Notes: I got back on the horse - just, dived right the fuck back in and cracked my whip until this shit got done. I'm badly traumatised by the recent spoilers (I know we all are - think we need a group hug around here or something, an AA style support group) and none of this really makes it better but it needed to be written or I might have just shrivelled up and died. The story is pretty angsty, quite character-studyish, but with a happy ending and a few It's A Wonderful Life references.
I hardly even know what I'm doing here. Go easy on me, please, I'm fragile!
Warnings: Mentions of domestic violence. Also spoilers for the next few weeks of episodes. Oh, and John-Paul McQueen is here but not for very long and he only has a bit part as a plot device.
Word Count: ~5500
Title and lyrics from Sarah McLachlan - Fumbling Towards Ecstasy
all the fear has left me now
i'm not frightened anymore
it's my heart that pounds beneath my flesh
it's my mouth that pushes out this breath
He sits, both hands wrapped around his pint and almost numb from the cold glass. Condensation dribbles through his fingers and it would irritate him normally, he hates condensation, a product of working in the club, hands constantly, itchingly damp from cold drinks and bottles, but right now the only thing his hands feel is the crack of skin and bone against his knuckles. The reverberation still rattles through the bones of his arm, constant and shattering, and Brendan thinks it would suit him just fine if he could feel the pain of it forever. It's the very least he deserves.
"Come on then, I've shared my miserable story," John-Paul says, cocks his head plainly like he's not going to stand for Brendan's bullshit so he'd better start talking. "Misery loves company after all."
"Wrong," he replies dully, "misery likes loneliness and self-reproach."
"When has that ever done anyone any good?" Funnily enough, Brendan wants to talk, just a bit, but he's just not used to it. He doesn't really know how someone starts a conversation like this - there's this bloke? I kind of love him but I decided he was too good for me and - oh, did I mention? I punched him in the face. Not likely. "You've got the rest of your life to sit and wallow in self pity and I'm off back home tomorrow so - "
There's something about him, though, this John-Paul. This guy who just materialised out of the shadows at the train station wearing an expression that somehow managed to match exactly how Brendan was feeling. He doesn't know if it's that or the accent, the clipped vowels and dropped consonants. It's so painfully, achingly familiar that he wants to keep him talking for a while until he's soaked up enough to saturate his memories with and unfortunately that requires some input from himself.
"There's this bloke - " he says, stops and scoffs. Fucking Christ that really did sound as crap as it did in his head.
If John-Paul's surprised by the admittance, he doesn't show it. Brendan doesn't know whether he's offended by that. He's still stuck on some ridiculous, outdated notion that he doesn't look gay, whatever the fuck that even means. He knows that's his Pa talking - he'll always be talking through Brendan, no matter how long and far the distance between them. " - I left England to get away from him."
"What did he do?"
"Christ," Brendan chokes, trembling hands pulling roughly through his hair, across his face. His heart's beating fast all of a sudden and he's irrationally angry and helpless all at once. "He didn't do anything, not a damn thing, he's fucking - he's just - "
"Wow, sounds like you're about to top my story," John-Paul says lightly but the tension in Brendan doesn't ease. It's there, always. Coming and going occasionally but generally constant, sometimes tamped down by booze or exhaustion and sometimes swelling in a tidal wave of all-encompassing agony that leaves him on his knees over the toilet bowl, sick and shaking and horrified. "Someone must 'ave done something?"
"I hit him," he blurts out and fuck, it's unexpected and ringing out like an accusation, like he's daring John-Paul to say something, just fucking asking for him to call Brendan all the things he feels as corrupt as. He's so broken like this, everything from his own limbs to the filter between his thoughts and his mouth is fucked so far out of his control that he feels half like he belongs to someone else. He does, he supposes.
This was supposed to be the easiest way out. It's over and that's what he wanted, he's meant to feel at peace with it.
John-Paul looks at him warily, cool and inquisitive and says, dispassionately, "sounds like a pretty shit thing to do."
"I'm a pretty shit guy."
"Yeah, I'm startin' to get that."
"What, you're not gonna ask why?"
"Ask why you hit your ex?" he asks, genuinely confused. Brendan says silent and tries to let that tone make sense. He processes John-Paul's face, tight frown, mouth twisted at the corner, and nods, wants John-Paul to say something to solidify what Brendan thinks he's getting at. "Didn't even cross my mind, no. Does it matter?"
"I dunno, yeah? I didn't just - " he starts and stutters. He didn't just what? Hit Steven for nothing? " - I did it for - " Christ, how does he end that sentence? He did for Steven? For his own good? "You know what, fuck it. Let's just say that people back home are better off without me."
John-Paul laughs. "So what am I then? Clarence? Should I call you George, now?"
"Trust me, there's nothing remotely hopeful or festive about my story," he scoffs, bitterly.
"Suit yourself. Fuck it, then. I'll drink to that." He holds up his glass and Brendan tips his forward and clinks them together. He's about to take a gulp, potentially down the whole lot, actually - he's definitely considering it, when his phone buzzes against his thigh through the denim of his jeans. He wriggles it out and his hands slip on his damp glass, fingers suddenly numb, the base landing unevenly on the table-top, liquid sloshing over the sides.
Incoming call - Steven.
He stares down at in blankly, hand curled around it and falling back onto his lap because he hasn't the strength to hold it up. It feels like a dense, lead brick in his palm.
There's two fingers clicking in front of his face and he looks up, slow like an insect through syrup. "What's up?"
Brendan can't speak, just shakes his empty, cotton-wool stuffed head. The phone stops vibrating in his hand and his skin tingles with aftershocks, sensations crawling up his arm, his shoulder, across his chest and through his stomach until he feels awareness creep through his shock and he can give those sensations a name. Steven just called him and it's weird, fluttering panic that he's feeling. Panic and something else. Relief. Fuck - it's relief and he should be ashamed of himself after what he's done that he still has the capacity to want what he has no right wanting anymore.
"Nothing," he rasps out through his suddenly swollen throat. "I'm fine."
"You look like you've just seen a ghost, seriously," John-Paul says and Brendan thinks, you're not far off. "Who's phoning? Or do I need to even ask?"
"None of your God-damned business, that's who," Brendan replies flatly, body filled to the brim with roiling, warring emotions but voice weirdly void of any of it like it can't decide which it wants to land on.
John-Paul exhales a dry laugh. "Not gonna answer this mystery caller then?"
"Did I not just tell you about the part where it's not your business?"
"You made it pretty clear, yeah."
"Okay, then. Drink your pint and shut up."
He does, concedes one sip, and then gets right back on Brendan's case. "You can't hide from shit like this forever, you know," he says softly. "Craig learned that the hard way and spent every day for the next four years making sure it wasn't a lesson wasted."
Good for fucking Craig, he thinks, but it resonates somewhere deep inside him that he has no power over, the place where all those things he can't control lurk and conspire and play nasty little games. The phone in his hand buzzes again, briefly, and it takes all his strength just to lift the thing up in front of his face.
answer your fucking phone you prick x
He barks an unexpected laugh, high and painful for the way it cuts out him like a knife through his throat, and immediately his phone rings again but this time he's so utterly disarmed by the text that he doesn't hesitate before he answers it.
"Come to the bridge," Steven says, calm and resolute and Brendan pauses, because - what?
"What?"
"What? You deaf now as well as bloody ignorant? Come. To. The. Bridge." And with that he hangs up and Brendan's head goes quiet and loud at the same time with fuzzing static.
"What did he say?" John-Paul asks, eagerly and shuffled right the way forward across the table with wide, excited eyes like this is a soap opera and he's on the edge of his seat waiting to see what happens next.
"Come to the bridge," Brendan tells him blankly and he doesn't move, doesn't know how to move because he can't have heard that right at all. Maybe it's a euphemism? Come to the bridge and throw yourself off it, I hope you die you arsehole?
"So - "
"So, what?"
"So - go to the bridge," he says like Brendan's a small child who needs clear instructions and Brendan feels like whacking him but then he remembers that John-Paul wouldn't understand why. Wait, what? His head's spinning like a brightly coloured top, everything swimming and blurring in his vision and Ha'penny bridge is literally yards up the quay, he can practically see it from the doorway of the pub they're in.
"He can't be - "
"Sounds like he is to me."
That's what it sounds like to Brendan, too, but how can he believe in something like that? He has no image in his head for this, can't imagine how Steven might look, stood on the bridge, yards up the quay, almost within touching distance. It hits him, suddenly and like a hurtling cannonball, that he doesn't have to imagine it, he can go and see for himself, and he's on his feet in the space of his next breath.
"Good luck, then," John-Paul offers with a wry grin and Brendan feels sure he only half means it but he stands regardless and holds out his hand which Brendan takes. "Maybe try not to hit him this time?"
"That's not even the least bit funny," Brendan says shakily but he feels like fucking laughing anyway because he's bordering on hysterical and there's something ready to rattle loose inside him and send him reeling. "Thanks, for - y'know," and John-Paul nods and there's nothing else to say, really, so he turns away, heads for the door and outside into the assault of cold, December air, coat pulled tight around him.
The bridge glares at him, lit up and shining like a beacon, all curved and intricate white rails and soft and pretty lights, and it's busy, too busy and too long for him to make out any one face in particular. The distance between him and the stairs zooms and stretches right before his eyes like he's in a Hitchcock film and when he moves he gets no closer until, bang, suddenly he's right there.
He gets a grip on the railing, breathes hard to get some oxygen into his brain, and ascends the stairs, looking ahead intently, quickly scanning every inch of newly opened space with his heart in his throat. He's about to shake apart, fly straight off his tenuously gripped handle and off somewhere into the fucking sea, the anticipation literally clawing through his insides and against his skin. And then, suddenly, it's gone. He stops and he sees and it's like a mirage shimmering out of humid desert air, gold wrapped and too good to be true.
Steven, stood leaning back against the railings, bags at his feet and arms folded across his middle against the cold. He's breathtaking, literally has taken Brendan's breath clean away from him, and shrouded in light and dreamlike haze and Brendan walks, one step at a time, no urgency now because he'll get there, has every confidence in that.
Something sparks along the invisible line that pulls between them, something hot and whip-crack electric and Brendan feels it with a jolt not a split second before Steven turns his head sharply in his direction like he sensed it too. He meets Steven's gaze and there's a sliding click in his head, the feeling of gears turning, of mechanisms fitting and connecting, of keys and locks and solid, indomitable solidity. It's no good and he tries to tear away from it but it's hold on him is too strong.
He dissolves the yards until there's just the one, the last piece of space between them that he can't - won't close it.
"It's alright is Dublin, innit?" Steven says, casual enough if you don't know him, but underlined with a hard undercurrent of something immovable like concrete that's for Brendan's ears alone.
"Yeah, suppose," he agrees.
"You obviously like it plenty. Seems to be your go-to when you cut and run."
It rankles, really irks in this low-down, dirty way that he can't handle because he's great at denial but not when truth is laid out in front of him like this. "I'm not running - "
"I know exactly what you're doin', or, sorry, should I say, what you think you're doin'," Steven interrupts coolly and he's rolling his eyes, lip curled in a displeased smirk. "Cheryl slipped up and blabbed."
His bloody, big-mouthed sister, he should have known she'd have something to do with this. He'll hold the verdict on whether he's going to throttle her or not. "What did she say?"
"She said that you loved me, is it true?" he asks, blunt as dulled steel but just as piercing as a blade to his heart.
"Steven - "
"She also said that you prayed when I was in that coma, that you said you'd leave me alone forever if I lived. What about that? That true?"
He stays silent, looks at Steven imploringly. He doesn't deserve the pity that he's begging for but he begs for it all the same, knowing and hating that Steven will give it to him because he always does in the end. He has a soft spot a mile wide for Brendan and he'll go on proving it until it kills him and Brendan realises, then and there, looking into Steven's already softening blue eyes, that there's no way to harden it. He's caved in this piece of his boy, stamped and pushed until it's weak and yielding and moulded in his shape and all Brendan can do now is try to shield it from any more damage.
"Yeah, that's true," he says softly.
"Any reason why you couldn't 'ave just, oh, I dunno, told me to get out of the club, told me you didn't give a shit about me? Lied and acted like a dick? Or did you think that one last kiss might just make the punch all that more painful?" Steven wields sarcasm like a weapon and it's been a long time since he's used it against Brendan with real, punishing intent like this. It's beautiful and wickedly cutting in equal measure and it helps to strip away the parts of them that he's corrupted with his last, misguided act of self-sacrifice.
"I needed you to hate me."
"Good job," Steven says darkly, mouth pressing into a tight line briefly before he goes on and it gives Brendan a quick and sour taste of something that he can hardly bear - the real and actual feeling that Steven might hate him. He doesn't want it, not anymore, doesn't know if he ever really considered the meaning of it in his blind panic at Steven coming to him and his lightning quick, ill-conceived decision to put an end to all of it in the worst way possible. Brendan suspects at some point in his near future a serious nervous breakdown may have been on the horizon with a side order of oh, Jesus Christ, what have you actually done. "You didn't answer the first question, though."
"I - I - " he tries to say and realises he can't and not because he doesn't want to, he just can't say it to this cold mask that's not his brilliant and passionate Steven. "No, hang on. Let me just - " He tries to relax, shakes his head to get his thoughts in order because this is so important. "I know I shouldn't have done it. I get it. I don't know what I was thinkin', it was like - what can I do that will make you realise that I'm dangerous? Y'know? That I'm the worst possible choice.."
"You think I didn't already know that, Brendan?" Steven asks, bursting, furious with energy and anger and his calm and sarcastic veneer has cracked and Brendan can finally see the real emotions underneath. "Do you think I'm fucking stupid?"
"No, no - "
"You think I don't know what I want? That I can't be trusted to make my own decisions?" he barrels on, ploughs through Brendan's protests.
"Your decision was me - you're a lunatic!"
It stops Steven short and he blinks, eyelashes fluttering in surprise and mouth curving incredulously. "Wow - "
"Well, it's true. You're here in Dublin for me after what I did to you - after everything I've done to you, for years. I can't keep hurting you, Steven, and I will. I'll hurt you until there's nothing left and it'll kill us both," he says in a rush and Steven looks at him, soft and open and considering for the first time since they got here.
"Thing is - I don't think you will."
"Oh, now who's not trusting who?" he scoffs.
"Still you, Brendan," Steven says plainly. "You don't trust me and you don't trust yourself. I can't keep telling you and, come to think of it, every other bloody person in your life, that you're a decent human being if you don't act like one. You won't, though. You're so scared of even tryin' 'cause people might still leave you and then it'll be twice as hard because it's you they'll be leaving, not some evil fucking villain that you wish you could be. It's easier for you to just blindly accept that you will hurt me so that if you do you can tell yourself it's okay because you knew all along - so you can justify it!"
Jesus that hurts. Steven might have just dealt his killing blow because Brendan's cut wide open and bleeding and he's pretty sure his insides are spilling out all over the pavement right now - he's actually gripping his stomach with white knuckles in some vain effort to keep everything in.
"What are you, a psychiatrist now?" he asks, desperately trying to keep the tremor out of his voice, and Steven just looks more furious, closer to breaking point.
"No, I've just been there and you know I 'ave, so don't you dare pretend that I don't know what I'm talkin' about because you know, Brendan, you fuckin' know - " he says with a sudden surge of devastating emotion and oh, God, Brendan does know. The connection between them swells and drives at him with breathtaking force and he's crumbling under its pressure.
"Fuck - I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, Steven, I know, I do know. You're right, all of it, everything - " and he's almost sobbing, heaving and swaying with the urge to move closer and lock them together tightly like a closed circuit but he can't, it's not his place to close that gap anymore. It's Steven's to take if that's what he wants. It's his to widen if that's what he decides.
It's out of Brendan's hands now, has been for a long time, actually, and he hates himself for not realising sooner. Hates himself for trying to take control of this thing between them, this rebellious, chaotic thing that he had no right to try and tame, and twist and break it until it behaved how he needed it to, until it became something he could run from and pat himself on the back and believe he was right.
Steven looks at him with something like real hope and Brendan doesn't have any more words for him, nothing that's good enough, nothing to say that Steven doesn't deserve better than because he was right when he said that sorry doesn't mean anything. Instead he looks back and finally, belatedly, releases every last bit of tension he's using to hold himself together. He's exposed, utterly and without any of his barriers, still as prey and brittle and transparent as thin ice. Steven drinks in every bit of what he's offering, considers him long and careful and Brendan doesn't think they've ever been this intimate before.
"Say it," Steven says, eventually, and it's both a command and a desperate plea but he doesn't need to beg; Brendan's right there with him.
"I love you," he replies instantly and Steven's eyes shine wet and he blinks, firm and rapid, to clear away the tears he clearly has no desire to shed. He's not ready for that yet, not ready to give up that particular vulnerability to Brendan, possibly not for a while, the memory of looking up from the floor through those same tears maybe too raw still, but it's okay, Brendan will wait, as long as it takes.
"If you hurt me again, that's it."
"I know," he says because he does. He doesn't promise he won't, though, as much as he's desperate to, as much as he believes it with all his heart, and Steven gets it, takes it for what it is because he's made his choice already and all Brendan can do now is everything in his power to prove it's the right one. It doesn't mean everything in his power will be enough.
He gives Brendan a shaky nod and reaches out with one hand, a clear breach of the space between them and Brendan feels the invasion like a physical thing. He grasps hold, threads their fingers together and thrills at the feel of nothing but naked flesh, no barrier of smooth metal separating them. Steven tugs, hard, and Brendan stumbles across the invisible line, right into his space, and he'd laugh because it's fitting, somehow, but he's suddenly very conscious of how public they are. Irrationally, he senses a million pairs of eyes scrutinising his every move and he breathes deep, remembers why he's here, what he stands to lose, again, and focuses on the only pair that matter.
"I love you, Steven," Brendan says again, loves how it rolls off his tongue and wants to try it every which way there is until it's as familiar as Steven's name, "and now I'm gonna kiss you, just so we're clear."
"In front of all these people?" Steven asks with a sly little smile but it's a front to hide the fact that he sensed Brendan's hesitation and Brendan can see right through it.
He sees every crack that's been growing since before the wedding, every molecule of weight that's been piling on Steven's shoulders since Amy moved away, every hurt and slight and confused emotion, and Brendan's watched him slowly fall apart for months now, a gradual crumbling rock slide, slow starting and gaining momentum, but right here in this moment, he thinks that Steven's never been more fragile. Not weak, never weak, just lost and exhausted. He's stripped bare at the end of all things and it's with Brendan he's chosen to risk his life with.
"In front of the Pope if you fancied a trip to Rome," he says with steel-hard conviction and it earns him a genuine chuckle, music to his ears. He can't remember the last time he heard Steven laugh, not even just in passing.
"Let's just start with this lot, shall we?"
Brendan presses close, slides a hand around Steven's neck and dips his head to catch Steven's lips but before he can, the smallest, sweetest fraction of space between them, Steven pulls back. Brendan lets out a squeaky, affronted sound that he's faintly horrified by and Steven breathes another laugh against him.
"Wait a sec - I forgot to tell you," he says softly, hardly a mumble, "I love you, too."
They're so close that Brendan could count every single one of his eyelashes if he was so inclined and he actually feels the vibration of those words through the air between them. He wasn't expecting it, not right now, maybe not for a long while, and it's a burden to shoulder as well as a force to ease the load. It's guilt and warmth and regret and faith, all-encompassing and vast with responsibility. He gets the sensation that he's trying to see the whole Universe through a single telescope and he's straining and tense, can't fall back into the easy embrace he was going for.
"Brendan, hey," Steven soothes, sliding both his hands over Brendan's shoulders, slipping his thumbs underneath the material of his t-shirt across his neck and pressing them firmly into his skin. "It's okay, it's good. I'm good."
Steven says he's good. He looks good. Better than good, actually, skin glowing softly in the lights across the bridge, twinkling Christmas strands and faux-Victorian street lamps, eyes liquid blue and staring up at him, fascinated and frail but so, so sure - Brendan's never seen him look more sure about anything. He trusts Steven, he does: He's not stupid. He knows his own mind. He knows what he wants. He isn't a naive, young boy anymore and Brendan can't keep treating him like one.
"You're good," he repeats back and smiles before sweeping forward in an arc and gathering Steven up into his arms so he's practically off his feet, head thrown back delightedly and mouth parted in a surprised laugh which Brendan quickly covers with his own. He kisses, lips clinging, perfectly dry and sweet, once, twice, before Steven angles his head properly and licks a path into Brendan's willing mouth.
They stay like that, bodies pressed together, sliding tongues and soft, breathless noises, warm and wet and close. He thinks of George Bailey, sad and staggering against those bridge railings, ready to jump but saved by someone else's leap of faith.
Steven pulls back, with a soft tug on Brendan's bottom lip, but he doesn't move far, just buries his face against Brendan's neck and rubs his cold nose back and forth making Brendan squirm and choke on a laugh. He realises Steven's slumped and shivering ever so faintly in the tight circle of his arms.
"Come on, Clarence," he murmurs into Steven's cheek with a kiss to his skin. "Let's get you back to the flat."
Steven nods against him and then pulls back to look him in the eye, face scrunched up. "Clarence?"
He thinks about saying, yeah, he's a guardian angel, gave a man at the end of his rope a reason to keep on living, but he doesn't. There's a couple a few hundred yards away practically having sex against the railings and two dudes drunkenly shouting at each other somewhere over to his right and if he's going to say something like that then he's doing it in the comfort of his own flat, possibly of his own bed.
"It's from a film," he says, instead. "Christmas one, actually."
"I love Christmas films," Steven tells him and Brendan has it on dvd somewhere so that settles that.
"It's a good, classic Christmas film, not, y'know, Santa Claus Four-hundred And Twelve: Return Of The Reindeer, or whatever."
"Oi, what exactly are you sayin'? You think I can't appreciate the classics?" Steven says, high-pitched and offended and Brendan shrugs and tries not to smile. "I appreciate you well enough, don't I?"
"Oh - oh - " Brendan chokes, steps back and away, throws up his hands dramatically and says, pointing one finger accusingly, "you can carry your own bags, I wouldn't wanna put my back out," before turning and walking. He hears Steven laughing and shuffling behind him.
"Alright!" he calls out, breathlessly, and Brendan stops and turns and finds him close. "Bloody hell, you move fast for an old bugger."
Brendan snorts and flings out an arm, grabs one of Steven's bags and slings it on his shoulder before dragging him closer and wrapping one arm around his narrow waist. "I dunno why I'm agreeing to put up with you."
"Because you love me," Steven says simply, looking up at him with a smug smile and all of Dublin shines, bright and heaving, sounds and lights and people and music all around them, but all Brendan can see, all he's ever been able to see, tunnel vision zoomed and focused for the past two years of his life, is Steven.
"Because I love you," he agrees with a nod, "and... because you make really good cake."
"Aww, that's actually quite nice. I was expecting summat dirty."
"And because you've got the nicest arse I've ever fucked."
"That's more like it."
Brendan laughs, pulls Steven to his side and guides him towards to the steps. They leave the bridge, giddy and stumbling like drunk teenagers feeling the rush of intoxication for the very first time. He buries his fingers in the material of Steven's coat, listens to him chatter on about all the things he wants to do in Dublin, and thinks, last chance, this is your last chance.
Tomorrow he's going to take Steven out and force-feed him Guinness. Then he's going to take him for a walk along the quay, or maybe to the Iveagh Gardens and show him where he used to muck around as a boy, where he once brought Cheryl when they were visiting his Ma and pulled her skirt up around her ears in front of a load of appalled pensioners on the bowling green - he thinks Steven would find that funny. They light the place up at Christmas with fairy lights and lanterns and Brendan kind of wants to get them thoroughly lost in the maze and then kiss Steven senseless in a bush.
His head's spinning with all the things he can think of sharing and he's never felt like this before, never watched possibility after possibility sprawl out in front of him for miles, options and freedom and endless 'what ifs' and 'let's trys'.
For now, though, he's happy enough to take Steven back to his flat and fill the cold, empty space full of his warm and living presence, to wrap him up warm in front of the fire and just soak in the sound of his voice, to lay him out on Brendan's bed and look and touch and devour.
For now, that's more than enough.