Arthur/Merlin - If You Want Closure In Your Relationship... [EPILOGUE]
Title: If You Want Closure in Your Relationship (start with your legs)
Author: tsumetaikaze
Fandom/Pairing: Merlin [Arthur/Merlin, Lance/Gwen, past Gwaine/Merlin, side Leon/Morgana, side Gwaine/Anything Willing]
Genre: Fluffy romance with a healthy dash of snarky humour, and a drop of semi-productive angst
Rating: R
Warnings: mild anxiety disorder (mostly humorous - explained in notes), waffling, too many words in general, attempts at being cultured and knowing what I’m talking about, boysecks.
Word Count: 52,000+ WHY IS IT SO LONG?
Summary: Merlin discovers he likes art but shelves a lot of strange books in between, and Arthur interrupts his down time by smiling - Merlin tries to find a way around it but it doesn’t really work out as planned, and there might be a little too much alcohol involved. Lance recites poetry along the way, maybe Morgana has a point and Gwen was right after all, and everyone knows Gaius is always right. Except when it came to the therapy. No one was right about the therapy.
[Part 1] - [Part 2] - [Part 3] - [Part 4] - [Part 5]
2 YEARS LATER
--
“Merlin, you bloody great clod - what are you doing?”
Merlin’s reply comes muffled through the thick stuffing of the sofa. “I don’t - know!” he huffs, voice straining with the effort.
“Lift, you pansy! Come on!”
“I am lifting - Gwaine, help!”
There’s a sort of forced, confused whine as Merlin cranes his neck to see Gwaine juggling two long wooden benches slotted together like tetris pieces with Leon, and takes it as its intended, “Can’t, got my hands full.”
“Right, you pathetic whelp, if you don’t put your back into it I’ll -“
“Don’t even bother - threatening me,” Merlin grits out. “You know as well as I that you can’t stick - mmph - to your word.”
“Boys, please,” Morgana’s voice calls from the gaping hall somewhere behind Merlin, “Lovers’ spats after work.”
“Sod off,” Merlin snaps, then directs his words back to Gwaine. “Couldn’t you just hire someone to do all the hard work?”
“Technically yes, but I used the rest of my money just buying the place so I have to use you lot as slave labour - move.”
Merlin rolls his eyes, gives one last, heaving yank, and they stumble and ooph into the open, empty room. He immediately drops his end of the overly large sofa, much to Arthur’s fuming annoyance, and heaves a loud sigh of relief, completely ignoring Gwaine’s shouted, “Oi, still coming through, here!”
He waves a hand in dismissal, collapses onto the soft cushions, and groans long and loud with his eyes closed. “My arms,” he complains. “I hurt.”
“I’ll make sure you hurt for the rest of your life if you don’t move that sofa right the hell now. I swear, Merlin -”
“No,” Merlin retorts, and there’s a loud bang which he takes as Gwaine dropping the benches. It takes him too long to work out what that might mean for his current illusion of safety, which is promptly shattered as Gwaine and Arthur join forces and lift it from the back, rolling him off with a clattering of pointy elbows hitting hardwood floor, accompanied by a barrage of violent curses and promises of delivering a similar kind of pain.
There’s a soft thud, three matching sighs, and when Merlin finally rearranges his limbs and looks over, he sees that all three of the bastards have sat down on the sofa and are looking quite comfortable.
“You’re all awful, yes? Yes. Glad we agree.”
“Well you’re the one who chose the floor,” Leon says, doing a very passable job of appearing genuinely confused.
“You,” Merlin chides, pointing up at him. “Don’t talk.”
“Giving up so soon?” Morgana smirks, sweeping into the room with a glass of water and planting herself down on the arm of the sofa beside Leon, handing the glass to him and looping the now free hand around his neck.
He smiles his thanks up at her then looks at the slightly cloudy liquid with a dubious eye. “Is this - er, safe?”
“I’ve bunked here for a week and I’m not dead yet, go for it.”
“You can also drink three times the amount of a large man and live to tell the tale. That’s not very reassuring.”
“Man up!” Gwaine claps.
“What is it about you men and regressing twenty years whenever you do anything remotely masculine?” Morgana wonders as Leon takes his first reluctant gulp.
Merlin frowns, shares a sideways look with Arthur and shrugs, “The same thing that makes you women collapse into pathetic, girly squeals whenever someone mentions the possibility of broken nails. Or shoe sales.”
“I do not squeal like a girl -“
“Pathetic girl, I think you’re wanting,” Arthur interjects, slouching right down until he’s verging on horizontal. Merlin reaches out an absent hand and rests it against Arthur’s bare ankle, thumb rubbing at the soft skin just behind the bone.
Morgana scowls as the boys bite at their sleeves to hide their laughter. “I’ll show you pathetic.” And in a flurry of motion she’s stomped off into the ladies bathroom, her heels echoing loudly off the freshly-painted hallway walls. Merlin bites his lip, grinning and chuckling to himself, and he smiles up at what he can see of Arthur’s knees.
There’s a loud, giggly squeal from outside and the sound of a car door, and they all look to the long, narrow hallway as Gwen comes tumbling through, paint-stained overalls just beginning to stretch over her baby bump. Merlin is filled with an incomprehensible level of joy when she smiles at them all, Lance following with a grin just as wide and a large box brimming with novelty lamp shades.
“Ahoy, fellow slaves!” Lance cheers upon arrival, and they all applaud.
“Do you have the goods?” Gwaine asks cheerfully, bounding to his feet and suddenly full of life.
“I do, my good man, I do.”
“Merlin, love, why are you on the floor?” Gwen asks sweetly, peering down at her friend.
He opens his mouth to explain when Arthur interrupts with, “Because he’s completely useless at anything requiring manual labour.”
Gwen asks, “Is that also why the sofa is still blocking the entrance?” at the same time as Merlin bites back, “I’m not built for manual labour!”
“That’s only because you don’t do any,” Arthur rolls his eyes.
“Why do I put up with you?”
“I think it’s more a case of why do I -“
“Because you love me,” Merlin grins, upside down and stretched at a strange angle on the floor, but Arthur’s holding a hand out to help him up and smiling his big toothy smile and Merlin’s not sure he could stand up even with the help. Everyone pauses in their conversations to ‘aaw’ at the appropriate moment, but then Morgana is bursting back into the room, armed with jeans and a t-shirt and sensible shoes, and a look of pure, terrifying determination.
“Right!” she declares, stalking up to the dumbfounded gaggle of tired friends. “Gwen, apparently we are pathetic girls who squeal in fear of breaking our nails. Let’s show these boys who is a more accurate representation of pathetic, shall we?” That little head-tilting smirk will probably give Merlin nightmares for at least three weeks to follow.
Gwen looks down at her belly, lays a gentle, reverent hand on it, then looks back up with a fierce fist pump and says, “Take one for the team, Morgana!”
Everyone packs up laughing, Lance bundles her into a kiss that literally sweeps her off her feet, and the flurry of activity that follows is probably the most productive Merlin has ever experienced, last-minute university study sessions included.
They move sofas and chairs and pool tables around under Gwen’s direction and sharp eye for detail, hang paintings and lay out the booze behind the bar. They unpack boxes and boxes of glasses, arrange increasingly ridiculous lamp shades at points of interest around the lounge area, test out the new speaker system by dancing to horrible old eighties classics and singing far, far too much. They set up the tall tables around the elevated bar area, push long bench seats against the far walls, and the hallway toilets have soap and paper and get mopped. The vacuum is broken out, Gwen dusts like a machine, and Morgana windexes so much glass Merlin’s sure she’s got a little high off the fumes. There’s a tense, precarious moment where Leon and Arthur are holding Gwaine on their shoulders (“I’ll do it!” “Lance, mate, my life is less important than yours.” “Well - okay”) and he’s fixing up the ludicrous chandelier that he’s had his heart set on from the moment he saw it, but then it’s up and everyone’s feet are back on safe ground and it looks pretty good.
And by nightfall, Merlin thinks they might be done.
Gwaine scoops up the customised sign from where he’s thrown it onto the closest pool table, loops it onto the hook, and flips it so that OPEN is visible through the glass.
The Court is ready for business.
There’s a brief moment where everyone holds their breath, then Gwen shouts, “I need an orange juice!” and everyone’s clapping. Morgana dashes behind the bar, gives them all a sultry smirk and says, “What’ll it be, boys?” while Arthur pretends to vomit and Leon laughs and shakes his head, leaning over the bar to kiss her cheek with a loud smack. Gwaine is looking around like he can’t believe it, Merlin has taken control of the music, Lance is resting two hands on Gwen’s stomach from behind and smiling at them all, and everyone is bursting with pride at a job well done. They know there won’t be any customers until the grand opening, so everyone pushes their hands in Gwaine’s face to shut him up when he says the booze is on the house.
“You don’t have a house for it to be on yet, you idiot,” Arthur laughs, and hands Morgana far too much money for his beer.
“Well if you’re going to pay for your drinks, you better bloody work for me free of charge as well.”
“Of course,” Lance agrees instantly. “You know we’ll help out whenever you need us.”
Merlin nearly chokes at the thought of all those drunk customers picking fights and shouting, wanting more, never leaving, and the noise and the din - until Arthur lays a hand on his arm and he realises that when Lance says ‘we’, it’s just his naivety that the rest of the world is as nice as him coming through.
“Who have you got working here?” he asks instead, leaning against Arthur’s shoulder and sliding further down into the corner sofa.
Gwaine shrugs. “At the moment? Just my old mate Percy that I met hostel-hopping in France, and that blonde girl from the pub.”
“My brother still says he’s happy to help out!” Gwen calls, leaning over the low wall that separates the raised bar platform from the lounge area.
Gwaine lifts his glass in a gesture of thanks as Leon repeats, “The blonde girl from the pub?”
“Vivian?” Arthur winces.
Gwaine smirks and nods, taking another swig. “The one and only.”
“Well that rules me out for Court Duty.”
“Oh come on,” Merlin laughs. “She’s not that bad.”
“Not that bad? Merlin, she is -“
“All right, she’s that bad.” To Gwaine, he says, “No one else?”
“Nope. Flying solo for the weeknights. I’m relying on you lot to spread the word, though. Slip the flyer into your library books or something, Merlin, there’s a good lad.”
“Can’t anymore,” Merlin grins, wriggling a little. “Gaius retired.”
“No he didn’t.”
Merlin is determined. “Well he’s about to.”
“Wishful thinking.”
He pushes his face into his hands. “God, I know. Old bastard.”
And from there the plans start about luring in the customers, from wild gay Thursdays to backdoor drug selling, and eventually settling on the standard poker and footy nights. They’ll be Gwaine’s advertising pimps until he starts breaking even, and Morgana will work weekends behind the bar, “Because let’s face it; you’re hot.”
Opening night comes round a week later once everything has been inspected and declared safe and Gwaine’s found a short-order cook, and it goes better than expected. Everyone is completely taken by the mix of modern and classic, the comfortable lounge sofas contrasting with the stark glass of the bar platform, and pool table always goes down a treat. The boys get roped into helping with glass runs, and Gwen is smiling and welcoming newcomers - Percy standing behind her, a brick wall of I dare you. Elyan and Arthur hit it off right away and Merlin finds he’s okay with people bustling him about and being rude, because if Arthur smiles like that for much longer his chest will probably burst. He might sneak a few extra kisses in when they cross paths behind the bar, but so what? He’s riding high and he’ll damn well snog Arthur senseless if he wants to.
Merlin knows that for the next year at least, most of their Saturday nights will be like this. They will come here to chat at the bar, Elyan will be whirling about and charming customers with his impish grin, and Leon will glare away any overly forward young men who think Morgana’s ‘a bit nice’.
Gwen eventually has to leave them to it whenever she gets a sudden craving for apples and tomato sauce and then little baby Laura comes along, and Lance leaves early every time to go home to his family but always makes an appearance. Gwaine begins to look more and more tired but at the same time never more alive, and later on stops trying to shag Percy (they think) and Viv. Morgana stuns Uther into a week long silence after a particularly heated breakfast during which her choice of friends is questioned just before winter sets in, and Arthur becomes a little unsure of what to do with himself for a while. Merlin is learning that no matter how much Arthur disagrees with his father behind his back, it’s the disapproval in those eyes that pushes him to do better.
He goes to France for six weeks to kiss important people’s arses and beg exhibition rights, during which time Merlin spends far too much time on his emails at work and his phone bill is atrocious. He goes to the gallery whenever he can spare a moment and takes up a temporary coffee addiction because he’s come to realise that Arthur is what keeps him sane now, and the Primavera replica above their bed that he was given for his birthday just makes it worse, and it’s all going to go to shit anyway, isn’t it? Because these things always do and he doesn’t know if he can take the rejection - but when Arthur returns the week before Christmas, his present to Merlin is a key and a promise to this year, finally, meet his mother. Merlin might spend the better part of his night locking himself in the bathroom and panicking over how he’ll explain to his mother he’s been dating a guy for going on three years now and just forgotten to tell her about it, and wonders if maybe sanity is just an illusion anyway and to give up now.
It’s not as bad as meeting Uther Pendragon for the first time though, and all Merlin can think as he walks out of the swanky restaurant is that he never, ever, wants to do that again. Luckily Arthur makes it up to him by shagging his brains out on what is inadvisably the kitchen bench - but hey, Arthur’s got another one, so it doesn’t matter.
Gaius eventually retires - eventually - and Merlin acquires his own room to spread his books and transcripts out and goes to a lot more meetings and conferences than, well, ever. He stops wearing ratty brown cardigans. Arthur jumps in front of a couple more cars when Merlin storms out on him in an angry huff, arguing over something neither can remember the next day because it all just seems so stupid once Merlin’s saved his arse time and time again. Arthur doesn’t stop spending virtually an entire pay check on one suit. The time he spent it on a suit for Merlin he got it thrown back in his face and told that if he brings the price down by two hundred pounds, the offer might be considered.
The offer has to be considered for Lance and Gwen’s wedding that has been three and a half years in the making (refusing all of Arthur and Morgana’s offers to pay), because “I will not let my boyfriend turn up to his best friend’s wedding looking like a hobo. I’m sorry, but no.” And Arthur looks dashing as the best man, Morgana stunning as the maid of honour, and Merlin is as proud as punch right in the middle because he will not endure the stress of picking a side and then having everyone wonder which newlywed he’s shagging.
And when Laura’s able to walk and Merlin and Arthur have balanced it out to twice as much sex as they have had fights, Gwen is about to get Branch Director at Shoe Lane and Lance is coaching the state football team in between his stay-at-home dad duties, when Gwaine is finally comfortable in the hardworking yet wealthy lifestyle and can afford to pay his staff comfortable amounts but still hasn’t settled down with anyone, and Morgana and Leon have become that infuriating yet endearing on-again, off-again couple that everyone wants to hit and get married simultaneously - their lives have progressed to the point where they know this is their lot and they’re just a little bit okay with it.
Arthur and Merlin will always argue and snipe but still be so in love that they know none of it really matters in the end, especially when Arthur smiles at him and Merlin whispers Arthur’s name into their kisses. Gwen and Lance will stay as Gwen And Lance and Laura will always be called Little Laura no matter how grown up she gets. Morgana will always be beautiful and stand tall and command her minions, Leon will always watch her with that quietly proud smile and be by her side when she needs it most, and Gwaine will always be a promiscuous little hussy that gets a lot of people drunk on a regular basis, but nobody will ever really understand what the deal is with him and Percy.
And, Merlin decides, settling against the arch of Arthur’s back and wrapping long, shower-warm limbs around him, he might be insane, he might still need those breathing techniques from time to time and he might love Arthur so much that occasionally it’s like a physical ache - but he’s definitely learned to take what life gives him, and if this is what’s been delivered, then he’s not going to complain.
Though he might start if Arthur doesn’t learn to share the bed properly.
------ end ------
LONG, COMPLICATED MODERATELY ANGSTY EVENTS THAT EVENTUALLY RESULT IN SEX DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO BE THIS. DAMN. LONG. IT JUST WASN’T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN LIKE THIS.
This story stole my soul, chewed it up, decided it wasn’t worth swallowing because there’s nothing left and spat it back out. I hope this was worth it, and I thank you for making it to the end. I honestly believe I write a lot of useless nonsense and unnecessary fillers, but I feel that they are in some ways my strong point and where I actually achieve some long-winded form of character development/funtimes. I hope the epilogue wasn’t too… well, JK Rowling-esque.
Also I’m really not known as a porny writer. I just can’t do it. I have too much fun with my oh-so-witty dialogue to work out where non-spoken words should go in any event of a seedy nature, so I pretty much just ignore them. Sorry if it was a bit nondescript. I tried!
For your perusal here are the book titles used/where I found them, also to cover my arse for crediting and all that jazz so whoever wrote these books, please don’t sue. I’m a poor student who doesn’t get much sleep and/or money.
All book titles were found here:
Silly Book Titles | Funny odd books
Ridiculous Book Titles
Also two equally humorous ones that didn’t make it because I just didn’t think this thing could handle any more stupid books:
Clitourist (GENIUS!)
The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America by A Guide to Field Identification
It was endless amounts of fun, regardless of rambling, and I thank my super wonderful koala mooingtron for falling asleep while I read to her and giving me pointers and dealing with my phone calls when she definitely should have been studying. Also thanks to my mum who endured honestly ridiculous questions and detailed discussions about the Dewy Decimal System because she can literally remember everything about it, and for putting up with my ditching her and Master Chef for writing. Big taboo, that one :P I also played 173 games of Free Cell while thinking. I own that game, bitches.
Thank you again for making it to the end and hopefully enjoying this as much as I did. If you read and enjoyed let me know, or if you read and didn't enjoy let me know why - I like to know the hits and misses to help me with future works - of which there are a fair few for this fandom :)
Lots and lots of shiny author-love to you all! :D