#353 - [FIC] Stay With Me (Cobb/Arthur)
Title: Stay With Me
Word Count: 775
Pairing: Cobb/Arthur
Rating: PG-13 for UST you can cut with a knife
Summary: He doesn’t think he can sleep without her, in this strange bed in a stranger city, but he’s tired, so tired...
Disclaimer: Not mine, never will be. God, even the idea isn't mine.
Author's Note: For this prompt on the kink meme.
Arthur picks up on the second ring. “Dom?”
“How’d you know it was me?”
“I don’t know anyone else who would call me at two in the morning.”
“Is that what time it is where you are?”
Arthur no longer sounds groggy. “What’s going on?”
His moment’s hesitation becomes two, then three until he’s lost his grasp on the words. There’s noise in the background that suggests movement, scrambling, the clink of keys, other sounds he can’t identify; what might be someone else’s voice.
“Dom, are you-where are you?” He hears the purr of a car engine and almost tells Arthur to put on his seatbelt. Be careful, kid, he thinks. “Dom-”
“Safehouse. Where we agreed.”
There is a pause. “Is Mal with you?”
“Arthur, Mal’s… she’s gone,” he says. It’s the first time he’s said it and the words taste strange like something he’s seen written but never heard aloud. “She’s gone,” he repeats. “She forgot her totem, but I brought it with me. I couldn’t… I had to take it, Arthur. I had to.”
“Are the kids safe?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, they’re… they’re safe.”
“I’ll be there in two hours,” Arthur says and then he’s gone, too.
There is nothing but static coming through the receiver, but Dom cradles it to his ear anyway, for the white noise. It sounds like the ocean and like the sound of the synapses in his brain firing fuzzily. He doesn’t think he can sleep without her, in this strange bed in a stranger city, but he’s tired, so tired, as he pulls one of the pillows toward his chest. There’s no trace of her here, but he falls asleep anyway, her little steel top caught between his thumb and forefinger.
When he wakes, Arthur is there. He’s wearing jeans and the jacket that Mal helped him pick out last Christmas, lying close enough that Dom could reach out and stroke his fingers over the soft, buttery leather if he wanted. He does, but he doesn’t.
“She loves that jacket on you,” he says, instead. Mal’s top digs into the callous on his thumb. “Thought it softened you. Were you in Paris?”
“Vienna.”
“Who’s in Vienna?”
The corner of Arthur’s mouth tics. “Austrians.”
Dom closes his eyes and almost smiles. He can feel the heat of Arthur’s hand, not touching him, hovering over his arm. It stops short and he opens his eyes, seeing it settle on the pillow that he’s still got an arm thrown over.
“Austrians,” he repeats. “Is-”
“No,” Arthur says, a little sharply. The line of his mouth is mildly self-deprecating. “He left months ago.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“It’s not your job to keep up with my personal life. How long have you been here?”
“Not long,” he says. In truth, he doesn’t remember anymore. Doesn’t know if he called Arthur right away or waited for an hour, two hours. A day.
“Have you eaten?”
“No.”
He thinks he might be sick if he tried. It must show on his face because Arthur backs off and they lay there without speaking. Dom listens to the steady sound of Arthur’s breathing and thinks about touching him as he squeezes his hand around cool steel that never seems to warm to his touch. It might help. Of course, it might not. It might make things worse, but he has to see.
Dom doesn’t really know what he’s doing, brushing his knuckles over Arthur’s cheek, or why Arthur lets him, his eyes squeezed shut and over them, his brow deeply lined. His breathing comes hard through his nostrils and his eyes are flicking back and forth behind his eyelids in a frenzy of activity.
He doesn’t know what to feel when it all stops and Arthur relaxes. Mostly he’s confused, because there’s this certainty, this tacit knowledge that tells him Arthur would let him have more than this, if he chose to take it. But he doesn’t know if he would be able to look at Arthur the same way when the morning came and the dawn flooded in and exposed them for what they were.
Dom draws his hand back and it makes him feel a little more human than he’s felt in a while. It’s the look that he sees, the shine of something in the gold-flecked umber of Arthur’s eyes when he opens him that makes him ask.
“Stay with me tonight,” he says, knowing it’s unfair. These things always are. “Stay with me, Arthur.”
And he does. Not only that night, but the following night and the night after that. Arthur stays every night for ten years.
Word Count: 775
Pairing: Cobb/Arthur
Rating: PG-13 for UST you can cut with a knife
Summary: He doesn’t think he can sleep without her, in this strange bed in a stranger city, but he’s tired, so tired...
Disclaimer: Not mine, never will be. God, even the idea isn't mine.
Author's Note: For this prompt on the kink meme.
Arthur picks up on the second ring. “Dom?”
“How’d you know it was me?”
“I don’t know anyone else who would call me at two in the morning.”
“Is that what time it is where you are?”
Arthur no longer sounds groggy. “What’s going on?”
His moment’s hesitation becomes two, then three until he’s lost his grasp on the words. There’s noise in the background that suggests movement, scrambling, the clink of keys, other sounds he can’t identify; what might be someone else’s voice.
“Dom, are you-where are you?” He hears the purr of a car engine and almost tells Arthur to put on his seatbelt. Be careful, kid, he thinks. “Dom-”
“Safehouse. Where we agreed.”
There is a pause. “Is Mal with you?”
“Arthur, Mal’s… she’s gone,” he says. It’s the first time he’s said it and the words taste strange like something he’s seen written but never heard aloud. “She’s gone,” he repeats. “She forgot her totem, but I brought it with me. I couldn’t… I had to take it, Arthur. I had to.”
“Are the kids safe?”
“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, they’re… they’re safe.”
“I’ll be there in two hours,” Arthur says and then he’s gone, too.
There is nothing but static coming through the receiver, but Dom cradles it to his ear anyway, for the white noise. It sounds like the ocean and like the sound of the synapses in his brain firing fuzzily. He doesn’t think he can sleep without her, in this strange bed in a stranger city, but he’s tired, so tired, as he pulls one of the pillows toward his chest. There’s no trace of her here, but he falls asleep anyway, her little steel top caught between his thumb and forefinger.
When he wakes, Arthur is there. He’s wearing jeans and the jacket that Mal helped him pick out last Christmas, lying close enough that Dom could reach out and stroke his fingers over the soft, buttery leather if he wanted. He does, but he doesn’t.
“She loves that jacket on you,” he says, instead. Mal’s top digs into the callous on his thumb. “Thought it softened you. Were you in Paris?”
“Vienna.”
“Who’s in Vienna?”
The corner of Arthur’s mouth tics. “Austrians.”
Dom closes his eyes and almost smiles. He can feel the heat of Arthur’s hand, not touching him, hovering over his arm. It stops short and he opens his eyes, seeing it settle on the pillow that he’s still got an arm thrown over.
“Austrians,” he repeats. “Is-”
“No,” Arthur says, a little sharply. The line of his mouth is mildly self-deprecating. “He left months ago.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“It’s not your job to keep up with my personal life. How long have you been here?”
“Not long,” he says. In truth, he doesn’t remember anymore. Doesn’t know if he called Arthur right away or waited for an hour, two hours. A day.
“Have you eaten?”
“No.”
He thinks he might be sick if he tried. It must show on his face because Arthur backs off and they lay there without speaking. Dom listens to the steady sound of Arthur’s breathing and thinks about touching him as he squeezes his hand around cool steel that never seems to warm to his touch. It might help. Of course, it might not. It might make things worse, but he has to see.
Dom doesn’t really know what he’s doing, brushing his knuckles over Arthur’s cheek, or why Arthur lets him, his eyes squeezed shut and over them, his brow deeply lined. His breathing comes hard through his nostrils and his eyes are flicking back and forth behind his eyelids in a frenzy of activity.
He doesn’t know what to feel when it all stops and Arthur relaxes. Mostly he’s confused, because there’s this certainty, this tacit knowledge that tells him Arthur would let him have more than this, if he chose to take it. But he doesn’t know if he would be able to look at Arthur the same way when the morning came and the dawn flooded in and exposed them for what they were.
Dom draws his hand back and it makes him feel a little more human than he’s felt in a while. It’s the look that he sees, the shine of something in the gold-flecked umber of Arthur’s eyes when he opens him that makes him ask.
“Stay with me tonight,” he says, knowing it’s unfair. These things always are. “Stay with me, Arthur.”
And he does. Not only that night, but the following night and the night after that. Arthur stays every night for ten years.