Suits fic: I've been losing myself here lately
Title: I’ve been losing myself here lately
Rating: PG
Genre: hurt/comfort, pre-slash
Characters/pairings: Harvey Specter, Mike Ross
Spoilers: “Asterisk” and “High Noon”
Warnings: references to drug use
Summary: Harvey cares because someone has to.
Word count: 2,700ish
Author’s note: I watched High Noon and had a lot of feelings. This was the result. Also, I’m pretty sure it wants to be a series, so watch this space. Title borrowed from Mark Owen’s “Sorry Lately”.
“I never thanked you.” Mike says, sliding some of Harvey’s records back onto the shelf. The others have gone home, but Harvey stayed behind to haul his boxes back up from the forty-sixth floor, because there’s no way he is spending another minute in that tiny excuse for a senior partner’s office. Mike, clearly not wanting to go back to his empty apartment, is helping.
“Thanked me for what?” Harvey plays dumb, not certain he wants to have this conversation.
Mike rolls his eyes. “You aren’t a convincing idiot.”
“That’s fine, since you are.” Harvey shoots back. This he can do-he and Mike can always trade in insulting but mostly friendly banter. He’s ninety-eight percent certain he can’t do emotional conversations with his associate without being on some kind of drug. And Harvey’s already filled up his stoner quotient for the year.
“It means a lot to me. That you were there.” Mike says, and he drags a hand through his already messy hair. His tie is askew and his shirt is wrinkled and his jacket is probably bunched up somewhere instead of on a hanger. The kid is a disaster, Harvey thinks, and pretends it doesn’t sound fond in his head.
Harvey doesn’t know what to say to that so he says nothing. He pulls a record off the shelf though, mostly because the office is suddenly too quiet and there’s the chance that music might derail the direction of Mike's conversation.
The beginning notes of the saxophone cause something warm and familiar to sink into Harvey’s chest. This is the best kind of comfort, the only thing that can settle him after a day like today.
“Your dad?” Mike asks, setting down one of Harvey’s basketballs and leaning back against the windowsill.
Harvey nods and sits down, content to take a break from unpacking his boxes. He feels better just being in this office again. Even he can admit today was a supremely close call; there have been too many of those recently. And it’s not over. It might feel like they have some breathing room, but Daniel will be back, somehow, twice as angry and three times as vindictive. And now Mike will be in the crosshairs too, right there with Harvey and Jessica and half of the partners.
Of all of them, Mike is the most vulnerable. Which makes Harvey vulnerable, because somewhere along the way, Harvey let Mike into the tiny circle of people he genuinely cares about and Hardman will go after Harvey the same way Harvey went after him five years ago. He’ll hit where it hurts most, and Harvey’s already shown him exactly where that is.
“I’m a liability here,” Mike says, because of course he’s already thinking as far ahead as Harvey is.
“We got rid of our biggest liability today.”
Mike scoffs, “Right, like you really believe he’s just going to give up.”
“It’ll be fine.” Harvey says and Mike frowns. They can both hear the lack of conviction in his voice.
“Are you okay?” Mike asks, his forehead wrinkling in concern. Harvey wonders if the kid knows he’s an open book, an absolute mess of tells and giveaways. Or maybe only Harvey can see them.
“I’m tired.” He says, not really realizing how true that is until the words leave his mouth. He isn’t physically tired, he’s still running on adrenaline from their victory and a little buzzed from the champagne, but for the first time, maybe ever, he’s tired of his job. The past few months have been exhausting, and not the satisfying way putting in a ten or twelve or twenty extra hours to close a case is. He’s drained from the fight with Tanner, and the fight for Donna and the fight with Hardman and can’t help thinking that a year off if he’d left the firm would’ve been a welcome thing.
(Really, Harvey knows himself better than that, and he knows that he’d feel like crawling out of his skin from boredom after a week away from his job.)
“Tired,” Mike repeats, looking at Harvey like he would a particular challenging contract, like he wants to pick him apart and find a loophole.
“I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept, rookie.”
“Why are you tired?” Mike shoots back. “I do all the heavy lifting around here.”
Harvey rolls his eyes and chooses not to reply. Mike pushes off the windowsill and comes to sit next to Harvey. He goes so far as to kick his shoes off and put his socked feet up on the coffee table. Unsurprisingly, his second toe is poking through a hole in his sock.
“Just make yourself at home,” Harvey says drily.
“I will, thanks,” Mike says, slouching into the couch. He looks as exhausted as Harvey feels. Harvey wonders if he’s slept at all since his grandmother died. Harvey didn’t sleep for more than an hour at a time for weeks after his father died.
“She likes,” Mike’s breath hitches on the mistake and it makes Harvey’s stomach jolt in uncomfortable sympathy. “Liked you.”
“I only met her once.”
“Doesn’t matter.” Mike shrugs. “I told her plenty.”
“I noticed.”
“She appreciated that you challenged me.”
“So you bitched about how I’m a hardass to your grandmother, and she told you to deal with it?”
“Pretty much.” Mike says, almost smiling. His hands twitch in some aborted movement, maybe to fiddle with his tie or run a hand through his hair again. “She just worried so much. It was obvious that I was different from other kids pretty early on. I was just so bored in high school and that’s how I fell in with Trevor, and I figured out that getting stoned slows my brain down enough that I feel normal. It felt like a break, or something. I was just so tired of being special, because there was nothing good about being special. So I coasted for years, and I pretended it was fine, and she tried to tell me what an idiot I was being, but of course I wouldn’t listen. And then I walked into that interview with you, and I got back on track and she was so incredibly grateful to you for forcing me to see what she’d been trying to tell me for so long. She didn’t even care that I’m a fake lawyer, she was so thrilled I was living up to my potential. And I’m happy she was happy. But it kills me that I was here when she was dying. I’d give anything to have been able to say goodbye,” Mike’s voice cracks and his hands are shaking and Harvey understands. As much as his job means to him, he would trade being senior partner for one more day with his dad.
Harvey considers getting up and going over to pour them both a drink, but between the two of them there’s been more than enough substance abuse over the past few days.
“It gets easier,” Harvey says, and Mike glances over at him.
“It doesn’t go away though, does it?”
“No. Or if it does, it hasn’t yet.”
Mike nods and seems to shrink in on himself a bit, his shoulders hunching, and Harvey can’t help thinking how young he looks. Mike is young, or younger than Harvey anyway, but it’s easy to forget because he isn’t naïve, as much as Harvey likes to give him a hard time about being a rookie. Mike has plenty of firsthand experience of how cruel the world can be.
“When was the last time you ate?” Harvey asks.
“Uh,” Mike says, frowning like he’s trying to remember.
That’s answer enough, as far as Harvey’s concerned. He gets to his feet. “Come with me,” he says, and Mike stands, probably more out of habit than a real desire to follow.
Mike doesn’t even ask questions, just follows Harvey to the elevators and down to the lobby, then out onto the street, where Harvey hails a cab and gives the driver his address.
Mike arches an eyebrow at him, which Harvey ignores in favor of thumbing through his phone, ordering a pizza online. As it’s quarter to eleven, there’s almost no traffic and the drive to Harvey’s building is a short one. Harvey pays and tips the cabbie and shoulders open his door, waiting on the sidewalk for Mike to slide across the seat and out of the cab.
His apartment smells faintly of Windex and wood polish, like it always does, and it’s testament to how little Harvey is actually here that it doesn’t really smell like a home. Harvey wonders if the same is true of Mike’s apartment, when it doesn’t reek of weed.
Harvey leaves Mike in the living room and goes to change, hanging up his suit and pulling on a t-shirt soft with age and equally worn sweatpants. On impulse, he grabs a Harvard t-shirt and a second pair of sweats from the drawer and brings them out into the living room.
Mike is studying Harvey’s DVD collection, his head tilted to one side to read the titles. “You’re such a nerd,” he says when Harvey steps up next to him.
Harvey doesn’t justify that with a comment (Mike’s in no place to be passing judgment over any of Harvey’s belongings considering the panda on his wall), just hands Mike the t-shirt and the sweats. “Thought you might like to change.”
“Thanks.”
“Bathroom’s down the hall,” Harvey says, pointing, and Mike nods, setting down his messenger bag and disappearing into the bathroom.
The intercom buzzes a moment later and Harvey goes to the door to meet the pizza boy. He’s setting the box down on the counter when Mike emerges from the bathroom. He looks more at home in Harvey’s sweats than he ever looks in the suits he wears to work, and the thought makes Harvey’s stomach twist, like he shouldn’t have thought it in the first place.
“Pizza?” Harvey offers.
“I’m not really hungry.”
“You have to eat.” Harvey says, and Mike looks ready to argue, but Harvey pulls out a slice and drops it onto a plate, shoving it into Mike’s hands before he can protest again.
“Is there cheese in this crust?” Mike asks, peering down at his pizza.
“I’ve heard it’s mind-blowing.” Harvey deadpans. “Now eat, rookie.”
Mike sits down at one of the kitchen island stools and seems to inhale his slice in less than a minute, then sits blinking at the plate like he’s not entirely sure where it went. Harvey wordlessly pushes the box over. Any illusion that he doesn’t care about his associate was well and truly shattered when he showed up at Mike’s apartment, so he may as well do the caring thing right now, because if last night was any indication, Mike certainly isn’t taking care of himself right now.
Mike eats four slices of pizza and eyes a fifth contemplatively before pushing his plate away.
“Verdict on the cheesy crust, counselor?”
“Slimy yet satisfying,” Harvey quotes and Mike’s answering smile is a little surprised.
“You don’t strike me as a Disney fan.”
“I have nieces. What’s your excuse?”
Mike shrugs. “I was ten when that movie came out.” He attempts to fight back a yawn and is mostly unsuccessful.
Harvey moves to sit on the couch and Mike goes back to the DVDs, pulling one off the shelf and sliding it into the DVD player.
It turns out to be The Breakfast Club, and it feels like years ago they were quoting it at each other, although it’s only been a week or so.
It’s strange how small his couch feels with another person on it; especially Mike, who sprawls across it like it’s his couch, not Harvey’s.
Somehow, Mike’s head ends up on Harvey’s shoulder halfway through the movie, and Harvey should probably move away, because this is straying outside the very carefully constructed lines of their relationship. But it’s nice, even nicer when he lets his arm drape across Mike’s shoulders. He can’t remember the last time he sat down and watched TV with someone like this, and it’s almost intimate. So few people get to see Harvey at his most relaxed - which is exactly how he prefers it.
He thinks if it were anybody else, he might be annoyed by how quickly Mike broke through all his rules and boundaries, but Mike did it so unintentionally, with about as much premeditation as he had the day he burst into Harvey’s interviews and spilled weed all over the floor, that Harvey can hardly fault him for it.
“You know what’s kind of pathetic?” Mike says quietly. “I keep thinking maybe it was a mistake. Like maybe the phone’s going to ring and it’s going to be her asking me where the fuck I’ve been for the past week.”
“That’s not pathetic.”
“Can you stop being so nice? It’s kind of freaking me out.”
“I’m not being nice. I’m being honest.”
Mike sighs, like maybe he doesn’t believe Harvey, but he stays put and doesn’t try to argue further.
He doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the movie, and neither of them move when the credits start to roll.
“Do you want to stay?” Harvey asks, and Mike looks at him with raised eyebrows, caught between surprise and confusion.
“I don’t know what you’re asking me.” Mike admits, looking flustered.
Harvey’s not sure he knows either. It would be so easy to lean in and close the distance and just take, and a part of him wants to; wants to kiss Mike, and touch him and taste him and strip him bare and learn every inch of him, has maybe wanted to since that first day when Mike sat down opposite him and talked his way into a job with nothing but his brain to recommend him.
But Harvey knows better. He remembers the things he did to cope in the days and weeks after losing his dad, and he regrets almost all of them. Mike will regret getting stoned again, especially getting stoned with Harvey, and he’ll probably regret letting Harvey see him like this, and he’ll likely regret some things Harvey hasn’t witnessed. Harvey doesn’t want to add another thing to that list.
“I’m asking you if you want to stay here tonight. You can sleep, you can watch movies if you can’t sleep, you can even trash my kitchen tomorrow morning if you want to make waffles.”
“I don’t know how to make waffles.”
“Even better.”
Mike yawns widely, and Harvey thinks maybe he’ll want to retreat into the guest room and finally get some sleep, but instead he leans more heavily on Harvey’s shoulder and asks, “Can we just do this?”
“Yes.” Harvey agrees. “This is fine too.”
He loses track of how long they stay like that, with Mike’s breath warm on his neck and his body a comfortable weight pressed against Harvey’s. He thinks Mike might actually be asleep, until he murmurs, “I can’t believe you got stoned with me.”
“Savor the memory. It’s not happening again.”
“It should. It could be our can opener.”
Harvey rolls his eyes. “I’m not getting stoned before every trial.”
Mike shrugs, “It can be an annual thing.”
“Maybe every five years. If you behave.”
Mike snorts. “If the next two months are anything like the last two, I’m not going to last one more year, let alone five.”
“Bullshit. If you didn’t love it, you would’ve walked away after the first week.”
Mike doesn’t have a witty rebuttal for that, and they fall silent again. Harvey watches two-thirty become two-thirty five then two-forty on his watch, and knows he should release Mike and retreat into his own room, if only to put a little distance between them. This whole evening has been walking the line between comfortable and too close for comfort, and Harvey’s natural instinct is to back away as quickly as possible. It’s too late for that, really, and Harvey can be an asshole, but he’s not enough of an asshole to push Mike away now - who knows what the kid would end up doing?
“I don’t know if I know how to be me without her.” Mike says, and he sounds so miserable it hits Harvey right in gut, triggers the same protective impulse he gets whenever he hears about Louis’ latest attempt to fuck with Mike, only Harvey can’t intimidate the grief away.
“You’ll be okay.” Harvey says, knowing it’s true, because he never makes promises he can’t keep.