Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
ā Live Streamingā Interactive Chatā Private Showsā HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch ⢠No registration required ⢠HD streaming
Hi! I just came across one of your fics and really enjoyed it. Saw you prompt list meme, and I hope you don't mind me plopping in a prompt here. Please ignore me if you do. :) I'd love to see nr. 18 (āI donāt like the way they look at you.ā) for Jamie Winter (or WinterNelson).
hello! thanks so much, I'm glad you enjoyed the fic! <3 always open for prompts, just also a bit slow - hope this is okay!
[read on AO3] [send a prompt, get a fic, Eventually]
They have every opportunity for regret, and take none. Nelson sees no faces tilted up, trying to pick out the flatās window from street level. No last glance through a rain-flecked windscreen. No farewell flash of lights. They just drive off into the low cloud of the early evening, gunmetal car gleaming amidst Caustonās muted, drizzle-gentled tones. Might as well have been a pair of high-flyers leaving a moderately successful business meeting.
Nelson hadnāt really expected anything more. Heās not at the window because heād been waiting to wave back. Watching them go, yes, but in the way a sheepdog waits for a wolf to vanish beyond the treeline; seeing, being sure that theyāre out of Winterās life again.
That done, he glances down into his glass, swirling it so that the last of the wine dances with reflections. A dust mote, caught against the deep ruby of the surface, sits steady as the hand of a spun compass.
āI donāt think they like me very much,ā he says.
On the other side of the flat, Winter looks up from the sink, considering Nelson over one shoulder. Still just as quiet, his expression just as empty as it had been all through lunch.
āParents usually love me,ā Nelson adds, straightening, pushing himself away from the window. He paces past the table, setting the glass down with a faint scrape of crystal against hardwood. āIām told I seem very responsible.ā
It takes a moment, as though Winterās internal systems are lagging so badly that he needs time just to recognise him, but then he smiles, and itās real. Nothing like the polite, skin-deep efforts that heād been making all afternoon.
āItās not personal,ā he says, and thereās even a trace of a laugh in it. He turns away from the washing up bowl, flicking excess water from his hands, and reaches for a tea towel. āAnd you donāt like them much either.ā
Nelson stops. Heād meant to make a start on the drying himself, but Winter is already descending on the draining board with a studied intensity that clearly would have been frenzy, if heād let it.
āI donāt like the way they look at you,ā Nelson says, settling against a work surface instead. He hadnāt liked most of it, really ā the atmosphere had been so cold, and Winter had carried himself so stiffly, that they might as well have eaten outside, half-frozen in the November wind ā but that had been the worst of it. Their polite disinterest. When theyād shaken his hand with all the engagement they might grant a gate across their walking route. A four-hour lunch with only cursory attention paid to their sonās partner, like it didnāt matter to them who he was seeing. Theyād looked at Winter, at everything he was and everything he cared for, weighed it and found him wanting. āWhen they asked about your inspectorās examāā Ā Ā Ā
Heād wanted to step in, then. Had let his eyes flick over to Winter, trying to ask, silently, do you want me to defend you? Is that why Iām here? But heād got nothing back. Winter had just sat there, replied to his parents in a flat, level voice, blank behind it.
Nelson had tried to divert them anyway, throwing out a few questions about their own work, but heād known by then that he wasnāt saving anything. There had never been any chance at that.
āTheyāve always had high expectations,ā Winter says, in the same casual tone that he uses to talk about everything that hurts. āI barely saw them growing up. They were always out working. Wanted to send us to the best schools, make sure we had a good start.ā He slots a plate back into its place in the cupboard, utterly without force, a stark contrast to the anger that turns in Nelsonās gut like an animal seeking flaws in its cage. āThey just wanted more for me than the police, and definitely more than a dead-end job in Midsomer.ā
āMore than someone like me?ā Nelson guesses, but even with all that bitterness in his mouth, none of itās on his own behalf.
Winter pauses, back at the draining board. His fingers shift away from another plate, reach for a glass instead. He passes Nelson on the way to its cabinet, and lays a brief hand against his arm, the slightest shading of regret across his features.
āIāve known for a long time that nothing that makes me happy is ever going to be enough for them,ā he says, his touch a request that Nelson hears the part he thinks is more important. He does, but the rest of itās still too sour for him to taste anything else.
āAnd youāre just all right with that?ā Nelson asks. Wasted breath, probably. They wouldnāt be having this conversation if Winter didnāt think he could pretend that everythingās fine.
āI got used to it.ā The same sort of thing heād say about Misomerās climate. About immutable qualities of the world that cannot be altered, rather than two people whoād apparently never got over the fact that their son didnāt measure success the same way they did, and didnāt bother trying to hide their disappointment. āThey do try.ā
āNot hard enough.ā Nelson curbs a snarl, swallows the urge to snatch the tea towel, take Winterās hands himself. Whenever this had broken, it had been a long time ago. The boneās too knitted for sharp edges anymore.
He leaves it.
A few months ago, he remembers, Winter had told the Barnabys about their relationship. Theyād talked about it beforehand. Winter had been sure the Barnabys would have no problem with his sexuality. Heād known that they already liked Nelson. And yet, through every conversation theyād had about it, Winter had been tense, nervous despite his efforts to pretend otherwise. Dogged by a fear of something he wouldnāt or couldnāt articulate, right up until heād finally spoken to them.
Winter had asked him down for this over the phone, voice so level, so resigned, that Nelson had thought there might actually be something wrong with the line, up until heād heard it the same all through lunch. Heād made no occasion of the introduction.
So, Nelsonās here for him, not them.
He stays where he is, lets himself be the still point, while Winter finishes with the drying up, and then starts to move methodically through the flat, putting everything back the way it had been before his parents had come. Keeps going until itās all done and the darkās drawn in around them, and then he just stops. Stands there like a clockwork toy thatās run down.
Nelson steps in before he can feel it.
āDo you want to order in tonight?ā he asks, pausing beside him with an off-hand glance at his watch. āThere are repeats on until three, and theyāre showing the episode where Detective Ostergaardās trapped in a haunted hotel.ā
Heād usually expect a light, good-natured jab about his taste in television, but Winter just nods and smiles, lets Nelson lead him to the sofa and trusts him to order something heāll like, while he scrolls through the available channels like he doesnāt remember exactly which one heās looking for.
Winterās quiet, and he stays that way until so close before the end of the opening credits of their first episode that he might have measured it specifically to stop the conversation from going any further. Or maybe heād just realised it was his last chance to speak.
āThanks for coming,ā he says, eyes fixed on the screen and flickering with cold reflections.
Nelson exhales, his attention flickering away from Detective Ostergaardās crime scene, spattered with red thatās slightly the wrong shade. He has nothing he knows how to say, so he just takes Winterās hand, and raises it to kiss the inside of his wrist, a ghost of lips across his pulse point. Hopes that tells him everything. And then he lets go, brushing his thumb across Winterās knuckles.
They watch in silence for a moment, Kateās favourite pathologist spouting nonsense to camera with more conviction than the average person will ever feel, then Winter lets out a dragging breath, like heās trying to purge every corner of his lungs. He wavers towards Nelson, and Nelson leans in to meet him. Ā
This is why heās here, Nelson thinks, as Winterās head settles onto his shoulder, and he inclines his own so that his cheek rests against Winterās hair. Crap telly and a takeaway, a weight of warmth, someone who remembers the way back to normal. Just to be there, where heās needed.
With any luck, itāll be a long while until Winterās parents feel obliged to visit again. The food will be here soon, and thereāll be enough spice in it to burn the last of the bitterness off Nelsonās tongue. The wound will scab over again, and Winterās smiles will look a little less brittle.
winternelson with: āCall me when you get home.ā
[read on AO3] [send a prompt, get a fic in 1-5 business days]
Barnaby had hoped that his desk might be better. It isnāt worse, at least. He doubts anything could be worse than lurking around in that cold-lit hospital corridor like a premature haunting, nodding in splintered understanding as the doctors use words like critical and catastrophic, Sarahās hand in his, gripping so tightly that he should have felt his knuckles crack.
Itās the same, in a different way, at the station. Heād needed to be useful, but thereās nothing left to do. Every officer available had descended on this investigation like locusts, stripping the possible tasks until every scrap of evidence had been collected and examined and compiled into a neat little report that tells him that theyāre still no closer to determining who had left Winter for dead, bleeding and broken in the gathering frost.
Ground too cold for tyre tracks, no cameras for miles, any potential witnesses bundled up indoors the way anyone sensible should be on a freezing January night. Nothing from forensics at the scene, though theyāre testing for fingerprints on all the nearby gates, and theyāre still waiting on full analysis of Winterās personal effects.
No wonder that no one in the incident room seems to want to come anywhere near him.
Maybe he should just go back to the hospital. Heād be just as much use there. Itās not as if Fleur would welcome his presence in the lab.
A chime from his email heralds the arrival of Winterās phone records, and Barnaby pounces on it with the speed and desperation of a starving crow at carrion. The data spools out across his screen, lists of calls and numbers, reams of texts, enough to make his computer wheeze for a moment as it adjusts.
Barnaby had sent him two messages, that night. He hadnāt really noticed that Winter never answered either of them. Maybe, if he had, they might haveā
He swallows against the sting in his throat, and clicks into the file of voicemails, before leaning down to excavate his headphones from the depths of his drawer, yanking at the wire as it tangles, again and again, no relief in the dull force of it. Once theyāre finally free, he plugs himself in, and hits play on the first one.
āHi, Jamie, itās Charlie.ā The voice at the other end is so familiar that it takes Barnaby a moment to register the actual words being spoken, his jaw slackening. āSorry to ring in work hours. Turns out Iāve got some leave coming up, and I thought maybe I could come down. Or we could go somewhere together, if you like. Call me when you get home.ā
Nelson. Barnaby blinks against the hang-up tone, and for a long minute his body feels simply too heavy to move. He doesnāt know what heād wanted. A confession, perhaps, a name for Winterās assailant. A clear, plain-English explanation for what had happened, what heād even been doing out there in the first place.
Not this. Not something personal. Not something so personal that heād had no idea about it himself.
Heād been aware, he supposes, that Nelson and Winter know one another. Theyād met at Sarahās last birthday do, and a couple of times since, on the odd occasion that Nelson had come visiting. If pressed, he might have said that theyād got on, but heād spent the lionās share of that party either doing the rounds or hiding in the kitchen with Paddy, and he couldnāt say how much of that belief was just a vague awareness of shared interests. He remembers them sitting together, Winter sprawled in a garden chair like itās an art form, gesturing with a champagne glass, Nelson straight-backed, smile slow but sincere.
Winter had never mentioned him. Yet here they are. First name terms, making plans.
Barnaby shifts the mouse to select the next message, and canāt help his focus drifting past the monitor, to Winterās empty desk. It watches him back, a hollow monument, and he clamps his teeth together at the sudden impulse to make excuses to it. There still might be something in here that could help. He has to check.
āHello, me again. Working late? I did try texting, and messaging, but I suppose youāre out in the sticks somewhere, and the second you get back to Causton Iāll have drowned you in notifications.ā Nelson pauses for a moment, and Barnaby grimaces. The sticks isnāt inaccurate. Theyād found him miles from anywhere, a pale gash amongst the bramble and hedgerow of a field boundary. Barnaby hadnāt seen him there, though heād passed the ambulance on his way out. There had been enough of a picture left, in crushed grass stems and bloodstains, the skeletal branches of a handful of trees jagged overhead like the roof of a shattered cathedral. āI swear, Midsomer wonāt get proper phone coverage until itās obsolete everywhere else. Anyway, they did all go out at normal intervals. Look, this holiday thing, itās not urgent, they just want me to book it as soon as I can. Hope whateverās going on isnāt too grim. Call me when you can.ā
Thereās an unease, gathering in the low points of Nelsonās voice, papered over and rationalised, but still clear enough to Barnaby. A fear that he couldnāt quite stifle.
One that Barnaby will have to confirm. Someone else he loves, who this will punch a hole in. At least he hadnāt had to tell Fleur ā sheād already been at the scene when heād got there, tearing into some poor uniform for something, as if she could make up for the blotching on her face with the sharpness of her teeth. Sarah had been there when heād taken the call, and theyād felt it together.
He canāt even be sure that Nelson will be an end to it, not when Winterās personal life is apparently more immaculately compartmented than Barnabyās sock drawer. Nothing hidden, just neatly never spoken of.
āJamie,ā Nelson says, in the next voicemail, a shade more urgent, control wavering. āCall me. Donāt make me try Barnaby.ā
That certainly would have been an interesting conversation. Though, from the timestamp, not one that would have made any difference. Theyād had the call by then. Dog-walker. Sheād thought he was dead already. Barnaby had taken her statement, the odd-eyed collie that might have saved his sergeantās life sitting patiently, obliviously by her side. Heāll have to tell Nelson that, too, make sure he understands that there was nothing he could have done.
Barnaby clicks through again, despite the flat, heavy certainty in his bones that thereāll be nothing here, nothing thatās his to hear.
āYouāre not getting these, are you? I donāt know why I keep sending them.ā Nelson drags in a breath, raw over the faint static of the line. āI checked the local news. I need you to call me, text me, I donāt care, send me a carrier pigeon, Iām sure someone still has those down there, just tell me that wasnāt you.ā
Barnaby hasnāt seen the reports. Someone else ā the chief superintendent, probably ā had spoken to the press. Heād been sitting on one of those hospital chairs, listening to Sarahās breathing hitching beside him, waiting to hear Winterās odds on lasting the night.
Last one.
āSo, Iām on my way down. Nearly called Sarah about eight times. Not sure what Iāll do if youāre okay ā surprise visit, I suppose. That wouldnāt be so bad, would it?ā Thereās a thud of a car door from somewhere, a distant muttering of other voices, Nelsonās cracking quieter in response. āI started picking up Radio Midsomer in the car. Theyāve still not given a name, soāā He cuts himself off, half-sigh and half-sob. āI love you. Iāll see you soon.ā
Barnaby wrenches the headphones off like a noose from round his neck, and then presses his face into his hands, hard enough that false light sparks across the backs of his eyelids. Something about the way that Nelson had said I love you had felt like it was the first time. Evidence, he thinks, and hates it.
He pulls his phone out, so numb that it doesnāt even really feel like an action that he takes, then scrolls down to his lesser-used contacts, and makes the call.
Nelson picks up within a second of the first ring.
āSir?ā His voice is taut, aching. He knows whatās coming, would have taken it as confirmation that Winter was the police officer heād heard about on the news the second heād seen Barnabyās name on the phone screen.
āAre you driving?ā
āPulled over.ā
He hadnāt meant it as a traffic safety admonishment, and hopes Nelson hadnāt taken it that way.
āWe had to access Winterās phone,ā he says, and then stops. Gives that a moment to settle in, for Nelson to grasp what it means, for the turning of guilt in his stomach to subside. āIām sorry, Nelson.ā
āIs heā¦?ā
āTheyāre doing their best.ā It might not be enough. āYou shouldnāt have found out like that.ā
āCauston Hospital?ā Ā Ā Ā Ā
āYes. How close are you?ā
āAbout an hour. Give or take.ā
āSarah and I will meet you there.ā And heāll grant Nelson the dignity of telling Sarah about the relationship himself, he decides. Heāll check over the rest of Winterās phone records, excepting his message history with Nelson, and then make his way back to the hospital. āWeāll you soon.ā
āYes, sir.ā Nelson pauses, the silence thick with everything that heās stifled back into his throat. āThank you, sir.ā
Nelson rings off, before Barnaby can tell him he doesnāt deserve that, and then heās left alone in the incident room, at the centre of a wasteland of hush that no one here would cross. He swallows, strikes the damp from around his eyes, and makes himself focus in on the screen again. This, and then heāll make sure that Nelson doesnāt spend another second of this alone.
Itās not as if thereās anything more he can do, for either of them.
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
ā Live Streamingā Interactive Chatā Private Showsā HD Quality
Anya is LIVE right now
FREE
Free to watch ⢠No registration required ⢠HD streaming
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Midsomer Murders - All Media Types
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Charlie Nelson/Jamie Winter, John Barnaby & Sarah Barnaby & Charlie Nelson & Jamie Winter
Characters: Jamie Winter, Charlie Nelson
Additional Tags: Violence, Aftermath of a Case, Trauma, First Meetings, Touch-Starved, Threats
Summary: Winter meets a stranger in Causton.