by Emrys Apollo
“I don’t know what just happened,” he confesses, confused and a little ashamed.
“Nothing happened,” Jarrod says simply, “we made love, you got a little overwhelmed, and you released your emotions by crying. That’s a really hard thing to do, Cli, being brave enough to do that. I’m so proud of you.”
Clive feels warm all over from the praise and slowly the humiliation ebbs away, leaving an exhausted peace behind, and he falls asleep in Jarrod’s arms, knowing that things won’t ever be the same.
***
Jarrod’s not there when he wakes up.
Clive doesn’t want to panic at something as small as not having Jarrod in sight as soon as he wakes up, but he can’t quite help it, because Jarrod’s not there. He’s petrified, half-convinced that crying after sex like a crazy person had scared Jarrod away.
He shifts onto the other side of the bed, buries his face in Jarrod’s pillow and takes a deep breath, calming down just enough to hear the water running in his bathroom. He relaxes immediately, sheepish and a little unnerved at his own emotional instability.
He takes another deep breath, and slowly gets out of bed, walking to the bathroom and opening the door, still nude and interrupting Jarrod as he sings quietly, a song he hasn’t heard before.
Jarrod beams at him and holds out his arms. “Good morning,” he says cheerfully, as Clive steps into the warm water and into his embrace. “Did you sleep okay, Cli? I was going to make you breakfast in bed… you were kind of wrecked last night and I thought you could use the extra rest.”
Clive leans up and kisses his cheek. “You’re going to spoil me if you keep this up,” he says, sounding as if he wouldn’t really mind.
“Someone’s got to spoil you, Clive Reynold, and if I don’t, who will?” Jarrod asks with a cheeky grin, reaching for the bottle of shampoo and carefully lathering it through Clive’s hair.
It doesn’t even occur to him to protest, as he leans against his someone and lets Jarrod take his weight, lets Jarrod rinse his hair and then clean his body and guide him out of the shower.
He comes back to himself during breakfast, sitting downstairs at the counter with Jarrod and eating an omelet, bright golden sunshine pouring through the windows. He remembers why Jarrod’s even here, why he’d gone over there, how young and devastated he’d sounded over the phone as he’d gasped for breath.
It hits him like a bucket of ice water, and he’s suddenly nauseous, toying with the half of his breakfast that he can no longer quite stomach. He’s practically drowning in self-loathing, and when Jarrod says his name, he looks up and suspects it wasn’t the first time Jarrod had tried to get his attention.
“Sorry,” he mutters, “I just - I’m sorry, for how I’ve been, last night and this morning. I’m supposed to look after you. You already look after everyone, you’re just that sort of person, I’m supposed to be the person who takes care of the caretaker.”
“So, what, I never get to take care of you just because I’ve taken care of other people before?” Jarrod asks softly, “that’s ridiculous, Cli. You take care of me already, and that means I get to take care of you, too. You deserve that.”
Clive wants to argue that last point. He doesn’t deserve it. He doesn’t even need it, he wants to say. He has a good life, he’s well-off, he’s living his dream, and he doesn’t need to be taken care of. But he can’t say any of that, a lump in his throat that doesn’t let him do a damn thing other than just looking at Jarrod and praying he understands.
Jarrod must see something there, because he smiles and caresses Clive’s cheek. “I like doing it,” he says honestly, “I like taking care of you, Clive, it’s not a chore, or a job. It makes me happy. Would you ever ask me to stop doing something that makes me happy?”
“No, of course not! I would never - “
“Then indulge me, love, let me spoil you for a little bit. We don’t have much time until I’ve got to be back at work, and if you do come to mine, bring something to keep you busy, okay? I haven’t got a TV, I don’t want you getting bored after I go to work.”
Clive packs a bunch of things to do - board games, books, a pack of cards, a jigsaw puzzle or two. Anything else he needs, he’ll have to pick up in Birmingham, he decides.
***
It’s bliss. He’s happy, living in Jarrod’s home and cooking his breakfast and puttering around the flat while he’s away. Sometimes he goes out for a jog, or a walk around the park. Jarrod works long hours, but he always comes home with a tired smile on his face and open arms.
It’s not like the times when Clive had taken a day and come to see him. They don’t have sex all the time, don’t have to squeeze a month’s worth of intimacy into a day and a half. Sometimes they fall asleep on the couch to the sound of the radio playing.
The poster of Michael Starling is still hanging on the inside door of Jarrod’s closet, but it doesn’t bother Clive that much anymore. They keep the closet door closed most of the time, anyway, especially when they’re kissing or having sex. Neither of them is too keen on looking up and having Michael’s eyes on them when they’re together.
Jarrod takes phone calls with Clive’s head in his lap, half-asleep as Jarrod talks to his mother and brothers. They tell each other stories, embarrassing stories from school. Clive shares anecdotes from training and Jarrod talks about patients, only the good ones where the patients get better. He tells the stories about the kids who get better and go to school, whose classmates throw them a party to welcome them back. He tells the stories of the babies he sees delivered, the twins who came prematurely and stayed in the neonatal intensive care unit, and the way the nurses brought in a cake for the day they finally got to go home with mum and dad.
Clive loves those stories, and he can’t help but fall a little in love with him every single time he hears one, something about the look in his eyes, the gentle curve of a smile on his lips.
Sometimes Jarrod comes home miserable, and the exhausted smile doesn’t reach his eyes, and his arms tremble slightly as he holds them out. Those are the nights where Clive holds him close, lets him talk about it if he wants to, reminds him it isn’t his fault, grieves with him for the strangers he couldn’t quite save this time.
Those are the nights when the words I love you pound at his teeth, desperate to escape, and those are the nights when he swallows them back with a grimace. Those are the nights when he rolls Jarrod onto his back and climbs on top of him, using his body to take Jarrod’s mind off it and nudge him into an uneasy sleep.
Those are the nights when Clive stays awake for hours, watching his partner sleep, watching the expressions on his face when he dreams, the pinched, pained look that means Clive should whisper something into his ears to shift his dreams into a softer, happier place. He whispers about having Jarrod in his home, living there together, kissing Jarrod goodbye before training and kissing him hello after a long day of work at the hospital. He strokes Jarrod’s hair, too, and eventually, his body softens, melts into the mattress and against Clive’s body, always relaxing more with the physical contact.
Those are the nights when Clive wonders what will become of them, and lets himself dream foolish dreams and falls asleep to terrible nightmares that he’s alone again, the way he always is and always will be.
CHAPTER 9
Preseason starts far too soon. Two days before training is set to start, he packs his things - he’s not picky, though, and he leaves behind the board games he never plays at home, the jigsaw puzzle occupying the floor in between the sofa and the bookshelf, and hides away some of his clothes in Jarrod’s closet, hoping he’ll find them and think of him.
He makes sure their fridge is stocked, and carefully hides some money in a novel, just in case Jarrod comes up a bit short. He won’t have Jarrod working himself to death, not if he doesn’t need to. He leaves a note with the money.
Please take care of yourself.
Yours, Clive.
When Jarrod comes home, he kisses him what fee
ls like a hundred times and yet a thousand too few. They have dinner and make love, one last time, and Clive promises to call once he gets home, to let Jarrod know he made it back safely.
Jarrod walks him over to the door, hands jammed into the pockets of his sweatpants. Clive pulls him in for one last hug that Jarrod’s slow to return.
“Bad boy,” he reprimands, “I thought if I got to hold you again, I wouldn’t be able to let go, and here you are, testing me.”
“That’s why you love me,” Clive says playfully, almost before he realizes what exactly he’s said.
Jarrod doesn’t say anything back, but there’s a soft, fond look in his eyes, and Clive takes the liberty of interpreting it as I guess it is.
“Why do you have to be so damn good at your job?” he grumbles instead, “even during international breaks, you’ll be off with UK. What about me? What about your lad, stuck here in Birmingham while you’re surrounded by hot, fit, naked men? It’s not fair, Cli.”
Clive feels a pang. It really isn’t fair. “This is your last year of school, love,” he says softly, “I’m sure they need a decent doctor in Manchester.”
“I’ve already applied,” Jarrod says sheepishly, not quite looking at him, “all that’s left is waiting to see what happens. Don’t get your hopes up too high, though, babe, I’ve applied all over, and at this point, it’s out of my hands.”
The words lift him up, higher than anything he could imagine, his most distant dreams suddenly within touching distance.
“I don’t suppose a recommendation letter from a hockey player would help your chances any?”
“Not if it just says ‘hey, Franklin has a great penis, please hire him so I can have sex with him every day.’”
“Look at you, assuming I’m interested in having sex with you! I just want my city to have to best possible medical providers, that’s all. Nothing to do with your incredible penis or your fantastic ass or the fact that your tongue can do things that I can’t think about without getting hard.”
Jarrod laughs warmly. “Call me when you get there, sweetheart,” he reminds him, “I don’t care what time it is, I’ll sleep on the sofa so I don’t miss your call.”
“Counteroffer: you go to sleep in bed, I’ll call when I get home, and if you don’t pick up, I’ll leave a message, and you won’t wake up with a sore neck and stiff back.”
Jarrod smiles and agrees. There’s one last kiss to be had.
After they have it, though, Clive wants one more last kiss. And a third.
“Sweetheart, you have to go, if we go for another round, you won’t get home until dawn, and I don’t want you driving that late.”
Clive pretends annoyance. “Look at you, being concerned about my safety when we could be having sex!” Still, he hugs him close and tells him to take care of himself, and lets Jarrod hand him a sweater, in case he needs it, and then he leaves, part of him aching to turn around the second his feet step onto the pavement.
***
Preseason training sucks. Preseason training always sucks, of course, but this year, it’s somehow a hundred times worse. He’s had a taste of what it’s like to have Jarrod make his house into a home. He knows what Jarrod looks like, sleepy-warm in the morning and not wanting him to get up quite yet. He knows how Jarrod sounds when he touches himself over the phone, the quiet sigh after he orgasms that says I wish you were here with me.
It helps that Samson is there. Now that he knows, Clive takes every opportunity to talk about Jarrod to him. He doesn’t particularly care to hear about the sex stuff, but Clive doesn’t really care to share that, either. It’s just such a novel experience to be able to tell his best friend about the man he’s in love with, and he gets to share the little things, like how Jarrod closes his eyes and lets out a happy sigh after a sip of tea, or how Jarrod writes little love notes when the bathroom mirror fogs up from the shower, or how Jarrod boxes in his spare time, how he looks when he’s staring at a punching bag like it’s an opponent. There’s no more paranoia that this time he’ll forget to switch the pronouns and talk about Jarrod as if he were a woman. He revels in it, in the small, precious honesty of it.
He feels a bit bad that his brother doesn’t know, though. There’s no real reason that Luke doesn’t know, Luke is an incredible brother and an incredible person. Clive just hadn’t felt the need to burden him with this. Part of him still looks at Luke like his younger brother, like he needs to protect him, and somehow, having a gay brother feels like something to protect him from. Or maybe it’s just Clive wanting to protect himself from Luke seeing him differently. Luke loves him and looks up to him, even now, and he just can’t stand the idea of losing that. He knows it’s a ridiculous thing to worry about, he knows that Luke loves him probably more unconditionally than anyone in the world other than his mother, and still it makes him worry.
Robin’s there, too, of course. He isn’t exactly going to leave the best team in the world just because he and Clive have had a falling out of epic proportions. He’s still there. He’s fully recovered from their breakup, walks into training looking completely relaxed and if he ignores Clive’s existence whenever possible, well, it’s mutual.
Clive doesn’t love him anymore, really. It had slowly converted itself to a quiet, seething anger. He’s angry at Robin, for not leaving Kendra. He’s angry at Robin for continuing to have sex with him, even after he found out about the pregnancy. He’s angry at Robin, for making him the home wrecker, for taking advantage of the way he had loved him, so long and so silently. He’s mad at Robin for ruining things with Jarrod, and proud of himself that he managed to somehow salvage the unsalvageable.
But mostly, Clive’s angry at the person Robin made him, the man that continued to have sex with a lad who had a pregnant fiancée waiting for him at home.
Sometimes, he lets himself indulge in the thought that maybe Jarrod’s making him into a better person. If he’d gotten ink stains on Jarrod’s pure white soul, maybe Jarrod had cleaned his of dirt and apathy.
The air between them now is cold. When Clive gives him an assist, he runs over and celebrates next to him, but he makes sure he’s just slow enough that someone else gets there first and throws their arms around Robin so Clive doesn’t have to hold him. It’s easy enough to do that during preseason, when the results don’t really matter so much as the performances do. He wonders what it’ll be like during the season, whether he’ll be drawn back into his orbit like a comet pulled in by a star’s gravity.
They travel to Australia and China for their preseason tour. The time difference is stupidly frustrating, and he can’t even call Jarrod except for right before he goes to bed, which is usually when Jarrod’s waking up in the morning. They speak for a few minutes, as Clive drifts off and Jarrod makes breakfast.
Samson is in the room sometimes, when he talks to Jarrod. He knows enough now not to ruin the few rare minutes Clive has with him, even though he likes to tease him about it afterwards. Sometimes he asks gentle questions, about what color Jarrod’s eyes are, and how tall he is, and what color his hair is, and whether that’s always been Clive’s type, and does he even have a type, and what does it feel like, to be with him in bed, and does it crush him, to have Jarrod’s weight on top of him.
They grow closer, over the course of the summer, and by the end of it, Samson is his best friend in the entire world, no questions asked. He knows things about him now that even Robin doesn’t. It makes him feel a little worse about keeping it from his brother, who looks at them sometimes with a lost, lonely expression when he thinks Clive can’t see.
Samson calls him on it too, unsurprisingly.
“You should tell Luke,” he says quietly, one night after Clive finishes talking to Jarrod. “I’ve never seen you like this before, Cli. I think your brother had a right to know you’re in love. He worries about you, you know.”
“I know.” Clive tried to figure out a good time, a time when he can say it without having to see Luke again every day. It’s te
rrifying, the thought of coming out to his brother. It’s not even that he’s afraid of rejection, though he definitely is. It’s just that he’s kept the secret so long it wants to stay inside him, buried away. Telling Samson was one thing, risky, certainly, but he and Samson weren’t bound to each other. Even very old childhood friends drifted apart sometimes, and he’d be sorry to lose him, but he’d survive. But losing Luke? Losing his brother? Absolutely out of the question, an entirely unacceptable risk.
So he talks to Jarrod about it, the next time they speak, with Samson sitting on the other bed in the hotel room and intently watching something on television with the volume muted.
“Are you out to your family at all, Jarr?”
“Not officially, but I’m pretty sure my mum knows. Haven’t talked about it with my brothers yet, they’re still young. And mum and I have never officially talked about it, but she’s always careful to ask about my partner instead of my girlfriend, and she’s always saying I need to settle down with someone nice, nothing gender specific. And it’s pretty hard for that to just be a coincidence.”
