Companion piece to:

Firehouse 42 - Brett’s personal life gets complicated when he’s assigned to ‘fix’ Firehouse 42.

Today sucks.

Brett knew it would.

The reception from Firehouse 42, it’s beyond chilly, in fact it’s practically glacial. It’s something he expected from the crew that swore blind loyalty to Vince Leone but not from his wildcard, Manny.

Avoiding eye contact, refusing to speak unless directly addressed, it cuts Brett right down to his core. The others, they think it’s a unity thing, part of their campaign to chase him out but Brett sees it for what it really is, the agony of a man forced to hide from his people, to keep a secret he fundamentally disagrees with.

This is going to end badly. Brett can see it coming, the same way you see that train hurtling towards a car stuck on the track.

When it does come, he’s kneeling on the floor of a dead man’s office attempting to rearrange the untouched stack of paperwork he found on his desk.

“No one’s been able to step foot in there since Vince passed away.” Manny had explained to him last night as they made dinner together in the kitchen. “There’s shit piling up but Jake’s a mess, Sharon’s checked out and I… it’s hard for me to see he’s not in there. It makes it real and I…”

His voice had broken then and Brett, he’d put down the knife he was chopping salad with before gathering his lover up in his arms and cradling him close. That grief, it still hits, even months and years down the line.

He’s pulled from his thoughts by a knock on the door, a gentle rap that he recognises. It creaks open and Manny lingers in the doorway, his boots barely touching the line of the threshold. He stares at the papers on the floor and then at Brett, who has his readers on as he sifts through the debris.

“This looks complicated.” He remarks wryly and Brett shrugs his shoulders, careful not to disparage the mentor that Manny holds so dear to his heart. The truth is there’s shit in here that should have been done long before Vince’s death, stuff the Battalion Chief assumed he’d eventually get around to.

“Look…” Manny begins, stepping inside and closing the door behind him. He leans against the wood, his teeth gnawing at his lower lip as Brett removes his glasses giving him his full attention. “I told them Brett, I just told them about me and you.”

In that moment Brett’s world implodes because his wildcard, he can be the most emotionally intelligent man in this world, but he can also be so fucking stupid.

“They’re my family.” Manny fills the silence as Brett sits there trying to process this new development. “I can’t keep secrets from them, and this” – he gestures between the two of them-“is a pretty big secret. They already know that I’ve been seeing someone, that it was starting to get serious...”

“You don’t understand what you’ve done.” Brett says, the muscle in his cheek twitching as he tilts his head away unable to look at Manny. “I wasn’t out yet, not to CalFire and this…”

For a long time, Brett thought he was straight. Then his wife died, and a year later he ended up taking a guy in a bar home with him, and that experience… it had been life altering. The fact he swings both ways is something he’s still coming to terms with even though he’s very much in love with a man.

“So, this was about the CalFire boy’s club.” Manny summarises, crossing his arms over his broad chest. “Good to know.”

“No.” Brett bites back with a fury in his eyes. “This was about me figuring my shit out.”

“You told me you already had that shit figured out.” Manny rebuts, his tone matching his fierce energy.

“My feelings for you certainly, but not the rest of it.” Brett snaps exasperated, running his hands through his unruly curls. “Now I’m about to be called up in front of a panel for not disclosing my relationship with the Captain of the firehouse I’m overseeing, the one I’m supposed to be making a decision on whether to close or not.”

The expression on Manny’s face, it looks like Brett’s slapped him. The colour drains, turning his skin ashen as he stares at the man he loves. “You didn’t tell me that, you didn’t say there was a possibility that that could happen.”

“The writing is on the wall Manny, you guys don’t function like team.” Brett informs him, dread in his chest as his phone starts to ring on the desk. He rises to his feet, each step filled with apprehension. “We have Jake and Bode tearing each other’s throats out, Audrey wavering between leaving and staying and Eve poring her time into the regeneration of Three Rock. You are the only one that is present here right now, and you’ve just fucked the only ally you had.”

“Brett I…”

But Brett’s already cutting him off with the sweep of his hand as he picks up his phone, his thumb resting on the screen.

“I’ve got to take this call.” He tells Manny, his voice steely as he stares at the number. “It looks like one of your ‘family’ has already reported a conflict of interest.”

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Manny shifts in his sleep, nuzzling closer into Brett’s warmth, and Brett’s grip on his lover tightens. His mouth chases up the side of Manny’s neck, teeth grazing that ticklish spot underneath his ear. Part of Brett wants him to wake up, for Manny to take him apart all over again but he also enjoys the serenity of this, the calm before the shit storm.

Firehouse 42, it’s going to be a nightmare, he just knows it.

Manny’s adamant they’re not as sloppy and undisciplined as Brett saw at Vince Leone’s memorial service, but he isn’t sure he believes him. His man, he had a big heart, it’s one of the reasons Brett fell in love with him. But it blinds him sometimes too.

He tries to slip out of the sheets as stealthily as possible when the first rays of sunshine filter through Manny’s bamboo blinds. He thinks he’s made it until he trips over one of his boots in the darkness, kicking it into the dresser. Manny jolts awake at the sudden noise and Brett feels like a god damn idiot.

“You’re leaving already?” Manny asks, his voice rough from sleep as he props his head up on his hand. God Brett loves that gruffness, he loves the sound of it in his ear when Manny’s inside of him, telling him he feels like fucking heaven as he jerks Brett’s dick.

“Yeah.” Brett says sheepishly, his palm rubbing over the nape of his neck. “Shift starts at 7am and I want to get there early. That means I need to get home, shower, change and then drive back over here.”

“Or…” Manny drawls as watches Brett search for his other boot. “You come back to bed, we shower at a more reasonable time, and we go in together.”

“Can’t do that.” Brett says abruptly, and the expression on Manny’s face…

It’s like he just drove a fire axe into his chest.

“Right.” Manny says, pursing his lips together as he rolls onto his back and stares at the ceiling. “Because you don’t want anyone to know we’re together.”

“It’s not that.” Brett scowls, jamming his foot into his boot. “You know it isn’t.”

“Kinda is.” Manny retorts without looking at him.

And he’s right, it kind of is but not for the reasons he thinks. Manny, he’s a good guy, and Brett… well he’s an asshole. The biggest fucking asshole in CALFIRE if anyone has anything to say about it. The two of them together it shouldn’t work but it does, because Manny, he actually sees Brett. The man underneath the reputation, the toll it takes.

The problem is, Brett’s about to walk into a hostile environment, he’s about to become the enemy, and if people find out about him and Manny, well Manny, he’ll become the enemy too. That’s not what Manny needs right now, not when he’s grieving his friend and mentor. He needs his firehouse family around him, supporting him just as much as he supports them.

“Manny…” Brett begins, thrusting his foot into his other boot before he sits down in the wicker chair and begins to tie the laces. “I don’t want to leave it like this.”

“Then don’t leave.” Manny responds. There’s an edge of pleading to his voice that eviscerates Brett. He wishes that he could just climb back into that bed. He’d kiss him until he’s breathless, until he forgets that they’re actually fighting and they start to make love all over again.

“I have to.” Brett asserts, raising to his feet and Manny’s disappointment it radiates through the room as he turns his back to Brett, his shoulders hunched.

“I’ll see you at the firehouse.” He says softly but Manny doesn’t respond and Brett doesn’t expect him to. He’s hurting right now and Brett, he can’t help with that no matter how much he may want to. What he’s doing is for the best, he feels that in the depths of his heart.

Today, he thinks as he closes the bedroom quietly behind him. Today is going to fucking suck.

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