Frank wasn’t a very heavy sleeper. You’d worn him down, over the years together. He was a man trained to stir at the slightest bump in the night; the upstairs neighbor stepping onto the fire escape, the AC whirring to life after a preprogrammed period. A man whose nightmares steered him away from falling asleep at all. It’s taken thousands of weekday mornings snoozing his alarm to get to the worksite, weekends turning them off altogether (who chooses to wake up at eight on a Saturday?) to turn Frank into a homebody. To convince him to spend weekend mornings pliant, limbs heavy and warm under a duvet like his were now.

So, he doesn’t rouse immediately when you touch him. It’s only when your fingers thread into his dark hair that he lets out a low sound, some mix of a heavy sigh and a grumble. Like a pitbull, you think again.

Frank only shifts slightly, his arm remaining anchored over your legs, but his face moving back to nose against your skin; this time, your hip, a move the hem of your underwear. The heatwave has you ditching your matching pajama sets, the ones Frank claimed made you look like a little Grandma. You’d given his shoulder a smack for that one.

“Morning, sleepy.” You mutter, gently scraping your nails across his scalp. He grunts in reply, cracking one almond eye open to peer up at you.

You smile down at him. He manages a lazier, more crooked one at you, and drops a kiss to your hip. His eyes close at the contact, and don’t reopen. When Frank finally opens his mouth, his voice is gravelly, slow to start. “..What time’s’it.”

Giving the clock on his nightstand a glance, you hum. “About eleven.” A longer, more sustained grumble from him. Much time passes like that, your fingers against his scalp, him making little effort to resist falling right back asleep, periodically making quiet and involuntary noises, grunts.

“Your hair’s getting long, Frankie.” You murmur eventually, with a tilt of your head. Another one of those old man sounds in reply. “Maybe you need a trim.”

“Y’think so?”

“Mm. We can get it done before breakfast,” you push the hair from his temple, internally considering the exact cuts needed.

“Sounds good.” But, he doesn’t move an inch. A minute passes, you in your own thoughts, before you catch his breathing evening again, and the subtle part of his lips.

“..Frank.”

“Uh.” He grunts, a muscle in his cheek jumping. You bite back a laugh.

With your fingers in the hair at his forehead, you gently tug his face away from your hip. “You’re falling asleep again.”

Frank cracks an eye, mumbling. “..m’awake.”

“Oh, are you?” You can’t hide a grin now. He makes an affirmative sound. Looking up now, you look around the bedroom. Morning light infiltrates through the thin white curtains, one of your many additions to his previously barren apartment before you. Where the sheets once only smelled like his cologne and faint musk, there’s a hint of your favorite linen spray and traces of the nightstand candle you like to burn in the evenings.

Well. That’s all what a deep breath of the space tells you, before you shuffle out from under the trap of Frank’s arm and stand with a small sigh. You stretch your arms above your head, twisting slightly to relieve the sleep-stiffness, and glance over your shoulder at Frank. Still in bed, laying in about the same position, though your absence made him shift further onto his stomach. The difference is that his eyes are open, only slightly bleary from sleep, and free of any hard creases or hardness. The only lines around his face now are the perpetual ones, from half a lifetime spent squinting and grimacing. There’s a softness, a near reverence to the way he watches you, bearded cheek against the fitted sheet that’s still bearing the impression of where your body was.

“You getting up, or what?” You hum, dropping your arms to your sides and turning slightly.

Frank nods simply, eyes not leaving you as he props a bent arm under his head, tucks his chin into the crook of his elbow. “Yeah, yeah.” A pause, where you grin and he huffs through the nostrils. He finally moves to lift himself up. “..Yeah. Getting up.”

—

“don’t leave it too long,” Frank reminds.

“I know!” You snip, both in tone and, well, wielding scissors.

He sits backwards on the closed toilet lid, his bare back to you. You’ve laid a dish towel over his shoulders, catching some of the brown strands of hair that fall as you cut. Being a hairdresser comes with exponential benefits; one being that you get to do your man’s hair exactly how you want it. He doesn’t complain too much.

It’s wet as you cut, you comb up sections to trim layers into with the shears you keep in the apartment. Your shared bathroom is quiet, save for sparse, unforced conversation and the sound of hair being snipped.

“Curt wants me to go back to one of those veterans.. group circle, things.” Frank mentions, offhandedly. He knows better than to give into instinct and bob his head as he speaks; with how long you’ve been together, he’s been reprimanded enough to learn.

“Yeah?” The subject would be touchy, if it were anyone but you.

“I think I might.”

“That would be good for you.” You agree. The conversation doesn’t die, but pauses for a good time. You move around him, taking more sections of hair with the comb. When you begin to trim the hair that falls around his temple, he turns his face to give you easier access.

You can feel his eyes on you, breaking through your concentration. You spare him a brief look. Sure enough, there’s that unreadable stare. “What?”

Frank shrugs, eyes averting to the far wall, you, who forgot that you were supposed to be giving him a brief look. “Nothin’.” You squint at him, then back to the task at hand. Stepping around him, you dust some hair off the skin of his back and reach for the other side of his forehead. He turns his face again for you.

Still staring. It’s practically tangible. You try to bite back a smile by the inside of your cheeks, cutting away as he speaks, “Damn gorgeous woman.”

You let out an easy laugh. Everything felt easy, when it was just the two of you. “Trying to compliment your way into a free haircut?”

Frank huffs at that, the corners of his lips turning up. “I thought livin’ together covered that.”

“Nope. Gotta pay the bills, y’know.”

“.. I pay those.”

“Whatever- turn around.” Frank shakes his head at you, but is unmistakably smiling as he turns on the lid to face you. He tips his chin up. That look hasn’t left his eyes; sweet content. Comfort. Some kind of quiet love, that couldn’t be louder to someone who knows how to read it on his features.

“Y’think I should shave it?” Frank mumbles, trying not to work his jaw too much as you bring the scissors to his beard. You scoff in disbelief.

“I’d kill you.” He laughs from the chest, brief and real. It’s a well known fact that you adored his gruff look. You only trim the facial hair, and you’re done in a minute. Carefully lifting the towel from his shoulders, you shake out the loose hair into the small trash bin beside the toilet as he stands to full height.

You can’t, and can never, resist raking your eyes down Frank’s chest, to his shoulders and arms; the movement of well-earned muscle under scarred skin as he makes his way to stand in front of the sink mirror.

He squints at his reflection, rubbing a large paw of a hand down his beard and turning his head this way and that. Coming to stand on tiptoes behind him, you reach up and shake out the freshly cut hair. He grumbles in interest, though there’s a crease between his brows.

“Left it kind of long, huh, sweetheart?”

You rest your hands on his shoulders, tipping your face up to peer at him through the mirror despite the height difference. “It looks better like this.” He grunts, noncommittally, his eyes moving from the haircut to you. “I’m the one who has to look at you, Frankie.”

A smile, toothy and lopsided, creases Frank’s features at that. He crosses his arms around his chest, covering your hands on his shoulders and muttering with a slight squint at you through the glass; “Well, you’re the boss, mama.”