AE-Match Fic: This Sentimentality Doesn't Look Good On Me

[eternalsojourn]

Hiya! I didn't get around to linking this earlier, but I posted an angsty fic over at ae-match. I have other fics underway; this was the first one out of the gate.

Link to ae-match post

Or view it right here!

This Sentimentality Doesn't Look Good On Me

Prompt: Silence and Fall
Word Count: ~2300
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Angst (no death, but no happy endings either)
Summary: Eames’s perfectly wonderful No Strings Attached arrangement with Arthur doesn’t quite go according to plan
Beta:night_reveals

Fourteen days. Two weeks since Arthur was buried hilt-deep inside Eames; two weeks since their sweaty, slick, half-bleary fuck (that was a maybe a little too tender this time to be called fucking), Arthur's hands both pressing on Eames's chest, Eames's thighs gripping Arthur's lean, muscular torso. Two weeks since Arthur was in Mombasa -- since he left as casually as he had arrived.

***

Four Months Ago

It was on a two-level corporate extraction, about a year after the Fischer job. They had grown used to calling each other in for the interesting ones, or the lucrative ones, or sometimes when they just got tired of breaking in new talent.

The job wasn't going well. Their intel was faulty and the plan had changed several times over. The variables were too numerous for Arthur's liking; too numerous for Eames's, even, and that, more than anything, made Arthur nervous.

The chemist was good, but incapable of contributing anything more than high-quality compounds. The architect was reliable, but always half a step behind in understanding the nuances of the problems they had to tackle. So in the end it was Arthur and Eames, as happened more and more.

Arthur was hunched over the table, standing with his elbows locked, sleeves rolled up. His shirt was sticking lightly to his back, a faint sheen of sweat on his temples. Eames stood beside him as they looked over the careful sprawl of photos and documents.

"We've been coming at this from the wrong angle; it's the PA we should be extracting from," Eames said contemplatively. It would make their lives a lot easier: less security, greatly reduced chance of a militarised subconscious, and she would have seen most everything they need to know. Not to mention Arthur's newly gained intel that the PA has been sleeping with her employer for the better part of a year. It wouldn't be perfect, but it would salvage much of the clusterfuck that the job had been so far.

"I can handle the background research quickly enough," Arthur nodded slowly, thinking out loud. "And we wouldn't even have to redesign the dream levels. But it would mean you'd have to start over with the tail." Arthur, for all his even-handed delivery, was no longer a closed book to Eames, so he heard Arthur's cautious optimism.

"You needn't worry about that; I can tail her easily enough in the next few days. It wouldn't throw our schedule out more than 2 days at the outside."

The corner of Arthur's mouth twitched as he looked down at the papers. Eames noted with some surprise that he'd been resting his hand on Arthur's shoulder. They were so close he could feel damp heat radiating off of Arthur's body, the sweaty result of a long day in an unventilated warehouse.

The heaviness of the air had little to do with the heat, though, and Eames could tell by the the particular quality of Arthur's stance, the sharpness of his glance that Arthur was as charged by these collaborative sessions as Eames was. A low thrum seemed to hover between them as Eames squeezed his fingers lightly on the muscle and bone under his hand.

Arthur turned, gave Eames a measuring stare for a moment, though surely it was an eternity.

"I don't do relationships," he said simply. "Relationships are leverage."

"Well, it's a good job I don't either, then, isn't it?" Eames replied, smirking.

Short minutes later Eames was bent over the table, paperwork shoved roughly to one side, trousers down to his ankles. Arthur's weight was above him, pressing him harshly into the sharp edge of the table, hand slipping up the back of Eames's shirt and skating over his flesh.

Arthur was slow, methodical, and Eames wanted to let loose, wanted Arthur to lose control and fuck him blind. But it was good, so good, the way Arthur grunted softly, felt Eames's skin like he was memorizing its texture.

After Arthur came, a stuttered groan and a harsh clench of fingers on Eames's shoulder, he spun Eames around, knelt, and sucked him in wet and tight. His long fingers were tantalizing on Eames's sac, lightly rolling, squeezing, and although it took long minutes, Arthur didn't let up until Eames burst hot pulses into Arthur's clamped and searing-hot mouth.

The rest of the job went as smoothly as could be expected, though with considerably less tension than before that night. Arthur looked as put together, calm and confident as he always did, and Eames... well. Eames thought more clearly when his recreational needs were seen to.

After that Eames looked forward rather more to jobs with Arthur, fringe benefits always having been of interest to him. And this was a particularly good one indeed.

***

Two Months Ago

A simple but very personal extraction in New York -- a woman wanting to know if her father had been embezzling her company’s money -- ended more jubilantly than most. Usually when relations are involved, the answers clients are looking for are not the answers they want to hear. But in this case they cleared her father’s name and the client was immensely relieved and exceptionally grateful for the team’s efforts. She promised to be a good contact should they need any favours in the future.

It wasn’t just the results of the job that had them flying high: Arthur and Eames were working like a well-oiled machine now. They deferred to each other’s expertise, they relied on each other’s strengths, and together were managing to bring out the best in the rest of their rotating assortment of colleagues.

With no client or mark to run from, the team had the luxury this time of getting rip-roaring drunk in celebration, on top-shelf liquors and champagne.

When Arthur and Eames had stumbled back to the hotel, they spent most of the night slowly taking each other apart. A drunk Arthur, it appeared, was far more amenable to Eames’s attention to Arthur’s arse, and for the first time Eames got to see Arthur folded in half, to hold him by the ankles and sink into him. Eames was not so far gone that the image or the sensation would ever be far from his mind after that.

And because they had no reason to run and no immediate plans, they spent the next three glorious days ordering room service and finding out just how quickly they could make each other come, and how long they could make each other wait.

Eames had finally boarded a plane to Singapore sore, tired and high on endorphins.

***

Two Weeks Ago

Eames eased his gun out of the holster attached above his doorframe and peered through the peephole. It was force of habit anyway, but the lateness of the hour ramped up his caution a little further.

After a second's look, he opened the door, gun held loosely at his side.

"Arthur, what on earth brings you to Mombasa?"

"I was in the area," Arthur said vaguely. When Eames looked at him pointedly, he said, "It's late, I thought maybe we'd talk in the morning. Can I come in?"

Eames moved to the side and Arthur sidled past him, breezing into Eames's space like he belonged there despite the fact that this was his first visit to this flat.

Eames brought out some bourbon he had picked up in Seattle and they chatted amiably, easily. There was something just a little too familiar, too domestic about how comfortable Eames was to have Arthur in his space, given that Eames was normally fiercely private about his few real homes. But Eames was enjoying himself too much to second-guess what was happening exactly -- enjoying himself too much to question whether this was within the established parameters of their agreement.

They had kissed, long and patient, before they'd divested each other of their clothes and Arthur pushed Eames back, laid him out, entered him as he suckled on Eames's nipple -- a sensitivity Arthur had discovered during their three-day stay in New York. Eames stroked through Arthur's hair, clung to Arthur's upper back with his other hand, trying vainly to gain purchase on the tense rippling muscle there.

Arthur began slowly but after a while, as Eames gripped the arm of the sofa above his head with one hand and periodically arched upwards to suck and bite at Arthur’s collarbone, his neck, Arthur began to lose control. He buried his face in Eames’s neck, pressed in erratically and deep, and clung to Eames’s shoulders, just this side of too tight.

Arthur worked his hand between them, lifted off just enough to make room, and stroked Eames firmly, his touch warm, familiar. And when Eames came with a groan, Arthur pressed his coated fingers into Eames’s mouth and didn’t give him a chance to swallow before licking in to share the taste.

When Arthur followed moments later, his moan was uttered into Eames’s mouth and his hands rested hard on Eames’s chest, the full weight of him pressing Eames into the sofa.

Afterward, they’d made their way to the bed where after an hour or two of sleep, Arthur woke Eames with the stiff prod of his cock into Eames’s arse, clearly having massaged more lube there prior to Eames waking. They sleepily, lazily pressed against each other in the dead of night, spooning, then collapsed back into sleep.

Eames woke to a cold bed, but after a moment he heard some clinking and shuffling coming from his kitchen.

When he wandered in he found Arthur pouring a cup of coffee, topping it up with cream and pushing into Eames's hand. Arthur turned back to the stove and slipped an egg into the pot of simmering water from a bowl he had ready, and popped the button down on the toaster.

"Hm. Aren't you a good guest?" Eames said, voice scratchy with sleep.

Arthur gave him a wry smile, finished making the poached eggs and toast and topped up his own coffee.

When he pushed the plate towards Eames and slotted an egg precisely onto his own toast, he sat down across the kitchen island from Eames and tucked into his breakfast.

"Lovely, Arthur, thank you," Eames said, and Arthur just nodded. "So was does bring you out this way? Do you have a line on some jobs?"

Arthur finished his bite and put down his fork and knife.

"No, actually. I'm getting out. Dropping off the grid."

Eames focused on his eggs, digesting the information. "Off the grid," he said. "Is there a problem? Job gone wrong?" He doesn't ask if there's some way he could help; Arthur is capable, and would call in favours if he needed them.

“No, nothing like that,” Arthur replied. “I just thought I’d take... a sabbatical, I guess. I’ve saved enough. And besides, this life -- it’s not really a permanent kind of lifestyle. I’m tired of not knowing if I’ll have to skip town after a job. And the people. You never know when someone’s going to stab you in the back, you know? It’s too risky.”

Eames took a sip of his coffee in a vain attempt to hide his offense. Arthur saw in anyway as their eyes met.

“I just wanted to tell you -- I don’t know,” Arthur said, looking a little a loss for words for the first time. “I’m not exactly making this public knowledge, but I thought you should know so when you don’t hear from me, you don’t think I’m dead or something.”

“No, I appreciate that, thank you,” Eames said. It’s more than anyone gives anyone else in this business, and he always could trust Arthur to do the decent thing. No one ever accused Arthur of lacking a sense of propriety. “So, what then? You’re getting out permanently?”

“No. Well, maybe. I thought I’d take a year, see how it goes. I can also see myself going crazy with boredom, so who knows?”

Eames nodded. “Sensible, Arthur. Although I can’t say I’m happy to see another veteran of the business drop out. It’s hard enough to find good talent, let alone someone with your experience.”

Arthur smiled in gratitude, a flash of a dimple that Eames always found entirely incongruous on one so sharp.

They finished up their coffee in companionable, if not exactly content silence, and afterwards Arthur got his things and left. A wave, a smile.

***

Now

The lager is going warm, sweating rings onto the antique chest Eames is using as a coffee table. The rubgy is on but he wouldn't be able to tell you the score; the sound is turned almost all the way down anyway.

He can hear the bustle of the cafe outside his window on the street below, the cafe owner shouting at someone in the back.

His phone lies on the chest to the right of his beer; it's perfectly aligned with the edges, the result of Eames toying with it again and again to no real purpose. It remains silent.

He thinks about Arthur: lean, clever, guarded, perfectly composed Arthur. The flashes of vulnerability he quickly recovers from. The rare glimpse of a genuine smile. "I don't do relationships." Arthur.

And Eames himself: casual gambler, occasional cheat, veteran thief, confident forger, independent, free.

In love.

Fuck me, he thinks. Fuck me sideways, and takes a long pull of his warm, flat beer.

**End**