My evergreen, you are always gonna be...

[m_pinocchio]

He's spent the night alone. It's taken some coaxing, Tom hadn't been especially willing, but gentle insistence and he'd given way. Yes, I'm fine. I'm sure I'm fine. You don't need to take the girls, I'm really fine. A night alone in this house, with his daughters, with his ghosts. He doesn't even know how many of them there are now. One more added

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[out_of_realm]

Tom Hobbes was worried. It wasn't a new state of things. He was worried about Neil and the brave little smile he got when they talked about where things were going with him and Mike. He was worried about the girls, crying for mommy when they wouldn't sleep in the horrible, thin hours of the night. He was worried for himself and for Eostre, wherever she'd gone. But most of all, he was worried for Mike Pinocchio, who'd gone through worse but shouldn't have ever had to, again and again.

As it was, when he made it to the World Tree that morning he was still damp from the shower, carrying baby food in bowls and a sandwich for Mike in a napkin. It hadn't been easy to leave him, not even for the span of one night, but Mike had been clear, drawn a line in the sand. Eventually, you learn when to stop pushing.

Tom hesitated, watching Mike work on his knees and then, even then without anything being said, something horrible and petrified began to work itself loose in his chest. Oh, he thought, Oh, does this mean we're moving on?. And he stood there, almost smiling, until one of the girls noticed him and shrieked a greeting, completly giving him away.

[m_pinocchio]

He raises his head at Flo's little yell and pauses in his work, fingers deep in the warm soil and the sun on his face. Tom is standing in a shaft of sunlight, the light setting off the blond in his hair, and for a moment he can't quite take a breath.

He'd asked Tom to leave him alone for a night. But he doesn't think he wants any other nights alone from now on.

He smiles, wide and warm, and pulls his hands out of the earth, dusting them off against each other. "So what're you staring at, dick?"

[out_of_realm]

"You," Tom said, shifting what he was carying into one hand so that he could reach down and stroke his fingers through Flo's hair, almost allowing himself to give into the cavern of relief opening up underneath him.

"You doing..." He stopped, still almost smiling, and went over to look over Mike's shoulder. "What are you doing, exactly?"

[m_pinocchio]

"I'm planting this thing," he says, looking back down at the little vine leaning up against the wall of the house. Leaning, and hopefully soon it'll climb, maybe with a little help. "And... and I guess it'll grow." It might not, he knows that... but somehow, here, so close to the place where Eostre had lived, he's sure it'll grow. Thrive.

[out_of_realm]

"Oh," Tom said quietly, spreading his hand on the back of Mike's neck. Things keep growing, didn't they? The sun almost always came back. For a second, just one, fleeting minute he felt a hard press of emotion against the back of his throat, the trembling ache that had been a part of their lives for so long, for a little more than two weeks. Two weeks. God."

"It looks good," he managed, quiet, sincere. He took a hard breath, holding up what he was carrying.

"I brought lunch."

[m_pinocchio]

"Hey, yeah?" He grins and straightens up, scooping Mack up in his arms and taking her with him. She laughs and reaches for him, chirping something that sounds like a fair approximation to "Tom!"

"I'll trade you." He nods to the bowls. "Help me feed 'em? I was actually gonna knock off soon and do it anyway, but you saved me a trip."

[out_of_realm]

Tom. Almost. They couldn't quite get the hard consonants down. He'd miss it when they could.

"You got it," he said, taking Mack in an easy movement, passing over the food. Flo had tottered over curiously, staring up at him reproachfully, jealous of the attention.

"You okay?" he asked after a moment, crouching down with both the girls, looking up at Mike carefully. "Sleep good?"

[m_pinocchio]

"I'm fine," he says simply, dropping to his knees in the grass, the World Tree's branches swaying slowly over them and scattering the light. "Or... better. And it's gonna get better."

He smiles a little wryly and ruffles Flo's hair with an admittedly dirty hand. "Honestly, I didn't sleep all that much. But it's okay. I can catch a nap later, maybe." His smile turns less wry. "And I could also maybe use some company."

[out_of_realm]

Tom sat down with Mack in his lap, down in the thick grass in front of the World Tree where a goddess had lived once and had left life behind when she'd gone away. He was transferring Mack from one thigh to the other as Mike was speaking and actually did a double take when he saw that familiar hitch in the other man's smile.

"...really?" he said after a pause, almost letting himself smile. "Company? For a nap?"

[m_pinocchio]

"For a nap," he repeats, getting a squirming Flo settled on his own lap, glancing at Tom and at the tree and back again. He's been trying to think about how to talk about this, trying to figure out if it should even be talked about so directly. Some things... maybe it's easier to just let them happen or not happen as they will. But there's no ignoring what he wants, and he can't help feeling like these are the days when the rest of his future is being solidified.

However long that future ends up being. He's not so stupid as to think of anything as certain now.

"For a nap and maybe for longer than that."

[out_of_realm]

Tom's anticipatory grin fell a little and he looked down at the soft, light hair on the back of Mack's head. It was getting long - they'd have to trim it up soon. There was so much that they hadn't had to think about before...

"Longer than that, huh?" he murmured, throat tight, something hard and difficult clogging up his throat. He drew breath to say something else, but nothing came out, everything caught up on worries and concerns that were only half admitted and less resolved. He swallowed hard, smoothing his fingers through Mack's hair, trying to make himself look up.

[m_pinocchio]

"Yeah," he says, looking away when he catches the tension, feeling tension of his own clench in his gut. Shit. He hadn't really expected this reaction, doesn't know what to do with it, and crazily, he finds himself thinking This is why I have never proposed to anyone. I suck at it.

"It's been... really great, having you here with me," he says quietly. "I was kinda hoping you might stay. I mean, if you want to."

[out_of_realm]

"No, Mike, I do," Tom said quickly, looking up sharply. He tugged Mack back against him, hugging her almost protectively, still trying to center himself. Reorient. He had felt this coming weeks ago, which probably should have made it easier. "It's been...great," he said, sincerely, because other than the grief, they'd worked through it. Trial by fire.

Again, he opened his mouth but it was a few moments before anything came out around the clash and clatter of emotions and the sudden jump in his pulse.

"I'm just....worried," he murmured, and maybe he meant scared and guilty, but it would have been too hard to tell. He stole a glance up at Mike, worrying his bottom lip. "You...uh...you know what I mean?"

[m_pinocchio]

He looks back at Tom just as Tom raises his head and when their eyes meet he feels a jolt of something, faint but unquestionably there. It's been there since the very beginning, when it had scared the hell out of him. Scared him almost into South America.

Worried. He shakes his head slowly, and he can feel Flo's eyes on him. The girls are both too good at sensing upset. A little more of this and they might start crying.

"I don't know what you mean," he says, and it's not accusatory. If anything it's a gentle question. So tell me what you mean.

[out_of_realm]

"Uhm," Tom said with great difficulty, actively resisting the urge to get up and pace. He felt like he'd been caught doing something disappointing and had to explain himself, like it would somehow make a difference.

"I mean...I move in..." he said, looking at the swirl of Mack's hair, "And it's you, me, and the girls..." He shook his head, steadying his breath. A long time ago, back when the girls had been born, he'd drawn a line for himself, something he couldn't cross over, not even with the sex that happened later. Eostre and Mike and the girls, and Tom got to play at being an uncle sometimes. It had been perfect. Tom had never stepped over the line. But Eostre had gone away and somewhere, the line had been scuffed away. He didn't even know where to start. "The girls get...two daddies?" he said finally, so difficult that he couldn't look up. "That's...they're yours, Mike," Tom said, and it was obvious he wasn't simply pawning off responsibility. "Eostre's and yours and I just..."

He shrugged with difficulty. That wasn't even the whole story. There was Neil, out in hut in between their abandoned homes, waiting for it to be good again.

"I'm just worried," he said again, very softly, lips brushing the back of Mack's head.

[m_pinocchio]

It's something he hasn't even thought about, not in those terms. Eostre's gone... and Tom's there, right when he'd needed him, just like always. Just like they've always been together. And it had been so easy to move to a place in his mind where two different huts felt like an absurdity.

And of course it's not that simple.

"But..." He shakes his head slightly, feeling, more than anything, bewildered. "But I want you." Childishly simple. But that's what it comes down to. "You don't have to be their father or anything, I'm not asking you to fucking marry me, Hobbes. I just..." He shakes his head again, feeling like maybe he's just ruined a good morning by opening his mouth.

"I just want you."