'are you with me?'

Barry smiled as his nose bumped against Len's, he loved placing his hands on Len's thick woolly jumper and then balling it up in his fists as he pulled the man in impossibly closer during a kiss. Barry was quickly learning that Len could either be incredibly soft and sweet when kissing or he could be very rough and passionate. He didn't mind which pace it was, he just really liked being close and intimate with Len.

Len used his hands to keep Barry pinned to the wall as he attacked his lips before he slowly inched his head away and rested his forehead down on Barry's shoulder as he took in a couple deep breaths. Barry took the opportunity to get a good amount of oxygen flowing around his system again. Ever since the whole Iris incident it had been difficult to get Len on his own for a long period of time again.

"I've missed you," Barry murmured softly as he let his head rest against the wall behind him.

Len looked up at him with a curious gaze "Me too," he replied "it shouldn't be like this for much longer." He added.

Barry let out a sigh "It's been a week and a half," he pointed out "Iris isn't going to say anything to Joe. You don't need to worry about it ever happening again."

Len stepped away from Barry with a look of exasperation on his face "Next time it might not be Iris that catches us, it could be West. Or it could be Cisco. It could be anyone Barry and it could happen anywhere. We've been reckless with this thing of ours."

"Reckless?" Barry scoffed "we've met at midnight while shopping, we ate breakfast at like two in the morning and when we went for dinner we went out of Central City. Len we can't hide forever, eventually someone else will find out and there's nothing we can do about that."

Len crossed his arms over his chest "Not if we can help it," he said sternly.

Barry ran a hand through his hair and over his face "I'm not living like this forever Len," he said "I don't possibly get how this can work forever."

"Well how do you see this panning out Barry?" Len asked with a sarcastic emphasis on his name "West will open his arms and welcome us right? Your friends will forget everything I've put them through right? We'll all be on big happy family that have turned a blind eye to all my past criminal activity?" he continued his voice rising so he was shouting "You're living a delusion Barry if you think that, in the end this was never going to work and you know it."

Barry couldn't believe not ten minutes ago he was up against the wall happily oblivious to the argument that was about to take place. He was honestly so shocked by how quickly the atmosphere had changed between them.

"Well," Barry said ashamed of how shaky his voice sounded "if that's how you feel then why didn't you stop this from happening? Because apparently I'm the fool that falls for you and I'm the only one in this thing of ours that is willing to go through whatever shit that happens in order for this to work."

Len was grabbing his coat that he had hung on the back of one of Barry's dining chairs "Well this was clearly not well thought through on either of our parts," he snapped.

Barry stared at him stunned for a moment "Len," he said softly "please, we can work something out okay?"

"Bye Barry," Len said before he was storming out of Barry's apartment leaving him with an emotion caught in his throat and his eyes burning with tears.

People kept calling him and he wasn't feeling sociable at all, he wanted one day to himself if that was too much to ask. Joe called twice, left no message. Iris called once, no voicemail. Both Cisco and Caitlin tried reaching him three times but he just let it go through to voicemail. He shouldn't feel resentful towards his friends and family but ultimately they were a deciding factor in Len leaving him and they had been hanging over Barry's relationship with Len since the very beginning as it seemed.

Barry supposed he could either mope around or he could get himself in the shower, get dressed and go about his life. He'd spent the past two days moping around his apartment that Len had helped him get, he'd spent the rest of the evening in bed with a bottle of coca cola and a bottle of vodka and a packet of chilli Dorito crisps as he binged watched a Netflix show for four hours straight until he was inebriated enough to cry and not remember doing so the next morning.

He had woken slightly confused as to why he was hugging a cold empty glass bottle of vodka and sleeping in a load of chilli Dorito crumbs. The hangover had him hugging the toilet bowl for a whole morning and it was at that point in which Barry realised he'd probably reached the lowest he'd ever felt after a break-up… could it even be considered as breaking up when they had never really labelled themselves?

Barry drank a pint of water after finally being able to stomach some toast and decided to pick up his gym bag and work out some frustration on a gym bag or two. He'd done enough moping around the apartment.

As it so happened, Iris had been lingering outside his building.

"Barry!" she exclaimed as he exited the warm building and entered the somewhat cold street "you've been dodging my calls, have you been getting busy with a certain Captain Cold?" she asked as she wiggled her eyebrows suggestively while falling into step with him.

"Don't want to talk about it," Barry said as he kept his gaze trained ahead.

"You look awful," she commented "are you feeling okay?" she asked sounding concerned.

"I'm fine," he said in the same flat voice as before.

"…No you're not," Iris eventually said "look tonight you, me, a bottle of whatever alcoholic drink you want, some Chinese food and a film. No talking necessary." She added.

Barry stopped walking as he looked at his best friend for the first time since they'd started walking "Thank you," he said sincerely because that sounded like something he needed "I'll see you tonight."

"Barry," Iris said reaching her hand out to rest on his forearm "whatever's happened just remember you're not always going to feel like this." She added.

Barry nodded his head in thanks and continued on down to the gym.

It actually felt somewhat good to get some of his pent up frustration out on a punch bag. He didn't have to think or feel, he just had to do.

Barry was in the changing room when a familiar voice from his left said "Wondered if I'd be running into you again at some point,"

Barry looked up to see Hartley standing there, a towel thrown over his shoulder and freshly dressed after a shower. "Barry you need to get out of there. Get out of there immediately." A voice he recognised said in his mind, the voice sounded worried and concerned. He shook his head slightly.

"Barry?" Hartley said but it sounded very distant to him.

He was standing over Hartley though on a road at night time and Hartley was wearing all black, sneering up to Barry "Amazing, he replaced me with you, a total moron. I got you with the same trick twice." He said.

Then there was pain in his head and his body was vibrating and he couldn't stop. His whole body hurt and his insides burned.

"I wonder if Harrison would even miss you," Barry heard Hartley say as he felt the cold and wet road beneath him, trying to focus on something but it was impossible to do so when his insides felt like they were going to burst and his head felt like it was about to explode.

"Barry!" Hartley sounded so distant.

Then it stopped, the pain and the vibrating just stopped. It was then just him lying on the cold road trying to gather his thoughts and control his breathing and Hartley lay at the edge of the road just a bit further away from him.

Barry frowned as he looked up from his hands to see Hartley sat beside him looking slightly freaked out. "What the hell was that all about?" he asked sounding slightly breathless.

"I…" Barry said as the piece of memory found its place in his mind "I think I remember you trying to kill me." He said.

Hartley's mouth opened and he had a range of emotions flicker over his face before he settled on looking cautious "Ah," he said "would that be the first or second time?" he asked.

Barry huffed out a laugh at how nonchalant he sounded "I honestly don't know," he said "I guess we came a long way since then huh." he added as he thought back to when Hartley had saved his job by chucking him out of a moving vehicle.

"I suppose so," Hartley said.

"Lenny I can't believe I have to keep asking but when am I finally going to be sitting down to have dinner with Ba-" Lisa said idly as she walked into the kitchen with a magazine in hand.

Leonard slammed the metal teaspoon on the counter top "You're not," he snapped "so stop bringing it up."

"What?" Lisa asked looking up from the gossip column of the magazine "why not?"

Leonard grabbed his cup off the counter "Why can't you understand the basic concept of what I'm telling you?" he asked "we are not sitting down for dinner with Barry at any point in time, understood?"

Lisa's look of surprise soon turned sour "What happened?" she asked in that tone that Leonard recognised as her not giving him an option but to spill about everything.

Leonard didn't want to talk about it because ultimately he had overreacted about something as small as Barry's closest friend accidentally intruding on their time together. It had Leonard thinking about how much longer Barry and he could continue behind Barry's family and friend's backs and that kind of nailed home how odd their relationship would seem to outsiders.

"We broke up," Leonard said curtly "end of story."

Could it be considered as breaking up? He never outright referred to Barry as his anything really.

He certainly felt shitty though, this time was a lot worse than the first time they had broken up.

Lisa sat down at the table with a sympathetic look on her face "Do I need to shoot a son of a bitch?" she asked with a hint of determination in her tone.

"Just leave him alone," Leonard sighed softly as he sat opposite his sister "Barry did nothing wrong." He added as he stared at the wooden table top as he remembered Barry telling him that he had fallen for him and Leonard had just walked right out the door. He could see how it must have seen to Barry, how cold and uncaring he must have come across.

"Lenny," Lisa said as she moved from her seat to throw her arms around her brothers neck, they were never ones for displays of affection for each other but it was appreciated.

"It's fine," Leonard said awkwardly "I have more time to put into planning our next job."

Lisa released him from her arms "If you say so Lenny," she said before picking her magazine up from the table and leaving Leonard to have some peace before he busied his mind.

Before Iris made an appearance at his apartment Barry thought it would probably do him some good to bin the empty bottle of vodka, place the now flat coca cola in the bin as well and discard of his chilli heatwave Dorito crumb infested sheets into the washing machine. No need for anyone else to witness one of his lowest points.

Barry had made the mistake of turning on the radio while he scrubbed the last of the dirty dishes from the night before, he'd be scrubbing away the last meal he had eaten with Len. He was halfway through the washing when the radio host announced the next song and Barry just groaned.

"Hello, it's me, I was wondering if after all these years you'd like to meet, to go over everything." Adele sang filling up his silent kitchen.

"Nope!" Barry said loudly as he grabbed a tea towel and dried his hands as he turned the radio off at the wall "no, no, no."

Adele was never good to listen to when you already emotionally felt like utter shit. Luckily Iris knocked on the door to save Barry from sinking any lower.

"I brought two bottles of white wine, a bottle of vodka, Chinese takeout and the Die Hard films." Iris announced loudly as she made her way through the apartment and to the kitchen "I thought what could go wrong with wine and vodka so it's your decision." She added smiling softly at Barry.

Barry grabbed two wine glasses from the cupboard "You are literally the best," he said.

Iris shrugged "I do my best," she said.

Barry chuckled as he opened the wine while Iris dished up their dinner onto their respective plates.

"Oh," Iris said "Dad's asked if you want to come round for dinner tomorrow?"

"Of course," Barry said as he grabbed his plate and offered Iris her glass of wine in which she accepted.

Barry then followed Iris through to the living room and ignored looking at the window that looked out over the city because Len climbing his fire escape was over and Barry intended to fill himself with Chinese and wine tonight.

A/N: Oh my goodness I never set out for the chapter to go this way so please don't kill me guys! but seriously the vodka and dorito thing is a sort of accurate account of how I reacted to a break up {the show i binge watched was Sense8 - you guys should check it out if you haven't!}

have extra hugs and kisses from me to tide you over
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo