A Question of Timing
Title: A Question of Timing
Author: lilymajolis
Pairing: Adam/Sauli
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~5000
Summary: From this prompt at the lambskikinkmeme : 5 times adumb tried to propose, and one time his boyfrond beat him to the punch
Disclaimer: Nothing here is real; no profit is made. Just playing.
A/N: So evidently I've gotten over my ~issues about writing a rl couple, fmal. I blame Adam and Sauli for being so ridiculously <3___<3 over each other.
Finally, Adam thinks, it has come to this. To a quiet corner table, two glasses of really good Zin, and Sauli’s eyes on his, warm and curious, reflecting candlelight. The overthinking and second-guessing and fretting of the last few weeks; the endless conversations with friends and family and even his damn hairdresser; the middle-of-the-night cold sweats; the long walks, for fuck’s sake, and Adam is not a long walks kind of guy-all of it fades to nothing as Adam holds Sauli’s hand across the table and realizes that he is absolutely certain that he never wants to let it go. Everything is perfect. One more sip of wine and he’ll ask him.
Except… there’s some kind of subdued freakout happening two tables over, where a trio of women keep glancing over and trying to pretend they’re not glancing over, and making a way bigger deal of giggling and poking each other than Adam thinks is justified. He tries to ignore them, but of course Sauli notices, and laughs brightly.
“Go over and say hello,” he says. “You will make them happy now, and after she tweets about this, your fans have something to make them happy, too. They maybe can stop telling me how sexy it is when you kiss Tommy.”
Adam groans. “Jesus fucking Christ, I’m so sorry. I told you about Twitter, didn’t I?”
He scans Sauli’s face, but there’s only amusement there. Sauli knows the deal and Adam appreciates that he gets it, which is part of why they’re sitting here in the first place.
After a couple of minutes the boldest of the women comes up to their table. Adam resigns himself to it, and rescues her from the stammering mess into which she’s melted down. He asks her name, and thanks her for being a fan, and signs the cocktail napkin she holds out. He turns back to Sauli and then it takes him a second to realize that the woman hasn’t budged. She’s staring down at the napkin, and then at Adam, looking embarrassed and shy.
“Did I spell your name wrong?” Adam asks, but she shakes her head, glances at Sauli from beneath her lashes.
“Thank you,” she murmurs, “but I wanted…” and then she finds her voice, starts chattering and giggling and gushing a mile a minute… in Finnish.
Adam can’t make out any of it except “BB” and “söpö” and watches amused as Sauli tries to answer her rapid-fire questions even as she doesn’t let him get a word in edgewise. She fishes around in her purse and gives her Hollywood guidebook to Sauli to sign, and then she beckons her friends over and they crowd around Sauli, pressing each of their cameraphones into Adam’s hand in turn so that he can take pictures of them with their arms around his boyfriend. When they finally scamper off emitting high-pitched squeals, Sauli smiles apologetically, and Adam chuckles.
“Baby, I’m so sorry! I shouldn’t have assumed. I should have known they weren’t my fans-not enough glitter!”
Sauli grins, and Adam nudges Sauli’s wineglass towards him and lifts his own. It’s time.
Except... Sauli’s phone is vibrating with an incoming text, and he lifts an apologetic finger at Adam while he reads, and then looks up at Adam wide-eyed.
“Remember I was telling you about that new Finnish magazine? Auringonpaiste? They want me to do a photoshoot next week for their ’Finns in America’ thing!”
Adam thinks this is awesome, and patiently talks Sauli down from the ledge he’s on about how he’s not famous enough or interesting enough. But when Sauli suggests he’s not good-looking enough, Adam has had enough.
”Are you fucking kidding me? Please tell me you totally get what a hot sexy fuck you are, because if I’ve been wasting my breath for the past few months, I’ll be pissed. You’re so gorgeous it hurts, and when that magazine comes out I’m gonna buy ten copies, and I need you to sign, ’For Adam, Love Sauli,’ on the crotch of the full-length shot, okay? You’re beautiful, you idiot!”
Which finally calms Sauli down and gets him laughing. And it’s true, too, Adam thinks, looking at Sauli across the table, with his sweet curving mouth and heartbreaking cheekbones and freckles scattered like stars. Adam takes a deep breath. Now.
Except... Sauli’s phone rings, and he talks rapidly to whoever it is and jots notes on the palm of his hand. Adam raises his eyebrow when Sauli hangs up.
”It was Aalto,” Sauli says. ”They just found out that Lauri Kalima is passing through L.A., and he agreed to an interview!”
Adam doesn’t have to ask to know that the interview needs to happen now. Before Sauli can start apologizing, Adam leans across the table and quiets him with a kiss.
”It’s okay, baby. Just promise me that when you’re famous, you’ll still love me.”
Sauli grabs onto the front of Adam’s shirt, pulls him closer before Adam can sit back, kisses him hard.
”I love you. Always,” he says. ”Thank you.”
So much for the perfect moment, Adam thinks as they leave the restaurant a few minutes later. But as Sauli hurries beside him on their way to the car, he squeezes Adam’s hand gratefully, and Adam thinks there are some things way better than perfect.
~ * ~
Sauli loves the pool. He loves swimming hard against the motorized current in the morning, emerging flushed and panting after a half hour, gratefully reaching out with dripping hands for the coffee that Adam holds out for him. He loves sitting on its edge in the glow of sunset, dangling his legs in, sipping a margarita, tipping his head to the side to let Adam lick the sweetsaltsour from his smile. He loves floating on his back under the few stars that are fierce enough to pierce through LA smog, some magic trick that Adam has never learned, only his face and belly and toes above the surface, his arms outstretched and fingers fluttering against the water as if he could play some liquid notes on it.
So Adam thinks it would be the perfect spot to ask him. He sets out candles and wine, cheese and bread and fruit on the teak table on the deck and waits until the moon is just so in the sky before finding Sauli in the kitchen putting away groceries and pulling him by the hand out to the poolside.
And it is perfect, with Sauli’s face silvered by moonlight, smiling towards Adam, just a hint of curiosity in his blue blue eyes as Adam edges closer to him, touches the edge of his glass against Sauli’s.
“Kippis,” Adam says, but then before he can get out the next words, the deck lurches under their feet, and lurches hard again, causing them to flail and grab hold of each other to stay upright. The water in the pool sways and spills over the side, splashing warmish water over their feet as the earth keeps shaking and a weird unearthly hushed roar fills the air.
Adam knows exactly what it is, but what he sees is the terror in Sauli’s face, and he drops his glass and pulls Sauli tightly towards him and down to crouch low on the deck, holding Sauli’s trembling body as the last shudders of the earth die down and the air stills.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Adam repeats, again and again. “It was just a little earthquake. It’s over.”
It takes a little while before Sauli can stand, though, and even longer before he can speak without his voice shaking apart into incoherent syllables.
By the time Adam makes some calls and determines that everyone is fine, and checks the house to see if anything is broken (good thing he never liked that faux Degas ballerina, anyway,) and sends an email to Sara to let her know they’re okay, in case it gets into the Finnish news, Sauli has collapsed in bed.
Adam brushes his teeth, undresses, and gets under the covers as carefully as he can. But Sauli starts awake at the motion, and Adam pulls him close, strokes his hair until Sauli’s breathing is even again.
“Your first earthquake, baby, congratulations!” he smiles, and Sauli stares at him for a moment, the bright moon illuminating his face, before his slight frown changes into a crooked grin and he laughs a little, pressing closer to Adam and sighing sleepily.
“My first earthquake,” Sauli repeats. “A very special night. Thank you.”
Adam holds him tight, feeling Sauli relax against him, falling asleep. Not quite the night he had imagined, but special all the same.
~ * ~
Okay, Adam, thinks, so maybe the fancy candlelit dinner proposal idea or the proposal by the pool idea didn’t work out because he didn’t think about when Sauli was happiest. As much as Sauli enjoys their shared nightlife, both at home and out, and he drinks and eats and dances and keeps up with Adam’s all-night energy perfectly well, Adam realizes that Sauli never looks happier than when they are in some remote natural place that is full of… well, nature.
Adam has nothing against nature, in theory. In reality, he’s quite sure that unpleasant, unpredictable things happen when people leave the safe parameters of the city. But for Sauli, Adam would do just about anything, so he plans and schemes and plots, and the first free day they have, he drives them to Franklin Canyon Park with a well-stocked picnic basket, a blanket, and a little speech he’s practiced in his head for days.
They head up the trail in the late afternoon sunlight. It’s warm but breezy, and the air smells like clean dry grass and Adam doesn’t even mind that Sauli lopes ahead of him effortlessly on his short legs while Adam struggles to keep up. He lets Sauli pick the spot, and it really is perfect. A flat place a little ways off the path, with dappled shade under lichen-draped oak trees and a view of the lake below.
“Beautiful!” Sauli says, softly, his face shining and happy as he gazes around and then finally lifts his eyes to Adam’s and smiles in that way that makes Adam’s heart ache a little with how much he loves him. The only thing that helps is to pull Sauli close and kiss him breathless, kiss him till Sauli can’t even open his eyes, till he can’t do anything but press closer to Adam and breathe hard against his mouth.
As much as it’s tempting to take it further, Adam thinks being charged with public indecency is something he can do without, so he reluctantly pulls away, laughing at Sauli’s pout.
“I know, baby, but look! I brought your favorite olives!” which gets Sauli grinning again, and they work together to spread out the blanket and unpack the basket. Adam uncorks the wine while Sauli neatly cuts bread.
“Oh, but wait,” Sauli says, scanning the spread when everything is laid out. “We need flowers.”
He pours some of the bottled water into a cup. “Be right back,” he says, and heads off into the trees with purpose. Adam chuckles and takes a sip of wine, settling back on his elbows to look out at the view and wait for his return. It doesn’t take long. Sauli plops down on the blanket, flushed and happy, with a fistful of bright wildflowers and… oh.
“Umm,” Adam says, trying to think of the right words. Sauli glances up at him, oblivious, busy arranging little purple blossoms and yellow flowers, and some bright green, scallop-edged leaves. Of poison oak.
Much later, Adam presses a kiss against his boyfriend’s hair as Sauli falls asleep in their bed. His hands are in cotton gloves, heavily coated with calamine lotion, and the Benadryl has finally taken effect. Adam settles in beside him, sighing and stroking his thumb gently against Sauli’s hip bone. Yeah, he was right about nature.
~ * ~
So it hasn’t quite worked out so far, Adam thinks, but what could be a more perfect place to propose than a wedding, and here they are, at Brooke’s wedding, and she looks beautiful and glowing and constantly on the verge of tears, which makes her even more beautiful and glowing, and through some miracle of scheduling, or more accurately, his own stubborn persistence, here he is with Sauli and a free weekend ahead of them.
He’s had it all planned. They’ll stay through the wedding, dance their asses off at the reception, and afterwards Adam will give Brooke a kiss and wish her and her new husband a fantastic future, and then he’ll grab Sauli and bundle him into the car and drive to that little inn on the coast with a view that goes on forever, and then, that will be their perfect moment, finally.
Adam holds Sauli in his arms, swaying to a song that has turned into random melody, looks down at Sauli’s face, all shining eyes and curving smile and freckles like raindrops on warm skin.
“Let’s get out of here,” Adam whispers, and Sauli clutches at Adam’s jacket, his eyes dark and heavy, licking his lips in a way that makes Adam shiver .
“Yes, yes, I want…” Sauli murmurs, pressing up against Adam, a little drunk, or a lot, it doesn’t really matter, because Adam is stone-cold sober and he still feels like his head spins with what he feels, it’s so overwhelming, so right. And then Sauli startles a bit in his arms, laughs.
“Your phone,” he says, and Adam finally feels the vibration against his thigh.
The phone call is like ice water, cold and real, and Sauli’s eyes are understanding even before Adam returns and begins to explain.
“You have to go,” Sauli starts.
“Yeah, oh my god, baby, I’m so sorry. It’s just, that producer we’ve been trying to schedule, he’s available right fucking now, and I need to get back down to L.A. to meet with him first thing tomorrow morning or else lose the chance.”
Sauli shakes his head. “Of course you must go!” And then, biting his lip, “but wait, how long do we have?”
Adam glances at his phone and makes a face. “About twenty minutes, baby. I’ve got to leave for SFO to catch…”
But Sauli isn’t listening, or maybe he is, as he drags Adam by the hand across the near-empty dance floor, waving at Brooke who winks at them from Peter’s arms, and Isaac who sticks his tongue out as he and Sophie cling to each other.
Sauli pulls Adam along, through the reception hall and the empty tasting room and out onto the wide stone veranda. The night is warm and it smells like dust and warm grass and the sweetness of ripening grapes.
“I wish I could stay,” Adam says, frustrated and pouting. But Sauli ignores him, drags him down the steps and across the dry grass until he pushes Adam up against one of the olive trees at the edge of the vineyard, in the shadows.
“Baby, I have to go…” Adam starts, but his voice falters as Sauli reaches up, winds his fingers into Adam’s hair and pulls him down, licking hot and desperate into his mouth.
Adam groans helplessly, sliding down against the trunk of the tree so that he can pull Sauli’s hips against his own, feeling the heat and the hardness of his cock and the sharpness of Sauli’s teeth on his lip.
“I know, I know,” Sauli breathes. “But, I want you so much. All night I wanted you. You look so good! Please…” and he pants against Adam’s throat, clenches a hand into Adam’s shirt, slides the other down to press against Adam’s cock, making Adam arch into his touch.
He could still ask Sauli before he has to leave, Adam thinks vaguely. But he doesn’t want to rush something like that, and anyway Sauli is practically frantic in his arms, panting and needy like he gets sometimes just seemingly out of the blue, and there’s nothing for it but to give him what he wants, and so Adam grabs his arms and flips them around, presses Sauli against the tree and sinks to his knees in front of him, opens his pants.
There’s barely enough light to see by, but Adam goes by touch. He grasps Sauli’s hips, not to hold him back but more to feel how he trembles helplessly against Adam’s hands, and Adam lets him thrust… “fuck my mouth, baby, come on, fucking give it to me,” taking it all as Sauli whimpers and tugs at Adam’s hair and comes, hot pulses down Adam’s throat, everything Adam wants.
Sauli pulls Adam up, fingers shaking and clumsy but determined, unzipping Adam’s pants and grasping Adam’s throbbing cock. There’s barely any time and Adam doesn’t care for finesse, and Sauli knows it; he pauses to lick his palm and then strips Adam’s cock hard and fast, offering up his mouth for Adam to lick into; he tastes of champagne and sweet icing, and Adam thrusts into his hand, comes hard, spilling over Sauli’s fingers and onto the trampled dust beneath their feet.
They cling to each other then, breathing hard, and Sauli runs his hands all over Adam like he’s not done with him, like he doesn’t want to let him go, but says, “Adam, you have to hurry,” and Adam reluctantly draws away.
“Okay,” he says, “okay,” and kisses Sauli again, like a promise. Unspoken, but real all the same.
~ * ~
He’s been going about it the wrong way, Adam thinks, jiggling the melting ice in his gin and tonic and staring at the television screen. He’s tired, and the thought of his early flight tomorrow morning makes him even more tired, but none of that tiredness takes away the twitchiness under his skin nor the heavy feeling in his chest. He’s been trying for weeks now to ask Sauli to marry him, and something always happens to interrupt him. Adam believes in signs, and in paying attention to what the Universe is trying tell you, and the more he thinks about it, the more miserable he gets, thinking that maybe what he thinks he wants with all his heart isn’t meant to happen at all.
Over a mostly-silent dinner, Adam had tried not to notice the concern on Sauli’s face, muttering something about trying to figure out a lyric, which of course made no sense, since one of their favorite things is to free-associate words and come up with lyrics together. Normally, even cleaning up after dinner is a good time. Sauli seems to get seriously inspired by kitchen-ware, and Adam has laughed himself dizzy at his antics. Tonight, though, they had washed and dried and put away quietly, until Adam had paused trying to remember where the colander went, and Sauli shook his head when Adam started to put it in one of the cabinets.
“No, it hangs here,” he had said, pointing to a hook above the stove, and Adam had huffed and pressed the stupid colander into his hands.
“Of course. You know right where everything belongs,” he’d said, irrationally annoyed, walking out into the den and collapsing on the sofa with the remote. After a while Sauli had joined him, and now they watched the screen as Adam flipped through the channels without paying attention.
Sauli goes back to the kitchen and returns carrying a couple of drinks and Adam takes his with an apologetic smile.
“Look, I’m sorry. I know I’m being an ass tonight. I just feel… off, you know?”
Sauli’s grin doesn’t quite erase the worry from his eyes, and he settles down against Adam’s side. “Is there something wrong?” he asks, “I think you have been… off, maybe for a few days?”
“Well, I’m feeling the pressure, you know? I want to meet the target date for the album, and everything’s coming to a head, and now I find out that instead of working on the last couple of songs in L.A., I’ve got to go to London again, and I’m already exhausted and I know I’m going to be fucking jetlagged and shitty tired, and…”
Sauli interrupts. “I know, Adam, I know all that. But there’s something else, I think. What is it?”
Which is really annoying for some reason Adam doesn’t feel like trying to figure out. He pulls away. “You know, if all that isn’t a good enough reason, I don’t know what to tell you.”
Sauli stares at him blankly for a moment, then stands and walks out of the room. Adam can hear him down the hall, the sounds of the shower running, and drawers opening and closing as Sauli gets ready for bed, and then finally silence. Adam seriously considers grabbing the fuzzy green afghan neatly folded on a nearby chair and sleeping right here on the sofa. Only for a minute, though, because even through a haze of self-pitying pissiness, he totally gets what a dick move that would be. He loves Sauli, he knows that, he loves him beyond all reason. And maybe that’s the problem. Maybe he needs to take a little more time, and wait until he can think straight before he goes and changes his whole life with a few words.
But… Adam loves him. He wants to spend the rest of his life with Sauli, he really does, doesn’t he? He sits in the dark, takes deep breaths, focuses on what he knows for sure. Finally, he decides. He’s going to ask him right now.
Sauli is curled up on his side clutching a pillow the way he does when Adam isn’t nearby to wrap himself around. Adam undresses and slips under the covers, which is usually more than enough to wake Sauli from his light sleep. But Sauli continues to breathe deep and even without budging, and Adam glances at the nightstand to see the half-glass of water and bottle of sleeping pills. He doesn’t take one often, but when he does, nothing can wake Sauli for hours. Adam sighs.
“Baby,” he tries, reaching out to run his fingers through Sauli’s soft hair. “Baby, I’m sorry. Can you hear me? I want you to marry me. I’ve been trying to ask you, and I don’t know what the hell keeps happening, and it’s freaking me out a little bit, but I’m not gonna stop trying, okay?”
Adam waits, but Sauli sleeps, oblivious. Adam sighs again, holds Sauli’s warm limp hand and watches the shadows move across the room with the moon, waiting for the morning light.
~ * ~
Adam is glad he thought to grab a business card from the hotel before he went out this afternoon, because he can barely remember his own name let alone wherever the fuck in London they’ve put him this time. The elevator is endlessly slow and the hallway is endlessly long. His joints hurt, and he feels hot all over, and all he wants to do is lie down and sleep for about a million years. When Adam finally fumbles the door open the room is ice-cold, and it takes him several tours around to find the thermostat, which does no good at all because the display makes no sense anyhow, and the longer Adam stares at it the more his head aches and the dizzier he gets. He considers it a win that he makes it into the bathroom before losing his long-ago lunch in the toilet. Or is it the bidet, he doesn’t even know or care. It’s tempting to curl up afterwards on the soft white rug on the bathroom floor, but he manages to get up and out into the bed before he falls asleep on top of the covers.
He dreams and wakes and sleeps; can’t tell which is which, through the fog in his head. He’s burning hot, and then shivering with cold, and thirsty and miserable. From a distance he hears his phone buzzing off and on, but the light of the screen is miles away, and there’s no way he can reach it. Again and again he sees Sauli’s face as it looked when Adam had left him in L.A., earnest and searching, silently asking a question Adam doesn’t know how to answer, no matter how he tries.
Hours or days or for all Adam can tell, it could be years later, through his haze of confusion, Adam feels careful hands helping him out of his sweaty clothes, and something damp and cool on his forehead, and water held to his parched lips, and he falls into a deeper, more restful sleep with a soft voice murmuring sounds both incomprehensible and familiar all at once. When he finally wakes, the first thing he sees is Sauli, and a feeling of relief hits him so hard it brings tears to his eyes.
“But how did you even get in here? And how are you in London?” Adam asks finally, when he is able to put thoughts into words. He’s still tired, but he doesn’t ache anymore, and it feels good the way Sauli is softly running his fingers through his hair as he sits cross-legged next to Adam’s head. A little while before Adam had made it to the bathroom on his own and even brushed his teeth, which felt like quite an accomplishment. And someday he might even overcome the trauma of catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Sauli doesn’t seem to mind that Adam looks like shit; he’s smiling down at him with that curvy pretty mouth, and Adam would lean up and kiss him if only his head didn’t feel quite so heavy.
“I have connections,” Sauli says. “Now get some more sleep, you need it.”
Adam wants to protest, because he loves a good argument over something pointless, but it feels too good to let Sauli guide his head onto a freshly-fluffed pillow and draw the covers over him. Just to show Sauli he’s not the boss of him, though, Adam grabs onto him and pulls him close, drifting off with the warmth of Sauli’s body against his.
When he wakes again, Adam can see bright sunlight streaming through the partially opened curtains, and Sauli is talking with someone in the other room. A few minutes later he comes in with a tray.
“Good morning! Are you feeling less sick? Do you feel like you can eat? Here’s coffee, but I thought this tea might feel better for you?” Sauli waits until Adam props himself up against the headboard before setting the tray down on the bed and leaning over to kiss him.
“Sorry,” Adam says, “I know I look like hell.”
Sauli settles down next to Adam and shrugs, pouring tea out for both of them. “Olet kaunis. Always. To me,” he says simply, and promises Adam a hot bath after he eats.
A little later Adam sinks into the huge, deep bathtub with a gratified sigh. Sauli has made the water really hot, with something bubbly added that smells like oranges, and he strips down to briefs and his t-shirt and settles on the edge by Adam’s head.
“Get your hair wet, and I’ll wash it for you,” he says, reaching for the shampoo. Adam complies and closes his eyes as Sauli rubs gently at his scalp with just the right amount of pressure, and then helps Adam rinse off the suds and settle back against the sloped rim of the tub. The warmth of the water and Sauli’s fingers playing with his hair, it’s perfect, and the heavy feeling that Adam’s had in his chest since he left L.A. is only a distant memory. It’s perfect. Oh…
Adam opens his eyes, reaches up and grabs Sauli’s wrist, tips his head back to see him smiling down. But before he can open his mouth, Sauli’s hand is on it, keeping him silent, and he leans down to whisper in Adam’s ear.
“I love you. Rakastan sinua. Marry me,” touching soft kisses on Adam’s dripping hair, and his forehead, and the side of his mouth as Sauli leans over him.
For a moment, Adam is still, trying to process what just happened. Then he carefully unwinds Sauli’s arms from around his neck and turns. Sauli is staring down at him, wide-eyed and serious, biting hard at his lower lip. There’s nothing to be done but to pull him into the tub, clothes and all, to get him as close as possible.
“Oh my god,” Adam says, “Are you…? I kept trying. I wanted everything to be perfect. I’ve been trying to ask you for weeks, and every time something would happen.”
Sauli grins a little. “I know. I know you were trying.” He’s still chewing on his lip, looking nervous and determined all at once. “And I kept waiting. But then I think to myself-why? Why am I keep waiting? I know what I want. All my life, if I want something, I reach for it. It is not me to wait. I want you, Adam. I want to be with you all the time, and so I am asking, okay? I am asking for you to marry…”
The rest of whatever he is going to say is lost as Adam kisses him. Kisses him like he’s never going to stop, searching and passionate, and then pulls back and sees the question still in Sauli’s eyes, and so Adam kisses him again, breathing yes, and yes, yesyesyes against Sauli’s mouth, and it’s perfect, and just like it was meant to be.
~ * ~
End
Author: lilymajolis
Pairing: Adam/Sauli
Rating: NC-17
Word count: ~5000
Summary: From this prompt at the lambskikinkmeme : 5 times adumb tried to propose, and one time his boyfrond beat him to the punch
Disclaimer: Nothing here is real; no profit is made. Just playing.
A/N: So evidently I've gotten over my ~issues about writing a rl couple, fmal. I blame Adam and Sauli for being so ridiculously <3___<3 over each other.
Finally, Adam thinks, it has come to this. To a quiet corner table, two glasses of really good Zin, and Sauli’s eyes on his, warm and curious, reflecting candlelight. The overthinking and second-guessing and fretting of the last few weeks; the endless conversations with friends and family and even his damn hairdresser; the middle-of-the-night cold sweats; the long walks, for fuck’s sake, and Adam is not a long walks kind of guy-all of it fades to nothing as Adam holds Sauli’s hand across the table and realizes that he is absolutely certain that he never wants to let it go. Everything is perfect. One more sip of wine and he’ll ask him.
Except… there’s some kind of subdued freakout happening two tables over, where a trio of women keep glancing over and trying to pretend they’re not glancing over, and making a way bigger deal of giggling and poking each other than Adam thinks is justified. He tries to ignore them, but of course Sauli notices, and laughs brightly.
“Go over and say hello,” he says. “You will make them happy now, and after she tweets about this, your fans have something to make them happy, too. They maybe can stop telling me how sexy it is when you kiss Tommy.”
Adam groans. “Jesus fucking Christ, I’m so sorry. I told you about Twitter, didn’t I?”
He scans Sauli’s face, but there’s only amusement there. Sauli knows the deal and Adam appreciates that he gets it, which is part of why they’re sitting here in the first place.
After a couple of minutes the boldest of the women comes up to their table. Adam resigns himself to it, and rescues her from the stammering mess into which she’s melted down. He asks her name, and thanks her for being a fan, and signs the cocktail napkin she holds out. He turns back to Sauli and then it takes him a second to realize that the woman hasn’t budged. She’s staring down at the napkin, and then at Adam, looking embarrassed and shy.
“Did I spell your name wrong?” Adam asks, but she shakes her head, glances at Sauli from beneath her lashes.
“Thank you,” she murmurs, “but I wanted…” and then she finds her voice, starts chattering and giggling and gushing a mile a minute… in Finnish.
Adam can’t make out any of it except “BB” and “söpö” and watches amused as Sauli tries to answer her rapid-fire questions even as she doesn’t let him get a word in edgewise. She fishes around in her purse and gives her Hollywood guidebook to Sauli to sign, and then she beckons her friends over and they crowd around Sauli, pressing each of their cameraphones into Adam’s hand in turn so that he can take pictures of them with their arms around his boyfriend. When they finally scamper off emitting high-pitched squeals, Sauli smiles apologetically, and Adam chuckles.
“Baby, I’m so sorry! I shouldn’t have assumed. I should have known they weren’t my fans-not enough glitter!”
Sauli grins, and Adam nudges Sauli’s wineglass towards him and lifts his own. It’s time.
Except... Sauli’s phone is vibrating with an incoming text, and he lifts an apologetic finger at Adam while he reads, and then looks up at Adam wide-eyed.
“Remember I was telling you about that new Finnish magazine? Auringonpaiste? They want me to do a photoshoot next week for their ’Finns in America’ thing!”
Adam thinks this is awesome, and patiently talks Sauli down from the ledge he’s on about how he’s not famous enough or interesting enough. But when Sauli suggests he’s not good-looking enough, Adam has had enough.
”Are you fucking kidding me? Please tell me you totally get what a hot sexy fuck you are, because if I’ve been wasting my breath for the past few months, I’ll be pissed. You’re so gorgeous it hurts, and when that magazine comes out I’m gonna buy ten copies, and I need you to sign, ’For Adam, Love Sauli,’ on the crotch of the full-length shot, okay? You’re beautiful, you idiot!”
Which finally calms Sauli down and gets him laughing. And it’s true, too, Adam thinks, looking at Sauli across the table, with his sweet curving mouth and heartbreaking cheekbones and freckles scattered like stars. Adam takes a deep breath. Now.
Except... Sauli’s phone rings, and he talks rapidly to whoever it is and jots notes on the palm of his hand. Adam raises his eyebrow when Sauli hangs up.
”It was Aalto,” Sauli says. ”They just found out that Lauri Kalima is passing through L.A., and he agreed to an interview!”
Adam doesn’t have to ask to know that the interview needs to happen now. Before Sauli can start apologizing, Adam leans across the table and quiets him with a kiss.
”It’s okay, baby. Just promise me that when you’re famous, you’ll still love me.”
Sauli grabs onto the front of Adam’s shirt, pulls him closer before Adam can sit back, kisses him hard.
”I love you. Always,” he says. ”Thank you.”
So much for the perfect moment, Adam thinks as they leave the restaurant a few minutes later. But as Sauli hurries beside him on their way to the car, he squeezes Adam’s hand gratefully, and Adam thinks there are some things way better than perfect.
~ * ~
Sauli loves the pool. He loves swimming hard against the motorized current in the morning, emerging flushed and panting after a half hour, gratefully reaching out with dripping hands for the coffee that Adam holds out for him. He loves sitting on its edge in the glow of sunset, dangling his legs in, sipping a margarita, tipping his head to the side to let Adam lick the sweetsaltsour from his smile. He loves floating on his back under the few stars that are fierce enough to pierce through LA smog, some magic trick that Adam has never learned, only his face and belly and toes above the surface, his arms outstretched and fingers fluttering against the water as if he could play some liquid notes on it.
So Adam thinks it would be the perfect spot to ask him. He sets out candles and wine, cheese and bread and fruit on the teak table on the deck and waits until the moon is just so in the sky before finding Sauli in the kitchen putting away groceries and pulling him by the hand out to the poolside.
And it is perfect, with Sauli’s face silvered by moonlight, smiling towards Adam, just a hint of curiosity in his blue blue eyes as Adam edges closer to him, touches the edge of his glass against Sauli’s.
“Kippis,” Adam says, but then before he can get out the next words, the deck lurches under their feet, and lurches hard again, causing them to flail and grab hold of each other to stay upright. The water in the pool sways and spills over the side, splashing warmish water over their feet as the earth keeps shaking and a weird unearthly hushed roar fills the air.
Adam knows exactly what it is, but what he sees is the terror in Sauli’s face, and he drops his glass and pulls Sauli tightly towards him and down to crouch low on the deck, holding Sauli’s trembling body as the last shudders of the earth die down and the air stills.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Adam repeats, again and again. “It was just a little earthquake. It’s over.”
It takes a little while before Sauli can stand, though, and even longer before he can speak without his voice shaking apart into incoherent syllables.
By the time Adam makes some calls and determines that everyone is fine, and checks the house to see if anything is broken (good thing he never liked that faux Degas ballerina, anyway,) and sends an email to Sara to let her know they’re okay, in case it gets into the Finnish news, Sauli has collapsed in bed.
Adam brushes his teeth, undresses, and gets under the covers as carefully as he can. But Sauli starts awake at the motion, and Adam pulls him close, strokes his hair until Sauli’s breathing is even again.
“Your first earthquake, baby, congratulations!” he smiles, and Sauli stares at him for a moment, the bright moon illuminating his face, before his slight frown changes into a crooked grin and he laughs a little, pressing closer to Adam and sighing sleepily.
“My first earthquake,” Sauli repeats. “A very special night. Thank you.”
Adam holds him tight, feeling Sauli relax against him, falling asleep. Not quite the night he had imagined, but special all the same.
~ * ~
Okay, Adam, thinks, so maybe the fancy candlelit dinner proposal idea or the proposal by the pool idea didn’t work out because he didn’t think about when Sauli was happiest. As much as Sauli enjoys their shared nightlife, both at home and out, and he drinks and eats and dances and keeps up with Adam’s all-night energy perfectly well, Adam realizes that Sauli never looks happier than when they are in some remote natural place that is full of… well, nature.
Adam has nothing against nature, in theory. In reality, he’s quite sure that unpleasant, unpredictable things happen when people leave the safe parameters of the city. But for Sauli, Adam would do just about anything, so he plans and schemes and plots, and the first free day they have, he drives them to Franklin Canyon Park with a well-stocked picnic basket, a blanket, and a little speech he’s practiced in his head for days.
They head up the trail in the late afternoon sunlight. It’s warm but breezy, and the air smells like clean dry grass and Adam doesn’t even mind that Sauli lopes ahead of him effortlessly on his short legs while Adam struggles to keep up. He lets Sauli pick the spot, and it really is perfect. A flat place a little ways off the path, with dappled shade under lichen-draped oak trees and a view of the lake below.
“Beautiful!” Sauli says, softly, his face shining and happy as he gazes around and then finally lifts his eyes to Adam’s and smiles in that way that makes Adam’s heart ache a little with how much he loves him. The only thing that helps is to pull Sauli close and kiss him breathless, kiss him till Sauli can’t even open his eyes, till he can’t do anything but press closer to Adam and breathe hard against his mouth.
As much as it’s tempting to take it further, Adam thinks being charged with public indecency is something he can do without, so he reluctantly pulls away, laughing at Sauli’s pout.
“I know, baby, but look! I brought your favorite olives!” which gets Sauli grinning again, and they work together to spread out the blanket and unpack the basket. Adam uncorks the wine while Sauli neatly cuts bread.
“Oh, but wait,” Sauli says, scanning the spread when everything is laid out. “We need flowers.”
He pours some of the bottled water into a cup. “Be right back,” he says, and heads off into the trees with purpose. Adam chuckles and takes a sip of wine, settling back on his elbows to look out at the view and wait for his return. It doesn’t take long. Sauli plops down on the blanket, flushed and happy, with a fistful of bright wildflowers and… oh.
“Umm,” Adam says, trying to think of the right words. Sauli glances up at him, oblivious, busy arranging little purple blossoms and yellow flowers, and some bright green, scallop-edged leaves. Of poison oak.
Much later, Adam presses a kiss against his boyfriend’s hair as Sauli falls asleep in their bed. His hands are in cotton gloves, heavily coated with calamine lotion, and the Benadryl has finally taken effect. Adam settles in beside him, sighing and stroking his thumb gently against Sauli’s hip bone. Yeah, he was right about nature.
~ * ~
So it hasn’t quite worked out so far, Adam thinks, but what could be a more perfect place to propose than a wedding, and here they are, at Brooke’s wedding, and she looks beautiful and glowing and constantly on the verge of tears, which makes her even more beautiful and glowing, and through some miracle of scheduling, or more accurately, his own stubborn persistence, here he is with Sauli and a free weekend ahead of them.
He’s had it all planned. They’ll stay through the wedding, dance their asses off at the reception, and afterwards Adam will give Brooke a kiss and wish her and her new husband a fantastic future, and then he’ll grab Sauli and bundle him into the car and drive to that little inn on the coast with a view that goes on forever, and then, that will be their perfect moment, finally.
Adam holds Sauli in his arms, swaying to a song that has turned into random melody, looks down at Sauli’s face, all shining eyes and curving smile and freckles like raindrops on warm skin.
“Let’s get out of here,” Adam whispers, and Sauli clutches at Adam’s jacket, his eyes dark and heavy, licking his lips in a way that makes Adam shiver .
“Yes, yes, I want…” Sauli murmurs, pressing up against Adam, a little drunk, or a lot, it doesn’t really matter, because Adam is stone-cold sober and he still feels like his head spins with what he feels, it’s so overwhelming, so right. And then Sauli startles a bit in his arms, laughs.
“Your phone,” he says, and Adam finally feels the vibration against his thigh.
The phone call is like ice water, cold and real, and Sauli’s eyes are understanding even before Adam returns and begins to explain.
“You have to go,” Sauli starts.
“Yeah, oh my god, baby, I’m so sorry. It’s just, that producer we’ve been trying to schedule, he’s available right fucking now, and I need to get back down to L.A. to meet with him first thing tomorrow morning or else lose the chance.”
Sauli shakes his head. “Of course you must go!” And then, biting his lip, “but wait, how long do we have?”
Adam glances at his phone and makes a face. “About twenty minutes, baby. I’ve got to leave for SFO to catch…”
But Sauli isn’t listening, or maybe he is, as he drags Adam by the hand across the near-empty dance floor, waving at Brooke who winks at them from Peter’s arms, and Isaac who sticks his tongue out as he and Sophie cling to each other.
Sauli pulls Adam along, through the reception hall and the empty tasting room and out onto the wide stone veranda. The night is warm and it smells like dust and warm grass and the sweetness of ripening grapes.
“I wish I could stay,” Adam says, frustrated and pouting. But Sauli ignores him, drags him down the steps and across the dry grass until he pushes Adam up against one of the olive trees at the edge of the vineyard, in the shadows.
“Baby, I have to go…” Adam starts, but his voice falters as Sauli reaches up, winds his fingers into Adam’s hair and pulls him down, licking hot and desperate into his mouth.
Adam groans helplessly, sliding down against the trunk of the tree so that he can pull Sauli’s hips against his own, feeling the heat and the hardness of his cock and the sharpness of Sauli’s teeth on his lip.
“I know, I know,” Sauli breathes. “But, I want you so much. All night I wanted you. You look so good! Please…” and he pants against Adam’s throat, clenches a hand into Adam’s shirt, slides the other down to press against Adam’s cock, making Adam arch into his touch.
He could still ask Sauli before he has to leave, Adam thinks vaguely. But he doesn’t want to rush something like that, and anyway Sauli is practically frantic in his arms, panting and needy like he gets sometimes just seemingly out of the blue, and there’s nothing for it but to give him what he wants, and so Adam grabs his arms and flips them around, presses Sauli against the tree and sinks to his knees in front of him, opens his pants.
There’s barely enough light to see by, but Adam goes by touch. He grasps Sauli’s hips, not to hold him back but more to feel how he trembles helplessly against Adam’s hands, and Adam lets him thrust… “fuck my mouth, baby, come on, fucking give it to me,” taking it all as Sauli whimpers and tugs at Adam’s hair and comes, hot pulses down Adam’s throat, everything Adam wants.
Sauli pulls Adam up, fingers shaking and clumsy but determined, unzipping Adam’s pants and grasping Adam’s throbbing cock. There’s barely any time and Adam doesn’t care for finesse, and Sauli knows it; he pauses to lick his palm and then strips Adam’s cock hard and fast, offering up his mouth for Adam to lick into; he tastes of champagne and sweet icing, and Adam thrusts into his hand, comes hard, spilling over Sauli’s fingers and onto the trampled dust beneath their feet.
They cling to each other then, breathing hard, and Sauli runs his hands all over Adam like he’s not done with him, like he doesn’t want to let him go, but says, “Adam, you have to hurry,” and Adam reluctantly draws away.
“Okay,” he says, “okay,” and kisses Sauli again, like a promise. Unspoken, but real all the same.
~ * ~
He’s been going about it the wrong way, Adam thinks, jiggling the melting ice in his gin and tonic and staring at the television screen. He’s tired, and the thought of his early flight tomorrow morning makes him even more tired, but none of that tiredness takes away the twitchiness under his skin nor the heavy feeling in his chest. He’s been trying for weeks now to ask Sauli to marry him, and something always happens to interrupt him. Adam believes in signs, and in paying attention to what the Universe is trying tell you, and the more he thinks about it, the more miserable he gets, thinking that maybe what he thinks he wants with all his heart isn’t meant to happen at all.
Over a mostly-silent dinner, Adam had tried not to notice the concern on Sauli’s face, muttering something about trying to figure out a lyric, which of course made no sense, since one of their favorite things is to free-associate words and come up with lyrics together. Normally, even cleaning up after dinner is a good time. Sauli seems to get seriously inspired by kitchen-ware, and Adam has laughed himself dizzy at his antics. Tonight, though, they had washed and dried and put away quietly, until Adam had paused trying to remember where the colander went, and Sauli shook his head when Adam started to put it in one of the cabinets.
“No, it hangs here,” he had said, pointing to a hook above the stove, and Adam had huffed and pressed the stupid colander into his hands.
“Of course. You know right where everything belongs,” he’d said, irrationally annoyed, walking out into the den and collapsing on the sofa with the remote. After a while Sauli had joined him, and now they watched the screen as Adam flipped through the channels without paying attention.
Sauli goes back to the kitchen and returns carrying a couple of drinks and Adam takes his with an apologetic smile.
“Look, I’m sorry. I know I’m being an ass tonight. I just feel… off, you know?”
Sauli’s grin doesn’t quite erase the worry from his eyes, and he settles down against Adam’s side. “Is there something wrong?” he asks, “I think you have been… off, maybe for a few days?”
“Well, I’m feeling the pressure, you know? I want to meet the target date for the album, and everything’s coming to a head, and now I find out that instead of working on the last couple of songs in L.A., I’ve got to go to London again, and I’m already exhausted and I know I’m going to be fucking jetlagged and shitty tired, and…”
Sauli interrupts. “I know, Adam, I know all that. But there’s something else, I think. What is it?”
Which is really annoying for some reason Adam doesn’t feel like trying to figure out. He pulls away. “You know, if all that isn’t a good enough reason, I don’t know what to tell you.”
Sauli stares at him blankly for a moment, then stands and walks out of the room. Adam can hear him down the hall, the sounds of the shower running, and drawers opening and closing as Sauli gets ready for bed, and then finally silence. Adam seriously considers grabbing the fuzzy green afghan neatly folded on a nearby chair and sleeping right here on the sofa. Only for a minute, though, because even through a haze of self-pitying pissiness, he totally gets what a dick move that would be. He loves Sauli, he knows that, he loves him beyond all reason. And maybe that’s the problem. Maybe he needs to take a little more time, and wait until he can think straight before he goes and changes his whole life with a few words.
But… Adam loves him. He wants to spend the rest of his life with Sauli, he really does, doesn’t he? He sits in the dark, takes deep breaths, focuses on what he knows for sure. Finally, he decides. He’s going to ask him right now.
Sauli is curled up on his side clutching a pillow the way he does when Adam isn’t nearby to wrap himself around. Adam undresses and slips under the covers, which is usually more than enough to wake Sauli from his light sleep. But Sauli continues to breathe deep and even without budging, and Adam glances at the nightstand to see the half-glass of water and bottle of sleeping pills. He doesn’t take one often, but when he does, nothing can wake Sauli for hours. Adam sighs.
“Baby,” he tries, reaching out to run his fingers through Sauli’s soft hair. “Baby, I’m sorry. Can you hear me? I want you to marry me. I’ve been trying to ask you, and I don’t know what the hell keeps happening, and it’s freaking me out a little bit, but I’m not gonna stop trying, okay?”
Adam waits, but Sauli sleeps, oblivious. Adam sighs again, holds Sauli’s warm limp hand and watches the shadows move across the room with the moon, waiting for the morning light.
~ * ~
Adam is glad he thought to grab a business card from the hotel before he went out this afternoon, because he can barely remember his own name let alone wherever the fuck in London they’ve put him this time. The elevator is endlessly slow and the hallway is endlessly long. His joints hurt, and he feels hot all over, and all he wants to do is lie down and sleep for about a million years. When Adam finally fumbles the door open the room is ice-cold, and it takes him several tours around to find the thermostat, which does no good at all because the display makes no sense anyhow, and the longer Adam stares at it the more his head aches and the dizzier he gets. He considers it a win that he makes it into the bathroom before losing his long-ago lunch in the toilet. Or is it the bidet, he doesn’t even know or care. It’s tempting to curl up afterwards on the soft white rug on the bathroom floor, but he manages to get up and out into the bed before he falls asleep on top of the covers.
He dreams and wakes and sleeps; can’t tell which is which, through the fog in his head. He’s burning hot, and then shivering with cold, and thirsty and miserable. From a distance he hears his phone buzzing off and on, but the light of the screen is miles away, and there’s no way he can reach it. Again and again he sees Sauli’s face as it looked when Adam had left him in L.A., earnest and searching, silently asking a question Adam doesn’t know how to answer, no matter how he tries.
Hours or days or for all Adam can tell, it could be years later, through his haze of confusion, Adam feels careful hands helping him out of his sweaty clothes, and something damp and cool on his forehead, and water held to his parched lips, and he falls into a deeper, more restful sleep with a soft voice murmuring sounds both incomprehensible and familiar all at once. When he finally wakes, the first thing he sees is Sauli, and a feeling of relief hits him so hard it brings tears to his eyes.
“But how did you even get in here? And how are you in London?” Adam asks finally, when he is able to put thoughts into words. He’s still tired, but he doesn’t ache anymore, and it feels good the way Sauli is softly running his fingers through his hair as he sits cross-legged next to Adam’s head. A little while before Adam had made it to the bathroom on his own and even brushed his teeth, which felt like quite an accomplishment. And someday he might even overcome the trauma of catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Sauli doesn’t seem to mind that Adam looks like shit; he’s smiling down at him with that curvy pretty mouth, and Adam would lean up and kiss him if only his head didn’t feel quite so heavy.
“I have connections,” Sauli says. “Now get some more sleep, you need it.”
Adam wants to protest, because he loves a good argument over something pointless, but it feels too good to let Sauli guide his head onto a freshly-fluffed pillow and draw the covers over him. Just to show Sauli he’s not the boss of him, though, Adam grabs onto him and pulls him close, drifting off with the warmth of Sauli’s body against his.
When he wakes again, Adam can see bright sunlight streaming through the partially opened curtains, and Sauli is talking with someone in the other room. A few minutes later he comes in with a tray.
“Good morning! Are you feeling less sick? Do you feel like you can eat? Here’s coffee, but I thought this tea might feel better for you?” Sauli waits until Adam props himself up against the headboard before setting the tray down on the bed and leaning over to kiss him.
“Sorry,” Adam says, “I know I look like hell.”
Sauli settles down next to Adam and shrugs, pouring tea out for both of them. “Olet kaunis. Always. To me,” he says simply, and promises Adam a hot bath after he eats.
A little later Adam sinks into the huge, deep bathtub with a gratified sigh. Sauli has made the water really hot, with something bubbly added that smells like oranges, and he strips down to briefs and his t-shirt and settles on the edge by Adam’s head.
“Get your hair wet, and I’ll wash it for you,” he says, reaching for the shampoo. Adam complies and closes his eyes as Sauli rubs gently at his scalp with just the right amount of pressure, and then helps Adam rinse off the suds and settle back against the sloped rim of the tub. The warmth of the water and Sauli’s fingers playing with his hair, it’s perfect, and the heavy feeling that Adam’s had in his chest since he left L.A. is only a distant memory. It’s perfect. Oh…
Adam opens his eyes, reaches up and grabs Sauli’s wrist, tips his head back to see him smiling down. But before he can open his mouth, Sauli’s hand is on it, keeping him silent, and he leans down to whisper in Adam’s ear.
“I love you. Rakastan sinua. Marry me,” touching soft kisses on Adam’s dripping hair, and his forehead, and the side of his mouth as Sauli leans over him.
For a moment, Adam is still, trying to process what just happened. Then he carefully unwinds Sauli’s arms from around his neck and turns. Sauli is staring down at him, wide-eyed and serious, biting hard at his lower lip. There’s nothing to be done but to pull him into the tub, clothes and all, to get him as close as possible.
“Oh my god,” Adam says, “Are you…? I kept trying. I wanted everything to be perfect. I’ve been trying to ask you for weeks, and every time something would happen.”
Sauli grins a little. “I know. I know you were trying.” He’s still chewing on his lip, looking nervous and determined all at once. “And I kept waiting. But then I think to myself-why? Why am I keep waiting? I know what I want. All my life, if I want something, I reach for it. It is not me to wait. I want you, Adam. I want to be with you all the time, and so I am asking, okay? I am asking for you to marry…”
The rest of whatever he is going to say is lost as Adam kisses him. Kisses him like he’s never going to stop, searching and passionate, and then pulls back and sees the question still in Sauli’s eyes, and so Adam kisses him again, breathing yes, and yes, yesyesyes against Sauli’s mouth, and it’s perfect, and just like it was meant to be.
~ * ~
End