OC-tober Day 6 — Relationships.
A little snippet of the relationship between Ash and Milo in Morituri, the novel I am currently working on.
He could feel Milo’s eyes on him, but that was the thing. He could feel them on him. Not past him, not through him. It was as if Milo truly saw him, simply and quietly, without searching or measuring. The sensation was strange, foreign even, but not unpleasant.
“Do you want something?” he asked in as casual a tone as he could muster, without looking up from his sketch.
“No. Not really,” Milo chuckled good-naturedly.
He had come to admit — only to himself and, reluctantly, to Spider — that he liked Milo’s laugh. It was deep, and soft, and most importantly, never at his expense — not even when he pointed out how small Ash was, or how flustered he got over the stupidest things. He always did it with a fondness that never failed to stir something warm in Ash’s chest.
Not just your chest, Spider cackled.
Shut the fuck up.
He dared a glance up at Milo, who was still leaning against the doorframe with his hands in his pockets, his head slightly tilted to one side.
“So, what? You holding the wall up or something?” Ash attempted to tease. The words turned out to be barely audible and, for some reason, slightly breathless.
Shit.
Told you so.
“Nope. Just looking at you,” Milo replied with a shrug, as if looking at Ash were something anyone would do for the simple pleasure of it.
“Why the fuck would you do that?” Ash snickered. His eyes were still trained on the drawing, but he was just absently scribbling over the same line.
“Because you’re pretty.”
The pen clattered to the floor.
Your heart rate is abnormally high, soldier, Spider pointed out. Ash did not even bother replying. He took a deep breath, and, to his mild horror, had to suppress a smile of his own.
“ Ah. Bullshit, but thank you,” he retorted, looking anywhere but in Milo’s direction.
And just in case he didn’t feel awkward enough, Milo apparently decided that crossing the distance between them to pick up the fallen pen and hand it back to him was the right thing to do. He was towering over Ash from this close. Ash should have felt cornered. He should have felt threatened. The fact that he didn’t did not make any sense.
Except it did. Because Milo’s smile was soft, the brush of his hand against Ash’s was gentle, and his bare chest was so close Ash could feel the heat radiating from his skin and… Spider? Seriously?!
The mental image of Ash burying his face in said chest subsided, but not fast enough to stop him from wincing.
“Something wrong?” Milo whispered with — damn this big oaf and his big heart — genuine concern.
“No,” Ash stammered. “Just…” The excuse died on the tip of his tongue. “No.”
“Good.”
Ash’s fingers closed on the pen, but Milo’s hand remained on his. Light. Warm. Steady. He didn’t flinch away. He couldn’t make himself want to. Not even when Milo’s fingers moved further up his wrist and held it gently — like something fragile. Something precious. Ash swallowed hard, looking up into Milo’s eyes. And Milo, as always, caught the distress signal in his.
“Do you want me to stop?” he asked. The words fluttered, soft and warm, over Ash’s flushed cheeks.
God, no, Spider protested indignantly. Ash gave a stiff shake of his head.
“Alright. Tell me if you do.”
Ash nodded just as stiffly, but made no attempt to break contact. His breath faltered when he felt Milo’s free hand come to rest lightly on the small of his back. Spider erupted into a litany of enthusiastic expletives.
“Still good?” Milo asked.
Ash nodded again — he would have been hard pressed to talk while choking on his own heart. Dizzy, he took the remaining half-step between them, as if marching off a cliff’s edge, but instead of meeting the abrupt end his instincts were predicting, he found himself engulfed in soothing warmth and the familiar scent of rosemary. Panic flashed through him when Milo froze against him for a split second. He was already opening his mouth to apologize — if he could even speak — when the hand on his back began to move in slow, grounding circles.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled nonetheless, without really knowing why, his forehead pressed against Milo’s collarbone. Spider had fallen into awed silence.
“Don’t be,” Milo whispered against his hair, with a solemn earnestness that made Ash’s throat tighten and his eyes sting. “You’re doing magnificently.”