Work Text:
I’ll tiptoe away
so you won’t have to say
you heard me leave…
Fredag, 21.27:
Are you keen on going back to mine this time? Or are we doing a suite again? It’s a light question too loaded between the lines, and even though Isak’s attempting a smile, Even can’t mirror it.
“No money left, I’m afraid.”
“Mine it is.”
The rain picks up on their way back, Isak’s hand a soothing weight in his, the tips of his fingers freezing where they slip around Even’s wrist. The train is almost asleep around them, the tracks the only thing Even can hear aside from his mind. Or maybe his breathing is just too loud.
When it finally calms, it’s to be replaced by the sound of their feet on concrete, Isak always slow and unhurried, almost like he is too scared to break Even. He hates it.
Walking up the steps to Isak’s flat only adds to the weight in Even’s chest, his mind counting down the seconds until Isak realizes this is not something he can deal with on a daily basis. How long until he realizes?
Isak squeezes his wrist once before opening the door, pulling Even in before he shuts it quietly. Eskild sits in the living room once they go through it, his eyes snapping up immediately, his mouth moving along to the start of a silent word he never finishes. Instead, he smiles at Even, nods his acknowledgment and focuses back on his phone.
The pity in his eyes makes Even want to scream.
His heart tugs the moment Isak’s hand does the same, guiding them into his room. He can barely hear the lock click, for Isak is instantly bringing his fingers up Even’s hair and tracing his lips over his cheek. The flame of a kiss blossoms by the side of his ear.
“Do you want to shower?”
Even honestly doesn’t think he’d ever walk back into this room were he to leave, now.
He shakes his head. “Just one of your shirts.”
The ghost of Isak’s touch remains once he starts roaming around the room. Even sits on the bed and watches as Isak sheds all layers, throws them on a pile on the floor. As if physically touched by the stare, he turns around and smiles, his eyebrows refusing to obey his command.
He looks ridiculous, and Even couldn’t love him more. Fuck.
“Here,” he whispers, pulling his own shirt down his torso and not giving Even a chance to change at all, taking all space on his lap and fully occupying his field of vision.
The silence ticks like a bomb, the soft murmurs coming from outside the door giving away the concern all over the flat. Even can faintly hear Eskild and Noora silently screaming at each other. How much has Isak told them?
There are hands now resting on his chest, lips pressed to his neck and a shaky breathing breaking the air between them. Even holds Isak’s waist and cradles his head where it rolls to his shoulder.
“You know I love you too, don’t you?”
Were Even’s heart to beat a bit louder, he would not have heard it. But it’s there, it’s clear, and it’s so loaded of truth he skips breathing for a second or two.
Before he gives himself a chance to reply, Isak’s crying. It’s silent like the whole night has been, like Isak always is, but it’s intense in the way he holds back what’s too hurtful to breathe out. Even feels it all the way to his heels, how much he never wants to leave this bed - this boy - again, at the same time he feels he shouldn’t be here at all.
“Hey,” he calls, nuzzling the side of Isak’s face and breathing him in. He’d never thought pain could smell so much like home.
“I’m sorry.”
“Isak, don’t.”
“Even, I’m sorry. I had no right to act like a complete dickhead the moment you needed me the most-”
“I didn’t trust us enough to let you know the truth.”
“I’m with you, though. That includes the shit moments as well.”
Even drops a kiss to where his lashes clump together from the moisture, then follows the salty path down to his cheek and the corner of his lips. Isak lets his lips fall open almost like a switch, breathing Even in just as desperately.
“I love you,” Isak repeats, then kisses him.
It’s like a burst of colour in the dark behind his lids and the inside of Even’s mind; the first sound in a deserted room, the touch of fire to the cold of his hands. He feels Isak everywhere, from where their tongues meet to his feet hugging Even’s thighs, to the way their hearts beat entirely out of synchronism.
Maybe in a parallel universe, this would be the only drug he’d live off of.
Isak pecks his lips one more time. “Let’s sleep.”
It’s not until they’re in bed in the deadly silence again that Even’s mind starts wandering again. There are a few irrefutable truths that he can think of: 1. He’s going to die. At some point. He’s on his way to death right now. And it even feels like it’s right around the corner, sometimes. 2. The world won’t stop once he’s gone, and his existence will not have made a single difference. 3. He’ll hurt Isak again, but this one particular truth doesn’t exclude the others, so he will be just fine.
“I can hear you thinking,” Isak drawls, voice syrupy with sleep and heavy with exhaustion. “I hate it.”
“Thinking? Yeah, I know.”
A weak laugh breaks the tension. “Fuck you.”
Even turns to the side, brushing Isak’s hair up. The reflection he sees in his eyes is one of uncertainty and hurt, while also of a man so fickle and unreliable. He’s not sure how much of what he sees is himself and how much of it is what Isak truly sees.
The third truth kills him.
Maybe in a parallel universe they never met; Isak never hurt for him.
Maybe in a parallel universe Even won’t leave before Isak awakes. Again.