Chapter Text
Somehow, Nate had thought that the end of the silence between them would make a sound.
But it’s not like that. When it does happen, it’s in the fast-food restaurant they are in to celebrate the Trojans’ last victory. His face has some ketchup running down it and he doesn’t flinch when Ichirou’s finger comes to rub off. He turns his head, lips touching those fingers. And Ichirou’s breath doesn’t so much hitch as catch.
Their eyes meet and Nate watches, waiting to see what happens, Ichirou traces his lips with his fingertips and Nate opens his mouth, closing his eyes.
It’s a blatant show of trust, eyes closed, hands letting his paper tissue drop to his empty plate and Ichirou knows it.
Nate knows it and Ichirou knows it, and they’re in a restaurant sitting ever so close.
Nate has grown up with touch being one of the many languages he speaks, and right here, his husband is saying a thousand words, breaking the silence by the touch.
Ichirou comes closer and Nate opens his eyes to Ichirou pecking him in the corner of his mouth. For a married couple, this is probably the most intimate they’ve been and it is somehow not scary. Nate is not startled as the peck builds into a kiss. It’s not his first kiss, and it is more chaste than his first kiss, But Ichirou presses his teeth unto Nate’s bottom lip before withdrawing and the slight twinge makes him feel warm all over his body.
The room's clatter comes back and Nathaniel raises his hand to his lips, still trying to process. Ichirou’s face has the slightest flush and his head is cocked in question. Nate bites his lips where Ichirou’s teeth had touched hem and Ichirou’s face darkens. He always chooses his words carefully but it is a mark of how flustered he is that he takes so long to choose them.
“Nathaniel, is this something that you want?” His hand moves away from Nate’s thighs, where it had come to as they kissed. Giving him space, giving reassurance while reaffirming their relationships increasingly blurring lines.
“I—yes. This is something I want.” The surety in his voice isn’t covered up in the way his words come out. Eager and trembling together.
This time it’s Nate who covers the gap between them, taking control of the kiss. His hands wrap around Ichirou’s neck as his husband’s come to touch his cheek, his chest.
They part for breath, in the scrambled sentences Nate’s brain can put together right now, he thinks how this is his teenager moment and a dam bursts as he laughs. This is his damn teenager moment; he has won a game, he is having his first kiss with someone he cares about, and they’re on a date.
Everything is out of order but it is.
And Nate was the kid who thought himself inconsequential at sixteen.
Ichirou doesn’t laugh with him, but Nate knows he sees the humor in the situation. Their eyes sparkle at each other. It is only a distinct cough from their waitress who has brought the bill that keeps Nate from going for it again.
The payment process and the short walk down to their car have never felt quite this long before, neither has the drive down to their flat. Nate is thankful to not be the one driving, he doesn’t think he could when all of him is a jumbled, if happy, mess. There is an undercurrent of worry as well, he still doesn’t know how he feels about how far they will go once they get home, but Nate pushes it down. In the entire time of their marriage, Ichirou has never pushed for anything physical. Nate thinks about the trust they had built up over time. And decides to let it was over in this aspect too.
They come home and Ichirou’s hand wraps around his waist as they ride to the elevator to their flat, his tongue leaving stripes on Nate’s neck. He blows on the wet spot a bit, making Nate shiver. He likes this, he wants this. It isn’t as big a revelation as it might have been.
They make it to their bedroom, nodding to the guard stationed outside their apartment. Nate doesn’t see him falter at the proximity his bosses are exhibiting.
“You’re still okay with this?” Ichirou asks, even as they’re both working to shed layers. “I want to see you naked, and take what we were doing further, but…..not have sex yet.” Nate spoke with more confidence than he felt, “Ichirou? we can do that right?”
“Yes, of course. If you want to stop let me know.”
Nate watched Ichirou strip until he was in his boxers, he usually folded his clothes with startling amounts of attention, nut today it was more of a habit born hurry. Nate himself put his clothes in the hamper. And sat on the edge of the bed. Ichirou moved to him and they fell back in together.
==
Nate fell asleep wrapped around Ichirou that night. They had shared a bed before and Ichirou ran cold, I this wasn’t his first rodeo, untangling himself from the mess of limbs they were to go to his morning run. Ichirou would wake p in some time before Nate got home and make coffee and cut fruit for both of them. It was an established routine, but Nate hadn’t factored in the fact that they fell asleep wrapped in each other, in ways beyond the heat-seeking. And that it was practically impossible to detach without waking up his husband.
Oh well. His morning run could be skipped. Nate fell asleep again in his husband’s arms, and well if he accidentally skipped his morning class, he figured he had earned it.