Work Text:
Patrick Mahomes: This true? https://twitter.com/adamschefter/status/1387849705233731591
Aaron Rodgers: I didn’t think you paid attention to “insider” shit.
Patrick Mahomes: It’s been trending on twitter for hours now…
[Read: 5:53]
Patrick Mahomes: ???
Aaron Rodgers: Yeah, it’s mostly true.
--
Patrick Mahomes appears on the doorstep of Aaron Rodgers’ Malibu house a week later. Not necessarily uninvited but still a surprise, an adidas duffle bag slung over his shoulder.
“Hey,” is all he says, a cheeky smirk carving into his face.
Aaron raises an eyebrow but opens the door wider for him, “come in.”
He steps in with ease and swagger. It’s something that has always intrigued Aaron about Patrick. There’s a lightness, an exuberance to him that comes so naturally to Pat when it has taken years for Aaron to feel that comfortable in his body. It’s on full display as he walks through Aaron’s home like he owns it.
“How long you staying?” Aaron asks.
It certainly isn’t the first time Pat has slept over at Aaron’s. It's his preferred spot when he’s in LA for more than a couple days or whenever he can find time to retreat from his superstardom for a while to play at domesticity. However, it’s been a while since Aaron has seen Patrick in person; there were only so many moments to get away during the season. He won’t lie, the open wound of not meeting in the superbowl also made it a little unbearable to catch up in the succeeding months. Now, he’s almost thankful for the small reprieve from the insane past couple of days.
Patrick sets his duffle bag onto the kitchen counter, “overnight, just wanted to see you.”
Aaron simply nods. There’s a quiet sincerity to that statement, it’s another facet of Patrick that unnerves him; if he’s thinking it he will say it. Not in a “no brain-to-mouth filter” way, he can be as careful with his words as Aaron is if he wants to, but more of a “tomorrows never guaranteed” outlook. Aaron respects it, yet he has trained himself to speak in riddles. Always revealing just enough but never showing his soft spots. That genuine candor is something that Aaron had boxed away a long, long time ago. It’s for the best, he tells himself, they’re all waiting for some sign of weakness.
“I brought a gift,” Pat offers, pulling out an expensive bottle of scotch from his bag, wrapped in random articles of clothing to keep from breaking.
“You know me so well,” Aaron cracks a smile, taking the bottle to the small cluster of alcohol he has sitting on the counter.
“Well, I’ve had your tongue down my throat enough to know a little,” Patrick laughs.
Aaron rolls his eyes but chuckles nonetheless, “I guess that would make us pretty close.”
Despite the time that fills the gaps between meetings, it is true. Patrick is let in on the most intimate part of himself and vice-versa. It’s not something he takes lightly or for granted. It's something he keeps closest to his heart.
Pat gestures to the multitude of peace-offering liquor bottles also in the stash, “looks like you’re pretty well stocked though, I should’ve bought you flowers.”
Aaron laughs again, a strikingly clear image of Patrick with a gaudy bouquet of flowers at his doorstep comes to mind.
“I’ll never have too much scotch. Matty was here a couple days ago, you just missed him, he brought most of those.”
Patrick’s face turns, so subtly that you would miss it if you haven’t spent weeks of your life mapping it out, “so you’re talking to your coach?”
The mood shifts and Aaron shrugs, pretending like he doesn’t notice.
“Why wouldn’t I be? Matt’s great.”
Aaron knows Pat isn’t happy about his silence on the matter, and he knows that’s the reason he appeared out of the blue. But, he thought he would be given more time before the conversation, at least a celebratory fuck for not seeing each other in months. They haven’t even gone through the perfunctory “how’s life going?” yet. Now, the stage has been set, the tension settling over the crowd.
Patrick sighs, something short and annoyed,“just didn’t know if you were disgruntled with him too.”
The barbed words didn’t feel great coming from Patrick, even if they were expected. Aaron’s discomfort shows on his face.
“I don’t really think that’s the right word for any of this.”
“Well how am I supposed to know? You aren’t exactly forthcoming with this information.”
Patrick will say anything he thinks and his body shows his thoughts just as well. His posture is riled up into fighting mode, shoulders taut and brow furrowed. While Aaron knows this conversation is why Patrick came here, he can’t quite wrap his head around why it’s bothering him so much. The career dealings of a quarterback on the precipice of being washed up, even after having an MVP season, shouldn’t be worrying to the man who has the world at his feet. He’s the future and there’s no need to be worrying about Aaron’s past.
“Is this really bothering you?” Aaron asks, it comes out clunky and wrong, his words landing openly on Pat’s face.
“Yes!” he semi-explodes, “You’re Aaron fucking Rodgers, you’re the goddamn MVP. You’re hanging it up-”
“I’m not hanging it up.”
“-because what? You proved everyone wrong this year, and now you're running away from the fight.”
There are so many things Aaron could say; explanations of how it feels to have his successor nipping at his ankles, the way he knows the ending of the story because that was him once, the desire to take his future into his own hands the only way he knows how, how his own mortality is so much more glaring now than it ever was. But, those words die on his tongue. Those are things he hopes Patrick never has to feel, and when he’s electric and passionate like this, it seems like he never will.
“Brett went to the conference championship the year before I became the starter, I know how this works,” Aaron says, “they’ve made their choice already, I’m just trying to make mine.”
Pat rolls his eyes, walking out of the kitchen, “that’s such a pussy ass excuse.”
“Don’t fucking act like you know how it is, because you don’t,” Aaron says, following him into the living room.
“Yup,” Pat says, “that’s me, no fucking clue, not like I play football too. Not like anyone with two eyes can see how stupid you’re being.”
“I’m being stupid?” Aaron says, “you think I’m being stupid for putting myself first?”
“No,” Pat whips around to face Aaron, “you’re not putting yourself first, you’re self-destructing. You’re being vengeful, throwing in the towel just because you can.”
“Fuck you.”
A tense moment. A pregnant pause. The ocean breeze ghosts through the house in a perennial waltz. The inevitable happens.
Patrick crashes his lips into Aaron’s, his hands groping aimlessly for purchase. Aaron doesn’t miss a beat, licking into the seam of Patrick’s mouth, falling into the familiarity of it all. Pat spreads his hands against Aaron’s chest pushing him backwards until the backs of his knees buckle at the couch.
This is easy for them, it’s how this whole mess started. There’s blurry memories of a benefit dinner then a hotel room afterwards so many nights ago, letting each other in on a sacred secret. Their relationship, purposefully unlabeled, works because they both know how their worlds soperate. The NFL isn’t fit for men who like men, yet as humans they desire connection. They desire a sense of understanding, of belonging, and no one quite gets it like they do. However, they were not prepared for the intimacy of letting someone in on your deepest scars and the aftermaths of doing so. The emotional undercurrent is getting harder to ignore but there’s not many options for them outside of letting it simmer, ignoring the elephant in the room.
Heat seeps through their clothing, burning as much as the argument did, mingling in the liminal space. Patrick hovers over Aaron, his knee balancing precariously on the cushion between Aaron’s legs with most of his weight hanging onto Aaron’s shoulders, which he bears as his hands slip into the back pockets of Pat’s jeans, groping. They’re both hard, both still angry, and there’s a frantic energy to their movements, an aggressiveness that wears like a second skin in the face of vulnerability.
“That seems like a promise,” Patrick says while stealing a breath.
“You’re wound too tight, you know,” he responds, a “I might have to.”
“Only around you. You’re just so fucking irritating sometimes, goddamn,” Patrick says, mouthing at Aaron’s neck.
“I could say the same thing about you,” Aaron huffs back, hauling him in to press their bodies flush against each other.
“Fuck off,” Patrick says, trying a little harder to draw blood.
“Never gonna happen.”
They play a game of back and forth, pushing and pulling, taking and giving. Aaron ends up on his knees in front of the couch, sucking Pat off. Hands curl in the hair Aaron is so intent on growing out, tugging harshly at the strands, swear words that are hurling from Patrick’s mouth are worse than a sailor’s. When Patrick’s legs are the most shaky and unsteady they’ve ever been, they decide to move from the living room. He practically puts all of his weight onto Aaron, relying on him to get them to the bedroom even though it’s muscle memory for the both of them at this point..
The view in the bedroom is beautiful, a glimmering ocean and miles and miles of pure California coastline that is fading into night time but nothing gets him going like the sight of Aaron alive and wanting. Closed off and enigmatic is fun for a while but once you get to know the real thing, once you get to see up close his fire and passion, something normally reserved for competing or sometimes sex, nothing else compares. It terrifies Patrick to think he would throw it all away, that he still might decide to.
He pushes those thoughts from his mind, focusing his attention on the present, but the tension from the kitchen has wafted all the way up the stairs. They’re testy and aggressive with each other, using their professional athlete strength to bully the other to the bed, still unable to be seperated. Patrick refuses any bite marks, he actually has work to do and people to see who will absolutely pry, but he leaves a couple good bruises on Aaron.
“Damn,” he remarks, back against the headboard, as Patrick is particularly mean to the meaty part of his thigh.
But in the end, he let’s Aaron make a home within his body, frustration and space forgotten and replaced by familiarity as easy as breathing.
--
The moon light creeps into the bedroom, bouncing off the waves and fragmenting onto the floors and furniture. Hours have passed, the bedroom is silent, there’s the illusion of both of them being asleep but they both know that’s not true.
“You should have told me,” Pat says into the darkness.
It’s quiet for some time. Aaron wets his mouth.
“I should’ve. I’m sorry.”
Patrick laughs, dry and low. It’s silly to be having this conversation, on paper they are nothing to each other. They lay in silence some more and Patrick feels the regret of saying anything at all seep in.
“It’s all good.”
There’s just more silence. It’s just so awkward it feels like it’s eating Patrick alive. He searches for words to fill up the void but all he can find is the truth.
“I worry about you sometimes.”
He can hear the rustle of the pillows as Aaron’s head shifts to the side so he’s gazing at Patrick’s side profile but Pat keeps his eyes up.
“You have a hard time letting people in,” Patrick continues, “I get that. But keeping everything so close to your chest tends to still hurt you, I think.”
Aaron wasn’t expecting that to come out of Patrick’s mouth. He’s right, is the thing, and Aaron feels like all of his skin has been peeled off. The worst part is that even if he’s right, he’s also wrong, there’s plenty of claw marks in Aaron’s past to prove it. Those are things that don’t go away, that can’t get scrubbed off, mistakes he doesn’t feel like making for the third time. But maybe not everyone needs to know, but someone like Pat, someone with shared life experience, that might not be so bad. It’s not a promise but it’s an idea.
In the end, he just says “yeah” because he’s sure Patrick can read between the lines anyway.
Quiet washes over them again before Aaron interrupts it, “we never got to drink that scotch you brought over.”
Patrick smiles to himself, “keep it until you have any other potentially life-changing decisions you need to make.”
--
Aaron Rodgers: Hey, got any free days to come down to L.A? I have a bottle of scotch and some life-changing decisions I need your opinion on.
Patrick Mahomes: I’ll send you my flight info :)