Author's Note: Over a month ago I started drafting a new fic, based off of my favourite group of boys, my favourite place in the world, and one of my favourite films of all time. That film is 'Dead Poets' Society'. Each chapter is inspired by a Rat Pack song, is littered with Britishisms (which I'll gladly explain), and follows Athos' adventures with his two best friends - if only Athos could tell them exactly what sort of adventures he dreams about.
This fic is a labour of love, encouraged by my beloved betas SirLancelotTheBrave and WizzKiz, and posted in honour of that brilliant man, Robin Williams. I hope you like it!
Chapter 1
"I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a poet, a pawn and a king.
I've been up and down and over and out, and I know one thing;
Each time I find myself flat on my face,
I pick myself up and get back in the race."
- Frank Sinatra, 'That's Life'
"This is an all stations, Piccadilly line train," the disjointed female voice said over the tannoy. "Next stop: Hounslow West."
Athos mouthed the familiar words and let his head tip back onto the chair, the sounds of clattering tracks and roaring tunnels in his ears. There was something unholy in how he had a thin scarf wound tight around his neck and yet he was still freezing.
He flicked his music onto shuffle and snorted contemptuously when Frank Sinatra's 'That's Life' came on.
Frank didn't know the half of it. Life had an alarming tendency to trip him up just when he thought he was coping, it was ferociously unfair.
Outside of his window, London loomed, a sleeping beast on the verge of a winter's dawn. It was grey, and dark, and cold, but it felt like more of a home than the house he had left that morning.
"This is: Hounslow East. Next stop: Osterley."
He'd been up since 5am, and that was Paris time. Now, back in England, it felt as if he had been awake for far too long already.
Not that anyone had noticed him leaving; his parents had been very aware of what time his plane was, but the sprawling house had been silent. Only the gardener had paid him any heed, their fogged breaths twirling in the frigid air as they nodded at each other over the frosted grass.
It was no more of a going away party than he had expected.
"This is: Boston Manor. Next stop: Northfields."
He closed his eyes and hunkered down further in his uncomfortable, scratchy, ridiculously reassuring, Underground train seat.
His parents had never forgiven him for choosing an English university – to be honest, they had never forgiven him for a myriad of things, none of which he felt deserved such an acerbic reaction. His dreams were so much stomping material to them.
Life was bitter as well as unfair, Frank.
But this was his way of picking himself up after falling flat on his face; England had been his new start, his new dream, his last chance.
He wouldn't be missed, not by his parents, not by Paris, not by the gardener, not by anyone.
"This is: South Ealing. Next stop: Acton-"
There was a commotion by the door, the sound of panting breaths and scraping bags. Athos frowned behind his closed eyelids, no one ever used the end carriages this early in the morning – it was why he liked them so much.
Someone sat down right next to him. In an empty carriage. At an outrageously early time.
They were warm and smelled like sandalwood.
It was the exact same scent that he had spent hours hunting for last Christmas.
"You know, they say 'mind the gap' for a reason, Porthos."
The low chuckle of a response was the first sincere thing he had heard in over three months. He smiled without opening his eyes, unable to restrain the burst of joy in his stomach, at the feeling of being able to fly after having his wings clipped for so long.
All morning he had felt adrift, in between homes, and suddenly he felt anchored to something steady. He shifted slightly, his shoulder leaning heavier on Porthos' broad one. "This is early for you, mon ami."
The pet name dropped from his mouth without him meaning to say it. He was still straddling the mental border between London and Paris, but he knew where he wanted to be, who he wanted to be with.
On one side was the clutching blackness of his past, sharp turns, jagged metal, and the seductive scent of night-blooming flowers. On the other was the person he had become; yes, that person was slightly – who was he kidding, very – damaged, but he had started healing here.
Heal what the best doctors in Paris could not.
"Yeah, well, knew you'd be in Heathrow at shit o'clock," Porthos laughed unabashedly, confirming the theory that he had deliberately searched the furthest, emptiest carriage for him.
His misanthropic nature was getting far too predictable.
He opened his eyes to meet Porthos' darker ones, and felt his chest twist in a way that shouldn't have been so familiar. Porthos had a grin that was at once friendly and dirty, as if he was considering hugging you but might bite your throat whilst he had you at his mercy.
The joy that had gripped his stomach sparked treacherously into something entirely unwanted and chased away any memories of cold hallways and bitter goodbyes.
"Why were you back at Ealing?" he asked hoarsely, and mentally chanted the word idiot at himself.
Only idiots looked at one of their best friends for the first time in three months and immediately forgot every single promise that they had made themselves over the summer, almost forgot why that could never happen.
Porthos shrugged, a movement of rippling muscle under his threadbare white t-shirt. "They had a space open and I wanted to be closer to Uni."
Athos forced his attention onto the words; it was easier to focus on their easy friendship than the whirling miasma of emotions roiling in his head.
It was always easier to focus on that, that was the problem; he was too good at running away.
Porthos lived in halfway homes during the holidays, saving every single penny he could for when his government grant kicked in for the semester. As an orphan born and bred in London, he was a kid of the state, but his aptitude for criminal psychology had garnered him a place in one of the city's best universities.
They had met on this exact train two years ago, when Athos had foolishly brought all of his luggage with him. Porthos had watched him struggle for a bit, evidently torn between breaking the indomitable rules of the Underground and courtesy, before shouldering two bags and striking up a conversation.
He had been too shocked to do anything but reply numbly, "Yes, I'm enrolled at Musketeers College, too."
That was the first time he had seen Porthos' insanely endearing grin, and the first time he had hidden a part of himself that he hadn't known existed – and still didn't know how to deal with.
Porthos offered him a piece of gum, not even noticing the way he twitched when their fingers brushed. It had been too long; he had forgotten what a kick to the system Porthos could be, with his muscled legs clad in black-denim stretched out in front of him and some black boots that had seen better days.
Porthos was an ebony statue with the rough edges displayed proudly, like a sculptor who wanted his art to be seen in its entirety, not just the individual pieces.
God, he was such an idiot.
"Did Aramis write to you?" Porthos asked, breaking into his dangerously loud thoughts.
"Of course he did, copiously," he replied, thankful to fall back into his usual dry tone. "In fact, I told him to make any postage payable to me and he took that as an opportunity to send me huge boxes of sweets."
Porthos' chuckled. "You know he worries you won't eat enough without him there to bug you."
He smiled wryly, affection managing to soothe the raging storm in his chest. Those letters had been like bursts of light in the dreariness of his summer, and the packages like glorious fireworks.
He had lunched on lobster and caviar, but those tiny, almost-stale chocolates had somehow tasted infinitely better.
"Did he write to you, too?"
"'Course, how d'you think I knew you were comin' today?"
"You're meant to use your degree to capture criminals, not learn how to stalk me," he murmured archly, but felt his lip twitch when Porthos just raised an eyebrow at him.
"You can talk, Monsieur English," Porthos taunted, and Athos winced at the ridiculous nickname and Porthos' awful attempts at a French accent. "Your emails were non-existent."
"I'll have you know the word you were looking for is sporadic," he said haughtily, but the effect was lost when Porthos snorted and mimicked him. "What did you want my emails for, anyway? Aramis' letters are like novels."
Porthos looked at him strangely then, a slight furrowing to his brow that Athos itched to reach out and smooth, but kept himself firmly in check. As he always did.
"Like to know you're doin' alright, 's'all," Porthos said it as if it was obvious, and it was, it should have been.
He had forgotten what it was like to be with people that actually cared and weren't just acting on some facsimile of emotion.
He felt the wall around his heart start to shudder, but he had built it the moment he had waved goodbye to his best friends and it was proving difficult to rip down again.
It had taken a beating this summer, too often had he seen cold, empty smiles and compared them to the bright, happy ones of Porthos and Aramis, and found his life wanting.
Honestly, he was already wanting too damn much.
When they finally got to their station, he was glad that Porthos was there. It would have felt too strange to walk onto campus without him by his side.
It occurred to him that Porthos and Aramis had known that.
He blinked stupidly at Porthos' broad back, at the bedraggled Nike bag with Porthos' few favoured possessions in, and realised that for all of his life's problems, he had two of the best friends in the entire world.
Aramis and Porthos were the ones who picked him up, put him back on his feet – sometimes literally. He couldn't be flung over Porthos' shoulder like Aramis could, but they had propped him up and ferried him home more times than he could count.
"Is Aramis already there?" he asked when they had broken into the blinding whiteness of a winter morning. London blared at him, all beautiful buildings and black cabs, a cacophony of noise even in the bizarre serenity of the moment.
Trees dotted the roads, little flashes of green amidst the grey. Porthos' fingers reached out to brush the bark as they walked down the street. "Yeah, he's got our rooms ready, said your microwave's still there."
He made a noise of surprise, he had thought that it would have been confiscated by now – they weren't supposed to have personal appliances. That hadn't stopped them from creating a kitchenette in his room, of course.
Why they insisted on using his room, he had no idea. Sometimes one of them would want to use something and then just end up lounging on his bed and watching television.
Really, he couldn't even call himself anti-social anymore, not around those two.
Certainly not when he felt himself smiling at the thought of seeing Aramis and it being the three of them again.
It had been the three of them since the first day of class, when Athos had fallen into a chair next to the most seductive of smiles he had ever seen. If Porthos had been the battering ram to his sensibilities, Aramis was the charismatic king that took up residence in the conquered castle.
The first day of term, and far from learning about Geoffrey Chaucer, he had learned something about himself that, if discovered, would have him cast even further out of his family circle. He already had painful knowledge of his parents' stance on dishonour and it hadn't ended well for Thomas, the brother he had lost.
Now he had to keep everything a secret so that he could keep the brothers he had gained, no matter how tempting a smile could be.
It hadn't helped that Aramis was a flirt of the first water and it had amused him to no end to realise that Athos didn't blink an eye at his charms. Aramis, ever appreciative of a challenge, had decided that they were going to be spending a lot of time together after that.
Aramis had claimed – as they walked away from their languages lecture – that anyone who didn't faint under his attention was worthy of it, but although Porthos hadn't fainted, he hadn't exactly been immune, either.
Athos remembered interest sparking in Porthos' gaze when Aramis had recognised him in their dorms that night, and sauntered over with so much sway in his step that it should have been illegal.
Athos had practiced for years to perfect a poker face, a polite smile, a look of boredom. Confronted with one of Aramis' winks, he had called upon every trick he knew to keep his expression unimpressed. Porthos, however, had let his eyes drift from the perfect curls on Aramis' head to the Cuban heel boots that he had spent a fortune on.
But then, Porthos had the freedom to do that.
Neither of them had any idea that desire had kicked him so very hard in the gut when they had started conversing in tones just a mile past flirtatious.
Where Porthos was muscled and broad, Aramis was lean and slender, and they both had smiles that could make the sun shine. They had also settled into a solid friendship tempered with lewd looks and harmless teasing, and dragged him along with them.
They had entered his life quite without his say, and they had no intention of leaving.
It was quite possibly the best thing that had ever happened to him, which was the sole reason he treated their friendship with the reverence Aramis saved for church.
Athos still didn't quite understand it, but they wanted to spend time with him just for being himself.
How could he ever risk that by acting on emotions he didn't even understand, let alone want?
No, he would suffer in silence, revel in their presence, savour the memories, and, when he was alone, play every single sweet smile, soft word, and warm touch, over in his head.
It was safest that way, for all of them.
They were his friends, and that's all they could ever be.
A stone arch passed overhead and then he and Porthos were on the campus proper. The greenery was hidden under a layer of hoarfrost but the weak sunlight made everything glitter brilliantly.
Something coiled and forcefully neutral in his chest unwound, and he took a deep, relaxed breath for the first time in months.
"Good to be back?" Porthos asked with a grin, but there was a streak of fond concern there too.
"You have no idea," he murmured, and let the rightness of this life wash over him. It was completed when Porthos' warm arm hooked around his shoulders, completely uncaring of the instinctive scowl Athos gave for accosting him – because Porthos knew he needed it.
It was perfected when Porthos herded him towards their dorm building and the front door slammed open, a stream of ecstatic Spanish sailing forth.
Suddenly, there were dark curls in his face and the smell of cinnamon – tart and sweet – in his nose. Aramis had ignored his grunt of surprise and thrown himself at them, fitting between he and Porthos perfectly.
He felt whole again, as if the two missing pieces to his life's puzzle had slotted into place.
"Okay, term can begin now," Aramis said, his smile so delighted that Athos couldn't help but laugh. It came straight from his stomach, affectionate and warm and ridiculous.
Porthos chuckled and curled his other arm over Aramis' shoulders, pulling them in for a quick, tight, impromptu hug. It was the three of them again, against the world, and the wall around his heart could finally fall.
He allowed himself this, the sweet torture, and sighed contentedly.
Life was good, sometimes.
Author's Note: Thank you for reading! Want to ask a question, have the boys go somewhere in particular, or perhaps you want to scream at Athos with me? Leave me a review!
The Piccadilly line is the navy blue line on the Underground, and a tannoy is a loudspeaker. Criminal psychology because why not, it may change.