Whenever You're Ready - Chapter Eleven [nanofic]
Title: Whenever You're Ready
Chapter: Eleven
Timeframe: Post Season Five
Rating: PG to R throughout the series
Word Count: 2013
Whenever You’re Ready
By Severina
* * *
Chapter Eleven
The ambulance speeds along the empty road. The fields on either side have long since been harvested -- Justin has no idea what was planted there, and had never thought to ask… and now he will never be able to find out. Surely the farmer who tilled that field is dead. But even so, small green shoots of new plantings already burst from the earth. A dead man’s legacy.
They are going to have to learn to do this, Justin thinks. Sow fields of wheat or corn or beans. Bring them to fruition. Protect them from the undead. The food on the shelves won’t last forever.
He doesn’t want to think about it.
They haven’t seen a zombie for miles.
Brian’s lips are set in a grim line, and his jaw clenches and unclenches with regularity. His eyes never leave the long stretch of barren road, despite the relative safety of this broad stretch of land. They haven’t spoken for miles, either, not even when Justin buried his face in his hands and cried. For Ben. For Michael. For all of them.
They don’t talk. Justin is a little bit grateful for that, and a little bit guilty for feeling grateful. But he knows he wouldn’t know what to say. Or how to say it if he did.
So when Brian suddenly stops the vehicle in the middle of the road, Justin looks up from his contemplation of the seemingly infinite fields of corn-wheat-beans but still says nothing. And when Brian opens the door and gets out and stands astride the unbroken white line with his head thrown back to the sky, Justin sits quietly with his hands folded in his lap and remains mute.
When the rear door opens with a soft chink and the others stumble out, blinking in the harsh sunlight and rubbing cramped and sore limbs, Justin doesn’t move.
And then Michael sees Brian.
And charges.
The impact of his body sends Brian hurtling to the concrete. Michael’s flailing fists connect with Brian’s face, his chest. And Michael is crying, screaming hateful hurtful words into the silence.
Screaming “It’s your fault”. Screaming “We begged you to stop.”
Justin is outside the vehicle without any knowledge of how he got there, except that the door is hanging open at his back and he is taking long strides toward the struggling couple. But Emmett holds him back. Emmett whispers “let them be” in his ear.
Brian doesn’t try to defend himself.
Justin digs his nails into his palms and pulls away from Emmett’s restraining embrace. He turns away. Feels his body vibrating with the effort of holding it all inside.
And when Michael’s rage suddenly peters out, when Michael lies limp and boneless on the hot concrete, Brian gathers him in his arms and holds him while he cries.
Beside a field in the middle of nowhere.
* * *
When they pull into the long driveway at Britin, Brian lets the ambulance idle.
He searches the perimeter of the property with their eyes, and knows Brian is doing the same. There is no movement from anywhere around the house. Only then does Brian turn off the engine. He leaves the keys dangling from the ignition.
Justin can hear the birds that have taken up residence in the shrubbery by the door. They’re singing.
“Home,” he says. It tastes bittersweet on his tongue.
“Let’s get inside,” Brian answers. He doesn’t look at Justin. His voice is rough and raw. It’s the first thing he’s said for an hour.
They dump their gym bags in the foyer. Brian shrugs out of his jacket. And they gather, still silent, in the sitting room. Justin leans his baseball bat against the side of the cream-coloured lounge. He doesn’t care about marring the furniture, about blood stains that Brian would previously have had a shit fit about. The bat is close at hand, there. He can reach it in a nanosecond.
Michael’s eyes are red-rimmed and bloodshot. There is a long ragged tear in his beloved Captain Astro T-shirt.
Justin doesn’t want to look at him. He stares at his own hands instead. Filthy. There is dried blood under his fingernails.
The grandfather clock in the corner ticks over another minute. The pendulum swings.
Ted finally clears his throat. It sounds ominously loud in the silence. “Well,” he says, “we’re here.”
Steve shifts in place. Brian’s eyes flit between the cold fireplace grate, the gleaming wood floor, the long flowing white curtains at the window. Justin continues to stare at his hands. Michael stares at nothing.
“Yes,” Emmett eventually answers.
Ted smiles gratefully. “We should… uh…”
No one seems to know. Justin can’t seem to care. He wants to curl up and sleep -- the wool rug in front of the fireplace looks inviting. He wants to cry. Or fuck. Anything but try to think.
Then Emmett speaks. “We should eat,” he suggests. His voice is bright and cheery. And Justin knows he’s trying, trying the only way he knows how, but it still makes him cringe inside. “We haven’t eaten since dawn,” Emmett continues, “and I, for one, am famished.”
“Yes,” Ted agrees eagerly. “We should eat. Then--”
“No,” Michael says.
Justin blinks.
Michael raises his eyes from contemplation of the wall, from what Justin knows he’s seeing there, replaying over and over, because he’s seeing it too.
“No,” Michael says again, his voice ragged and tear-choked and scared, and he looks at each of them in turn. “First we search the grounds. Make sure none of those…those…” he breaks off, blinks rapidly, almost physically gulps down the pain.
“Sweetie, I think we should get some rest--” Emmett starts.
“We secure the area,” Michael says, more firmly now. “And we set up a watch. We set… surveillance.”
“Right.” Ted takes a deep breath. “Okay. Brian, didn’t you say there was a way to--”
“The attic,” Brian interrupts dully. “There’s a window that leads out to the flat of the roof. From there you can see for miles.”
“We have to move everything we’ll need to the upper floors,” Michael adds.
“Yes,” Emmett chirps enthusiastically. “Zombies can’t climb stairs!”
“But won’t we just get trapped there if they get inside?” Steve asks.
Emmett makes a shushing motion with his hand. “They’re not going to get inside.”
“We’ll plan for that,” Justin puts in.
And as they work out the details, as the defeated army becomes animated again, Michael does his best to hide his anguish, though he rarely meets Brian‘s eyes. And when Brian wanders away, Justin lets him. And the others don’t say a word.
* * *
Justin finds Brian, later, stiff and silent, at the french doors that lead out to the deck. The sun is just beginning to set, lighting the courtyard in yellow-orange fire, making the water in the pool look dark and fathomless. It has always been one of Justin’s favourite places in the house, and his favourite time of day. He remembers sitting on the deck, glass of wine or beer or spring water forgotten beside him on the patio table, sketchbook in hand, trying in vain to capture the beauty of the moment. And Brian wrapping his arms around him from behind when he came home, usually scaring the shit out of him.
“The perimeter’s clear,” Justin says.
Brian remains still.
“We’ve set up a system for surveillance,” Justin continues. “Steve’s taking the first watch. Four hour increments. He’s got the walkie-talkie in case he spots anything. If he does, he’ll radio and we’ll… take care of it. No guns. We don’t want to make too much noise.”
Brian says nothing.
Justin can’t even see his reflection in the glass.
He persists, blindly. “You’re not up ‘til ten tomorrow morning. Ted’s going next; then Emmett. I’m after that. We left Michael out of the rotation for now, until---” And Justin stops, rubs the back of his neck. Bites at his lower lip. Until he gets over it? How the fuck do you get over seeing your partner, your husband, killed before your eyes? How do you get over knowing that you saw it happen, and then you walked away? Even if you had no choice.
And Brian is silent.
Justin closes the distance between them, rests his palm lightly on Brian’s back. “Brian,” he says.
The air seems to deflate out of Brian at the touch. He rests his forehead on the cool glass. “He’ll never forgive me,” Brian says softly.
And Justin has nothing to say to that. Nothing, because it’s probably true. His friends have always considered Brian to be the convenient whipping boy when things go wrong. Can’t get over your boyhood crush? Brian’s fault. Jeopardize a current relationship because of said crush? Brian’s fault. Cheat on him? Brian’s fault. Come out and lose a lucrative endorsement deal? Brian’s fault.
He knows it doesn’t matter that he was in the front of the ambulance, too. That he also missed seeing Ben run out of the passageway, until it was too late. It will never be his fault. Only Brian’s.
No, there’s nothing to say. So he just wraps his arms around Brian’s waist. Rests his cheek on Brian’s back. Soothes with actions because words mean nothing.
There is a sound, an almost-sound, from behind them. Justin shifts.
Michael hovers in the doorway, a white-knuckled grip on the jamb. “We’re moving upstairs,” he says shortly.
“We’ll be right there,” Justin starts to say. But Michael is already gone.
* * *
They shower in shifts.
Ted goes first. He’s quick and efficient. He dresses in the bathroom; polo top and baggy jeans that he grabbed from the racks of the Big Q in the hours before they left the strip mall. God forbid anyone should see him naked.
Then Emmett. He emerges with one bath towel wrapped in an elaborate twist around his head and another large fluffy towel around his waist, bare feet trailing water on to the polished hardwood floors.
Michael slips into the bathroom after Emmett. He stays inside a long time. Just as Justin is starting to worry, is about to knock gently on the door, Michael steps out. The pale soft flesh beneath his eyes looks red and raw, and Justin looks away immediately, ashamed to see it and not knowing why. There should be no shame in the natural experience of grief. Michael shuffles past Justin without a word.
Justin hands the walkie-talkie off to Emmett and leaves him and Ted lugging up their supplies and divvying up the spare bedrooms before he joins Brian in the shower.
The water is hot -- hotter than he likes it, hotter than even Brian likes it. He reaches around Brian’s body to snatch at the tap, dials it down a notch or two.
Brian stands listless under the spray. His left hand moves methodically back and forth across his chest, the bar of soap buried in his palm.
Justin reaches up to skim his fingers through Brian’s wet hair. He presses a gentle kiss to Brian’s collarbone.
And Brian blinks, once, slowly, before shoving him against the shower wall.
Brian’s fingers grasp at his hips. Brian’s tongue licks at the sensitive spot behind his ear, the spot that never fails to make him gasp and squirm. He gasps now, wet and half-hard, a Pavlovian response, his mind flashing on too many other occasions just like this. There are too many to identify so all of them blur into one fluid moment, from the first on the day that Gus was born to the last, only a few nights ago. He needs, and the hunger is as sudden and overwhelming as it was the first time.
But there is no answering swell of desire.
He didn’t think there would be.
So Justin wraps his arms around Brian’s neck instead. Threads his fingers through the fine hair at the nape of Brian’s neck. And holds him while his body shakes with silent tears.
42070 / 50000 words. 84% done!
.
Chapter: Eleven
Timeframe: Post Season Five
Rating: PG to R throughout the series
Word Count: 2013
Whenever You’re Ready
By Severina
* * *
Chapter Eleven
The ambulance speeds along the empty road. The fields on either side have long since been harvested -- Justin has no idea what was planted there, and had never thought to ask… and now he will never be able to find out. Surely the farmer who tilled that field is dead. But even so, small green shoots of new plantings already burst from the earth. A dead man’s legacy.
They are going to have to learn to do this, Justin thinks. Sow fields of wheat or corn or beans. Bring them to fruition. Protect them from the undead. The food on the shelves won’t last forever.
He doesn’t want to think about it.
They haven’t seen a zombie for miles.
Brian’s lips are set in a grim line, and his jaw clenches and unclenches with regularity. His eyes never leave the long stretch of barren road, despite the relative safety of this broad stretch of land. They haven’t spoken for miles, either, not even when Justin buried his face in his hands and cried. For Ben. For Michael. For all of them.
They don’t talk. Justin is a little bit grateful for that, and a little bit guilty for feeling grateful. But he knows he wouldn’t know what to say. Or how to say it if he did.
So when Brian suddenly stops the vehicle in the middle of the road, Justin looks up from his contemplation of the seemingly infinite fields of corn-wheat-beans but still says nothing. And when Brian opens the door and gets out and stands astride the unbroken white line with his head thrown back to the sky, Justin sits quietly with his hands folded in his lap and remains mute.
When the rear door opens with a soft chink and the others stumble out, blinking in the harsh sunlight and rubbing cramped and sore limbs, Justin doesn’t move.
And then Michael sees Brian.
And charges.
The impact of his body sends Brian hurtling to the concrete. Michael’s flailing fists connect with Brian’s face, his chest. And Michael is crying, screaming hateful hurtful words into the silence.
Screaming “It’s your fault”. Screaming “We begged you to stop.”
Justin is outside the vehicle without any knowledge of how he got there, except that the door is hanging open at his back and he is taking long strides toward the struggling couple. But Emmett holds him back. Emmett whispers “let them be” in his ear.
Brian doesn’t try to defend himself.
Justin digs his nails into his palms and pulls away from Emmett’s restraining embrace. He turns away. Feels his body vibrating with the effort of holding it all inside.
And when Michael’s rage suddenly peters out, when Michael lies limp and boneless on the hot concrete, Brian gathers him in his arms and holds him while he cries.
Beside a field in the middle of nowhere.
* * *
When they pull into the long driveway at Britin, Brian lets the ambulance idle.
He searches the perimeter of the property with their eyes, and knows Brian is doing the same. There is no movement from anywhere around the house. Only then does Brian turn off the engine. He leaves the keys dangling from the ignition.
Justin can hear the birds that have taken up residence in the shrubbery by the door. They’re singing.
“Home,” he says. It tastes bittersweet on his tongue.
“Let’s get inside,” Brian answers. He doesn’t look at Justin. His voice is rough and raw. It’s the first thing he’s said for an hour.
They dump their gym bags in the foyer. Brian shrugs out of his jacket. And they gather, still silent, in the sitting room. Justin leans his baseball bat against the side of the cream-coloured lounge. He doesn’t care about marring the furniture, about blood stains that Brian would previously have had a shit fit about. The bat is close at hand, there. He can reach it in a nanosecond.
Michael’s eyes are red-rimmed and bloodshot. There is a long ragged tear in his beloved Captain Astro T-shirt.
Justin doesn’t want to look at him. He stares at his own hands instead. Filthy. There is dried blood under his fingernails.
The grandfather clock in the corner ticks over another minute. The pendulum swings.
Ted finally clears his throat. It sounds ominously loud in the silence. “Well,” he says, “we’re here.”
Steve shifts in place. Brian’s eyes flit between the cold fireplace grate, the gleaming wood floor, the long flowing white curtains at the window. Justin continues to stare at his hands. Michael stares at nothing.
“Yes,” Emmett eventually answers.
Ted smiles gratefully. “We should… uh…”
No one seems to know. Justin can’t seem to care. He wants to curl up and sleep -- the wool rug in front of the fireplace looks inviting. He wants to cry. Or fuck. Anything but try to think.
Then Emmett speaks. “We should eat,” he suggests. His voice is bright and cheery. And Justin knows he’s trying, trying the only way he knows how, but it still makes him cringe inside. “We haven’t eaten since dawn,” Emmett continues, “and I, for one, am famished.”
“Yes,” Ted agrees eagerly. “We should eat. Then--”
“No,” Michael says.
Justin blinks.
Michael raises his eyes from contemplation of the wall, from what Justin knows he’s seeing there, replaying over and over, because he’s seeing it too.
“No,” Michael says again, his voice ragged and tear-choked and scared, and he looks at each of them in turn. “First we search the grounds. Make sure none of those…those…” he breaks off, blinks rapidly, almost physically gulps down the pain.
“Sweetie, I think we should get some rest--” Emmett starts.
“We secure the area,” Michael says, more firmly now. “And we set up a watch. We set… surveillance.”
“Right.” Ted takes a deep breath. “Okay. Brian, didn’t you say there was a way to--”
“The attic,” Brian interrupts dully. “There’s a window that leads out to the flat of the roof. From there you can see for miles.”
“We have to move everything we’ll need to the upper floors,” Michael adds.
“Yes,” Emmett chirps enthusiastically. “Zombies can’t climb stairs!”
“But won’t we just get trapped there if they get inside?” Steve asks.
Emmett makes a shushing motion with his hand. “They’re not going to get inside.”
“We’ll plan for that,” Justin puts in.
And as they work out the details, as the defeated army becomes animated again, Michael does his best to hide his anguish, though he rarely meets Brian‘s eyes. And when Brian wanders away, Justin lets him. And the others don’t say a word.
* * *
Justin finds Brian, later, stiff and silent, at the french doors that lead out to the deck. The sun is just beginning to set, lighting the courtyard in yellow-orange fire, making the water in the pool look dark and fathomless. It has always been one of Justin’s favourite places in the house, and his favourite time of day. He remembers sitting on the deck, glass of wine or beer or spring water forgotten beside him on the patio table, sketchbook in hand, trying in vain to capture the beauty of the moment. And Brian wrapping his arms around him from behind when he came home, usually scaring the shit out of him.
“The perimeter’s clear,” Justin says.
Brian remains still.
“We’ve set up a system for surveillance,” Justin continues. “Steve’s taking the first watch. Four hour increments. He’s got the walkie-talkie in case he spots anything. If he does, he’ll radio and we’ll… take care of it. No guns. We don’t want to make too much noise.”
Brian says nothing.
Justin can’t even see his reflection in the glass.
He persists, blindly. “You’re not up ‘til ten tomorrow morning. Ted’s going next; then Emmett. I’m after that. We left Michael out of the rotation for now, until---” And Justin stops, rubs the back of his neck. Bites at his lower lip. Until he gets over it? How the fuck do you get over seeing your partner, your husband, killed before your eyes? How do you get over knowing that you saw it happen, and then you walked away? Even if you had no choice.
And Brian is silent.
Justin closes the distance between them, rests his palm lightly on Brian’s back. “Brian,” he says.
The air seems to deflate out of Brian at the touch. He rests his forehead on the cool glass. “He’ll never forgive me,” Brian says softly.
And Justin has nothing to say to that. Nothing, because it’s probably true. His friends have always considered Brian to be the convenient whipping boy when things go wrong. Can’t get over your boyhood crush? Brian’s fault. Jeopardize a current relationship because of said crush? Brian’s fault. Cheat on him? Brian’s fault. Come out and lose a lucrative endorsement deal? Brian’s fault.
He knows it doesn’t matter that he was in the front of the ambulance, too. That he also missed seeing Ben run out of the passageway, until it was too late. It will never be his fault. Only Brian’s.
No, there’s nothing to say. So he just wraps his arms around Brian’s waist. Rests his cheek on Brian’s back. Soothes with actions because words mean nothing.
There is a sound, an almost-sound, from behind them. Justin shifts.
Michael hovers in the doorway, a white-knuckled grip on the jamb. “We’re moving upstairs,” he says shortly.
“We’ll be right there,” Justin starts to say. But Michael is already gone.
* * *
They shower in shifts.
Ted goes first. He’s quick and efficient. He dresses in the bathroom; polo top and baggy jeans that he grabbed from the racks of the Big Q in the hours before they left the strip mall. God forbid anyone should see him naked.
Then Emmett. He emerges with one bath towel wrapped in an elaborate twist around his head and another large fluffy towel around his waist, bare feet trailing water on to the polished hardwood floors.
Michael slips into the bathroom after Emmett. He stays inside a long time. Just as Justin is starting to worry, is about to knock gently on the door, Michael steps out. The pale soft flesh beneath his eyes looks red and raw, and Justin looks away immediately, ashamed to see it and not knowing why. There should be no shame in the natural experience of grief. Michael shuffles past Justin without a word.
Justin hands the walkie-talkie off to Emmett and leaves him and Ted lugging up their supplies and divvying up the spare bedrooms before he joins Brian in the shower.
The water is hot -- hotter than he likes it, hotter than even Brian likes it. He reaches around Brian’s body to snatch at the tap, dials it down a notch or two.
Brian stands listless under the spray. His left hand moves methodically back and forth across his chest, the bar of soap buried in his palm.
Justin reaches up to skim his fingers through Brian’s wet hair. He presses a gentle kiss to Brian’s collarbone.
And Brian blinks, once, slowly, before shoving him against the shower wall.
Brian’s fingers grasp at his hips. Brian’s tongue licks at the sensitive spot behind his ear, the spot that never fails to make him gasp and squirm. He gasps now, wet and half-hard, a Pavlovian response, his mind flashing on too many other occasions just like this. There are too many to identify so all of them blur into one fluid moment, from the first on the day that Gus was born to the last, only a few nights ago. He needs, and the hunger is as sudden and overwhelming as it was the first time.
But there is no answering swell of desire.
He didn’t think there would be.
So Justin wraps his arms around Brian’s neck instead. Threads his fingers through the fine hair at the nape of Brian’s neck. And holds him while his body shakes with silent tears.
42070 / 50000 words. 84% done!
.