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Apollo is lying quietly in their bed. He has been for quite some time. They’d gotten all ready to sleep when Clay said that he wasn’t tired and was going to go look at the stars for a bit. Apollo knows he’s free to fall asleep if he likes, Clay is an adult and can take care of himself well enough now to be able to handle his personal needs like this. But that doesn’t stop the pit in his stomach from forming every time.
It has only been a week or so since he was finally well enough to transition to receiving outpatient care. And for those past few days, Apollo has waited on him hand and foot. Even now, he refuses to let Clay out of his sight. He’s only a few steps away, a distance he can quickly cross if something happens. He chooses to call it everything except separation anxiety. Mikeko is snuggled up into the crook of his arm, purring herself to sleep as he scratches her overturned chin. The balmy summer breeze sweeps at the curtains, sending them fluttering every so often and obscuring the image behind them. Clay is still on the balcony, staring up as he’s done often since they were children. It is only because of the silence in the room that Apollo can hear him when, all of a sudden, he starts to sing.
His singing voice is achy still, sounding not unlike when he first woke up from that two year long coma he was stuck in. But it is still beautiful. Still one of the many, many things Apollo loves so very dearly about him. He strains his ears to hear, as Clay is both facing away from his general direction and singing softly enough that it takes a conscious effort to hear him as he begins.
“When you call to me asleep,
Up the ragged cliffs I scramble.
A single thread hangs limply down
And I breathe not now, not now.”
Apollo isn’t familiar with the song, if he’s going by the first few verses. He turns onto his side to face the glass balcony doors, Mikeko resting her head against his chest now. He watches as Clay stands bent slightly over the railing, his head held at an angle that is meant less for stargazing and more for the proper movement of air through his lungs. He takes a few seconds to catch his breath before starting again. His lungs still haven’t fully recovered, and probably never will.
“And I find you all unwoven,
Trying desperately to sew.
And I know the kindest thing,
Is to leave you alone.”
His voice slips into the lower half of his register. His tone is thin yet even in that way only Apollo knows he speaks—and sings—in when he is willing himself not to cry. It was a much more familiar sound during their childhood. And that just compounds the ache to stand and comfort Clay that begins to settle in his heavily gut like a glob of molten lead. He balls his unused hand into a tight fist instead to fight the compulsion, trying to get rid of some of the excess energy urging him forward.
“When your seams have come unknitted,
And you cry out to the sky:
‘I've run out of my words, my song,
Just let me die, me die.’
The rockrose and the thistle,
Will whistle as you moan.
I could try to calm you down,
But I know you won't.”
Partway enshrouded in the curtains from Apollo’s sight, he watches Clay’s shoulders begin to tremble during the fourth or fifth verse of this section. It’s heartbreaking to see and Apollo can’t help himself any longer, giving into the impulse as he slowly rises from the bed, careful to not make a sound as he lifts his weight off of the mattress. Mikeko doesn’t even complain like she usually does, as if she understands the sanctity of the relative silence in this moment. This last section was longer. It takes Clay longer to recover and start again. Apollo has his back to the wall next to the glass-pane balcony doors, listening intently from his pseudo-hiding place.
“All the pins inside your fretted head,
And your muttered ‘when’s and ‘how’s,
All your mother's weaves and your father's threads,
Let me rob them of you now.
'Cause I'll darn you back together,
When you think that you're bereft.
And you'll wail, you'll scream, but I'll never stop,
'Cause it's all that I have left.”
His words are rough with painful ardor as they grow in volume. The tears are audible in his intonation now. His breathing is beginning to rasp as he tries to recover. And yet, he carries on. Though he cannot see it from where he stands, Clay is clutching tight to the thin fabriced shirt that covers his bandaged chest. Not because of his lungs—although they are beginning to sting from the squeeze of overuse, but because of the overwhelming pain in his heart, driving him to cry. He takes a few more ragged breaths before continuing.
“I wake and hear you calling,
And up those cliffs I climb,
And I find you with a thimble weeping.
‘May I,’ I ask, ‘May I?’”
He sniffles as he ends the fourth verse, wiping at his eyes and then his tear-streaked cheeks. Apollo quietly pads even closer, deliberating on his decision for only a passing second before moving to standing behind the curtains. They are lightly billowing in the wind now, a much more sustained breeze rolling its way into the room and turning Clay and the balcony’s image gauzy in his sight. Still, it’s better than how he saw him in his dreams during their time apart: half-transparent and always out of reach, even if just a hand’s breadth away.
“And you gently gift it to me,
'Cause you've no clue how to sew.
And I know the kindest thing…
I pray to God it's the kindest thing…”
His voice finally breaks as his words peter off delicately. His other hand grips so tightly to the top iron bar of the balcony’s railing, so hard his knuckles have turned white. If this were years ago, he might worry about Clay actually hurting the metal. In his current state, it’s a challenge for him to hold onto anything with more than the amount of force one would need to peel an orange, let alone such dramatic intensity as he’s using now. Apollo can only guess that the hand on his chest is clenched into the front of his shirt with a similar severeness. It makes him pang with the want to clutch him tight. Still, he doesn’t move.
“I know the kindest thing,
Is to never leave you alone.”
The last verse draws the softest of sobs from him, sound drawing forth a minute shaking from his thinned shoulders. In the not-quite-silence following, it takes several moments for it to fully start to set in just what he is singing about. He was singing about Apollo. He was singing about leaving him to suffer alone in his mourning for the man he loved since before he knew the word and fully believed he had lost—caught in the crossfire of something much bigger than both of them, all the while Clay slowly healed in a comatose state under Interpol’s exacting care.
The notion alone makes hot, stinging tears fight their way up into Apollo’s eyes, spilling over before he even has the chance to try and will them away. He steps forward onto the balcony with a single, wide pace, just to get to Clay that much faster. Apollo wraps his arms around him, holding him with all his strength and then some and hiding his face in the space between Clay’s shoulder blades. He feels him wetly gasp and shudder even harder beneath his touch. One hand finds its way over his, Apollo’s own clasped together atop Clay’s midsection as he holds him from behind. The back of his shirt is becoming quite damp all of a sudden, Clay notes inwardly.
“Oh, ‘Pollo…” He sighs, the sound tired far beyond his years. Clay does not move, standing there still shivering with light sobs that wrack his form and intentions still unclear to the other. He doesn’t dare move either, a sizable part of him silently worries that if he does, he’ll wake up and Clay will still be gone. That, and this is the closest he’s been to him since he’s woken up. The worry of hurting him while he’s still delicate in constitution has kept him from reaching out when he stays his hand, instead. There was something about the song itself, the way he sang it, even the fact he was singing, that drove Apollo to finally bridge the gap. It takes several minutes of thin-sounded breathing for him to stir up the courage to take Apollo’s hand into his own more firmly. Clay guides it up to his face and presses a warm, lingering kiss to its scarred knuckles and freckled, tan skin that cover them. Apollo holds his breath as he feels the lips upon the back of his hand, devout in their gentleness. A couple seconds of true silence pass before he carefully moves Apollo’s other hand to rest upon his hip before releasing his hold on the first and turning around to face him.
The visible tear tracks reflecting the city’s light back make his gaunt face seem that much thinner. But he’s smiling. A little sadly, a little tiredly, but smiling all the same. And the sight of it makes fresh moisture spring to his eyes. He’s just as beautiful as he was the day Apollo thought he lost him.
“I love you,” Apollo whispers reverently, as if being any louder that the quietest whisper he can manage would shatter the delicate peace surrounding this singular moment.
Clay leans forward and downward, just enough on both axes that he can touch his forehead to his lover’s in an intimate, comforting gesture. Apollo bites his lip to keep the mournful noise rising in his throat away. This is among his favorite ways they are physically affectionate with each other.
“I love you too.” Apollo can nearly feel the thick eyelashes of the other against his skin as his eyes flutter shut with his words. “I’m sorry for worrying you.”
He shakes his head so very faintly, just enough that Clay understands the motion. “You’re here now. That’s all that matters.” He means it will all of his heart and soul. He would weather any expanse of time if he knew he could see Clay again at the end of it.
They both feel something soft touching their calves. It’s Mikeko, weaving her way between them to rub herself up against them.
“I guess ‘Keko agrees too, huh?” Clay bends down to pick up the calico, holding her in his arms like a baby. She’s always liked him better and it’s something Apollo is mad about only half the time, since the other half was spent admiring how cute they look together.
Apollo lets out a breath he didn’t know he was holding in, letting it slip silently out his nose. “You know, I really love when you sing.”
Clay stiffens suddenly, turning bright red. “You… You do?” His voice is an octave higher than it usually is. It’s adorable. Apollo can’t help but laugh, loud and half-wheezing the way he used to before everything. Soon, Clay can’t stand to not laugh either. It shakes in his chest, the sound only half there. But it’s a delightful sound all the same. This is a sensation Apollo thought he would never have again. Getting to be here with Clay so very close, getting to laugh with him like everything is right with the world again. Like the HAT-2 launch is months away again and Apollo has only known the weight of a GYAXA jacket on his shoulders from when he’s cold because the AC is up so aggressively high that it’s financially objectionable. His laugh fades to comfortable silence, something that Clay follows when the last few semi-silent giggles stop jostling his shoulders. He can’t help but look up at Clay and smile like he hung the fucking moon because of course, to Apollo, he did.
“Of course I do, I love everything about you.” It’s the easiest thing in the world to say from the sheer simplicity of its truth. And then it sets in for Apollo just what he said and he blushes a shade that rivals his vest in vibrancy. His hands immediately shoot up to cover his face.
Clay barks with laughter at it immediately after it leaves his lips. “Jeez, ‘Pollo. When did you go all mushy on me?”
He lets Mikeko down, something she is obviously unhappy about with the pouty meow she lets out, but stalks back into the bedroom anyways. He leans down to Apollo’s height once more, hands going to the other’s wrists so he can see his face properly. “If it gets you to say sappy shit like that again, I’ll gladly sing for you.”
Instead, Apollo buries his face in the crook of his lover’s collarbone. “Sh-shut up, Clay.”
He cranes his neck to the side so he can press a soft kiss to Apollo’s head, breathing in the scent of his shampoo and the last whiffs of his cologne from the day. It makes him feel like he’s finally home more than any four walls could. After two years of bodiless drifting, existing in some half reality where he watched Apollo experience misfortune after misfortune, powerless to stop it and not quite understanding if what he was seeing was really real or his own personal hell, this truly feels genuine. He exhales happily, Apollo’s hair fluttering delicately from his soft, hot breath.
“‘Love you too, AJ.” And he couldn’t be happier that he could say it.