#beekeeper anon

There is a decided learning curve to how they manage to make things work in the future.  It’s incredibly difficult, and living apart for so long when Adam is in grad school in California doesn’t help.  Seven years of only seeing each other for a few weeks at a time doesn’t lay as much groundwork for co-habitating as they thought it would, considering how comfortable it always is when Adam comes home from school or when Ronan went to stay with him at his apartment.  It’s a gross miscalculation on their part.They fight, a lot and often and sometimes violently--never with or at each other, mind you, but at things because they both struggle with anger and violent impulses.  There are a lot of slammed doors and punched walls, days and nights spent anywhere but with each other, packed bags that idle in cars for when things finally break for good, shouting matches and silent treatment.There is also a lot of making up and quietly reuniting and lots of apologies and don’t leave like that agains and I missed you, you assholes. There’s waking up and finding the other came back sometime in the middle of the night.  There are times when their friends need to intervene to make them talk to each other.  There’s make-up sex.  They do figure it all out, eventually.  Adam starts DBT.  Ronan, for several years, stops drinking.  They learn how to talk to each other and how to disagree without it turning explosive.  They get used to living together, settle into routines and habits.  They stop being complicated and difficult and start making compromises and things become simple without either of them realizing it.Like I said, they do learn how to take care of each other.  And things get really good between them!  They surprise each other with favorite meals and TV/movie nights and they binge watch shows together.  They get into a fierce and years-long argument over whether or not the Dragon Age or Mass Effect series is a more solid series and it’s only resolved when they play each other’s series and agree that both have their own merits.  They have favorite podcasts they listen to on long car rides.  Ronan gets especially tense when he’s stressed out over things at the Barns; when he was younger, he’d drink himself stupid or get into trouble with his car until he felt better.  Now he goes a few rounds with his punching bag or goads Adam into getting rough with him (wink wink, nudge nudge).  Adam has difficult conferences around the country and demonstrations that don’t pan out and he just needs Ronan to pet his hair and hold him close until he stops beating himself up for not always having things go off without a hitch.  There are, sometimes, I love yous.  It does not mean for them what it means for other people and they both know that.  Adam might not love Ronan the way Ronan loves him, but he always comes back to the Barns.  Without fail.  That alone is more than enough for Ronan.

The hair moves and some of the feeling starts to come back to his hand.  He flexes his fingers, grimacing through the pins and needles as he tries to figure out how to get out of this without disturbing his companion, and something licks his fingers.  Even numb, the sensation is unmistakable.“Ugh.”  The hair whines at him and turns and licks his chin.  Adam wrinkles his nose and turns away from the attention and gets a very wet nose pressing into his Adam’s apple.  He clearly made himself quite cosy overnight.  “Fox, come on.  Lemme up.”  Fox does not move and rolls onto his belly, cutting off the blood in Adam’s arm again.  Adam rubs Fox’s belly and says, with more sternness than he feels, “You’re lucky you’re cute.”  Fox’s tail wags and his tongue lolls out, breathing dog breath on Adam’s face.  “You’re gross.  Get up.”The dog blinks his amber eye and rolls onto his side before standing up, leaning over to nose at Adam’s face again as he stretches and gets up.  He twists as Adam goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wash his face, and eventually follows after to sit in the doorway and watch.  Adam watches him back.This wasn’t supposed to be permanent, but now the idea of waking up and being alone again in his apartment is hopelessly depressing.  He’s even getting used to waking up spooning Fox, who doesn’t seem to understand the “stay at the foot of the bed rule”.  He really is lucky he’s cute.  Fox mostly watches Adam go about the rest of his morning, with a kind of patience Adam hadn’t anticipated when he agreed to foster him.  He seems perfectly content to wait until Adam’s ready to take him out most mornings, so long as Adam pets him everytime he walks past and so long as he gets his breakfast on time.  “Spoiled,” Adam tells him, like he does every morning.  The dog eats better than he does, but he’s loathe to admit that he prefers it that way; he didn’t bring this thing into his house to not treat it properly.  Fox, for his part, never contests being called spoiled and seems to revel in it.  He dances a little as Adam fills his bowls and wraps his medicine in a piece of cold-cut turkey.Across the room, Skype chimes at him.  Adam sets the bowls on the floor and steps over Fox to answer the call.  “So I was on the bus today,” Noah says, without preamble.  “And this dude in a suit sits next to me with a legal pad that just had the word ‘muppets’ written on it.”“You saw that on Tumblr,” Adam says.  “You need new material.”Noah huffs and takes an indignant drag from his cigarette.  It might be a cigarette.  It might also be a joint.  Adam can’t quite tell.  “I don’t have the time to be genuinely clever anymore.  Being an adjunct sucks, man.  It’s like having a job.”Adam wanders back into his kitchen to get his coffee mug, patting Fox as he goes.  “It is a job.  You’ve been there for almost three years.”“Don’t remind me.”  Noah takes another drag and peers into the camera like he can see into Adam’s apartment better.  “Every day gets me closer to my tenure.  Where’s Fox?”“Eating,” Adam tells him when he comes back.  “It’s raining and he hates getting his feet wet, so we’re waiting for it to stop to go for a w-a-l-k in the p-a-r-k.”“Same, if by all that you mean enjoying my day off doing fuck all.”  It’s definitely a joint, then.  “Have you heard from everyone?”  Adam goes to his email in another window, deleting notifications from job hunting websites trying to get him to become a CDL driver despite his chosen parameters, and apartment listings that are no longer relevant.  There’s even a good, old-fashioned porn bot hiding in his spam folder, highly suspect and definitely carrying something unsavory.  It spelled his name wrong (Ada Paraishe sounds like a nice girl, though) and seems to think he’s interested in frisky “big-titted” co-eds, because, obviously, he is, possessing both a dick and a college degree.  It gets deleted.  Another, from an adult site he does subscribe to, gets filed away for later perusal.  “They’re good, enjoying the open road and Gansey’s semester off.”  Noah is reading something else on his screen, his tone slightly absent.  “Henry said they might head out this way if we can make the time to see them next month.  I told him I’d talk to you about it.”“Far be it from me to get in your way.  They’re all, like, yours.”  “They miss you, too, and it’s not that far out of the way when they’re driving aimlessly across the country like this.  He said they’d bring Ronan.”Adam makes a sound that’s equally laugh and groan.  Fox trots over to see what’s wrong, jumping up on his hind legs to whine at Adam’s neck.  Dismayed, Noah asks, “Did you fight?”“No, no, we didn’t fight.  He’s coming in a few weeks, spending the month.”  He sets his mug down to scratch Fox roughly about the ears the way he likes it.  “Fox misses him.  Don’t you?  You miss Ronan?”  Fox’s ears go back and his tail wags so hard it makes him stumble.  He whines and looks at the door like he’s expecting Ronan to walk in at any minute.  “Just Fox, I’m sure,” Noah muses.  “It’s definitely just Fox.”  Fox waves his paw at Adam for more attention the moment he looks away.  “You just miss getting laid, you fiend.”Adam laughs.  “Yeah, that’s all I miss.”Ronan got a hotel room for that exact reason, at least for the first few days.  He was strangely prudish about being despoiled in the dog’s presence.  It’s like he’s forgotten that Adam’s apartment is nearly three times the size of the one he’d had in New York, with enough doors to keep Fox out of the bedroom for an hour or two.  Or more.  Probably more.  It’s been three months.“Your hands are probably all calloused again,” Noah says.  His grin is salacious.  “He’s gonna love it.”“If you think I’ve been jerking off to the point of having callouses, you’re more stoned than I thought.”Noah looks at his joint, considering it for a long, long moment, before shrugging and bringing it to his mouth again.  “Whatever.  I don’t have anywhere to be today.  Tell me I’m wrong, though.  I know I’m not.”Adam raises his eyebrows.  “You sure about that?”“Is that an invitation to investigate my claim?”“Six hours isn’t that far.”“It’s an hour by plane and if you keep joking like that and I’m gonna get the wrong idea,” Noah says.“Joking or not, you already have the wrong idea,” Adam retorts.  Fox rests his head on Adam’s thigh and huffs, his one eye meeting Adam’s and glancing at the window meaningfully.  Adam leans over to lift the shade.  “I’ve gotta go, sun’s finally out and Fox is probably dying.”Noah waves the joint at the webcam.   “Go, enjoy your outing and your vitamin D.  I’m trying to not look stupid at the next faculty meeting, I’ll be here all day.”  He doesn’t wait for Adam to disconnect and ends the call.Adam pulls shorts on over his boxers and rummages around for a clean pair of socks while Fox’s patience starts to run out in the next room.  He even starts whining, guilting Adam into nearly forgetting his keys.  As he gets Fox into his harness for the day, he apologizes (”I know, buddy, I know, I’m hurrying”), his phone buzzes.  hey loserAdam smiles, responds, and tucks it into his pocket as he ushers Fox outside.Hey yourself, Lynch.