18. Chapter 18 #3
Sidney seems to realize what he's said. The guard cracks.
Color floods his face, just the slightest hint of pink at his cheekbones and the bridge of his nose, and he curses under his breath.
Something short and vicious and directed entirely at himself.
He steps away from Erath, already turning back to the hallway, and Erath can see the self-degradation washing over him, the internal collapse of someone who showed their hand and immediately wishes they hadn't.
He's retreating. He's going to go into the bathroom and help Penny with her bath and by the time he comes out the wall will be rebuilt and reinforced and this conversation will be filed away under things they don't talk about.
Erath can't let it happen. He can't let Sidney spiral like this when he's wrong, because it does mean something to Erath. It means everything to Erath. It means more than he knows how to say with a vocabulary that was built for managing the dead and not for telling the living that they matter.
This time he grabs him with one hand on his waist and one hand on his shoulder and turns him around bodily.
It's more contact than he's initiated since the first night they were together, more assertive than he's been since he learned that Sidney flinches from hands that move too fast, and he's careful about it, deliberate, making sure the touch is firm but not forceful.
Sidney goes without a fight. He turns in Erath's grip and faces him and the expression on his face is not angry or guarded or calm.
It's defeated. He looks so beaten. He looks like every man who has ever stood in front of him has said the exact same thing and he has learned to expect it the way you learn to expect rain.
Erath moves his hand from his shoulder to his cheek.
He holds him there, palm against the side of Sidney's face, and he can feel the heat of him, the blood and the warmth and the life that is so staggeringly present.
Sidney's eyes are bright and wounded and looking at him and Erath has never in his existence been so terrified of saying the wrong thing.
"I've only ever done this once before and it ended badly," he says, and the words come out quiet. "The person I thought I loved took everything from me. We're not so different, Sidney. We've both been hurt."
Sidney swallows. His eyes move, trying to look away, trying to find somewhere else to be, and Erath's hand holds him in place. Not forcefully. Just present. Just there. Saying stay. Look at me. Let me try.
"But I've already let you in," Erath says, and the truth of it resonates through him with the force of something shaken loose, something that's been stuck for a very long time. "There's a hollow place in my chest that I didn't realize was empty until you and her walked back through that door."
Sidney stares at him. The defeat is still there, but something else is pushing through it, something that looks terrified and hopeful and angry at itself for being hopeful.
His lips part but nothing comes out. His eyes are shining and his throat works and he doesn't speak, and Erath realizes he doesn't need him to. Not right now. Not yet.
He leans in and kisses him softly. Carefully.
The way he's learned to touch Sidney, with patience and intention and the understanding that every gentleness is new, every tenderness a language Sidney is still learning to trust. Sidney's mouth is warm and his breath catches and for a moment he's perfectly still, and then he presses back.
His hands come up and curl into the fabric of Erath's shirt and pull him forward, closer, and the kiss deepens into something that tastes desperate and relieved at the same time.
They stand there in the hallway and kiss for a long moment, unhurried, the sounds of the underworld distant and irrelevant. Erath's hand stays on his face and his other hand stays on his waist and he doesn't pull, doesn't push, just holds on while Sidney takes what he needs.
Then, from the bathroom, the unmistakable sound of a faucet being turned on full blast and the enthusiastic splashing of a five-year-old who has discovered that bubbles are more fun when you use the entire bottle.
They pull apart. Sidney's eyes are bright and his lips are swollen and there's pink on his cheeks that has nothing to do with embarrassment this time. He looks at Erath, and the wall is not gone but there's a door in it now that's open, and Erath can see through it.
Sidney touches his face. Just a press of his fingers, light and brief, against the line of Erath's jaw. Then he turns and goes into the bathroom, and Erath can hear him saying, "Penny, that is way too many bubbles," and Penny's responding shriek of delight, and the splash of water hitting tile.
Erath breathes in. He stands in the hallway with his hand still warm from the side of Sidney's face and the weight of what he hasn't said pressing against his ribs, and listens to the sounds of his family in the other room.