Chapter Text
There’s an army bag slung over Tim’s shoulder and his boots just a touched scuffed, but they fit. His eyes are the same color, the same color as they were the last time Raylan saw him. It’s strange, he thought they would have changed. Everything else has.
“What’re you doing here?” Raylan hears himself say. The words sound like someone else is saying them, like they’re coming through cotton. Maybe he’s underwater, drowning, and this is the light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe he died last night, just kneeled over an empty bottle.
Or it was a heart attack, brought on by too much grease and loneliness. Maybe he's dead in his bed, and his roommates will find him in the morning. Just in time to call Helen before she heads in for her shift, and they'll hold the service at the church. They'll bury his next to his mama, and rest there until his bones wither into the soil and dissolve to nothing.
Tim shifts on the porch, and the wood under his boots creaks with it. Just the tiniest bit of Tim’s bravado has drained, let through in the lowering of his shoulders, heavy with anticipation. His hair is shorter, none of the usual tinged dark blonde over his forehead that Raylan is so fond of, the way it falls into his eyes when he ducks his head.
“Oh, I don’t know,” Tim drawls, looking left and right, without meeting Raylan’s eyes. “‘Just was in the neighborhood.”
Raylan makes a strangled sound, and that shuts Tim right up out of the joking. His eyes soften around the edges. “I’m on leave,” he clarifies, peaking a look into Raylan’s door without stepping over the threshold. His eyes are just that touch of wary, like Raylan might throw him out on his ass.
“Leave,” Raylan echoes dumbly.
Tim blinks at him, head tilted slighty, like Raylan’s being intentionally slow. ”Leave,” he says back. “‘We playing twenty questions now?” He knocks his boot on the side of the doorframe, playful, but still reserved, like he’s wondering if any of this was a good idea, and fuck that, that just won’t fucking do.
Raylan reaches out and uses the strap of Tim’s pack to haul him across the door jab, completely ignoring the surprised sound Tim makes. But he doesn’t fight him, just lets himself by yanked through the doorway and is enough of a gentleman to step out of the way while Raylan throws the door shut without even thinking.
He’s not moving fast enough for Raylan’s taste, so he hauls the backpack off Tim’s shoulder himself, eyes tracking the fatigues, the boots, the new hair cut, a small scar at the hairline that wasn’t there before. Tim is staring at him, not saying a word, his eyes big and maybe wet. Maybe Raylan is just seeing things. He hardly notices the particulars.
There’s a yawning pit in his stomach, right below his sternum, gnawing through his chest. It’s like he hasn’t eaten in days, like a black well of sorrow is drowning his lungs with so much gunk that he can’t breathe. And now, like the tide is receding and the rush of air in his lungs is too much, like he might choke on it. It might kill him.
“Raylan,” Tim starts and Raylan can’t say his name back because it might break the air and this might not be real, he just makes a wordless noise and surges into him, cupping Tim’s head with his left hand under the ear, fingers wrapped around the nape of his neck. The right cups against Tim’s cheek, just as Tim’s hands are coming up to mirror Raylan’s. The touch, lightly calloused hands against his face, break any hesitance brought on by shock. They both reach of each other at the same time, and finally, finally connect.
Tim’s mouth is warm and just as eager against his own, the two of them crushing skin and clacking teeth together. He hear Tim startles into a laugh, just the smallest bit, and swallows the sound himself, bitting at the bottom lip a touch so he knows it was heard. Tim chases him and bites back, that touch of mean that is so Tim Raylan could die.
He uses his grip on the other man to bring their bodies together, doesn’t want a sliver of sunshine between them. Tim wraps one arm around Raylans’ back, and pulls them as close together as physically possible. The weight and warmth of another person against him, of Tim, is so intoxicating that Raylan feels heady with it, like he could faint. There is no space between them and yet, it’s still a chasm. He wasn’t to crawl into Tim, crack his chest open and hollow out a place where Raylan can live.
He frames Tim’s face with his hands, mashing his nose against Tim’s as he kisses him again, trying to impress the way he feels right into their mouths. It’s like touch is making him hungrier, instead of sated. There’s white noise ringing in his ears, but he must be making a noise, saying something, because he can feel Tim’s talking to him, against his mouth.
“Don’t-why-might not-want,” is Tim’s garbled voice, so clearly undershot with exhaustion and emotion. Raylan takes his whole bottom lip in his mouth and bites until he tastes iron, just to shut him up.
“Jesus, Ray,” Tim groans, without breaking his hold on Raylan. Tim’s always been good at multitasking, Raylan less so. Givens are single minded, to their credit and detriment. He puts that determination to good use, refusing to let Tim put any distance between them, less he betray any of this as a dream.
“Raylan,” Tim says his name and Raylan ignores him. “Raylan,” Tim repeats. “Raylan.”
“What?” Raylan finally snaps, rearing back just enough to look Tim in the eye. They’re as wild as his own. Tim tracks his face without betraying a thing, a complicated look on his face. What the hell is so important that they need words to say it?
“Nothin,” Tim says, and Raylan could strangle him, he really could, but then Tim adds, “But I have just got off a six hour bus ride, and I think I’mma collapse soon, and I’d rather that be on a mattress than the floor.”
“Oh,” Raylan feels like an idiot, like fool four years ago, bashful and unsure. His shoulder drop with the realization, and Tim clocks him, rolls his eyes, and grabs his wrist before he can retreat.
“I meant with you in it, dumbass,” he says, so Tim, bitting and quick and clever and mean.
“Tim,” Raylan says. He can’t help himself, he crushes Tim into a bear hug, tucking his head against Tim’s ear and hooking his chin on his shoulder, pressing the white-hot tears against his eyelids, overcome. Tim’s arms come around him so naturally, two puzzle pieces fitting back together. Raylan blinks because no one is looking, staring out into the yard over Tim’s shoulder to his screened-in front door. The sunlight makes everything hazy, the edges of his vision blurred.
“I missed you,” Raylan manages, unable to look at him while he says it. A bluebird flies by the window; the sunlight flickers through the whole room.
Tim turns his head enough to kiss the shell of Raylan’s ear, so rare and achingly tender that he thinks his chest is caving inward. “I missed you too, cowboy,” he whispers, breathing tickling.
“Knew it,” Tim declares later, sated and sleepy, still sweaty, and with the light in his eyes.
“Knew what?” Raylan asks, slightly distracted. He crawls back on the mattress, pressing as much as he can get against Tim, all warm and familiar skin. He presses two quick kisses just because he can, because he’s here. Tim bats him away playfully, grabs his wrist and wrestles Raylan back to the bed, laughing when Raylan tries to break free and just succeeds in face planting right where Tim wanted him.
Raylan can’t bring himself to mind being a bit manhandled, not used to Tim with this added muscle and confidence, more of a man than he’s even been. It’s a good look on him. The new dogs tags hand around his neck, he hadn’t chucked them with the fatigues, crumbled somewhere on the floor. He’ll bitch about how they need to be ironed or something tomorrow, and Raylan will bitch back and then they’ll find a flat surface and a steamer or something, and they’ll fix things that aren’t permanently broken.
He curls into Tim’s side, against him, intertwined. The bedroom door is locked, he had enough mind to do that before he pealed himself and Tim out of their clothes, and no one will be back the rest of the weekend anyway. But some old habits are good to keep, and he’d seen the hooded look flee Tim’s eyes the minute he heard the heavy click of the lock.
“Knew you’d have a bed worth sleeping in,” Tim says with his eyes closed. Raylan has a hand across his too-short hair and he’s leaning into it, even if he’d deny it if asked. There’s the barest hint of a smile, just the ends of his mouth curling up. It might as well be the sun breaking over the land, the way it lights up Raylan’s day.
“Perks of having a real job,” Raylan tells him, easy.
Tim hums at him, agreeable. He cracks one eye open, looks at Raylan. “The person in it ain’t half bad either,” he drawls, voice gone honey soft.
Raylan opens his mouth to tease him back, that’s their default, always had been, but the words get stuck in his throat. He ghosts a hand against Tim’s head, gentle, missing the pull of curls against his fingers. It’s too short for that now, nearly cut to the skull. But it’s still Tim, still snarky, playful, straight-to-the-point, blue eyes and sharp stares Tim.
This is the Tim that no one gets to see, that no one but Raylan likely even has seen. Soft and almost sweet, pliable and agreeable. All the fight with the edges buffed. This is the Tim Raylan gets to see, and no one else.
“Yeah,” he says back, just as soft. Tim’s breathing is already steadying out, slipping into a deep sleep. “Ain’t half bad at all.”
The cabinets are depressingly empty, enough that Raylan looks sheepish when Tim finds little more than alcohol the next morning and raises a brow at Raylan in question.
“Been a little thin,” he mumbles, shrugging into a jacket and pushing Tim out the door with him. Tim had slept through the day and night like a dead man, even rolled onto his back and started open-mouthed snoring, which Raylan could count on his hands the number of times he’d seen before. He’s still left giddy with adrenaline, like there were fireworks buzzing under his skin, so he’d gone for a run, finished off a slice of toast and a beer, took a shower, and collapsed right back into bed with him. He’d slept through the night, too.
After all that sleep, they’d both awoken like a couple of bears out of hibernation, and raring to eat like one.
He drives them to a quiet little diner a few minutes away from the house, within walking distance, but he sees the dark circles under Tim’s eyes and makes some excuse about construction so they have to take the truck. Tim clocks it, he knows he does, but bumps his shoulder companionably against Raylan’s own and doesn’t comment, so he’s forgiven for the white-lie. They’re both being a little softer than usual with one another, like they don’t want to press too tightly on a bruise.
They both get the biggest plate the place offers, and haul into it like they haven’t eaten in days. Raylan drinks at least three cups of coffee, he thinks Tim has him beat, even if he doesn’t bother to count the empty cups as they stack up.
They beat around conversation, Tim gives half-answers about the Army that make Raylan frown, but he tucks it away, unwilling to spoil the morning. He dodges Tim’s questions in return, half-assed excuses about applying for clerking positions and passing his bar duties off as a side hustle (which is it) while he hunts for something better (he isn’t.)
"S'fine" Tim says in his slightly bored way, when Raylan asks about the Army. Getting Tim to talk about something when he doesn't want to is like trying to draw blood from a stone, but it's also something that Raylan's got more experience than most, so he's a bit put out to be stonewalled so effectively. He kicks at the other side of the booth, good natured, and the glare he gets in return is half-hearted, at best. "What'd you want to know about?" Tim relents.
"I don't know," Raylan says honestly, because the extent of his personal experience with the Army is Arlo's half-baked memories of Vietnam, when he'd wake screaming the house down, drive himself to veterans club, or the nearest bar, and get so drunk he couldn't remember his own name. Sometimes, Raylan is jealous. He wishes he didn't remember those nights, either.
Tim blows a breath around the straw in his mouth. "Pretty boring, most of the time." He shrugs. "It's a job. They tell me what to do, I do it."
"Oh?" Raylan can't resist raising an eyebrow. "You, following orders?"
Tim glares at him, eyes narrowing. "Yeah, asshole. Kinda had to learn to do that, ya'know, in basic and all," and kicks Raylan back under the table. He's fighting a smile though, so Raylan knows he's forgiven.
He doesn't get much more out of him, regardless of how much he hems and haws. In the time since they've been together last, Tim has really perfected the art of deflection, and he uses it like a proper weapon down, carefully pivoting away from any talk about himself to Raylan's goals, his ambitions. He carries on about it for a while, humoring them both. But he's so acutely aware of the height of the sun in the sky and the dwindling time, that he's finally had enough by the time the waitress comes along to collect their money.
He keeps his patience though, the whole way home, until they've got the door shut between them and Tim is almost on him before he can speak, and he has to placate them both with a few kisses, opened mouthed, one hand stopping Tim's at the front of his jeans before he can get them properly started.
Tim's look is properly befuddled at the pause, and he looks so genuinely offended by the denial that Raylan has to kiss the look off his face.
"Just a sec," he says, as much to himself as Tim. Tim presses against him, just so drive home the point of how he feels about that, and Raylan does his best to swallow the groan in response. "I gotta say something."
"Say it quick," Tim tells him, nosing along his jaw with intent.
"I just think," Raylan lets him travel up his face and loses himself in the presses of their mouths against one another. The familiarity, the warmth, is like a thaw in his soul. He basks in it for another moment, before he taps against Tim's cheek, trying to draw his attention. Tim ignores him, lost in what they're both trying to do. So Raylan uses his free hand to press against his forehead, missing those curls, just enough to tip his head back, so he has to look at Raylan too.
And Raylan just stares.
He stares at those eyes, the color of the water that's broken over the white sand in Florida, watching the light catch them. He forgets what he was going to say. He stares at the man before him, transformed from the boy he has always know, and cannot bear it another second. He pulls their bodies back flush together, so quickly Tim nearly stumbles, but he catches on quick, always has, and crushes back against him, jerking Tim's pants loops along with him so that they both hit the bed together, kicking the door shut as they go.