Loveallthatjazz on tumblr reblogged a list of headcanons for Mereta – one of which was clothes sharing. And, while I have absolutely no doubt that Merida would happily commandeer Eret's clothes (mainly tshirts, but she probably sleeps in a pair of his boxers that he doesn't know how she got), my brain tried to find any situation where Eret would end up in her clothes.

Thus, this thing was born. Daydreamerssmile liked the headcanon, so I went ahead and wrote it.

This is set in my Jackunzel story "Safe Haven".

Shirtless

Chicago was not Eret's favorite city. He had hoped that his side mission with Jack would keep him away from it all together, while the rest of the team was there. But he and Jack had finished up in California sooner than expected, unlike the rest of the team, who were running behind, and expected to be in Chicago for at least another week.

Hence why he was there.

He had missed the mission briefing (he had been at a different briefing), so he didn't even know what the job was yet. Or why the rest of the them had been scattered across three different hotels, but were now moving into a temporary base North had thrown together.

He took the elevator up to the eighteenth floor of the hotel where Merida was staying. As the elevator door opened, he double checked the room number she had sent him via text. He didn't really need to bother, though. When he looked up, he saw her waiting in the hallway.

"Hey," he greeted, grinning in spite of himself. They had been married less than nine months, and he decided a week and a half long separation was way too long.

"Ya took yer time," she said, but he could see that she was grinning too. Trying to fight it – but the expression was still there.

"The plane was late."

He wasn't entirely sure how it happened. But he blinked, and suddenly he was inside the hotelroom, the door slamming behind them.

Merida had a grip on the collar of his black tshirt, pulling him down until their lips crushed together. Once he got over the initial surprise, he had absolutely no problem with the situation. He pressed into the kiss, enjoying the benefits of being reunited.

Just as he expected the "welcome back" kiss to end, he felt her hands tugging at the hem of his shirt.

He pulled back. "Aren't we—" without thinking, he let her tug the shirt over his head "—busy?"

When he had gotten out of the taxi, Jack had been heading to their makeshift base. If he remembered correctly, he and Merida were supposed to meet the others there. He might remember wrong, though. His memory got a little faulty when Merida kissed him like that.

"We've got an hour," Merida said, already pulling his mouth back to her. And her fingers, calloused from her bowstring, brushed his lower stomach as they found the button of his jeans.

A shiver shot up his spine.

"Careful, Red – I might think you missed me." One hand teased the hem of her black tshirt, the other traced the Celtic knot tattooed on her left upper arm. Identical to the one on his own arm. Their line of work didn't allow them to wear wedding bands, so they had gotten the tattoos instead.

"I did," she admitted, grinning.

Cohesive thought was done when their lips met again.

#

Eret woke up to something loud and obnoxious. As he regained consciousness, he recognized it as the alarm on Merida' phone.

Merida groaned, lifting her head from his chest as she started to disentangle their limbs. "Wha' time is it?"

Grimacing against the harsh blue light of her screen, Eret turned off the alarm. "Uh... five-thirty p.m."

She jolted. "Five-thirty?"

She rolled away quickly – too quickly. The patches of skin stuck together with dried sweat stung as her sudden movement pulled them apart.

"We're late."

"Late?" He rolled off the hotel bed, scrambling to pick their clothes up off the floor. He founds his pants first, tugging them off. "You said we had time!"

"I didn't think you'd fall asleep!" Merida said, jumping to get her pants up over her hips. "You're the responsible one!"

Eret rolled his eyes as he grabbed their tshirts off the floor. He tossed one to her, then went to pull on the other.

The responsible one. Right. Because it was so easy to be responsible when his wife was tugging at his clothes. Merida must be completely oblivious to the affect she had on him.

The fabric of his tshirt strained as he pulled it over his shoulders. Which distracted him from all thoughts of what Merida did or did not realize. His shirts were usually fitted, but getting them on wasn't usually this hard. The seams around the shoulders dug under his arms. When he went to pull it on, the hem barely covered his navel.

He realized what was wrong just as Merida started laughing.

"Shut up," Eret muttered.

But she didn't seem to hear him, since she was almost doubled over with laughter. "You almost look good."

Rather than answer, Eret grabbed the back of the shirt's collar. But just that movement put too much strain on the cotton threads.

riiiiiiiiip

Merida stopped laughing.

In frustration, Eret just tugged the shirt off. The move accompanied by more ripping.

"That was my shirt!"

"Don't you have another one?" He eyed the black tshirt she still held. His shirt.

Noticing his gaze, she pulled his shirt on faster than he could blink. "I already sent my backpack to the base."

Eret sighed, shoving his feet back into his boots. If he hadn't been so distracted, he would have notived the room was void of Merida's things.

With a shrug, Merida pulled the door open.

There was nothing else he could do but follow her out. Into the hall.

"I can't believe you feel asleep," she said, as they ran down the hallway, back towards the elevator. "You shoulda told me you were tired."

"You expect me to think straight when you're taking my clothes odd?" he asked. "I'm human, Merida!"

The middle aged couple they ran past stared at them in something akin to horror, and Eret cringed.

"You killed my favorite shirt!"

"It was a black tshirt!" he said. "You couldn't have picked it out in a line up!"

She glared at him as they reached the elevator, and he could only shrug as she hit the down button.

The elevator doors opened a moment later. The woman inside glanced up, eyes wide, lingering on Eret's bare chest as he and Merida get in. He noticed, but didn't pay enough attention to be flattered.

"Next time, let's just wait until we're home," he said, hitting the button for the lobby. He didn't really like the idea. But he wasn't looking forward to walking into the GUARDIAN base (even a temporary one) without a shirt. Or having to explain to Hiccup why they were late.

Merida made a noncommittal sound. That "I-won't-dane-to-argue-with-you" sound he knew well.

The woman gave him another sidelong look, smiling when Eret accidentally met the look.

"Oh—" Merida growled in frustration, grabbing Eret's wrist and pulling him into another kiss. This one a pure marking of her territory.

The elevator doors opened, and the woman stepped out.

"Subtle."

"Shut up," she muttered.

They started across the lobby, all eyes seeming to gravitate to them.

After a few paces, Merida veered to their right. Eret stopped and watched, crossing his arms over his chest as Merida went into the hotel's gift shop. Though the plate glass windows he could see her grab a dark grey souvenir hoodie, Chicago emblazoned on the front in white letters. Rather than wait in line, she slapped a couple bills on the counter and came back out.

"Here," she said, tossing him the hoodie.

He shrugged into the thing, hoping she wouldn't see his grin. In a strange way... her jealousy was kind of cute.

But she didn't like the word "cute", so he kept that thought to himself as they ran outside, to the taxi that was already waiting at the curb.