After
By carnifax (originally posted to tumblr)
Suits
Harvey/Mike
Rated T
Romance | Angst
Mike tries to breathe and finds he can't. His eyes are still on the clean, white sheets, crumpled and tangled.
Mike stands with his back to the door, his hands over his face, his fingers just spread enough to see through. He doesn't want to look but he stares, unblinking. He can't look away. It's like a car crash, a train wreck, a building demolition. But it's not violent, not destruction; not physical, anyway.
It's just a bed. A mattress. Pillows. Clean sheets, white, made of something soft. And it's still warm from where he scrambled out of it a moment ago upon realizing that the other side of it was empty.
Things happened in that bed. There are testaments to the night everywhere. Half the covers thrown off. Stray bits of clothing strewn across the dresser, the footboard, caught in the curtain rod. A bottle of lubricant laying sideways on the nightstand, uncapped and oozing. Condom wrappers littering the floor by the garbage can where no one was patient enough to aim.
But that's all that's left — that, and the memory in Mike's head, which may as well have been a dream, for all that it matters now.
Mike had started it. It had only been a kiss, not even with a specific intention, but in the pause afterwards, in the brief seconds that their lips were apart, they both seemed to come to the same conclusion. They ended up here, in Harvey's apartment, in this bed. Mike couldn't remember the details — only a whirlwind of desire and laughter and sex and familiarity and warmth — but he knew it had been perfect. There had been no second thoughts, no fear, no scowls or disappointments or awkward pauses.
But it must not have been perfect, because now Mike is alone and Harvey is gone.
Mike tries to breathe and finds he can't. His eyes are still on the clean, white sheets, crumpled and tangled. It hurts. It fucking hurts.
For the last six months at least, Mike has been trying to pretend that his feelings for his boss were harmless. It was hero-worship, innocuous and temporary. Once they subsided, all that would be left would be admiration, he was sure.
Even last night, he figured it was a friendly thing.
It isn't friendly anymore, he knows it. It was always like this — always going to end like this, too, with him alone and Harvey who-knows-where. He's in love with the man, and Harvey must know it. Harvey must have left because of it.
He swallows and drops his hands from his face. He's shaking and cold, so he dresses, but that does nothing. He catches a glimpse of himself in the long mirror at the side of Harvey's closet and scrubs at his red eyes, hating Harvey, hating himself even more. It just makes more tears fall, so Mike turns away and shoves on his other shoe, wraps his tie in a ball and tucks it in his coat pocket.
He glances around the bedroom once more before he opens the door, knowing that the image of that clean, silent, tousled bed would stay perfectly preserved in his memory.
Mike is reaching for his bag where he dropped it last night in the entryway when the lock of the front door clicks open. The smell of coffee hits him just as the sound registers; he jerks upright and doesn't turn around.
A deep laugh, Harvey's — and Mike feels like he was just stabbed through the chest. His lungs stop working entirely. His eyes burn and his throat closes.
"You're leaving already?" comes the voice, amused. "Where do you have to go? It's Saturday." A pause; "Mike?"
He turns around to face Harvey, rifling his hand through his hair, pulling on it nervously. He can't fucking do this, he can't even speak, he can't even catch his goddamn breath. He doesn't need his dignity to be another casualty of this shit decision and he doesn't know if he could—
"Christ, Mike, what—"
"I ruined it. Didn't I?" He swallows hard. "Last night. I ruined it."
Harvey looks just as terrified as Mike feels for half a second. But then understanding — of what? Mike doesn't know — lights up behind his eyes and he closes his mouth. Neatly, calmly, Harvey closes the door, and puts down the brown bag and coffee, and then looks at his associate again.
"Harvey," Mike says when he can't take any more of the man's solemn gaze. His voice is broken and desperate. "I'm sorry— I didn't mean— I can't—"
Harvey reaches for him before he can say anything else, pulling Mike into his chest. "Shit, kid," he breathes as Mike buries his face against Harvey's neck. "I think we might be fucked on this one."
It's a long time before Mike can manage words again, and when he speaks, he just asks, "'We'?"
Harvey's arm around his waist tightens slightly. "Yeah," he says, with a degree of hesitation. "Yeah, Mike, trust me. I'm just as fucked as you are."