The Daily Grind
Miles isn't domestic in any sense of the word.
Growing up, with a tired-scientist dad and a working-so-hard-she's-almost-catatonic mom, Miles had learnt pretty quickly that there were more important things in the world, such as earning cold, hard cash, than knowing how to make pasta (or edible pasta, to be precise) or knowing how to properly clean a room or how to operate the damn Hoover of Hate.
His first apartment - a small, dilapidated property in the city - had always been half-covered in clothes, plates, mugs, DVDs and CDs out of their cases and pretty much every single book in his possession during his tenure in UCLA.
Any date he'd brought back - and he had to admit that those had been few and far between at the best of times - had had to contend with lying back on sheets washed a few months ago and spreading themselves afterwards, somewhat sated, on a too-small bed for two.
Fortunately, Daniel is surprisingly great at this sorta thing. Miles' dad tries to hook him up with Charlotte from the archaeology crew and while she's pretty awesome and they hang out all the time, Miles finds himself watching her best friend Daniel a bit too much. Daniel's not his type - a guy for starters - and he's a bit clumsy and talkative and some kind of physics genius who can't remember to tie his shoes a lot of the time.
But for some reason, Miles asks him out and Daniel agrees and Miles gets the 'best-friend-break-his-heart-I-break-your-nuts' speech from Charlotte before their date. They go to dinner and despite Daniel's habit of filling comfortable silence with random facts and figures and Miles' habit of sarcasm and cynical quips, they have a great time.
That night they tumble into bed together, Miles makes Daniel come apart and reform like nothing else in the world. Daniel's a keeper, Miles deduces, before drifting off to sleep.
Six months later and that old apartment is gone, replaced in favour of a bigger one near Venice Beach ("where all the trendy artists hock their crap to people who are trying to be trendy", Miles explains to Charlotte over lunch one day in a bistro) and Daniel and Miles christen the apartment by fucking in every room (even though Daniel complains lightly that his shins hurt and Miles' upper back is killing him for days afterwards) and it's perfect.
And every night, after Miles has said goodnight to James in the office and high-fived Ana-Lucia out of the way out of the police building, he returns to their apartment to find Daniel cooking something and looking a strange paragon of domesticity in a blue-striped Oceanic apron.
A cookery book - a whole menagerie of French and Italian and Japanese and Thai (and Miles even thinks he saw fucking Australian there. Seriously, what is Australian cuisine? Kangaroos??) tomes reside on a shelf near the stove - is always propped up next to the radio which always plays classical music with an always-present Daniel stirring something.
At the back of his mind, Miles sometimes wonders whether or not he should be frustrated with this domestic pattern they've fallen into. They got out and see friends and go to clubs (the memory of Miles dragging Daniel to a goth club will serve as an anecdote for many years to come) and have amazing sex but Miles never feels quite as relaxed as when it's just him and Daniel, trapped in their little bubble.
No. Not trapped. Snug.
Miles never quite feels as chilled as he does when his hands curl possessive around Daniel's too-skinny waist and he breathes in the scent of spices and sweetness from the nape of Daniel's neck. The job does a lot to a guy's psyche but five minutes with Daniel, hearing him hum 'The Girl With The Flaxen Hair' (the first time Daniel had told Miles it was his favourite, after falling for a girl when he was ten, Miles always remembers the irrational spike of jealousy he felt) has the tension dissolving into nothing.
Sure, he and Daniel hang out with Charlotte and Miles' mom and dad all the time (the former much, much more than the latter) and they're cool but Miles enjoys having Daniel all to himself. Having Daniel become domestic and comforting and relaxing is so fucking amazing that Miles can't believe it every time he comes in.
So they hum to Debussy and eat strange delicacies and make love and talk about nothing and everything and you know what?
It's perfect.
Fin