Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chris woke up with a weight in his chest that no amount of push-ups or whiskey could shake.

The TV hummed static again — some late-night cartoon turned ghost noise hours ago. In the quiet hum, the world felt softer than it should. Vulnerable. Like everything could break if he moved too fast.
He hated that feeling.

Adrian was snoring softly on the recliner. One boot still on, mask tossed on the floor, mouth slightly open in that way only idiots and puppies could get away with. Somehow, he looked peaceful. Like he didn’t have the mess of the world buzzing inside him like a hornet’s nest.

Chris turned his head toward the ceiling.

He couldn’t sleep. Not really. Hadn’t been sleeping well for months. Not since the mission ended, not since they came back and everyone else pretended things were fine — like having blood on your hands was just another Tuesday, like killing for peace hadn’t left something rotting in his chest.

Not since he started noticing things about Adrian he wasn’t supposed to.

Noticing too much.

It started small. Always does.

The way Adrian leaned against doorframes with that stupid smirk when he made Chris laugh. The way he’d patch up bullet wounds with careful hands, humming some off-key pop song like bleeding was no big deal. The way he called him dude and buddy and said things like “I like being around you” without flinching, without needing to prove it with a punch or a kill count.

Chris didn’t know what to do with that kind of softness. It scared him more than any battlefield.

Because it made him feel.
It made him want.

He sat up slowly on the couch, elbows on his knees, hands in his hair. His fingers were shaking. His heart too, maybe.

He’d killed people with less hesitation than this. But this?

This wasn’t about someone else.
It was about him. And he didn’t have a weapon for that.

He remembered his dad once catching him watching a movie — some old action flick with a guy who had a shirt off for half the runtime. Chris was barely thirteen. He hadn’t thought much of it. Just stared too long. Maybe lingered on the way the light caught on sweat, the way strength looked when it wasn’t angry, just there.

His dad had changed the channel without a word. Then later, in the garage, made a comment about “faggot shows” and handed him a wrench like it was supposed to fix him.

Chris learned something that day. He learned to shut it down. Swallow it whole.

And now?

Now it was back. It had a face. It had a laugh. It had a name.

Adrian.

And Chris couldn’t un-feel it. Couldn’t box it up anymore.

Adrian stirred on the recliner. Yawned. Sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes.

“Why are you up?” he mumbled, voice rough. “It’s, like, stupid o’clock.”

Chris shrugged, eyes fixed on the TV screen. Static hissed.

“You okay?” Adrian asked, more awake now. “You’ve been all broody lately. Not in the hot way, in the ‘he might accidentally kill someone at a grocery store’ kind of way.”

Chris barked out a short laugh. Then winced. He didn’t mean to laugh.

“I’m fine.”

“You suck at lying. Like, genuinely. It’s a talent.”

Chris stood up. The air felt too tight in his lungs.

“I’m going for a run.”

“It’s raining,” Adrian said, glancing at the window. “Like, biblical raining. Frogs and plagues next.”

“Don’t care.”

Adrian stood too, frowning. “Dude. Talk to me. Seriously.”

Chris froze. His back was to Adrian, but his throat burned.

“You ever think you’re broken?” he asked, voice low. “Like, not just ‘had a messed-up childhood’ broken, but... something deeper. Something that makes you not fit right in your own skin.”

Adrian was quiet.

Chris kept talking, not sure if he was breathing.

“Like there’s this... thing inside you that wants something you don’t even have words for, and every time you feel it, it’s like your body flinches. Like it learned a long time ago that feeling it means you’re wrong. That you’re not... the man you’re supposed to be.”

He turned around. Adrian’s eyes were soft. No smile now. Just listening.

Chris stepped closer.

“I think about you sometimes. In ways I’m not proud of. Ways that don’t make sense. And I hate that it scares me. Because I’ve never been scared of anything the way I’m scared of this.”

Adrian blinked, stunned into silence.

Chris shook his head, ashamed. “I’m not saying I’m— I don’t even know what I am. I just... needed to say something before it rotted me out from the inside.”

Adrian stepped forward, slowly, like he was approaching a wounded animal.

“You think I’d ever judge you for that?”

“I don’t know,” Chris said. “But I judge myself. Every second.”

A pause. Heavy.

Then Adrian said, so softly it almost broke, “Chris. You could tell me you wanted to kiss a dinosaur and I’d still be here. Because I’ve seen who you are when you’re not trying to be who your dad made you.”

Chris swallowed hard.

Adrian stepped closer, close enough to touch. But he didn’t.

“You don’t have to name it. Not tonight. Not ever, if you don’t want to. But you’re not broken. You’re just learning how to be.”

Chris’s eyes stung.

“Why do you care so much?” he whispered.

Adrian smiled — not big, not dumb, just real.

“Because I like you. And not just as the guy who blows stuff up with style. I like you. The part that still thinks peace is worth fighting for, even when the world tells you you’re too violent, too angry, too far gone.”

Silence.

Then Chris said, barely audible, “I think I like you too. I just don’t know what to do with it.”

Adrian nodded. “That’s okay. We can not-know together.”

Later, they sat side by side on the couch, no TV, just rain.

Chris didn’t say anything else. He didn’t need to.

But when Adrian’s shoulder brushed his, and he didn’t pull away, something shifted.

Small.

But enough.

Chapter Text

Chris didn’t sleep that night.

After the talk — that weird, terrifying, kind-of-honest moment between him and Adrian — he’d laid in bed with the lights off, staring at the ceiling and trying not to think. Naturally, that made his brain think louder.

The same three thoughts looped over and over:

He had said it out loud.
Adrian didn’t run.
He didn’t feel any less confused. Just… less alone.
That should’ve been good. Progress, right?

But his chest still felt like it had a landmine in it, and the more he tried to name what he was feeling, the more it just turned into noise. And guilt. And a lot of questions.

So naturally, the next step in his emotional journey was the same one anyone else would take.

He opened his laptop and typed into Google:
“how do you know if you’re bisexual”

And then immediately closed the laptop.

Then opened it again.

And stared at the search bar like it was going to shoot him.

Fifteen minutes later, Chris was sitting on the edge of the bed, reading through forums with titles like “Coming Out Later in Life: Is It Valid?” and “Bisexuality & Compulsory Heterosexuality Explained”.

He didn’t understand half the words. He clicked through six Reddit threads, two articles, and one Tumblr post about internalized biphobia that sent him spiraling.

He got stuck on a comment that said:

“You don’t need a label to validate your feelings — but if a label helps you understand yourself better, then it’s yours to claim. Gently. At your own pace.”

He reread that sentence three times. Then slammed the laptop shut again like it had punched him in the chest.

“You doing okay in there?” came Adrian’s voice from outside the bedroom.

Chris almost jumped. He thought Adrian had gone back to sleep.

“Fine,” Chris grunted. “Just tired.”

“You’re typing like you’re mad at your keyboard. What are you researching, gay porn or war crimes?”

Chris opened the door. His expression was a mix of murder and embarrassment.

Adrian blinked at him from the hallway in his ridiculous pink unicorn pajama pants and said, “Was that a yes to both?”

Chris rubbed a hand down his face. “You’re a moron.”

“You like this moron,” Adrian said, nudging past him and walking straight into the room.

Chris moved to stop him. “Don’t—hey, don’t touch the—”

Adrian, naturally, opened the laptop.

Chris panicked. “Adrian—”

Adrian paused. Blinked.

Then read the open tab silently.

Chris could feel his soul leave his body.

Adrian turned around slowly. “Oh.”

Chris looked everywhere but at him. “I was just curious.”

“Sure.”

“It doesn’t mean anything.”

“It might.”

Chris sat down hard on the bed. He didn’t even try to argue.

“I don’t know what the hell I’m doing,” he muttered. “I feel like I’m trying to read instructions in a language I was never allowed to learn. Like there’s this version of me I was never given permission to meet.”

Adrian sat beside him, legs crossed, surprisingly quiet.

Chris exhaled. “I didn’t even think this was possible for me. I mean—yeah, sure, I looked at guys sometimes. Thought maybe I was just… I don’t know. Jealous. Or whatever. But now it’s not just a look. It’s a feeling. And it’s loud. And I don’t know where to put it.”

Adrian nodded slowly, fiddling with the hem of his pajama pants.

“You don’t have to have an answer tonight,” he said. “You’re not on a deadline.”

Chris let his head drop into his hands. “It feels like I am.”

“Why?”

“Because the longer I don’t know, the more it feels like I’m lying to myself. And to you.”

“You’re not lying,” Adrian said gently. “You’re unpacking. That’s messy. It’s supposed to be messy.”

Chris huffed a bitter laugh. “You’re surprisingly insightful for a guy who once tried to use a blender as a helmet.”

Adrian grinned. “You make me want to try harder. Emotionally. Not, like, blender-wise.”

Chris glanced sideways. “Why?”

Adrian shrugged, smile soft. “Because I care. And because when you’re not self-sabotaging, you’re kinda amazing. Don’t tell anyone I said that.”

Chris stared at him.

Then said, so quietly it barely registered, “I think I’ve been afraid of this since I was a kid.”

Adrian didn’t answer, just nodded like he understood more than he let on.

Chris continued, voice hoarse: “There were moments. Looking back, I see them. But every time they got too close to the surface, I shoved them down. I became someone else. Someone louder. Angrier. Straighter.”

Adrian didn’t flinch. “And now?”

Chris hesitated.

“Now I don’t want to keep being that guy. But I don’t know who I am without him.”

Adrian leaned in, pressing their shoulders together.

“You’re still you,” he said. “Even if you’re softer. Or messier. Or scared.”

Chris looked at their shoulders, touching.

“That doesn’t freak you out?”

“Chris, I’ve eaten lasagna out of a vending machine. Nothing freaks me out.”

Chris laughed — actually laughed, full and cracked open and real. It startled him.

Adrian’s smile widened.

“Plus,” he added, “you’re kind of hot when you’re vulnerable. Just saying.”

Chris groaned. “Why do you ruin every emotional moment?”

“Because otherwise you’d explode,” Adrian said, with way too much accuracy.

A few minutes passed.

Chris opened the laptop again. He clicked the Reddit tab.

Adrian peeked over his shoulder. “Ooh, a bisexuality thread. Spicy.”

“Adrian,” Chris warned.

“Okay, okay. I’ll behave. But if you need help translating gay Internet terms, I got you.”

Chris rolled his eyes. “I don’t need—”

“Do you know what ‘comphet’ is?”

Chris paused. “...No.”

“Boom,” Adrian said. “See? We’re learning together.”

Chris smirked despite himself. “You’re such a dork.”

“But I’m your dork. Eventually. Hopefully.”

Chris glanced at him again. Something about the way Adrian was looking at him — wide open, nothing hidden — made his chest tighten in a good way.

“I’m not ready,” Chris admitted.

“You don’t have to be,” Adrian said. “I’ll wait. I mean, I’ll still be obnoxious and annoy the hell out of you, but like—emotionally patient. Mostly.”

Chris closed the laptop and leaned back on the bed. He stared at the ceiling.

“Can you just… stay here tonight?”

Adrian blinked. “Like… emotionally? Or physically? Because I can absolutely haunt the room in a supportive ghost-like fashion.”

Chris laughed again. “Just—lie down, idiot.”

Adrian slid onto the bed beside him, arms crossed behind his head.

They didn’t talk much after that.

But when Chris drifted off, heart still heavy but a little less alone, he realized that this — whatever this was becoming — was something he didn’t want to run from anymore.

Even if he still had no idea where it was going.

Chapter Text

Chris stood outside Leota’s apartment door for fifteen straight minutes and did absolutely nothing except almost knock four times.

The fifth time, his hand finally connected with the wood. Once. Softly.

Then he panicked and turned to leave.

“Chris?” came Leota’s voice from inside. “Is that you? Are you creeping in the hallway like a serial killer again?”

Chris winced and stopped halfway down the hall. He turned around slowly.

“I’m not creeping,” he said.

“You’re definitely creeping.”

The door opened.

Leota stood in leggings and a hoodie, holding a mug of tea and squinting at him like he was the ghost of bad decisions past. “It’s 9 p.m. on a Tuesday. What’s going on? Are you bleeding? Is Adrian dead? Did you accidentally blow up another animal shelter?”

Chris grimaced. “Why is that your first thought?”

“Because I know you.”

Chris scratched the back of his neck. “Can I come in?”

Leota blinked once, then stepped aside. “Yeah. Of course.”

The apartment smelled like lavender and takeout noodles. There were three half-finished jigsaw puzzles on the coffee table, a pride flag draped over a bookshelf, and a sleepy dog (with one eye) snoring in a corner bed.

It was the safest place Chris had ever stood in.

And he hated how much that made his throat tighten.

Leota handed him a second mug — he didn’t even ask for one — and sat across from him on the couch.

She gave him a long, slow look. “Okay. What’s eating you?”

Chris stared into the tea. He didn’t drink it.

“It’s stupid.”

Leota raised an eyebrow. “Try me.”

“It’s… complicated.”

“Chris, you once explained to me, in detail, how to kill a man with a roll of duct tape and a squirrel. I think I can handle ‘complicated.’”

Chris exhaled. His hands clenched on the mug.

Then, finally:
“You’re the only gay person I know.”

Leota blinked. Then grinned. “That’s not true, but I’ll let you have that.”

“I mean, you’re the only one I trust enough to… ask this stuff.”

Her smile faded into something more serious. “Okay. I’m listening.”

Chris looked down at the tea again, then up at her.

“I think I’m bi,” he said. The words hit the air like a bomb with no shrapnel — just heat and finality.

Leota blinked again, slower this time.

Chris rushed to fill the silence. “I mean, I don’t know know. But I think I’ve always kind of known, and just shoved it so far down I forgot where I buried it. And now it’s all coming back and it’s confusing and terrifying and makes me want to punch drywall, which probably isn’t healthy—”

Leota reached out and gently touched his knee.

“Hey. Breathe.”

Chris did. Barely.

She softened. “You’re not the only person who’s ever felt like that, y’know. Like your identity is a loaded gun you forgot you were carrying.”

Chris huffed a shaky laugh. “Yeah. Except I usually know how to use the gun.”

Leota gave him a look. “That’s a metaphor. Don’t make it literal.”

“No promises.”

She sat back and sipped her tea. “So. What brought this up now?”

Chris hesitated. “Adrian.”

Leota’s face did a subtle I-knew-it smirk, but she didn’t say anything.

Chris continued. “He makes me feel… something. Not just friendship. Not just, like, bro stuff. It’s deeper. He looks at me like he sees me. And instead of punching that feeling away, I’m starting to wonder if I want to lean into it. But I don’t know how.”

Leota nodded slowly. “Okay. Well, first of all: I’m proud of you.”

Chris looked up, startled. “For what? Being a disaster?”

“For being honest. With yourself. With me. With Adrian.”

Chris frowned. “I haven’t told him everything.”

“You’ve told him more than most people ever would,” she said. “And he’s still here, right?”

Chris nodded.

Leota smiled. “Sounds like he’s a good one.”

Chris’s ears turned a little red. “He’s an idiot.”

“Most of the good ones are.”

They both laughed, quietly.

Then Chris said, more seriously, “How did you know? About yourself, I mean.”

Leota took a breath. “I didn’t, at first. I spent years thinking I was just… close to certain girls. That I admired them too much. Or that I was weird for not really being into guys the way my friends were. It was subtle. Quiet. Until it wasn’t. Until I kissed someone and felt my entire body say yes. And then I had to deal with the fear, and the shame, and the voice in my head telling me I’d broken something.”

Chris looked away. That part hit too close.

Leota leaned forward. “You’re not broken, Chris. You’ve just been lied to about what love is supposed to look like.”

He swallowed hard. “I don’t even know if it’s love.”

“Doesn’t have to be. Could just be want. Or comfort. Or peace.”

Chris looked at her, eyes a little glassy. “I don’t know what peace feels like.”

She softened. “Then maybe that’s what Adrian is. A piece of it.”

—

They talked for over an hour.

About fear. About family. About how hard it is to rewire your brain when all it’s ever known is survival and silence. About queerness not being a straight line (pun intended).

And when Chris finally stood up to leave, the air felt lighter in his lungs.

Leota hugged him — real, tight, steady.

“You’re allowed to be scared,” she said against his shoulder. “Just don’t let the fear win.”

Chris pulled back, voice rough. “Thanks. For not laughing. Or judging. Or making it weird.”

Leota smiled. “You’re my friend. You could tell me you’re into lizard men and I’d probably still bake you a cake.”

Chris grinned. “Noted.”

He opened the door.

Then paused. “Hey, Leota?”

“Yeah?”

“I think I do like him.”

Leota’s smile was soft. “Then you’re braver than you think.”

Chapter Text

Chris was totally fine.

Completely.

Fine.

Not jealous. Not brooding. Not staring too hard at Adrian laughing with that guy at the bar. Not clenching his jaw so tight his molars felt like they might fuse. Nope. Just… observing. Calmly. Like a completely emotionally healthy individual.

“Dude, are you grinding your teeth?” Economos asked, sipping a beer beside him. “You sound like a woodchipper.”

Chris snapped his head toward him. “No.”

“Huh. Just checking. You got that look on your face like you’re about to either cry or commit a felony.”

“I’m not jealous,” Chris muttered.

Economos raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t say you were.”

Chris looked back toward the bar. Adrian was leaning against the counter, grinning like the goddamn sun, talking to a guy in a leather jacket with dimples and good hair and the audacity to lean close when he laughed.

Chris took a long drink of his beer. It didn’t help.

It had been two weeks since he talked to Leota. Since he admitted out loud — in a quiet, shaking voice — that he might like Adrian. That he might like guys. That this part of himself was real.

He felt like he’d been rewired since then. Everything looked the same on the surface, but internally? He was glitching. Constantly. Trying to act normal, to keep being the same loud, arrogant, buffoon-shaped murder machine he’d always been. But the feelings didn’t shut up just because he did.

Adrian didn’t know how much had changed. Not really. Chris hadn’t told him what he told Leota. Not yet.

And now this guy — Dimple Guy — was making him laugh with his dumb, pretty face and expensive boots and—

Chris slammed his beer down.

“You okay?” Harcourt asked, walking up from the other side of the room. She was scanning the bar like she was expecting a fight. Or maybe just ready for one.

Chris didn’t answer right away.

She followed his gaze.

“Oh,” she said. “Is this a jealousy thing?”

Chris groaned.

“Because it looks like a jealousy thing.”

“I’m not jealous.”

“You’re vibrating.”

Chris turned away from the scene like it wasn’t already burned into the inside of his skull. “He can talk to whoever he wants.”

Harcourt arched an eyebrow. “Uh-huh.”

“He’s allowed to laugh. And flirt. And wear that stupid shirt that makes his arms look—shut up.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

Chris rubbed his face. “God, I’m so screwed.”

“Yep,” Harcourt said, not unkindly. “You like him.”

Chris groaned into his hands. “I know.”

“Then tell him.”

Chris glared. “That’s not how this works. I just… I need time. And space. And for that guy to go away or die quietly in a ditch.”

Harcourt blinked. “You are so emotionally stunted it physically hurts me.”

It all went sideways about twenty minutes later.

The guy leaned in too close. Touched Adrian’s arm. Whispered something that made him laugh a little too hard. And Chris just… moved.

He didn’t think. He just walked — no, stormed — across the bar like a six-foot-four thundercloud of feelings he didn’t want to name. Shoulders squared, fists clenched, heart slamming against his ribs like a fist against a locked door.

He got between them without a word, standing shoulder to shoulder with Adrian and glaring at Dimple Guy like he was a live grenade.

The guy blinked. “Uh. Hey?”

Chris didn’t blink. “You should go.”

Adrian blinked beside him. “Chris—”

Chris didn’t look at him. “Now.”

Dimple Guy raised his hands. “Okay. Damn. Chill. I didn’t realize he had a bodyguard.”

Chris stepped forward. Just a little. But enough.

The guy backed off fast, muttering something about psychos and muscle freaks, and vanished into the crowd.

Adrian stared at Chris.

“What the hell was that?”

Chris turned, still fuming, still trying to shove the roaring in his head back into a box it didn’t fit in.

“I didn’t like the way he looked at you.”

“You glared a guy out of a bar.”

“He touched your arm.”

“He was nice! I was having a normal, friendly conversation! We were talking about sea turtles!”

Chris blinked. “What?”

“Sea turtles, Chris. He works at the aquarium.”

Chris frowned. “That’s not a real job.”

Adrian rolled his eyes. “What the hell is going on with you?”

Chris opened his mouth.

Closed it.

Looked away.

Adrian’s expression softened. “Wait. Are you… jealous?”

Chris exhaled hard. “Don’t.”

Adrian stepped closer. “Chris. You literally pulled an alpha-male mating display in a dive bar.”

Chris turned away. “Forget it.”

“No. No way. You don’t get to blow up my potential boyfriend like a human grenade and then walk away without explaining yourself.”

Chris spun around. “He wasn’t your boyfriend.”

Adrian blinked. “No. He wasn’t. Because you scared him off.”

“He wasn’t right for you.”

“And you know that how?”

Chris hesitated.

Adrian’s voice dropped, softer now. “Chris. Talk to me.”

Chris looked at him.

And broke.

“I can’t act normal,” he said, voice raw. “I keep pretending everything’s fine, that I can just ignore this, and then I see you smiling at some guy and I feel like I’m going to explode.”

Adrian blinked, breath caught.

Chris shook his head. “I don’t know what I am. I don’t know how to be this. But when I think about you being with someone else, it makes my skin crawl. Not because I want to own you. Because I’m terrified that I waited too long. That I was a coward. And that someone else gets to see the part of you I only just realized I want.”

The silence between them was thunderous.

Chris looked down.

Then, gently, Adrian reached out and placed a hand on his wrist.

“You’re not too late,” he said, quiet but steady.

Chris looked up.

“I’ve liked you for a long time,” Adrian added. “I just didn’t think you could ever see me that way. Not really.”

“I do now,” Chris said, voice barely above a whisper.

Adrian smiled. “Then maybe next time, instead of trying to kill the competition, you could just ask me to dance or something.”

Chris let out a shaky laugh. “I don’t dance.”

“I’ve seen you do the worm during a firefight.”

“That doesn’t count.”

Adrian squeezed his wrist. “Well… do you want to try? With me?”

Chris swallowed. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“That’s okay. I do.”

Chris smiled — soft and unsure, but real.

Adrian smiled back.

-

Later, they sat outside on the curb, sharing cold fries and warm silence.

Chris leaned into him, just a little.

And Adrian leaned right back.

It wasn’t a confession. Not yet.

But it was something.

And maybe, for now, that was enough.

Chapter Text

The apartment was quiet in that kind of after way — the silence that settles when something loud has finally been let go.

Chris had barely spoken since they got back.

Adrian didn’t push.

He just changed into a hoodie and sweatpants, ordered takeout with extra napkins, and put on a movie Chris half-liked. Something with explosions and sad men who couldn’t talk about their feelings. Chris stared at it without really watching.

They sat on opposite ends of the couch.

Adrian didn’t try to close the space. He let it stay.

Eventually, Chris cleared his throat. “You don’t have to stay tonight.”

Adrian looked over. “You want me to go?”

Chris shook his head fast. “No. That’s not— No.”

Adrian smiled gently. “Then I’ll stay.”

Chris swallowed. “You’re just… really calm about all this.”

“About what?”

“Me. Being a disaster.”

Adrian shrugged. “I’ve always liked disasters. Preferably the hot, emotionally damaged kind.”

Chris let out a short, quiet laugh — the kind that always sounded like it surprised him.

-

They ate on the couch. Takeout boxes scattered on the coffee table. Adrian stole fries off Chris’s plate, and Chris let him. Which, by itself, was a miracle of biblical proportions.

Halfway through the movie, Chris said, softly, “I don’t know how to do this.”

Adrian muted the TV.

“Do what?”

“This,” Chris gestured vaguely between them. “This… thing. This feeling. This maybe-liking-you thing.”

Adrian didn’t move. “You don’t have to know yet. There’s no scorecard. No right answers.”

“I’ve never been soft with anyone,” Chris said, looking down. “Not really.”

Adrian hesitated. Then reached out slowly — not to grab him, just to let his hand rest on the couch cushion between them, palm up.

An offering.

Chris stared at it for a second.

Then, very carefully, laid his hand over Adrian’s.

Their fingers didn’t interlock. Not yet.

Just touch.

Warm. Human. Steady.

Chris exhaled. “This is weird.”

Adrian smiled. “Yeah. But like… good weird.”

Chris nodded. “It doesn’t feel wrong.”

“That’s the point.”

-

Later, they switched to an older movie. Something in black and white. Adrian curled his legs up under him and eventually drifted sideways until his shoulder was resting against Chris’s.

Chris stiffened for half a second.

Then slowly, quietly… relaxed.

His arm shifted behind Adrian, not quite wrapping around, but there. A steady presence. The couch was small. Their legs touched.

Neither of them moved away.

The clock ticked past midnight. Rain started tapping gently at the windows. Adrian’s head was resting on Chris’s shoulder now, and Chris hadn’t noticed the exact moment it happened.

He didn’t mind.

In fact, if he was honest — and God help him, he was trying to be honest now — he kind of liked it.

He looked down at Adrian’s face. Soft. Calm. Half-asleep.

Chris’s chest hurt in a way that wasn’t bad. Just… big.

Huge, even.

Like something had cracked open.

He spoke, barely above a whisper. “I’m not used to feeling safe with someone.”

Adrian murmured, sleepily, “You can. With me.”

Chris looked at him for a long time.

Then leaned down and pressed the gentlest kiss to the top of Adrian’s curls.

Adrian blinked, sleep-dazed. “Did you just kiss me?”

Chris cleared his throat. “No.”

“You so did.”

Chris looked away. “Shut up.”

Adrian grinned. “Do it again.”

Chris rolled his eyes. “I hate you.”

“You do not.”

Chris didn’t argue.

He didn’t have to.

-

Eventually, Adrian fell asleep on his shoulder.

Chris stayed awake a little longer, staring at the ceiling, listening to the rain and the quiet movie credits and the steady rhythm of Adrian breathing beside him.

For the first time in a long, long time, the silence didn’t feel like a weight.

It felt like peace.

Chapter Text

The smell of breakfast hit first — eggs, toast, bacon. Adrian singing something faintly off-key from the kitchen, pan sizzling in sync.

Chris sat on the couch, shirtless, blanket around his shoulders, still half-drugged by sleep. It should have been a good morning.

He should’ve felt safe.

Instead, he felt watched.

Not by Adrian.

By something colder.

Something older.

He looked up and saw his father standing by the hallway door.

Just standing there.

White hair slicked back. Scowl deep. The same damn hunting jacket he always wore like armor.

Chris didn’t breathe.

Didn’t blink.

Just stared.

Because he knew that face was dead — he’d watched the man bleed out on a dirty concrete road, had made it happen — but there he was.

Whole. Unforgiving.

Auggie Smith.

Chris’s heart pounded like a siren in his chest.

“Chris?” Adrian called from the kitchen, oblivious. “You okay?”

Chris didn’t answer.

The ghost smirked. “This what you’ve become?”

Chris swallowed, eyes locked on him.

“You really think playing house with that twitchy little fruitcake makes you a man?”

Chris stood up, slowly. “You’re not real.”

Auggie’s smile widened. “Don’t need to be. I’m in your bones, boy. You can’t bleach that out.”

Chris backed up a step.

“Can’t kill what made you.”

Adrian peeked out from the kitchen. “Chris? You’re—who are you talking to?”

Chris didn’t look at him.

Couldn’t.

His fists clenched.

The hallucination stepped closer. “You think he’s gonna save you? He doesn’t even know you. He sees a mask. You take it off, he runs. Just like everyone else.”

Adrian was at his side now, brow furrowed, voice gentle. “Chris. Hey. Look at me.”

Chris shook his head.

His breathing was too fast.

“Don’t you see him?” he whispered.

“See who?”

Chris pointed. “Right there. Right fucking there.”

There was nothing.

Just the hallway.

Just shadows and memory.

Adrian turned him gently, hands warm on his arms. “There’s no one there.”

Chris’s chest heaved. “He was right there. I saw him.”

“I believe you,” Adrian said softly. “But you’re safe. You’re here. With me.”

Chris’s eyes were wild. “I thought he was gone. I thought—”

“You’re not him,” Adrian said.

Chris’s jaw trembled.

“You hear me?” Adrian whispered, voice breaking. “You’re not him.”

Chris finally let himself breathe. Just once.

Then crumpled forward into Adrian’s chest.

They sat on the floor, backs against the couch, Adrian holding him without comment.

Chris didn’t cry.

Not really.

Just shook.

Hands gripping Adrian’s hoodie like it was the only solid thing in the world.

“He still lives in my head,” Chris murmured eventually. “All the time. Like he’s waiting. Like I’ll slip.”

“You won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do,” Adrian said. “Because every day, you don’t become him — you’re choosing something else. That counts. That’s you.”

Chris looked down at their hands. Adrian had taken one in his own without asking.

Their fingers were already laced.

-

Later, when the shakes passed and the morning sun crept higher, Chris stared at the patch of hallway where the ghost had stood.

Still empty.

But not harmless.

“Adrian,” he said quietly. “What if I never stop seeing him?”

Adrian paused. “Then we make space for it. But we don’t let him win.”

Chris looked at him. “Even if it makes me hard to love?”

Adrian smiled, sad and sure. “You’re not hard to love. You’re just not used to being loved right.”

Chris didn’t say anything else.

He just leaned in.

Pressed his forehead to Adrian’s.

And breathed.

Chapter Text

Chris didn’t speak for a long time.

Not because he didn’t want to.

But because the apartment was the first thing that had been quiet in days — really quiet. Not just soundless, but still. Like the air had stopped waiting for something to explode.

Adrian didn’t fill the space either. He just sat beside him on the floor, cross-legged in socks, munching dry cereal out of the box like it was the most normal thing in the world to witness your best friend hallucinate his dead father.

It helped, weirdly.

Chris didn’t want pity.

He wanted this. The mundanity. The being-seen-but-not-poked. The safe silence.

“I didn’t sleep last night,” Chris said eventually.

Adrian didn’t look up from the cereal. “Yeah. I kinda guessed when you stared at the bathroom mirror for forty minutes.”

“I thought I was fine. After we talked.”

“You were. You still are. You just hit a wall.”

Chris exhaled, knees drawn up. “The wall had my dad’s face.”

Adrian paused. “Okay, yeah. That’s a really shitty kind of wall.”

Chris gave a dry laugh — the kind that was more air than humor.

They sat in silence for a bit longer, save for the gentle clink of cereal bits against the cardboard.

Then Adrian said, offhandedly, “I used to see things too. Not like ghosts or dead dads. But… weird stuff.”

Chris glanced at him. “Yeah?”

Adrian shrugged. “I was a kid. Lotta noise in my head back then. Sometimes the only way I could deal with it was to pretend it was someone else’s.”

Chris didn’t reply, but his gaze sharpened — not mocking. Not pushing. Just present.

“I’d do this thing,” Adrian continued, voice slower now, like he was reaching into places he hadn’t touched in a while. “I’d imagine another version of me. One who wasn’t scared all the time. Who didn’t freeze up when people yelled. I called him 'The Other Guy.'"

Chris didn’t move. He barely breathed.

Adrian picked at a corner of the cereal box, eyes distant.

“The Other Guy never cried. Never blinked. He could take anything. Screaming? He’d just stare. Pain? He’d laugh at it. When stuff got bad, I’d just… switch.”

Chris’s voice was low. “Bad how?”

Adrian hesitated.

Then said, without flinching, “My parents used to break plates when they fought. And walls. And sometimes me. Not often. Just enough.”

Chris’s hands curled on his knees, but he didn’t interrupt.

“So I made The Other Guy,” Adrian said softly. “And eventually, people started liking him more than they liked me. So I just stayed him.”

Chris finally spoke. “You’re not him now.”

“I don’t know,” Adrian said. “I still feel like him sometimes. Like I’m just… wearing a guy suit. But you — you look at me like I’m real. I don’t think anyone’s ever done that before.”

Chris’s throat tightened.

“You are real,” he said.

“I don’t always know what that means,” Adrian admitted. “But when I’m with you, it feels like maybe it’s okay not to.”

Chris shifted, resting his forearm on his knee, leaning in just slightly.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

Adrian smiled faintly. “You were kinda busy punching Nazis and repressing your bisexuality.”

Chris snorted.

Adrian bumped his knee lightly. “Also, I didn’t know if you’d want to know.”

“I do.”

Chris said it with certainty.

And Adrian went still, like something inside him had gone quiet too.

Not numb. Just finally settled.

Adrian stood up eventually, but he didn’t go far. Just wandered to the window, chewing the inside of his cheek like the words still hadn’t finished cooking in his mouth.

Chris stayed where he was, eyes on him.

Not demanding.

Just waiting.

Adrian leaned his forehead against the glass.

“When I was eleven,” he said quietly, “I didn’t speak for two weeks.”

Chris blinked. “You?”

Adrian nodded.

“Not one word. My mom thought it was a stunt. My dad told her to let me starve if I wasn’t gonna ask for food like a ‘normal fucking child.’” He swallowed. “They called it a phase. But it wasn’t.”

“What was it?”

Adrian stared at his own reflection. “It was the first time I realized that talking didn’t matter. No one listened. So I just… shut up.”

Chris stood now too, slow and careful, but didn’t interrupt.

“I started making up conversations in my head,” Adrian went on. “Ones where I said what I wanted and people actually heard me. It was… the only time I felt human.”

He turned around, leaning back against the window frame, eyes a little too bright.

“I think that’s why I talk so much now. It’s like I’m trying to make up for every second I spent being invisible.”

Chris’s throat tightened.

“Hey,” he said, gently. “You’re not invisible to me.”

Adrian’s eyes flickered. “Yeah?”

Chris stepped closer. “You’re the only person I’ve ever known who could make me laugh when I felt like garbage. Who stayed even when I gave every reason not to. Who held me when I couldn’t hold myself together.”

Adrian blinked. “You… remember that night?”

Chris looked away briefly, then back.

“I remember all of it.”

Silence stretched between them like breath held too long.

Then Adrian said, with the tiniest crack in his voice, “Sometimes I don’t know if I’m a person, Chris. I still feel like that kid. Too loud. Too much. Not enough.”

Chris took the last step forward and stopped right in front of him.

“You’re enough,” he said. “Even when you’re too much. Especially then.”

Adrian smiled. Wobbly, but real.

“I don’t know what to do with that.”

Chris nodded. “Same.”

They stood there for a long minute, only the faint hum of the fridge between them.

Then Adrian laughed softly. “God. This is so messed up. We’re like the world’s worst therapy group.”

Chris smirked. “Speak for yourself. I think we’re nailing it.”

“Sure. If nailing it means reliving childhood trauma on a Wednesday morning in boxers.”

Chris looked down at his boxers. “Hey. These are clean. That’s progress.”

Adrian grinned, and it made something sharp in Chris’s chest ease.

-

They ended up back on the couch, this time closer. Shoulder to shoulder, sharing the blanket. Adrian’s feet tucked under him, Chris sitting with one knee up like always, the same pose he used when talking felt too vulnerable without cover.

Adrian looked over.

“You know something stupid?”

Chris raised an eyebrow.

“I used to think I had to be funny to be lovable.”

Chris was quiet for a beat. “And now?”

“I think… maybe I don’t. At least not with you.”

Chris’s hand moved without him thinking — just rested on Adrian’s forearm.

Warm. Steady. Real.

“You don’t have to be anything but you,” he said.

Adrian looked down at his hand. Then back up.

“Even when I’m annoying?”

Chris huffed. “Especially then. Because if you ever stop being annoying, I’ll know the world’s ending.”

Adrian snorted. “Deal.”

They both smiled — tired, sore, but lighter.

Like they'd survived another quiet battle neither of them had words for.

Chapter Text

It didn’t start with a kiss.

It started with quiet.

The kind of quiet that didn’t demand anything.

Chris was bad at silence, usually. His brain filled it with noise. Echoes. His father’s voice. The things he’d done. The things he couldn’t undo.

But with Adrian, silence felt like a place. Not empty — just open. Like he didn’t have to fill it to earn his space inside it.

They were on the couch. Something mindless on the screen. Adrian’s pick. Probably something violent wrapped in glitter and sarcasm, like always.

Chris couldn’t have said what the plot was.

He was too aware of the five inches of space between them.

And the fact that Adrian hadn’t crossed it.

Not yet.

But he would. Chris knew it. He could feel it, like a weight in the air — not heavy, just inevitable.

Adrian shifted a little, socked foot nudging against Chris’s ankle.

Chris didn’t pull away.

Didn’t lean in either.

He just breathed.

“Hey,” Adrian said quietly, “you’ve been staring at that guy’s face for ten straight minutes. I don’t think he’s gonna do a monologue.”

Chris blinked. “Huh?”

“TV. You’re zoning out.”

“Oh. Sorry. Just—thinking.”

Adrian tilted his head, eyes soft. “You okay?”

Chris hesitated. Then: “Yeah. I just…”

He sighed. “Been thinking about touch.”

Adrian’s expression didn’t change, but Chris saw the stillness behind it — the kind he only used when he was listening for real.

“I used to think it was only for hurting people,” Chris said. “Or proving something. Dominance. Control.”

He rubbed a hand over his jaw. “I don’t think I really understood what it was for until you started touching me like it wasn’t a weapon.”

Adrian was quiet. Not tense. Just… waiting.

“You do it like it’s nothing,” Chris said. “Like it doesn’t cost anything.”

“It doesn’t,” Adrian said gently. “Not when it’s earned.”

Chris looked over at him, brow furrowed.

“What does that mean?”

Adrian’s voice was soft. “It means you’re the only person I’ve ever touched this much who didn’t ask for anything in return.”

Chris swallowed.

Adrian’s knee bumped his again.

“You can lean into me,” Adrian said. “You don’t have to be so careful.”

“I’m not—”

“You are,” Adrian said, smiling faintly. “You hold yourself like you’re afraid to bruise anyone.”

Chris looked down at his own hands. Scarred. Steady. He flexed them.

Then, slowly, he shifted.

Leaning sideways.

Letting his shoulder brush Adrian’s.

It felt like exhaling for the first time in hours.

-

They stayed like that for minutes — long, stretching, honest minutes.

Chris could feel his heartbeat slowing. Could feel the way Adrian’s presence settled something inside him he didn’t know was jagged.

Then Adrian did something small.

Simple.

He hooked his pinky with Chris’s.

Not a grab. Not a tug.

Just an anchor.

Chris’s breath hitched. Not because of the touch — but because of what it wasn’t.

It wasn’t possessive.

It wasn’t urgent.

It was a promise.

You’re allowed to want this.
You’re allowed to take your time.

“I didn’t think I could ever do this,” Chris murmured.

“Do what?”

“This. Just… be here. With someone. Without thinking it’s gonna fall apart.”

Adrian hummed. “Everything falls apart eventually.”

“Great pep talk.”

“But,” Adrian added, “some stuff holds first. That’s what makes it worth it.”

Chris turned his head, meeting Adrian’s eyes.

“You ever get scared?”

Adrian smiled crookedly. “Constantly. I’m terrified right now.”

Chris blinked. “Really?”

“You think I curl up next to my best friend with unresolved bisexual tension and zero social skills and don’t freak out?”

Chris barked out a surprised laugh.

Adrian leaned a little closer. “It’s okay to be scared. It’s not okay to lie to yourself about it.”

Chris let that sit for a while.

Then he murmured, “You’re not lying to yourself right now?”

Adrian’s face went still again.

“No,” he said.

Very quietly.

“No, I’m not.”

-

Later — when the movie ended and the lights stayed low — Chris got up to get water.

When he came back, Adrian was still there, curled on the couch like he’d always belonged there.

And for once, Chris didn’t feel the urge to escape to his room. He just walked over. Set his water down.

And asked:

“You staying over?”

Adrian looked up at him.

Soft smile.

“I was hoping you’d ask.”