Title from the song Home by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros. Short, soppy little thing written to satisfy my insatiable need for coupley!boys and protective!Brendan. No warnings.
Brendan fingers his phone compulsively, only realises he's doing it after the tip of it gets sore. He's staring out into the office at nothing in particular, not really seeing, just watching the air in front of him. It's 2:20pm according the the clock and he decides, enough is enough, he knows he's in the right about this and he's going to fucking prove it, and gets up, grabs his stuff, throws on his jacket and heads for the bar.
"I'm going out, I'll be about half an hour," he tells Joel, "you okay here?"
Joel looks at him blankly for a second before doing a sweeping gesture across the room with his arm. It's empty. Brendan hadn't even noticed.
"Oh, right then, see you later."
He takes the stairs at a jog but slows down once he gets outside, sights set on the blue building across the street. There's a customer inside, big guy, bald, hands on his hips and lips pursed, looks like he has an attitude problem. His t-shirt is tucked into his tracksuit bottoms. Steven's stood at the other side of the counter watching him with none of the practiced patience he's developed from owning a business. He's leaning on the marble top heavily with both hands, head bowed, glowering up at the man through dark-circled eyes.
"How are your cinnamon rolls?" Brendan hears the guy ask as he enters the building.
"They taste like cinnamon rolls," Steven replies dully, voice raspy; it looks like they've have been having this conversation for a while. He glances over at the doorway and gives Brendan a small quirk of his lips. He notices that Steven's arms are shaking minutely from holding him up.
"Well, yeah, I guessed that," baldy says with a derisive snort that settles in Brendan's chest and concludes for him that this man is a tosser and Brendan hates him. "I meant are they good? Are they fresh? I don't want whatever leftovers you've just chucked out because you couldn't sell them yesterday."
Steven's eyes flick over to Brendan so briefly that he wouldn't have noticed if he wasn't expecting it.
"They're fresh, everything that gets put out here is fresh," he says with grim, forced-politeness.
Brendan takes a few slow steps across the shop, hands in his pockets, and stops inches behind the customer, so close the guy must be able to feel his body heat against his back. He smells like unwashed hair and Brendan catches a glimpse of the guy's squash-nosed profile as he turns his head slightly to look behind him. He has no discernible chin, face slouching gracelessly straight from mouth to neck. He's got at least three inches on Brendan, height wise.
Steven looks down at the counter, bites his lip and Brendan can tell he's trying not to smirk.
"Umm," the guy says, shuffles forward a little but Brendan just steps after him. "What about the Danish?"
"I hear they're a very friendly people," Brendan says helpfully over his shoulder and the guy jumps and half turns to face him.
"Look mate, can you give me some space here, I'm trying to order," he says defensively.
"I'm sorry, I thought you'd gone off topic. You've been here long enough."
"What are you, the security?" he asks with a sarcastic little laugh and looks at Steven, gestures a thumb over his shoulder, "who is this guy? You gonna let him speak to your customers like that?"
Steven pulls an unconcerned face and shrugs. "Let him? He does what he wants."
"Aww, honey," Brendan croons, steps up beside the guy and leans across the counter to give Steven a kiss, two kisses, pulls back and sees him smiling softly and has to give him a third. He stands back, turns to baldy and says fondly, "he gets me."
The guy stands, gawping a little, nasty little curl to his top lip that suggests disgust.
"What's the matter? Gone off your food?" Brendan asks him coldly, "that's a shame, maybe you should leave then."
"Yeah, I'm okay for now, I'll just - " he gestures to the doorway. Brendan steps close to him once again and the guy jumps back like he's been electrocuted. Brendan follows him to the door and turns the sign, closed. He breathes a little easier.
"Thanks, Bren," Steven sighs tiredly, he usually gets mad when Brendan pulls stunts like that, "not that I should be encouragin' you to bully my customers."
"That guy had it comin'," Brendan shrugs and makes his way behind the counter. "How are you feeling?"
"Alright," he replies, coming in close and wrapping both arms around Brendan's middle, resting his forehead against Brendan's shoulder. He's pale as a ghost and Brendan feels the heat rolling off him when he wraps him up in his arms, feels him slump his weight until Brendan's practically holding him up.
"Yeah, you're totally alright," he says dryly, "I told you you shouldn't have come in today."
"I had to, Doug's sick," Steven muffles into his jacket.
"Yeah I know, how d'you think you got sick in the first place?"
"I'm fine, it's just a cold."
"If that were even remotely true and you weren't actually running a hundred degree temperature, your job is serving food to people. Do you want to start a epidemic?"
Steven's silent in his arms and Brendan sighs, strokes his hand up to touch the back of his neck and presses a kiss into his temple.
"Come back to mine," he pleads softly into Steven's skin.
"I can't shut up this early."
"Just for an hour then, let me get some Lemsip down you."
Steven pulls back to look at him and, after a moment, nods. Up close he looks exhausted, eyes dull and bruised, lips pale. When he swallows, Brendan sees him wince in pain.
This morning Brendan had woken up to him shifting under the covers and giving off so much heat that for a second he'd been confused and thought he'd acquired an electric blanket. He'd pressed his fingers into the sides of Steven's throat, just like his Ma used to do for him when he was a boy, smell of onion soup and Vicks thick in his memory, and felt how swollen his glands had been. He'd nearly collapsed in the shower, hadn't been able to bear more than a few sips of coffee. He'd squeezed his eyes shut against the morning light like a vampire when they'd left the flat, buried his face in Brendan's chest as he'd locked up.
Of course he'd told Steven he had the flu and shouldn't go into work and of course Steven had completely ignored him. As a result, Brendan had spent the entire day ignoring his own job in favour of worrying and rehearsing every single way there was to say 'I told you so' in his head.
"Come on then, Typhoid Mary," Brendan slides his arm securely around Steven and steers him towards the door, "let's get you out of here."
Steven sits on Brendan's kitchen counter, slumped back against the top cabinet and blinking drowsily. Brendan stirs some boiled water into a mug filled with purple powder, sweet smell of blackcurrant rolling off the rising steam. He'd bought it in earlier, prefers lemon himself but Steven hates anything citrus flavoured.
He hands the mug over carefully, sidles up close to stand between Steven's legs and watches his throat bob as he cringes through a few sips. His forehead is clammy and hot when Brendan brings up a hand to touch, Steven batting it away like an annoying fly. The thermometer is sitting right there in the drawer he's stood against and he itches to take it out but not for one second does he think that it will be allowed anywhere near that stubborn mouth.
Instead he puts his hands flat down on the kitchen surface, bracketing Steven's body in with his own. They'd bickered earlier about space, Steven sternly reprimanding him for trying to steal a kiss.
You'll catch my cold, he'd said and Brendan had rolled his eyes. Last night they'd swapped so much bodily fluid Brendan could have built a dam and powered half of Chester. Whatever disease Steven's got, and he'd bet Declan on it not being a bloody cold, Brendan's pretty sure he's already caught it. If not then he's officially calling himself a super-hero.
Steven drinks deeply from the cup and puts it down next to him, leans forward and buries his face in Brendan's neck.
"I feel ill," he mumbles and Brendan snorts a laugh.
"You don't say?"
"Think I might need to lie down for a bit."
"That's such a good and original idea."
Steven kicks him weakly on the arse with the back of his foot and Brendan grips his waist and drags him off the counter. When he hits the floor he sways, eyes squeezing shut and hands curling in Brendan's shirt for balance. He feels small and fragile in Brendan's arms and it makes him feel even more fiercely protective than usual.
They make their way into the bedroom, Steven rolling immediately down onto the bed in a pathetic heap and groaning pitifully. Brendan fishes around the mess of their combined clothes strewn across the floor for a pair of jogging bottoms and one of his own soft t-shirts, the one that Steven's pretty much adopted as his own anyway. Occasionally, when Brendan stops sweeping through life long enough to take a breath for five seconds, he glances around at his flat, his space, his life, and feels like he's the unwitting victim of some slow, creeping invasion.
Sometimes, he's blind-sided by how much Steven touches every inch of his existence and mostly by how he doesn't notice until he stops to look for it. At some point, Steven became integral and the transition had been so seamless that it had slipped by him without fuss. He'd never in his wildest dreams thought that living life together with another person could be easier than existing on his own.
He gets on the bed and swings a leg over Steven's prone form to work on the buttons of his shirt.
"You don't 'ave to undress me," he says moodily, squirming a little and bringing his hands up to help.
"I've had a stressful day, let me have my fun," Brendan quips, wiggles his eyebrows and makes a sleazy face that makes Steven crack a smile. Together they wrangle him out of his work clothes and into something more comfortable.
He tugs back the covers and Steven snuggles into them, contracts himself up into morose lump which Brendan tucks the duvet around. When he's satisfied he wraps his arms around Steven's body, curls up close and rests his face against his shoulder.
"Want me to stay for a bit?" he asks gently.
"Don't you 'ave to get back to work?"
"Yep."
Steven turns his head to face him. "Stay."
Brendan nods against him, nuzzles his nose into the side of Steven's face briefly then lays down and makes himself comfortable. He has a headache building behind his eyes, a thrum of steadily growing pressure. His limbs feel heavy. When he swallows his throat sticks. He just needs a little nap, that's all, all the worrying, all the being right, it takes a lot out of a guy.
I told you so.
He'll have to remember to say it when they both wake up.