Five #2
I can control where my attention and my thoughts go; I’ve been doing it for years.
I’ve known I like blokes since before I knew what the word for it was.
Before the locker-room panic, and the fact that I was paying as much attention to the lads as the girls.
You hear stories about men sidelined and careers suffocated because they weren’t the right kind of soldier.
The safe kind.
I’ve worked too hard for the rank on my chest, the competence, and the tiny piece of respect I’ve carved out in a system that eats people alive. I’m not about to blow it all by getting sloppy over the wrong person.
Especially not over my superior officer on a foreign base in Russia, of all places. I repeat it in my head like a mantra — he’s engaged, straight, his fiancée is due in eight weeks, and he’s going to be someone’s dad.
This crush is a dead thing walking.
“Again?” he says, standing, offering me his hand. Something misaligns the moment our hands meet; it’s a brief failure of discipline. He hauls me up with an ease that says I weigh less than my kit.
No. Shut it down.
I let go as quickly as I can without making it weird. “Ready when you are, sir.”
We’re just shifting back into position when someone calls out from across the field. “Zakirov!” Both our heads turn automatically.
And there he is.
Ari moves quickly across the snow towards us.
He’s not wearing a hat, which is completely insane.
His long blond hair is pushed back, and his cheeks are bitten red by the cold.
He’s in standard winter combat gear but somehow manages to look like he’s turned up to ruin someone’s life rather than do whatever logistical job his file says he does.
He has the kind of face you’d call handsome right up until he turns his attention on you. Then it’s just dangerous.
He says something to Niko in rapid-fire Russian that sounds like a complaint, wrapped in an insult, wrapped in affection. Niko snorts, replies in kind, and the two of them fall into that easy sibling rhythm that feels too intimate to eavesdrop on even if I could understand every word.
Then Ari’s attention shifts to me.
It’s not a long look, but it doesn’t need to be.
In one efficient look, I feel like I’ve been sorted into some category I don’t even know the criteria for.
Not a threat or important enough to be an enemy, somewhere in the territory of annoyance.
Then he turns and walks away, throwing comments over his shoulder to Niko.
Only when he’s gone do I notice how tightly I’d been braced and let it go. “Did...” I start, then stop, swallow, and try again. “Did I do something to him?”
Niko barks a laugh. “Arseny hates everyone, don’t flatter yourself. He is an equal opportunity bastard.”
I should probably be reassured. I’m not. “He looked at me like I stole his favourite toy.”
“That is just his face. If he really hates you, you will know. There would be lots of screaming.” He waves a hand vaguely. “You’re fine.” Easy for you to say, I think. He’s not tracking you like you’re a faulty piece of equipment.
We go back to it, stance, grip, reaction speed, all the things I’m supposed to be focusing on instead of the weight of my own thoughts.
Niko corrects my footing with a boot tap and my guard with a brush of his knuckles.
His guidance is precise. “Too tight here,” he says, nudging my elbow.
“You choke your own reach. Relax. You’re not a piano wire. ”
“Yes, sir.”
“Again.”
We go through the sequence until my muscles ache and sweat trickles down my spine despite the cold.
Every time I start to drift, my thoughts skid toward the ring on his chain, and the way his face softened when he talked about his son.
I drag myself back, focus on the work, the pattern, and the count.
This is what I’m good at. Not feelings or whatever mess is currently trying to occupy my headspace.
“Better,” he says eventually, stepping back and nodding in approval.
The rest of the session blurs into repetitions, corrections, and I move on autopilot, muscle memory taking over when my brain threatens to spiral.
When he finally calls a halt, dismissing us to shower and get food, my body feels wrung out.
I offer him a quick, “Thank you, sir,” because he’s earned it and I’m trying to be a normal human being, not just a bundle of neuroses in uniform.
He claps my shoulder once with a solid, friendly thump. “You did well today, Caiden,” he says. “You push hard. I like it.”
“Just trying not to make us look bad, sir,” I say, aiming for a light reply.
He smirks, then turns to yell something in Russian at one of his men who’s dropped a piece of kit in the snow. I shake myself, turn, and trudge off toward the barracks with the others.
On the outside, it’s simple — joint training and skill exchange.
Another cold morning on another cold base in another year that will blur together with the rest. On the inside, I’ve just learned that the man I’ve been quietly, stupidly half-crushing on since we met is engaged, weeks away from becoming a father, and completely, thoroughly, blissfully straight.
And yet I still can’t stop thinking about the way his hand felt when it closed around mine and pulled me to my feet.
I shove my gloved hands into my pockets, hunch my shoulders against the wind, and mutter to myself, low enough no one else can hear, “Get a grip, Caiden.”
The wind slaps me in the face, and honestly, I deserve it. Because deep down, under all the logic and self-preservation and the mental lists of reasons this is a terrible fucking idea, one small traitorous voice won’t shut up.
It keeps replaying the unguarded softness in his expression when he talked about his son. The way he said my name made it seem like it meant something. Then the way he said, “Inside is safer,” and had no idea how true that was for me.
Over all of it, a quiet, resigned truth takes hold, which is highly inconvenient.
Yeah. This isn't going away.