Fic: Merlin: Crépuscule, 1/?
Title: Crépuscule
Author: emei
Rating: mild R?
Length: 3000 words.
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Warnings/spoilers: Modern AU. No specific spoilers.
Summary: Paris!AU. Merlin is a struggling writer living in a bookstore. Arthur's an exchange student. If they hadn't met, Arthur's life would have ended under the wheels of a parisian bus.
Notes: This started out as short crack, and then began growing a plot and tons of backstory. There'll be more, probably three or four parts in total. Enjoy!
“Merci beaucoup, vraiment,” says Arthur and the guy who’s just let go of Arthur’s arm smiles and says, “You’re welcome,” in a decidedly British accent.
“Am I that obvious?” asks Arthur, somewhat annoyed but mostly amused and still very grateful. He would not have liked get run over by a bus just because he looked the wrong way before stepping out into a one-way street. Son of Uther Pendragon Killed by Own Stupidity in Paris. It wouldn’t have sounded good.
“Yeah, kind of… Sorry,” the guy says and smiles even wider. It makes him look a bit manic.
“Guess I still need to work on my pronunciation, huh. So, let me buy you a coffee?” The guy looks surprised and confused, and Arthur adds quickly, “To thank you for saving my skin”.
“Oh, you don’t have to. But all right. I’d never turn down coffee.”
“I’m Arthur,” Arthur says and sticks his hand out.
“Merlin,” the guy says and greets him with a bony and cold hand.
“Merlin. Really?” repeats Arthur and tries and fails miserably not to sound sarcastic and amused. Merlin looks tired and says, voice flat, “That’s my name. Let’s go, shall we?”
Arthur starts heading towards the closest café, next to the metro, with a nice big terrace.
“Nah,” says Merlin, “let’s not fall into the tourist trap,” and heads the other way. Arthur restrains himself from pointing out that it’s a perfectly nice place and that he’s the one who’s buying the coffee anyway. Merlin (honestly, who names their kid Merlin?) did save Arthur’s life. So if he wants his coffee somewhere else, so be it. They follow a smaller street, turn right, and end up in front of a small slightly shabby looking bar. Merlin orders coffee for them both and because Arthur is in a generous mood he acknowledges that it’s actually the best he’s had in a while. It’s cheap, too. They make small talk about how French is a ridiculously hard language, and Paris lovely but very annoying, and the conversation is calm and pleasant. Then Arthur realises that he’s got a lesson starting in ten minutes. It feels stupid to thank somebody for saving your life by spending two euro on coffee and then running away as soon as you’ve finished your tiny cup, so Arthur asks if Merlin wants to meet up later for a pint.
“Sure. Is seven fine with you? At, say, metro Saint-Paul?” Merlin says, looking pleased. Arthur answers “Sounds great. See you!” and almost sprints from the bar towards his lesson. The French professors are very old-fashioned and strict with their timetables.
Arthur has been hanging around the metro exit for fifteen minutes when Merlin shows up that evening. Mostly it’s because Arthur was early. He still says “You’re late,” to Merlin by way of hello, as fifteen minutes feel very long when you’re leaning on a railing, staring at a tiny merry-go-round and watching every new wave of people coming up the stairs for a darkhaired almost-stranger.
“Sorry,” says Merlin and doesn’t look it. “Come on, let’s go a bit further into the Marais.”
“That’s the gay district, right?” says Arthur as they’re waiting to cross the street.
“Yeah.”
He takes another look at Merlin. Considering that he isn’t actually French, Arthur realises that Merlin looks kind of feminine. What with the scarf and those slim jeans and the expressive hands. If he stops chalking it up to the Being French, it takes another significance. And now they’re going to have a drink in the gay district.
“We’re not actually going to a gay bar though, are we?”
Merlin hesitates. “Well… If it bothers you, I know another really nice place a few blocks from here.”
“I’m not bothered. Lead the way.”
Arthur saves getting bothered for really important things, mostly the kind that risk making his father disappointed. Gay bars do not belong to them. As least if nobody’s telling Arthur’s father about it. He just might get a tiny bit nervous at the thought, but Merlin provides ample distraction. Ten minutes later they’re walking down a street Arthur could have sworn they’d crossed twice already.
“In my world, leading the way implies actually knowing where you are going,” he says.
Merlin looks completely unapologetic. “Hang on, we’re almost there. Marais is a damned labyrinth.”
“I’d rather not have you for a guide in a real one, thanks. We’d starve to death before we got out,” says Arthur.
“There is nothing wrong with my sense of directions,” says Merlin and laughs.
They don’t actually go to the place with the four gigantic rainbow flags, for which Arthur is thankful. Seeing as it would have meant Merlin had no taste and Arthur would have had to look down on him for it. Their bar is small, with wooden tables along the red walls, a few couples and a group of friends occupying different corners. Merlin sits down by a small table and Arthur goes to buy the beers. The barman smiles seductively at him and when he makes his way back to Merlin he notices several pairs of eyes following him.
“They’re staring at me,” he says, voice low.
“Well, you’re very blond. It’s noticeable here,” answers Merlin without bothering to keep his voice down. Clearly he has no sense of discretion.
“I must seem very exotic. Probably irresistible.” It’s possible that he sounds a little too smug. Merlin snorts and tells him not to flatter himself too much. New prey is always interesting when the pond is small. Arthur does not want to imagine himself as a goldfish chased around a pond by big gay eels, but he does.
“Ew. Shut up.”
“You’re the one who started it, you prat,” says Merlin.
The banter reminds Arthur of Morgana, but this is kinder, softer, not based on tricky lifelong dynamics and armed with too much intimate details and childhood humiliations. With Merlin it’s just cheerful mockery.
“Got to get going,” says Merlin eventually. “Gwen promised to let me in at ten and I really can’t be late.”
“Don’t you have a key to your place?” Arthur wonders if Gwen is his girlfriend and if the only reason for the gay bar thing was to try to mock him by making him uncomfortable.
“Oh,” says Merlin and realises they’ve actually skipped the fact-exchanging introduction part of the evening completely. “No, actually I’m staying in a bookstore. I’m a tumbleweed. The struggling writer charity case of the month. Usually I get to borrow the spare key but someone else needed it today.”
“A writer? What kind of stuff do you write?”
”Mostly I write silly fantasy about gay wizards,” says Merlin and smiles crookedly. It’s quite true. His real manuscript, though, is something else entirely. Memory of will. He never talks about it.
Arthur laughs. It makes him look open, young. “What, no pretentious poetry about love in the city of light? How refreshingly down-to-earth of you.”
Walking towards the metro in the evening light that turns the city into a coulisse, Merlin gets that feeling, the one he uses when he’s writing. It’s a tingling under his skin, a rush of potential - as though he could change the entire world, wring it inside out and rearrange it if he just pushed. In those moments he sees the multiple ways the story could unfold from here, threads of would-be storylines. He rarely gets the feeling from his own life. It’s been long. Perhaps not since the first days with Will.
Arthur waits for Merlin to call him. If he wants to meet up again, it’s up to him. After three days Arthur’s about to give in and call anyway because he keeps thinking about the annoying bastard. His lessons feel dull, the people unfailingly polite but lacking personality. Then he realises that Merlin never gave him his number. Arthur isn’t sure whether Merlin has his phone number either. It’s ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous. Arthur does not meet strangers in the street and go hang out in gay bars with them, and he definitely does not let them take over his thoughts entirely.
He caves the next day and seeks out the bookstore Merlin said he was staying at. It’s a sunny day and the city is crowded. It’s surprising that Arthur finds Merlin so quickly. He’s sitting on a bench in front of the store, head bent over a notebook he’s scribbling in. Arthur slips between the old women and students milling among the boxes of books on sale, and sits down next to Merlin. He just keeps writing.
“Hello,” says Arthur and Merlin jumps a little. Then he looks up and smiles.
“Hi there. How are you?”
“You never gave me your number,” Arthur says. “Which was clearly very stupid. Otherwise we could have had more beer yesterday.”
Merlin laughs and says that it’s never too late for beer.
“Exactly. But first we must remedy this great mistake. Here, just enter your number.” Arthur holds his phone out to Merlin, who stares a bit at it and doesn’t take it.
“I don’t have one, actually,” he says.
Arthur is speechless for a moment.
“Hang on, what era are you living in? The middle ages?”
“Some of us prefer not to have our brains turn to mush from radiation, thank you very much,” quips Merlin, still smiling.
“Ha. But seriously, how do you get in touch with people?”
“I write letters?”
Arthur folds over laughing and Merlin glares at him.
“Letters are very nice! Very underappreciated!”
“You’re such a grandma. Lucky for us you keep the traditional ways alive,” says Arthur, still wheezing with laughter. He still thinks Merlin might be joking. Arthur would go crazy without his phone. He almost shudders at the thought: to be unreachable, out of touch with the world, and without Internet, camera, music, calendar…
Merlin really has no phone. It’s baffling. Arthur pokes fun at his old-fashioned hippie mindset for the rest of the afternoon as they wander along the Seine in search of ice cream and an unoccupied place in the sun. They end up on île Saint Louis, buying what Merlin insists is the best ice cream in Paris and eating it sitting on the tip of the island, opposite Notre Dame. The cathedral looks different from this angle. More interesting. Somehow the whole city seems more interesting in Merlin’s company. His penchant for back streets and odd details turn this romanticised city more real, more multidimensional.
Late in the afternoon, Arthur follows Merlin all the way back to the bookstore before rushing off to yet another class. Merlin enters to find Gwen smiling at him from behind the counter.
“Was that your boyfriend? He’s really good looking,” she says.
“No,” Merlin says and tries hard for neutral. Something must show on his face anyway because Gwen turns horrifyingly embarrassed and awkward.
“I’m sorry! No offence meant, right, I wasn’t trying to imply that… but of course I did so, er. Sorry. I mean, it’s not that you’re…”
Merlin can’t help smiling at how crimson she’s blushing. He wouldn’t have thought that colour possible on her. He cuts off her apologies.
“Gwen! It’s fine. Don’t worry. I am gay, for the record. But Arthur’s not my boyfriend.”
Gwen looks relieved. “But he is very handsome. Is he French?”
“No, he’s British. Very. And a bit of snob.”
Gwen snorts.
“But an entertaining one,” Merlin adds and gets a charmed smile out of her.
Leaving Gwen to tend to the customers who are barging through the door, Merlin goes upstairs. He takes two steps at a time, in need of pen and paper right now, needs his words to distract him from this quivering deep in him that won’t let him breathe properly. He can’t allow it to take control of him. He writes furiously, curled on a hard chair in a corner, wills himself away from the constraints of this life.
Arthur decides that they should have drinks somewhere nice this time, and Merlin fears bars with expensive wine lists and disdainful waiters. That’s why he says, “Yes, of course, nice it is,” and drags Arthur into the nearest wine store and down to the Seine.
“I didn’t mean nice as in sitting on cold, dirty stones and drinking wine straight from the bottle,” Arthur grumbles again, and again.
“I’ll make sure to bring glasses next time then, so I don’t offend your sensibilities.”
“Hah,” says Arthur and takes another swig of the wine, looking surprisingly content. Merlin wanted to buy the cheapest there was, claiming that it was necessary for the bohemian style he was going for, but Arthur insisted that he did have some standards to uphold. Merlin isn’t complaining, since the wine tastes light years better than what he usually drinks. And he’s already feeling pleasantly fuzzy and languid. Arthur tilts his head back to drink a little more and, oh, how the sunset light glitters in his hair.
Merlin leans against him to take the bottle and stays where he ends up, shoulder pressed against Arthur’s arm. It’s comfortable. Arthur next to him is warm and real and human, and Merlin tries to stop thinking. The wine helps a great deal with that, but it doesn’t help his balance.
“Hey, don’t fall in the river, you idiot,” says Arthur with his arm around Merlin’s waist to keep him steady.
“I wouldn’t have,” says Merlin and relaxes into Arthur’s hold anyway.
It gets chilly, eventually. The sun has set, melting golden over the rooftops and glittering swashes of colour over the Seine. That set Merlin off on a tangent about this scene in L’Œuvre by Zola with a golden sunset over île de la cité. A painter gets inspired and then goes mad trying to recreate that splendour, and, says Merlin and waves a hand vaguely towards the sky, you can understand him when you see this, yeah?
They stumble up the boulevard Saint-Michel, shoulders bumping into each other ever so often, perhaps not only from drunken unbalance. Since it’s getting late and Merlin is drunk, it’s perfectly rational and a friendly gesture that Arthur invites him home to his apartment. Merlin would surely make a fool of himself if he went to the bookstore in this state. Arthur likes the look of the place. He really can’t inflict a drunken Merlin on it.
“So you live by the Luxembourg gardens. What a luxury. You rent a chambre de bonne?” says Merlin.
“A what?” Arthur has to ask, and he wishes Merlin would stop trying to impress him with superior French skills already. It doesn’t work anyway. Arthur prefers to be the one impressing others with knowledge. Now if Merlin would just stop getting that lower, huskier voice when he speaks French. It sounds like the words themselves want to be a caress.
“Chambre de bonne. A room in the attic, old servants quarters,” says Merlin and Arthur is a little bit appalled.
“Of course not,” he huffs. “I rent a flat, just round the corner here. Come on, I’ll show you.”
Merlin actually stops short and stares the moment they’ve stepped over the threshold of Arthur’s flat.
“You live in a three-room flat by the Luxembourg by yourself,” Merlin breathes. “Just how fucking rich are you?”
“Just because you’re a penniless artiste doesn’t mean the rest of us are broke, you know,” Arthur says and shoves Merlin towards the couch in the living room.
He had forgotten that pile of books on the floor. Merlin stumbles over it and grabs Arthur’s wrist for balance. They both end up on the floor, Arthur sprawling on top on Merlin in an undignified way. Merlin’s face is just inches from his own, wide blue eyes staring up at him, mouth slightly open. Arthur can’t help closing that space and kissing him. For a panicky moment Merlin goes a shocked sort of paralysed and Arthur thinks oh hell. Then Merlin kisses him back with a frenzied intent and curls his hands around Arthur’s neck, drawing him closer. They battle, kissing and stroking and pressing, it’s like Merlin wants to meld them into one single body. Arthur feels all his nerves are on the surface of his skin, for Merlin to use, amuse, twist to new heights of pleasure and pain.
They’re drunk. It’s fumbling and urgent. Arthur bangs his elbow on the table and Merlin bites his lip so hard it bleeds. The floor is very cold. Arthur wants to keep going for hours.
The early morning light follows the angle of Merlin’s shoulder, down his ribcage, along a long jagged scar Arthur didn’t see last night, to the sheets that pool around his hips. He’s turned towards the window, looking out. Arthur’s relaxed on his pillows, feeling pleasantly sleepy. Merlin looks almost ethereal like this, all pale skin and hard angles, soft stretches like the line of his neck in between, morning sun slipping over him. Frail and breakable. None of the fire that left them breathless hours earlier.
“How did you get that scar?” Arthur asks. Merlin stiffens, almost imperceptibly.
“An accident,” he says, voice very light. “Car crash. I’ll go take a shower, if that’s okay.”
“Go on then,” says Arthur and resists the temptation of pulling Merlin back to explore all corners of him some more.
More Notes: All comments are welcomed & cherished, concrit and language nitpicks especially. Since I'm a beta-less non-native speaker, there's bound to be some oddities in there. In the next part: Morgana comes to town, Merlin wonders if Hunith is blackmailing Gauis and there’s a hug at Centre Pompidou.
Author: emei
Rating: mild R?
Length: 3000 words.
Pairing: Merlin/Arthur
Warnings/spoilers: Modern AU. No specific spoilers.
Summary: Paris!AU. Merlin is a struggling writer living in a bookstore. Arthur's an exchange student. If they hadn't met, Arthur's life would have ended under the wheels of a parisian bus.
Notes: This started out as short crack, and then began growing a plot and tons of backstory. There'll be more, probably three or four parts in total. Enjoy!
“Merci beaucoup, vraiment,” says Arthur and the guy who’s just let go of Arthur’s arm smiles and says, “You’re welcome,” in a decidedly British accent.
“Am I that obvious?” asks Arthur, somewhat annoyed but mostly amused and still very grateful. He would not have liked get run over by a bus just because he looked the wrong way before stepping out into a one-way street. Son of Uther Pendragon Killed by Own Stupidity in Paris. It wouldn’t have sounded good.
“Yeah, kind of… Sorry,” the guy says and smiles even wider. It makes him look a bit manic.
“Guess I still need to work on my pronunciation, huh. So, let me buy you a coffee?” The guy looks surprised and confused, and Arthur adds quickly, “To thank you for saving my skin”.
“Oh, you don’t have to. But all right. I’d never turn down coffee.”
“I’m Arthur,” Arthur says and sticks his hand out.
“Merlin,” the guy says and greets him with a bony and cold hand.
“Merlin. Really?” repeats Arthur and tries and fails miserably not to sound sarcastic and amused. Merlin looks tired and says, voice flat, “That’s my name. Let’s go, shall we?”
Arthur starts heading towards the closest café, next to the metro, with a nice big terrace.
“Nah,” says Merlin, “let’s not fall into the tourist trap,” and heads the other way. Arthur restrains himself from pointing out that it’s a perfectly nice place and that he’s the one who’s buying the coffee anyway. Merlin (honestly, who names their kid Merlin?) did save Arthur’s life. So if he wants his coffee somewhere else, so be it. They follow a smaller street, turn right, and end up in front of a small slightly shabby looking bar. Merlin orders coffee for them both and because Arthur is in a generous mood he acknowledges that it’s actually the best he’s had in a while. It’s cheap, too. They make small talk about how French is a ridiculously hard language, and Paris lovely but very annoying, and the conversation is calm and pleasant. Then Arthur realises that he’s got a lesson starting in ten minutes. It feels stupid to thank somebody for saving your life by spending two euro on coffee and then running away as soon as you’ve finished your tiny cup, so Arthur asks if Merlin wants to meet up later for a pint.
“Sure. Is seven fine with you? At, say, metro Saint-Paul?” Merlin says, looking pleased. Arthur answers “Sounds great. See you!” and almost sprints from the bar towards his lesson. The French professors are very old-fashioned and strict with their timetables.
Arthur has been hanging around the metro exit for fifteen minutes when Merlin shows up that evening. Mostly it’s because Arthur was early. He still says “You’re late,” to Merlin by way of hello, as fifteen minutes feel very long when you’re leaning on a railing, staring at a tiny merry-go-round and watching every new wave of people coming up the stairs for a darkhaired almost-stranger.
“Sorry,” says Merlin and doesn’t look it. “Come on, let’s go a bit further into the Marais.”
“That’s the gay district, right?” says Arthur as they’re waiting to cross the street.
“Yeah.”
He takes another look at Merlin. Considering that he isn’t actually French, Arthur realises that Merlin looks kind of feminine. What with the scarf and those slim jeans and the expressive hands. If he stops chalking it up to the Being French, it takes another significance. And now they’re going to have a drink in the gay district.
“We’re not actually going to a gay bar though, are we?”
Merlin hesitates. “Well… If it bothers you, I know another really nice place a few blocks from here.”
“I’m not bothered. Lead the way.”
Arthur saves getting bothered for really important things, mostly the kind that risk making his father disappointed. Gay bars do not belong to them. As least if nobody’s telling Arthur’s father about it. He just might get a tiny bit nervous at the thought, but Merlin provides ample distraction. Ten minutes later they’re walking down a street Arthur could have sworn they’d crossed twice already.
“In my world, leading the way implies actually knowing where you are going,” he says.
Merlin looks completely unapologetic. “Hang on, we’re almost there. Marais is a damned labyrinth.”
“I’d rather not have you for a guide in a real one, thanks. We’d starve to death before we got out,” says Arthur.
“There is nothing wrong with my sense of directions,” says Merlin and laughs.
They don’t actually go to the place with the four gigantic rainbow flags, for which Arthur is thankful. Seeing as it would have meant Merlin had no taste and Arthur would have had to look down on him for it. Their bar is small, with wooden tables along the red walls, a few couples and a group of friends occupying different corners. Merlin sits down by a small table and Arthur goes to buy the beers. The barman smiles seductively at him and when he makes his way back to Merlin he notices several pairs of eyes following him.
“They’re staring at me,” he says, voice low.
“Well, you’re very blond. It’s noticeable here,” answers Merlin without bothering to keep his voice down. Clearly he has no sense of discretion.
“I must seem very exotic. Probably irresistible.” It’s possible that he sounds a little too smug. Merlin snorts and tells him not to flatter himself too much. New prey is always interesting when the pond is small. Arthur does not want to imagine himself as a goldfish chased around a pond by big gay eels, but he does.
“Ew. Shut up.”
“You’re the one who started it, you prat,” says Merlin.
The banter reminds Arthur of Morgana, but this is kinder, softer, not based on tricky lifelong dynamics and armed with too much intimate details and childhood humiliations. With Merlin it’s just cheerful mockery.
“Got to get going,” says Merlin eventually. “Gwen promised to let me in at ten and I really can’t be late.”
“Don’t you have a key to your place?” Arthur wonders if Gwen is his girlfriend and if the only reason for the gay bar thing was to try to mock him by making him uncomfortable.
“Oh,” says Merlin and realises they’ve actually skipped the fact-exchanging introduction part of the evening completely. “No, actually I’m staying in a bookstore. I’m a tumbleweed. The struggling writer charity case of the month. Usually I get to borrow the spare key but someone else needed it today.”
“A writer? What kind of stuff do you write?”
”Mostly I write silly fantasy about gay wizards,” says Merlin and smiles crookedly. It’s quite true. His real manuscript, though, is something else entirely. Memory of will. He never talks about it.
Arthur laughs. It makes him look open, young. “What, no pretentious poetry about love in the city of light? How refreshingly down-to-earth of you.”
Walking towards the metro in the evening light that turns the city into a coulisse, Merlin gets that feeling, the one he uses when he’s writing. It’s a tingling under his skin, a rush of potential - as though he could change the entire world, wring it inside out and rearrange it if he just pushed. In those moments he sees the multiple ways the story could unfold from here, threads of would-be storylines. He rarely gets the feeling from his own life. It’s been long. Perhaps not since the first days with Will.
Arthur waits for Merlin to call him. If he wants to meet up again, it’s up to him. After three days Arthur’s about to give in and call anyway because he keeps thinking about the annoying bastard. His lessons feel dull, the people unfailingly polite but lacking personality. Then he realises that Merlin never gave him his number. Arthur isn’t sure whether Merlin has his phone number either. It’s ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous. Arthur does not meet strangers in the street and go hang out in gay bars with them, and he definitely does not let them take over his thoughts entirely.
He caves the next day and seeks out the bookstore Merlin said he was staying at. It’s a sunny day and the city is crowded. It’s surprising that Arthur finds Merlin so quickly. He’s sitting on a bench in front of the store, head bent over a notebook he’s scribbling in. Arthur slips between the old women and students milling among the boxes of books on sale, and sits down next to Merlin. He just keeps writing.
“Hello,” says Arthur and Merlin jumps a little. Then he looks up and smiles.
“Hi there. How are you?”
“You never gave me your number,” Arthur says. “Which was clearly very stupid. Otherwise we could have had more beer yesterday.”
Merlin laughs and says that it’s never too late for beer.
“Exactly. But first we must remedy this great mistake. Here, just enter your number.” Arthur holds his phone out to Merlin, who stares a bit at it and doesn’t take it.
“I don’t have one, actually,” he says.
Arthur is speechless for a moment.
“Hang on, what era are you living in? The middle ages?”
“Some of us prefer not to have our brains turn to mush from radiation, thank you very much,” quips Merlin, still smiling.
“Ha. But seriously, how do you get in touch with people?”
“I write letters?”
Arthur folds over laughing and Merlin glares at him.
“Letters are very nice! Very underappreciated!”
“You’re such a grandma. Lucky for us you keep the traditional ways alive,” says Arthur, still wheezing with laughter. He still thinks Merlin might be joking. Arthur would go crazy without his phone. He almost shudders at the thought: to be unreachable, out of touch with the world, and without Internet, camera, music, calendar…
Merlin really has no phone. It’s baffling. Arthur pokes fun at his old-fashioned hippie mindset for the rest of the afternoon as they wander along the Seine in search of ice cream and an unoccupied place in the sun. They end up on île Saint Louis, buying what Merlin insists is the best ice cream in Paris and eating it sitting on the tip of the island, opposite Notre Dame. The cathedral looks different from this angle. More interesting. Somehow the whole city seems more interesting in Merlin’s company. His penchant for back streets and odd details turn this romanticised city more real, more multidimensional.
Late in the afternoon, Arthur follows Merlin all the way back to the bookstore before rushing off to yet another class. Merlin enters to find Gwen smiling at him from behind the counter.
“Was that your boyfriend? He’s really good looking,” she says.
“No,” Merlin says and tries hard for neutral. Something must show on his face anyway because Gwen turns horrifyingly embarrassed and awkward.
“I’m sorry! No offence meant, right, I wasn’t trying to imply that… but of course I did so, er. Sorry. I mean, it’s not that you’re…”
Merlin can’t help smiling at how crimson she’s blushing. He wouldn’t have thought that colour possible on her. He cuts off her apologies.
“Gwen! It’s fine. Don’t worry. I am gay, for the record. But Arthur’s not my boyfriend.”
Gwen looks relieved. “But he is very handsome. Is he French?”
“No, he’s British. Very. And a bit of snob.”
Gwen snorts.
“But an entertaining one,” Merlin adds and gets a charmed smile out of her.
Leaving Gwen to tend to the customers who are barging through the door, Merlin goes upstairs. He takes two steps at a time, in need of pen and paper right now, needs his words to distract him from this quivering deep in him that won’t let him breathe properly. He can’t allow it to take control of him. He writes furiously, curled on a hard chair in a corner, wills himself away from the constraints of this life.
Arthur decides that they should have drinks somewhere nice this time, and Merlin fears bars with expensive wine lists and disdainful waiters. That’s why he says, “Yes, of course, nice it is,” and drags Arthur into the nearest wine store and down to the Seine.
“I didn’t mean nice as in sitting on cold, dirty stones and drinking wine straight from the bottle,” Arthur grumbles again, and again.
“I’ll make sure to bring glasses next time then, so I don’t offend your sensibilities.”
“Hah,” says Arthur and takes another swig of the wine, looking surprisingly content. Merlin wanted to buy the cheapest there was, claiming that it was necessary for the bohemian style he was going for, but Arthur insisted that he did have some standards to uphold. Merlin isn’t complaining, since the wine tastes light years better than what he usually drinks. And he’s already feeling pleasantly fuzzy and languid. Arthur tilts his head back to drink a little more and, oh, how the sunset light glitters in his hair.
Merlin leans against him to take the bottle and stays where he ends up, shoulder pressed against Arthur’s arm. It’s comfortable. Arthur next to him is warm and real and human, and Merlin tries to stop thinking. The wine helps a great deal with that, but it doesn’t help his balance.
“Hey, don’t fall in the river, you idiot,” says Arthur with his arm around Merlin’s waist to keep him steady.
“I wouldn’t have,” says Merlin and relaxes into Arthur’s hold anyway.
It gets chilly, eventually. The sun has set, melting golden over the rooftops and glittering swashes of colour over the Seine. That set Merlin off on a tangent about this scene in L’Œuvre by Zola with a golden sunset over île de la cité. A painter gets inspired and then goes mad trying to recreate that splendour, and, says Merlin and waves a hand vaguely towards the sky, you can understand him when you see this, yeah?
They stumble up the boulevard Saint-Michel, shoulders bumping into each other ever so often, perhaps not only from drunken unbalance. Since it’s getting late and Merlin is drunk, it’s perfectly rational and a friendly gesture that Arthur invites him home to his apartment. Merlin would surely make a fool of himself if he went to the bookstore in this state. Arthur likes the look of the place. He really can’t inflict a drunken Merlin on it.
“So you live by the Luxembourg gardens. What a luxury. You rent a chambre de bonne?” says Merlin.
“A what?” Arthur has to ask, and he wishes Merlin would stop trying to impress him with superior French skills already. It doesn’t work anyway. Arthur prefers to be the one impressing others with knowledge. Now if Merlin would just stop getting that lower, huskier voice when he speaks French. It sounds like the words themselves want to be a caress.
“Chambre de bonne. A room in the attic, old servants quarters,” says Merlin and Arthur is a little bit appalled.
“Of course not,” he huffs. “I rent a flat, just round the corner here. Come on, I’ll show you.”
Merlin actually stops short and stares the moment they’ve stepped over the threshold of Arthur’s flat.
“You live in a three-room flat by the Luxembourg by yourself,” Merlin breathes. “Just how fucking rich are you?”
“Just because you’re a penniless artiste doesn’t mean the rest of us are broke, you know,” Arthur says and shoves Merlin towards the couch in the living room.
He had forgotten that pile of books on the floor. Merlin stumbles over it and grabs Arthur’s wrist for balance. They both end up on the floor, Arthur sprawling on top on Merlin in an undignified way. Merlin’s face is just inches from his own, wide blue eyes staring up at him, mouth slightly open. Arthur can’t help closing that space and kissing him. For a panicky moment Merlin goes a shocked sort of paralysed and Arthur thinks oh hell. Then Merlin kisses him back with a frenzied intent and curls his hands around Arthur’s neck, drawing him closer. They battle, kissing and stroking and pressing, it’s like Merlin wants to meld them into one single body. Arthur feels all his nerves are on the surface of his skin, for Merlin to use, amuse, twist to new heights of pleasure and pain.
They’re drunk. It’s fumbling and urgent. Arthur bangs his elbow on the table and Merlin bites his lip so hard it bleeds. The floor is very cold. Arthur wants to keep going for hours.
The early morning light follows the angle of Merlin’s shoulder, down his ribcage, along a long jagged scar Arthur didn’t see last night, to the sheets that pool around his hips. He’s turned towards the window, looking out. Arthur’s relaxed on his pillows, feeling pleasantly sleepy. Merlin looks almost ethereal like this, all pale skin and hard angles, soft stretches like the line of his neck in between, morning sun slipping over him. Frail and breakable. None of the fire that left them breathless hours earlier.
“How did you get that scar?” Arthur asks. Merlin stiffens, almost imperceptibly.
“An accident,” he says, voice very light. “Car crash. I’ll go take a shower, if that’s okay.”
“Go on then,” says Arthur and resists the temptation of pulling Merlin back to explore all corners of him some more.
More Notes: All comments are welcomed & cherished, concrit and language nitpicks especially. Since I'm a beta-less non-native speaker, there's bound to be some oddities in there. In the next part: Morgana comes to town, Merlin wonders if Hunith is blackmailing Gauis and there’s a hug at Centre Pompidou.