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A single pearl of water drips out of the faucet and lands in the bathwater. The resulting ripples chase each other to the edges of the glass-tiled, in-ground tub, lapping at Alhaitham’s bare chest as he soaks in the steam.
Ever since the cataclysmic toppling of the Akademiya’s internal hierarchy, the days have felt longer and longer. There are far more questions than he has answers to, and while such is the nature of a life spent in the pursuit of knowledge, Alhaitham can only handle so many anxiety-riddled scholars begging him for direction before he’ll start to feel like a machine on the verge of malfunction.
If only there was a polite way to pray for Lesser Lord Kusanali to put the whole city to sleep for a week or two.
The silence in the bathroom is interrupted by muffled footsteps up and down the hallway. Kaveh being back after months away on sabbatical, or whatever, will take some adjustment. Alhaitham had almost forgotten what it’s like to have a roommate. The house feels an inch or two too small now, and Kaveh's taking up space like he never left—dishes in the sink that Alhaitham didn’t put there, the door unlocked when he comes home, the smell of food filling the house before he even wakes up.
To be honest, Alhaitham is kind of glad for it. The chaos of the Akademiya scandal left everyone a little more than unsettled. The existence of his familiar roommate surrounding him almost makes it easier.
No use ruminating on the fact that he and Kaveh could be considered settled.
He listens to the flurry of footsteps back and forth, eyes closed, relaxing into the heat of the bath. Kaveh sounds like he’s on a mission, hopefully cleaning up after their dinner like he promised to.
For some minutes, it’s quiet. And then the door to the bathroom opens.
Alhaitham senses Kaveh approaching without having to turn around. With him enters a rush of cooler air from the hallway before the door shuts again, trapping the steam and their body heat in the bathroom. He picks up on the tap, tap, tap of Kaveh’s bare feet bringing him closer to the tub. A moment later, a waft of the incense that Kaveh seems to radiate all on his own. Like paper and bold coffee. It mixes oddly well with the floral oils Alhaitham added to the water.
Where he expects Kaveh to open his mouth and punctuate the peaceful evening with something to complain about, instead two long legs slide into the bath on either side of his shoulders.
On reflex, Alhaitham’s fingers draw curiously up the outside of a pale calf. He turns his head just enough to glance at his prodigal roommate sitting on the floor to let his feet dangle in the water.
“I see you went rummaging around in my wardrobe.”
His eyes drag over the sheer, champagne-colored silk robe wrapped around Kaveh’s shoulders. The folds of it part like flower petals just above his hips. He isn’t wearing anything underneath.
“I came in to ask you just what you thought you needed to hide this for,” Kaveh says with a hum. He plucks at the hem, which makes the fabric shimmer in the low bathroom light. “Forgot to send your lady friend home with it before I got back?”
Alhaitham pushes a short laugh through his nose. Of course Kaveh would make him say it out loud. He accounted for his possibility when he bought it.
“It’s a one-of-a-kind piece. The artisan was packing up her booth to go back to Fontaine that very day,” he explains, knowing it won’t be enough to throw Kaveh off the topic. “I couldn’t pass it up.”
“I never knew you to be such a patron of the arts.”
Kaveh’s palm continues smoothing over the shift, rippling it against his chest and shoulders, like he can’t get enough of it.
Good. Neither can Alhaitham.
“I’d argue that letting an architect live in my house for free qualifies as patronage of the arts.”
A scoff. “That’s no surprise.”
“No?”
“We all know how much you love to argue.” The hand skims off the fabric and floats through the air, falling languidly to Alhaitham’s cheek. Kaveh’s thumb traces his jaw, his lower lip. “Don’t change the subject. This is for me, isn’t it?”
Now Alhaitham could scoff. All it takes is one look at Kaveh to know. Just the right size, if he were to stand up and actually tie the thing closed, the hem would just barely caress the stone floor. The color, similar to the shade of his blond hair, compliments his ruby eyes perfectly. Threads of real gold woven into the fabric—Kaveh is a treasure trove incarnate, and he certainly looks the part now. He watches Alhaitham with that easy, I’m waiting expression, petting his cheek and letting the touch wander down his neck.
It’s ridiculously obvious. Of course Alhaitham bought it for him.
“As expensive and well-made as it is,” he says, turning around to recline against the wall of the tub again, “it’s not something I would ever wear. You can have it if you want.”
“A truly generous roommate, you are. Forget the Sages, someone canonize you as a saint.”
“Now there’s an idea.”
He closes his eyes and draws the damp bathroom air into his lungs. One of Kaveh’s feet rests on the top of his thigh, just before the bend of his hip. Alhaitham’s fingers dance along the bump of his ankle absently. The silence is uncharacteristic for both of them, so he soaks it in.
Fingers disappear under the hair at the back of his head, nails scratching his scalp. Alhaitham leans into the lazy massage. More tension that he thought he’d let go of dissipates from his muscles like a fog. Another hand rests on his shoulder, thumb carving slow circles.
“I can tell it’s been rough lately. You’re stiff.”
“Political unrest tends to do that to a person.”
“Must’ve been worse without me around.”
A clipped laugh. “How do you figure you could’ve made it any better?”
The hand on his shoulder ascends his neck, his jaw, until Kaveh's knuckle tilts his chin back. Alhaitham opens his eyes and has nowhere to look but into that sultry red gaze as Kaveh leans into his space. The fingers in his hair tighten.
“By helping you relax, obviously.”
Despite the warm water, Alhaitham wants to shiver. He suppresses the reaction, instead dragging his gaze down to Kaveh’s lips and back up again. An assessment, an invitation.
“Just like you’re doing right now? With your feet in my lap and half of a massage? As pretty as your hands are, they still aren’t enough to place the empty seats we have with the Sages.”
Kaveh smiles, his breath fanning across Alhaitham’s mouth. The thumb on his chin strokes back and forth slowly.
“Deflect all you want. What I’m hearing is, ‘I missed you, Kaveh’.”
Once again, Alhaitham doesn’t think he needs to say it out loud. All the evidence is wrapped around Kaveh’s shoulders.
He can’t not have the last word, though.
“A wonder your head doesn’t inflate to fit the size of your ego—”
The end of his sentence is annoyingly, perfectly interrupted by Kaveh’s lips pressing down onto his own. Alhaitham watches Kaveh’s pretty eyelashes fan over the tops of his cheeks before following suit and closing his eyes.
He tastes like the wine and honeyed dates they had for dessert. Alhaitham washes his tongue across the sweetness of Kaveh’s lips, before biting down when a deft foot fits itself over Alhaitham’s half hard cock. He gives Kaveh a soft growl in warning, mostly distracted by the kiss, but all he gets in return is an amused hum and a tongue in his mouth.
Kaveh grips his hair harder to keep him in place, and his foot presses down with more intent, more friction. Alhaitham wraps his fingers around Kaveh’s ankle—to push him away or drag him closer, the reason is moot. What matters is that he’s touching Kaveh, and the ‘I’m glad you’re back’ can remain unsaid.
Toes drag up his shaft, completely hard now, and stroke along the tip of his cock. Kaveh moves slowly, as if he’s not even aware he’s doing it. To hell with helping you relax. Kaveh wants to wind him up, and they both know it.
He must be confident that Alhaitham won’t move now, because Kaveh’s hand leaves his chin to travel back down his neck, then his chest. Alhaitham would never protest a kiss—at least, not one from Kaveh—so he has no reservations in pressing his tongue forward to explore his deviant mouth.
It feels like the bathwater is getting warmer, but no, it’s just them.
Almost forgetting where that hand was going, Alhaitham lets out a short groan when Kaveh pinches his nipple. He squeezes Kaveh’s ankle to complain, to encourage, and fights the instinct to roll his hips into the arch of Kaveh’s foot. Kaveh squeezes his pec in cheeky, open admiration, proven by the breathy laugh that breezes across Alhaitham’s lips.
“Maybe I should get you off like this,” he murmurs between kisses. Alhaitham bites his lower lip to remind him to choose his next words carefully. “With just my foot. Is that all you need?”
Not careful enough, in the end.
Kaveh has always been prone to a loose, rude tongue when he’s had wine, even just a drop. He gets rather comfortable around Alhaitham.
“Says the one who barged in here and disrupted my routine in the first place.”
With a firm grip around Kaveh’s ankle, Alhaitham holds him in place and rocks up, finally getting enough friction where he needs it. The touch on his shaft isn’t dexterous like Kaveh’s fingers, or wet like his throat, or warm like the luxurious envelope of his body that Alhaitham is all too familiar with, all too spoiled by.
This won’t do. Alhaitham needs all of him.
While Kaveh might be content to keep playing with him until their fingers and toes go wrinkly, Alhaitham is not so patient. Not when it’s been months.
He turns around between Kaveh’s knees, so his chest presses against the wall of the tub. Their kiss breaks with a wet sound, accompanied by the sloshing of water as Alhaitham moves. He pushes Kaveh’s thighs apart a few more inches, fingertips trailing up the sensitive skin.
Their eyes meet, and Alhaitham watches as Kaveh fixes his bangs with a wet hand, soaking the strands enough that they stick to his forehead. Despite the level gaze Kaveh gives him, his cheeks and lips are flushed ever so slightly.
“Take this off,” he orders with a glance down at the glittering robe.
“I thought you said I could have it.”
“Take it off so it doesn’t get wet. It was expensive and should be treated well.”
As much as Alhaitham likes the look of Kaveh dangling before the tub in something that hardly counts as a nightgown, dripping in excess and refinery, he’d hate to see his gift get ruined after the first wear. Between the time he bought it and now, he’s had plenty of fantasies about Kaveh sauntering around the house dressed only in this. If he wears it enough, it’ll start smelling like him, just like Alhaitham’s pillows do after they’ve spent a night together.
Graciously, Kaveh removes the shift without something smart to say in return. The thin, see-through fabric slips off his shoulders. Alhaitham watches rapturously as it falls off his body in the softest caress, and he can’t bring himself to be annoyed that it lands on the floor in a heap. Almost dutifully, Kaveh gathers the shift into a quick fold and sets it aside, far enough away from the water to stay safe.
He’s just as beautiful with nothing on, Alhaitham is reminded as his gaze moves down the length of Kaveh’s body.
Leaning back on his hands, legs dipped in the water, Kaveh lets him look. He’s half hard between his hips, slowly filling out like all it takes for him is Alhaitham’s attention. The corner of his mouth ticks up.
“Are you going to spend the whole night just looking at me?”
Slipping a hand under one of Kaveh’s knees, Alhaitham glances at his face.
“I don’t know about the whole night. While the water is warm, at least.”
He lifts Kaveh’s leg a few inches, nearly tipping him backwards if not for the palms he has pressed flat against the floor. Kaveh watches him, expression heady and expectant, as Alhaitham dips down to drag his lips over his inner thigh.
Alhaitham’s eyes close as Kaveh’s perfume swirls around in his skull, seemingly emanating from the skin itself. He kisses a line up towards one hip, pausing to nibble above the joint. The shiver it produces, Alhaitham relishes in it.
His other hand strokes down Kaveh’s calf and back up again, lathering him with the silky, oiled water. He hears the quietest intake of breath, and it becomes his cue to move in closer.
Fingers in his hair follow the path of his head as he mouths across the base of Kaveh’s shaft. His tongue pokes out, washing over the seam between his balls until Kaveh vocalizes his pleasure with a moan. Alhaitham deigns to glance up at his face and finds him already looking. Those red eyes darken, his lips parted to let his soft breaths out.
As if urged by a command, Kaveh wraps a hand around himself and feeds his cock into Alhaitham’s waiting mouth. He watches hungrily as half of it disappears past his lips, until Alhaitham’s tongue causes his eyes to slip closed again.
Kaveh lets go of the base of his cock to trail his fingers up Alhaitham’s jaw. With nothing in the way, Alhaitham has room to slowly sink down over the rest of him, drawing out a moan that lasts just as long. He relaxes his throat to accommodate the length of him, breath measured in time with intermittent swallows.
He bobs his head lazily, reacquainting himself with Kaveh’s shape and taste. His movements earn him little gasps from above, the slight clenching of fingers around strands of his hair. As he gets into the rhythm of it, his thumb teases the space between Kaveh’s hip and thigh, until Kaveh is leaning back on his elbows like he doesn’t have the strength to hold himself up.
Easing off his cock, Alhaitham licks his lips and guides Kaveh’s leg just a bit higher. The string of saliva connecting them dissipates. Kaveh takes the moment to catch his breath, a flustered huff, and watches with a hazy expression as Alhaitham drops his knee over one shoulder. The position brings them closer. Alhaitham can feel the heat radiating off of Kaveh’s body against his face.
He looks like he has something to say—sarcastic or otherwise, Alhaitham doesn’t give him the chance.
With Kaveh’s hips tilted back like this, Alhaitham has the space to press his lips to the spot just under his balls. While Kaveh full-body shudders, Alhaitham licks the soft skin and travels lower, kissing and lapping at his entrance. His hand remains securely pressed against Kaveh’s other thigh to keep his legs open, which are trying to squeeze around his head.
Alhaitham can forgive him for it. Judging by the moan that rattles out of him, he simply can’t help himself.
“Haitham,” comes the whispered call of his name. Kaveh switches from pulling on his hair to petting it imploringly. His muscles tense briefly when Alhaitham hums against him in response.
For a moment, Kaveh doesn’t follow it up with anything, perhaps too distracted by the wiggling of Alhaitham’s tongue. His hips arch like they want to lift off the floor and grind closer to Alhaitham, but he keeps himself surprisingly restrained.
“Be good and give me your fingers,” he finally manages to order.
Though, murmured through desperate breaths makes it sound more like begging.
The edge in his voice makes Alhaitham’s cock twitch in the water. He scrapes his teeth over Kaveh’s perineum, eliciting a jolt and a high moan. Lifting his head, Alhaitham surveys the state he’s left Kaveh in. That is to say, a very flushed, lust-drunk state.
His index finger slips in easily enough. Kaveh draws his lower lip between his teeth and visibly swallows whatever it is he wants to say. Alhaitham gives one, two strokes of his finger before adding a second one, and this time Kaveh is more vocal about it.
“Damn you…” he curses unsteadily, almost out of breath.
Alhaitham rubs his soft, warm inner walls and feels himself grin. “I’m doing exactly what you asked.”
“Teasing me is what you’re doing.” He almost sounds offended.
“I have no idea what you mean.” Alhaitham contradicts the statement by deliberately, precisely targeting Kaveh’s prostate.
His back arches, a sharp breath sucked into his lungs. Alhaitham chooses this moment to push a third finger into Kaveh’s welcoming body. Any protest Kaveh has disintegrates into a whine.
“No more suggestions?” Alhaitham needles. Were he a more patient man, he would push Kaveh further and further, to his breaking point and beyond. He knows what it takes to turn him into a mess, and Kaveh, like always, is a sight to behold when he gets there.
But Alhaitham can think of only one request he would honor in this moment. His cock throbs from lack of attention, from seeing Kaveh all spread out and open for him like this. After a few more plaintive thrusts of his hand, he retracts it.
The muscles in Kaveh’s legs relax, and he exhales a precarious sigh. Alhaitham wraps a hand around himself under the water and strokes a few times. If they were in bed, he’d have easier access to the oil they use, but this will do just fine. Between the bath and how much the tip of his cock is leaking for release, Kaveh’s body won’t resist.
“Here? The floor is so hard.”
Alhaitham blinks up at Kaveh, paused where he was about to shuffle forward and take him just like this.
“Wasn't it you who approached me in the middle of my bath,” Alhaitham reminds him. “Consequences and actions and all that.”
“The consequence of you getting hard from an innocent massage shouldn’t result in my tailbone getting bruised on the tile.” Kaveh’s fingers rest against his own chest demonstratively. A grin tugs at the corners of his lips. Alhaitham opens his mouth to refute every word he just said, but Kaveh continues, “How about you take me back to your bed?”
“I notice you’re not offering your own sheets to get soaked. If you had waited a few more minutes before abandoning the ability to keep your hands and feet to yourself, I could’ve been dried off by now.”
But here they are, both dripping in flowery bath oil and slaves to their own desire for each other. Alhaitham supposes there are worse things.
Kaveh’s little smirk melts into a frown, or a pout, and he places the ball of his foot against Alhaitham’s hip to keep him away.
“Fine, but if I get abrasions all up and down my back because you were too rough with me, then I’m making you fetch and apply the medicinal herbs. Every. Day.”
Alhaitham doubts he could ever be ‘too rough’ with Kaveh.
He sighs. “Come here.”
Stepping back from where he was kneeling on the bath seat to face outward, he beckons for Kaveh to take his spot. Kaveh goes willingly and without another word, doing a slow turn to let Alhaitham appreciate the expanse of his bare skin from front to back. Once in place, he leans his elbows on the floor leading up to the edge of the tub, and he bends forward just slightly.
He looks like one of his own blank canvases. Alhaitham trails a touch downward, parallel to his spine, and rests his hand above his ass. The skin has gotten gently red from sitting and wiggling on the tile. Alhaitham figures he wasn’t exaggerating.
A few more strokes of his own hand, and he lines up. In this position, the water comes up to their thighs. It won’t make too much of a mess, splashing bathwater around because despite all logical factors, they’re like magnets to each other.
He rubs the tip in circles around Kaveh’s entrance, leaning forward to wrap his free arm around his waist. He pushes in slowly, as slowly as he can tolerate, because it’s been too long for both of them.
“Is it wet enough?” he asks once seated. His lips brush the shell of Kaveh’s ear.
They fit seamlessly, back to chest. He can feel each breath taken into Kaveh’s ribs, the fast, thick pumping of his heart.
Kaveh nods, one of his hands floating down to rest on Alhaitham’s forearm.
“Just give me a moment. To feel you.”
Alhaitham can also take the time to relish in the feeling of Kaveh around him. He’s tight and warm, fluttering against the intrusion with every breath. Alhaitham’s hand wanders up his stomach, his chest, his fingers circling lightly around one nipple. Kaveh gives the smallest jolt, exhaling a quiet laugh. He paws Alhaitham away from playing with him further.
“You’re so impatient.”
Alhaitham fits his nose behind Kaveh’s ear, burying his face in his soft blond hair. It’s a bit damp from the humidity now, radiating that scent that’s so distinctly Kaveh.
“You started it,” he says in place of the truth, which is, Can you blame me? Look at you.
Another laugh, one that Alhaitham feels down to his cock.
“Childish, too.” Fingers wrapping around Alhaitham’s wrist, Kaveh guides his hand back down. “You can move now.”
Alhaitham holds him around the base as he pulls back and pushes forward again. Kaveh leans into him, and leans into him again when Alhaitham repeats the action. The languid tugging around his cock draws a hiss out of him, and intentionally or not, he squeezes Kaveh’s shaft.
Once they get going, it’s like no time at all has passed. Alhaitham remembers the pace and the rhythm Kaveh likes and gradually eases into them. Both of Kaveh’s palms flatten on the floor, thumbs hooked over the edge of the tub like he needs to hold on. His moans start off small, almost reserved by Kaveh’s standards, but they trickle into sounds that Alhaitham knows are involuntary. He thrusts harder, just once, to hear the surprised yelp it forces out.
It’s inevitable that the water splashes. The sound echoes off the bathroom walls, joined by Alhaitham’s grunts from the effort of fighting against the water’s resistance. It sloshes up between their bodies each time he pulls back, and surges forward when he forces it away again. His strokes around Kaveh’s cock are messy, unbalanced, but with everything else going on around them, Kaveh probably doesn’t notice.
“A-Ah! Haitham…” he moans.
He certainly isn’t complaining right now.
Alhaitham’s free hand wanders possessively up Kaveh’s torso, until his fingers rest along his jaw and tilt his face in one direction. He kisses the shell of his ear, his smooth and flushed cheek, and finally seals their lips together. It’s off-kilter, both of them breathing too hard, but Alhaitham drinks down Kaveh’s gasps like the richest wine he’s ever tasted.
Kaveh chances lifting a hand to the back of Alhaitham’s head. It leaves him even more precarious than before, but he still manages to rock back into Alhaitham’s thrusts at the risk of toppling over.
Nails in his scalp spur a growl out of Alhaitham’s throat. He pushes and pushes into Kaveh, stuck somewhere between fighting for control and relinquishing it, when Kaveh breaks their kiss with a sharp inhale.
“Yes…! Right there,” he orders frantically, fingers digging and twisting into Alhaitham’s hair.
Alhaitham corrects the rhythm of his hand, fist sliding up and down Kaveh’s shaft in time with his thrusts. The skin is hot and slick in his palm, and he swears he feels it pulse when Kaveh releases into the water with a weak cry.
His back arches artfully as he rides it out. Alhaitham strokes him through it and even speeds up so he can feel the way Kaveh twitches around him from the overstimulation.
He almost smirks when Kaveh whines and pushes his hand away. Alhaitham does relent, instead grabbing Kaveh’s hips with both hands to pull him back into each thrust. He’s just about there, gaze dragging greedily over the sensual curve of Kaveh’s shoulders, the cascade of his spine.
Out of breath, Kaveh folds his arms on the floor and rests his head on them. He’s bent forward beautifully like this, ribs expanding and contracting while the exhilaration washes through him. Alhaitham pictures him all wrapped up in that shift again, imagines the light catching on the gold threads like fragments of chiseled glass.
He pulls out and grinds his cock between Kaveh’s legs. It’s warm here too, pressed up against his perineum and brushing underneath his balls. Alhaitham rubs himself back and forth, fingers digging into Kaveh’s hips hard enough to bruise, until he’s tripping over the edge.
It splashes into the bath, and when their bodies slow to a stop, so does the agitated water. Alhaitham rests his forehead between Kaveh’s shoulder blades and gradually relaxes the grip around his waist. Their hearts hammer in unison, the loudest sound in Alhaitham’s ears.
“Thank you for not giving me another mess to clean up,” Kaveh mutters, shifting his weight.
“I take this to mean you’ve already finished washing the dishes?”
Alhaitham slips out from between his legs as he softens, appreciating the sway of Kaveh’s hips when he unsteadily steps out of the tub. He goes for their towels and hands one to Alhaitham.
“Is it too early to go to bed? I nearly forgot how exhausting you are,” Kaveh says instead of answering the question. The towel wraps around his shoulders like a fluffy emerald cloak.
A laugh escapes through Alhaitham’s nose as he dries off. Only Kaveh would say it like that, as if getting exactly what he asked for is anything to complain about. Actually, if Alhaitham didn’t exhaust him, he’s sure Kaveh would make him do it again.
Towel tucked around his hips, Alhaitham moves toward the bathroom door but is stopped when Kaveh says, “Not even going to offer to carry me? What are all those muscles for?”
“Your legs operate fine, don’t they?”
He turns around and glances pointedly at Kaveh’s legs, which he’s just now noticing are wrapped up in the silk robe again. His eyes linger, then slowly drag back up Kaveh’s body. It’s almost obscene how good he looks in gold. The hints of skin peeking through the sheer fabric are going to find themselves in Alhaitham’s idle thoughts for a while.
Kaveh smirks, but Alhaitham can’t feel bothered by getting caught staring. He has excellent taste in clothing.
“I get it. You didn’t miss me at all. You don’t have to say it.” Kaveh’s hand flops around carelessly.
It’s irritating he says that because they both know it isn’t true.
With an impatient growl, Alhaitham strides over to Kaveh in two large steps and hikes the shift all the way up to Kaveh’s waist. It earns him a yelp, but before Kaveh can demand ‘just what do you think you’re doing,’ Alhaitham scoops him up.
His palms slide possessively under Kaveh’s thighs and guide his legs around his waist. Kaveh takes the hint from there, wrapping himself around Alhaitham’s torso. He’s still warm from the bath, cheeks flushed. Alhaitham hikes him a little higher, and their eyes meet for an extended moment.
“And to think,” Kaveh says through a grin, “the traveler told me you referred to yourself as a feeble scholar—”
Alhaitham cuts off the remark with a searing kiss. Kaveh’s hands come up to either side of his face, a short laugh melting into a moan when their tongues meet in the middle.
He has walked the path from the bathroom to his bed enough times to get them there blind. His eyes are closed, lips too busy molding themselves to Kaveh’s. In the hallway, he pauses to lean Kaveh against the wall and feel his heat. They’re hardly dressed—Kaveh in the robe and Alhaitham in nothing but a towel—but it suddenly feels like too many layers.
When he resumes the walk towards the bed, he opens one eye to check for obstacles and separates from the kiss completely.
“You were supposed to clean the dishes. And there’s still food on the table—”
Now Kaveh interrupts him with a kiss, gently shushing him and bringing their lips back together. Alhaitham will have to deal with it, apparently. Kaveh makes a compelling argument.
He knows he’s reached the bed when his legs bump against the cushion. He unceremoniously drops Kaveh onto the sheets and relishes in the sight of him landing in a rumpled heap. Blond hair askew, silk robe slipping off his shoulders, red eyes drinking Alhaitham in like the first drop of water in the desert.
Alhaitham bends to him, hand clasping the knot in his towel.
The dishes can wait. They have lost time to make up.