Life goes on. Arthur's buried under a mountain of work for the new merger, which is getting him a Christmas bonus (and probably a heart condition), and Eames is put into the 'worried wife' role, which mostly involves trying to make sure his fiancé makes it to their wedding day alive. He makes soups and cakes, he helps organise the few things Arthur trusts him not to mess up (namely ordering the napkins and chair covers), he tries to get Arthur into bed at a sensible time. He prays, very earnestly, that this torment will all be over soon, and then it'll just be him and Arthur in a hotel room and a substantial supply of lube.
Arthur nearly has a meltdown over the bridesmaids. Well, Arthur nearly has several meltdowns over the few months preceding the wedding. (This is Near-Meltdown #7.) The problem with the bridesmaids is that there are thirty-six of them, and it's not exactly easy to find a dress that will suit everyone. Sue from Logistics is six months pregnant, Pam from Catering is seventy, and Jeff from Engineering is a man.
"Why don't you just have them all in different dresses?" Eames suggests, tiredly leaning against the doorframe and eating a yoghurt while Arthur freaks out about it at his desk at a few minutes past two in the morning, "You know, different kinds and colours."
"Because it's not the done thing!" Arthur cries.
Eames shrugs and spoons more yoghurt into his mouth, because there are seriously not enough dairy products in their fridge to get him through this shit.
"Marrying someone you've never slept with isn't the done thing, but we're doing that."
"Rainbow bridesmaids," Arthur says darkly, "Has it come to this? Rainbow bridesmaids?"
"Well, it is a gay wedding."
Arthur groans.
"Darling," says Eames, coming over to put a hand on Arthur's shoulder, "Won't you come back to bed now?"
"How can I sleep when the colour scheme of our wedding has been destroyed?! You don't understand how –"
Eames pushes a spoonful of yoghurt into Arthur's mouth, which has the desired effect of shutting him up. Eames is definitely not turned on by the curve of Arthur's lips around the spoon, or the way he swallows thickly, or the flash of his tongue, quickly licking away the yoghurt at the corner of his mouth. No. That is not erotic in any way. Arthur whines for more, and Eames feeds it to him, slowly, until it's all gone, and Arthur's licking the spoon clean. Eames makes an inadvertent choking noise in his throat, because Jesus Christ he wishes Arthur was licking something other than that spoon, and Arthur looks up at him.
"Did I just give you a hard-on by eating yoghurt?"
"Maybe you should check."
Arthur places his hand on Eames' crotch, and yeah, he does have a hard-on. A very big, hard, hard-on. Woah. Did he mention big?
"Don't you have any self-control?" asks Arthur, but he's not taking his hand away.
"Don't you?" says Eames, nodding at Arthur's hand, "I mean, honestly, Arthur. You can't just manhandle me like that. I'm not a piece of meat."
Arthur smiles, pushes his hand harder into Eames, his fingers squeezing a little.
"You'd love to be manhandled."
Eames shrugs.
"There's a lot of man to handle."
Arthur blushes, because he can't really deny that that's true.
"Oh, darling," says Eames, "You don't need to be shy. I promise to be gentle with you."
Arthur rolls his eyes.
"I'm a big boy, Eames. I think I can take it."
Eames leans in.
"I'd like to see you take it."
He takes Arthur's hand, pulls him up out of his chair.
"Now," he says, "Won't you come back to bed now?"
"To sleep."
"Do you know," says Eames, leading Arthur by the hand back to their bedroom, "If you look up massive fucking cocktease in the dictionary, there's a picture of you?"
"Do you know," says Arthur, crawling back into bed, "If you listen very carefully, you can hear the sound of me not giving a fuck?"
"And if you listen very carefully, you can hear the sound of me jerking off anyway."
Arthur smiles, presses himself up against Eames' back, kisses his neck, puts his hand on Eames' arm, feels it move up and down, hears Eames say, "Fuck, Arthur, Arthur."
"Ssh," Arthur breathes, and pushes his fingers into Eames' mouth, feels him suck them, feels Eames tip over the edge and shudder and come, his breathing heavy.
"Didn't that break your rule about not having sex before the wedding?" Eames asks.
"No," says Arthur, as he takes Eames' fingers into his mouth and licks them clean, "I figure this doesn't count."
It's not exactly what Eames wants, but it is an improvement.
The next day isn't so good. Because the next day, Actual Meltdown #1 happens. Arthur comes home late from work, runs into the kitchen where Eames is cooking dinner because he's basically Arthur's neglected housewife by this point, sobs, "I'm sorry, Eames! I love you but I can't marry you! Oh God!", and runs back out of the front door. Eames stares, then runs after him, even though he's wearing an apron and boxer shorts and little else. (Hey, a man's allowed to wear what he wants in his own house, and he knows Arthur just loves it.)
"Don't come after me, Eames! There's nothing you can do!"
"Arthur," cries Eames, catching Arthur's arm and turning him round to face him, "Darling, what is it?"
"Don't make this any more difficult than it already is!" Arthur shouts, and he's full-on weeping now, his face streaked with tears.
"Just – just come inside and we'll talk about it, yeah?" Eames says soothingly, holding Arthur by his shoulders.
"There's nothing more to be said!"
Eames sees a few curtains twitching. Their neighbours are no doubt wondering what the hell is going on. Eames knows the feeling.
"Come on, darling," he says gently, "There's nothing in this world that's so terrible that means we can't be together, is there?"
"There is! Oh, Eames, there is."
"Arthur Levine, I love you. I love you, and you love me, and we are going to get married. Whatever it is that's upsetting you, whatever it is that comes between us, we can work it out."
"It's the caterers!" Arthur yells, falling forwards and sobbing into Eames' chest.
Eames blinks.
"The caterers."
"They say – they say they can't do it and – and the wedding's practically weeks away now and – God – Eames – we can't get married, we can't – oh, Eames…"
"Oh, darling," says Eames, hugging Arthur close, "Don't cry. It's alright."
"It's not alright!"
"Will you come inside, darling? The macaroni cheese is going to burn."
Arthur only cries louder.
"I always loved your macaroni cheese. I'll miss you."
Eames presses a kiss to the side of Arthur's head.
"I'm not going anywhere, darling. And neither are you. This is your home. Here, with me. Come back inside."
Arthur nods numbly, letting Eames pull him back into the house. Mercifully, the macaroni cheese isn't burnt. They sit on the sofa and eat it – or rather, Eames eats it, and Arthur stares blankly in front of him.
"Open up," says Eames, dangling a forkful of pasta in front of Arthur's mouth.
Arthur does as he's told, eating the food unblinkingly.
"This wedding really can't come soon enough," says Eames, because they've reached the point when Arthur's become emotionally volatile as a result of caterers and can therefore no longer feed himself.
He puts an arm round Arthur, says, "I'm going to love you always. Always. Now eat your macaroni."
Anyway, Eames sorts out the catering fiasco – which basically involves asking Saito to deal with it. When it all works itself out, Arthur hugs Eames tightly and says, "You know what, Mr Eames? You're not so bad."
"You're rather wonderful yourself."
"Come here," says Arthur, and kisses him soundly, before dashing off to harass the florists again.
Eames groans and leans against the wall, because he's hard from kissing Arthur for eight seconds and his life really isn't fair.
The wedding's in just a month now, which Arthur thinks is a tight deadline, and Eames thinks is a bloody lifetime away. Arthur's been working nonstop, but Eames at least gets him to have a rest over Christmas. At first Arthur complains that he's from a Jewish family and he doesn't believe in Christmas, but Eames reminds him that he stopped practising Judaism as soon as he left home, and that is a bacon sandwich in your hand right now. So Arthur gives in. They have Christmas with Dom and the kids and Ari, who are already a perfectly adorable, dysfunctional family unit. They have dinner and exchange presents and Dom and Ari bicker over whose turn it is to put the kids to bed and it's actually pretty perfect.
"Have you told your parents yet?" Arthur asks Ari when they're doing the washing-up.
"Well, not exactly. I mean, I've told them I'm spending Christmas with my boyfriend, but, er…"
"Have failed to mention he's a widower with children."
"Something like that."
Arthur laughs.
"Have you been getting on okay?"
Ari grins.
"Yeah. It's just… I don't know, really nice."
"Hmm, nice. That most promising of adjectives."
Ari hits him with the tea towel.
"It's a lot more promising than 'Oh, Ari, I don't like Eames, and I never will'. Now shut up, or I'll give you explicit details about our sex life."
"Oh God, I don't need to know. Dom's like a brother, and you're like a sister."
Ari raises an eyebrow.
"Alright then, I won't tell you about our kinky incestuous sex. So, uh, you and Eames haven't, you know?"
"No."
"How's he coping?"
Arthur sucks in his breath.
"They say it's only a matter of days now before his cock drops off from masturbating too much. The doctors don't think he'll make it."
"I can hear you!" Eames calls from the next room.
"So can I! Please stop saying my name when you come, I always think you're calling me because you want something."
"I do want something."
"Awh, he says your name when he comes. That's kind of – romantic?" says Ari.
Arthur gives her a look.
"Don't encourage him."
They all crash out in the lounge with a few glasses of wine and before long, Dom and Ari have fallen asleep on the sofa, curled up with each other.
"C'mere," says Eames, pulling Arthur closer, "You know, next Christmas is going to be very different."
"Yeah. I won't be stressed about seating arrangements, for one."
"I mean, we'll be married. And it'll just be me and you… And we can just hang out and have dinner and lots of sex."
Arthur chuckles.
"Thinking about the things you're going to do to me is the only thing keeping you going right now, isn't it?"
"Kind of, yeah."
Arthur leans closer.
"I'll tell you a secret. It's the only thing keeping me going, too."
"Really?"
"Yes, Eames. I think about you all the time. I want you. I've wanted you so long now. I want you to take me upstairs on our wedding night and fuck me into the next day. Fuck, Eames, I want that. I need it."
"You'll get it, darling. You'll get everything you want. I'm going to fuck you into mattress, until all you can do is scream like a fucking whore, and I'll come inside you and I'll lick you clean, and I'll –"
"Jesus," says Dom, because he and Ari would pick that moment to wake up, "I'll just put that in a box labelled 'things I need to forget'."
"I'm quite happy to remember it," says Ari, shrugging.
Arthur tries to wriggle off the sofa, but Eames pulls him back. It's only when he feels something press against his thigh that he realises why.
"Really, Eames."
"This is what you do to me."
"Okay, I'm also going to put the fact that Eames blatantly has a boner in that box," says Dom.
"Wow," says Ari, "That box sounds like a lot of fun."