GK, You Who Are My Home, Epilogue, NC17, Brad/Nate/Ray, 458
Epilogue
Nate’s fever breaks three days later.
He’s tucked into Brad’s bed, covers pulled low down his hips and spread out across the mattress on his stomach like he owns it. His face is pressed into a pillow, half-hidden from the room, but there’s enough of him to touch for Ray to feel his skin.
It’s a relief of such epic proportions that Ray doesn’t even know where to begin celebrating, but dragging Brad from the shower seems a good a place to start as any.
”You’re sure?” Brad asks, wiping his face with a towel slowly before he wraps it around his waist. He frowns but lets himself be led back into the bedroom.
Nate is still there, in the same spot Ray left him, the sun warm on his naked skin and a sleepy smile on his face.
”I might not be able to take apart a car or a computer and put it back together blindfolded, but I do know how to take someone’s temperature,” Ray says, shaking his head. He leaves Brad and crawls back on the bed, touching Nate’s forehead again. “He’s not hot anymore.”
Brad moves quietly until he’s sitting on the bed by Nate, nudging Ray’s hand out of the way so he can feel Nate’s forehead himself. “Yeah,” he says softly. “It’s gone.”
Ray relaxes when Brad smiles at him, and it’s amazing how the exhaustion is lifted from the both of them.
”Do you think we should call Doc and tell him?” Ray asks, touching his fingers to Nate’s shoulder lightly. “He threatened to kick down the door if we didn’t keep him updated.”
”In not so many words,” Brad agrees. He’s still smiling though, brushing Nate’s hair from his face and smoothing it down. “It can wait, though.”
Ray nods his head. He stretches out at Nate’s side, resting his hand on the small of Nate’s back, and smiles up at Brad. There are so many things he could say right now, but he doesn’t voice any of them.
But, Brad doesn’t say anything either when he stretches out on Nate’s other side, propping himself up on an elbow and covering Nate’s hand with his own, and the silence is comforting for once instead of oppressive.
Now that they know Nate’s going to be fine, that he’s okay, everything feels so much easier and lighter.
And maybe there are other things they could be doing, but now that the relief gnawing away at their stomachs is gone, they can’t think of a single place they would rather be.
Nate is here, he’s fine, and for as long as he’s sleeping between them, easy and deep, he’s theirs, and they’ll protect him and keep him safe.
Everything will be okay.
← | Index | →