Archive of Our Own

It wasn't even a serious conversation. Not to start.

Ronan tipped his head, crown against the soft flesh of Adam’s thigh.Wrapped an arm around his shin, tugged until knee settled over the exposed skin of his shoulder— flamboyantly intertwined, skin-to-skin, bare and hot and possessive under public eye. Or, the discerning eye of Cheng, across on the other sofa, eyebrow raised while Ronan made himself busy fiddling with Adam’s ankle, pressing thumb into bone, digging and grinding pad against the intoxicating and easy jut. Gansey, too, noticed, and was polite enough to look away. Blue, not scandalized, more desensitized. Adam’s easy melt into the simmering heat of exposure, body-to-body. Enjoyed draping, being draped, touching. Eventually, through exposure, his starvation for contact had faded into a constant, ravenous hunger— eagerly indulged, fed on a regular schedule. The desperation and frenzy remained, though Ronan had enough sense to know that had more to do with him than craving for touch itself. Adam wanted, recklessly, fiercely, insatiably. It had taken cautious prying, years of it, to coax that out of him. Ronan considered that, above anything else taken from his head, the greatest fruit of his labour. 

This, mindless and easy contact, unraveled something deep in him. Like he’d spent eighteen years clenching his fist, and finally, finally released tensions. Let fingers splay. Blood through appendage. 

Inhibitions and guard down. Ease made tongues and lips loose. 

“You are not pro-life!” Sargent was saying, hand around cup; ice clinking against the rim. “That’s ridiculous!”

“Are you surprised?” Henry pointed out, “Mr. Sunday Mass? That’s, like, Catholic trademark. They get five things, and that’s one of them.”

“We have more than five things.” Ronan said, “And I don’t really give a shit, okay? It’s not my business. What do I fucking care? I just know that life is sacred, or special, or whatever, and we’re taught to cherish it. So, yeah. Whatever. Like, kill it if you want. But don’t call it something fancy.”

“Adam killed a man.” Blue pointed out. 

“No I didn’t.” Adam said, lazily dancing his fingertip along the nape of Ronan’s neck, up to the jaw, along the shell of his ear; descending, nail grazing in a feather tickle. Rivulets and poorly-restrained delights when Ronan shuddered, immediately and instinctively responsive. “Inaction, by nature. Lack of action. I didn’t do anything. He had it coming.”

“Would that hold up to a jury?”

Adam glared at Henry, for that comment.

“He didn’t kill anyone,” Ronan insisted, “And it’s a different thing.”

“Yeah, one of them is killing a person–”

“They’re both killing a person.” Ronan said, “Technically. Except he didn’t. But yeah, if you got an abortion, you’d be killing a baby. I don’t know. I don’t think about it a lot. I stopped paying attention when they brought in the bees.”

“Are the bees vaginas?” Henry asked, “Now, that doesn’t make sense.”

“Bees are lead by queens, I’d argue–” Gansey began.

“Chainsaw.” Ronan offered, “I’m raising her. Raven boys. Obviously, the bees are the vaginas.”

“I don’t think you’re going to enjoy the associations you’re making.” Adam drawled, and his pinkie curled along scapha, just sharp enough it could have ached for all the absence of nerve endings. There weren’t enough sensations to satisfy the need for constant sensation, “Blue, you're not going to get anywhere with him on this.”

“What,” She scowled, “You've tried?” Legs thrown over Gansey's— not as outrageous or perverse a display, but it staked a claim; teeth marks would have been less overt. Ronan knew the urge. Everyone under the sun had, as of late, said he and Sargent were made of the same core stuff— same compound, same bits of matter, same chemical bond with poorly attempted snips. He didn't see it, usually. 

She shifted, rest the heel of her palm along Gansey's shoulder. 

Usually.

“He won't budge. And it's not my business.” Adam shrugged, “That's not really something for me to worry about. Won't have to, really.” He scraped the back of his knuckles over the fresh prickle of hair along Ronan's scalp. Another poorly disclosed shudder.

And it was that, over all the contact and the press of Adam's foot where it had imprinted, heel digging into Ronan's stomach, that delighted more than all else. Won't have to. It triggered something ferociously enthusiastic in him. Nothing to worry about. Adam had him; obsessively and eternally; hands on him, discussing a future with him as his sure thing. For someone so determined on concrete, no dares or leaving up to chance, the faith inherent in the sentiment said enough. 

“Sure.” Blue scowled, “Of course you can say that. It doesn't apply to you. Not like you can get Ronan pregnant. Bet you'd change your tune.”

“You can try.” Ronan joked, “Go ahead, give it a shot.”

Adam huffed in laughter, and his leg moved in, a bit closer. Invited Ronan to turn, nuzzle, murmur the tail end of his sentence along the sensitive spot behind his knees, up to the middle of his thigh where shorts had shifted up. Summer draped sweat and lethargy in a heavy blanket, and it presented in the barest traces of sweat he picked up along his tongue. “Later.” Adam said, and he meant it as a joke. It was a joke. 

“Gross.” Blue said, where Ronan went silent and no one, really, noticed.

Hands clasped into the give of his shoulder, into the divot between joints to near elicit pain. Not really, because Adam never hurt, just toed the line. Pulled back before rosy indents blossomed to orchid bruises, before muscle did more than phantom ache, before fingers could ache more than cramp, before breath could really hitch or blood flow could cease. 

He noticed, because he always noticed, and he worked the reminder into the precarious composition of shoulder and clavicle to breastbone.

Adam noticed. He didn't let it go.

•••

Adam, in general, was good at giving Ronan what he wanted. They both were. Wordless and synergized; Adam wouldn't ask, Ronan didn't always know what to ask so they stumbled along roadbumps piecing it together along the way. Ronan liked that Adam didn't make him ask— because chance was Ronan would say yes, because with Adam it was nearly always yes, and Adam enjoyed uninhibited permission to take without the blow to his pride.

This time? Shift, in tempo; in dynamic. Adam was observant, that was a fact. Ronan, more attuned than credit often granted granted— well-studied in the nuances and minutiae of Adam’s expressions. When he lingered on words, in rooms; in moments, on concepts. More to discern in the unspoken, in the beats between sentences. When Adam found himself wanting, he never approached with a shame or hesitance, but he combed over, held up to scrutiny, twisted and examined from each angle until every polish, chip, flaw could be sanded or danced about to avoid the cut. Preparatory, when he thought through every contingency, every area where the ball could roll too harsh downhill. It meant Adam loitered on topics, on concepts; with eyes, hands, words. It meant Adam spent the remainder of that evening, hand pressed to Ronan’s shoulder— drifting, down, down, down. It meant Adam dug his heel into Ronan’s stomach, partial breath restriction, until Gansey glanced their way and Ronan burned in some muddled jump rope of elation and humility knowing it would take seconds to parse together why Ronan had fallen still. It meant Adam was burning a thumb, now, into the press and hinge of his neck; pressed a memory in an ache of skin, and pulled back before permanence took hold. It meant, when they left, retreated to the Barns (home, home, and the fact it was their home kept Ronan up to twilight luminescent rays), Adam rest a hand on his knee and swiped just harsh enough to leave impressions through fabric. And it meant, when Adam brushed his teeth, Ronan laid over duvet and pondering how mundane and routine this had all become, Adam kept glancing over, mouth quirking in a grin, and returning to the mirror— like he was privy to some joke Ronan couldn’t even begin opening the gate of. 

Before Adam, who Ronan kept in capital because it was Before, and Before Adam was so, so different from Now Adam and so far removed from After Adam he struggled to reconcile the two in their contradictory tones. Winter, frosted soil and fresh, fertilized tilled ground. Dawn and dusk. Before Adam had been so close to crawling out his own skin, that those nights in St. Agnes were tainted with Ronan’s guilt at sneaking scraps of Adam’s privacy— curled on floor, on side, press of hardwood and splinters piercing ribs, tracking the shuffle of shadow beneath bathroom door while Adam exchanged day and night in folds of clothing. As if he hadn’t seen Adam, shirtless, in locker rooms or by the lake, or even one moment when Adam had let sweat loom across his hairline and he’d brought hem to forehead and exposed a labour-won line of svelte torso and cascade scale of ribs. He’d seen this all before, but those snapshots had been offered, or inevitable exposure Adam had come to peace with. Those glimpses, from Before Adam, were plundered, purloined contributions to a vision he’d fought hard to neglect. Told himself that was why Adam had begun changing in the restroom, when Ronan was nearby— later, knew it was not to break that frangible tightrope they’d walked, prior that first summer. That once Adam had recognized, pieced enough together to rationalize Ronan’s looks were packed with intent, not dalliance with intrigue, it had felt— his words, not Ronan’s, because the notion clashed incongruous to the way Adam sung praise against the run of his spine— too cruel. 

After Adam, too, had been restrained in the casual exposure— different, in dim light, tucked around corners. If Ronan’s hands uncovered, he let inhibition go; contact flint strike ignition, and press the spark to his mouth and that Adam was too focused with finding synchrony in breathing to locate anything self conscious. But that came in the aftermath, Adam covering; shirt, sheet, restroom door, towel. Dredges he’d brought, captured, woven into his fabric, that sort of self-mortification. After Adam still changed in the restroom, door cracked an inch in case Ronan slipped through. Under pretenses of necessity, but he’d always find his way to seep in the shower and wind himself around shoulders and bare, braised skin. And sometimes, after they’d cranked faucet off, he clung to the remnants of humidity on skin, before torrid patches of red over planes of hips, waist, legs could be whisked by parched winter air. That Adam, at least, had the decency to let Ronan sip on his fill before pulling threadbare, borrowed tee over head and curling his chest around Ronan under covers.

Now Adam had aged into self assurance with a grace hard-earned and equally endowed in affirmation. That hadn’t been overnight, but the press of tongue to inner thigh and lips to wrists, palms, wrapped around thumbs and prayer alike had done its fair share of encouragement towards the now open door while Adam loitered, bare chest, near faucet. Ronan rolled, now, onto his stomach and hummed to hone in on the smudge of toothpaste on the corner of Adam’s mouth, the languorous descent of lids, down, down, where he’d sunk to exhaustion. Melded into seams of  walls, to the washroom tiles, to the quilt on the couch downstairs, to the crinkle of autumn leaves where they clung in desperation to window panes. Closed his eyes, because Adam would be there when they darted open; and he was, sinking mattress— displacement, shifting tides— and flattening a palm on the colliding tectonics of shoulder blades, pressed a thumb into trapezius. Creased down, to delt, lat. Ended just above boxer band, right before flush to glutes. Ronan hummed, shifted into press of palms. 

“Hey.” Adam said, “Tired?”

“Don’t have to be.” Ronan muttered into pillowcase, caught cotton on his tongue and spat, recoiled. 

“Long night.” Adam added, “Tuckered, probably.” And pinkie snapped at elastic; halted. Creeped back to shoulder in retreat. 

“M’not.” Ronan managed, renewed interest in the tickle of fingernails ghosting up, down ridge of spine.

“Look it.” Voice, dropped; nail, dug to skin, “Talked a lot tonight, didn’t you?”

He hadn’t, they both knew damn well, and he raised his hair up to retort, but Adam was grinding the heel of his palm into a knot and he lost the rebuttal in a groan. 

“Lot of effort to get Blue all pissed with you, wasn’t that?” He continued, “Last I checked, you weren’t that invested in the topic.”

Shrug, because no, not really. “What does that have to do with me?”

“I didn’t think it had anything to do with you.” Adam kept humming, rhythm along ministrations, worked blood flow through the pent-up musculature of week’s work. Traded tension for boneless splay along bedspread. 

But. Ronan waited. 

Adam kept uncoiling the week’s tensions in brazen trails. 

“I’m tired, then.” He declared, moments after, “Okay if I turn the light off?”

Ronan groaned in affirmative. Waited. But. 

Usually, this was when Adam indulged in the lower end of those workings— when one of them was too tired to move, or they’d expended most mental energies, or they just needed the quick release of a moment sanctimonious to their eyes, ears, hands alone. This was when. Lights dimmed, Adam’s mouth tinged in peppermint, and his hair eager to go mussed. 

Tonight, he just rolled, balanced himself over Ronan’s back to curl against the wall— right ear, down, curled away. Distance in bodies of water immersed in storm-strewn sheets. Ronan gripped a hand along canals of space to dance a finger against the nape of his neck. One little ripple. 

But. 

Adam, churning thoughts; rolled head up, around over shoulder. Crook, to mouth— bow, unfurled. Before Adam wouldn’t have turned, because expression was a knife and he didn’t trust himself not to gouge. After Adam wouldn’t have looked away; the hiding, he knew, invited intrigue. Now Adam sat in a basin between. Enough, just enough, murky ground to simmer thought. Enough Ronan knew there was a But, and this time it wasn’t Adam’s job to broach topic. Capsize, upset. 

For once, he thought, Adam was making him ask. 

•••

At the bottom of the pantry cupboard, dusty and arenose from unyielding hands of time, there’s a recipe box. Six by four, acacia wood; walnut finish. Tucked to lower right hand of floor, metal clasp for safekeeping. The first time Ronan discovers it, he sinks to rest back, tailbone, against wood door frame, clenched until white knuckle peak in ten finger mountain range. Ran thumb over wooden seam, nudged lid to exposure of rows and rows in little index cards. Aurora Lynch had distinctive handwriting. Impossibly, determinately, hers. Ronan had assumed, in the time it had taken to forget the loped, elegant scrawl bearing the expanse of her name in fountain pen ink, that she’d be photocopied— as she’d come from dreams, from visions, from idyllic flights of childhood fancy. Maybe he’d been searching for the track marks of his father’s hard-pressed ink bleed. Or Matthew’s overdramatic cursive-print hybrid. Declan’s cramped, pristine font. His own, pristine and crisp for all he’d fought careful coaching. Maybe if someone else had Aurora Lynch’s writing, she wasn’t really gone. Maybe that’s what he’d been hoping for. But this was all her, from impressions of nib to the seamless blend of letters in freeform inscription. Handwriting on refrigerator whiteboard, on Ronan’s papers, on post-it notes, on grocery lists, on school reports. Last impressions of her, and he’d thrown most away before he’d known there’d be a day left without reminders and he’d be disparaging that loss, all gutted and shelled seedpod. 

Three days. That’s how long it takes to carry the that box down. Marked down. Day one: discovery. Sit, head bowed, front clasped to chest. Stay there, curled head to knees tracing thumbs over initials hatched, grooved along front. Day two: Flip, top open. Hum, childhood lullaby. Stand up. Pace, make track grooves on closet carpet. Back to seated, close top. Day three: out, in doorway. Staring into kitchen like its full of treachery; something with a capacity for tainted the careful, sterile air sealed to inviolability. Bringing it from place of thought, from conception, to action, of execution. This is a production in three parts; a play in three acts, broken further to scenes of excruciating increments. Ending note, incidental melodic swell, when Ronan finally sets collection down on countertop. Leaves it, gathering sunlight, another three days. 

Entrance: Stage Left: Adam. Adam had noticed— because that’s what Adam does, he notices— came home to tap fingers along perimeter of sacrosanct, matched material walnut that gives center stage. Watched Ronan, dancing around final ground, made point not to pry in unnecessary inquiry. 

Ronan doesn’t bring it up, because Adam is equipped with the skill of inference when it comes to Ronan’s idiosyncracies, and he sees the curled L initialed over latch and knows this is something Ronan will work through, in his own time. And Adam doesn’t ask, because when he comes home to tornado wreckage in flour, plaster of half-kneaded dough creasing nails, countertop, stuck to shirt collars, it’s not a raise of brow to indulge in theory of confusion. Inevitable, he might have figured, and its a seamless understanding that pressed in the memory of those recipe cards, in the motion of heel, palm, skin-to-bowl is some sort of conquering of that mighty foe grief, so he says little to bring to forefront of thought.

(Ronan thinks, somewhere, that Adam might get this more than anyone. That there’d been a point, when first making something that resembled a home in the Barns sun-bleached contours, Adam had been winding over the treacherous ground of weaving branches from pie crust around an old plate Ronan was sure hadn’t been from their cupboard. But then it was their cupboard, and Adam had been backlit from a dwindling afternoon haze, and he hadn’t needled the point beyond, blackberry, really, its strawberry season, and Adam was too busy in contrarian rebuttals to think too harsh on anemic, sunken middle when he’d pulled it from the oven.)

Backdrop, for setting of scene, because there’s reason to take notice when Adam calls attention to it, from nowhere. Comes home, again, from work, and slides his arms around Ronan’s middle. Joins thumbs, interlocked across navel. Chin, shoulder. Not a significant rise, the push up to toes, but there’s a race and wicked delight in the inches like miles. Another liberation of wants, indulgences, in Ronan enjoying and Adam knowing, and neither needing the other to particularly ask. Wholly unnecessary, he thinks, for Adam to accentuate differentials in stature like this. But he does it anyway, and he’s not of the mind it helps any to point it out. 

“Busy, here.” Adam says, waft of pressed detergents, fabric softener; something interwoven on skin, another foray into a cologne Ronan has spied in their cabinet— citrus and fresh herb, morning and sunlight and summer-scraped skin. “You’re not about to start making your own butter, are you?”

Ronan raises fingers, scowls to disparage spare dough clinging, needy on pads and crooks in folds, “If I made butter, it’d be the best fucking butter of your life.”

“I’m not saying don’t.” Adam adds, and he’s all spearmint and gum and the poor disguise of smoke on his breath. Social vice, turned stress, turned packs of gum because Ronan hasn’t, yet, admitted to enjoying the lace of nicotine under the swipe of his tongue— or maybe its the association, the source the scent nuzzles within, he more so enjoys. The two conflate, nebulous differentiation. “Just asking. You’re two seconds from flower print apron and sourdough starter.”

What Ronan doesn’t say is he’s got the jar for sourdough, that that’s what’s wrapped in twine and cheesecloth on the window sill. Instead, he’s focused on Adam’s massaging along the divot between ribs. “I’m just making fucking bread.” He adds. 

“Sure.” Lips to top of neck; inch under, behind ear. Hum resonating through skin. “No complaint. Just noticing a pattern.”

“Pattern?” Ronan twists— to turn, to catch the twist of Adam’s mouth into the smirk making mark on skin, but he’s twisting with the movement. Arms locked, pacing in exact trajectory. 

“Don’t worry about it.” Laugh: discreet, noticeable. Adam’s not playing with pretenses that Ronan won’t track his expressions, won’t feel the indulgence of heel palm press cutting edges of air before lung takes its fill. “Just nice to come back to.” 

Back to. Broken phrase takes little, incendiary loop in the Ronan’s gut. 

“You’re just waiting at home for me,” Adam adds, still deliberately out of sight, brushing lips against the back shell, cartilage of Ronan’s ear, “It’s sweet. You do that? Wait for me?”

“I mean I…” Ronan clears his throat; suddenly very cognizant of dough, of cloying clumps and fingerprints in chalky grain, “I do. Stuff.” He left town more than Adam did, at least, and he's indignant now. Wasn't a fucking homebody.

“It’s okay if you didn’t.” Adam continues, “If you were just…” Finger, dip; pressing into skin. Just enough of a flare up, tip and edge of pain. “It’s all cute of you. Domestic, even.”

“I’m not– domestic? Asshole. You want me to call Sargent? She’d have something to say. What is it? Is it the bread? You think baking makes me domestic? Dickhead. I’m–”

“You’re waiting at home, making bread and butter and getting dinner on the table.” Adam pressed a kiss to the hinge of his jaw, nips further down. Drying throat, shaking hands. Shudder, rattled chest bone. “Next thing you know, you’re barefoot in the kitchen, pregnant. Packing lunches for work.” 

“Fuck off.” Ronan inhales; Adam’s ghosting words over the curve of his shoulder, where t-shirt collar dips to leave skin on display, hands tracing circles, triangles, geometric amalgamations and fiddling with fabric hems. Cool rush, fresh air, liners along hipbone, into the trail of hairs weaving themselves along navel. 

“I don't mind it.” Adam murmurs into collarbone, “I don't. Not really. I told you, it's good to come home to.”

It's a relief, really it is, when Adam finishes with another kiss to shoulder blade, through cotton; backs off, now, and the absence of heat is both refreshment from the dizzying implication— Adam saying home with such familiarity his accent curls fond over consonants— while leaving him a sort of vacancy; empty. It's hard not to feel Adam tears something from his chest cavity each time he pulls back.

“I'm gonna go shower,” He says, like he's not ripping Ronan to a husk by just walking away. 

It's unnecessary, he's well aware, the sudden needy curve of desire, simmering below every inch of skin Adam had feathered across. He's right there, he's just going upstairs. He's right there. 

“Can I…” Ronan pauses, spreads his fingers again. Bread. Rising. 

He never usually asks, to join Adam. Doesn't have to. It's seamless. Adam would nod his head, tug him forward— mouth to mouth, give oxygen back, resuscitate desire. Lead him by the wrist, press him against slick tile while water bloomed outrageous and furious blush along wrinkled skin, osmosis a symptom of desperation. Fuck him against the wall, or near the faucet, or press him down to the tub itself and hold the back of his head and guide himself to Ronan's mouth, cooing and whispering good, good job. God, Ronan, and go red, blush down to his hips. Allow Ronan to pull off, mouth over curvature of bone, kiss along thigh muscle down to the knee, back along tender, bruised inner leg. A task, demanded, and one Ronan took to with vigor: if you're given the object of piety, you got on your knees and prayed along that altar. Knees could ache, grind against tile, or wooden grain, or in this case the slip, slide, unsteady slick of porcelain that Ronan navigated to really put himself to use. Determination, in his eyes, he knew, and Adam reassured it as well earned, goading, hips rocking, scraping nails against the nape of his neck. Along the crown. Clamping against shoulder when he came, went slump in momentary bliss, before sinking, too, to Ronan's level and kissed him to exchange taste on tongue and continue singing hymnal praise, you did good, you did, I love you, you're so good, Ronan. Beautiful, really. Do you know what you look like, on your knees like that? God, I wish you did. I love you, I love you, and with that echoing in sacrosanct arena of curtain, tile, tub, how could he not twist and turn this part of their day to one of utmost reverence? 

“Can you what?” Adam asks, and there it is. Little smirk, playing along lips. Amused. Smug, even. That wicked little thing, counterfeit of Ronan's own exclusionary smile; borrowed from high school. There were remnants of Ronan's influence in the creases of Adam Parrish. Vice versa, in every facet of Ronan's life. Hairs, strewn on pillows; golden threads snatching streams of light. Adam's shoes, toed off and lopsided against Ronan's own. That stupid threadbare blanket Adam had carried from St. Agnes that he insisted on rolling on the foot of the bed, even if it was too thin to hold any heat and packed too full of static to offer any comfort. Ronan could thread a thumb through mothbites, but Adam insisted it stayed in their room— and he'd said our room, then Ronan was preoccupied with Adam's hands up the back of his shirt, down the front of his pants and our, our, our. 

Little bites: those spread long-lasting claim, too. Floriculture possessive mark lining neck, the collarbone, chest. Hips, even, and while those aren't for outright showmanship— because Adam gets delight in knowing there's something to stake, signature in orchid pressed bruising--they're the deepest, darkest. Maybe he recognized these were the teeth, claw marks in which Ronan most delighted. There was nothing wrong, he thought, in Adam at his most carnal. Even if he winced at the implication, when he got too far in his head and Ronan could see in his eyes the question: is it too much, am I doing too much, pressing too hard, pushing to break? Nevermind, Ronan thought that if Adam did break him, he'd spend the rest of the night piecing him back together.

It was enough, at least, that Adam knew Ronan would let him. 

“I just…” He holds his hands up, now, “I gotta get dough resting. But I–”

“Well, it sounds like you're busy, then.” Adam says, smile losing wicked edge, something tender and irrevocably fond. Sparked, tinged of a mischief entirely his own. “I don't want to keep you. So, shower.”

“Yeah, but you can wait for me to–”

“For you to what?” Adam tips his head, “You need to go first?”

“No.” Ronan scowled, “No. Parrish–”

“Don't worry. I'll be quick.” Adam's tone laced brown sugar; honey and iced tea. Syllables poured free, consonants sluggish. “Do you really need the hot water?” 

Didn't wait, for input. Adam turns, shrugging suit jacket off, folding and smoothing out inevitable lines, creases. Careful where it wasn't always necessary. “I'll be back down. Wait for me, yeah?”

Another grin. Inside joke. Ronan shifts, watches Adam make retreat upstairs; stares back down at hands. 

Yeah.

Definitely making him ask. 

•••

Rampant, that's how it runs. From there.

Whether Adam is fucking with him— not out of character, they tug and pull and push back and forth on near-daily interval— or this is some sudden change of heart, need to shift dynamic, all the unspoken goes untranslated with pointed ignorance.

It's a subtle thing, the pulling back. Touches stop lingering, don't return when Ronan leans in, begs with kinesthetic tongues. Bed, late, and hands stay above the waist— dance, on occasion, to bands on briefs, under t-shirt hems. Leaves, early. Presses lips to the top of Ronan's neck, where it curls below his lobes, murmurs affections in concrete nothings, ghosts fingers where grooming went unchecked and roots of curls begin to form.

(Ronan thinks Adam indulges in the stages of hair growth, from the way he laces fingers through fresh coil spring, or the reassuring coax of thumbs to crown when he helps him buzz it off, again. Thinks Adam sees these pillars and infrastructures that form Ronan's every level as a present, a gift to cherish and cup within tender hand trap.)

It’s not celibacy: Adam’s ill-suited for the practice; there’s something equally ravenous in them as sits in Ronan, and he’s not the type to retreat, to abandon that language, that tactile necessity. So Adam still does what he needs to do: and he’ll fuck Ronan all the same, press him to the bed, the wall, the kitchen counter if he’s pent up enough. Unravel him with hands, mouth, bodies and bodies and bodies and grind of hipbone. He’ll mouth and suckle along neck and leave marks that Ronan buys deep cut shirts to flaunt about. He grips, harsh, on Ronan’s arm, waist, wrist; holds him down or pushes him up; takes control from lower vantage. And this all remains the same: it’d be more concerning, Ronan thinks, if this had changed at all, and its the only reason he doesn’t sit in furor, panic. 

But there’s a restraint: Adam’s holding himself, back. Or waiting for Ronan to beckon him, forward. Grip isn’t as bruising, teeth only scrape and don’t broach skin, and he might lace his fingers through the premature curls falling over Ronan’s ears, but he never properly tugs. And this: the discrepancy, that’s enough to send him to hysteria. Adam, Adam, Adam, and it pours out in a babble, and Adam’s still laughing and hushing and showering him in affections when he lays spent on his back, stomach heaving, but there’s a depth to it, hollow little pit. And he gets up, in the aftermath, and closes the bathroom door when he goes to clean up. And Ronan stares, remains at rest, at the oscillation of a ceiling fan, at the ebb and flow of shadows where they dance in merry refrain over slanting ceiling, over wooden scaffolding, over ribs and beams and the knick where Ronan had been trying to hand picture frames and slipped and ravaged a splinter out the grain. And his breath comes back to him, and something in him aches because Adam is away, he’s far fucking away, and its ridiculous someone can be a mere ten feet vacant, but its a two inch door stretching further than the miles between Henrietta and Campbridge, or nineteen and twenty four, or accent or not, and he’s aching, aching, Adam, come back. 

And Adam does come back. 

It doesn’t feel like enough, even when he curls himself around Ronan’s back again, sternum to spine, lips to nape of neck, descend to knobs and vertebrae, and balance and dance back, up, up, up, because Ronan may not say it, but Adam knows to remind him he’s there. 

This is the sort of frame, train, pathway Ronan finds himself spiraling, swinging, descending upon: he’s still going to leave, he can still leave, and its a wound he didn’t know still bore itself raw and open and bloodied untended gash. But here is it, heaving in fresh crimson swell, even if Adam is curled all around him, and he can smell the head and shoulders and humidity and the nostalgia in sweat from running in the backyard all day. There’s the option to leave, and even if he knows Adam comes back, he still hangs himself up on how do I convince him he has to stay and it’s all…

He doesn’t say it, but he turns and wraps his limbs around Adam, until they’re both anchored in this devastating, horrid depth. Adam, buoyant and easy in the drift to sleep. Ronan, dragging down down down. 

Maybe it could get better, from here, and Ronan considers that maybe Adam is busy— he works, a lot, and sometimes it reminds Ronan of when his father left poltergeist footpaths in the hallway, and his mother would lose herself staring blank blank blank out porch window. And he wonders, truly, why that comparison rings so true, and where it shifts and displaces something uncomfortable in him. 

It would be fine, on its own. Adam is busy, Ronan remembers, and they’re made of the same fabric of tacit contact and craving. Adam is busy, and he’s always irritated around the holidays anyway, it’s nothing it’s nothing its nothing its nothing. 

Except.

He’s still being Adam. But the dial's been cranked, and a new channel erupts.

Little tidbits, little snips, static: Adam comes down, in the middle of the afternoon, and Ronan’s inside— on break, from fiddling with fencing and gates and posts— and this is a delight of his, too, that Adam sleeps in on Saturdays, rises early on Sunday to catch Ronan before church. Will raise himself onto knees and catch Ronan’s mouth, cup cheeks between hands and echo goodbyes, I love you, tamquam (those two interchangeable, now, equal use), and smile into it, and it’s that Adam is so happy, and Adam is laughing, and pushing his hands between the unbuttoned free-fabric swing of Ronan’s shirt where he’d been grappling with the tie. Then Adam’s hooking fingers in the knot, loosening and pulling him back, and hey, hey, asshole, I just got that done properly and I’ll be late and Declan’s going to bitch me out and they both know that’s not true, when Ronan sets the alarm just early enough for this nonnegotiable time slot. And no time, little time, Adam lets him go because he’ll be coming back they both know he’ll be coming back, and Ronan sneaks glances back, before, to Adam curled on his right side. Properly bundled, arms wrapped around his own middle, blinking to sleep; enervated smile while he pretends, not to watch Ronan watch him. Waiting, when Ronan comes home— because he’s coming back he’s coming back he comes back— and they've also cemented to memory that when Ronan's back from church, he's primed to play steward of god, and this, too, is a precious part of that routine. Crawling over, around, resting himself in every crevice of bare skin, submerging nose and curling mouth over jugular, over pulse beat; murmurs good morning, hello, hi, I’m back, I’m home, into the curve of Adam’s waist, over the scar on his hip that curves jagged waning crescent over hipbone.

This part, the next part, is usually Adam’s job, but Ronan’s fired up, on edge, and Adam was waiting, waiting, waiting, and still blinking sleep out his eyes. Half-dazed, still caught in that precipice between subconscious, between feet on ground and head in clouds. Drags him down to earth, when Ronan pulls fingers to mouth and .murmurs he'll do it he doesn't mind he doesn't please please let me, because Adam shirt smells like the same detergent that washed baby blankets and superhero socks and his hair is nostalgia from sun exhausted pigment and his eyes are heavy lidded from ease and Ronan's isn't just buzzing interface of wanting it's a need, so he slips fingers in his mouth and coats coats coats well and when he's sure that's enough he convinces Adam to let him guide Adam's hands around himself, closes his own fingers over Adam's own and lets him determine rhythm, pressure. Stops only to slip his thumb over the slit, and Adam's sighing contentedly, still drifting, and Ronan's never had it in him to coax him back to waking— sleep is Adam's finite resource; even now he's in rebound. So he lets him, lets him sleep, and keeps moving, and reminds himself what Adam would say if he was awake, and that's almost always enough to send him careening over the edge, pressing his mouth to his and Adam's fingers where he's still convincing Adam to come on come on it's okay. Even if he's asleep and can't hear him it's still okay, come on Adam please. Reward, reaped, when Adam does let go, and Ronan's cleaning with an eager tongue because Adam will bitch him out again for the mess if it awaits an hour later, when he finally drifts to a sense of self. So this is the most he'll do. Just for now. Ends that chapter by kissing, up up up and wonders if in sleep Adam's tasting himself on Ronan’s tongue and recognizes how good that ought to feel and…

Well, this is when Ronan does fall asleep, but it's only an extra hour, maybe two if his knees entered equation under either house of worship, and they'll stumble down to mid afternoon, summer peak or winter's premature greetings, and toy with the idea of getting anything done because there's time there's time there's time. It’s pressing against one another, Adam’s back to the fridge, dislodging magnets to scatter over tiling. Or Adam trying and failing to work the stove, because he still hasn’t learned the nuances of food not burning into cast iron, and he’s distracted by Ronan at his back and nosing under shirt collar. Inevitably they give up and wind up back on the couch, wound around until limbs weave and knot inseparable. That’s ideal; these Sundays. Time bleeds too slow, too fast, hours interchangeable. Seconds tick, intervals in the huff of a laugh or Adam’s mouth, and he feels eighteen and enamoured, and how does this feel synonymous with twenty four and enamoured?

This following Saturday, Adam’s late departure from bed. Adam hums and rounds around Ronan, and that’s his need for touching shining through, something satisfied prickling in Ronan that this is first inclination. But he’s also bent over, squinting at a measuring glass, because there’s a ratio to this cleaner: lemon concentrate and water, shaken and stirred. Mixology, of the spotless kind. And when Adam sees the spray bottle, the rag, the discarded nozzle, and snickers into the strap of Ronan’s tank top. 

“What?” Ronan asks, because he’s shaking his arm and its an exact measurement, goddamnit. 

“You’re all cleanliness and godliness now.” Adam laughs, and reaches around to tap the measuring glass. “You’re gonna take valium and dress up, next?”

“Oh fuck off, I’m cleaning the bathroom because someone gets getting hair all over the counter and–”

“Someone being you.” Adam adds, “You shed a lot. Your hair’s thick, of course it does.” This is his little indulgence, following the clasp of arms around waist to emerge face-to-face, pushing fingers through the tangle of Ronan’s hair. “You need me to shave it, again?” It’s sincere, separate from the rest, and up close Ronan can see where sleep still crusts in eyes and smell the musk of slumber in stench on his breath. 

“Maybe.” Ronan says, tilts into the brush of nails over scalp, “You offering?”

Adam snorts— because, of course he is, you new here— and flicks his nail against the measuring glass, “Before you set up a chore wheel, maybe.” Yanks down, by neck, to kiss him— morning breath be damned— and snarls around a thick enough mat of hair, pain pricks at scalp, and Ronan moans into the fierce, temporary, burning pain. 

“Hm.” Adam considers, when he leans back, smoothing his hand over that spot, reassuring little trill and vocal flip. “Maybe after.”

“After what?”

“After we figure that out.” He teases, and Ronan can feel him twirling a curl around his finger, winding and coiling and tangling, because now it’ll knot and he has to fucking mist it to brush it and this is why he doesn’t– 

“You want a shower?” Adam continues, “I’m thinking of one.”

Ronan perks, brightens; and screw recreating that lemon cleaner, especially today, he wants, he wants he wants, Adam’s hands in his hair, and he wants Adam’s hands on his hips, waist, chest. Pushing him against bathroom counter, moaning against his back, commanding Ronan’s physical contortions with the force of his hands, to back. Hands, in hair, pressing as deep into him as attainable, flickers something rampant and possessive in the both of them, when Adam can glance up at the misting mirror— he’s finally stopped putting a fuss over wasting hot water, because the water heater is its own attribute— and guide Ronan’s head up to make eye contact with him, with himself in the position Adam’s put him in, and there’s something so strikingly close in it all, knowing Adam’s indented and printed himself along seams to a point he couldn’t walk away without leaving something crucial behind.

“Yeah, yeah let’s go.” He breathes, and Adam’s next tug is firm, nails carve a pale line unseens, but shuddering in resonant sensation. 

“Yeah? You wanna?” Adam says, and there’s that little grin, mocking but not without affections. It’s a little game, they’re players one and two, and Adam’s hitting start, “I need to be sure though. Manners, try them. You’d be surprised.”

Groan, curl down and press nose to throat and Ronan’s smelling laundry detergent and nighttime sweat, and yes, yeah, they could use a shower with ultimately little efficiency, and mumbles, “Please,” over pulse point. Adam wants him to ask, and here he is, replying in turn; he doesn’t even need to be told. He doesn’t, he just knows, and does what Adam needs him to, and he’s right he can tell he’s right, when Adam’s smile widens and tugs Ronan against him, all surface aligned, and leans him against the kitchen cupboard to push fingers down cotton, rolling his waistband down simply enough to introduce a stream of air. Tantalizing, cool, heady. Lick of autumn chill, because seasons are turning but this doesn’t. Adam’s hands, under pants, boxers, grasping over Ronan, desperation in the desperate workings. Not much, to get Ronan worked up— never is, if it’s Adam involved, though he doesn’t have much a metric to compare to, doesn’t want one, not when reality is blending and blurring and all he’s seeing is Adam around him, over him, pressing into him, one knuckle dancing over rim— and just when Ronan’s ready to say fuck it, bathroom can wait, down to the floor, or hell you can keep me here against the wall, I just want you, Adam’s pulling back and letting Ronan clean off his thumb for him, and inclining his had to the stairs. 

“Come on.” He says, and flickerings of amusement are warmed under sun, undercut in a heat wave of desire. Wanting, wanting, wanted, and Adam mirrors and matches beat for beat where he traces the arc of a beard over jaw. 

Standing straight, pushing off counter, Ronan’s about to follow when Adam backs up, readying retreat, when he stops, halts, staring near the sink. Ronan’s going to scream in frustration, because he asked, that’s what Adam wanted, he asked, but Adam’s staring at the spray bottle, and Ronan’s clumsy attempts to imitate a formula he had to call Matthew up to replicate, and working with something. Complex, twisting over mouth. 

“Parrish, seriously. It’s going black and blue.”

“Bring the bottle.” Adam says, and oh. 

“Seriously?”

“To clean up. That’s what you want, right?” And yeah, this is how Adam asks, dancing around the words and knowing Ronan trusts him enough to pick up the slack, “Clean up all nice and pretty, yeah? So bring it.”Like he senses Ronan’s trepidation, he adds, “Easier to make a mess, you know, if we know we’re tidying. At least, for me. You disagree?” There’s a promise, there, Ronan’s hips burning where decade old calluses and scabs rub voracious against hip bone, when Adam grabs his waist, his hips, thighs thighs thighs, Adam’s always liked his thighs, and he leaves the bruises to prove it, and if this is Adam asking, why would Ronan say no?

He grabs the bottle.

•••

Makes sense, that this hits a peak on Sunday. 

Adam, at his lowest inhibition. Ronan, his most wired. That this morning, when Ronan was getting dressed, Adam had captured him with a feverish abberation of illogical want. That Adam had tugged him by the tie until he went lightheaded with circulatory loss, and invited Ronan to lean over him, press him into boxspring, rucked hips up, legs making union behind Ronan’s thighs, and it was tongue, and struggle for air, and Adam asking him to just stay a bit, it’s alright if you’re a bit late. Groaning and furious— hidden poorly, when his heel digs into femoris muscle and he scowls at Ronan, scowls like this is some breach of contract— when Ronan’s phone begins a merry trill, that its a sign Declan and Matthew are outside, and Ronan’s dress shirt is still rumpled, and he’s buzzing with anticipation of the fire Adam woke with. 

“They can wait.” Adam says. 

“Declan will come up.” Ronan argues, but Adam’s making a good point, mouth over clavicle, dragging a tongue and sucking on a junction, on the dip exposed by shirt collar. 

“Okay.” Adam breaths, unaffected, and sucks just under larynx, cupping the side of Ronan’s neck. Tugs at the ends of hairs— they hadn’t cleaned, shaved yesterday. Ronan’s legs wobbled, unsteady, Adam folding his legs criss-cross on the counter and watching Ronan clean the countertops, in the tub, submerging the room in heady, cloying citrus and wood cleaner, and then, when he’d gotten bored of Ronan cleaning up after them, he’d dragged him to the hallway and made a wreck of him against the stairway railing, and Ronan had realized only then that all Adam’s insistence on patience and making Ronan ask for this had been a protections against whatever was simmering in him to start. Because he was pushing into Ronan and groaning, and asking him over and over again, would you just stay like this, all day everyday, do you think you’d just sit here and wait for me, if I asked you to would you stay in bed all day and just wait for me, would you let me… and let him what, Ronan’s only beginning to guess. But he’d just nodded, yes yes yes, in a bout, and alternating Adam and God, yes, and he’s gotten it now, when Adam drags him back down, even when the car horn outside is blaring, traversal through the house impressive despise distance. 

“You’ll be here, when I get back.” Ronan tries, and there’s a ferocious bonfire in Adam’s eyes when he straightens Ronan’s tie for him, “Right?”

“If you give me a reason to.” Adam adds, and Ronan can’t stop himself from grinding into Adam again, tent in slacks on display be damned, and his dress shirt is wrinkled when he comes downstairs, and Declan’s glaring through the rearview in a judgmental contortion even though he and Jordan do the exact same thing, and Matthew asks how’s Adam, and Ronan can’t tell him, sleep well and good because I just jerked him off until he stopped bitching at me for leaving, and I think I just realized my fiance wants me chained up in the basement for ease of access because he’s a possessive fuck, how are you? Because he and Matthew don’t talk about things like that, there’s an unspoken agreement to keep that image out of his head, but he does meet Declan’s scowl, and say, “Oh, good. You have hand sanitizer?”

He’d argue: acts of service. Declan might disagree. But silence in the ritual, and they take bread and wine and Ronan has to tug his shirt collar up when it comes offered because Adam had marked him up tantalizing and mammalian in a wretched little display and…

Well, there’s a silent agreement. 

Adam’s asleep, still, when he comes home, and Ronan’s debating between waking him (he needsneedsneedsneedsneeds) or letting him sink through two decades of perpetual exhaustion only now beginning to scab over. There’s a melancholy knit between Adam’s brow, and even if Ronan feels clawing and desperate and ravenous in a way he can’t explain, he goes downstairs and tries to supplement with whatever’s in the kitchen.

That’s what alerts him: to waking, to action. Adam pads downstairs, yawning and arms stretching overhead, shirt tugging far up enough Ronan can see dimpling along the base of his spine when he starts fussing over the coffee maker— there’s bread, fresh, and Ronan feels an unreasonable heat when Adam smirks over his coffee cup.

“Would you put an apron on? If I asked?” He questions, and he drops a bit of creamer to ripple over a fresh outpour from the pot— acid reflux, black coffee on an empty stomach— and watches Ronan whisk eggs of all things like he’s performing a strip tease. 

“Depends on how you asked.” Ronan snipes back; which just means yeah, just say when, and Adam knows when he snickers into his coffee. 

“It’s just good of you, you know. Doing this.” Adam continues, “All homemaker.” Fluctuates, between jovial and sincere. Delight, maybe. 

“Fuck off.” 

“I like it.” Adam says, and that’s where they’ve been missing the mark, he thinks. That Adam likes it. That Adam’s okay with liking it. That… “I like that I know you’re here.”

That's the kicker, the catapult from catalyst to action; potential to enacted. If Ronan ever tracked it. It's Adam, in Ronan's shirt and a pair of boxers from when he was seventeen and god, they're not even that old but this feels like decades now. It's Adam, setting a stained mug down, and there's a smudge of toothpaste at the corner of his mouth, and his hair is slicked along the side from their pillow and he's here and he's here and Ronan is too and…

They want the same things. 

“Last week,” He starts, “When…” And Adam raises an eyebrow, cocks his head in invitation. “Would you?”

“Would I what?” And Ronan huffs because of course he'd make this difficult. He ought to have known better, really this is on him, and… he wants to throw his hands up and groan because this is fucking ridiculous Parrish you know what, but it's Adam and he smells like home and he blends into sunbeams and refractory light, and…

They want the same things. 

“Would you… try?” He finally, finally, forces out. Asks. Properly.

Flash, flicker, and it's night and day. It's not so much he thought Adam would say no— Adam can't, he doesn't think— but it's the speed Adam echoes his question with, closing distance from counter to stove, pushing him back back through the room, shoving his jacket off and mouthing up his jaw, towards his ear, down his neck. Tongue and mouth, and oh, there they are, it's that nip of teeth. Guides him towards the stairs, and helps him up, one step at a time— intervals to lavish him in attention. And this is an Adam Ronan indulges in, too, in all his nonverbal affirmation. Pressing reassurance and adorations and searing them into skin with muscle memory. 

“I don't know how you think that's going to work,” Adam murmurs, when they're at the top step, now, the hallway faded golden hour because really they do just waste days away, and the sunrise has hit in a languid crawl to match hues from blossoming scarlets and marigold leaves, “You took biology, right?”

“You said you'd try.” Ronan jokes, but the levity hits a tinge too sincere. 

“What?” Adam pants— pants, and how did Ronan not let himself ask sooner— “You think I won't?”

Whether Ronan believed in follow through or not, he doesn't wait to hear affirmations for or otherwise. Once the topic is breached and begged, Adam's all base instinct in his tug of fabric overhead, yanking Ronan's dress shirt off, pausing only to run his hands in wholehearted reverence along shoulders, chest, back to waist. Finds grounding against the doorframe, and it's slower for a moment; it's a lazy unbuckling of Ronan's belt, its a lackadaisical suck to chest, to base of neck. It's Adam taking time, like he's reminding himself it's alright, give it a minute, Ronan's not going anywhere, right here we're right here. Then he snaps back to himself, when Ronan whines, goads, prods. Slow is grand, widespread exploration is glorious with the right precedent, but now he wants Adam on him, around him, in him, stop waiting just go go gogogogogogo. He feels unrelentingly needy, insatiable craving, and he doesn't even have to ask Adam to match him beat for beat— that's obvious in the hand tremor, in shaky exhale when Adam dances them both to their (theirtheirtheir) bedroom, when he pauses, minute and fractal webbing of hesitance etched over smug exterior. And Ronan forgets, sometimes, that Adam still has a tendency to make the enormity of wanting an adversary, so he grabs one of Adam's hands and presses his mouth to the back, over unchapped skin, down to knuckles, lets a finger broach into his mouth, hums around it. As close to please as he can manage without saying it, because words could push Adam over either edge, and he doesn't want to risk the wrong cliffside. He's only just recognized, really, what he's asking for, and the message delivers just fine. 

So, this will do. 

Adam's above him, and that's a sight he'll always be used to, can't envision any realm where he tires of it. Adam's above him, and Ronan's not breaking eye contact or grip on his wrist, even when he realizes Adam's moving him by the shoulders to sit, that he's got one hand still attached at the crux of neck to shoulder junction. Adam's above him, and what does that change for him beyond Adam's touching him and so long as that remains universal law he could do what he wanted to Ronan with no complaint. 

This is a special edition Adam delights in— once again, unspoken, because even if there's no shame in the wanting of one another, there's reliance on the knowing, and that's precious, not as frail as the clumsy stumble over words— that Ronan would do what he said. That it's Ronan submerging himself below eye level and granting vantage point, that it's for Adam and Adam alone and that's brewing a whole other collision in his gut. 

“Lay down.” Adam says, none of that trepidation from prior. Occupied, likely, cleaning the roll of split over Ronan's chin, because he's been busy, thank you very much, “Come on. Down.” Not unkind, but unyielding. No room for negotiation.

(Ronan's not much for negotiation. Not here.)

He's more torn than Adam, releasing fingers, but then again Adam's been planning, knows what's next, and Ronan's trapped in some precipice before that ball gets rolling. Back, down, mouth open to (maybe now, maybe he will, because Adam likes when he's vocal— maybe not the way Adam gets vocal, he doesn't have that in him, but they fill the gaps the other can't, that's the role he plays here), but Adam's rounding on top of him, straddling over torso, running his hands up and down still. There's time, to take a moment to trace bylines and contours, but Adam's still chasing something when he grasps down Ronan's pants; wrestles down, and all he feels is the scrape of wool and cotton blend where Adam's a bit too hurried, and it veers into a burn for half a second. Boxers, too, down to ankles. A moment, considering, then Adam stands back up and tosses those, too. And he folds Ronan's pants over the nightstand, across the lampshade— and even if it doesn't erase all creaselines, doesn't save either of them the effort of ironing next Sunday, the action is so painstakingly Adam it makes him want to whine, so he does. The smile flickered his way, plastered over Adam's June-stained mouth is so flushed with delight he wants to take a snapshot and sit in this. In AdamAdamAdam. 

“Turn over, too, I think.” Squints and tilts his head at Ronan, like this is an especially difficult equation to tackle. Clarifying best angle, best approaching. Breaking the formula to the barest bones. Shirt, off. Pants, off. Ronan? Hard, wanting. It's the methodology Adam approaches all uncertainty with. Break down to atoms, fundamentals. That's part of the flood of affection in Ronan, too. Adam tucking all these hesitations under assured pretense. 

And maybe it'll help, Ronan decides, when he asks, “You can help. Can't you?”

Blink. Blink. That hadn’t entirely crossed his mind, but Adam nods, half dazed, and rounds back. Hovers over him, considering. 

Okay, now it's getting ridiculous.

“Are you waiting for a fucking handwritten note, because I haven't exactly been practicing my penmanship–” 

Snapping point, and yeah, he's back; a little rougher than Adam usually permits. It's gripping around midline and flipping Ronan by the hips, pressing his cheek into the comforter, and that stupid fucking blanket. It's Adam curling himself over Ronan's spine and rubbing circles into his hips with thumbs and murmuring assurances in his ears that if he just waits, give me a minute, you want to wait don't you? 

He doesn't, but that's what Adam wants, and he nods anyway, even when there's hot breath over his neck, along the shell of his ear, incremental motions down his spine. Shirt, whisper of fabric where it hangs off him, and usually Ronan likes when Adam's undressed, too, equally bare, but the drape of a shared amalgamation of smells— it's Ronan's deodorant and the underscore of store brand conditioner, and they're merged to the cotton pressing on his back, to the shirt Adam picked up off the floor when he rolled out of bed, and that sparks through him, raw electric current, more than be thinks bare chest could have. Then, mouth to the base of his back, his tailbone. Air, puffs. Impatient bursts of oxygen. Circles, from hips to thigh to knee. Lingers, maybe a second too long on an arch of muscle in his leg, but that's neither here nor there.

What's here is the drape of hands, curving lower, and Ronan grips, situates fingers in the fringe along Adam's— theirs, now, that's theirs— old blanket. “I'll get to it.” Adam adds, “Stay here.”

Cold front, along his spine when Adam gets back up. But he's waiting, it's not a question. He's holding on, he's staying. And Adam comes back, and Ronan's in that exact same pose, same pressure curled to blanket, holding his breath. 

“Thank you.” Adam says, tinged in something awed. And there's another moment for the books, when Adam lets adoration leak free. Kiss, between shoulder blades, and pop of cap, and Adam's running his hands down Ronan's back, pulling himself to rest on backs of his thighs, hard and unashamed to press the proof into Ronan's muscle. “You've been patient this week. You've been so good this week, you know that? I almost felt bad, but god you kept yourself busy, didn't you?” And fingers, prodding and curling, tracing rim, and Adam keeps talking, blessed affirmations, raised just enough Ronan can hear the breathless hitch, “Do you know how nice it is? I come home, and you're here, and you're so pretty sitting in the kitchen waiting for me. God, do you even know? It's gorgeous, I come back, do you know how lucky I am? Do you even realize? You're here keeping everything clean and perfect.” Back up, and Adam's voice in his ear, and that's when he pushes a finger in, wet and probing and curious digit, breath hitching again when Ronan moans, again, muffles it into his forearm because he wants to let Adam know when it feels good but that isn't always what Adam wants and…

“It's okay. Share with the class.” Adam murmurs, nips at ear lobe and he's curling his first finger to shred a moan out him, again. “You've been so good. You're taking care of everything here, aren't you? Let me take care of you, too. I could just keep you at home forever, you know? Do you want that? You can answer.”

Which is what he says, but he's working in a second finger, imploring rebuttal and wrenching air out him in one go. Multitasker, to a fault. 

“I think it'd be good. That's what you want, right? I can make that happen. And you'd let me.” Airy, breathless chuckle. Like he can't believe it, either. “What was it you said? You can try? Give it a shot? You can't say shit like that, and expect me not to want to try. It's all I can think about. I've been at work, thinking about it. About giving it a shot— your words, not mine— and how good it would feel. You'd let me do that to you? Pump you full of kids? Rinse and repeat? Because I'd keep you like that. And you'd let me.”

Properly stretching, now, that's two fingers, and he's toying a third, testing the waters, holding Ronan's back down when he bucks his hips back. “If it doesn't work the first time, we can just try it again, right? So I might just need to keep you here, until it works, if you're so keen on me trying.”

And Ronan's never considered himself especially excited by the prospect of children— Opal, notwithstanding, because she was never quite child, even if his heart clenches when he thinks of how adoring Adam is of her, that wasn't childhood that was Adam's easy acceptance of every protrusion out Ronan's psyche. But the idea he's broaching is… 

Well, he'd gone silent the first time it'd been brought up. For a reason.

Isn't quiet now— can't be, he doesn't think, when Adam works a third finger to add to stretch and strain, and keeps going, keeps talking. Not rambling—Adam's selective, particular with his words, and every syllable intentional. 

“So, I'm trying, right? That's what you want? Until it works?”

Ronan nods, and at this point he's clenching fingers so harsh to the comforter they've gone numb, and it's ridiculous, he feels ridiculous. Feels ridiculous he's even this into it. But god, he is, and if the way Adam's hand has gone frantic, the way fingers are digging blemishes into his hip, he's just as worked up.

Nod, a second nod, Ronan manages some affirmative gesture, but really his dick is dragging over the blankets, and he can feel the outline of Adam's, still restrained with near decade old boxers, and he's never sure when he's stretched out enough— that's Adam's job, it's always been Adam's job— but he can tell he's waiting for more, for longer, for something with more edge and curve and Adam's holding back. Hips, demanding more friction, for Adam to hit just so at a new angle, or to abandon hands altogether and just…

“Okay.” Adam says, finally, and Ronan wants to fucking cry at the thought. “I didn't even take that long. I've been waiting all week, you can't even make it, what, a few minutes?”

It's been more than a few minutes. Ronan goes to prop himself up, twist over shoulder in rebuttal, but Adam slips out, leaves him suddenly clenching and pulsing and fucking empty, asshole, and he's getting off the bed again.

“Parrish, can you fucking…” He does prop himself up now, to scowl at Adam where he's digging for a bottle of lube, again, and goddamn it. “Seriously?”

“What?” Adam asks, “I'm sorry, it's your asshole. I'm trying to be considerate so it doesn't fucking hurt.” 

When Ronan goes to protest— he doesn't care, its okay, it can hurt just a bit, it's Adam, he doesn't mind— Adam drops the bottle on the nightstand and pads back over to him, crouched to eye level, confused and filtered through sunbeams wrangled around curtains.

“Ronan, what do you want, then?”

You. 

Ronan shrugs. 

“Try again.” Adam says.

“I… I just want you to… just do it. I don't… it can hurt. That's okay.”

“Do you want that?”

God fucking… Ronan huffs. Adam's mouth twitches, up. “I want what you want.”

“Third times the charm. One more go.” And when Ronan groans, Adam adds, “Or we can stop. Maybe we can cuddle. Wanna check out cable?”

“Just… Parrish just stick it in. Stop playing around.”

“You don't like waiting?”

“No, I want…” And Ronan flushes, again; feels that over his chest, neck, cheeks. “I want you to… goddamn it. You know.”

“I'd really like you to say it. Just so I'm sure.” Adam murmurs, smooths a thumb over Ronan's cheeks, “Do you know how much I appreciate you? Coming home to you, knowing I can. Knowing you're waiting back here? I could leave you, all night if you want. Head out, for the day. Then when I come home, you'll be sitting pretty and ready for me. If you want that, too. I like that option. I like both options. But I'll be honest,” And he leaned in to accentuate words over Ronan's jaw, to his ear, and he's all fresh mowed grass and open fields and AdamAdamAdam, and Ronan's eyes close to sink in it. “I like knowing you would let me fuck you until you're full. Kids, whatever, I don't give a shit about that. But you'd let me get you full of them. I can't stop thinking about it. And you staying here, cleaning and cooking and you're carrying around this piece of me in you? I can't stop thinking about it. And it doesn’t matter, I just want… I want to fuck you until you can feel me in you, all the time. Every second of every minute, and I think that's what it is. And you'd look so gorgeous, you know? I keep picturing it. And you're not helping, walking around here, looking like you want it. That's what I'd like to do. Pump you up, right? So, I just want to be sure. We both want that? Because when I say I'll make it happen, I will.”

Of course he would— not a question, for either of them. Adam's good at giving Ronan what he wants. And Ronan's never questioned handing over whatever Adam would take, to meet his own needs.

Ronan nods. “I… I want that.”

“Want what?”

It's an irritation at Adam's stubborn, sore streak. He won't let it go, he'll make him ask, and he already promised he promised already, please. “I want you to… try, all that. I want you to… try. Please. Please.”

“I'm not going to try.” Adam says, determined flicker in his eyes, “Just so you know. I'm going to do it.”

Of course he would.

It feels fucking ridiculous. Illogical. Moronic. But Adam wants it too, and he almost believes, for a moment, that Adam could. 

“Adam,” He pants, and it's that dizzying little rush, sitting on sheer drop of what he really really wants, please please please, “Adam, please.”

He's asking. 

He's asking.

“Get back down.” Adam says, “Head on the pillow. I don't want your neck cramping.”

Ridiculous, how Adam's adamance to practicality ripples, euphoric. Head to toe, waves of an impending delight. Rearranges himself, braces his forehead against the pillow. Adam sighs. 

“No, that's good. Knees down, though. Hips up, if you can. I think that's better. It's a better angle.” 

It's not a fucking… science experiment, Ronan thinks, but Adam gives another one of those satisfied hums when he maneuvers his knees, down. Arches his back, a bit, for it to work, and if he's making a show of it, well neither of them will complain. 

“That's perfect.” Hand over his back, traversal from head, to tailbone. Pit stops on the way, where Ronan knows Adam indulges in tracing ink lines, and dancing his mouth over interlocking branches, claws, a tangled knot of leaves. Not the first time, Adam's begged him into this position. He's always liked Ronan like this, whether for the display or just knowing Ronan propositions Adam maneuver him where he feels its appropriate.

“Okay,” Adam breathes, and there's a familiar drop in the vowel, loss of restraint. “Fuck, Ronan, you're…” 

More touch— and it's accompanied by that familiar dip, in bedframe. Hands, hands, hands, and they're winding and kneading into shoulder muscle. It's a slow-build, delighted act. Thumbs grind into the knot Ronan built, hunched over one of the pens on Friday. Fingers trickle along planes, along hilltops and canyons and archways. Adam doesn't need to take this much time, to properly work him up— Ronan's ready, he's been ready, and he knows Adam is too, he can see it. But he is, and it's his own delight, this involved in the touching.

“Beautiful.” Adam adds, rounding back over pressing his lips just under Ronan's ear, to his neck, his shoulder, and if he closes his eyes its amplified. Tenfold, twentyfold, until all he is is a scaffolding of nerve endings, each one of them alight. And that's stressed, strained, overwired into circuit fry, when Adam's nudging between his legs, and he can feel him, whenever he pulls his briefs down, and he's taking time to draw the tip up, down, just barely breaching. “Might hurt a bit.” He ”

What was that, again? Thought earlier, a bit of a warning? Adam, piecing him back together. He wants that, he wants the deconstruction and the rebuild. Dismantled, unraveled, dissected, then built back and smoothed over under the tremor of Adam’s hands. If it hurts, if anything breaks, there’s double the assurance in piecing back together. 

“It’s you. It’s okay.”

Trigger, pulled. Adam bucks forward, at the implication, and slides into Ronan in a single punched-out gasp. A crazed push, forward, and Ronan’s forced up with impact— when Adam got himself this worked up, if it was Ronan, the mere thought of Ronan, if he’s been amping up to this all week, all night, for the minutes of tactile exploration— and he chokes on all the overpowering sentiment. That’s all it took. 

“Ronan, you feel so good, jesus fuck.”

Another bonus, buy one get one: Adam’s never had a clean mouth, but he’s never as liberal with the expletives as he is with Ronan under him, and that’s the biggest rush of it all. That Adam’s careful restraint dwindles on a threat with the closeness, the touch. That all Ronan has to do is arch pretty and throw his head back and moan and writhe and Adam’s bursting at the seams. Paroxysm of motion, when Adam starts moving, properly, jerking his hips back, gripping Ronan’s and guiding the motion, so they meet in the middle with the same rhythm. Accurate, when he said it might hurt a bit, there’s a burn, hiss, drag, until Ronan’s focusing less on the fact he’s being rubbed raw and more that it’s Adam doing it. That this is Adam with the chokehold, brutal grip about his pelvis, and this is Adam reaching around to thumb at his cock, just until the burn is worked through and Ronan’s breathing comes less pained and more appreciative. 

“Fuck.” Adam mutters, again, and his next thrust forward comes with an extra shake, and there’s teeth scraping over his shoulder, and Ronan’s being pushed again up the spread. “God, I could. I mean it. God I could keep you here. I want to. Just keep trying. You’re so good, you’re so gorgeous spread out like this. You take it so well, god I’m gonna come in you and you could just… you would just let me, you won’t even say no. I could, I just keep you full of it, keep coming back and trying until it takes. Just keep you up here, every day, couldn’t I? You can stay here, and I’ll take care of you.”

It’s something else to appreciate about Adam: he sells it. Doesn’t feel ridiculous, anymore, when Adam keeps pushing it, keeps pressing into him, until the bedframe has begun to creak just so (it’s so worn with age, and Adam never gets this frenetic with it, but god there’s is something intoxicatingly feral about the way he’s gripping Ronan right now, it’s everything, it’s unbound and desperate and ravenous, thisthisthis was what Ronan wanted). Doesn’t feel so ridiculous, when Adam sounds so enamoured at the prospect, that he’d just keep working at it until Ronan was full of him, and it isn’t the pregnancy he’s most intoxicated by, he doesn’t think. He hasn’t fleshed it out, but so much of his appeal is the way Adam is burning into him, promising to stay, and oh, that’s what it is. 

And Adam’s memorized him, that’s why this works, that’s where Adam twists and readjusts and angles until Ronan’s muscles tighten underneath him and he barely bites back an outrageous groan, because Adam knows him, could chart his way over these waters in his sleep; of course he’s shaking wherever they touch, because Adam’s hands are well-oriented to commandeering; and of course it works in the reverse, when Ronan curls his spine just a bit more and hears the way Adam’s voice cracks and halts, he knows he’s almost done. That Adam carries remnants of biting a climax into his fist, but now he directs canines to Ronan’s shoulder and scrapes and picks and goes. Wraps his arm firm over Ronan’s midriff, embraces and makes sure he’s pumping along Ronan’s dick with equal attention to every other facet. Usually, he’d dedicate both hands to it, but the other is guiding, is building indents in muscle tissue, so its maximizing efforts of the one he has— dancing knuckle over perineum, contorting his shoulder around to even reach, playing and lightly squeezing at his balls, but its the wrist, and this is when he comes back to the main event, rocking his wrist, and he’s egging Ronan on, come on, it’s okay, I want you to come, it’s alright, you’re doing so good. And Ronan’s trying to hold on, but the second Adam goads, he’s listening, and he’s doubled over spilling across Adam’s hand, over his thigh, onto the fucking blanket and he’d laugh if he wasn’t so busy holding himself steady when Adam keeps going. Shifts him up, pulls chest off the bed, to lean back against him, so they’re seated, better leverage. Keeps murmuring in his ear, about how stunning he looks, how he can and will try, he’ll try, and he’ll get it, Ronan just imagine, I could just keep you full of come and plug you up until it takes. Would you like that? I wouldn’t be able to leave or go to work, I’d just be here, all day, every day, that’s all I could think about. Do you realize that? Ronan, I love you, I love you, alright? I’ll stay there and keep at it if that’s what you want, you’re gorgeous god, you’d just stay here and take it and–

And even when Ronan’s veering into a melding over pain, emerging to something that contorts all that raw circuitry, until there’s pricks and aches, he’s shuddering, again, and Adam’s picking up his pace like this is the end to a race, and gripping Ronan by the jaw to twist and moan into his mouth, silences noise into Ronan’s mouth and it’s…

Possessive and abrasive and painful and everything in him is delighted and it’s everything he wasn’t asking for, and everything Adam wanted too, and they’re here, and its theirs and…

He wracks, shudders, grinds to a stop— this is a limit, and it hurts to push further, running an engine with no gas, no exhaust. Falls properly to the bed, when Adam groans and pulses and its hot and charged and all he feels in him is Adam, warm and… well, it’s not fucking comfortable, but its Adam. And that’s Adam collapsing over him, folding arms around him and murmuring and pressing kisses against his skin, against heaving and sweat, and massaging the spot in his hip that’s sure to fester to a bruise. But it’s Adam telling him god, you did so well, you did so good, and rolling off him to help Ronan lay on his back. And it’s Adam kissing him, painstakingly sweet, brushing the back of his knuckles over Ronan’s cheek and reminding him again how good he’s been. Should be exhausted, the impact of that word, but it’s tripping off Adam’s tongue, so all it does is lace in little webs of intoxicating bliss and it’s Adam curling around him and wrapping arms around him and thanking him. 

It takes time, for their panting to go down. For Adam to stop running his hands over the sweat-mat of Ronan’s hair, twirling fingers through the strands. Reassuring tugs, not enough to hurt. Just riding the line. Pausing between each to properly drag and detangle, even if it’ll frizz. Tug, hair; assemble. Adam’s chest is heaving, and the sun has dipped to a point most the room is laying in scarlet afterglow, and Ronan has just enough energy to lean his hand up and feel the thunder, thump thump thump, of Adam’s heart as the beat goes down. They pull themselves together, on the same bassline.

“So.” Ronan begins, when he can string coherent thought to intonation, and Adam swivels his head in the dark, brow raised. “Think it took?”

Adam expression splits; puzzled. Then, head tossed, and he’s guffawing into the room, into the cavern and onslaught of night; catches a strand of dwindling, burning rays on the sweat clinging to his throat. Shaking the bed, more, and that’s the most Ronan’s stomach has fluttered, despite it all. Adam’s laugh. Carefree and limbs liberated from a week of tension, a week of work. He’d bottle it up, if he could, but he doubts it’d hit the same without real time impact. 

“Maybe.” Adam jokes, on those dregs of joy, and Ronan’s heart clenches . It's levity, it's bright, there's something plucked and soaring out of him. It's ridiculous. It's not a big deal. It's fine. It's wanting, it's wanted. They're laughing. They're making light. And he was paranoid, they'd stew in discomfort, in aftermath. But Adam's still laughing when he adds, “Let’s try again, sometime.”

Yeah, they're fine.