I Believe I Can Fly
Title: I Believe I Can Fly
Author: tvlove
Pairings: Ryan/Esposito
Written for the Ryan & Esposito Secret Santa Fic Exchange
For hyuuganeji11
Spoilers: None
Beta:
starscythe
Disclaimer: I don't own them :( (but I want to)
I Believe I Can Fly
The trilling tone continued to ring in Esposito’s ear as he stood in line at the coffee shop at the end of Ryan’s block. C’mon, pick up, he thought impatiently as he moved forward a step in line. As the old lady in front of him collected her tea and brushed past him, the strong scent of cinnamon wafted up from her silver curls, tickling his nose. He recognized the scent and realized the same old lady had been there last week when he’d stopped in to pick up some milk on the way to Ryan’s.
He gave up on the phone, snapping it shut and pushed it into his pocket as he stepped up to the counter.
“Two coffees please,” he told the young girl. “One with two sugars and cream.” He mentally rolled his eyes as he placed the order. It was a wonder Ryan had any teeth left. He figured a number of them were sweet teeth.
As he waited for the girl to make his coffee, he re-dialed Ryan’s number again. He was trying to tell him they had a murder, but, yet again, he didn’t answer. It didn’t really matter, seeing as how Esposito was only two minutes from Ryan’s apartment anyway. He’d just call by and wake his lazy-ass up in person.
Sliding his phone into his pocket again and perusing the spread of delicious-looking pastries and cakes, he couldn’t help but add two banana muffins to his order. Thanking the pretty brunette and filling his arms with the coffees and breakfast, he began the two minute walk to his partner’s apartment.
It’s a good thing Beckett told us not to rush, he thought, chastising Ryan in his mind. Sloan and Creyner had been on call at the time and the crime scene was already under control, so Beckett asked them to stop by the offices of the victim instead and ask some questions before heading in to the precinct.
When he got to Ryan’s door, hands full, he knocked roughly with his foot. There was no answer and Esposito cursed his partner as he set the coffees on the railing beside him and dug in his pocket for his keys. If it wasn’t such a regular occurrence for Ryan to sleep in and be running late, he might have been worried. But Esposito just figured he was either still asleep or in the shower, so just used the spare key on his keychain to let himself in. He closed the door behind him with his foot and set the coffee on the small wooden table in the dining room before heading towards Ryan’s bedroom door.
He could hear the water running through the pipes so he knew his partner was in the shower. Esposito decided to knock on the adjoining bathroom door to let him know he was there, but stopped short when he heard a strange noise coming from the other side. It kind of sounded like… A young girl crying.
Esposito’s mind jumped all over the place as he inched closer to the bathroom door, listening carefully.
After a few more increased heartbeats, Esposito realized it wasn’t a young girl crying after all. He could make out distinct words in the wailing.
“I belieeeeeve I can flyyyyyy!”
Ryan was singing in the shower.
“I belieeeeeve I can touch the skyyyy.”
Esposito couldn’t help the grin that immediately found its way to his face. He pressed his ear up against the door and fought back his chuckle. His plans to knock on the door and alert his partner to his presence had now changed.
Esposito went back into the dining room to retrieve his coffee and breakfast and collapsed onto Ryan’s horrible, yet comfortable, red couch while he waited. He thought back to days at the 54th with Ike. If anyone had told him back then that one day his partner would be a childlike and dorky Irish boy who wrote a blog, got his couch from the side of the road and sung nineties RnB songs in the shower, he would have flat-out refused to believe it. In fact, he would have probably run the other way at the idea of being sidled with someone matching that description. But Kevin Ryan was different. He’d wormed his way into Esposito’s head, gotten in under his skin and even managed to claim a little space in his heart.
He took a swig of his coffee as he listened to the distant sound of Ryan murdering an already-awful song. It’s a good thing he’s cute enough to get away with that horrible voice, he thought absently and cast his eyes to the assortment of photo frames on the top of Ryan’s TV cabinet.
The one thing Esposito always found unusual when he looked at Ryan’s family pictures was that Ryan was the only member of his family with bright blue eyes. There was a photo of him with his arm around his Mom’s shoulders at his academy graduation, a photo of all three of his sisters at his cousin’s wedding, one of Ryan with his old dog, Pip, and a shot of Ryan and himself, taken by Castle at one of his flashy parties. Esposito had teased him about it when he first noticed it there, but really he’d felt indescribably thrilled that Ryan thought him worthy enough to join his family pictures.
Suddenly Esposito heard the distant singing (if you could call it that) stop along with the sound of running water. Esposito rose from the couch and moved to lean against the doorway of Ryan’s bedroom. His plan was to startle Ryan and then embarrass him when he realized he’d heard him singing.
But Esposito’s plan had several giant flaws:
When Ryan emerged from the bathroom, he was wet.
And wearing only a towel.
And to make matters even worse, he didn’t immediately see Esposito standing in the doorway and nearly walked right into him, causing his towel to slip down even further on his hips.
“Javi!” Ryan jumped as he nearly knocked into his partner, just managing to catch his towel before it fell to the floor.
This was the part where Esposito was supposed to come out with a remark like “dude, I think I heard a wounded animal in your bathroom” but his brain-to-mouth function seemed to have stopped working. All he could do was gawp at Ryan, standing less than a foot in front of him, glistening with moisture and his hair mussed up. Damn…
He watched as Ryan’s adams-apple bobbed up and down. He knew he was staring. He knew Ryan was watching him staring. But he just couldn’t shake out of it. He was frozen to the spot with the fight raging inside of him to either move closer or move further away.
“What, uh… what are you doing… here?” Ryan asked, his voice sounding uncertain and eyes wide with shock.
Esposito snapped his eyes up from where he’d been watching a drop of water rolling slowly down the other man’s chest. He looked into his curious eyes and, thankfully, found the power to form a sentence.
“Beckett called. We have a murder. You didn’t answer your phone…” he trailed off. This was so not how this was supposed to go down.
“Oh, right, of course. I’ll, uh, I’ll just get dressed and we can go,” Ryan said, but didn’t move. Somewhere in the logical side of his brain, a little voice told Esposito this was his cue to leave Ryan’s bedroom while he changed. His body seemed to be ignoring that little voice determinedly.
Ryan was studying him. Confusion was etched into his features as he watched Esposito, who was trying, rather unsuccessfully, to keep his wandering eyes on Ryan’s face. Then, the confusion was replaced by a look of amusement, mixed with a challenging glint in his eye.
“What’s the matter Javi?” he asked, a smirk coming through in his tone.
“Nothing. Why would something be the matter?” OK, not very convincing, but Esposito’s brain wasn’t operating at full capacity.
“You’re staring, bro.”
“I’m no-“
“And you’re still standing in my doorway.” Ryan was enjoying this far too much, Esposito decided. And the fact that Ryan was being so bold and sassy whilst he stood there squirming in his skin just wasn’t fair.
“Hey man, you’re the one who believes you can fly,” Esposito managed to say sarcastically, even managing the raising of an eyebrow to reduce the tension in the room nearer the normal amount for the duo.
Ryan’s eyes widened slightly. Gotcha, Esposito thought smugly, time to turn the tables on the embarrassment.
“You - you heard…?” Ryan actually started blushing. And because he was standing there half-naked at the time, Esposito could see the blush creep up from his chest.
Half-naked. And now his eyes were roaming again.
Esposito knew he needed to end this odd situation before it started up again.
“Guess I know what the ‘R’ in ‘R.Kelly’ stands for now,” he teased. “Get dressed Space Jam, we gotta get going,” he managed a smirk before he backed out of the doorway. He still couldn’t take his eyes off of Ryan, but at least now he wasn’t preventing him from shutting the door and breaking the eye contact himself.
Which he did, albeit reluctantly.
As soon as the door shut, Esposito ran a hand over his face and paced back and forth in Ryan’s living room, mentally slapping himself repeatedly. He’d admitted, to himself, his attraction to his partner a while ago and decided it was perfectly fine to feel the attraction so long as he maintained control over it. He couldn’t, for example, jump his partner when they were on a stakeout and Ryan insisted on leaning over him occasionally to get a look at something out the window. And he couldn’t kiss the grin off his partner’s face whenever he was laughing at him. He also couldn’t push Ryan up against a wall and have his way with him when they were sparring in the gym.
He knew these boundaries. He’d stuck by these boundaries. But this morning… well the combination of Dorky-And-Adorable-Ryan singing in the shower and Sexy-Wet-Ryan standing so close to him had his heart racing and his lower brain taking over from the one in his skull.
Esposito sighed, turning his back to Ryan’s bedroom door and picking his coffee up off the table. It was no longer scalding hot, but this only helped him drain the liquid quickly, scrunching the cup in his hand with a crackle afterwards. The noise it produced must have covered the sound of Ryan’s bedroom door opening because when he turned around again he nearly bumped into his partner, who was standing right behind him.
Esposito groaned. He actually groaned audibly. He simply could not control the noise escaping from the back of his throat. Ryan had pants on this time, and a shirt. But it was unbuttoned. And his hair was still damp and standing at cute, funny angles on his head.
What hit him the hardest though was the look in Ryan’s eyes. After his own had travelled up and down his partner’s body, they rested on the other man’s intense, gaze. They seemed to be a darker blue than usual.
“I’m not sure I can do this anymore man,” Ryan confessed softly, his gaze never faltering, piercing blue eyes boring into his own.
“Do what?” Esposito asked, trying to sound light, but failing miserably. The seriousness on Ryan’s face made him nervous.
“I can’t… do the opposite of this,” he finally got out before taking Esposito’s face in both hands and pressing his lips roughly against his own.
Esposito felt like his mind momentarily vacated his body. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. Ryan was kissing him and he’d drawn a blank. He was frozen again! He felt Ryan start to pull away and realized that if he didn’t do something, anything, Ryan would think he didn’t want this. Didn’t want him.
That thought was enough to spur Esposito into action. He wrapped both his arms around the man's waist, slipping them beneath the open shirt, and ran his tongue over his bottom lip. Ryan gasped into his mouth at the sudden shift and Esposito struggled to not moan out loud. They seemed to be moving, Esposito noticed, gravitating backwards towards Ryan’s bedroom. Ryan’s hands had moved to his hair and then they were roaming down his chest, pulling at his shirt. Esposito realized Ryan’s shirt was gone, but had no recollection of who had slipped it off his shoulders. Their kisses were getting rougher, more frenzied, as they each fought for dominance.
When Ryan broke away to start nibbling on Esposito’s neck, kissing and tugging and teasing the flesh there, Esposito realized they were in Ryan’s room. He quickly steered them towards the bathroom and Ryan looked up at him with curiosity between kisses.
“No singing this time,” Esposito mumbled against his mouth and felt Ryan smile in response.
“Is screaming allowed?”
“It’s compulsory,” he said, his voice low as it echoed off the bathroom walls.
Huh, good acoustics in here, Esposito thought briefly. It’s a good thing Beckett told us not to rush.