Work Text:
They don't make a big announcement.
There is, however, a big announcement. It comes on a Monday. The President, the Joint Chiefs, and all the other press-seeking vultures gather and make their speeches. When Brad and Nate watch the coverage on the news that night, the editors cut from the press conference to footage of men making out with each other, in uniform, in the middle of some park.
"That's pretty fucking gay," Brad remarks. He has one foot on the ground and his other leg stretched along the length of the couch. Nate is lying on Brad's chest and has one of his legs tangled with Brad's. Brad's fingers card through Nate's hair.
Nate tips his head back so he can look at Brad. His eyebrows are raised pointedly.
"I am in the privacy of my own home," Brad defends, though his words lack any biting edge.
Nate rolls so they're chest to chest and kisses him. He breathes in, like he's preparing to speak. He lets the air out without saying anything and lowers himself so his cheek is resting against Brad's chest. Brad waits him out. "What if we make it ours now?" he asks, eventually.
Brad smirks. "You mean move the last three pairs of socks and the old toothbrush from your crappy apartment to here?"
Nate raises himself onto his elbows and looks at Brad with the face he always makes when Brad takes a shot at his apartment; it's usually followed by him extolling the apartment's virtues. Brad tries to figure out a new way to tell Nate that he'd realize how awful the place was if he spent any time there, when Nate quickly derails that train of thought.
"I was thinking more like putting my name on the mortgage."
Brad studies Nate. He has a horrible poker face; Brad can tell he's trying to hide it, but he looks so earnest and hopeful. "No" doesn't cross Brad's mind, but he's not sure how to respond to an offer this big, and put forth so simply, the way only Nate could. He settles for smiling and nodding once.
Brad feels Nate's weight sag into him a little more and watches Nate's face relax as he smiles back.
They tell the people involved in the paper work, by implication, at least. It's more than a few people. With each knowing look they get, Brad's torn between wanting to punch someone and wanting to wait in the car.
Instead, he sits next to Nate, signing page after page after page. His elbow knocks into Nate a few times as he vigorously flips through the sheets, muttering about paper work that rivals the Corps'. When all is said and done, Nate has taken on half of Brad's debt, and Brad's given Nate half of his most valuable possession. They both come away with a few pieces of paper binding them together, for better or for worse.
Brad turns to Nate when they reach the car, blocking Nate from walking around to the passenger side. He keeps his distance as they look at each other, all too aware of the parking lot full of people. Brad feels like he's supposed to do something or say something, that he's missing something vital for the occasion. He works to keep his face impassive as he debates with himself about what to do; the facade is all he has going for him, comfortably familiar, when everything is suddenly so different. He can tell Nate's not buying it when he fixes his officer stare on Brad, silently challenging.
Brad lets out the breath he didn't know he was holding. "Let's go home. To our house."
Nate smiles at him, his whole face lighting up. It's a marked change from the looks he'd been shooting at Brad the whole time they were inside. Brad offers a smile back and steps out of Nate's way. Nate walks around to his side of the car, their arms brushing as he passes. By the time Nate climbs in, Brad already has the car started and the AC blasting. Brad reaches out and grabs Nate's hand as soon as he's buckled up, lacing their fingers together and squeezing. He pulls his hand away to shift, and drives them home. He's not sure whether or not he imagines the glare Nate shoots at the shift.
---
Nate does, in fact, have furniture in his apartment, most of which is made redundant by what Brad already has in their house. Nate spends Wednesday night taking pictures of everything he doesn't need anymore and makes Brad put up the Craig's List postings. Everything but the old, crappy TV is gone by Saturday morning.
They have their first co-habitation-related fight about the TV.
"Throw it away," Brad says, trying to determine if it was manufactured before or after 1999. It's a tough call.
Nate protests. He always protests. "But we could put it in the-"
"Throw. It. Away. It's a piece of crap. There's a reason no one wanted it."
Nate goes off to his old bedroom to sulk. Or roll socks. Or to do whatever he does when he knows that he's wrong and Brad's right. Brad keeps boxing up what's left of Nate's DVD collection for the five minutes it takes until Nate comes back out and hauls Brad up by his shirt.
They kiss, hot and dirty, letting their tongues tangle together. Nate pushes down on Brad's shoulders. Brad follows Nate's urging to the floor and lets Nate pin him there. They fuck with a fierceness they haven't had since this whole thing was new.
Nate rolls to the side as they catch their breath, and ends up right in the middle of a pile of DVDs. Nate wrinkles his face in displeasure as he lifts his arm and peels off a DVD that's stuck to his sweaty, sticky skin.
Brad laughs. He can't stop; the laughter claws its way out from inside of him. One he stops staring at Brad bemusedly, Nate joins in too, though without Brad's manic intensity. Brad finally calms when his abs start to hurt. They catch their breath a second time, lying on the floor with their fingers brushing.
"Come on," Nate says eventually, nudging Brad with his knee. "We've got work to do."
---
There are some bulky things left: some ugly end tables that Nate's grandmother passed down to him from her childhood home, making it impossible for Brad to order Nate to throw those away too; Nate's favorite reading chair; and bookcases that they'll have to figure out how to fit somewhere. Nate has amassed a small library in just over thirty years on earth.
Brad calls Poke after they've finished fucking, again, in the mostly empty kitchen this time, since "it really doesn't make sense to rent a truck when we know someone who has one." It's also really hard to say no to a naked Nate who has one leg thrown over your body. Poke won't lend him the truck with out Brad giving a reason and "I need to move stuff" proves not to be specific enough. Then Poke knows, and it's really just a matter of time before everyone else does too.
(For a few people, Poke included, it's more a matter of being allowed to know what they've been carefully not knowing for a couple of years.)
---
Brad spends lunch at his desk on Monday, searching through DIY Web sites for any ideas on how to make the heirloom end tables less of an eyesore. Mike Wynn manages to track him down, anyway, and makes himself comfortable leaning against the wall of Brad cubical. "I've been trying to call Nate all morning. Where's he at today?"
Brad smirks. "Nate overestimated his own strength yesterday and dropped a bookcase on his phone."
Mike makes a pained face. "And while this was happening, you…?"
"Watched. It was an epic battle." Brad smirks again as he remembers the look on Nate's face as he watched his phone fall out of his pocket and the shelves follow right behind. (He also remembers the way the muscles had rippled in Nate's back as he'd struggled in the moments before. That's why he'd been watching.)
Mike shakes his head in disbelief. "Man, Laura would kill me if I sat back and let that happen. If you weren't sleeping on the couch last night, consider yourself a lucky man."
Brad stiffens in his seat and his eyes dart about the room, ensuring everyone else is, in fact, out at lunch. "Is there a message?"
Mike stays relaxed and causal, either unaware of, or ignoring, Brad's discomfort. "Two things." He holds up his fingers. "One, Katie is failing Latin, so Laura and I are hoping Nate will be willing to work some magic on her. Two, Laura and I are throwing together a barbeque for Saturday. That part of the message is for both of you, obviously."
Brad nods. "I'll tell Nate to call you."
"Thanks." Mike wanders out, stopping in the doorway. He turns back to Brad, who's already taken a huge bite out of his sandwich. "I'll see both of you on Saturday, right?"
Brad nods again, unable to speak around the food in his mouth. There's really no other acceptable answer, anyway.
---
On Tuesday, Nate meets Brad at the door, kisses him quickly, and presses a beer into his hand. Brad tosses his cover on the little table next to the door and takes a draught from his beer. "I was unaware I was getting a '50s housewife in the deal when you moved in. What time will dinner be on the table?"
Nate rolls his eyes. "Whenever the Chinese food gets here."
"Good enough." Brad moves to walk around Nate, but Nate puts his palm flat on Brad's chest, stopping him in the doorway.
"I need you to brace yourself for what's in the kitchen."
Brad looks at him with one eyebrow raised. "Why?" he asks evenly.
"We got a gift. From, well, from a whole list of people, but Ray's name is at the top."
Brad rolls his eyes. "Jesus. This can't end well." He takes another swig of his beer and walks around Nate into the kitchen.
There's a gigantic gift basket in the middle of the kitchen table. Brad's eyes are immediately drawn to the green dildo in the middle--still in its packaging, thank God. He looks over his shoulder at Nate, disbelief etched on his face. Nate's mouth is twitching, like he's trying very hard not to smile. "There's a card." Nate motions to the envelope lying in front of the basket.
Brad picks it up and slides the card out. There's a mostly naked man on the front. Inside, whatever message the greeting card company had deemed appropriate for general consumption has been scratched out and replaced by a poem in Ray's messy scrawl:
Roses are red
This dildo is green
There's also a gag
So we won't hear Nate scream
It's followed by the names of half the people they'd been with in Iraq, from what Brad can make out through the smudged ink.
Brad digs through the basket, shoving things to the side roughly, and does, indeed, find a gag buried under an assortment of butt plugs, two cock rings, handcuffs, and a very large container of lube. "How soon until trash day?" he asks, throwing everything back into the basket. "We need this shit out of the house." His words are clipped, and a mixture of irritation and panic is swirling around in his chest.
"You would get rid of perfectly good sex toys just because they came from Ray Person?" Nate asks, crossing the kitchen toward Brad. His tone is light, but it sounds forced, like he's working really hard to keep it that way. "The man I moved in with would not be that wasteful." He slides one arm around Brad's waist and pulls Brad close. He lines his mouth up with Brad's ear. "I don't care what you tell Ray, but we are not throwing any of this out." Nate is enjoying himself way too much, but that doesn't stop Brad from taking advantage of their position and thrusting his hips forward, into Nate. He knows the R.O.E. for this situation.
Nate smirks at him as he pulls away to grab a couple books off the counter. "Besides, I've already marked off some interesting pages in this." He holds up a copy of The Joy of Gay Sex with a bunch of post-it flags sticking out the side. "This one, I'm saving for you to read first." He hands Brad a book with two men making out on the cover while a third watches from the shadows. It might as well have Fabio on the cover. Brad doesn't even want to touch it.
He grabs it, and the other book, out of Nate's hands and tosses them onto the table. He backs Nate up against the counter, keeping their faces close. "Is this what you've been doing all day?" he asks playfully. "What the hell do they pay you for?"
Nate's hands settle on his hips as he pulls his head back, serious now. "They pay me to go to D.C. for the next three days. I came home early to pack and spend a couple hours brushing up on my eighth-grade Latin with Katie. And I needed a new phone." He leans forward to kiss Brad. "Then I got distracted."
"I forgot," Brad says, tightening his hands in Nate's shirt and kissing him again. "You're back Friday?" Nate nods. Brad cups the back of Nate's head and pulls him forward. He kisses him with intent this time, sliding his tongue into Nate's mouth and sucking on his lower lip until Nate starts to moan low in his throat. Brad pulls back slowly. "Bed?" he asks.
"Yeah." Nate's voice is rough. He slides his hands down Brad's back to his ass. Brad grabs one of Nate's hands and starts to pull him out of the kitchen. Nate reaches out with his free hand and roots through the basket, pulling out the handcuffs and one of the cock rings.
Brad stops and looks at what Nate's holding. He drops Nate's hand. "No." Nate looks back at him, with the hybrid of pleading, puppy dog eyes and lust that only he can manage. He tilts his head to the side. Brad capitulates. "Ray never knows."
"I assure you, he won't."
Brad stares Nate down. "That's comforting." The sarcasm is practically tangible.
Nate rolls his eyes. "Come on," Nate says, pushing Brad toward their bedroom.
---
They don't tell Ray.
---
When Nate grabs a quick shower before he heads to the airport to catch his redeye, Brad uses the opportunity to take Nate's copy of Founding Brothers out of his briefcase and slip the book jacket around the Fabio-esque piece of trash from the basket. He adds a post-it note that says "enjoy" and puts it in Nate's bag. Brad's really not expecting it when he finds the book on his pillow after Nate gets back, with notes in the margins and the words "your turn" added to his note.
---
Thursday, Brad goes to his parents' house for dinner. His mom had called him, and the first sentence out of her mouth had been a promise of matzoth ball soup. He'd been in Iraq last Passover, so there was no way he was going to pass that up.
The house is too empty without Nate, anyway.
Brad does the dishes after dinner. He watches through the window over the sink as his father circles the yard with a pair of hedge trimmers, stopping now and then to clip a stray branch. When he finishes with the dishes, Brad wanders into the living room. His mother is curled up on the couch, with her legs tucked under her and a crossword book in her lap. Brad drops to the floor and leans back against the couch next to her.
Growing up, it hadn't taken him long to get too big to fit on her lap, so he'd started to curl up next to her when he was sick or upset. (When his sisters teased him about being like a dog, he'd just chased them around the house with the next spider he found.) Even when the detentions and suspensions started--even through military school--this had been their safe place, away from the fighting. And now, well into his thirties, he knows several ways to kill anyone who sees.
His mother unfolds her legs and lets her feet hit the floor. Brad leans in, his shoulder to her knee. "It must be nice, for you and Nate," she says, "not having to sneak around and pretend anymore." Her eyes don't leave the crossword, but her tone is loaded.
Brad grunts something non-committal in response.
"Have you started talking about him at work?" she prods.
"No."
None of his men would have dared continue in the face of his current tone of voice. His mother doesn't balk. "Why not?"
Brad's words are clipped. "It's got nothing to do with work. It's personal."
"I suppose you never talk to anyone about their wives or girlfriends? Or football or baseball or your bike for that matter? No non work-related subjects on your watch." Her voice stays light, but the challenge is clear.
Brad is silent as he flashes back to the NCOs he'd heard complaining about the fucking faggots they'd have to let in now. And the group of baby Marines he'd seen acting out limp wristed men trying to fire off a round. One of them was miming a blowjob so poorly, that Brad almost felt sorry for him if he thought that's what a blowjob should be. Almost.
There are a lot of things he could say to his mom right now. "No one wants a faggot to lead them into battle" or "Everything I've worked for will be ruined" or "I think Nate's pretty much ready to be on the cover of The Advocate, but I don't want anyone to know." He can't bring himself to say any of them out loud. He lets the silence speak for him. It all comes down to the same thing. "I'm afraid Nate will think I don't want him." His voice shakes.
"Oh, Brad." There's no trace of anything but sympathy left in his mother's voice. "Talk to him. He's been in the Corps." She reaches out and rubs her hand through Brad's hair. He rests his cheek on her leg and lets her continue to stroke his head, just like the dog his sisters teased him about being. When his father comes in from the yard and sees them, he says nothing, just sits down on the couch and turns on the T.V. Brad has never appreciated him more.
---
Brad swears to himself that he is going to talk to Nate. But when Nate walks in on Friday night, rumpled from the plane, all Brad manages to do is fuck him slow and sweet. He keeps their bodies pressed together and his mouth on Nate's skin. He falls asleep with his arm curled around Nate and their legs tangled together. He thinks that might count a little.
---
Brad is fiddling with his phone when Nate parks on the side of the road a few doors down from Mike's house. "Go ahead," Brad says. "I need to get this e-mail taken care of. I'll catch up."
Nate looks at Brad warily. Brad slides his eyes from the screen to meet Nate's. Please, he begs, silently. Nate sighs and nods and grabs the two six packs out of the back seat. Brad watches him cut across the lawns, a pack of beer in each hand, head hanging, alone.
"Fuck," Brad says to the empty car, and finishes unsubscribing from the Urban Dictionary word of the day, which Ray had signed him up for. Again. He grabs the keys out of the ignition and follows Nate's path to Mike's backyard.
When Brad walks through the gate, he scans the crowd and finds Nate talking with Mike and Tony. Nate's holding two beers, and he passes one to Brad when Brad slides into the circle next to him. The sound of jewelry banging together, plus the way Mike's face lights up a little, gives away Laura walking up behind them. Brad and Nate both turn their heads over their shoulders--mirror images--to see her. She's got a big smile on her face. Her skirt trails behind her in the grass as she walks, her bare feet visible each time she kicks at the hem to get it out of her way. She hugs each of them and then reaches up to put one arm around each of their shoulders. There's no way that can be comfortable, or look anything less than hilarious, judging from Poke's face.
"I'm so happy for you two," she says. "I keep thinking I should find some sort of 'Happy Repeal of DADT' card and send it over." Brad resists the urge to look over his shoulder to see who else is close by, but the smile on Nate's face falters when he looks at Brad. He must have given something away.
Katie saves the day by choosing that moment to break off from her friends and run over to Nate, saying that she has to show him something as she tugs at his arm.
Brad turns to Laura. He settles for, "Thanks," and changes the subject back to the Lakers' shot at making it through the playoffs.
Brad ducks away after a few minutes. Katie is back with her friends, but Nate is nowhere to be seen. Brad finds him in the kitchen, leaning against the center island, empty beer bottle in front of him. "Katie wanted to show me her test," Nate says, when Brad stands next to him, setting down his own bottle. Nate motions to the fridge in front of them with his chin. There's a paper with a big, red 81 written on it, stuck to the freezer. Nate's eyes dart to the window where Katie is visible, sitting on the grass. He looks so proud of her, so happy. It's much better than the way he's been looking at Brad for the past two weeks. Brad hates it.
"This is really hard for me," Brad says. He's studying his beer bottle intently, worrying at the corner of the label with his thumb, but he can feel Nate's eyes on him, can picture the way Nate must have turned his head and focused on him.
"I know."
"I'm trying."
"I know," Nate says again.
"I didn't think it would be this difficult."
"I know the culture of the Corps, Brad. I can imagine what it's like to go into that every day, and suddenly, it's personal."
Brad grabs Nate's hand under the counter top and interlaces their fingers. "I want to be with you, but there are still some people I don't want to know that."
Nate squeezes Brad's hand and moves his foot forward so it's touching Brad's. "Even if DADT had never existed, you would have wanted to be more private about this than I would have. But I don't just love the things about you that are convenient for me. We'll find a balance that works for us." Brad meets Nate's eyes. "It's okay," Nate continues, pointedly.
Brad nods. "Okay," he agrees.
They stand in silence for a minute; barely touching, completely connected.
A baby starts to cry outside, breaking into the moment. Brad glances out the window and sees one of Katie's friends hurrying across the yard, holding the screaming child out in front of her. He turns back to Nate, who steps closer and speaks in a low voice. "Let's go out there, relax, and enjoy the party, because when we get home, I want to use Ray's presents to act out page 272 of that book you left me for the plane."
The side of Brad's mouth twitches. "I don't believe I've gotten to that page yet."
"Can you handle the suspense?"
Brad gets as far into Nate's space as he can without kissing him in the middle of Mike's kitchen. "I can handle whatever you dish out, Fick."
Nate closes the gap, kissing Brad chastely. "Yeah?"
Brad doesn't pull back, or tense up, or run into the other room. "Yeah," he says confidently.
Nate starts toward the door, their hands still joined. "You know, there's actually a really good story with just a couple of sex scenes in that book. The author really needs a better agent or publisher or something."
Brad nods and lets himself be pulled. He takes a deep breath as they reach the door. He will do this for Nate; it can't be worse than SERE. But Nate drops his hand to reach for the handle and opens the door for Brad, continuing with his book review like nothing significant is happening.
Brad lets out his breath, and falls in love all over again.
If You Forget Me
By Pablo Neruda
I want you to know
one thing.
You know how this is:
if I look
at the crystal moon, at the red branch
of the slow autumn at my window,
if I touch
near the fire
the impalpable ash
or the wrinkled body of the log,
everything carries me to you,
as if everything that exists,
aromas, light, metals,
were little boats
that sail
toward those isles of yours that wait for me.
Well, now,
if little by little you stop loving me
I shall stop loving you little by little.
If suddenly
you forget me
do not look for me,
for I shall already have forgotten you.
If you think it long and mad,
the wind of banners
that passes through my life,
and you decide
to leave me at the shore
of the heart where I have roots,
remember
that on that day,
at that hour,
I shall lift my arms
and my roots will set off
to seek another land.
But
if each day,
each hour,
you feel that you are destined for me
with implacable sweetness,
if each day a flower
climbs up to your lips to seek me,
ah my love, ah my own,
in me all that fire is repeated,
in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,
my love feeds on your love, beloved,
and as long as you live it will be in your arms
without leaving mine.