Work Text:
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“And now what?” Bob looks at him with his big puppy eyes.
John doesn’t allow himself to get hypnotized. “Let me see?” He rises from his armchair, walks over to the couch and inspects Bob’s progress. “That’s good. Now you just flip that needle back to the left and work the next row exactly how you did that one.”
“Oh.”
Bob’s frowning as he focuses on the knitting needles and does as he’s told. As ever he was one of the guys with no back talk today after lunch when it was John’s turn to lead another of their series of “calm afternoons where you relax and get to know your teammates better while you teach them a therapeutic hobby you like to do.” It’s a thing they are supposed to do to feel more like normal people, basically. Like they are perfectly sane, functioning members of society. A bunch of people who can just chill out on a Sunday afternoon, doing something relaxing.
So now the six of them are in the Watchtower, spread out in the armchairs and on the couch in the living room, knitting. Teaching others a therapeutic hobby was an idea Mel and Yelena came up with and it’s supposed to help them find “appropriate tools” to deal with the fucked up lives they’ve led and to relax between missions. They all of them scoffed at the idea at first, but all the others have already taken turns presenting their hobbies and even John has to admit it might not have been as useless as he first thought.
Alexei eagerly volunteered to start their little group project and one Sunday afternoon a couple of weeks ago, he took them fishing. They all piled into a car and after an hour’s drive, during which Alexei told them in detail how his father taught him fishing, how some days their catch was the only thing standing between life and starvation, and what fishing meant for him, they finally found themselves at a lake surrounded by woods and meadows. Alexei emphasized that silence was absolutely vital for a successful session, so after Bob poured everyone coffee from the huge thermos and they each plopped into a camping chair, nobody spoke for nearly two hours. They didn’t actually catch anything, but sitting there for such a long time in near silence – without Alexei’s reminiscing about the great days of past or Yelena’s off-key singing or Bucky and Ava bickering – just watching the lake, the trees swaying in the breeze, the birds twittering over their heads – (and covertly watching Bob sprawled out in his camping chair, eyes closed and soaking up the sun shining into his face, barefoot and only wearing a t-shirt and shorts, and completely ignoring his fishing rod) – John felt that maybe, one day, everything would be okay.
Yelena took over the next weekend. They headed into one of the upper floors of the tower, with the large windows and lots of natural light, and found dozens of pots and planters filling the room. Little exotic plants were hanging from the ceiling, crawling over walls, crowded on the shelves. Wide planters, row upon a row, full of fruits and vegetables in various stages of growth. And with that, the mystery of Yelena’s occasional inexplicable disappearances was explained. As they all got on their knees and got their hands dirty, she told them about how the widows were all taught to work with poisons and how they all had to learn to grow their own poisonous plants as well. Once she got away, she realized there was a part of it she liked. She enjoyed keeping something alive, making something thrive; seeing the results of her work, tangible in her hand and delicious in her mouth. John thought it was alright, but he’s more than happy to continue buying his veggies in a store, thanks very much.
Ava was next. Never in a million years would John have expected her to lead them to easels and thrust palettes and paint brushes into their hands, but hey, you never really know a guy. He supposed it was quite amazing that even with the life she’s led, painting was a thing she was somehow always allowed to do. She took classes when she was still with her parents, then there was a brief pause while she was in the orphanage after the accident, but once she was with Dr. Foster, and even when she was with Shield, she was able to secure that for herself. That whole afternoon, John felt clumsy and awkward, trying not to compare his painting with others (Alexei’s and Bob’s = as awful as John’s; Bucky’s and Yelena’s = annoyingly good). At one point, John felt eyes on him, and when he looked around, he found Bob looking over at his canvas. Bob motioned between his own canvas and John’s with his paint brush, somehow managing to convey “look, we are equally shit at this”; and then Bob grinned at him, scrunching his nose in a way that was growing on John rather alarmingly.
When it was Bucky’s turn, he took them to the workshop floor. They all got allocated a workstation, some blocks of wood and various knives, chisels and rasps. As they started shaving bits of wood off the blocks, they listened as Bucky recounted how in the 1930s, scavenging for scrap wood, carefully making it into a toy or something useful and then trying to sell it or trade it was one of the ways he and Rogers actually managed to keep food on the table. Decades later, when he broke free and was still trying to find himself, he realized he still enjoyed it. Woodworking was a thing he could do on the run, in hideouts, everywhere, and it provided him with a distraction, something to do with his hands other than killing. This John understood. The tools felt right in John’s hands. What he managed to create at the end was miles away from the perfection of the various models Bucky provided, but it felt good. An honest, useful, respectable, old-timey skill. Like something your grandpa might teach you, and, well, it was Bucky, so…
On the morning of the day when it was Bob’s turn to show them his hobby, Bob emerged from his room looking exhausted and jittery, like he hadn’t slept much, too anxious over his upcoming demonstration. He led them to the gym and they each got a yoga mat. And even though they’d been living together for months by then, Bob still managed to look like he was getting tortured as he stood before them, wringing his hands, looking at the floor and stammering through what was without a doubt a rehearsed speech. He told them about the time he “was travelling through Asia, feeling like a failure, really, with no purpose or anything, you know, and yeah, I was doing drugs at the time, but also I tried – I really tried – there was this place in Thailand, kind of a temple, where I spent a couple of months, and they were doing these fancy yoga retreats, and they let you stay for free if you – well, never mind, and I was trying to get clean, I really was, but then every time it somehow went wrong, like it always does, but I think that when I was there, doing yoga and trying to meditate, I was almost able to forget about everything, you know, and I think that was the first time I ever truly felt at peace –” and at that point, Bob’s eyes went glassy and John had this overwhelming urge to make it stop, go to him and do something. And then Bob suddenly lifted his head and smiled, almost blinding them with it, and that was that. They did some yoga, and when it was done, Bob disappeared into his room to recharge and didn’t reappear until the next morning, looking relieved and like himself again.
And suddenly it’s John’s turn. So today after lunch, realizing there is no escaping it and it’s really happening, John goes shopping. He brings back six pairs of knitting needles and dozens of balls of yarn and dumps it all on the coffee table in the living room, the others already sitting in the armchairs and on the couch, waiting for him.
John insisted on going last. Honestly, he kind of hoped they might get tired of this shit and he might get out of doing it all together. Worst of all, though, he could not think of any other relaxing and boring hobby or skill he had aside from knitting and he dreaded the others’ reaction when they found out.
He learned to knit from his grandma, who used to babysit him and his sister when their parents were working late or away on business trips. It was such fun at the beginning. He always marvelled at his grandma’s ability to take some balls of yarn and make a brand new sweater or blanket out of them. To the child that he was, it seemed like magic, so when she taught him and he could accomplish that as well, he was ecstatic. When a couple of his classmates laughed at him after he proudly announced he knitted his own hat, he realized it wasn’t a typical boys’ hobby, and then he wisely kept it to himself. Later, while he was in the Academy and then in the military, on tours, he told himself there was barely any time left for it, but in truth, he didn’t want the guys knowing. Guys could be dicks about stuff like that. Only at home, with Olivia, did he feel comfortable enough to knit. She laughed affectionately when he made a pair of tiny socks, tinier than anything he’s ever knitted before, and held them experimentally in front of her huge belly, whispering: “come on, sweetheart, we’re ready for you!” The tiny socks were probably the last thing he ever knitted before his life went to shit. He wonders what’s become of them.
So when he spills out his shopping onto the coffee table, sending a couple of balls of yarn rolling across the floor in colorful streaks, and stands there with his back straight and arms akimbo, feeling the gaze of his five teammates on him, he is ready for anything. Giggling, mockery and straight up refusal.
Ava grabbing the knitting needles and making complex stabbing motions with them and Alexei leaning back in his armchair and grumbling something in Russian – that John kind of expected. What he didn’t expect is Bob, Bucky and Yelena exclaiming excitedly and rushing forward, their eyes lighting up, hurriedly laying their hands on what they deem to be the best yarn color.
After some initial chaos and chattering, John separates Yelena and Ava who have started jumping over furniture and fencing with the needles. He makes them all sit down, hands the knitting needles to the less enthusiastic non-stabbing participants and asks them to choose a ball of yarn they like. With his own needles and yarn, he shows them all how to cast on, how to do the basic knit stitch and then does a couple of rows. He goes around, makes sure everyone understands and then sits down in his armchair.
And then it’s quiet. Mission accomplished. Now, they can relax. They can begin their “healing journey” and –
It doesn’t even last a minute.
Alexei is the first to give up. He mutters to himself as he struggles with the first stitch and then he finally explodes with frustration. He stands up dramatically, thundering: “Come on, this is clearly ladies’ work!”, before throwing the needles to the floor and striding out of the room.
Ava tries, she really does, but she doesn’t have the patience for it, or maybe she’s just having a bad day. After she messes up several times and her yarn gets hopelessly tangled up, she drops the jumble on the table, through gritted teeth hisses: “Right, do I seem relaxed to you?” into John’s face and stalks out.
Bucky is a knitting pro. To the remaining audience, he tells how he used to knit with his mother and sister back in the day. He knits one (1) mitten. The whole time, he has that pensive expression on his face that means he’s thinking about the past. After a couple of hours, when he’s finished, he tries to put the mitten on, but it’s too small. He lays it on the coffee table and gets up. He smiles across the room at John, mutters: “Jesus Christ, Walker,” and leaves the room.
Yelena picks up knitting incredibly quickly (and what can’t this woman do?) and under John’s and Bucky’s instructions, starts knitting herself a beanie. “You know how many ways there are of killing a person with a knitting needle? You’d be so surprised,” she cackles. Some time after Bucky’s left, when she’s finished and satisfied with her wonky hat, she puts it on and then scoops Miss Fluffy the Malaysian guinea pig from her lap and happily waltzes out of the room.
Bob is the last one to remain in the living room with John. He’s been very quiet the whole day, listening attentively to everyone and smiling when appropriate, but not actively contributing very much. He paid close attention when John showed him the basics, and after consulting it thoughtfully with John, Bucky and Yelena, he decided on trying to start on a scarf. Now he is sitting on the couch with his legs folded under him, and while in the beginning, he was frowning in concentration, now his brow has smoothed out. He’s very careful with his project and he’s much slower than John, Bucky and Yelena. Very slow. Over the months, John has noticed that Bob is in a better mood when he has enough time to do things. In a better mood when no one is rushing him into anything, when no one is yelling at him – yeah, basically when he’s being treated like a fucking human being.
Isn’t that true for all of them?
John has started working on a blanket. He feels the weight of the horrendous time commitment that knitting a blanket is, but the mostly positive response of his teammates to knitting made him think that maybe, possibly, he could take it up again, living here, and actually finish the blanket. Hell, even if he doesn’t finish it or if it’s ugly, he’s just gonna leave it lying around and let the guinea pig shit on it.
It’s not like he has a ton of stuff to do or people to see these days. The divorce got finalized a couple of months ago, but every other weekend, John gets to see his son in a park, at a playground or somewhere neutral. Olivia is amiable enough during these outings, and although he fucked up his marriage, John tries, really tries, to make the most of the moments he has with his son. Occasionally, he goes out with his army mates, but it’s weird spending time with them without Lemar by his side; he can’t get drunk anyway, so it mostly just leaves him feeling hollow and nostalgic. His sister’s terribly busy with her family and just talking to her on the phone, constantly being interrupted by her kids screaming in the background, always makes him feel like he’s wasting her time.
So even when they’re not on a mission together, he spends all his free time with his teammates anyway. He supposes there is no avoiding it, really, when your co-workers are your roommates are your friends.
Living in the Watchtower is –
Going to the gym and there’s a fair chance he’s gonna find Ava already on the leg press or Alexei with the barbell. Heading for a snack usually means John’s gonna have to walk through a floury hell, which is what the kitchen transforms into while Bob and Yelena bake cookies, and then John nearly always ends up being roped into oven duty. Getting up for a glass of water at 2AM and blearily padding by the living room, he will usually witness Bucky, Yelena, Bob and Ava huddled up on the couch, watching The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and barely hearing a word over their giggles, all of them gesturing at him to join them. Heading to the garage to take the motorbike for a spin, he’s likely to see Bucky and Alexei with their heads deep in the hood of some ancient car they brought from god knows where, tinkering with something, and being called over for his opinion as well.
However, living in the tower is also looking for the beer he stashed in the back of the fridge, just because he likes the taste, and in its place only finding a post-it note saying: “NO ALCOHOL IN THIS HOUSE, THANK YOU!” It’s someone’s red pair of shorts getting mixed up with his washing and ending up with nearly all his underwear pink, and nobody admitting whose they were. It’s coming to piles of dirty dishes in the sink even though the dishwasher is right there, and huffing angrily as he stacks everything inside, and then returning hours later and the sink is full again. It’s listening to Alexei’s and Yelena’s easy talk during dinner and wondering if he’ll ever have that with his son.
When it all gets a bit too much, he can always retreat to his room. And when that gets too intense – the solitude with the memories and regrets it invites – and he craves company but not really, when he doesn’t want loud chaos, but not loneliness, either, he knows where to find it.
It’s not really a reading room. It’s not even Bob’s room. It’s just a room where Bob can be found fairly reliably. It’s a common consensus that this is the place where Bob goes when he needs a break. He’s in therapy, and he’s learned to ask for help when he needs it, to seek one of them out if he feels trouble encroaching, but if he’s alright and just overwhelmed, when he wants the quiet but doesn’t necessarily need to be alone, this is where he goes. It’s a safe space. A tranquil place. And anyone who feels the same is allowed to join him. There are bookshelves and loveseats and noise-cancelling headphones and even a fake fucking fireplace that looks and sounds freakishly real. And John knows that every time he tentatively walks up to the door that’s always kept ajar and stops in the doorframe, wordlessly asking Can I…? with just his face, Bob will look up from his book and give him a little smile, nod and glance at the other loveseat, and John can curl up on it under the throw blanket like a little miserable croissant and close his eyes; and listening with his serum-enhanced hearing to the fake fire cracking, and the pages turning, and Bob’s peaceful breathing a few feet away, he feels safe and warm and grateful to be alive.
And that is exactly the feeling John has now, alone in a room with the man capable of plunging the entire population of NYC into maddening despair just by lifting his arm. The man who can fly effortlessly. The man who bended his shield into a taco like it was made of playdough. The man who saw his shame, who saw his soul at its ugliest with just a simple touch. The soft-looking man with the dishevelled hair, deeply focused on the knitting needles twisting between his fingers.
Bob sits alone in the middle of the couch. He was initially flanked by Yelena and Ava, but now that they’ve left, there’s room enough. A heavy checkered blanket is draped across his lap. It’s the oversized blanket Bob once brought back from a shopping spree with the girls, and all three of them have started huddling up under it ever since then, especially when they’re watching horror movies long into the night. And John doesn’t really care, watching them from his armchair a few feet away. It doesn’t bother him. He makes it a point not to look at them too much, anyway. But now, the girls are not here, and John could get up from his armchair, and he could take a couple of steps, and the couch – the blanket is huge, and he could theoretically sit next to him, and the blanket would be large enough for both him and Bob –
“So, um…” Bob looks at him with his eyebrows furrowed.
And John realizes he’s stopped knitting some time ago and has just been staring at him and daydreaming. “Hmm?”
“This is nice. I’ve never had a grandmotherly figure teaching me boring shit,” Bob says as he grins at him.
“Oh, fuck off.” John breaks eye contact and looks back down at his knitting.
“No, I’m sorry, I was just teasing you.” Bob’s face gets somber, suddenly. “Seriously, though. I like it. Nobody ever really taught me anything worth a damn.”
John doesn’t know what to say to that, so he doesn’t say anything. He thinks about the mean asshole in Bob’s shame room. He’s so glad he punched him out when he had the chance.
Bob speaks up again. “I never managed to ask. How was yesterday?”
John looks up, surprised that Bob remembered. Yesterday, he didn’t really announce to anyone that he was going to the playground to see his son.
“It was…” He shrugs. “Okay, I guess? Olivia got him this little push bike, and we thought we’d try it together for the first time, and he was scared at first, but then he got the hang of it real quick and by the end I almost couldn’t keep up with him.” He shakes his head fondly. “Every time I see him, it feels like he’s grown so much.”
Bob only hums. It’s quiet for a bit. Then:
“He’s lucky to have you.”
“Right.” John’s not sure if that’s sarcastic or not. He doesn’t think Bob would do that. But then he also thinks back to the memory of his son crying in the crib while he stared into his phone. The memory Bob witnessed. “Listen, I know you know I was shit. But I’m trying, these days, to be there for him. I really am.”
“I know.” And there is nothing but honesty in Bob’s face, so he must mean it.
They knit in companionable silence for a while. Somewhere deep in the tower, he dimly hears someone break something made of glass and swear. Then the cuckoo clock they bought for fun announces 4 o’clock, and John realizes they’ve been at it for hours now and the time Bob usually hides himself away with a book and a cup of tea has long passed. Bob doesn’t seem to notice, though. He doesn’t look bored or tired, doesn’t move to get up and wrap things up.
John finishes a row and sets the needles with the barely–even–there beginning of the blanket down. He takes a quiet breath, slowly.
“Tea?”
“Sure, thanks,” Bob flashes him a smile and his eyes sparkle with warmth.
Waiting in the kitchen by the kettle, he thinks about Bob’s eyes sparkling with something else altogether, outside the incineration chamber the day they met. Bob called him an asshole and John shoved him, pressed him up against the wall and there it was. The supernatural silver light glittering in Bob’s eyes, his cheeky little smirk, head held high, throat bared. John was captivated. He couldn’t figure him out then and he still can’t, these days. The way Bob sometimes looks at him, the way he sometimes jokes with him in a way that might be flirty, but John is so out of practise in this, and there’s no way of telling –
The water comes to a boil.
When John comes back and sets Bob’s mug in front of him on the coffee table, Bob throws one corner of the blanket aside and looks at him expectantly as he pats the couch cushion next to him.
“I don’t need –” John looks at the fluffy blanket, mind blank. “I don’t get cold – the serum, you know.”
Bob rolls his eyes. “Yeah, and I’m probably indestructible. Who gives a damn?”
There is not a single thought clanking around in the vast emptiness of John’s head right now, looking into Bob’s eyes. He sets his own mug of tea next to Bob’s, goes and fetches his knitting, and sits down next to Bob, at a perfectly respectable distance, not crowding him like the girls usually do. And Bob grabs the corner of the blanket he pulled aside and tosses it over John, and he scoots a bit closer, and because he’s sitting cross-legged, his knee presses into John’s thigh and Jesus Christ what the fuck has he gotten himself into.
“Are you okay?” Bob asks him, and John is a goddamned disaster apparently, because in his life, he’s seen some bad shit, some unimaginable horrors, been in a countless situations when things looked hopeless and he always managed to keep his cool, and now a beautiful man simply offers to share a blanket with him and John just freezes. John stares at him, and Bob’s so very close; John contemplates Bob’s eyelashes, which are stupidly, needlessly long and dark, and the curl with a couple of silver hairs in it that always falls into his eyes, and the few-days old stubble he’s let grow out; and Bob starts to look a bit worried, and then reaches over and wrapping his fingers around John’s wrist, says: “John?” –
– and that’s the last thing John hears before Bob’s touch transports him back to a memory.
Painfully aware that Bob is watching this as well, John sees himself aged seventeen, waiting at the corner of a suburban street, holding a bunch of marigolds he technically stole from one of the neighbours’ garden minutes before. Christ, he looks so young. Twenty years have passed and he barely recognizes himself. To think that this kid will go to the Academy in a year is insane.
As John watches his younger self nervously tapping his foot and slowly crushing the flowers in his grip, seventeen year-old Olivia comes into view. She’s wearing a summer dress and her hair glitters in the sun as it bounces on her shoulders with each step she takes. She is resplendent.
Seventeen year-old John smiles when he sees her. It’s a smile of someone who has yet to know pain, death, loneliness and failure. Seventeen year-old Olivia comes to him, grinning, and he hands her the flowers, self-conscious. She thanks him and does a silly little curtsy. Then she goes on her tiptoes, steadies herself by grabbing his arm, and kisses him quickly. Seventeen year-old John looks like all his wildest dreams just came true – and they just did. They hold hands and start walking away.
– and then Bob lets go of his wrist and John can breathe again.
These days, Bob doesn’t always project a flashback with his touch. It’s been a long time since he projected someone’s bad memory, but he will occasionally trigger something innocent. It’s always a bit strange when it happens with someone else and John is just watching it as an observer. The two caught in it always freeze for a couple of seconds and then they are back like nothing’s happened. Gradually they found out that the memory projected is usually of a similar tone to the emotion felt by the person Bob touches at the moment.
And so it must be broken now, surely, because John knows exactly what the young John felt in that memory. Affection. Infatuation. A sort of disbelief that someone like Olivia would choose him. In a measure, panic at the intensity of his feelings towards her.
A memory like that while sitting here alone with Bob? He will not think about what that implies, not now. He will not think about what Bob must be thinking right now.
The brand new existential crisis aside, John isn’t upset or angry at Bob for doing that. None of the others are when it happens, either. That would be pointless. They all got used to it. At the same time, Bob has learned not to apologize when it happens, not anymore; instead, Bob just smiles at him shyly, and his face does something John can’t quite decipher – his eyes go all big, like he’s just seen a unicorn and is giddy about it, and then Bob fucking blushes.
And what the hell is that supposed to mean?
All of a sudden, Bob breaks eye-contact and leans forward to grab his mug. He takes a sip and sighs contentedly.
“Mm. This is good tea. It’s steeped just right. Thank you. I’ll have to ask Bucky where he bought it. Though the coffee beans he got this time seem a bit too much, don’t you think? Oh, have I told you about the coffee I drank in Vietnam? It was so good. They serve it with sweetened condensed milk and it’s like a hug in a cup, honestly. I haven’t had better coffee since. Oh, and the rice wine! A national treasure. I used to buy it at this street stall from a lady who must have been like a hundred years old. It’s nothing fancy, but you could have it fast and it was cheap and good for you. Okay, granted, it is 40% alcohol, so, um, it’s bad for the body, good for the soul, but still –”
As Bob rambles, John stares at Bob’s hands wrapped around the mug of tea. So much power in those hands, and it’s fascinating, he supposes, yet what John really cares about is that Bob actually managed to stop biting his nails a couple weeks ago. He wonders whether babbling like that might be Bob’s way of dealing with whatever just happened between them.
John considers how far the two of them have come since the day they met, and the more John thinks back to that day, the more he wants to slap himself. Bob never really said so, but John knows Bob must have despised him that day; how he likely reminded him of his father, so irritable, so aggressive. Bob must have detested him after seeing that flashback of him neglecting his crying son.
Can a person ever truly change their mind about someone? Can months of interactions beat a horrible first impression?
John thinks about Bob drifting off most times during movie nights, and how he usually ends up with his head resting against the shoulder of whoever happens to sit nearest. The first time it happened when John was sitting beside him, he stilled in disbelief. He’d watched Bob fall asleep on Yelena and Ava before, but what had John ever done to deserve that? John held himself unnaturally still, determined not to squirm and wake him up. He was hyper-aware of the way Bob’s head weighed him down, of every slow breath he took. He wouldn’t have moved unless the tower was under attack. When the movie was over, Bob still collapsed against John’s upper arm, Yelena noticed and her face did a thing – it sort of melted in on itself, like it usually does when she’s watching videos about abandoned puppies finally finding a new loving home – and she began whispering “oh my god, guys, you’re too cute!” and made a little heart with her fingers. And John tried to look as threatening as possible while he mouthed “shut the fuck up”, shot daggers at her with his eyes and felt his face turn deep red. She would have probably stayed there for eternity, making fun of him, if Bucky hadn’t grabbed her by the back of her hoodie and dragged her out of the room.
He thinks back to the first time Olivia finally allowed him to see his son after she left, after months of no contact, and how awful it was – how he clung to his mother the whole time, and didn’t even want to look at him – and when John came back to the tower, he collapsed into the chair in the dining room and laid his head onto the table miserably. And then Bob came in, and made them both hot cocoa. He sat across from him, bumped John’s ankle with his foot and with a voice soft as leaves, said: “Tell me about him”.
He thinks about that time it was his and Bob’s turn to bring them all iced mochas, and while they were waiting in the queue in the coffeeshop, some old drunk guy began harassing the young barista, yelling at her and complaining his order was wrong. And Bob took a step closer to John, and they were so close they could have held hands if they wanted to, and he tried to be subtle about it, but when John looked at him and laid his hand on Bob’s elbow gently, Bob just shook his head imperceptibly, gave a sad little smile and stared at the floor. Normally, John would have probably gone to tell the drunk to knock it off, but as he was essentially acting like a human shield between Bob and the old yeller, he stayed put. He just stood next to Bob, their elbows touching, until the manager came and sorted it out.
He thinks back to that time he came back from his morning run on a scorching hot day, and it was so hot he already took his shirt off in the elevator, and as he walked shirtless into the kitchen, wiping the sweat out of his eyes and taking a water bottle out of the fridge, he heard someone choke behind him and he whipped around, and there was Bob, sitting alone at the table. There was half-eaten breakfast before him, and Bob spluttered some more and then sprayed coffee all over the table, and he wheezed “I’m okay, I’m okay”, all the while staring at John’s torso, never once looking into his eyes, and then his face went red and his mouth said words that had no meaning and he hurriedly walked out of the kitchen.
And now Bob rambles about Vietnamese drinks next to him while John, in his late thirties, is having a gay awakening? Not really an awakening, it’s just that… He’s never actually been with anyone apart from Olivia. They had been together since high-school and while he was perfectly aware there have been guys he was attracted to over the years, guys he liked looking at, he was incredibly happy with her and the thought would have never crossed his mind to do anything about it. He always supposed that this would be a part of him he’d leave unexplored. Ever since their relationship fell apart, he hasn’t really been in a state of mind that would allow him to think about – something – with someone. Or has he? Isn’t it crazy, that such a relatively short time after breaking up with the only woman he’s ever had, his companion of two decades, he’s now realizing that he might have a thing for a guy he didn’t even know a year ago? A guy he wouldn’t even have met if he weren’t sent to his death to that barbecue trap that night?
John looks at Bob’s knitting resting on the folds of the blanket in his lap, all wonky and uneven, but radiating enthusiasm. He follows the line of Bob’s arms and shoulders covered up by a hoodie, now relaxed and hunched, even though lately Bob’s started carrying himself with more self-confidence, back straight and shoulders broad. John basks in his closeness, the knee still pressed to his thigh under the blanket, out of sight yet at the forefront of his mind. He’s so very close he could reach out and touch him.
“– and this tearoom was on top of an east-facing cliff, you see, so if you actually forced yourself to get up early enough, you could watch the sunrise from up there? I felt real good there.” Bob smiles. There is a brightness in his eyes, a loveliness. He looks at John with genuine interest. No one ever looks at him like that anymore. “What’s the best place you’ve ever had tea in? Place that made you feel good?”
John glances at his own mug of tea, leans forward to grab it from the coffee table and takes a sip. Something all knotted up inside his chest lets go.
“Here, I reckon.”
~