(no subject)
Title: Bloom
Series: AC360, Countdown
Rating: R
Summary: Anderson spends a quiet day recovering from a tiring week. Also includes sex, roses, and complaints about rural education.
Author Note: Thanks a bunch to my beta, missstewart. I am not entirely confident in this story. It grew from a single line of dialogue and was intended to be quite a bit shorter - as in, not exceeding five hundred or so words. I'm not sure how the transition has treated it.
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Anderson comes home exhausted. Keith has expected no better. He hasn't been gone for that long, really, not even a week, and never even left the country, but he was still entirely too far away, so far as Keith was concerned. He had been tired when he left and it gives Keith absolutely no satisfaction to find that his suspicion that he would get one of the undead back in place of his lover to be correct. There are some things he doesn't want to be right about.
Anderson gets in pretty late in the evening and mutters a greeting and an apology, both half incoherent, before passing out on the bed without bothering to take off his shoes. Keith doesn't really mind - he's been looking forward to their reunion sex but if putting it off until morning will ensure Anderson's actually awake for it, he's all for waiting. He pulls off Anderson's shoes and socks and jeans, noting the soaked hems only in passing.
Though not particularly tired, Keith gets into bed not long after, careful not to do anything that might disturb him, though he suspects it would take something fairly substantial to get him up now that he's got himself set to rest. Something like a buffalo stampede, perhaps, or a bomb going off beside him. But this isn't the sort of theory he'd be inclined to test, even if he had the means to do so, so he's as quiet as he can manage and undresses in the dark before slipping in next to Anderson.
He lays awake for a little while, mulling over a thought that feels like a larval Special Comment but finds it impossible to build up enough indignant rage to nudge it into being with Anderson breathing peacefully beside him. So, after a rather shorter time then he would normally spend on such an endeavor, he gives up and just listens to that breathing. It's deep and regular, which is nice, and a sighing quality that sounds like relief, though that might just be his imagination. It still makes him want to drag Anderson over and hold onto him. He's very much aware of the absurdity of his own protectiveness and this sometimes irritated him, but recently he's become resigned to it so it's with relatively little internal debate that he searches out Anderson's hand under the covers and takes hold. He falls asleep shortly thereafter and doesn't so much deny the connection as fail to acknowledge it.
It's with absolutely no surprise at all that Keith finds himself waking up first the next morning. It's with only slightly more that he finds Anderson, though still dead to the world and looking for all of it that he hasn't been anything but since collapsing the night before, is pressed securely into his arms. His weight is comfortable and familiar and his t-shirt has ridden up in his sleep so Keith can't help but run a hand up underneath, rubbing the warm skin in slow circles and trying to figure out if it feels any different now than it did before.
No less ridiculous then his protectiveness is that Keith has missed him so much over the last few days, especially considering how commonplace separations of several weeks or longer are for the two of them. He feels almost justified, though, because the tired look in Anderson's eyes when he left, and the way he lingered just a little too long before heading out the door has been bothering him. Most often, Anderson is apologetic about leaving, but never about going. He has no particular desire to be without Keith but a strong one to pursue whatever story he's being sent out for. That eternal enthusiasm was dampened and he'd been just plain reluctant.
Keith's not sure how long he lays there, touching gently and contemplating everything he knows about Anderson before the other man wakes up, but he's aware of it the moment it happens. This isn't magic, no telepathy involved, only familiarity. When he's just surfacing from a deep sleep, there's this sound that Anderson makes in the back of his throat, before letting out a breath like a sigh. It's typically a minute or so before he shows any more overt signs of consciousness, and Keith doesn't stop the movement of his hand in this time. There's a slight shifting of his body, barely qualifying as movement, just checking that everything is present and accounted for, and then a more deliberate sigh. Another ten of fifteen seconds pass before he actually opens his eyes. This process can take up to half an hour from beginning to end, depending on how long he's been sleep and what time of day it is, with much subtle stretching and indecisive fluttering of eyelids, and, on the occasion he's alone in bed (and this is something that Keith has only witnessed once or twice but would like very much to see again), he'll sometimes work off all the covers and slide his hands slowly over his own body, restless and wondering, as though making sure all his parts are still where he left them. His fingers will slide up under his shirt, if he's wearing one, and then back down to trace his own hipbones, contemplating the skin stretched over them, and then continually back to his belly as though fascinated by it's texture.
This morning he seems content to check over Keith instead, rubbing his palm over his collar bone and then down to the center of his chest before settling over his navel. His head shifts and his breath is hot and moist against Keith's jaw when he speaks.
“You molesting me in my sleep, Olbermann?” he asks, his voice rough and smirking.
“You started it,” Keith mutters, then turns to kiss him, deep and warm and full of everything he's been thinking of for the past couple of days - affection and desire and mildly idiotic concern. Anderson answers in kind and their mouth fit together in that perfect way defined by the first proper kiss in too long.
This kiss lead to the first of the Welcome Home sex and it's slow and lazy and Keith notes Anderson smells of sweat and airports and time spent far away. He much prefers the smell of Anderson when he's clean, and more than that he likes how his own smell overlays that of a clean Anderson so he suggests, afterward, that Anderson go shower so he can recover before being forced to jump him, again.
The next Welcome Home sex is in the bathroom, something like half an hour later. Not in the shower because, as romantic as it sounds, it's kind of dangerous. They've done it before, with other people, and tried it together once, but on the whole neither of them have a death wish so Keith fucks Anderson up against the sink and watches his face as he comes. His intention is to remember it forever and he later thinks - again, absurdly, but he seems to have a lot of absurd thoughts around and about Anderson - that after he dies, that memory will somehow live on without him.
They stay where they are for a little while, afterward, leaned up against the sink, breathing deep and giving their heart rates time to slow. Keith finds himself kissing Anderson's neck, gentle and almost chaste and it's at this point he decides it's time they adjourn to some place more comfortable. Anderson approves of this plan whole-heartedly.
They spend the rest of the day with the door locked, the TV off, and their respective cell phones tucked away in a drawer. They sit on the couch in pajama pants and t-shirts and Anderson lays back with his feet in Keith's lap. It's a testament to how much he's been missed that Keith says nothing but rubs at them absently as Anderson tells him about his trip with little detail aside from the ones that will never make it to air.
Keith learns that he went to one of the poorest, most rural areas in the country to investigate their educational system. The first place they went, a public school, was a masterpiece of apathy and ineptitude and misplaced arrogance. It was utterly depressing and a lot of people didn't even try to hide their resentment over the city folks coming in to make them look bad. Anderson sounds sad when he talks about it and Keith wraps his hand around his ankle and rubs gently, trying to make the tone soften.
The next place they went was a college prep school with less then sixty students, total. It wasn't made up entirely of spoiled rich kids, when surprised Keith until Anderson mentioned it was tuition free. He'd sat in on a public speaking class and the kids had all brought in prized possessions to tell stories about. One girl brought in a black metal box full of the roses an old boyfriend had given her and when she was done her classmates were curiously silent for a long moment. Another brought nothing but explained with honesty and conviction that everything she considered bringing was produced with her own hands and that they were her most prized possessions.
It didn't take long, as there were only five of them, and afterward they talked to him. They all seemed to know who he was, and asked searching questions about what had brought him down, but seemed reluctant to go further. He mentioned that they would next visit a nearby alternative school and the girl with the roses snorted out bitter laughter as the other's exchanged grim, knowing glances.
“You're a couple of years later,” she said. “That place is crashing and burning. It was a great place, before - helped my brother out a lot - but they can't keep administrators and the last guy conned the board of directors into giving him a big pile of money they didn't have before he left.”
“They were talking at the beginning of the year about clearing out all the 'riff-raff',” someone else said. “And when you consider that their student body is everyone else's riff-raff...” He trailed off with a shrug.
He'd gone next to see the dean, and had been amused by the giggles and emphatic apologies thrown his way by the students and concerned that the teacher said nothing to silence or contradict the kid who called him an 'odious old man' and only objected to his profanity when another boy added, 'self-righteous prick' to the litany of insults being thrown around.
“None of it was particularly inaccurate,” he says to Keith, who smirks.
The part of the story dealing with the alternative school is uncomfortable and depressing and within a few minutes that tired look is coming back, worse then ever, so Keith moves on top of him and kisses him slowly and thoroughly until he relaxes. They have sex, again, and it takes more then an hour because they can't seem to stop kissing.
Anderson is still tired, so they go to bed relatively early. Or they try to, anyway. Despite obvious fatigue, every time he lays down Anderson manages to remember something else he absolutely must do and insists he won't be able to sleep until he does it or makes a note of it someplace. After the fourth time, Keith waits until he'd settled into the mattress and then says to him, “You're not getting up again.”
“Promise,” Anderson replies.
“I don't think you understand,” Keith says. “You're not getting up again. I'm not going to let you.”
“Going to tie me down?” he asks, a smile evident in his tone.
“No,” he says. “Not exactly.”
He reaches out and draws Anderson closer then drapes his body across him as restrictively as is comfortable, one arm stretched out to the touch the bed on his other side and one leg installing itself in between Anderson's, holding him in place.
“See?” he says, when Anderson doesn't speak. “You're not going anywhere. Go to sleep.”
“Keith?” Anderson says, after a moment of thought. He lays one hand on his arm but doesn't try to shift it. “What if I have to use the bathroom.”
“You should have thought of that during one of the many field trips you've already taken,” he replies.
Anderson giggles, softly, but presses closer to Keith, seeming glad to have an excuse to do so, and relaxes. It's a while before either of them speak, again, and when he does, Anderson's voice is soft and heavy, at the edge of sleep, but still tinged with amusement.
“Why haven't you given me any roses, Keith?” he asks.
Keith is himself too close to sleep to decode his mostly happy, almost wistful tone, so he just presses his lips directly to his ear and humors him, saying, very softly, “Anderson, I will buy you a rose garden if you'll just go to sleep.”
Anderson turns his head to kiss him, and speaks against his lips, smiling. “Promise?” he asks.
“Promise.”
It's more then a week later that they're walking together, on their way back to Anderson's place after a dinner that was much more peaceful than most they had shared. That is, there was minimal bickering, few insults, and no one had interrupted or stared to obviously from other tables. They had even gotten the waiter with the curly hair, the one who treated them just like any other customers, to the point they had thought he didn't recognize them for several months.
There's a florist midway between the Anderson's building and the restaurant that they've passed dozens of times before and never spared a second glance, but this time as they draw near, Keith gestures to it and says, “You mind waiting for a minute?”
Anderson looks at him, bemused, and says, “Not at all.”
He goes in and Anderson waits for him, standing close to the wall with his head down and his hands shoved in his pockets. He watches the feet of the people that go by - fluffy pink boots, some sneakers of varying degrees of wear, and a set of leather boots with vertigo-inducingly high heels going in step with battered purple Converse high tops - until Keith emerges, smirking, with a rose in his hand. He hands it to Anderson with elaborate casualness then continues down the street without checking to see if he's following.
Anderson stays where he is, looking down at the flower. It's just a rose, dark red, conspicuous only because it's not part of a dozen. It would never be selected as the favorite of a bunch, unless the rest were in some way substandard. But because it is a rose, and therefore beautiful, and because Keith gave it to him, and because Keith remembered the conversation that Anderson himself had half-forgotten, and kept a promise extracted mostly in jest (even though he'd bet dollars to donuts that Keith is just messing with him and contemplated the absurdity of their situation even as he was paying for it), Anderson finds himself thinking that he'll keep it forever.
It's a silly though, excessively romantic, and Keith most likely laugh if he ever voiced it. But, then, maybe not, because Keith's the one giving him flowers and, wow, are they ever going to be taunting each other over this for years.
Anderson smiles a little wider at the thought and then sets off down the street, after him.
Series: AC360, Countdown
Rating: R
Summary: Anderson spends a quiet day recovering from a tiring week. Also includes sex, roses, and complaints about rural education.
Author Note: Thanks a bunch to my beta, missstewart. I am not entirely confident in this story. It grew from a single line of dialogue and was intended to be quite a bit shorter - as in, not exceeding five hundred or so words. I'm not sure how the transition has treated it.
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Anderson comes home exhausted. Keith has expected no better. He hasn't been gone for that long, really, not even a week, and never even left the country, but he was still entirely too far away, so far as Keith was concerned. He had been tired when he left and it gives Keith absolutely no satisfaction to find that his suspicion that he would get one of the undead back in place of his lover to be correct. There are some things he doesn't want to be right about.
Anderson gets in pretty late in the evening and mutters a greeting and an apology, both half incoherent, before passing out on the bed without bothering to take off his shoes. Keith doesn't really mind - he's been looking forward to their reunion sex but if putting it off until morning will ensure Anderson's actually awake for it, he's all for waiting. He pulls off Anderson's shoes and socks and jeans, noting the soaked hems only in passing.
Though not particularly tired, Keith gets into bed not long after, careful not to do anything that might disturb him, though he suspects it would take something fairly substantial to get him up now that he's got himself set to rest. Something like a buffalo stampede, perhaps, or a bomb going off beside him. But this isn't the sort of theory he'd be inclined to test, even if he had the means to do so, so he's as quiet as he can manage and undresses in the dark before slipping in next to Anderson.
He lays awake for a little while, mulling over a thought that feels like a larval Special Comment but finds it impossible to build up enough indignant rage to nudge it into being with Anderson breathing peacefully beside him. So, after a rather shorter time then he would normally spend on such an endeavor, he gives up and just listens to that breathing. It's deep and regular, which is nice, and a sighing quality that sounds like relief, though that might just be his imagination. It still makes him want to drag Anderson over and hold onto him. He's very much aware of the absurdity of his own protectiveness and this sometimes irritated him, but recently he's become resigned to it so it's with relatively little internal debate that he searches out Anderson's hand under the covers and takes hold. He falls asleep shortly thereafter and doesn't so much deny the connection as fail to acknowledge it.
It's with absolutely no surprise at all that Keith finds himself waking up first the next morning. It's with only slightly more that he finds Anderson, though still dead to the world and looking for all of it that he hasn't been anything but since collapsing the night before, is pressed securely into his arms. His weight is comfortable and familiar and his t-shirt has ridden up in his sleep so Keith can't help but run a hand up underneath, rubbing the warm skin in slow circles and trying to figure out if it feels any different now than it did before.
No less ridiculous then his protectiveness is that Keith has missed him so much over the last few days, especially considering how commonplace separations of several weeks or longer are for the two of them. He feels almost justified, though, because the tired look in Anderson's eyes when he left, and the way he lingered just a little too long before heading out the door has been bothering him. Most often, Anderson is apologetic about leaving, but never about going. He has no particular desire to be without Keith but a strong one to pursue whatever story he's being sent out for. That eternal enthusiasm was dampened and he'd been just plain reluctant.
Keith's not sure how long he lays there, touching gently and contemplating everything he knows about Anderson before the other man wakes up, but he's aware of it the moment it happens. This isn't magic, no telepathy involved, only familiarity. When he's just surfacing from a deep sleep, there's this sound that Anderson makes in the back of his throat, before letting out a breath like a sigh. It's typically a minute or so before he shows any more overt signs of consciousness, and Keith doesn't stop the movement of his hand in this time. There's a slight shifting of his body, barely qualifying as movement, just checking that everything is present and accounted for, and then a more deliberate sigh. Another ten of fifteen seconds pass before he actually opens his eyes. This process can take up to half an hour from beginning to end, depending on how long he's been sleep and what time of day it is, with much subtle stretching and indecisive fluttering of eyelids, and, on the occasion he's alone in bed (and this is something that Keith has only witnessed once or twice but would like very much to see again), he'll sometimes work off all the covers and slide his hands slowly over his own body, restless and wondering, as though making sure all his parts are still where he left them. His fingers will slide up under his shirt, if he's wearing one, and then back down to trace his own hipbones, contemplating the skin stretched over them, and then continually back to his belly as though fascinated by it's texture.
This morning he seems content to check over Keith instead, rubbing his palm over his collar bone and then down to the center of his chest before settling over his navel. His head shifts and his breath is hot and moist against Keith's jaw when he speaks.
“You molesting me in my sleep, Olbermann?” he asks, his voice rough and smirking.
“You started it,” Keith mutters, then turns to kiss him, deep and warm and full of everything he's been thinking of for the past couple of days - affection and desire and mildly idiotic concern. Anderson answers in kind and their mouth fit together in that perfect way defined by the first proper kiss in too long.
This kiss lead to the first of the Welcome Home sex and it's slow and lazy and Keith notes Anderson smells of sweat and airports and time spent far away. He much prefers the smell of Anderson when he's clean, and more than that he likes how his own smell overlays that of a clean Anderson so he suggests, afterward, that Anderson go shower so he can recover before being forced to jump him, again.
The next Welcome Home sex is in the bathroom, something like half an hour later. Not in the shower because, as romantic as it sounds, it's kind of dangerous. They've done it before, with other people, and tried it together once, but on the whole neither of them have a death wish so Keith fucks Anderson up against the sink and watches his face as he comes. His intention is to remember it forever and he later thinks - again, absurdly, but he seems to have a lot of absurd thoughts around and about Anderson - that after he dies, that memory will somehow live on without him.
They stay where they are for a little while, afterward, leaned up against the sink, breathing deep and giving their heart rates time to slow. Keith finds himself kissing Anderson's neck, gentle and almost chaste and it's at this point he decides it's time they adjourn to some place more comfortable. Anderson approves of this plan whole-heartedly.
They spend the rest of the day with the door locked, the TV off, and their respective cell phones tucked away in a drawer. They sit on the couch in pajama pants and t-shirts and Anderson lays back with his feet in Keith's lap. It's a testament to how much he's been missed that Keith says nothing but rubs at them absently as Anderson tells him about his trip with little detail aside from the ones that will never make it to air.
Keith learns that he went to one of the poorest, most rural areas in the country to investigate their educational system. The first place they went, a public school, was a masterpiece of apathy and ineptitude and misplaced arrogance. It was utterly depressing and a lot of people didn't even try to hide their resentment over the city folks coming in to make them look bad. Anderson sounds sad when he talks about it and Keith wraps his hand around his ankle and rubs gently, trying to make the tone soften.
The next place they went was a college prep school with less then sixty students, total. It wasn't made up entirely of spoiled rich kids, when surprised Keith until Anderson mentioned it was tuition free. He'd sat in on a public speaking class and the kids had all brought in prized possessions to tell stories about. One girl brought in a black metal box full of the roses an old boyfriend had given her and when she was done her classmates were curiously silent for a long moment. Another brought nothing but explained with honesty and conviction that everything she considered bringing was produced with her own hands and that they were her most prized possessions.
It didn't take long, as there were only five of them, and afterward they talked to him. They all seemed to know who he was, and asked searching questions about what had brought him down, but seemed reluctant to go further. He mentioned that they would next visit a nearby alternative school and the girl with the roses snorted out bitter laughter as the other's exchanged grim, knowing glances.
“You're a couple of years later,” she said. “That place is crashing and burning. It was a great place, before - helped my brother out a lot - but they can't keep administrators and the last guy conned the board of directors into giving him a big pile of money they didn't have before he left.”
“They were talking at the beginning of the year about clearing out all the 'riff-raff',” someone else said. “And when you consider that their student body is everyone else's riff-raff...” He trailed off with a shrug.
He'd gone next to see the dean, and had been amused by the giggles and emphatic apologies thrown his way by the students and concerned that the teacher said nothing to silence or contradict the kid who called him an 'odious old man' and only objected to his profanity when another boy added, 'self-righteous prick' to the litany of insults being thrown around.
“None of it was particularly inaccurate,” he says to Keith, who smirks.
The part of the story dealing with the alternative school is uncomfortable and depressing and within a few minutes that tired look is coming back, worse then ever, so Keith moves on top of him and kisses him slowly and thoroughly until he relaxes. They have sex, again, and it takes more then an hour because they can't seem to stop kissing.
Anderson is still tired, so they go to bed relatively early. Or they try to, anyway. Despite obvious fatigue, every time he lays down Anderson manages to remember something else he absolutely must do and insists he won't be able to sleep until he does it or makes a note of it someplace. After the fourth time, Keith waits until he'd settled into the mattress and then says to him, “You're not getting up again.”
“Promise,” Anderson replies.
“I don't think you understand,” Keith says. “You're not getting up again. I'm not going to let you.”
“Going to tie me down?” he asks, a smile evident in his tone.
“No,” he says. “Not exactly.”
He reaches out and draws Anderson closer then drapes his body across him as restrictively as is comfortable, one arm stretched out to the touch the bed on his other side and one leg installing itself in between Anderson's, holding him in place.
“See?” he says, when Anderson doesn't speak. “You're not going anywhere. Go to sleep.”
“Keith?” Anderson says, after a moment of thought. He lays one hand on his arm but doesn't try to shift it. “What if I have to use the bathroom.”
“You should have thought of that during one of the many field trips you've already taken,” he replies.
Anderson giggles, softly, but presses closer to Keith, seeming glad to have an excuse to do so, and relaxes. It's a while before either of them speak, again, and when he does, Anderson's voice is soft and heavy, at the edge of sleep, but still tinged with amusement.
“Why haven't you given me any roses, Keith?” he asks.
Keith is himself too close to sleep to decode his mostly happy, almost wistful tone, so he just presses his lips directly to his ear and humors him, saying, very softly, “Anderson, I will buy you a rose garden if you'll just go to sleep.”
Anderson turns his head to kiss him, and speaks against his lips, smiling. “Promise?” he asks.
“Promise.”
It's more then a week later that they're walking together, on their way back to Anderson's place after a dinner that was much more peaceful than most they had shared. That is, there was minimal bickering, few insults, and no one had interrupted or stared to obviously from other tables. They had even gotten the waiter with the curly hair, the one who treated them just like any other customers, to the point they had thought he didn't recognize them for several months.
There's a florist midway between the Anderson's building and the restaurant that they've passed dozens of times before and never spared a second glance, but this time as they draw near, Keith gestures to it and says, “You mind waiting for a minute?”
Anderson looks at him, bemused, and says, “Not at all.”
He goes in and Anderson waits for him, standing close to the wall with his head down and his hands shoved in his pockets. He watches the feet of the people that go by - fluffy pink boots, some sneakers of varying degrees of wear, and a set of leather boots with vertigo-inducingly high heels going in step with battered purple Converse high tops - until Keith emerges, smirking, with a rose in his hand. He hands it to Anderson with elaborate casualness then continues down the street without checking to see if he's following.
Anderson stays where he is, looking down at the flower. It's just a rose, dark red, conspicuous only because it's not part of a dozen. It would never be selected as the favorite of a bunch, unless the rest were in some way substandard. But because it is a rose, and therefore beautiful, and because Keith gave it to him, and because Keith remembered the conversation that Anderson himself had half-forgotten, and kept a promise extracted mostly in jest (even though he'd bet dollars to donuts that Keith is just messing with him and contemplated the absurdity of their situation even as he was paying for it), Anderson finds himself thinking that he'll keep it forever.
It's a silly though, excessively romantic, and Keith most likely laugh if he ever voiced it. But, then, maybe not, because Keith's the one giving him flowers and, wow, are they ever going to be taunting each other over this for years.
Anderson smiles a little wider at the thought and then sets off down the street, after him.