and the wall, just like the last time they were here a thousand years ago. It’s hot and clammy the way they’re jammed up together, and Colin’s snoring should be annoying, but Bradley finds himself smiling anyway. He half buries his face in the pillow.
Reaching out to follow the shell of Colin’s ear with his fingertip, he registers a subtle change in breathing. Colin’s waking up.
Bradley leans in, open-mouthed and earnest over the spot, still red from last night, where Colin's pulse dances under the skin. He relishes the surrender as Colin stretches and presents a little more of his neck. Nosing the fine hair at Colin’s nape, Bradley murmurs, “Good morning,” in a tone that he hopes is husky and sweetly loaded, just like his mood.
With a massive yawn, Colin rolls over onto his stomach until the flex of his body and the breadth of his shoulders are almost enough to startle Bradley into falling off the bed, then settles back into the pillows, boneless. Bradley feels like he can never see enough of this sleep-soft Colin, never get enough of this feeling.
“Mhhmph,” Colin mutters, creeping a hand under Bradley’s t-shirt and flexing his fingers, lightly scratching Bradley’s belly.
Closing his eyes at the sensation, Bradley rolls toward it. He drapes himself over Colin’s body, slides his arm and his thigh across, loving every single thing about the way it feels. He presses kiss after kiss into the cotton over Colin’s skin, mouth following the curve of shoulder to the bare dip of neck until he’s mouthing at a soft earlobe and listening to Colin’s breath stutter and huff into the pillow beneath.
With his whole being craving closeness, he presses himself down and tightens his hold, bulldozing right into Colin’s body, a fistful of t-shirt the lifeline in his grasp. Nosing along Colin’s cheek, Bradley’s lips rasp along the stubble until finally, finally, he finds Colin’s mouth.
Unhurried, he nips and kisses at Colin’s lips, and the dry stick and pull of them is the only thing in the world that matters. He nibbles and tastes, a slow drag of lips over each other, something inside him tightening at the way Colin fists the bedding, his lithe body flexing in response to Bradley’s mouth.
Slipping his fingers into Colin’s hair, he pulls them even closer together, and licks at the fleshy center of Colin’s mouth with the very tip of his tongue, rediscovering how it makes Colin heavy and pliant in his arms.
“Last time you were here,” he murmurs, truths falling effortless from his mouth against Colin’s lips, kissing between words, “Could smell you for days, on the pillow, on my clothes. Everybody loved you, even the dog. My sisters made such a fuss, didn’t know whether to be glad or jealous they liked you more than me.”
Colin huffs a laugh, slipping his knee between Bradley’s thighs, teasing them apart with gentle pressure. “They didn’t like me that much. Last time I was here, your sister threatened to feed me raw chicken.”
The teasing grows insistent, Colin’s movements slow and rhythmic, his thigh firm and hot between Bradley’s legs, his voice falling rough over Bradley’s lips.
“That’s because you kept eating her cereal,” Bradley says, his mind not at all on the conversation, and very much on the growing heat between his legs, and Colin’s arms winding around him.
“I’ll stay away from her cereal this time, then.”
“Wise.”
Suddenly, all movement stops.
“Oh my God, I’m gonna have to face your mother, aren’t I?” Colin mumbles, covering his face with the duvet.
“Yup,” Bradley says. He’s trying not to grin but it’s a lost cause.
“Crap.”
“You scared of my dear old mother, Colin?”
“Scared? Would she know we had--we’re here?”
Bradley doesn’t say anything, just waits until Colin hazards a peek out from the duvet, then gives him a look. Colin groans pathetically. “She’s gonna eat me alive.”
“Rightly so,” Bradley tells him, rather smug. Colin is quiet for a bit, then says,
“I know.”
Ah shit. Maybe Colin was referring to other things. Bradley’s heart hurts a little for how vulnerable he looks.
“What she knows, is that there’s an Irishman in her son’s childhood bed, canoodling with said son, who thankfully is no longer a child because that would be creepy,” he explains, eyes trained on Colin’s.
There is a long pause while Colin considers this. “Bad enough, I suppose.”
“She’s never been the sort to tell me to be careful, you know. She’s always been the loudest of all the footy mums, shrieking at me to get in amongst it, get the job done.” Bradley pauses, eyes sweeping over Colin’s face. “Always let me fight my own battles.”
Colin grins.
“Now, my sister...” Bradley trails off, uncertain how to explain. “I needed to confide in someone. It was eating me up and I had to tell someone I trust. Can you understand that?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I can.” Colin rubs small circles over Bradley’s hip, the whirring of cogs in his brain almost audible. Half his mouth buried in the pillow, he says, “Are we okay, then?”
The echo of their words outside the club is sweetly tinged with the rasp of stubble against skin as they’d kissed and kissed. Tell me you’re not going back and I’ll believe you. Say you want only me, Bradley had breathed, pressing his mouth against Colin’s jugular, feeling the blood pulse through skin still hot and clammy from the dancefloor. Like I want only you.
Colin’s breath fanned hotly across his cheek with a desperate lick of, Only you, Bradley, always you. Then, when the heat between them turned into loaded silence inside the cab home, Does it bother you? What I was doing?
A bit. Yeah, Bradley had said, turning away to the bleak nightscape rushing past. Finding Colin’s hand alongside his on the vinyl seat, twining their pinkies together, he’d turned to find Colin’s face impassive. Waiting. I won’t let it ruin this. Colin’s answering smile had been blinding.
“Yeah,” Bradley says, his heart lighter. “Still, this morning it’s the walk of shame for both of us, I’m afraid.”
“Oh God,” Colin groans into the pillows, burrowing deeper under the blankets.
Bradley lets the silence stretch, drawing his palm over Colin’s shoulder, hard and warm beneath his hand. “Col, I’m sor--”
Colin’s up out of pillownest between one breath and the next. He sits back on his heels and takes Bradley’s face between his hands. “Not now,” he whispers. “Me too, but not now. We’ll talk about it later, but we don’t have to yet. Let’s just--be. For now.”
“Okay,” Bradley breathes. “Okay.”
Ending the conversation, Colin’s lips are warm and dry, firmly pressed over his own. Bradley pulls him down tight, the scent of Colin’s sleep-hot skin so wonderful, so unexpectedly precious. I’m not letting go, he thinks. Not this time.
For all their years of this weird push and pull, it’s the first Sunday morning they’re spending together like this. He’s never before taken the time to appreciate the beauty of it, the comfort. Colin’s body is solid and strong, and the weight of him makes Bradley feel like his chest’s exploding with colour, breath caught in his lungs.
He fits his hand around Colin’s nape, kneading, tugging, pushing and pulling. Wanting distance so he can look at him, glut his eyes on Colin’s throat and the mole on his scapula, the crease of his elbow and the hair low on his belly, wanting it all. Wanting closeness so exclusive that they melt together with no room for a lick of air between them, only skin.
There are words trapped between their mouths, words like I and love and you. It’s too soon to say them, there are miles and miles of road they have to travel again after taking an epically wrong turn, but it’s okay. Bradley doesn’t need to say them yet. The taste of them is enough, for now.
And if they take their time leaving their sanctuary, well, so be it.
~Fin~
(Colin, Saturday, June 13th, 2015)
It doesn’t take long for Colin to find himself in that headspace again--the one where lying on the couch in the same pair of sweats for days on end, watching game shows on TV, eating rubbish food and cultivating facial scruff seems like a perfectly acceptable way to exist.
He hasn’t been here in years, but it’s as comfortable as a warm blanket, as easy as falling off a bike and scraping off three layers of skin. You never forget how to do it so it hurts just right.Of course, he calls Meghan after the initial panic wears off. It takes three days for Bradley’s words to sink in, and by then, Colin’s ripe for all the guilt to galvanise his nerves.
This is important, Bradley had said. We can fix this. Please, he’d implored.
Shocked right out of his comfort zone, Colin had flung those words back in Bradley’s face like a handful of dead leaves. Bradley had been trying to tell him something he’d have killed to hear years ago. They could have talked, really talked for the first time. All the things which had eaten at Colin for so long, the questions and the resentments--all of it could have been brought out into the open. It’s a kick in the guts to realise it was his turn to miss his chance, and he’d taken it, brandished it in Bradley’s face as though it was some kind of victory.
Another couple of days are lost in self pity and then in trying to get up the nerve to put things to rights. So he calls Meghan, only to find out Bradley had beaten him to it--had come looking for him, had been persistent. Had gone away empty-handed.
Colin asks for details of the encounter and has never had more affection for Meghan than when she refuses to indulge him. He knows then that he really fucked up, or else she’d not try to save his feelings by telling him as little as possible.
The only thing left to do then, is to shower, shave and sit on his hands for most of the day before braving his own conscience and venturing outside.
His fisted hand hovers in midair for long moments before he knocks on Bradley’s door, only to find it hasn’t been Bradley’s for nigh on two years.
The bus stop bench is hard and uncomfortable, doesn’t help at all in fighting back the choking lump in his throat. He feels completely fucking disconnected and more desperately helpless than in all his bloody life.
It’s days later that he finally gives in and looks up Bradley’s mum, and days later still before he picks up the phone.
Except that when he finally, finally calls, it’s not Mrs James who answers. It’s--is that--
“Stephanie?” he asks, voice full of wonder. He hasn’t seen Stephanie in so many years, but can still see the look on her face, panning between Bradley and himself over a tableful of Christmas food, saying, how old are you two again?, shaking her head in fond exasperation at their ridiculous behaviour, antagonising each other with absurd relish.
“Speaking.”
“It’s Colin.” There’s a silence. To be honest, Colin hasn’t thought much further than this. He almost expects--he doesn’t know, really. For her to yell at him, maybe. To hang up. To call him every single name he deserves. It occurs to him she might not know anything at all, that Bradley never went home. Something coagulates in the pit of Colin’s gut because if Bradley didn’t go home, Colin has no idea, no idea, where he is. What he’s doing. If he’s all right.
“Is Bradley there?” He asks before he loses the last of his nerve. There’s a small sigh on the other end of the line and more silence. He’s about to say something, anything at all when Stephanie says,
“He’s pretty upset.”
“Oh.” Colin begins to tremble and sinks down on the floor in the middle of his hotel room. It’s the closest surface. “But he’s there, right? He’s, uh. He’s with you guys.”
“He is.”
“Okay, that’s--” The breath that shudders out of him is rough and Colin has to blink at the sunlight streaming through his window because his eyelids are stinging. “That’s good,” he goes on, nearly whispering. “I mean. Okay.”
There’s another sigh and as he thinks about just hanging up, giving up, he hears her close a door. “He told me everything, Colin.” Blood pools hot and shameful in his cheeks. “Everything. I can’t even--I can’t believe what you did. I really can’t. It’s like, I don’t even want to put it into words because it makes me so angry I’ll cry. He told me what he did too, and don’t get me wrong, I yelled at him for walking away like a coward all those years ago. But he didn’t deserve this. He didn’t deserve this at all.” She pauses and he can hear the tremor in her breath, wonders if there are silent tears running down her face, or if that’s just him.
“I understand. I do,” she tells him, quiet and a little apologetic. Colin knows he’s not going to like what comes next. He braces himself. “But I don’t think you can fix this. Not anymore.” The resignation in her voice strums his hurt like fingers on an old guitar.
“Stephanie,” he says, the word splintering on his tongue. “I need to--to try. At least. I’m in town.” He almost expects her to tell him to piss off, to keep away from her brother, but instead she sighs, sounding so tired that Colin swallows a sob.
“Okay,” Stephanie says. Colin hears her sniff, muffled as if she’s turned her face away from the phone. “He went out, though.”
Colin tightens his grip on the phone, feeling like he’s pushing his luck. “Just out?”
“He didn’t tell me where he was going. For a drink, maybe. I don’t know, I promise, Colin. I really don’t know.”
“Okay. Yeah, that’s--thanks. Stephanie. Thanks.” Colin rubs his face, is about to hit the end call button when he hears,
“Colin?”
“Yeah?” he says, bringing the phone back to his ear.
“Find him.”
There’s nothing he could say to that even if his throat wasn’t seized closed. He’s aware she can’t see it, but a nod is all he can manage. He hangs up.
He feels a momentary flush of panic at how impossible it’s going to be, but in the end it’s not all that hard. Once he figures out Bradley’s still hurting as much as Colin is--maybe more now, thanks to him--he knows where to go.
Years ago, after Merlin’s first season had wrapped and they were riding the high of their newfound camaraderie, Colin let slip that he wasn’t going home for Christmas. He’d treated his family to a holiday and it didn’t make sense for him to go since he only had one week off, so Colin had planned to stay in London. It hadn’t even taken Bradley a second’s thought to invite Colin over. (Are you sure? -- Yeah man, the house will be packed and my family is crazy so, you’ll fit right in.)
Side by side they slept in Bradley’s tiny single bed. There was no room anywhere else and Bradley wouldn’t hear of Colin camping out on the floor. (You’ll bruise the floorboards with those elbows of yours.) He’d woken up wedged tight between the wall of plaster and the solid warmth that was Bradley, with a faceful of hair that even smelled like sunlight.
On New Year’s Eve they’d gone to this club. With the music thick in his veins and Bradley’s imperfectly gorgeous smile around every one of their weirdly brain-aligned dark jokes, it’s where Colin really considered kissing Bradley for the first time. Where it had been more than a wouldn’t it be nice sort of fleeting thought. It’d still been easily dismissed back then, this latent desire, this pull he’d felt. Something to linger in, to drift on like a castle in the air.
It’s one of the last carefree memories he has of the two of them together. It’s not that hard at all to figure out that’s where Bradley might go. And if he’s not there, well. If he’s not there Colin will leave him in peace. They’ve haunted each other long enough.
All that resolve is put to the test though, when Colin finally shoulders his way past the funnel at the entrance and into the club, just after one AM. The place is absolutely packed. It will take more than a poke in the corners to spot Bradley, if he’s even here at all.
There are so many bodies, so many people, all moving like the pulse of the place is alive inside them. Colin stands in the midst of it all, the noise and sweat, the music so loud that his teeth vibrate with it. Ultraviolet light filters down to the floor, where it’s all glowing eyes and bra straps, everything white is an iridescent underscore.
He finds himself scanning the crowd for that golden head, but of course, under these lights, everyone glows blue, then dissolves into black from the neck down. How fitting, Colin thinks. We’re all black from the neck down if you look long enough to see past the glow.
Could Bradley really be here, losing himself in this crowd? The song is inevitably fitting, too, perfectly vivid, an unstoppable flick-book of heartbreak. A soul without a mind, in a body without a heart, he knows the words. He feels them. His blood rhythmically floods his veins in time with the complexity in those words, and he’s bereft at Bradley’s absence. He’s compelled, absolutely pushed to search now, to find Bradley and to eat away at this distance between them, to make all this right somehow.
The feeling of loss is crushing, and Colin doesn’t think he can live like this, with this horrible ache, the great hole in his chest where Bradley’s warm bulk should be, even if it’s only friendship he offers. Even if Colin can never have all of him but the parts he’s allowed.
Jostled on all sides, he can feel the desperation on his face, the crease between his brows becoming deeper with every minute of disconnection. He pans around helplessly, wondering how in the hell he’ll ever find Br-
Colin’s heart sputters to life like an imprecisely stuck match and his hands fold at his sides, clutching at hope where moments ago there was only despair.
In the vibrating throng, with a backdrop of the fluorescent light show, Bradley is a man apart.
Colin’s eyes snag on the familiar set of shoulders, the stillness, something he always thought of as Bradley’s solid strength. He’d always admired the way Bradley’s body moves so deliberately, so sparingly, every gesture considered, where Colin’s limbs sometimes whip out and flail around with no aptitude for elegance. He has always loved Bradley’s innate stillness.
Tonight though, Bradley’s stance looks heavy. Overwhelmed. Colin watches in despair as Bradley lifts his hands to his face, rubbing at his temples. Tiredness is etched into the tilt of his face and the ghost of the weight tethering him to the ground, to this loud and busy place where he looks so lost. Colin wants to yell out, to stop the gesture before it imprints itself on his brain, because it’s so wrong for Bradley to be this sad, this alone, but the music is too loud and his throat so full of his heart, he can’t so much as whimper.
Colin starts moving without volition, just following his heart into the crowd, letting it weave its way through the throng of moving, dancing people, pulling him to where Bradley stands alone like a pillar, like he’s holding up the ceiling with his shoulders. Colin watches the crowd milling around him, parting disconcertedly around the oddity of a man unmoving in their midst, and his throat constricts at the sight of Bradley’s dejection wrapped around his body like a threadbare blanket for everyone to see.
He’s more and more desperate the closer he gets, pushing his way through the crowd, elbowing people out of the way, bouncing up on the balls of his feet to keep Bradley always in sight. And then suddenly, Colin thinks he finally understands ...how can you have a day without a night... and what that even means, because Bradley feels him, must sense Colin nearing. He turns, eyes locking on target, and Colin doesn’t know how he lived for years without those eyes trained on him, watching him, seeing him.
Colin has been half a man for years, refusing to acknowledge the scar where the shape of his other half mists like a ghost, and if Bradley rejects him now, Colin doesn’t know what--he’d be completely--
People move between them in every direction, but Bradley’s eyes track only him, and Colin can’t breathe from the stifling heat and the press of humanity, from the weight in eyes made black by the fluorescents above.
He thought he’d feel relief at finding Bradley, but there is only a desperate silence in his mind and frantic tugging at his insides where his lungs are supposed to be filling with air. He’s right there, Bradley’s right there just a few feet away and somehow getting closer. If Colin didn’t know it was impossible, he’d think he was carried along by the sheer force of the pull between them.
Colin doesn’t feel the jostling, nudging people all around him at all; can’t hear anything except the roaring rush of blood in his ears, until they’re face to face. Bradley is so familiar, so real. Colin doesn’t know where to look, so he looks everywhere, takes in everything at once, from the three-day growth which frames Bradley’s face, to the accusing grief in his eyes.
He opens his mouth for I’m so sorry, and God, I’m still so in love with you, and if you walk away, I’ll eat at myself until I choke, but nothing comes out, and Bradley just stands there with this look in his eyes like maybe Colin isn’t who he thought he was.
And maybe it’s the desperate longing in the song, or a wild flash of courage, or maybe Bradley is true north just as Colin had always suspected, back when he still entertained dreams of a great love. Whatever it is, instead of saying anything at all, Colin slowly inclines forward, closes his eyes like in a story, and meets Bradley at the lips, leaving all the words behind for another day, or maybe for never.
Under his eyelids, the strobe lights flare fast and hard, while against his mouth, Bradley gasps so softly, Colin’s not sure it happened at all. He pulls away to look, and his knees weaken at the sight of Bradley’s guarded eyes, so full of grief and longing.
It’s me, Colin wants to say, it’s just me, who loves you, but he knows words won’t cut it. There is nothing but a litany of words behind them and a precipice in front of them, and Colin’s doesn’t even realise it, but he’s already jumping.
He leans in once more and presses his mouth to Bradley’s so firmly, there’s the hardness of teeth beneath the soft flesh. He stamps himself there into Bradley’s lips, brands his name just in case there was any doubt. And this time, God, this time, Bradley presses back.
They make a bridge of their bodies, touching each other only with a kiss until Colin can’t stand it anymore. He gives in to the yearning and opens his mouth and breathes Bradley in, closing around him with the kind of breathless awe which makes his stomach drop and his heart explode into beats to rival the bass beat. He lists forward to feel the heat of Bradley’s chest and almost laughs out loud with joy when Bradley grips his elbow to steady him, drawing whorls there with his fingertips. Draw your name on me, Colin wants to say, write your name on what’s always been yours.
With music deafening his ears and strobes blinding him, Colin’s a sensory creature at last. Sweeping aside everything that isn’t Bradley and now, he lays his love into the grooves of Bradley’s mouth, into each crease of his lips. He touches them with the tip of his tongue, and when Bradley inclines his head just so in invitation, he falls in with abandon, kissing Bradley like he can lick away the bitterness of all that wasted time.
And God, it’s hot in here, but not as hot as the way Bradley huffs urgent breaths through his nose and clutches greedily at the muscle of Colin’s hip. It’s overwhelming how quickly they fall into sync with each other, bodies moving together like it’s intrinsic.
Bradley’s desperate fingers dig into the small of his back and the rise of his shoulder blade, everywhere he touches. The neediness answers all of Colin’s questions, the ones which start with do you still want and will you always and can you forgive with such beautiful honest abandon when Bradley gathers him in, holding him tightly against his chest, where Colin remembers once feeling so secure.
Colin inches his hands up until his fingers are furrowed under soft hair against Bradley’s scalp and enfolds him within his arms, bracing them over Bradley’s shoulders and hugging for all he’s worth. His face wants to split at the seams when Bradley’s hand glides up, and fingers sink into the hair at Colin’s nape, worrying and tugging.
They kiss until Colin can’t breathe, until his lips feel bruised and his face is raw, razed by Bradley’s stubble. They kiss until he’s sure he’ll always find his way home.
“I found you,” he laughs, the sound immediately lost in the din, talking straight into Bradley’s mouth, still kissing, their lips clinging to each other. He’s unwilling to distance himself at all, and his arms are so full of Bradley there’s no room for uncertainty.
Bradley yells something right back against his mouth, which sounds a lot like a laddie pissed chew but Colin is almost sure is probably bloody missed you and it might be wishful thinking, but suddenly nothing is irreparable.
In his arms, Bradley’s the most solid he has ever felt, really here, really present. Colin throws back his head and laughs, loud and rich like he can’t hold it in.
(Bradley, Sunday, June 14th, 2015)
It’s not at all like Christmas. Sunlight streams warm and summery through the window, strips of it laying like ribbons across pale skin. Bradley squints his eyes to follow lazy dust motes, counting Colin’s steady pulse as it beats against his arm.
Bradley spent his teens here, and echos of him linger in the corners, past-Bradleys sleeping and studying and all the other things teenage boys do; this room has seen it all. Pinholes and oily tac marks have long since gone from the walls, but there’s a presence here, safe like a sleeping bag to roll up in.
He thinks the sensation of waking up in this particular room, different from all the rooms in all the world, will never cease feeling like home. He knows the sounds of this room, the smells, the slant of light on his face. Knows it so well, it’s like a haven, deep in his marrow.
This tiny bed isn’t big enough for him anymore, let alone the two of them, and Colin’s wedged between Bradley’s chest and the wall, just like the last time they were here a thousand years ago. It’s hot and clammy the way they’re jammed up together, and Colin’s snoring should be annoying, but Bradley finds himself smiling anyway. He half buries his face in the pillow.
Reaching out to follow the shell of Colin’s ear with his fingertip, he registers a subtle change in breathing. Colin’s waking up.
Bradley leans in, open-mouthed and earnest over the spot, still red from last night, where Colin's pulse dances under the skin. He relishes the surrender as Colin stretches and presents a little more of his neck. Nosing the fine hair at Colin’s nape, Bradley murmurs, “Good morning,” in a tone that he hopes is husky and sweetly loaded, just like his mood.
With a massive yawn, Colin rolls over onto his stomach until the flex of his body and the breadth of his shoulders are almost enough to startle Bradley into falling off the bed, then settles back into the pillows, boneless. Bradley feels like he can never see enough of this sleep-soft Colin, never get enough of this feeling.
“Mhhmph,” Colin mutters, creeping a hand under Bradley’s t-shirt and flexing his fingers, lightly scratching Bradley’s belly.
Closing his eyes at the sensation, Bradley rolls toward it. He drapes himself over Colin’s body, slides his arm and his thigh across, loving every single thing about the way it feels. He presses kiss after kiss into the cotton over Colin’s skin, mouth following the curve of shoulder to the bare dip of neck until he’s mouthing at a soft earlobe and listening to Colin’s breath stutter and huff into the pillow beneath.
With his whole being craving closeness, he presses himself down and tightens his hold, bulldozing right into Colin’s body, a fistful of t-shirt the lifeline in his grasp. Nosing along Colin’s cheek, Bradley’s lips rasp along the stubble until finally, finally, he finds Colin’s mouth.
Unhurried, he nips and kisses at Colin’s lips, and the dry stick and pull of them is the only thing in the world that matters. He nibbles and tastes, a slow drag of lips over each other, something inside him tightening at the way Colin fists the bedding, his lithe body flexing in response to Bradley’s mouth.
Slipping his fingers into Colin’s hair, he pulls them even closer together, and licks at the fleshy center of Colin’s mouth with the very tip of his tongue, rediscovering how it makes Colin heavy and pliant in his arms.
“Last time you were here,” he murmurs, truths falling effortless from his mouth against Colin’s lips, kissing between words, “Could smell you for days, on the pillow, on my clothes. Everybody loved you, even the dog. My sisters made such a fuss, didn’t know whether to be glad or jealous they liked you more than me.”
Colin huffs a laugh, slipping his knee between Bradley’s thighs, teasing them apart with gentle pressure. “They didn’t like me that much. Last time I was here, your sister threatened to feed me raw chicken.”
The teasing grows insistent, Colin’s movements slow and rhythmic, his thigh firm and hot between Bradley’s legs, his voice falling rough over Bradley’s lips.
“That’s because you kept eating her cereal,” Bradley says, his mind not at all on the conversation, and very much on the growing heat between his legs, and Colin’s arms winding around him.
“I’ll stay away from her cereal this time, then.”
“Wise.”
Suddenly, all movement stops.
“Oh my God, I’m gonna have to face your mother, aren’t I?” Colin mumbles, covering his face with the duvet.
“Yup,” Bradley says. He’s trying not to grin but it’s a lost cause.
“Crap.”
“You scared of my dear old mother, Colin?”
“Scared? Would she know we had--we’re here?”
Bradley doesn’t say anything, just waits until Colin hazards a peek out from the duvet, then gives him a look. Colin groans pathetically. “She’s gonna eat me alive.”
“Rightly so,” Bradley tells him, rather smug. Colin is quiet for a bit, then says,
“I know.”
Ah shit. Maybe Colin was referring to other things. Bradley’s heart hurts a little for how vulnerable he looks.
“What she knows, is that there’s an Irishman in her son’s childhood bed, canoodling with said son, who thankfully is no longer a child because that would be creepy,” he explains, eyes trained on Colin’s.
There is a long pause while Colin considers this. “Bad enough, I suppose.”
“She’s never been the sort to tell me to be careful, you know. She’s always been the loudest of all the footy mums, shrieking at me to get in amongst it, get the job done.” Bradley pauses, eyes sweeping over Colin’s face. “Always let me fight my own battles.”
Colin grins.
“Now, my sister...” Bradley trails off, uncertain how to explain. “I needed to confide in someone. It was eating me up and I had to tell someone I trust. Can you understand that?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I can.” Colin rubs small circles over Bradley’s hip, the whirring of cogs in his brain almost audible. Half his mouth buried in the pillow, he says, “Are we okay, then?”
The echo of their words outside the club is sweetly tinged with the rasp of stubble against skin as they’d kissed and kissed. Tell me you’re not going back and I’ll believe you. Say you want only me, Bradley had breathed, pressing his mouth against Colin’s jugular, feeling the blood pulse through skin still hot and clammy from the dancefloor. Like I want only you.
Colin’s breath fanned hotly across his cheek with a desperate lick of, Only you, Bradley, always you. Then, when the heat between them turned into loaded silence inside the cab home, Does it bother you? What I was doing?
A bit. Yeah, Bradley had said, turning away to the bleak nightscape rushing past. Finding Colin’s hand alongside his on the vinyl seat, twining their pinkies together, he’d turned to find Colin’s face impassive. Waiting. I won’t let it ruin this. Colin’s answering smile had been blinding.
“Yeah,” Bradley says, his heart lighter. “Still, this morning it’s the walk of shame for both of us, I’m afraid.”
“Oh God,” Colin groans into the pillows, burrowing deeper under the blankets.
Bradley lets the silence stretch, drawing his palm over Colin’s shoulder, hard and warm beneath his hand. “Col, I’m sor--”
Colin’s up out of pillownest between one breath and the next. He sits back on his heels and takes Bradley’s face between his hands. “Not now,” he whispers. “Me too, but not now. We’ll talk about it later, but we don’t have to yet. Let’s just--be. For now.”
“Okay,” Bradley breathes. “Okay.”
Ending the conversation, Colin’s lips are warm and dry, firmly pressed over his own. Bradley pulls him down tight, the scent of Colin’s sleep-hot skin so wonderful, so unexpectedly precious. I’m not letting go, he thinks. Not this time.
For all their years of this weird push and pull, it’s the first Sunday morning they’re spending together like this. He’s never before taken the time to appreciate the beauty of it, the comfort. Colin’s body is solid and strong, and the weight of him makes Bradley feel like his chest’s exploding with colour, breath caught in his lungs.
He fits his hand around Colin’s nape, kneading, tugging, pushing and pulling. Wanting distance so he can look at him, glut his eyes on Colin’s throat and the mole on his scapula, the crease of his elbow and the hair low on his belly, wanting it all. Wanting closeness so exclusive that they melt together with no room for a lick of air between them, only skin.
There are words trapped between their mouths, words like I and love and you. It’s too soon to say them, there are miles and miles of road they have to travel again after taking an epically wrong turn, but it’s okay. Bradley doesn’t need to say them yet. The taste of them is enough, for now.
And if they take their time leaving their sanctuary, well, so be it.
~Fin~