Work Text:
July 2022
“Come on, Breagha. Rise and shine.”
Andy makes every contrary noise he can muster, clings tightly to the bedsheets he’s pulled over his head, and burrows down deeper into the mattress. “No.” Short and to the point. “Can’t make me.”
“I can,” Virgil chuckles, which is true, but he’s in no real rush to prove it. Just tugs at the covers, trying to find a mess of ginger hair in all the cotton. He’s unsuccessful. “Robbo,” he chastises playfully, “it’s our off day. Get up. Let’s enjoy it.”
“Not an off day if the gaffer still says what time we have to be up,” Andy counters from beneath the safety of the blankets, eyes scrunched closed against the sunlight he knows Virgil has let into the room by opening the curtains.
“If you don’t get out of bed, you’re going to miss the bus,” Virgil tries another tactic, voice low and leading. “No bus, no beach.”
Full of fake annoyance, Andy throws the covers back with a huff of breath. “Have you seen me, Virg? Do you think I like sitting on a beach fully clothed, so I don’t go tomato red? No thank you. I’m going back to sleep.”
Virgil can’t hold in a surprised laugh as Andy burrows away once more. “What’ll you tell the boys, then?” he asks, amused and showing it, poking at the lump of human in the middle of the bed. “Nunez will be so disappointed.”
“Don’t start,” Andy snaps immediately, scrambling to be seen, face sour with dislike. He gets nothing but more deep laughter for his trouble and he knows he’s been tricked. Can’t seem to wrestle the blanket from Virgil’s grip to hide from light of day again so he simply sits there defiantly, looking unimpressed. “It’s not funny.”
“It is,” Virgil insists. “And now you are up!” He grins and winks and stands, taking Andy’s precious covers with him, dragging them down and off the bed. “Let’s go. The day awaits!”
Andy flops on his back, spread eagle, and stares. “The only thing that awaits me is this bed. ‘M not going.”
Arms crossed over his chest and one eyebrow raised, Virgil shrugs. “Suit yourself. I’ll see you tonight.” He makes it less than three steps before Andy is out of bed and on him, jumping on his back, arms and legs wrapped tightly around his chest and waist.
“Viiiiiirg,” it’s a put-on whine meant to bring more laughter and it works. “You have to stay with me.”
“Oh, I do?” Virgil hooks his hands under Andy’s knees to support him better and turns his head to brush a kiss against his cheek. “Says who? I am not so afraid of the sun as you. I want to go.”
“No,” Andy corrects. “You want to stay. Here. In bed. With me.” He gives Virgil his best puppy dog eyes and a bright smile. “You do. You know you do.”
“Spent all night in bed with you,” he teases in return. A knock at the door breaks their banter but Virgil doesn’t put Andy down, just walks towards the noise, checks the keyhole to see who’s standing in the hallway, and snickers. “Millie.” A nickname whispered for Andy’s benefit before opening the door without fanfare.
“Fucks sake, lads.” The response is immediate and accompanied by a massive eyeroll. “Bus is set to leave in ten minutes. Are you coming, then?”
“James,” Andy says gravely, “I regret to inform you I’m ill and will be unable to join the festivities today.”
James looks Virgil square in the eye and deadpans, “has he started drinking already?”
“That hurts me, Millie.”
“No,” Virgil snorts his reply. “I’ve only just gotten him out of bed.”
“And I’m none too happy about it, not that anyone asked.”
“No one asked for a reason, Robbo.” Virgil gives him a look and Andy falls silent.
James scoffs and shakes his head. “Lunatics, both of you.”
Andy kicks the door shut without saying goodbye.
“That was rude.” It doesn’t sound like Virgil means it, feels even less so as the tall man ambles back across the room towards the bed. Andy’s face is tucked up against his neck as they go, clinging tighter than is necessary but Virgil isn’t complaining. Is honestly fine with skipping a day out with the team to have a day in with his boy, uninterrupted and unbothered. No distractions. “All good?” he checks in, soft lips once again finding the scruff of hair on Andy’s cheek. Thinks it’s fine but wants to make sure, clinginess sometimes meaning insecurities and that’s the last thing Virgil wants today.
“All good,” Andy confirms, soft and full of smiles. “Long as you’re staying.”
“I’m staying.” Virgil lets him down on the edge of the bed and then steps back, kicks off sliders and tugs off t-shirt before dropping shorts as well. Crawls onto the mattress in the same state of undress Andy has been in the entire time, tight boxer-briefs leaving little to the imagination. Not that either man has to imagine anything about the other at this point. Years of knowledge, taken to memory, not soon forgotten. “You’re very persuasive.”
Andy nearly vibrates with happiness, stretching out along Virgil’s body, knee between two solid thighs, arm slung across sculpted chest, lips pressed to strong shoulder. Unhurried, he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Large hands splay out across his back, pull him closer, hold him with a gentleness that can only come with love. A love that gets his humor and makes it easy to joke, “you just know you’re gonna get laid now.”
“Am I?” Virgil raises his head from the pillows and gets a hand under Andy’s chin, tugging their mouths close together. “You sure?” The question is a whisper brushed along lips that part without being asked, both men getting lost to the kiss for longer than they intend to.
“Positive,” Andy says when he can, out of breath in the best of way, hard but in no hurry. Another soft kiss, not quite so lingering. “Probably more than once.”
“My lucky day then.” Virgil winks and pulls Andy impossibly closer, kisses moving from mouth to neck and then across his collarbone. He drags teeth along pale skin, leaving streaks of red in their wake, as Andy strains and arches to get more contact, more pressure, more heat. As quickly as Virgil makes the marks, he runs back over them with his tongue, soothing and erasing. “Lucky week, really.”
At the mention of the finite amount of time they have together, Andy struggles to contain a grumble. He succeeds but only by covering it with a melancholy sigh that makes Virgil frown. “Don’t wanna go home.” He doesn’t mean it, really. Home is good. Family is good. He misses his wife and his kids when he’s away and he loves the smiling faces he sees each time he returns. And yet.
Virgil understands Andy’s words in a way that no one else can, pets his hair and gives him a squeeze, legs twining together as he holds him. And it’s not that he doesn’t feel exactly the same. He’d stay here with this man in his arms forever if he could, but Virgil is a realist, and he knows that Andy needs him to be just that. “Have to. You know how Rocco gets when you’re gone.”
The mention of his son makes him smile, genuine and warm. “Little man of mischief,” he muses, face going soft. “You’re right. Won’t be a house to go back to if I’m away much longer.”
“There it is.” When Virgil speaks this time it’s deeper than before, brings his thumb up to trace along Andy’s bottom lip, resisting the urge to tug it between his teeth.
“What’s that?” Andy trails fingers slowly down Virgil’s spine, as close to dreamy as he gets, eyes hooded with both contentment and desire.
“This smile I like to see.” Leans in for another kiss, lingers, pulls back and then quickly repeats the process. Once. Twice. A third time. Until Andy is nearly writhing beneath him, trying to get closer, more skin on skin, wanting to touch everywhere.
“Virg…”
“I know.” Large hands slip below the edges of elastic waistband, fingertips roaming, pressing, prodding. “I will take care of you, Breagha. Be patient.”
“Never been any good at that.” Andy laughs, out of breath though he’s done nothing at all, and brutally honest. He will be patient though. As much as he can be. Because he’s more than fine with this late morning lasting all day. Intends to do nothing in the coming hours but get lost in Virgil, however that looks and whatever it means. It’s the ghost of a whisper when he speaks again, Gaelic but a phrase he knows is understood. “Tha gaol agam ort.”
A slow, steady smile spreads across Virgil’s mouth and there’s a shine to his usually dark eyes that can’t be mistaken. His response comes easily in his first language, means it just the same in all that he can speak. “Ik houd van je.”
I love you.