A/N: You pick up a book written in 1941 and it's so good you ship two characters who are only in three chapters. THEY'RE SO ADORABLE I WILL SAIL THIS SHIP ALONE AND LIKE IT. *Cough* anyway these two cuties have just gotten out of France after travelling/trying to escape together for a few months post-Dunkirk.
"Guess I'll be seeing you," Sam says. His voice doesn't carry well in the bustling port.
Charles Townshend isn't as pale as he had been during the trek across France, though he'd turned out to be weak to the sea. His shoulder is tightly bandaged under his shirt, though the only outward sign of it is that he holds his arm gingerly. He's a peculiar mixture of delicate and tough, walking with grit teeth as he had through poison and wound, and it inspires the most passionate feelings in Sam's chest. He hasn't quite had time to work out what they are yet.
"Yes," Charles agrees, just as faintly. It strikes Sam that the dock isn't actually all that noisy or crowded. "You should come visit me at Oxford sometime."
Sam mumbles an assent. Sure he would, just the same as Charles would swing by Yorkshire when he found the time, and after a thick pause, Charles nods to him and turns away.
Only Yorkshire and Oxford boys don't get together for tea. They never would have met if not for the war, and they'll never meet again after they walk away. Sam will go back to work his hands strong as tree branches in trade, and Charles will go back to finery and politics and settle down with some girl or other and make little Townshends, assuming they all live that long, and he's worked himself up into such a state that it's not until he's listening to the fading shout of "Wait!" that he realizes he's said anything.
Maybe he's being stupid, maybe too many sleepless and frightful days with Charles shivering and sick, curled into his broader frame, have given him some sort of Townshend-specific shell-shock.
Whatever the case, before he's much thought about it he's kissing a man in broad daylight. He feels like an oversized, clumsy giant with Charles' thin face cradled in his big, rough hands, and he tries to be careful, a starving man given a meal trying to mind his manners. Charles is small, he never realized, or he did but not in context. Sam has to tilt his fine-boned chin up so far with his thumbs, and both of their lips are chapped and they taste like fish and miles of French countryside but Sam doesn't care, he's warm, on fire for the first time it seems since he left England months ago, and he never wants to stop.
Of course, he has to. Has to draw back when Charles regains his balance and composure and knocks at his chest, even if his long fingers seem torn between shoving and sticking.
Charles falls back with wide eyes, the hand of his unhurt arm flung up to protect his lips, but he doesn't go more than a pace away. People are looking at them, but he and Charles are obviously enough returned soldiers that no one will give them lip for the offense.
"You- Sam what in god's name did you do that for?!" Charles says, maybe louder than is wise, but his cheeks are flushed probably for the first time in their acquaintance and even as some bright light in Sam's chest fades, he revels in it. "You can't just- you can't do that to someone in public - and a man, and-"
Sam winces. So he's fucked this up, which, good going Walls, what the hell else did you expect. He mutters an apology and makes to leave - not that he's ever been one to back down from a fight, no, there's still a madness controlling him, mind, body, and soul, and there's a terrible guilt suffusing through him in place of the pleasantly glowing embers, so he's about to run for the hope that distance will give Charles some peace.
But as he takes one quick stride away a hand latches onto his forearm. "Don't go!" Charles again proves he isn't the waifish fig tree he looks, his grip like iron. There's a note in his voice, now devoid of anger, that stops Sam in his tracks. He sounds exactly like Sam feels - leave it to an educated upper-class boy to find a way to put that nameless desire into words. Charles seems to realize it too, and his flush manages to deepen. He looks away but doesn't let go. "I wasn't finished."
If not for the warning glare Charles gave him, Sam would have kissed him again right there. As it is he grins wide and happy, his joy, like him, too brutish to be tentative. Charles, at least, has the grace to be bashful.
"Look, we both got a ways to go to get home. Let's find a place to sleep off the trip and plan our next move," Sam suggests.
Charles casts his gaze about the little port, then nods. "There must be an inn nearby."
Sam tugs Charles in close to his side, then blinks up at the sun for a moment, wondering why it chose then to shine so much brighter. "Come on then," he says, looking back down at Charles "stay close."
And they did.