" mmm -- ya hurtin' again, red? " his voice is low and groggy, tired eyes looking over the man next to him. at the very least, he knows if barney's aches are bothering him, he can provide some relief. he works to shake the sleep off, blinking hard once, turning up his temp. tom opens up his arms to him, eyes swimming with the still clutch of exhaustion and sweet, sweet affection. " c'mere. "
softness / @bringsfires / always accepting
SNOW WAKES HIM ; not needing to see gentle flakes melt on the windows to know it’s there. Age old pain from years new and old alike radiating within. Blossoming into reaching petals that leave aching kisses along his spine. There’s a numbing comfort in it. The pain. A constant in a life filled with unknowns; a bud that always, always blooms.
He hadn’t meant to wake Tom with his movements. Hadn’t wanted to share the moment with the one he shared a bed with. Not because he liked to keep things from Tom; not at all. But who wanted so obvious a reminder that mistakes haunted?
Caught, however, he shudders. Feels the leaves of his own, shallow attempts at discretion fall away. Baring ugly thorns of a mess of scars, littered on his skin.
“Just a little…” A hand wipes his face, features drawn and tight. Too tired to lie. Tongue licking chapped lips, as if to draw out something else, anything else to say. Yet nothing comes. “Just a little.”
Silence ticks by; snowflakes swirl under street lamps. And for a long moment the misery of the season threatens to blow in with the first winter storm. Bringing sharp reminders of battles lost.
They’ve both lost so much. He’s not eager to bring another reminder of his own into what the shining jewel of what they have. Hates when Tom catches his eye with a knowing Look that makes Barney wonder if perhaps he himself wasn’t the one who hadn’t been brought back to life years and years and years later. It would at least explain the depths of years he feels in his bones. (Would excuse him for succumbing to weakness sometimes.)
He turns then to tell Tom to sleep. The morning always brings some kind of relief and this will be no exception. But words find themselves burning like flash paper in Tom’s eyes.
Bright blue, hot flames crackling within the dark, smelling of smoke and cedar. Calling him nearer like the proverbial moth. And as the chill of the room blankets his face, his neck, his hands, he finds himself craving just what Tom offers. Heat exuding even in the distance between him.
(When did that warmth begin to feel so much like home?)
For a long moment he watches Tom watch him. Silence stretching and yet everything said clearly. C’mon, Barns, come back. And surely, surely there isn’t anything wrong with leaving the cold, lonely fight against himself for just one night.
Without a word at all, he lays back down. Pressing aching back against Tom’s stomach. Feeling arms wrap around him, finger tips tracing and leaving heat trails even through his shirt.
A sigh slips from him as old wounds begin to relent, pain cracking frost like patterns before beginning to drip away.
And as the pain begins to dissipate, he feels it zing through. That funny feeling he knows now is called peace. What a thing that is; casting off the old ache for something vibrant and beautifully new. Long since forgotten and planted now in the safety of blue fire and smoke scented skin pressing the tip of a nose into the back of his neck.
Tears prick his eyes. In pain, in relief, likely both if he knows himself at all. “Thanks,” he says softly into the dark, grateful for the privacy the night gives.
>There’s no better feeling, he thinks, than Tom’s arms squeezing gently, oh so gently, in reply.
