Author's Note: Cross-posted from InsaneJournal. Uhm, yeah. So. This is because I want everyone to suffer the imagery in my head as badly as I do.
Deniz doesn't know what time it is when he wakes up, but he thinks that it must be early, because his feet are freezing and Roman's fidgeting next to him like he always does about that time. That dead time a few hours before dawn that's always the darkest, the coldest, and he'd never liked being awake at this hour until he'd started living with Roman. Until he'd seen and heard the proof that Roman's mind works as feverishly in sleep as it does in wakefulness; felt him writhe or kick or snuggle or thrust. The thing that always amazes Deniz is that he can stop all this – well, when he wants to. He knows just how much to comfort, or to nuzzle or prod to keep Roman calm, and just how much to respond to sleep-wandering hands and insistent hips.
He also knows just when to wake him up.
Tonight, Roman's face is shoved half into the pillow half into Deniz's shoulder, a small frown of concentration darkening the lines of shadow on his face. A few stray limbs are entangled with Deniz's in that strangely natural, comfortable way that Deniz has never experienced with anyone else. Too sticky with sweat and alcohol and god knows what else, or interrupted by female softness which made it feel more like smooshing than entanglement. As ridiculous as the notion seems, they fit, he and Roman, and in the early hours of the morning, still half asleep, he's willing to indulge in that thought.
He's almost asleep again when he feels Roman's thigh tense across his own, and he sighs lazily in interest as an insistent foot works itself in between his calves, trapping Deniz's right leg. Roman makes that noise that's somewhere between a moan and a sigh, and Deniz shifts, curious. The grip on his leg tightens, Roman's hips moving against his side in an almost painfully familiar way, and he hears himself grunt sleepily in the dark room.
There's hot breath close to his ear, making his skin prickle slightly; as hot as that is sometimes, most of the time it just tickles. It's something that has always made him feel oddly childish, being ticklish there, and he thinks that it might have something to do with the fact that Roman is so very not. Sensitive, yes – he could make Roman squirm and shudder by biting him only once, just beneath his ear – but not ticklish.
Deniz stretches out a little, feeling oddly kitten-like as his muscles readjust to wakefulness, and Roman exhales more interestedly as he drags himself closer to Deniz's movement, fingers splayed on his chest. He's about to join in when Roman grinds into his side, moaning again.
Only this time, it's not a moan. Not really. It's a syllable, although it feels more like a kick in the gut than anything. Marc.
A tiny syllable. It's only half enunciated, the word fading into breath at the end, and Deniz isn't quite sure what to do. He lays there for a minute that might have been an hour, blank, immobilised. He's oblivious to Roman's hips, still insistently pressed against his side; oblivious to the leg wound around his own; to the hand that twitches impatiently across his stomach. The only thing he notices is the breath on his neck, hot and humid and it doesn't tickle, anymore, he thinks absurdly. It doesn't tickle, but it seems to grate. Like a mosquito that buzzes incessantly around your ear only heavier, darker, and Deniz can't stand it.
He shrugs Roman's head off his shoulder, and it's only then that he realizes that his whole body is tensed. The earlier laziness is gone completely as he shifts on the pillow, trying to get rid of the feeling of the breath, and only succeeds in eliciting another wordless groan from Roman.
He hears himself sob, then – not loudly, but more like the choked release of a breath he wasn't aware he'd been holding. He bites his lip, willing himself to shut up, but he can't stay here right now, and he sure as hell isn't going to wake Roman up. Wouldn't want to interrupt his fun, his cynical side tosses in cruelly.
Deniz is out of the bed – their bed – before he's really made the decision to be, and isn't entirely sure how he ends up in the bathroom, only knows that all he wants right now is a shower. The heat, the heady steam.
Something to wash the breath from his neck.
To wash that syllable from his ear.
He steps under the water, conscious again of his still-tense muscles, and scrubs his hands across his neck almost frantically. His ears are almost ringing after a few seconds, and he feels so many familiar feelings wash over him with the water. And like the water, a few of them cling to him. His hands find the tiled wall in front of him, and he leans against it, arms extended, shaking more than he'd like, and he thinks that it's anger.
Staring through the wall in front of him, he just stands there and lets thoughts come to him.
The problem is that all he can tell himself for those minutes is that he should have known. Or, worse, that he did know. That he'd known all along, really, and that he'd trusted Roman when he told him he was over his ex, and that that was a big, big mistake.
Breathing shakily, Deniz squeezes his eyes shut and lets his head drop.
No. That isn't fair. He knows that dreams aren't controllable, and as many times as Nina has tried to convince him otherwise, he knows that dreams aren't always an outlet for a repressed subconscious. He's had enough ridiculous dreams to know, and he'd be lying if he said he'd only ever dreamed about Roman.
He spends a few seconds trying to convince himself of that but he knows it's not the same thing. Not the same thing to dream of some random person as it is to dream of your ex. He feels something akin to desperation hit him hard in the chest, and it's like being winded. His hands push into the wall harder, his shoulders tensing, and the lump in his throat threatens to choke him. It's only then that he realizes that the lump has been there this whole time. It's been there since Roman said that.
The water temperature fluctuates a little bit, the near-searing heat dropping momentarily to a luke-warm, and the moment seems much longer than it is. He's always hated it when showers did that, because the shower had always been one place he could shut himself off entirely from the rest of the world, where no one would interrupt him and he could just think. Or let himself not think. But that disruption of the heat tapping steadily against his skin always grounded him, reminded him where he was, made him aware of whatever he'd been thinking of.
Not tonight, though. Tonight, it just pisses him off. Tips him over the edge, and he hears his fist connect with the tile long before he feels it.
When Roman wakes up the next morning, smiling impishly and biting Deniz's side, Deniz pretends he doesn't know. Pretends he doesn't know what Roman may or may not remember. Pretends everything is okay, when really it's all he can do to keep from demanding the answers to the questions that have plagued him all night. Pretends it normal when he ignores Roman's cheeky foreplay and pins him to the mattress, desperate for this in a way he hasn't been for more than a year.
Roman doesn't ask, but his blue eyes are darkened with something more than lust, and Deniz wonders for a brief, horrible moment if Roman knows, too.
The dull ache in his fist turns into a sharper pain as he holds Roman's hands above his head, tighter than strictly necessary, but when Roman hooks his legs around Deniz's waist, he forgets his hand altogether. He wishes, not for the first time, that the ache in his chest could be gotten rid of the same way.