#swiftywrites

come lay me low and love me clegan 7.5k

inspired by this textpost by @gydima

Years before Gale understands what arousal is, he watches two men grapple in an alley. 

It’s something to watch. Something to keep the sleep at bay for a few more minutes as their clothes rumple and their heels kick up dust. Mostly in shadow, Gale can only see because he’s been sitting in the dark for hours. Anyone walking by would likely think it’s no more than two alley cats sciffling. At first he thinks they’re drunk, settling a score started over a card table. Bodies pushing together then apart, soft panting noises like weeping. A crowd at their hips, hands in the mix grasping and pulling. 

Gale watches, breath a shallow ache in his chest and understands, through some sort of childish instinct, that this was something that should be kept a secret between him and the stars. 

Salt Drops, Chapter Five: the song of the homesick gael

The Bering Sea has a different taste than the Atlantic. Different more so still, than the waters of Lake Michigan. The salt, for one, and the cold. The freshness. The way it isn’t content to sit on John’s lips, but slips right inside to coat his teeth and his tongue. It’s hard to tell if the salt is so strong because of the water, or the smell of fish, bait, boats crusted with barnacles and other parasitic things that mistook the thick, sea-faring hulls for the ribcages of whales. The docks are the same, if a little more weathered, the wood nearing bone-white like a moldering skeleton, but the vessels aren’t the same fleet they were a decade ago, though John recognizes a name here and there. 

So much of that week was lost in a haze of coffee, exhaustion.

Salt water and sea air and endless, endless ocean. 

Cigarettes. Whiskey. 

Floodlights shining through a porthole onto a rumpled pillow. 

John shoulders his bag, the weight a familiar drag that he easily compensates against. He’s already smoking, lit stick dangling from his lips hands-free. The hustle and bustle is the same, a constant state of motion as men move back and forth loading rope and bait and belongings, shouting at each other, shouting at the gulls lurking above, shouting at the sea herself, saying hello. John’s familiar. A part of it. He knows how to wind through the chaos without disrupting it. He steps over men snoozing against bags of gear, waiting for there to be something to do or someone to find them something to do. The sky is a soft gray above, a promise of rain and unquiet seas; a drizzle that will start to fall soon. John can smell a little extra freshness on the breeze– water with no rot to it, no bite. It’ll bloat the wood soon, turn it slippery and dark like it was freshly laid. Rain is a good omen. 

If the fishing is for something other than Alaskan Crab. 

Salt Drops, Chapter one: Sea-Hoardings

Up near the bow of the ship, tucked away from any sort of chore or activity, likely because it’s the prime spot for the worst of the wind and spray, John’s gear is damp almost instantly, his hair blown back from his face as he gets a perfect view of the open ocean through the open maw of the harbor. It’s the perfect spot to feel the waves begin to grow bigger, grow rougher, each rise a longer pause before the fall until John feels like a bug stuck to the forehead of a galloping horse, each audible impact of the boat coming back down to the bottom of a wave a solid whump that makes John shiver.

The water is foamy and gray, a few bits of debris floating here and there on the surface. Probably only sixty, seventy feet deep here, but too cloudy to show any hint of fish or bottom. John can taste them, though. 

It hits him now, as the land passes him by and then fades out of sight of his periphery. The reality of what John has gotten himself into. There’s no getting bored, or getting tired, or giving up and going home. This is the most enormous, adult thing he’s ever done; no kiddie rails, no safety net. He’d signed an agreement that the boat isn’t liable if he dies. He’d listed his mother down as the recipient of any wages, if that were to happen. This is a real test. John finally doing something with himself. Or at close to it. 

Salt Drops, Chapter Eleven: as the tide comes in

He drags his hands over John’s chest, feeling the shift of skin, sinew, bone, the glitter of gray hair amongst the darker strands. He digs his nails in, weighing the shape of the man on top of him against the memories of a boy pressed flush behind him. He closes his eyes, hearing the sound of the storm outside. Like the crash of waves against a porthole window. Remembers with perfect clarity the overwhelming feeling of John against his back, skin to frozen skin, breath hot, the way he smelled of sweat and salt. How the crease of his elbow had tasted under Gale’s lips, parted just enough that he could hide the kiss in the middle of all the intense feeling. 

“Can you–” He catches himself, flushing hot with shyness. 

The words are spoken right up against John’s lips, garbled for how there’s hardly any room. They barely come out legible, but John hums curiously anyways. Gale swallows, audible and hating it as his chest clenches tight. He clears his throat slightly and tries again. “Can we–” 

John’s thumb traces over his cheek, from the corner of his eye down to the curve of his jaw, a soft, encouraging touch. Gale’s so hard he aches. He’s grateful for whatever ability John seems to have to read him, lids lowering with understanding. 

“Like last time,” he finally says to the soft room.

and this is junkyard love A Little Beasts Fic (7.6k)

“I’m not doing this here.” 

“Doing what, Buck? Taking an afternoon stroll? Last I checked you aren’t supposed to be turning away the needy and the godless. Did I miss Mass already? Or am I early.” 

“What can I do for you, John,” Gale says, as flatly far from a question as he can manage. 

Silently exhaling air through his lips, John makes a wounded face, though there’s something sharp to it too. The beginning signs of John rising to the confrontation. “Hell of an attitude, Father– sorry for swearin’.”

There’s a faint ringing in the deepest recesses of Gale’s ears, like distant tornado sirens. Something like hunger sits at the back of his throat, oily and slick. “You’re never sorry.”

“Maybe I mean it this time.”

“I have better things to do than play games, Egan.” 

“Somebody piss in your Communion wine?” 

“Jesus, John,” Gale breaks, frustration crackling into his voice. 

John clicks his tongue at him, one eye squeezing shut and a finger coming up to aim a perfect shot between Gale’s eyes. “I came for Confession.”

“You pulled that one already, remember?”

large, extra pepperoni, a caustin one shot

“Name’s Callum.”

Austin watches the shirt stretch over Callum’s back, emblazoned with a cheap, welcoming logo,“What brings you all the way to New York?”

Callum pauses, then looks over his shoulder, face creasing into the sort of smile that belongs on magazine spreads. He isn’t that much taller or bigger than Austin, but he seems to fill up the kitchen, hogging all the air and energy like he’s daring Austin to not share the space. “Came out here to do some modeling. Become an actor. Pizza’s just a side gig when the casting calls aren’t coming.” 

Austin watches Callum sling flour across a counter, drizzling it with practiced flicks of his wrist. “How are the calls comin’?”

Callum grins, grabbing a scraper and using it to dislodge a circular wad of dough from a bowl, dropping it onto the flour and beginning a complicated series of kneading and pulling to spread it out thin. His biceps are still mostly soft, but there’s a pleasant flex to them as he works the pizza dough into a circle with deft hands. “About to be the best damn pizza you’ve ever had, mate.” 

Austin grins, rubbing his cheek and looking down.

Salt Drops, Chapter six: cosmism

“Nice sweater, by the way, Buck,” John calls, ignoring the way Harry’s brows furrow in confusion at the name.

Gale half turns and looks down. For a moment, his face shifts into a look of shy surprise, self-conscious awareness. His cheeks pinken, and again, John sees right through to the boy he used to be. Gale smiles. Faint, self-contained and fond. “Ah, thank you. Marge made it for me.”

The name is familiar, plucked out of a handful of conversations over meals and pot-pulling. It isn’t the first of Gale’s sweaters made by her hand that John has complimented. He hadn’t been the only one last time with someone waiting for him back home. Hating to be second at anything, he can’t help but look down to Gale’s finger. Bare and empty, void of even a line of lighter skin like John’s. But maybe he’s the sort to take it off while working, perhaps he wears it around a chain like some fishermen tend to. The neckline of the sweater is high enough to obscure anything, but John sees no lump beneath.  

“Get your things stowed,” Gale tells him, quietly drawing John’s attention back to his face. If he knows where John’s thoughts had wandered, his face and words give no indication. “Then meet us up on deck. We’ll sign the papers after.”

John finds a grin in him, pushes himself off the table as well. “Aye, aye, Captain.”

Gale smiles, small and composed. 

Salt Drops, Chapter Nine: sea-mad

“Easy, John,” Gale says. “Easy. Can you hear me, Bucky?” 

Crosby comes skidding back, spraying them with water, making John flinch and twitch. With Chick’s careful lifting, they secure the collar around John’s neck, pushing the skin of his jaw awkwardly up, immobilizing his spine and any damage that might have been caused. Gale checks its placement all around.

“Lucky you’re a firefighter, huh Buck?” Curt asks.

The pot clangs against the side of the ship. 

“Firefighter, Curt, not EMT,” Gale says, pushing himself to standing. “We need to move him off the deck.” 

John lets out a quiet groan, then tries to sit up. He’s immediately pushed back again by several hands, Gale’s kneecaps clipping against the deck as he kneels again, pushing a palm against the center of John’s chest. “Hey, hey, hey, Bucky, need you to keep still for me.”

“Come on, man,” Curt says, “Captain’s orders.”