Archive of Our Own

Guilt churns in his stomach, heavy like stone and writhing like snakes. He shouldn’t be here, not so soon. Doris only died in May, and he’s prowling around for a one-night stand although it’s just halfway through July. It’s disgusting, and he can’t believe how far he’s fallen. But he can’t bear the idea of going back to his kids—back to Debra, with her intrusive behavior and agonizing clinginess, and Dexter, with his hollow eyes and empty worship. He can’t stand being around them, being weighed down by Deb’s grief—but his son’s reaction (or lack thereof) is somehow worse. The very thought of it makes his skin crawl uncomfortably, and he puts his car in its parking spot, checking his keys and wallet before he opens the door to get out.

The air is uncomfortably humid and almost as hot as a sauna, but that’s normal for Miami this time of year. And the temperature will continue to skyrocket until it finally plateaus at hellish in August. There’s nothing Harry can do about the weather, so he goes into his glove compartment and puts on another layer of deodorant before sweat can start beading beneath his shirt. (It’s not overwhelming, which is a relief, and the scent of citrus is both pleasant and effective, so he takes a stick wherever he goes.) Then, he tucks it back in its spot. He slams the door with more force than strictly necessary, making the truck rattle concerningly, and he forces a few calmer breaths when agitation burns in his veins like fire. He needs to have a handle on this, needs to keep a lid on his temper. It’s not an issue he’s going to inflict on some innocent woman. Harry stalks across the parking lot and throws the door open and relaxes when he re-enters an air-conditioned environment.

He slides into a stool at the bar, threading a hand through his hair in an attempt to soothe the headache beginning to pound against his skull. He’s not sure if it’s stress or last night's actions catching up with him, but he decides that he’ll do what is expected of everyone at a bar and get a drink. So, he leans forward and asks the bartender for whatever’s on tap. At first, he’s just focusing on drinking, on getting enough of a buzz that the shame of it, but it quickly becomes chasing the sweet relief of drunkenness. Fuck, he can’t even bring himself to take off his wedding ring—how is he supposed to do this? He twists it around his finger glaring at it as if it’ll make the thing go away. It doesn’t, so Harry grabs the bottle and tilts it back enough to let the taste wash over his tongue, hoping it’ll dull his stresses the way it normally does. The game isn't looking particularly good—the Red Sox are on—so he decides to people-watch instead.

He doesn’t mean to start staring, not at first, but he can’t help himself when he catches sight of the gorgeous young man a couple of seats down from him. He’s barely more than a boy, really, but there’s something about him that catches Harry’s attention despite himself. (And, oh, that is something he’s not going to address anytime soon. He can save the self-reflection for another decade or so. Right now, he just wants to feel good.) He’s slender and tall—probably about six feet, putting him a couple inches above himself—and decisively in the ‘twink’ category. The boy has sharp cheekbones and a narrow face, light skin speckled with freckles. Green eyes meet his own, and Harry is hit with a peculiar sense of deja vu, though he can’t place anything combined with the previous features and curly black hair.

There’s a heaviness about him, as if he’s several years older than his appearance suggests, and it’s something deeply and intimately familiar to him. It makes his heart stutter to a halt before starting up again. There’s something about him that has old wounds opening up again, ones he’d learned to live with so long ago that its very resurgence is a surprise. This boy, whoever he is, awakens old nostalgia and a sharp pang of longing that he hasn’t felt for more than a decade. Harry decides. He’ll approach him, talk to him, at least. He gets up and makes his way down the length of the bar before taking a seat next to the boy, watching him stir his drink around in his glass as if he’s trying to hypnotize someone with it. The ice clinks against the glass in a rhythmic manner, and he wonders if it’s soothing somehow.

“What are you having?” Harry questions the young man, and the boy jolts in surprise, head snapping over to face him before relaxing when he sees who’s speaking.

“A mint julep,” He replies before giving him a charming, boyish grin when it’s clear that he doesn’t know what that is. “It’s bourbon, mint, and simple syrup, topped with Angostura bitters.” He explains, and Harry pretends to know what that means beyond the bourbon and mint—he’s never been one for fancier drinks and is more than happy to stick with beer, but he’s not going to make the boy feel uncomfortable for having his own preferences.

“I’m Brian,” The boy tells him, and Harry stiffens instantly, only to relax when he hears the next words leave his mouth. “Brian Moore, that is.”

For a moment, he’d been concerned. For a moment, he’d been terrified, because he just knows that Brian Moser, wherever he is, would have no mercy for him. He’s not going to lie, not even to himself, and say he doesn’t regret what he’s done—Dexter started showing signs, and it was only because of Harry's constant, dedicated attention that he hadn’t gone the route of a regular serial killer, hadn’t killed anyone (yet). Having another support figure, someone to reinforce the behaviors he was learning could have helped his son settle in more compliantly, take things seriously instead of treating them like a game. (Or, it could have completely fucked everything up and triggered a rebellious streak, he reminds himself.) But, if given the chance again, he thinks he would have taken him in, would have at least given him a chance before he threw a six-year-old into a place like that. But Brian Moore, no matter how he resembles the child he failed so badly, is someone else, and that knowledge calms him enough to continue.

Harry sticks his hand out as an offering to the boy, waiting for him to take it.

“I’m Harry Morgan.” He introduces himself, and Brian nods easily. His hand is cool against his own, but it trembles against him despite the boy’s supposed calmness.

“Yeah, I know.” He replies, and Harry blinks, confusion shooting through him like adrenaline—he knows that he’s a decent detective, but he’s not in a position of power, and he didn’t think his respect on the force had translated to attention in the outside world.

“Pardon me?” Harry asks.

“We’ve met before,” Brian explains, offering him a shy smile. Embarrassingly, he can’t even remember when and how that was, but the boy offers an answer to him before he even has to ask. “You caught the man who murdered my parents back when I was a kid, sent him to prison.”

He’s ashamed to realize that he doesn’t remember that at all, doesn’t recall the boy or how he lost his parents, doesn’t even remember the crime scene the boy was attached to. Harry thought that it was impossible to forget the horrible things that he’s seen, that every scene would haunt his nightmares until the day he died. But, somewhere in the midst of his career, each crime scene he’s seen has blurred together into some amalgamation of horror—an atrocious depiction of human cruelty—with only a few, singular scenes still standing out to him after all these years. Each of those scenes, those crimes, that he saw on a daily basis was a horrific, painful day that the families of the victims would never forget. And here he was, not even having the decency to remember the murder of a child’s parents, a killer he’d brought to justice.

“I’m sorry that happened to you.” Harry murmurs, the words feeling ridiculously hollow and meaningless in the wake of the pain that boy must have felt. Loss is hard enough when the causes are ‘natural,’ when there’s ample opportunity to come to terms and say everything you’d normally utter over the course of a lifetime. But to have your family so horrifically ripped from you at such a tender age? To lose everyone without any opportunity to even say goodbye? He can barely imagine it, guilt tearing through him at being unable to stop such a tragedy. (How many more lives have been lost because of his incompetence? How many people have suffered due to the failure of the justice system? Harry knows he needs to stop delaying, needs to find someone suited to the Code for Dexter. There needs to be an end to this, some sort of retribution for what’s been done.) A sharp breath hisses through his teeth, and he reaches over to put a hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“It was a long time ago.” The boy replies, and the expression is so familiar—an exhausted resignation mixed with a desperation to forget for just a moment—that Harry draws him into a hug without even asking. There’s a moment of hesitation before Brian melts into the touch like it’s heaven on earth, and he can easily smell the boy’s shampoo, like citrus and cedar, sharply contrasting the stiff air of the bar around them, unextraordinary aside from the chill to it. Arms wrap around his waist when the boy reciprocates. His body is frail underneath his touch, sharp bones jutting against his body, and it makes Harry’s stomach knot up in concern. It’s not normal, not healthy in any sense of the word, and he has to wonder if he has an eating disorder that’s been consuming him, pun not intended. He’s heard that it’s particularly common in teenagers and young adults with traumatic childhoods—something about self-starvation as a way of exerting control—and he’s seen how children react to losing even just one parent. Two is even worse, and he can’t imagine how it’d feel at such a young age.

They separate after a moment longer, and Harry stares at the boy as he takes his seat again, trying not to blatantly check him out. He’s a child, for fuck’s sake! Barely legal if he isn’t drinking illegally, and easily a college student! It’s disgusting; it’s wrong, and he should be ashamed of himself—he is ashamed of himself. But, for some reason, he can’t find the willpower to stand up and get away from the poor kid who has no idea what he’s getting into. He needs to run, to go far away from here and leave before he somehow fucks up someone else’s life. But he doesn’t. He doesn’t get up. He doesn’t move away. He just sits there, drinking his beer and ogling a boy his son’s age.

“I’m sorry about your wife.” Brian adds after another moment, ordering a refill as he glances over at him with shy eyes and a sympathetic smile that hits him like a vixen’s grin. (Harry wants him. He shouldn’t, but he’s drawn in like a moth to a flame.) “I know how awful it is to lose someone.”

“Thank you,” He murmurs, trying to compose himself with a deep, long draw from his glass before setting it down. Harry doesn’t want to talk about it, doesn’t want to think about it. He’s tired of grief and pain and the constant exhaustion that wears at him, only growing and growing the longer he’s alive. “I just….Does it ever go away?”

He needs to know—needs to know if the pain eases, if it somehow becomes more manageable, or if it just sits there and builds on him like a monument to his failures, proof of his grandest mistakes without any method to ever undo it. He wonders if it’ll sit on his chest and choke off his breathing until the day he dies or if it might somehow lighten, lessen, over time to something he could someday call bearable. Harry wants the pain to stop, wants to fall into a dreamless sleep and never wake up. (The idea sounds ridiculously nice, and Harry ponders the merits of getting himself a twelve-pack and drinking himself into a coma for the next twelve hours or so.)

“I…not really.” Brian responds, staring down at his drink once more. “My mom—and dad—still haunt me; I still deal with it every day. But I learned to live with it, and it might be easier for you. There’s a difference in how things feel when someone dies from sickness and murder, after all.”

Well, fuck. Harry wants to scream, wants to cry, but his eyes remain painfully dry. He thinks it’s fitting, really—he doesn’t deserve to cry after all the ways he betrayed Doris, betrayed their marriage and their family and her trust. It’s probably for the best, actually. Debra had been sobbing enough for all three of them, and it was unbearable to deal with. (A deciding factor in his need to get out for a drink, actually.)

“How do you deal with it, then?” He asks, voice rasping as he does so.

“Most of the time?” Brian replies, voice rising in a rhetorical question. “I try to forget.”

Harry wants to laugh, because that was exactly the reason that he came here in the first place: to forget his grief, to drown his sorrows, and to hope to God that when he gets back that the kids are in bed. He glances over at the boy next to him, stares at those heavy, mournful eyes and the nightmare scars underneath them. He’s so fragile looking, like he’s made of porcelain and on the verge of shattering into a thousand pieces. All he wants is to forget, to drive those painful memories from both of their minds—have something good, even if it’s just for a bit.

One moment, he’s threading his fingers through his hair in some attempt to recompose himself. The next, Harry’s pressing Brian against the bar and claiming his lips with his own.

The boy’s mouth tastes like medicine against his own, tastes like mint and menthol, a sharp bitterness that painfully reminds him of hospitals, of Doris. But he pushes that aside—he won’t think about his dead wife while he’s making out with someone else—and nips at his mouth to compel the boy to open his mouth. He doesn’t get a reaction from that, and Harry comes to the conclusion that he’s either not into that or somewhat inexperienced with the cues associated with more adult activities. (God, he hopes it’s not the latter—he can’t bear the stress of being someone’s first, of being the person to introduce someone to sex. He very distinctly remembers his first time, even after all these years, and the thought of ruining that for someone—some kid—is nauseating.) He doesn’t let it trip himself up, though. Instead, he remains calm, takes the lead, and stays gentle enough that it shouldn’t be overwhelming. Then, a sharp, shaky breath—drawn hesitantly through the boy’s nose—catches his attention, and he pulls back instantly to check the boy’s response.

“Want me to stop?” He questions, even though everything in him fights the idea. But he’s not going to assault some kid who made the mistake of not shooing him off immediately. (And how many times had he heard Doris complain that so many of her girl-friends feel obligated to endure a creep’s attempts at flirting to avoid trouble?) He’s spent his whole life going after people who exploit and abuse others, and he’s not going to be someone like that.

“No, no—do it again.” Brian murmurs, reaching up to cup the back of his head, tangling his fingers in Harry’s brown-going-gray hair, and some of the fear eases from its nest in his bones. With more confidence than he feels, he presses his mouth against the boy’s again, guiding him in what he desperately hopes is not his first proper kiss. His lips are mostly soft, though chapped skin and little nicks catch against the creases of his own. He’s sweet to him, letting Harry steer him in whatever direction he chooses, and he’d feel horrible about the power of it if it weren’t making his pants uncomfortably tight. He nips again at Brian’s lips, and the boy puts enough together to part them, a soft noise of surprise escaping him when he actually presses his tongue forward. The taste is sharper in his mouth, heavier and stronger, and it makes his knees weak with want.

When they pull away from each other—Harry leaving a few more kisses pressed against the boy’s mouth as he does—their lips are slick with spit, and the look in Brian’s eyes is almost addictive: wide and awestruck, a bright sparkle of something that wasn’t there only minutes before. It’s so damn attractive, and he wants to see what other expressions he can pull from him, what he can make the boy feel. He wants to make him feel good, wants to feel good, too—they need a break, desperately, from the pain of their loss, and the weight on each of their shoulders to be just a little bit lighter than it was.

“What are you doing after this?” Harry asks, attempting to be natural, and Brian’s face pinkens for the first time. He wonders immediately, with prickling nerves, if he was too forward, too presumptuous. (As if he isn’t already a revolting, lecherous creep going way too far and hitting on a kid his son’s age.) But the boy’s expression doesn’t twist with disgust or stiffen with panic, and his posture remains open, accepting. It’s not the look of someone uncomfortable, and that puts Harry at ease, just a little bit.

“I was just going to head back after this.” Brian responds, glancing away and towards the door, though there’s no fondness in either his voice or expression at the mention of what should be his reprieve from the outside world. It’s a touch distant, hollow in that familiar, aching way he’s trying to forget. “My hotel’s nearby, and I walked here, anyway.”

“Hotel?” Harry questions, echoing his thoughts before he even considers filtering it, and Brian stiffens for a split second before the tension leaves him.

“I’m off to university soon.” The boy explains with a shrug that feels a touch too casual for someone about to take a massive step in what’s considered adulthood. “So, it doesn’t really make sense for me to be getting a place if I’m just going to leave the country in a few months.”

“Oh, congratulations,” He responds automatically, though he doesn’t actually know where Brian is going. But it seems to be the right answer, because he lights up with a relieved, sunshine smile—a perfect picture of happiness despite the heaviness that the boy wore only moments ago.

“Thank you; I’m really looking forward to it.” Brian tells him, and Harry finds himself pressing his hand against the boy’s cheek in a clear desire to touch him—hold him—just a moment longer. He catches his lower lip between his teeth for a moment to consider what he’s going to do. He’s such a creep, such a disgusting person for preying on him when he’s barely more than a child—he’s going somewhere with nobody else that he knows will be ending up in a different country. It sounds like something a serial killer would do, or an abuser who wants to keep face with his hometown, and Harry’s repulsed by himself for doing such a thing. But he can’t seem to stop himself from acting any more than he can stop Dexter from killing one day, and some mix of alcohol and desperation has him acting like a dog in heat.

“Would you like to go back to my place?” He offers, giving Brian a significant look that he hopes the boy catches on to—partly because that would be very awkward (humiliating, even) to say out loud and partly because it means the boy is probably old enough to actually be having sex if he does. The boy in question stares at him, flushing scarlet in response to the offer, and relief wells up in Harry’s chest. He understands what he’s implying, not so young that he’s out of his element after more than a little kissing. Then, another thought enters his awareness, and concern overwhelms him: the boy in his arms said that he’d found the man who murdered his parents, that he’d been the one to put him in prison. What kind of pressure would that put on him? Would he feel obligated to sleep with him, even if he’s not interested in going that far? The idea has nausea churning in his stomach, threatening to crawl up his throat and make him sick, but he can’t seem to speak out.

“Yes—I’d like to go home with you.” Brian replies, though his face is going seven shades of scarlet, each more gorgeous than the last, and Harry has to fight back the urge to pull him into a kiss again. The boy tucks a curl behind his ear, offering him a shy smile that has his heart stuttering in his chest in a way that really shouldn’t happen for someone twenty to twenty-five years younger than he is. But he can’t bring himself to ask again, to make that boy question his choices when all Harry wants to do is take him home and ravish him. One of his hands cups his face, and the way Brian leans into it—like he’s been starved it all his life—has his heart breaking, has him pressing the sweetest kiss he can bring himself to give on that boy’s lips. Brian reciprocates eagerly, and Harry finds him making out with the boy once again, biting just hard enough to get those sweet, quiet groans that hit him like ambrosia out of Brian.

They separate when he starts worrying that the patrons will complain or, worse, that the staff will kick them out, and as he reaches into his own wallet to pay for his beers, Harry decides that he’ll pay for the kid's drink, too. Brian sputters and tries to argue against him on that, but there’s something that aches deep in his chest at the thought of letting the boy pay when he’s in such a vulnerable situation and without a source of cash. (Harry’s drinking himself half to death with everything in the life insurance check that didn’t go to college funds or house repairs.) It feels wrong and repulsive—though he can’t help but wonder what kind of conscience he has if it lets him take home a boy his son's age and doesn't let the aforementioned kid pay for his own drinks.

“Really—it’s not necessary.” Brian rushes to tell him, wallet already in hand and reaching for a couple folded bills inside, and Harry intentionally covers both of the boy’s hands in one of his larger ones. (He should not be thinking about how hot his stomach gets when he notices that difference—that’s outright predatory, disgusting of him to do.) His chest twinges at the discomfort on Brian’s face, the confusion at being treated with any sort of care or generosity. There’s wariness in his eyes that almost makes him sick, and he cups Brian’s face in one of his hands the moment the boy turns to him with nerves as plain on his face as the morning sun.

“It’s okay.” He promises, keeping his voice soft enough that it won’t be taken as a threat. “I’m not trying to hurt you. I just think it’s not right that you pay when I have more money than you do at the moment—you can pay me off when you’re in a more stable position.”

That seems to have him relaxing somewhat, and the tension eases from his shoulders. It’s sickening that he’s so familiar with the nature of returning debt at such a young age, that he’s hard-wired to reject gifts as if they’re threats. But Harry doesn’t want to think about that, doesn’t want to consider more pain when all he wants to do is forget it, so he presses another gentle kiss against the boy’s lips and gestures for them to leave the bar. After a moment’s hesitation, one where he appears to brace himself, Brian nods, and they head towards the door, an arm wrapped around the boy’s waist.

The hot, muggy, miserable Miami heat bites into him again the moment that the door opens, and the boy shudders, nose wrinkling in disgust. He bites back a laugh and instead leads the boy to his truck, trying not to gape at the way the sunset plays off curly hair. He’s pretty in this light—not that he was anywhere close to ugly in the bar, but it’s emphasized in the natural sun. Harry’s skin prickles with sweat, and he finds himself overwhelmed by the relief that he brought the deodorant with him. It’d be more than uncomfortable to hook up with someone if he stank of sweat when they met—the stench is less than attractive, and he dislikes how unclean it makes him feel.

They come to his truck, clicking the beeper to unlock the doors, and he moves over to the passenger side to open the door for the boy. The handle is searingly hot against his palm, but he’s able to push past the pain and hold the door for Brian—who, he’s now noticed, is no longer standing right beside him. Concern builds up and overflows in his chest, and Harry spins around to check on the boy. He’s not next to him, instead standing almost a body’s length behind him and shifting on his feet nervously, rocking himself from the base of his heels until he’s perching on his toes like a bird on the verge of flight.

“Ah—wait a moment, Harry?” Brian asks, voice hesitant.

“Yeah, Kid?” He responds instantly, wincing when he realizes he used the exact same tone that he uses on his son, the one that he uses when he looks like he needs to talk about something big. For Dexter, that means convincing the boy not to murder someone; it means talking him down from whatever he planned to do or giving him an explanation of how the way he behaved was wrong. That’s probably uncomfortably patronizing for his soon-to-be-hook-up to hear. But the boy that he’s bringing home (All Harry can focus on is how small and vulnerable he looks right now.) twists his fingers together, picking at his cuticles like he’s some errant teen confessing wrongdoing, and he wants to grab that boy and wrap him in his arms, keep him safe from the whole world.

“I…I have something to tell you.” He says in a small, tremulous voice, and he bridges the gap between the two of them in an instant.

“Yeah, Baby, you can tell me anything.” He promises—he’s not sure he can keep that promise, but he’s not going to tell the kid that.

“I figured that I’d better tell you before we went to your place and hooked up with you,” Brian explains, tucking a dark curl behind his ear in an anxious habit. “I’m…Well, I’m not a guy—not a real one, anyway.” The boy stammers out, and the confusion that Harry’s feeling only increases at that, but he needs to stop him before he travels down a rabbit hole.

“Explain it?” Harry asks, carefully keeping his tone gentle and accepting towards him, and it seems to soothe Brian a touch. It’s only amplified when he cups the boy’s jaw again and rubs his thumb across his skin.

“I’m a fake—I’m not a real boy.” He responds, and that doesn’t really explain anything, but he’s not going to force his date (?) to talk before he's ready. “I’m just a stupid kid—some dumb girl who decided she wanted to play at being a boy, and it’s been years, but I don’t even have the right parts.“ Brian babbles, and gorgeous tears spill over his eyelids that he’d want to see more of if he weren’t so distressed by the pain all but radiating from him. But, fortunately, he understands what he’s talking about now and knows how to soothe him.

“Oh, Baby,” He murmurs softly, drawing the boy into a hug and twisting his fingers in his hair. “It’s okay—it’s alright, kiddo. I know what you mean, and it’s okay.”

“I’m a fraud.” The boy repeats, acting as if it’s the end of the world, as if he’s untouchable, unlovable, by any metric of worth. It makes him sick. It makes him sad. And he won’t let those misconceptions continue.

“That’s not true.” Harry states firmly, though his gut twists with guilt when Brian stiffens as if firmness has always been a threat to him. He presses a kiss to his forehead, clutching the boy closely enough to feel the harsh angles of his bones pressed against his body. “I know what you are—know what you’re talking about, and it doesn’t change anything for me.”

“I’m a freak.” Brian tells him, voice breaking as he speaks, and wetness presses into the fabric of his shirt.

“Nonsense, Brian.” He promises. “You’re transsexual. It’s not a crime; you’re not evil for existing.”

“There’s a term for it?” He questions, and the shock in the boy’s voice is heartbreaking. Harry pulls away from the hug, heartwarming at the way Brian chases him as if he’s worth having.

“Yeah, Kiddo—it’s a recorded phenomenon.” He explains, and he can tell from the blank look in the boy’s eyes that he doesn’t quite get it, so Harry rephrases the sentence more clearly. “You’re not alone. There are other people like you.”

Brian’s entire expression changes when he says that, confusion giving way to shock, then crystal clear relief. He gasps softly, reaching up to cover his mouth, and Harry hopes that the silent tears tracking down his cheeks are tears of joy instead of sadness. He thumbs at the tears without being asked to, and all he wants to see is the look of relief, the look of joy in his eyes bright enough to rival the sun for a couple minutes more.

“And you’re okay with that?” Brian questions, still sounding shocked, and he’s more than happy to reassure him one last time.

“Of course—I’m interested in you, and that doesn’t change, regardless of the parts you have.” That seems to be enough, and his boy finally climbs into the truck.

——

Brian did not expect that he’d be doing this—he didn’t think he’d be taking after one of the sloppiest types of killers in history and picking a man up in the bar, just to take him home, fuck him, and kill him. (In that order, thank you very much!) Hell, he hadn’t even been planning on meeting anyone at the bar, and it’s not as if he can afford to fuck up when he’s about a month away from heading to Paris for university. If he gets caught related to any crimes at all, he could lose his scholarships and subsequently lose any possibility of having a stable career or life. And how on earth is he supposed to take care of Dexter if he has a bad job—or, worse, ends up in jail? So, his Dahmer-esque murder needs to go completely unnoticed by the cops.

Technically, he’s not doing things exactly the way that disgusting slob did. He’s going to Harry’s house, not the other way around, and he has no intention of drugging the man, much less committing an act as disgusting and unsanitary as necrophilia. But, despite that, the comparisons have been drawn, and Brian’s nerves are shot to bits. He’s planned this for weeks, months, almost a year now—walked himself through what he’d do, all the possible outcomes, what to do if someone walks in on it—but it feels so different now that it’s actually happening. His body is trembling like a leaf, and he can’t get it to stop, no matter how many times he tenses and un-tenses his muscles.

He forces his body to relax, bringing a practiced smile to his lips and staring at Harry like a lovestruck adolescent boy. The asshole smiles back at him, and Brian can see the guilt in his eyes. It’s for all the wrong reasons, and he’s going to teach him the right ones soon.

Brian isn’t sure what he’s doing—not really. Sleeping with Harry is not what he had in mind when he saw the man at the bar he decided to drop by, and he can’t even identify what part of himself thought that fucking the man who ruined his life would be a good idea. Even the Dark Passenger, with its heavy grief and hunger, is silent in coming up with any reasons to actually do this. But there’s a hot pit in the depths of his stomach that he’s never felt before, and the entire situation has him off-balance and overwhelmed in a way that he, peculiarly, doesn’t want to end. It’s confusing, intoxicating, and absolutely addictive.

“Having second thoughts?” Harry’s voice startles him out of his reverie, and his head snaps over to meet the man’s gaze. “We don’t have to do this—I can take you back to your hotel.”

The idea should be tempting. He should be chomping at the bit for this opportunity, to have Harry go back to his hotel room, give him an excuse to get the man inside and murder him without ever taking his clothes off. He should lunge at it, seize it as if the offer will be rescinded, but everything inside Brian snarls at him not to do that, not to abandon this.

“No—I want to do this, want you.” He stammers out to say, and he’s floored to realize he means every single word he just said with a sincerity that he hasn’t used since he learned to start lying, that telling the truth risked his life. Brian, for reasons he can neither understand nor explain, wants this—wants Harry. He’s not exactly sure what he’s hoping to get out of the man? A reason why Mama trusted him so blindly that she let him lead her to her death? Something good in exchange for every horror he’s endured? But there’s a heat spreading throughout his body that he’s never felt before, and all he can think about is how good Harry’s lips feel against his own. He wants this, wants more.

Harry, from the driver’s seat, looks over at him, probably to gauge something, and Brian doesn’t argue with him about it, just meets the man’s eyes and tries to convey the need building within him that has nothing to do with the gnawing, aching pain from fifteen years of starvation for whatever Need has been growing within him. He buries that as deeply as he can, shoving every other pitiful emotion he has over it to hide the flaw from view. (And, oh, he knows how humans hate whatever he is.) Harry would see him, would recognize him if he didn’t manage to cover it up. Whatever the man sees, it’s enough to satisfy him, and the speedometer doesn’t drop below fifty the entire way to the Morgan house.

When they pull up, there’s already a single car in the driveway, one that indicates that Harry’s children, Dex and Deb (?), are home. There’s an intoxicating dizziness at the realization that he’s closer to Dexter—his Dexter—now than he has been for fifteen years, since the awful day that the Incident ended, and they were separated. It has his heart racing dizzily, and his entire body is full of jitters as he unbuckles his seatbelt. He focuses more on the strange brew of arousal building in his gut when he gets out of the truck, closing the door firmly but quietly, and he darts over to Harry’s side to press a kiss against the man’s mouth before they’re heading inside, keys fumbling with the lock as a result of the drunk’s less-than-stellar coordination. For a moment, Brian wonders if he’ll even be able to do it, much less the bedroom activities if he’s this inebriated, but he finally manages it after some careful jiggling of the doorknob.

“Do we have to worry about someone walking in on us?” He asks, dropping his voice to a quiet hiss to avoid being heard.

“My daughter’s staying over at Camilla’s place…I think.” Harry mumbles after a moment of hesitation that does not reassure Brian of the older man’s parenting. “My son might be home, but he probably snuck out.”

(For fuck’s sake; this man is as bad of a parent as he is a cop.)

They sneak inside like horny teenagers from all those bad romance novels from the institution’s library, and Harry’s pressing him against the nearest wall to kiss him senseless. The man’s lips are rough, domineering, where they were careful and hesitant earlier, and the tongue intruding in his mouth is sexy in a way he hadn’t thought possible—there are hands on his wrists, pinning him against the wall in a position he’d find terrifying if it were anyone but Harry-fucking-Morgan, and all he can do is let out a soft groan at the way the man holds him, clings to him like he’s some sort of treasure rather than a monster pretending to be human. Then, they’re pulling apart, a thin strand of saliva connecting them before Brian’s leaning forward to bring them back together again.

But Harry is pulling away far too quickly, and he whines in protest.

“Not here, Baby—my son might see.” Harry tells him, and Brian doesn’t have the emotional wherewithal to unpack that statement, so he lets the man take him by the hand and lead him to the bedroom. There are a couple more heavy kisses, and the older man seems eager to push him against every flat surface to kiss him silly. It’s ridiculous and putting him at risk of being seen by his brother for the first time in fifteen years as some kid his adoptive father’s taken home, but it’s so addicting to be wanted that he can’t even begin to complain. Then Harry’s pushing him into the bedroom, and Brian turns around to get a look at the room that the man who ruined his life has slept in for a decade and a half.

It’s a lived-in room, one with a large, queen-sized bed placed in the middle of the wall and bedside tables flanking it. One has pens and files and more than a few cans of beer on it, the one that he must assume belongs to Harry. There’s a photo frame on the table as well, but it’s set face-down, the occupant firmly covered up. He can only assume who the person in the photo is. The other one…he knows it belonged to Doris. It’s been a short enough period of time that there isn’t yet dust settled on them—the photo of her and Harry’s wedding still set up for all to see and stacked with books, a tube of chapstick, a pill planner. There’s a tall dresser on Harry’s side of the room, covered in various tchotchkes, such as watches, matches, and a tray of change and pocket-knives. On the other, a long, low dresser, there are photos and a vase of dried flowers and a jewelry box, scarves, and a pair of glasses. There’s a comfy lounge chair and a small table perched perfectly next to the window, curtains now closed. But, inevitably, his eyes are drawn back to the bed that takes up the center of the room. The sheets and pillows of the bed are a deep black color, and it looks oddly seductive in the warm light of the bedside table lamps.

“It’s gorgeous.” Brian whispers (He’s not even lying! The room is positively cozy!), looking at Harry, and the man offers him a rakish grin as he closes the door behind himself.

“I’m glad you think so,” The man tells him, crossing the distance between them, and the man’s kissing him so roughly that it has his knees quaking. They stumble backwards until they’re standing right at the edges of the bed, and then they split apart for a couple seconds.

“Let me get my clothes off.” Brian says, hoping to ease the tension, and he shucks off his clothes, one piece at a time. Shoes off first, followed by socks that are tucked into the shoe of their correspondence. He unbuttons his shirt next, the starched, white fabric scraping against his skin uncomfortably. After that, he pushes his pants down and steps out of them one leg at a time. His boxers are the last to go, and he’s left completely and utterly naked before the man. But the idea of just leaving his clothes on the floor is distasteful, so he folds them all as quickly as he can, setting them on a chair set by the window to avoid cluttering up the floor.

Brian doesn’t like himself that much, but he can admit that he’s escaped the worst of female puberty—he spent far too long underfed to have the body weight to develop breasts beyond a discomforting softness in his chest area, and his hips have remained mercifully slender. However, there isn’t much to like. He’s tall but fragile enough to have broken a few bones, lanky and awkward in a way he’s certain has him looking like an elongated scarecrow. But Harry’s looking at him like he’s gorgeous, staring at him as if he’s someone radiant instead of ruined—eyes warm, gentle towards him in a way that nobody else has ever been.

“You’re beautiful,” Harry murmurs softly, and he quickly divests himself of his shirt with far less order than Brian did, tossing it aside to let it fall onto the floor and leaving behind a tank top in its stead. His hands touch him gently, ghosting across his chest and stomach before they finally settle on his hips as if they’ve always belonged there. It’s the softest touch he’s ever felt, and it’s the closest thing he’s felt to love since childhood. He reminds himself that it’s not real, that Harry’s only reacting like this—treating him like this—because he thinks he’s some kid high on hero worship. He wouldn’t want him this way if he knew who Brian really is. But he can’t focus on that right now. Right now, he needs to focus more on the sex part of his plan than the revenge part of it—he needs to hide the rage simmering in his stomach along with his arousal.

“So…how do we exactly do this?” He questions, and it’s hilarious to watch his expression freeze with an indescribable mixture of horror.

“Wait—you mean to say you haven’t had sex before?” Harry sputters, and Brian hesitates for a second. Then, he shakes the thought aside physically—that doesn’t count—clear enough to answer the question for the man, but he wants to give verbal confirmation for clarity’s sake.

“Not really.” He admits, sitting down on the edge of the bed, and Harry Morgan looks almost a decade older than he was before as he moves to crouch down, sitting in front of him the way the doctors always did when they tried to get down on his level, to talk to him seriously without being seen as patronizing—to seem more approachable, he means. Seeing the man in such a position stirs up old anxieties, memories of a promise to protect his mother. A promise broken years ago. But the look in his eyes is different enough that it drags him from the past.

“I’ll be gentle,” Harry promises, and Brian wants to laugh at that. Nothing good has ever come from careful, gentle—nothing good has ever come without harshness, without pain. He doesn’t trust gentle, doesn’t want it.

“Don’t.” He tells him before he can even think to stop himself. “I’m not fragile—I’ve weathered things you can’t even imagine. Don’t treat me like I’m made of glass.”

That seems to confuse the older man, and he moves to take a seat beside him, his hands wrapping around one of Brian’s own. The warmth is pleasant, and he relaxes into the touch as Harry meets his eyes. But he’s going in blind, and his heart stutters in his chest anxiously. He needs to know what his elder is thinking, needs to understand everything that goes on inside his head—the thought of going in blind stresses him, but he can’t see any deceit in the older man’s eyes.

“Life hasn’t been kind to you, has it?” Harry asks softly, and everything in him stiffens at the tone of his voice, the look on his face. It’s, unmistakably, care. It’s concern. It’s everything he’s been denied for a decade and a half of rotting in that place, and it’s as intoxicating as it is alien to him. He feels as if he’s been a plant growing in the dark since his conception, and Harry’s just thrown open the curtains to show him the sun. He finds himself clinging to the hands holding his own, even as he answers.

“Not really,” Brian repeats, hoping that he won’t be asked anything else about his childhood. Fortunately, the man seems to understand his need, and the heaviness leaves his eyes.

“Alright, not too gentle.” He responds. “But the moment I do something you don’t like, tell me to stop or say the word ‘Red’ or ‘Stop,’ okay? We stop until you tell me to continue.”

Red. Stop.

Brian doesn’t know the significance of it, but the enormity of the idea that Harry’s suggesting doesn’t escape him. A word—two words, actually—that makes the sex stop if he wants it to, no matter how far into it they are into the act they are. Everything stops—no questions asked—until he says that they continue. His breathing comes to a ragged halt, throat choked up with some unnamable emotion connected to the immense relief that’s hit him like a tidal wave. Every word that he wants to say is clogged up in that same lump in his throat, and all he can do is blink back tears before they get the opportunity to form.

Wordlessly, Brian throws his arms around Harry’s shoulders, pulls the man into a hug, and he buries his face into the crook of his neck like a child. The man’s so solid, sturdy, against him, and he doesn't even complain when he clings to Harry in a manner entirely unbecoming of someone he plans to fuck. Instead, he just pulls him into a hug and threads his fingers into Brian’s hair, the nails digging into his scalp in a way that has him sighing in relief. (In the back of his head, Brian realizes that he’s been hit with the distinct awareness that this is why Mama was so in love with Harry, so willing to risk her life just to make him happy.) When he’s finally pulled himself together, blinked back the tears and regained his voice, he pulls away from the man and meets his eyes again.

“Is there anything else?” He questions, and Harry hesitates at the question—and he can’t have that after all that the man’s done to put him at ease, so he speaks again. “Tell me; whatever it is, I won’t be upset.”

“I was wondering if you’d be willing to wear a nightgown.” He explains, voice stilted with anxiety. “While we had sex, I mean.”

“You have a nightgown?” He asks, voice light with as much humor as he can manage after the heaviness of their conversation.

“I do not.” There’s a moment’s hesitation as he processes Harry’s response. Then, understanding hits him.

“You want me to wear your dead wife’s nightgown while we have sex?” Brian questions, voice some mixture of teasing and confusion. Even if he doesn’t understand what’s going on, he doesn’t want Harry to think that he’s angry.

He knows that there are people who are interested in more feminine behaviors, even if both of the parties involved are men—that’s nothing strange in and of itself. But wearing a dead woman’s nightgown has his stomach twisting with the discomfort he’s never had before. It feels wrong—dirty, even. He thinks it’s something that normal people shouldn’t do. But Brian has never been normal, never even been human. And he can indulge Harry on the only thing he’s asked him to do. (Even more compellingly, that peculiar warmth in his stomach burns hotter at the idea how wrong it is. But he’s not going to acknowledge that.)

Harry just nods, looking ashamed. (And, fuck, that’s not for the right reasons either!)

“I’ll do it.”

“What?” Harry questions, flabbergasted, and the sentiment is clearly reflected within Brian’s own head. He’s doing what????

“I’ll do it—I’m not repulsed.” Brian repeats (He really is still ridiculously surprised by the honesty of that statement.), and he goes to the long, low dresser covered in Doris’ belongings. He opens the top drawer to the right—that’s where he’s always put his pajamas in the institute, and it’s exactly where Doris apparently kept her own, judging by the various sleepwear he sees. Most of the dresses have paisley or floral patterns, and he is not going to wear anything like that. So, he shuffles through a dead woman’s wardrobe until he comes across something bearable.

It’s a pale Victorian-style nightgown that should hit just past his knees and a sleeve-slot neckline tied with a white ribbon. (He likes that name far better than the sweetheart neckline, which makes his stomach turn with the unbearable discomfort he first felt when he first started edging into puberty.) The sleeves are three-quarters poet sleeves, the kind that have an almost teardrop shape with frills after the cuffs. It’s not overly feminine, though it is, clearly, a nightgown—it reminds him of nightshirts that used to be worn in the olden days. Brian slips the nightgown on, cotton brushing against his skin. It doesn’t feel awful, despite the twist of wrongness that curdles in his stomach.

He doesn’t feel particularly attractive in the nightgown (It’s a pretty nightgown, but he doesn’t see the appeal on him.), though he does like feeling more covered than before, but the way that Harry looks at him is enough to make his stomach do summersaults—it’s an intense, needy look that has his eyes darkening with lust, and he gets to his feet with urgency controlling his every move. It’s enough to ignore the twist in his stomach from being girly, the fear that he’ll be found out despite the fact that Harry already knows. For all the man’s done, he accepts him and the weirdness of his body without question—he wants him all the same. He charges across the few feet of distance between them as if its existence is a crime, and one of his hands finds its place at his waist, the other tangling its way into his hair. The man’s lips are on his own, rough and frantic, as if there’s not enough time in the world, and Brian feels swept away by the intensity of it.

“Beautiful,” Harry murmurs when they pull apart, and he moves on to pressing kisses against his throat in a way that has embarrassing noises escaping him. “So fucking gorgeous.”

That’s probably the first time someone’s complimented him, the way he looks, in more than a decade—the place he grew up didn’t pay particular attention to people’s appearances, and, in there, he was just another person that needed to be broken down and rebuilt. He was barely a name there, and he blended into the background like another neutral tone in a grayscale wall. But Harry—for some fucking reason—looks at him like he’s a work of art, and it has his skin burning with a peculiar but not unpleasant warmth. It’s addictive, intoxicating, and absolutely overwhelming.

“Can we take this to the bed now?” He asks, voice teasingly miffed, and the man grins at him—the first real grin he’s gotten all night.

“Yeah, Baby,” Harry responds, and Brian’s embarrassed at the way he flushes up at that, “Let’s go to bed.”

It turns into a few more kisses that turn into Harry nipping at his mouth until he can push his tongue inside. The bite of it is just rough enough to have him groaning into the touch, draping his arms over the man’s shoulders to pull him back—because he’s taking too long, damnit! Brian wants him, wants that irresistible mouth on his and those hands on every part of his body. Fortunately, he’s very receptive, and Harry’s hands are on his waist before he even has time to ask. There’s a moment where he’s filled with some mixture of terror and excitement when Harry scoops him up, then he’s being tossed onto the bed—albeit gently—the breath leaving him in a big huff that, despite its presence, leaves him breathless in a dizzying cocktail of nerve impulses that add up to arousal. A startled laugh escapes him, giddy with agog, and Brian props himself on his elbows and tries to act as if he’s not completely blown away by the man before him. (And, fuck, this really is what Mama saw in him.)

Harry’s climbing on top of him in a heartbeat, helping him shuffle back on the bed until his head lands on a pillow, but it feels nothing close to threatening. The look in his piercing blue eyes is unbearably fond, and no one’s ever looked at him like that since Dexter was lost. Brian threads his fingers into the older man’s hair and brings him back down for a kiss. His partner greets him eagerly, and, this time, he’s the one to bite at his lips, asking for an entrance that’s quickly denied. They pull apart when his head starts to spin with dizziness, and he runs one of his hands down the planes of his chest, taking in the sensation of warm flesh and muscle stretched beneath skin until it’s interrupted by the sensation of a leather belt and the top of pants. His mind struggles to connect the dots for a couple moments, but Brian is quickly reminded that the only thing the older man’s taken off since they started this is his shirt—and that’s not enough, damnit!

“Get your fucking clothes off.” He urges, hands fumbling at Harry’s belt until the man’s come to hold him still. Brian looks up at him, mouth already opening in protest, but the look he gets is enough to silence him temporarily.

“Brian,” Harry says, and the tone of his voice is an authoritative one that has him shuddering pleasantly—some primal, animalistic part of his brain going oh in response to it. His heart stutters at a staccato pace, but all he can focus on is the way that Harry’s behavior is making him feel, like it filled some long hollowed-out wound that he’d grown so accustomed to that he’d forgotten about it entirely. The look Harry’s giving him feels like that, and every single word he knows vanishes from his mind. “That’s not how we ask for things.”

He should be embarrassed—he should be furious. Harry’s talking down to him like he’s some kid that doesn’t understand the concept of manners. It’s patronizing, degrading, and utterly inappropriate for something like this. It feels like he’s being fathered in bed! (But when was the last time there was somebody like that in his life? Anyone who wanted to take care of him? Driscoll never even bothered to come visit him after he got out of prison, told him to stop writing after eight years of weekly letters to him. He’d never bothered to parent much before that, either, and Harry never seemed all that fond of him before.) It’s been far too long since anyone’s looked at him like he needs to be protected or cared for, but Harry’s giving him the most attentive, affectionate, paternal look that he’s ever seen in his life. That’s the thought that has his cheeks burning red once again, and he’s hit with another unfortunate realization: fuck, that’s hot. It is definitely not normal—all he can think about is the phrase ‘Oedipus Complex’—but he can’t bring himself to complain when it might be the single most pleasant experience of his adult life.

There’s a pause as they meet each other’s eyes, and Harry stares down at him for several seconds, expression searching before it slowly drops into something like concern and lights up with realization and shame.

“I’m sorry about that—it was completely inappropriate.” Harry stumbles over his words, moving back and away from him.

“No!” Brian yelps before he can even think to stop himself, and Harry freezes, blinking owlishly at him. (Fuck. Now he’s put his foot in his mouth.) “It’s—I…” He tries to speak, but his words don’t seem to be working, and he lets loose a frustrated groan at his inability to do something so simple.

“Take your time,” He mumbles, pressing a kiss against his forehead in a move that he remembers faintly from Mama tucking him in at night. “It’s okay; I’m in no rush.”

Brian inhales shakily, trying to piece himself together, and does his best to not lose his courage. It’s not easy to gather himself, to speak so plainly when he’s spent so many years saying what people want, when they want, how they want it said. Being honest doesn’t come naturally to him anymore—it feels like a risk. But he wants this—needs this—and that means he needs to swallow his pride and be honest for once in his life. (Fuck, all that’s occurring to him is that he’s stupidly jealous of Harry’s kids for getting affection shown to them on the regular.) It takes too long, and the older man is probably annoyed with him, but Brian finally finds something that starts to convey what he’s feeling right now.

“I like it.” He finally gets out, and he’s certain he’s crimson from the shame of his confession. This man is responsible for the murder of his mother—this is the man who ruined his life—and he’s depending on him for some sort of affection that he’s been denied his entire life. “It’s nice—to be…to have someone that cares like that. I haven’t had it for a long time.”

His voice is pathetically weak, trembling in a way he hasn’t let it for years when it wasn’t a carefully crafted ploy—proof to the doctors that he’s human, that he has emotions—and Brian feels intensely aware that this is the reason people hide to cry and break down. He’s scared—he’s so fucking scared, and he hates that he put himself in this position. A position where Harry could ruin him entirely. The worst part is that it’s true; his chest aches ruthlessly at the possibility of Harry’s paternal affection being snatched away from him, the idea of going back to that horrible, violent pain of being alone and unwanted again. He doesn’t even know where Dexter is right now, can’t even know if “survived by Dexter and Debra Morgan” is actually him—he just wants to not be alone anymore. His hands clutch at the sheets of the bed with anxious energy, and all he can do is try to focus on controlling his breathing, trying to keep himself from falling apart.

There’s no response for several seconds, and nerves build in his stomach like a pit of vipers. What’s he thinking? Is he angry, upset, disgusted with him? Is he going to have to leave—get out of the house, because he’s clearly still too much for the man to even try to handle. The thought that it’s him that it’s always him, no matter how he acts or who he pretends to be—that drives any adult out of his life, makes them sick with disgust, is something that’s haunted him for years. The quiet, heavy knowledge that there’d never be a home or a family for him aside from Dexter. He thought he’d learned to handle it, that he’d adjusted his behavior after spending a decade and a half learning how to dilute his personality, to act like a human. But being rejected even now—even just the thought of it? It’s nauseating.

Brian glances up, heart in his throat and his hopes in his stomach.

There’s a look of bone-deep guilt in Harry’s eyes—just as much as the heat of arousal that still simmers in them—but it's the kind of pain he hadn’t thought Harry could feel without reminding him of what he’d done to Mama. But here it is: a pain, a guilt, fitting for the man who let his mother die, grief for a childhood stolen and innocence lost. Righteous fury burns in his chest, a vicious brand of schadenfreude at finally seeing something break the man—the pain of his past finally starting to be returned. He exhales a sharp, shuddering breath, blinking rapidly as he meets Harry’s gaze.

“I’m sorry,” The man whispers, voice rasping with an intense emotion that Brian can’t even begin to name. “I’m sorry I couldn’t save them.”

And that…that’s something Harry’s never said before—he’d offered bland condolences after ripping him from his brother’s side and mother's blood, but he’d never said sorry. He’d never taken responsibility for the damage he’d caused, the lives he’d ruined. That, he thinks, makes things different, and it robs him of the vindictive rage he felt only moments before. It does nothing to bring his Mama back, and that snuffs out the satisfaction he felt at the man’s guilt.

“I’m going to take care of you, okay?” Harry murmurs, and he presses his lips against the first of the tears that slip down his cheeks, stopping them in their tracks. (He didn’t even realize he was crying, doesn’t know when it started.) “You don’t have a father, so I’ll be your daddy.”

Brian finds himself nodding at that, reaching up to scrub his face of any remaining tears, and Harry pulls his hands away more gently than anyone has touched him in years. He kisses him softly, and he appreciates the sweetness of it, lets himself melt against the touch like ice in the heat of the sun. Then, those hands are slipping upwards to entwine their fingers together, and it feels like being held instead of restrained. He can feel the man’s heartbeat fluttering in his fingertips.

“Don’t you go soft on me, old man.” He comments with far more confidence than he actually feels—his legs are trembling and boneless, completely out of his control, and he’s shivering despite the warmth of the room around them.

“Right—don’t go gentle,” Harry reminds himself aloud, and a more mischievous look settles onto his face. “Something tells me you’re the kind of kid who needs to be straightened out—figuratively speaking, that is.”

That look has Brian’s stomach churning with that intoxicating mixture of excitement and anxiety, sending his insides trembling in a rhythm that reminds him of butterfly wings. He needs this, needs more—he wants the man before him desperately, wants him to get his damn clothes off instead of wasting more time with foreplay. As much as the care that Harry’s treating with him has him trembling, there’s something inside his senses that lights up at the thought of being left with bruises, with enough proof that it was real.

“Hurry up with it, then.” Brian instructs, propping himself up on his elbows to steal another kiss from the older man before he decides to take control.

Harry indulges him for a couple moments, dominating the kiss and nipping his way into his mouth in a delicious manner that has him groaning against the man’s lips. Then, he’s pulling back and away from him, despite the way he chases his lips, and tugging the tank top off entirely. He’s hot—Brian didn’t know before that he had a thing for older men, but he definitely does now. Harry’s in his fifties now, was around his mid-thirties back when Mama was alive, but he hasn’t done the thing that the security guards at the institute did where they let themselves get soft and complacent. There isn’t as much obvious, bulging muscle as there is on a young man’s body, but he can see the definition and toning created from years of regimented workouts and efforts, and it’s enough to make his skin prickle with heat. Something about the lines on his face and the silver in his hair is stupidly attractive, and all the words in his mouth leave him at once. He’s flushed and at a loss for words, left clutching at his chest like a starstruck maiden.

“You can’t afford to take a lifetime about this, after all.” He notes with a grin, and it gets a chuckle out of the older man.

“I’m going to have to teach you some manners.” Harry teases, then he’s shucking his shoes off—finally—and unclasping his belt to toss aside.

“Yeah, yeah—we can work on that in a bit. Just put it in already.” Brian urges without any irritation, but it gets the reaction he desires as the older man plants a hand beside his head and looms over him in a way that has his stomach clenching pleasurably. “I can take it.”

“No!” He admonishes, slapping softly at his thigh in a move that’s barely more than a tap. “This is your first time, and vaginal tearing is a concern.” That statement has him shuddering with terror at the promise of such pain, and he obediently parts his legs when Harry’s hands slip onto his thighs, pushing up the skirt of the nightgown. There’s a part of him that tenses up when the older man’s hands brush against his upper thighs, but his partner is far more cautious than he had expected before—taking the time to pause and let him acclimate to the touch, thumbs rubbing against his skin to ease his nerves. Only when Brian gives him verbal approval does he move again to close the distance. He wants to be angry. He should be angry. For some reason, this man—the asshole who ruined his life—is focused on being a good partner for him in the sack. He should be furious that he doesn’t apply this care to everyone in his job, every victim that he comes across. He has every right to be apoplectic. But he isn’t. He just wishes that Harry had shown half as much care for his mother out of bed.

Brian isn’t sure what he expected, but it wasn’t the careful intrusion against his cunt, a single finger pressed against the hole. His hands are larger than his own—courtesy of him being a real man—and rough, calloused from years of work, but they’re gentle despite the instructions that he gave to Harry. The finger is careful, probing into his body with a gravity that he hadn’t expected based upon their previous conversation. But it’s hard to focus on that when there’s a sharp burst of pleasure striking against his synapses, and Brian has to fight the urge to thrash in response to it. Vaguely, he recalls his childhood exploration of biology books, returned to with greater attention when he reached the age he should have hit puberty, and mentions of a point of physical stimulation and extreme sensitivity—the name is on the tip of his tongue. This, Brian concludes with an embarrassing noise as Harry presses against that spot again, must be that spot in his body.

His stomach sours at that reminder of womanhood, of being a fake, but he’s distracted as his partner (And that is something he never thought he’d think.) returns to exploring his body, pressing against every part of him as if there’s some sort of prize for it. Warm fingers probe at him with previously unexperienced care, and Brian lets himself lie back against the pillows the moment his body decides the man isn’t a threat—his instincts have yet to be wrong about that, after all. There are a few moments where sparks of almost-phantom pleasure light up in his stomach, but it just feels peculiar for the most part, something to indulge while he waits for things to heat up, get good—whatever it’s called. He bites back a sigh, not wanting to be rude, but the impatience wells up in him despite his attempts at self-control. He’s waited so long! For years and years and years! Can’t something come quickly for him? But, despite his irritation, he doesn’t complain, not when it could fuck up whatever is happening right now.

“You’re being so good for me.” Harry tells him softly, and he has to fight back the laugh that bubbles up in him. Being good? He’s being obedient. There’s a difference, he’s pretty sure, but he doesn’t argue with the man on it. Instead, he shimmies into a more comfortable position and glances over at the man from where he’s sitting between his legs, expression pressed with concentration as he plunges a finger in and out of the most sensitive part of Brian’s anatomy.

“Is there any way you can speed this up?” He grumbles, but his heart stutters when Harry laughs—warm and deep and rumbling like thunder—and the noise has those weird sparks of pseudo-pleasure striking against his synapses. Fuck. He wants to hear that noise again, wants to hear more of it—Brian wants the older man pressed up against him, pressed in him, wants to feel the rumble of his chest with every noise he makes. But, right now, his only option is to be patient and accept what Harry deigns to give him—as infuriating as that is.

“Good things come to those who wait.” Harry chastises, but he’s grinning like a fool as his middle finger brushes against the rim of his cunt. The area is sensitive in a way he hasn’t explored before, and he groans softly at the touch, trying to lean further into it and increase the contact.

“I’m falling asleep up here!” He complains, and he gets another huff of laughter as the man leans forward to mouth at his throat.

“Sorry.” Harry murmurs, drawing back all too quickly, and Brian shrieks in surprise when he presses another finger into him. “I’ll try to better keep your attention.”

“Fuck—” He gasps, shuddering at the new stretch. It’s far more intense than it was with one finger, and it has him whining pathetically, hips canting to create greater contact between the two of them. This is good—he wants more, more, more. All he can focus on is the sensation of it—of having something not insignificantly sized pressed into the most sensitive orifice of his body, pressing right against that spot that has him moaning like a whore and dragging against every nerve until his body’s lingering pains leave the edges of his awareness. Brian didn’t think that two fingers would be so different from one, but the impact on his body is completely different; two fingers are far wider than one, stretching him out and probing far more deeply than one could alone. It’s intense, leaves him breathless in its wake, but it feels like vehemence not violence. He squirms beneath Harry, panting as he tries to compose himself. Fuck. Brian hadn’t realized it’d get intense so fast, that it could be so much! If this is what it’s like to have fingers pressed into him, he can only imagine how the actual sex will feel.

There’s another warm, comforting chuckle when he throws a hand over his mouth to muffle the noises he’s making, only for Harry to pry it away, pressing kisses against each of his knuckles before releasing him. The message is clear: I don’t want you to hide from me. (He does not think about the concern of maybe having his brother in the house at the moment, becoming aware of the situation—the very thought of it has ice shooting through his veins. He also definitely does not think about how this acceptance of him, of his behavior, is entirely dependent on the older man not knowing his true identity.) Regardless of his concerns, Harry quickly develops a steady, controlled pace after that, pressing into Brian with a firm intensity that has his stomach squirming like a bag full of snakes. It has him panting and gasping despite his normally impressive self-control, toes curling against the sheets, and the older man just fixes him with a smug, aroused look that has him wishing Harry would take a break to kiss him silly again.

“Why—why didn’t you start with this?” Brian gasps out, chest heaving as he tries to compose himself. This is what he’s heard about sex, the mind-blowing, life-changing thing that he’s heard about whispered in the orderlies’ idle gossip, the intensity of emotion and sensation that has them putting up with toxic, abusive behavior that he would never tolerate now that he has a choice. But this? This makes it all make sense—the way that Harry’s pressing against him is mind-melting, utterly addictive, and overwhelming in the best way possible. He’s burning with a potent mixture of desire and need, utterly at the mercy of the man who ruined his life, and he can’t even bring himself to be upset. As it is, his sexual education at the hands of Harry is going better than he’d have ever dared to hope.

“I wanted to ease you into this,” The man explains softly, voice oddly subdued. “I didn’t want to rush you.”

“You don’t need to bother.” Brian points out matter-of-factly. (Or, at least as factually as he can with two fingers buried in his cunt.) “I’m not some fragile flower—I can handle starting fast, and foreplay’s wasted on me.”

That seems to be the wrong answer, and Harry stiffens instantly, withdrawing his fingers with clinical certainty at such a speed that Brian can barely process it.

“No, no, no!” He whines, shuffling his limbs in a disorganized attempt to prop himself up with his elbows that Harry quickly foils. “Put them back in—Harry!”

Instead of chastising him or punishing him, the older man simply grasps him firmly by the wrists, lifting him up by the arms before firmly pushing him down onto the bed in a move that has heat burning in his stomach. He looms above him, panting as his hands lock around his wrists and leave him pinned to the bed like a butterfly on display. The heat, the desire in his expression, is maddening, and Brian has to fight that part of himself that urges him to give in, to tuck tail (figuratively) and bare his neck (probably figuratively) in some sort of display of submission. But he’s not going to go easily, not going to go quietly—if Harry Morgan wants him to submit, he’s going to have to make him. His chest heaves rapidly as he stares up at the man, eyes wide, and waits for a response.

“Sorry, Baby.” Harry tells him, pressing a soft kiss against both of his cheeks despite the glint of steely will in his voice. “You told me to take care of you, so that’s what I’m going to do. But I’m not going to take this kind of attitude.”

And, oh, there it is. The promise of punishment, of enough harshness to ease the jittery, almost nauseous, sensation that Harry’s kindness leaves him with. The other shoe to drop when things don’t go according to plan. He’s familiar with this, with punishment, and he needs to know what Harry’s entails. He very harshly shoves down that tiny little part of him that wants to see the man’s reactions, wants to be punished or dominated or whatever else could happen to him. That’s not relevant to the situation.

“And what are you going to do about it?” Brian replies, imbuing his voice with as much confidence as he can muster, and his stomach drops pleasantly when Harry smirks at him.

“You’ll see.” He responds, voice coy and teasing. “Now, stay still for me—if you can manage that.”

Brian’s about to ask what Harry means, but the man presses another kiss against his mouth and gives him a firm look that orders him not to move without uttering a single noise. Then, the hands leave his wrists, and he’s left with startling mobility that he doesn’t even know what to do with. Harry’s hands are on his thighs, pulling him backwards to leave him more firmly planted on his back and parting his legs to give the man a clearer view of him. The soft cotton rubs against his skin pleasantly, complimented by the heat of the older man’s body against his own.

“You’re so gorgeous—so pretty for me. He coos sweetly, and Brian’s stomach twists pleasantly. No one’s ever complimented him like that, and even though it should make him feel awful and dysphoric, his skin crawls with a peculiar sort of pleasure. But he knows that he’s about to be punished, and his body tenses unconsciously as Harry settles between his legs, pressing kisses against his thighs. One hand cups against him, fingers tracing his folds carefully. It’s not enough to have his nerves sparking like fireworks, but he shudders when the older man presses more firmly against his clit before hesitantly pushing two fingers inside him once again.

“How…exactly is this a punishment?” Brian questions warily, body trembling with anticipation. “You’re going right back to what we were doing before.”

The look Harry gives him is downright predatory in the best way.

“I’m touching you, yes, but it won’t be where you want it or how you want it.” He explains it with all the confidence in the world. “Not until you apologize.”

That’s stupid, he quickly decides. He’s endured a decade and a half of every kind of suffering known to man. He can handle being touched everywhere but where wants it most for a while no problem. He’ll outlast Harry, and he won’t even break a sweat doing it.

“Do your worst, old man.” Brian tells him, fixing his eyes on the ceiling rather than. He can handle it.

“If you say so.” Harry tells him, voice light and lilting despite the heated promise in the undertone.

Brian’s oh-so-confident mental claim about being unbothered, unaffected lasts all of five minutes.

Things start out acceptably—Harry presses his fingers inside him once again, and he finds himself biting back a groan of relief at being filled again. He didn’t realize how accustomed he’d grown to the fingers buried in him until they were removed, and he was left painfully empty in their wake. It’s comforting to return to their temporary norm, and the familiar territory puts him at ease. The other man doesn’t even move them at first, just lets them rest like he’s waiting for Brian to complain, but he is definitely not going to be doing that. This? This is a child’s play to handle, and he has to restrain a scoff at Harry’s failure to do anything actually worthy of being called a punishment.

Then, the man begins moving again, and his senses spit up sparks until the fire in his stomach is growing into an inferno. He bites at his lip before he can make any incriminating noises, though it’s not entirely necessary. Harry’s fingers are pressing into him in a way that’s almost perfect, muddling about his insides firmly enough to turn his legs into jelly, although he avoids that sensitive spot that he desperately wants to be touched again. That’s okay, though; he’s remarkably unused to being touched this way, and he’s happy to have some time to adjust. So, he lets his partner poke around his insides, carefully avoiding the sensitive cluster of nerves that drive him crazy. Even when the man scissors his fingers, stretching him out before slipping a third finger in, he is methodical in his avoidance of that spot.

It’s pleasant at first, getting contact and friction again after being denied anything inside him while Harry decided to tease him, but Brian discovers the true punishment the moment that he tries to grind down against the touch: the man presses his free hand harshly against his pelvis, halting any movement he’d attempt to make in its tracks. He whines before he can stop himself, the noise high and desperate—it’s utterly humiliating, but he’s burning with need at this point. There’s a wildfire inside him, tearing him up and consuming every part of him except where he actually needs to be touched. It’s like an itch that can’t be scratched, rooted beneath his skin and weaving its way into his very being. He squirms, desperate to move the point of stimulation just an inch deeper, only for Harry to once again press his hand down, hard enough to leave a dull ache pressed against his flesh. The message is clear: he’s not allowed to move, not allowed to protest. He needs to just lie there and take it.

The next noise he lets out is embarrassingly pathetic. He should be more composed, more collected, considering all that he’s endured. But all Brian can focus on is how desperately he wants more, more, more. He feels good—for the first time he can remember since what happened, he isn’t hurting or breaking or falling apart. It’s almost like dissociation; he can feel the cotton against his skin, the soft linens of the sheets, but it all feels distant and vague—the same temperature as the air around him, leaving him with the indistinct sensation of floating. The issue is that it makes everything Harry’s doing (and not doing) to him particularly intrusive and impossible to ignore.

“Knock it off!” He whines, scrunching his eyes shut in some attempt to drown out the sensations that are so painfully present but far less than what he actually needs. “Just touch me!”

Harry chuckles again, and he cracks his eyes open to look up at the man. He’s so fucking gorgeous, and he shouldn’t be at all—Harry’s more than twenty years older than him, approaching his early fifties, and he has every reason to be repulsed by him emotionally. But he isn’t, for some fucking reason. All Brian can focus on is how hot the man is when he looks at him like that, how badly he wants to be fucked by him.

“I know, Baby—you need me to touch you.” Harry tells him, using that tone of voice that has his breath shuddering and his pulse rocketing into the stratosphere. “But I think you still owe me something first, and then I’ll give you what you need.”

Brian hesitates—he doesn’t want to just give in to him, doesn’t want to submit without a fight, but his body burns and yearns to be touched, and he knows that his pleasure is so close to him. All he has to do is give up, promise to be a good boy for him. His stomach twists with the instinctive discomfort at the thought of giving in, of surrender. He promised when he got out of that place that he’d never listen to a voice that wasn’t his own, that he’d do what he wanted, when he wanted. Even thinking about this sort of submission grates against his newfound freedom. But Harry punctuates his hesitation with a sharp jab just shy of his g-spot, and Brian’s resistance ebbs away, replaced by the desperation to finally be touched and, hopefully, fucked.

“Harry? Touch me, please?” He gets out, voice closer to a whimper than a response. “I’m sorry. I’ll do what you ask. I’ll be good—I’ll be a good boy for you!”

Harry freezes, staring down at him, and Brian’s stomach drops with terror. Did he do something wrong? Did he upset the man? His body breaks out into gooseflesh, and the chill that strikes him has nothing to do with the room’s temperature around him. The older man leans forward, bracing himself on his free hand, and he stiffens in response.

“Good boy.” Harry murmurs, breath ghosting against his ear, and his thoughts go fuzzy with a potent cocktail of endorphins. “I’m so proud of you. So proud of you, Baby.”

(He will not be acknowledging the pathetic, desperate noise he made at that.)

It’s been so long since anyone said they were proud of him, so long since anyone’s looked at him with affection like this, and Brian can’t focus on anything other than the relief of letting someone take charge without threat to his person. The tension leaves his body all at once, and it’s so pleasant to be held, to have arms wrapped around him, that he doesn’t care that he’s empty once again. All he needs is Harry, holding him, touching him, acting like he’s worth something—even if it’s just pretend.

“Harry—” He pleads, blanking for a moment before he remembers the title that the man gave himself. “Daddy, please?”

He’s going to kill Harry—there’s no doubt about it now. Brian has no clue why that name—that term of endearment—slips so naturally from his lips, but he’s not going to let there be a world where anyone knows that he’s going around calling older men ‘Daddy.’ (And, god, that sounds like a line from a shit-quality porno made half a decade earlier on someone’s old camcorder.) He’s not going to let any of the realizations he’s had leave the bedroom, not going to risk it for a second. So, he reasons, stomach churning with anxiety, that he can let go, enjoy himself before he goes. No one’s going to know—they can’t know. He won’t let them get the chance.

Harry yanks Brian from his thoughts before he even realizes what’s happening, pressing kisses against his throat that have his stomach fluttering with butterflies before following them up with harsh, rough sucking that he knows will leave hickies where anyone can see—but he can’t complain when the older man’s finally stopped treating him like he’s made of spun glass. A harsh nip against his skin has him yelping in surprise, but Harry laves over the wound with his tongue, and the sting becomes miniscule in comparison. He continues it, sinking his teeth into his shoulder with a harshness that’s almost familiar and kissing the wound when Brian moans.

“You’re so good for me.” He tells him, and he squirms as the man presses his nose into the crook of his neck, ragged breathing the only proof of how affected by this he is. “And you look so fucking pretty.”

He doesn’t quite know how to respond—his head’s still in that distant, fuzzy state, where words seem difficult and all he wants is to be touched more, and he doubts his very basic understanding of sex will be too helpful here—so he just hitches a leg over Harry’s hips, yanking the man closer, until his bare skin is pressed against him with only the sheer nightgown acting as a barrier. The man seems to love it, and Brian quickly understands the reason when Harry’s erection presses against him. (And, wow, it’s actually arousing to have him so worked up, to be the reason Harry’s straining against his pants, rubbing up against him to get any scrap of relief that he can.)

“Please.” Brian gets out again, pressing kisses against his partner’s mouth the moment he pulls back from mauling on his throat and shoulders.

“Okay, Baby.” Harry croons, and he’s not in control of the noise he lets out—a concerning habit as of late. “I’ll give you what you need.”

Then, he’s pulling away, and he physically bites his tongue to avoid making a noise of disappointment. He’s not going to give the man an excuse to deny him any longer, not going to misbehave and incur a punishment when they’re finally getting to the good part. So, he unhooks his leg and scrambles backwards until he’s propped up, carefully avoiding where his arousal has left the duvet covered in slick, and instead focuses on Harry as he stumbles backwards and sits on the edge of the bed. From there, he yanks his pants off, throwing them to the floor, followed by his boxers. Brian draws in a shaky breath, his body alight with some mixture of anticipation and anxiety. He’s never seen a man naked before—not fully naked, at least—and seeing the older man that way plays on his nerves like a piano. It’s like he’s swallowed stone, like there’s lead sitting in his stomach.

“Are you alright?” Harry asks him, and he starts at the question. Once again, he’s asking about his opinion, his consent, even beyond a point that most people would be checking, and his chest fills with that peculiar, unfamiliar warmth again.

“Yeah—it’s just…a lot.” He replies, huffing out an awkward laugh at the simplification.

“Do we need to stop?” Harry questions, and Brian shakes his head quickly. He does not want to stop, does not want to put an end to his, and he can handle a bit of discomfort—all he wants is a moment to process that, and his partner seems to recognize that. He takes a moment to steady his breathing, and then he’s nodding to give the older man permission to continue.

Harry prowls across the bed in several short strides, closing the gap between them and kissing him with such passion that he’s dizzy. It’s intoxicating, and it has him back to where he was in only a minute or two, chasing the man’s lips when he pulls away. But, Brian can’t tell what it is that he’s planned, because Harry scoops him up, counting on him to wrap his legs around his waist once again. He’s about to ask the reason for it, especially with the awkward way their bodies are pressed against each other, but the older man draws back the covers, and, oh, that makes a certain amount of sense. Sex does, after all, generally happen under the covers when it’s in a bed.

Then, he’s being pressed down against the mattress, and Harry is everywhere, filling up each of his senses until all he can focus on is him: warm hands that start pressed against his wrists and wander down to his hips, the firmness of his torso pressed between his legs, lips covering his own and stealing every noise he makes, and his smell—Brian doesn’t know what his cologne is beyond a heady citrus scent, but it’s driving him mad—all of it is turning him into a puddle of wanton need. He can’t even complain; he wants all of it, and he accepts the man’s advances eagerly.

Brian whines when Harry pulls off him, breaking the strand of saliva that connects them when they part, but doesn’t complain, and he’s rewarded when the man pulls back and parts his legs once again. He’s trembling with anticipation, desperation—his body aches with a need he’s never known or felt until today, a hunger just as potent and all-consuming as the nameless Need that’s bubbled in him for more than a decade. His body hungers for Harry, and he has to bite back a snarl when the man’s weight leaves him. He needs to be good, be controlled—he can’t just lose it on Harry and attack him for pulling away, even if he feels bitterly cold in the absence of his furnace-like heat.

The man’s fingers brush against the folds again, and Brian moans embarrassingly loud, trying to lean into the touch as much as he can. Harry’s responding laugh is warm and gentle, and it makes his chest light up with pride. He made him happy, did something the man liked, and that has relief short-circuiting his senses until he can collect himself. There are fingers pressed into his cunt again, but their depth is entirely superficial when compared to where they were before. Instead, Harry parts his pussy’s lips with careful touch, and he moans at the stimulation. It feels good, is good, and Brian hazily considers the idea of letting the man live a little longer if the sex is as good as the foreplay—they can probably do a second round if they’re quick about things. Then there’s a new intrusion pressed against him, and he can only assume that it’s the other man’s dick, head just barely breaching him.

“That’s it, Baby—that's it.” Harry tells him, voice breaking into a moan as he pushes inside of him in one fluid thrust.

It hurts—he’s being stretched even beyond the point of three fingers, and his partner is what he classifies as decently endowed, but it’s the good sort of hurt, like pressing alcohol to a wound. He’s being stretched out and filled in a single move, and it has him groaning at the degree and suddenness of the change, but his brain rushes him with endorphins that he’s never experienced before, and the pain he feels seems to compliment that pleasure rather than detract from it. Then, Harry’s leaning over him again, pressing his body against Brian’s until there isn’t an inch of space between them—exactly how it should be.

“Fuck!” Brian gasps, wrapping his arms around Harry’s shoulders and burying his face in the crook of his neck. It’s pleasant to be held, a relief greater than any of the painkillers he’s taken. His skin had been covered by this unbearable, inescapable agony somewhere between a sharp ache and an itch that he can only describe as longing, but had somehow never noticed before—it’s like he was dying of thirst, but he’d suffered for so long that he didn’t realize until he got to drink water. It’s addictive, maddening, and he never wants to be separated from this feeling of completion. (Or, at least, as close to complete as he can get without his brother in his life.)

Harry once again surprises him by waiting instead of immediately fucking into him the way he’d expected, considering his pleas for him not to be gentle. But, once again, Brian finds himself relieved because of Harry’s generosity, adjusting to the sensation of the man’s cock nestled inside him. It’s such a peculiar sensation, one he doesn’t think he’ll ever really get used to, but that gaping hole that’s been opened up in him’s been filled—the physical one, at least—and he’s left with the oddest feeling of peace that he's felt in his life. It’s a bit like being stabbed, he thinks—at least, conceptually; Brian won’t have any experience with stabbing anyone until he finally kills Harry. (His first kill, the man who ruined his life. He shudders at the heat of vengeance flickering to life within him.) Despite that, the flame of fury is quickly doused, and all that he’s left with is desire and that strange relief.

His partner is getting a bit antsy—he can tell, because Harry’s returned to mouthing at his throat again, sucking hickies against him and nipping at his flesh like he’s starved for it. Brian unwraps his arms from his partner’s neck, threading his fingers through his hair and tugging him until he raises his head. Harry gives him a confused look, blue eyes clouded with emotion, but it melts away when Brian presses a kiss against his lips—the physical affection between them is easy, natural in a way that it hasn’t been in years. There isn’t anything hidden about him, not really. He can read Harry’s emotions like a bold-print book, even if his secrets escape his understanding, and the way the man touches him is familiar, unthreatening, despite the fact that he’d barely even put a hand on his shoulder before they’d reunited tonight. It’s like he’s been opened up and known before he even had the opportunity to speak.

“Are you ready, Kiddo?” He questions, and his face heats up so much he thinks his blood will boil. It’s stupid. It’s genuinely and legitimately stupid. It should be demeaning and infuriating to be talked to like that—he always hated when the staff infantilized him, treated him like he was lesser—and he still doesn’t get why it’s suddenly okay with everything inside him when it’s Harry. But the way the older man talks to him still has his stomach twisting with excitement, and he doesn’t have anything in him but intense, unfiltered desire.

“I’m ready.” Brian reassures him, and he gets a two-second look from Harry that reminds him of their earlier talk. “Daddy.” He tacks on, cheeks pinkening with a mix of emotions he can’t quite identify, but he doesn’t think that they’re bad. And the reaction he gets is well worth the lingering embarrassment of using a parental title for someone he is very much not related to: a quiet groan behind the older man’s teeth, a smoldering look intense enough to put volcanoes to shame.

“That’s it, Baby—you’re such a good boy for me.” Harry tells him, and he doesn’t bother to fight the wrongness of the compliment, not when it has him whining with some mix of need and ecstasy. He can ignore the erroneous nature of being called good for now—he can pretend, just for a little bit. He can pretend to be good.

Harry starts out slow, shifting backwards like he’s scared of hurting him. He doesn’t even go remotely close to pulling out, just sliding a bit back before pushing himself back in. Brian doesn’t know how to classify the sensation of being penetrated, of having another man pressed up inside him. At the moment, it’s nothing close to rough or violent, just the slow, steady pull of flesh against flesh, Harry’s body rocking against his in such a monumentally gentle way that it almost leaves him stunned. He’d thought that the man would be selfish in bed, a cruel lover who cared little for what his partner experienced, for what they were feeling or if they were satisfied at all. He had gone into this expecting apathy, the same cold disregard he’s experienced a thousand times before, only to be treated with a care he can’t remember experiencing before. It’s not bad—it’s nowhere near bad. But it’s not what he expected, not what he thought the man would act like at all.

“Not glass, remember?” Brian asks, trying to keep his voice teasing despite the uncharacteristically solemn look he’s gotten from the older man, the tone of the room around them. It doesn’t work.

“Just….” Harry trails off, seemingly at a loss for words. Then, he continues, voice hesitant. “I’ve failed so many people—I failed you. Let me take care of you. Just for a little while.”

That takes the breath from Brian’s lungs, the wind from his sails, the hate from his heart, and all he can see is a man, fatally flawed and haunted by regret. This is not the man he thought he’d meet. Harry Morgan is not the monster from his childhood—at least, not anymore. He’s not the callous, uncaring man who dismissed his mother when she said she was being stalked, the man who promised he’d protect her and did nothing to keep it. He’s not the man who looked at him, still covered in Mama’s gore, and dismissed him as a monster without a second thought. He’s not the man who called him a liar when he asked for help. He’s not anyone but the person who has to live with all those choices, now.

In that moment, they’re just two incredibly broken people, and Brian doesn’t know what to do about that.

“Fuck me.” He pleads, and Harry nods, blinking back tears.

They fall together like they were made for each other after that, the older man finally moving more quickly. He pulls back, and Brian gasps sharply as the calming, reassuring weight of the man buried inside him is ripped from him like a rug from under his feet, opening up a chasm inside his body that he’d never known was empty before. Brian reaches out, wraps his arms around Harry’s neck and tries to focus on the heat of the man’s skin against his nightgown rather than the horrific feeling of emptiness that encompasses him. Then, the man pushes back into him, moves like Brian had always been his, and the sense of loss is forced away in a single swift movement. He can breathe again, can think and focus and relax, knowing he isn’t alone in the world anymore.

Brian can’t bring himself to speak yet, can’t put words to what he’s feeling, but, after a bit of experience, he can definitively classify this as good. Harry rocks back with an animalistic groan that has the Dark Passenger perking up in the back of his head like it’s been offered a meal. But none of that matters when the older man thrusts back into him with enough force for the pressure to have his body lighting up with pleasure—and, fuck, that’s exactly what he was looking for, exactly what he needs. His hands fumble around until he can cling onto Harry’s back, something more stable than around the man’s neck or shoulders. He’s warm against him, solid and real, and it’s comforting in a way he’d never thought that people could be.

There are a couple moments of awkward, stilted silence, like the grief that weighs on them both is silencing them, preventing either of them from doing much more than the faintest, quietest of moans and breathing. It’s what Brian imagines being in church is like—a weight upon everyone, shame seeping into his pores like the very air he breathes. Then, Harry slams against that spot inside him, and he lets out an undignified moan that shatters the silence like glass. There’s another pause, and they make eye contact for a split second before he looks away, face darkening with shame, but one of the older man’s arms shifts, bracing his weight on his elbow so that his hand can cup Brian’s face.

“Good—good boy, Brian.” Harry tells him, though he can’t for the life of him put together what’s so good about making noise when Dexter might be in the house. But his strange, continually surprising partner offers him a smile before pressing a kiss against his mouth. “Keep it up, Baby. Tell me what you’re feeling.”

Oh. That’s also strange, but he guesses he can do it.

Harry rocks against him, filling him up like he was never meant to be on his own, and Brian adores the way the man leans against him, pressing his chest against him as if he can’t stand the idea of being separated. It’s addictive, and he holds onto him for dear life, even though they aren’t anywhere close to being rough with each other. But this feels good, and he wants it to continue. Another, firmer thrust has him groaning softly, fighting the way his body instinctively clamps down around the man—he doesn’t know if that’s something that feels good or hurts—but Harry doesn’t complain, and he moans when Brian does it again experimentally. Whether it’s a reward or pure accident,  the force that he’s being fucked with increases rapidly.

“That’s—I like that.” He mumbles awkwardly, feeling a little stupid, and there’s a warm rumbling that he eventually identifies as Harry laughing.

“Not like that.” Harry instructs gently, and it’s humiliating the way sharpness pierces his chest at the thought of doing something wrong, at the possibility of disappointing the man. He aches with the familiar sting of terror, though it hasn’t been directed at anything as mundane as embarrassment in years. But there’s a part of him that wants, craves, needs the affection that Harry provides him—the way he tells him he’s done well, touches him like he’s something worth holding and protecting, presses kisses against him like he matters—and disappointing or, worse, upsetting the man could take all of that away.

“I’m sorry.” Brian gets out, trying to keep his breathing calm and collected—he wants to be good, wants to make the man proud of him. There’s a knot in his chest of guilt and shame for his mistake, and he’ll do whatever it takes to remedy it.

“No, no, no.” His partner reassures him, and Harry presses conciliatory kisses against the crook of his neck before meeting his gaze again. “You haven’t done anything wrong. I just want to hear the noises you make, okay?”

Oh. Oh. That makes much more sense, but he can barely process anything other than the relief that fills him when Harry tells him he hasn’t messed up, that he’s not disappointed in him. He thought that he’d messed up horribly, that he’d completely misunderstood and pissed off the man who’s finally fucking him literally instead of figuratively. The weight lifts from his chest, and a heavy, shuddering sigh leaves him as he nuzzles against the older man briefly. Not holding back? Not biting his lips and choking back noises that build up in his throat? He thinks he can do that—no, he has to. He wants to be good for Harry, wants to make the man proud of him.

“Okay, Daddy.” Brian gives in—the nickname coming to him more easily this time—and he shifts to press a kiss against his jaw.

“You’re being so good for me.” Harry tells him, and he once again ignores the inherent wrongness of the statement. He’ll see the truth soon enough. “You really have been.”

Brian doesn’t fight him on it, just hitches a leg up around Harry’s hips and pulls the man close until they’re pressed flush against each other, and that’s enough of a signal to get the older man to start moving again. There are a couple moments of slow, unsteady movements as they try to find the way that they fit together best, but find a rhythm more quickly this time—his partner moving more quickly, more confidently and snapping his hips forward harshly enough that there’s a sharp burst of addictive pleasure-pain that has him pleading for more before his brain can even catch up with his mouth.

It’s peculiarly comforting to have Harry in him, on him, with him, and he silently thinks an apology towards Mama for judging her, for wondering what she could have possibly seen in the man who caused her life to end—it was so easy to judge as a little kid, seeing the way Harry regarded him with concern and dislike while so clearly adoring Dexter, the way he dismissed her concerns and worries as if she was overreacting. He gets it now: the surprising charm that feeds into an addictive, all-consuming desire to please the man, to make him look at him with the same fondness that he has before, the soothing way he speaks to him that makes the rest of the world seem insignificant and manageable all at once.

No, Brian can’t blame Mama for falling for Harry at all. He would have, too, if he were in her position.

He’s roughly dragged from his thoughts by another harsh thrust that has his nails skidding across Harry’s back, leaving gouges in the man’s skin. His fingers scrabble for purchase on his flesh, trying to cling to his partner, and any burgeoning worries of hurting him are immediately dismissed when the older man moans right in his ear, pressing a few open-mouthed kisses against his throat and jaw.

“You look so pretty.” He murmurs, and Brian’s heart does that weird, annoying stutter thing that’s becoming more common. “That nightgown—you’re so gorgeous, and I’m worried that I’ll tear you apart for it.”

Harry says that as if he doesn’t have his own spot in the gallery of attractiveness—as if he isn’t desperately attractive in a way that makes Brian realize he is basically a stereotype about women with daddy issues dressing up as a man. But, if he has a type, that type is probably Harry: older men with silver in their hair and lines around their eyes that make one of the constant aches in his body and mind go quiet. The man’s ruined him for anyone else, and he can’t imagine a world where he isn’t attracted to Harry-fucking-Morgan, even if his feelings towards the man are…complicated, to say the least. But something tells him that Harry doesn’t feel the same way, that he doesn’t see anything worth wanting.

“I wouldn’t mind being torn apart.” Brian points out—and he won’t address the unusual honesty in that admission, even for his life. “And you’re stupidly sexy, too, if there was any fucking doubt.”

“Language.” Harry chastises, but there’s no annoyance in his voice, and he smiles when he kisses him again.

There’s a familiarity in kissing Harry, now—though, that makes sense, considering he’s the only person that Brian’s ever kissed like this—a sort of domesticity that makes him feel almost whole. They fit together, as if the wounds and scars that make him up are perfectly suited to fill the ridges and gaps that make Harry Harry. They simply fit, and Brian wants him, wants to be closer and connected in a way that no one will ever be able to take away. He releases his hold on the man’s back, fumbling around with his hands in a desperate attempt to touch and feel, to connect with the man above him. His skin isn’t smooth the way young men’s are, but it’s soft and comforting, and Brian loves it all the same—it’s just Harry, a beacon of stability and sanity. He would do anything to hold him forever, to not be alone again.

The older man slams into him like he doesn’t want him to walk tomorrow, like he wants to leave Brian bedbound and all to himself. But that doesn’t bother him at all. Actually, he’s worryingly aroused by that, by the idea that Harry wants him so much that he’s willing to hurt him to keep him. Though, that’s probably helped by the fact that he’s getting hit right in that sensitive part of his cunt that has his knees going weak. He wasn’t lying, Brian reminds himself as he squirms, back arching in response to the stimulation he receives; he’d gladly let Harry tear him to pieces, as long as he looks at him with that softness, that desire, in his eyes—because he cares for him (That must be what those feelings he sees are!), and he’d do anything to keep that.

“Like that, like that—harder, please!” He gets out, dragging Harry into a brutal kiss that’s more teeth than tongue.

The man obliges, hands fumbling for Brian’s before locking around his wrists like handcuffs, pinning him to the bed. He should be scared—should be terrified. He’s pinned down, helpless—can’t even dream of escaping—that’s never been a good thing, never been safe. It’s only ever been danger, only ever brought him pain. But things are different now. He’s with Harry, and, for some reason, that makes all the difference. There’s no panic, no overwhelming, all-consuming terror that makes his blood freeze and his skin boil. Just need—burning, desperate need. For a moment, he can’t understand the reason he’s done it, thrashes out of instinct, an animalistic desire to free himself. Then, Harry adjusts his position and hits him at an angle that all but brings tears to his eyes.

The noise he lets out is a humiliating, pathetic moan. It’s a cry for more as much as a plea for attention that is far beyond his ability to articulate. His body is overwhelmed, every sense driven into overdrive as he attempts to process what’s happening, and it’s driving him mad in the best way he’s ever felt. Before—in his childhood—his sensitivity had been dragged against his flesh and beneath his blood, a thousand little agonies from the lights being too-bright to the breathing of someone nearby that built into an unbearable concoction that had him irritated and defensive for hours on end. But, now, every ounce of that attention is turned upon Harry, to what they’re doing, and none of it’s left for outside stimulus—he can’t feel the temperature of the room around them, can barely feel the sheets, even where they’re pressed against his skin, just the vague awareness that they’re there.

Harry is, objectively, a handsome man—he’s sharp-jawed and able-bodied, and his eyes are the prettiest, clearest shade of blue he’s ever seen. His voice is rich, unwavering, and he’s strong enough to pin Brian down and make escape attempts futile. (He’s not ashamed to admit his burgeoning attraction to strength, not when he’s been deprived of it all his life.) And his morals, his discipline, are as rigid as his unyielding durability. Yes, he knows quite a bit on the extent and protocol of Harry’s principles. He follows the law to the letter, only ever acting within its confines. As a child, Brian looked up to him as some sort of arbiter of justice, some advocate for the victims, a righter of wrongs. He was the standard by which he measured good and evil. He’s a bit like a god, really.

Yes, he thinks that’s the best description. Harry doesn’t act like a man, even though he looks like one. (A strong, attractive man, but a man, nonetheless.) His morals are rigid, as unyielding and unchanging as mountains against the elements. He embodies the principles that he believes in, makes their laws his code of conduct. He’s made with firmer mettle than the rest, set with stony convictions that put others to shame, and it makes him more than just a man. Surely, someone like that can’t just be a regular human, can’t be the same as all those awful, evil humans that crawl about the earth like vermin. No, Harry sees things more clearly than the rest, and it makes him able to condemn the unworthy or exonerate the innocent as he sees fit.

He thinks, actually, that might be the best summarization of the way that this reunion with Harry has gone, even if it’s been fairly deceptive on the nature of his own identity—but Brian knows that things wouldn’t go well if he was Brian Moser, and he’s not stupid enough to risk it. But, right now, Harry’s told him he’s good—absolved him of his (unknown) sins. For a few scarce moments, he can pretend to be human, he can pretend to be the person Harry thinks him to be.

“That’s it—Good boy.” Harry tells him, and Brian shudders under the compliment as much as he preens. It’s not lying, he tells himself—not really, anyway. It doesn’t count if he’s just trying to survive. It makes his stomach go sour, but he can’t bring himself to do anything about it. Not now.

Harry pushes himself against him, nuzzles into the crook of his neck and sinks his teeth into his flesh, lapping at the wound with a kindness that has him whining for more. Brian yelps as pain pierces through his skin, only for it to mix and blur with his pleasure when his partner thrusts into him again, and he gasps violently, trying to orient himself despite the fact that he’s not left the bed. But his body jolts from the impact from Harry thrusting into him like he’s on the verge of losing control—he’s fast and rough, and it’s overwhelming in the best way possible. There’s the lovely, wonderful sensation of their bodies moving against each other, and Brian does his best to meet his partner in each of his movements, bringing them together with as much energy as he can.

“Fuck—Daddy!” He gets out, voice ending in an embarrassing moan when Harry strikes against his g-spot. There’s a warm laugh and more open-mouthed kisses pressed against his throat, and the world around him starts to go fuzzy, indistinct.

He can’t hear what’s being said to him—it’s presumably dirty talk of some sort, but all Brian can focus on is the sweet bliss of being physically whole, of being connected to another person instead of floating in the maddening void of isolation. Even if it’s not the same, even if it's not perfect—he’s a creature playing at being a person, after all, and Harry’s hardly his brother—it’s such a relief to bond to someone else, anyone else, to touch them and be touched in return. He needs this, needs Harry, and he won’t let him be separated from the man, won’t let this brief reprieve end.

That’s when the doubts start in the back of his mind, niggling at him, reminding him that the whole situation is temporary, that Harry’s promises to protect him and care for them are more likely guilt-driven lies to soothe his conscience than genuine vows. It’s not going to be forever. He’s not even going to make it to the morning—but the thought of being abandoned, of being left behind once more, is sickening. And some part of him—some aching, wounded child—can’t bear the thought of it happening again, not in the brief time before he ends the man’s life.

“Stay with me?” Brian asks, and Harry slows down to stare at him. “J-just until the morning.”

His expression is something sensitive, almost fragile, and it makes him feel like an interloper who’s stumbled upon something sacred—a private moment he’s not meant to see. There’s a pause, and he finds himself holding his breath instinctively. (He’s scared. He’s so scared. It’s stupid that he is—he’s survived so much worse—but fear’s taken root in him with icy hands, clutching at his innards and making his blood run cold.) The older man leans forward, pressing his forehead against Brian’s own, and he feels his stomach drop.

“Always.” Harry promises solemnly, and he seals the oath with a kiss.

Something in Brian breaks loose, and his face crumples with some cathartically agonizing mixture of gratitude and relief. He has to bite his lip harshly enough to make it bleed to stop himself from crying, from making a sound that could be associated with it, but he can’t stop the violent, ragged way his breathing shudders. A promise like that—a vow to stay by someone’s side, no matter how temporarily—is not to be taken lightly, and it makes Brian's heart ache with a familiar grief. The last person who told him that was Mama. (She kept her word, for what it was worth—she stayed by his side until she was slaughtered in front of them, stayed with him and Dexter as long as she possibly could.)

“Baby?” Harry questions, pulling back for a moment, and Brian fights the urge to mutter several choice words under his breath—he’s attracted attention, failed to keep his emotional state under wraps, and now Harry thinks there’s something wrong. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”

Brian shakes his head instantly. He doesn’t want this to stop, doesn’t want it to go away or end when things are finally good for him, for the first time in more than a decade, and he doesn’t want Harry to stop touching him. He wants this. He wants to keep going.

“No—nothing’s wrong. I’m not hurt.” He gets out, clearing his throat when his voice fails on him. “It’s just been a while, and the last person who said that to me...” Brian doesn’t spell out what happened, but he watches awareness trickle into Harry’s expression, and then understanding mixed with grief joins his emotions. It’s at that moment that he remembers that Harry’s missing someone, too, that he went to that bar to forget about losing someone who promised to stay by his side until death did her part, that that vow came to completion for them only weeks ago. His partner knows all too much about losing someone he thought would never leave.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.” Harry whispers, pressing kisses against his cheeks before giving him a heavy look. “I’ll take care of you—I promise I’ll take care of you.”

The older man pistons into him with enough force to punch the breath out of Brian’s lungs from the jolt, and he knows he’ll have handprint bruises etched on his wrists for weeks, but they’re from something good for once. The pace Harry sets is punishing, but it has him whining like a whore once again, and there’s a part of him that relishes that the older man’s finally living up to his promise to not go easy on him. Brian can feel him hitting every sensitive part of his cunt with all the force of a jackhammer, can tell it’ll be a struggle to walk tomorrow, but that’s what he wants—he wants something physical, something real, to remind him of what happened. He’s relieved, happy even, that Harry’s leaving marks, proof of his attention—he just wishes he could do the same.

They fall together rough and desperately, pressing together like it’ll fill all the holes in their damaged hearts or bring them some semblance of peace. Harry’s hands are iron against his wrists, breaking blood vessels and leaving bruises behind—he can’t even bring himself to care, not when it proves someone wants him, needs him. He stretches up enough to press his mouth against his partner’s, moaning when the older man bites at him, and the tinny taste of blood bursts against his tongue. He hates it, loves it, needs it—Brian's defined by blood, born and bound in it. It only makes sense that this—whatever this is—is marred by it as well. He whines when he can finally take a breath, gasping as he tries to control his racing thoughts and rapid heartbeat.

“It’s okay—it’s okay. I’ve got you.” Harry promises—it's the same words he’s heard uttered a hundred times for other kids, for other boys, for other people. But, for the first time since he was barely out of infancy, the words are directed at him, and something inside Brian breaks into a thousand different pieces.

“More, Daddy. Please.” He begs—he doesn’t want to think about this, doesn’t want to consider how he is the way he is or what’s going to happen after this—he just wants to feel good, wants to forget everything that’s ever happened to him. He wants Harry, wants to feel him pressed against him—on his skin and in his mouth and everywhere else. He wants to not know where Harry ends, and he begins. He wants Harry more than anything but Dexter, and he’s so fucking lucky that the man actually wants him.

And Harry, being the man that he is, obliges his plea all but instantly pressing against him with enough intensity that he can feel the breath forced from him in every thrust. The sensation is overwhelming enough to drive him to the brink of tears, but it’s the best he’s ever felt, and he thinks that gives him an excuse. The overwhelming heat of need’s spreading in his veins, not unlike the pleasant inferno that started in his stomach and now rages in the mingled space between there and his cunt, where Harry’s made himself at home. Even now, he presses against him like he belongs, fucks him like he was made to take him. Brian didn’t know that sex could be good, intoxicating, overwhelming—he'd assumed that it was simply an urge humans felt, like how he felt the Need. But, physically? This is the best he’s ever felt. He writhes, back arching as his partner hits the exact spot inside him that drives him wild—his brain seems to short circuit when the man does that, voice coming to a halt even as his mouth opens to loose a moan. This, some hazy part of his brain finally thinks, this must be heaven, nirvana—or, at least, as close as a monster like him can ever get.

“You’re such a good boy for me.” Harry tells him, and, for some reason, it hits the point where Brian can’t take it anymore. He can’t lie and pretend and act like he’s good. There’s something wrong with him, something deep inside him that he’s buried for years and years and years, but there’s a rot deep in his core, and it contaminates all he does and is. There is an evil in his heart, and nothing he does can ever undo that. He’s a monster—a freak of nature—something broken all the way down to the bone. No matter what he does or how hard he tries, he can never be good. And the thought of deceiving Harry, of continuing to act like someone who deserves love and support sickens him.

It’s stupid. It’s self-destructive and dangerous and risks everything that he’s doing right now—whatever he’s getting by fucking Harry and any opportunity to get him in a vulnerable position—but he can’t stand it. He’s been lying for so long, pretending for so long. And he’s so fucking sick of it.

“I’m not.” He argues, blinking rapidly to force away the tears that well up in his eyes. “I’m not good—I act like it, and I pretend that I am, but I’m not. I’m not good at all.”

“Yes, you are.” He argues, as if he knows everything in the world, and Brian wishes he could just trust the man’s conviction to be enough, wishes that his blind naivety could be enough to justify acting, lying to himself and everyone else he meets. “You’re a good kid, and I’ll repeat that however many times you need to hear it.”

“Stop saying it—stop telling me I’m good.” Brian argues, and he tries to free his arms. He can feel tears spilling over his eyelids, and heat blurs his vision as he does so. Fuck. He’s crying, and humiliation hits him like a bullet—he’s endured so much, but he’s falling apart like a child at being told that he’s good. It’s pathetic. It’s shameful, and it feels like a weakness that anyone could exploit. That’s what gives him the strength to pull one of his hands free, scrubbing his eyes harshly enough to make them hurt.

“No, Baby.” Harry argues, voice breaking, and his hips come to a stop as he says that, the rhythm of their movement breaking as they’re dragged out of their sex and into conversation that Brian desperately wants to avoid. But he’s started this, and now he’ll have to finish it. “How could you say that? How could you even think it?”

Brian doesn’t even have time to think before he’s speaking, spilling the proof of his monstrosity.

“Because, if I was good, you would’ve let me stay with Dexter!” He snarls, and Harry recoils like he’s been struck.

Fuck.

“You.” Harry gasps, eyes widening with horror and outrage—and there’s the look he’s expecting, the disgust that he’s known would hit him the moment the truth was revealed. The man’s face twists with an emotion that Brian can’t even begin to identify. But he doesn’t need to—he’s seen enough. He’s seen enough to know that Harry hates him. It’s proof that everything he said was true, that he was a liar, a pretender. He never actually cared about him. The next words that the man gets out are a feral, furious shriek. “It is you!”

They pull away from each other—not enough to pull the man out of him, but enough that the distance between them feels like a chasm. It’s agony—Brian’s body shrieks in distress at being separated from someone he’s stupidly, foolishly come to depend on over the course of an hour or two. He wants to scream. He wants to sob. And some stupid, infantile part of him wails like a child, rages at the fact that the first good thing he’s had in more than a decade’s been ruined—but that’s his own fucking fault. His fault for growing a conscience about lying at the most inconvenient time. And he deserves this, deserves the pain for being stupid enough to even consider a world where a human could want him.

“The fuck are you doing here?” The disgust—the rage—in the man’s tone makes him flinch, and he jolts backward in some attempt to get some space. He can’t think; he can’t breathe, not when all he can focus on is the scent of Harry all over the bedroom—on the sheets, on him. It’s overwhelming. It’s nauseating. Brian stares at the man harshly, doing his best not to blink. He can feel tears building behind his eyes—maybe if he doesn’t blink, they’ll end up drying out and going away. It’s the only thing that he can think to do, the only way to cover the raw, agonizing wound—the vulnerability—that seems to encompass him.

“I—Harry…” He stumbles over his words. Every single word he’d planned to say, every explanation or excuse, vanishes from the tip of his tongue, and Brian’s left behind, raggedly breathing as he attempts to cover up his pathetic state, his failures. “Please, I can explain!”

“I don’t want to hear it—I don’t ever want to hear your voice again.” Harry growls, and Brian’s heart comes to a stop.

No. Nonononononono. He can’t. He can’t do this. Harry can’t just abandon him, ignore him again and send him away like he’s worthless! He is; he is—he knows he is—but he can’t bear to go back to the bad place, can’t handle the isolation and hatred and looking over his shoulder everywhere he turns. He needs him, needs Harry, needs someone by his side before he gets back to Dexter—needs help navigating the outside world, adjusting to how rapidly everything changes. He doesn’t know the laws and rules like the bad place, doesn’t know what to do or how to act. And Harry—Harry’s at fault for that, so he has to help him, has to make up for it! He needs someone, because—because… Brian’s excuses float away from him one by one until he’s left with the awful, honest truth. He doesn’t want to be alone again. He can’t be alone again.

He knows he can’t bear it.

“No!” Brian shrieks—though it barely even sounds like a word, more like a guttural, animalistic cry—and his body moves before he can think, lunging forward and grasping Harry by the upper arms as tightly as he can, fingers wrapping around his biceps and squeezing until his hands hurt. “No, no, no! Harry, please—stay; you said you’d stay! You promised!”

He doesn’t know where the words come from, not really—Brian's been saving up every foul word and name in the book, every insult and promise of retribution to spew at Harry the moment he saw him again, a tirade of fury and pain built up after a decade and a half of unmitigated torture, every word a damning reminder of the lives he ended through his neglect and disbelief. He has every right to say it, every right to crush that fucker with the guilt of what he’s done. But, for some reason, that rant doesn’t leave him—he doesn’t utter a single word of it. All of his righteous fury, his determination to make Harry suffer for what he’s endured, every disgusting name and condemnation he wants to scream at the man...it doesn’t leave him—Brian can feel the emotions building under the surface, boiling his blood and charring his bones to cinders—but he can’t bring himself to say a single word of it.

Because it doesn’t matter in that moment, not when all he so desperately wants to avoid being alone again. His chest heaves as his lungs futilely try to draw air through no fault of their own—he’s gasping so raggedly the noise fills his ears, and his nerves are sparking like a live wire on water. Harry doesn’t try to escape, doesn’t shove him off or throw him aside, doesn’t even move to pry his hands from around his arms—he just sits there, staring at him with a look that he can’t even begin to identify, much less understand. There’s a moment of silence, one where Brian tries to compose himself into something resembling the mask he’s worn for so many years—someone strong and stoic and whole, but he doesn’t feel any of those things. He feels like a fucking kid, and that he’s going to get torn apart.

“Oh god, kid, what happened to you?” Harry whispers breathlessly, face aghast, and it fills Brian with a sort of incandescent fury that had all but abandoned him earlier that night.

“Nothing good!” He gets out, voice breaking in the next sentence with some mixture of grief and rage. “What did you think would happen when you left me there?”

What did he think would happen when he left him in that nightmare? Did he think the electroshock burns were self-induced, that there wouldn’t be more with the only cop involved gone from the city? (Fuck the fact that any institution that let children get access to dangerous tools isn’t one to be trusted.) Was he stupid enough to think that that place would even let him get access to tools he could hurt himself with? He barely got fucking safety scissors for kiddie class crafts! Did he truly think Brian was lying? That he made up that monstrous man for the fun of it? Did he think he’d lie about being starved, about the way they forced pills down his throat until they made him sick? Did he think that he was the only one being hurt, that there was no danger there? Or was he just willing to let innocent kids suffer as long as he got to punish Brian for surviving? Was hurting him worth letting others die? Brian’s too furious for the thoughts to translate to speech—too much would get lost in transmission, and he’d never be able to explain things as clearly as they are in his head—so he covers his mouth, grits his teeth to stop himself from saying anything else stupid and vulnerable.

Harry stares at him like he’s never seen him before, stares at him like he’s some sort of alien thing, physically distorted enough to reflect the monstrosity within him. He looks like he’s going to be sick, and Brian lets go, shifting to move away as quickly as he can on violently shaky arms and legs. He feels like he’s going to puke—he's far too vulnerable, in far too much danger, and the jig is up. He needs to get out of here, needs to get away before Harry comes to his senses and calls the cops. The air tastes bitter when he inhales it, and he wonders if the air is tainted with the stench of his fear, if his panic has manifested miasma like the Incident. Breathing shakily, Brian shifts backwards, finally making an attempt to leave before Harry catches his hand with one of his own.

“Brian, I’m so sorry—I never...I didn’t think it’d turn out like this.” He stumbles over his words—finally raw and uncomposed and full of all the guilt that he deserves to feel for what he’s done to them—to Mama and Dexter and him. A part of him lights up in an angry, malicious joy at his distress, but he doesn’t feel satisfied about it the way he expected. He just feels heavy, poisoned, overwhelmed with a visceral pain that’s only gotten worse.

“You’re sorry? You ruined my life.” Brian tells him, and he’s suddenly able to say every horrible thing he’s been wanting to. “You sent me to that...that hellhole and left me there to rot. I missed every single important moment of my brother’s life—his first day of school, his first crush, puberty, school dances, growing up. I missed it all. And you got Mama murdered—you're the reason she’s dead!”

His voice gives out on him once again, and Brian unsuccessfully chokes back tears. He’d said that a hundred different times and a hundred different ways in what was somehow classified as therapy, talked about it and supposedly come to terms with what happened. He hasn’t even cried about it in years, not beyond what the nightmares cause. He should be normal—or, as close to normal as he can get. He passed all their tests and their psych evaluations, every fucked-up Rorschach test. He should be over it, putting it behind himself now that he’s confronting the cause of his pain. It’s supposed to be getting better. They said it would hurt less, but it doesn’t. And he doesn’t know what else to do except cry in his hands like a fucking high schooler.

It’s fucking humiliating—he's twenty-one, a grown-ass man! He shouldn’t be sobbing at all, much less in front of the man who ruined his life! He thought he’d left this behind, that he’d stopped the crying and the breakdowns and the waking up screaming. He’d been doing so well, acting so normal, so human—it doesn’t make sense! He’s falling to pieces in an instant, and it doesn’t make sense. Brian scrubs his knuckles across his face, trying to force the tears from his eyes.

Why does he still feel like that kid? Why does it still hurt? He doesn’t understand.

An arm wraps around his shoulders, pulling him against Harry’s chest, and Brian utters a noise of surprise and complaint, only for it to dissipate the moment that he’s pressed against the warmth of his skin once again. It’s too stupidly pleasant to have heat pressed up against him, and he can’t bring himself to pull away from the older man right now—he needs a moment, just to compose himself, and then he’ll go. He can sneak back in later, kill the bastard then. The hand that had been clamped against his wrist, preventing him from making a dash for his clothes, lets go of him, only to thread its way through his hair and start scratching at his scalp softly. It’s a comfort he hasn’t felt in years, one that has him sighing in brief relief.

“I know.” Harry tells him, and his voice is heavy with grief—a raw, genuine grief that he can tell is as weighed down by guilt as much as loss. It’s deserved; it’s earned, and he hopes it haunts him for the rest of his fucking life. (As short as that’s going to be.) “I know it is.”

There’s a painful, quiet pause between them, and Brian doesn’t quite know how to feel. There’s a part of him that wants answers, that wants to hear the man’s reasoning for what he did, the pain he caused—was he simply careless or skeptical or just plain lazy? He wants to know the reason, wants to tear it to shreds and leave him there to stew. Was there a bigger reason involved, or did he not think the drug cartel he was investigating would kill a leak if it was a single mother? (Did he want her to die? Want to cover up his latest affair?) The other part of him’s relieved—he thinks—that Harry isn’t making excuses, that he isn’t trying to make what he did seem like it was any less than allowing his Mama to get murdered. It doesn’t matter why he did it, if it was laziness or skepticism of the threat or something worse—the outcome is still the same, and the thought of the bastard trying to justify whatever choice he made is sickening.

The realization is somewhat freeing, although he’ll never truly purge himself of that immature need for there to be a reason—a good one—for what happened, and it leaves Brian with one remaining question to be answered.

“What did I do?” He asks. He sounds like a child—voice tremulous, weak—and even his anger seems flimsy in the face of this question, this one question whose answer has the potential to ruin him completely. “Why did you leave me there?”

Harry inhales sharply, every muscle tensing beneath Brian, and his heart rate stuttering at a break-neck pace.

“Oh, kid, no. You didn’t, you weren’t...” Harry stammers at him, and the hand carding through his hair digs its nails into his scalp, hard enough to draw a pained noise from Brian’s throat. There’s another second as the man draws a deep, shuddering breath and lets it out, the air brushing across his skin like a warm front.

(He needs to know, needs to hear him say it—he can’t live with the confusion and the insecurity, the nagging, ever-present question in the back of his head. It’s haunted him for years now, and he knows he’ll never be able to move on if he doesn’t get answers. It’s something bad, it’s something really bad—some horrible thing he must have done and forgotten about, something Harry doesn’t want to remind him about, because making him think about it might trigger the part of him that does those things and hurt other people. Or, at least, that must be what he’s thinking, because he doesn’t know that Brian’s here to kill him, to become that awful, terrible thing the doctors always knew he’d be.)

“It wasn’t anything you did. It wasn’t anything you said.” Harry tells him, his voice in his ear, reverberating in his chest with a soothing rumble, though confusion tears him apart like a pack of starving wolves. “It was me—my choice, and mine alone.”

It doesn’t make sense. What does he mean Brian didn’t do anything wrong? It’s true that he hadn’t said—or done—anything violent, not even anything rude. He’d been innocent, or as close to innocent that anything like him could get. So, what was the reason that the detective saw fit to send him away? To split him up from his brother? Why would he do that? What could be the reason? Was Brian just...not worthy? Not deserving of love or care or support the way humans do? Was he just born evil? Born tainted?

“But why? If it wasn’t—I hadn’t hurt anyone—so, why?” Brian asks, and there’s a pause as Harry absorbs the question. His chest rises and falls steadily, if a bit on the fast side. But there’s no answer from him, no explanation beyond the nails embedded in his scalp and the hand that’s migrated to rub against his spine. His stomach twists with nerves, and he feels like he’s going to be sick. The longer the older man takes to compose himself—the longer he puts off answering him—the more likely it seems that his fears are the truth, that there’s something inherently unlovable about him. In fact, he’s just about to tell him to forget the question when Harry finally speaks.

“I was...I could tell from the start that things were different.” He explains, with careful emphasis placed on the last word, and Brian can just tell what it means. “You weren’t the same kids you were before, and I didn’t know what to do about that. Dexter, I thought, was young enough to forget—young enough to be normal, with the right support. But you...”

Harry trails off; his sentence is uncompleted, but the implication’s as clear as daylight.

“Oh,” Brian whispers, and he supposes—in a distant, almost disconnected sort of logic—that it makes some kind of sense. Infantile amnesia is a normal phenomenon, the process by which people forget their first years. Some children repress memories of the trauma they experience, a defense mechanism when the pain’s too great. It’d be natural to expect something like that from Dexter, still an infant when it happened. Perhaps there was a way he could have a normal upbringing—a human life—under the right coaching. With careful support and guidance, the trauma could have been minimized to a negligible impact.

But Brian could never forget. Brian will never forget. He was too old, too used to the horrors of the world around him, even then—though past horrors were a child’s daydream in comparison of the Incident (The strange and violent men who came for money, the sight of Mama distant and gone from her body, unresponsive to any attempt to rouse her, the shouting matches between Mama and Driscoll that carried through shut doors.)—to be shocked by a new atrocity. No, by that point, it was far too late for Brian to forget; he was too old and too broken for that, and Harry acted in response to that.

“That...I understand.” He mumbles blankly, though he doesn’t feel he understands at all—what makes the border between young enough and too old? Why send him there instead of to a different house with a therapist? There are a thousand questions that Brian wants to ask, but the thought of speaking them into existence is a nauseating prospect.

“No, you don’t.” Harry states harshly, and that summons Brian back to himself, out of the hazy, distant comfort of dissociation—that place he goes whenever the hurt becomes too much to bear. Suddenly, he’s back in his body and aching with anticipation, and he needs to know what the older man means.

“What don’t I understand?” He questions, forcing a stern coldness in his voice that he doesn’t feel at all—he's tired; he wants the weight set upon him to ease. He wants it to stop, wants the pain to end.

“It wasn’t that—wasn't just that, I mean.” The older man explains, gritting his teeth as he speaks, as if every word he says is painful to speak. Then, his voice becomes hesitant as he continues his explanation. “You always saw through me, kid—your mother, she didn’t...hold me to things the way you did, when I made promises, that is. She didn’t really have a choice in it, just had to trust I’d keep my word. But you? You were a kid—bright-eyed and filled with all those ideals kids start out with—and when I said something, you expected me to do it, no matter what. So, when I said I’d protect your mother, I knew she’d tell you, try to reassure you. And I knew the second we arrived on the scene that you’d know, the moment we saw each other again, you’d know what happened was my fault. And I couldn’t bear that.”

“I don’t—what are you saying?” Brian questions, his brain still struggling to put all the pieces together in a way that makes sense. But they aren’t going—the pieces aren’t clicking, and he doesn’t know what to do to make them fit.

“I was trying to save myself pain,” Harry confesses, sounding thoroughly ashamed of himself. “And I caused you a lifetime of it.”

Brian pauses for a second, breath shuddering as he tries to absorb what the older man just told him.

He didn’t do anything wrong.

He didn’t do anything wrong.

“You—” Brian chokes on his words, slamming a fist into Harry’s chest when he can’t compose himself beyond the ragged, wheezing breath he’s drawn. “You bastard!”

“I know,” He murmurs, but his arms don’t leave him—Harry doesn’t move away or try to distance himself from Brian, doesn’t even flinch when he repeats the gesture with more force, just crushes him against his chest when he tries to pull away. “I know, and I’m so, so sorry.”

His face is wet with tears, and Brian can barely believe it, considering the last time he cried was when he was eight. But here he is, gasping for air like he’s been starved of it and choking on sobs. His fingers scrabble against Harry’s bare chest, nails digging into his flesh as if returning some fraction of the cosmic, all-consuming agony the man’s forced upon him will make it better. And the older man just sits there and takes it, petting his hair as if he’s not some monster he decided wasn’t worth the effort of even trying to help.

“I hate you.” He growls, and it’s the rabid, raw cry of a wounded animal. “I hate you!”

“I know. You have every reason to.” Harry tells him, and it just makes the fury burn hotter—he wants the man to beg for forgiveness, to plead and pray and profess his sorrow. He wants him to grovel, to sob and wail—he wants him to tell Brian he can’t sleep, that he’s been haunted and destroyed by the things that he’s done. But he’s not doing that, and it fills him with a sort of fury he can’t even begin to describe.

“You ruined everything!” He snarls, voice taking on a distraught—almost wailing—overtone, “It’s bad—it's all gone—an' it’ll never be right again!”

Harry doesn’t even speak this time, just clutches him close, and all Brian wishes is that the man had shown this sort of care when he needed it. He wishes he could have had this when he was small and scared and in need of support. He wishes he could have been held and comforted and reassured—told it was going to be okay, even if it was just a lie to make the world seem more manageable in the face of the horrors. The struggles come to a slow halt, his clawing and punching at Harry stopping once it becomes plain the detective won’t beg or pray. Instead, he slumps against the older man’s chest, drawing ragged, wheezing breaths as he tries to calm himself.

“Are you...?” Harry’s voice trails off.

“I still have nightmares.” Brian whispers, and it’s a small, childish confession that he’d be ashamed to tell anyone but the man before him (and maybe Dexter), but he needs for him to know what he’s done, needs him to understand what he’s endured. For all his claims of guilt and grief, Harry can’t even begin to imagine what it was like to watch the massacre happen, to watch people get carved to shreds before his eyes. “I still wake up screaming because of it. It hurts, Harry—it hurts so much I wish I’d die to be rid of it.”

There’s a second’s hesitation, and his skin crawls with the discomfort of revealing something so personal—it's a stupid (Dangerous) thing to do, and Brian. It’s too much, and Brian’s pulling himself backward, dragging his body away despite the way his baser instincts cry out for the man’s warmth. He won’t risk it, not with this man being who he is. Harry stares at him—really stares at him—with that haunted, horrified look in his eyes. Then, he’s cupping Brian’s cheek in one of his own larger hands, tilting his face gently to make him meet his gaze. Finally, he speaks, voice soft and rough and heavy with grief.

“I can make you forget, if you want. For a little while.”

Brian knows what he’s offering. It’s the same reason they came back to Harry’s house in the first place. But it feels...different—heavier—now that the man knows his true identity. He’s not looking at Brian Moore, awkward post-adolescent and future university student with some hero worship to ease the attraction. He sees Brian Moser as all the wreck he is, the same kid he looked at and decided wasn’t worth the effort of saving, the same kid he called evil and abandoned. (Still, he can hear those words from more than a decade ago as clear as day, saying that he’s not good, that he’ll never be good. He hears those words in his nightmares sometimes.) But he’s still willing to have sex with him, still willing to take a tumble with a freak like him in the same bed he once fucked his wife, and he doesn’t know if that makes what they’re doing sacrilegious or holy. There’s no love between them, but there’s a lifetime’s worth of pain and connection, and he thinks that’s close enough.

“Touch me.” He orders, and he reaches up to grab a hold of the older man’s hair, dragging him in for a kiss that he knows will leave his lips bruised by the end of it. Harry gasps into the kiss, the gesture reeks of surprise, but he kisses him all the same.

Hesitantly—oh, so hesitantly—one of Harry’s hands brushes against his waist, and Brian bites back the urge to comment on it. The asshole will have to get himself together somehow if he’s going to fuck him, and Brian’ll remind him about his promise from earlier—it's far too late for him to be gentle, after all, and he won’t tolerate being treated like he matters after it’s been proven that he doesn’t. He nips harshly at the older man’s mouth, tasting the bitter iron of blood against his tongue when Harry finally obliges and deepens the kiss. They pull apart when Brian needs to gasp for air, and he promptly moves on to covering the older man in bruises and hickies—it's only fair, considering the marks that’ll be left on him for weeks to come.

Harry groans against him when he bites harder than the man’s willing to put up with, and hands wrap around his wrists before he’s shoved onto his back like an upturned turtle and pinned down once again, the older man bullying his way between his legs with enough force that Brian doesn’t feel the need to tell him off for being gentle. There’s a familiar curl of discomfort at the knowledge that Harry knows now, that he knows who he’s seeing and fucking, and that his judgments are likely colored now by his immense dislike of him rather than the apparent fondness he felt for his alter-ego of sorts, Brian-But-Good.

But the older man doesn’t stop, doesn’t even hesitate, just pulls his hands away to line himself up and presses back into him with the confidence of someone who thinks he belongs there. The thought is nauseating enough to provoke a reaction, and Brian chokes back bile before he pukes like some teenager with alcohol poisoning and no self-control. But he doesn’t, and the sensation quickly sparks pleasure in his veins once more—Harry's stupidly good, pressing in with enough force that it has his toes curling from the intensity and carefully enough that it doesn’t hurt him beyond what he can take. A high, breathy moan escapes him before he can make it something less embarrassing, so he just tries to move past it as quickly as he can.

“More.” He gets out, somewhere between a plea and an order, and Brian hopes that Harry won’t go back to insisting on that stupid, humiliating nickname now that he knows the truth about him. But the man just gives him a stern look and reaches down to pinch at his clit harshly in a move that no one’s ever tried before. Pain explodes against his senses, sharp and pounding pain that pierces him like the doctors’ needles, and even the dizzying mixture of endorphins doesn’t dull the sensation against his nerves.

“Fuck!” He yelps, squirming away out of instinct before his hips are pinned by steady hands—whether to stop his escape or prevent him from grinding down on Harry to reach orgasm, Brian doesn’t know, but the result is frustrating either way, and he’s not about to censor himself when the truth is out in the open. “You’re an asshole, Harry Morgan.”

The response he gets is a heavy, somewhat amused sigh from the older man, and his stomach drops with the realizations: this man is not above being stupidly petty and trying to humiliate him through insistence on that stupid fucking nickname.

“I think you forgot something, Baby.” He offers in that warm, unapologetic tone that proves he’s an incorrigible jerk who enjoys making fools of people. “I’ve let you get away with your temper up until now, but I’m more than happy to change that if you keep misbehaving.”

Brian throws his head back on the pillow, glaring at the ceiling with all the force of his fury, since Harry might pull out if he actually glares at him, before he heaves a heavy sigh and decides to abandon his pride—he's already done it before tonight, and it’s not as if he’ll let the man get the opportunity to tell anyone else.

“You’re an asshole, Daddy.” Brian repeats, each word pointed and primed with enough needle-sharp passive-aggression to pop every balloon on the planet. But it seems to be close enough to what Harry was expecting, because his expression softens into something mixed with fondness and pain—though he’s fairly fucking certain that he imagined the first one, because the older man has never been fond of him. Never. Not even back when he was human. He’d liked Dexter well enough, but Brian—even back then—was somehow worthy of his ire. Maybe the man’s just fond of his blatant irritation—that makes far more sense than any newfound affection towards him, after all.

“I know, Baby.” Harry responds, reaching up to pet at his hair before the hand travels down to cup his jaw, and Brian fights the urge to nuzzle into the affection like a touch-starved stray—nothing good will come of it, and he forces himself to pull away. The older man leans forward, tangling his fingers in the hair at the base of his skull to force him to expose his throat. The move has every instinct in Brian’s body screaming at red alert—this is dangerous, a threat to his safety, and just asking to get beaten or choked or garroted. His pulse thrums in his veins as his heart beats like it’ll be ripped out of his chest, and he instinctively braces for death, or for new awful, unbearable pain, at the very least.

But Harry doesn’t do that, doesn’t wrap his other hand around his throat and put an end to him now that he’s no longer a child, doesn’t strike him or strangle him. Instead, he leans down and mouths at his throat like a man starved, pressing open-mouthed kisses against him. But it isn’t like earlier, when he was kissing him and sucking hickies into his skin—this time, it’s violent, harsh, and Brian keens the moment Harry buries his teeth in his throat, thrashing as he pulls back and laps at the bruising wound like a victorious cougar. Then, he’s finding another spot and repeating the process as he yelps in pain. He does it one last time, jaws snapping shut on him with the force of a bear trap, and Brian gouges his nails against Harry’s back, claws against him like a cornered animal until he finally releases him. He opens his mouth to complain, but the older man silences him with the sweetest kiss he’s ever gotten—hesitant and gentle and unabashedly caring, and it leaves him blinking back tears when it ends.

“That’s it, Brian—good boy. You took that so well for me.” Harry tells him, and Brian’s stupid, slutty body betrays him, hitting him with enough dopamine, relief, and something bordering on ecstasy to make him willing to endure it a hundred times over, if only the older man will kiss him sweetly and tell him he’s good again. He’s a fucking disgrace—he shouldn’t be getting wet over that asshole mauling him like an animal, even if he told him not to be anywhere close to gentle.

“Fuck me already!” He complains, but melts when he gets another stern, disappointed look. Fuck. Again? Brian’s newfound fucking libido is leading him places he wouldn’t go with a gun. But he gives into the pressure and fixes Harry with a pleading look. “Please, Daddy?”

Harry doesn’t respond verbally, just pulls himself most of the way out, and that alone has him moaning like a whore, body clamping down on him as if that’ll somehow keep the older man inside of him. Then, the man presses back into him with enough force that it has Brian hissing through clenched teeth to avoid doing anything particularly unbecoming. But it feels good in a way that he’s never felt before, and he’s not going to deny the first good thing that’s happened in a decade. Instead, he hitches a leg around Harry’s waist the way he saw those fools who hooked up in a storage closet and drags him closer. There’s a fire beneath his skin, a desperation set alight in his flesh, and, in the moment, he can’t even conceptualize anything going differently.

With little urging, the detective sets himself at a steady, dizzyingly fast pace that punches the breath out of his lungs and leaves him clinging to the older man like a squirrel to a tree. There’s the maddening, enrapturing sensation of their flesh sliding against each other, and the impression of sparks flying, striking against every nerve he hadn’t known was sensitive. Brian doesn’t want to consider the slick, repulsive sounds coming from where they’re connected—no, that makes him far too uncomfortable in a heavy way he doesn’t have a name for—so he tries to tune out the worst of the noise and focus on the overwhelming feeling building in the pits of his stomach. It’s hot and squirmy, not unlike that of vertigo, and pleasant in a way he hadn’t expected—but, best of all, it’s growing, building to something. Brian doesn’t know what, but he hardly cares about that if the way he’s feeling keeps up.

Harry ruts against him like a rabid animal, and he chokes out a breathless laugh at the thought of it—the older man, whenever they’d spoken when he was little, had always implied he was out of control. He’d never said that—never been so blatant in his dislike, especially not in front of Mama—but the sentiment oozed through every interaction they had, despite its unspoken nature. Every chiding reminder to not speak so loudly or play so roughly, every comment about how much of a mess he made and that he behaved inappropriately in public, every condescending look when he cried at getting hurt or made the mistake of getting too excited—all of it built into one heavy, undeniable realization. It’s ironic, is what it is—that the man who berated him for being improper and unruly is fucking into him like the thought of stopping would make him sick. The hypocrite’s completely lost control, and Brian would laugh at him if he weren’t worried that he’ll stop fucking him if he points it out.

“Fuck!” He groans, body seizing up the moment that Harry hits a part of his body he’d never bothered to explore before, and Harry makes a victorious sound in his ears before he’s murmuring something in his ear that he can’t quite process or understand—but he doesn’t care; all he wants is for it not to stop. “There—there, there, there!”

He thinks there’s a noise of assent—or something similar-sounding escapes the older man’s throat—and then Harry pulls back so quickly that it feels like a void’s opened up inside of him. He wants it back, wants more, and he says as much in a plaintive, childish cry that he’d be humiliated by if he were lucid. But Brian doesn’t care about that right now; Brian couldn’t give less of a shit. He just wants to get fucked, wants to feel good in a way he hasn’t before. And Harry finally obliges, pushing back in with enough force and the right angle to have him scream in a way he hasn’t for years—high and sharp and shrill, and he hates that he still sounds too much like a girl. He shoves the thought aside when Harry strikes him there again—this time, hard enough to have tears budding in his eyes for a completely different reason—and he squirms in an attempt to get his hands free. He needs to hold onto something—anything!

But Harry’s decided to hold true to one of his promises for the first time in his life, and he’s taken the order not to be gentle seriously—and that includes not releasing his wrists from the iron-tight stranglehold he’s gotten on them. It’s somewhere between exhilarating and terrifying, to be held down by someone who’s hurt him so badly—even if he never laid a hand on him before tonight), and Brian can’t decide which one has a stronger hold on him. His breathing is ragged, violently so, and he tries to ground himself by squeezing his legs around the older man’s waist, hoping the sensation of exerting force will ease the tension building inside him.

“It’s okay, Baby—I've got you.” His partner tells him, and Brian doesn’t care that it’s a fucking lie, not right now, at least. Harry’s touching him, holding him, and it’s enough for him to pretend he’s being cared for.

They fall into a sort of pattern after that, the older man burying himself in Brian’s body again and again and again, the lewd, discordant sound of their bodies sliding against each other filling the room to a degree that he’d be embarrassed if not for the heat fogging up his thoughts. All he wants is more of this—more touch without pain, more of this peculiar warmth that drives the chill from his flesh, more of the sharp pleasure building in his stomach. Brian’s eyes squeeze shut when Harry presses against that spot again, and coherent thoughts are driven from his mind entirely.

“Please.” He begs, voice trembling—he doesn’t even know what he’s begging for, not really, but the older man does before he’s even tried to verbalize it. (And he ignores the warmth that rises up in his chest at being understood for whatever it is he asked for. It’s not relevant. It doesn’t matter.)

Harry nails him in that one, sensitive spot again, and every muscle in Brian’s body reacts like he’s been struck by lightning: freezing like ice and tensing up so quickly his body aches with the aftermath of it. Then, that overwhelming pleasure associated with the spot has him thawing with the violent heat that spreads against his senses. For a moment, he’s disconnected from his body—somewhere close to floating the way he got when the nurses upped his meds too much—and everything that defines him goes away for a little bit. Then, he’s crashing back into his body with the force of a Florida-sized meteor, left with all the aches of sex and an unfamiliar wetness coating his thighs. (It doesn’t feel like blood—it isn’t the peculiar sensation of arousal, either—and Brian hasn’t lost control of his bladder since he was eight or nine.) The conclusion is obvious, and he adds it to the list of novel experiences he’s had.

The man on top of him continues thrusting, and he yelps loudly at the overstimulation that knocks him over like an ocean front. His body recoils with the sort of sensitivity, but he doesn’t need to endure it long, and Harry finally stills, emptying himself into Brian’s body. He has to push away the desire to bite the asshole for doing that without even asking or trying to pull out—he feels so dirty, like he needs to scrub all his skin off—but he can’t leave evidence on the corpse, so he fights the urge to maul the man atop him.

They stop after that, and Harry rolls off him and onto the bed, slumping down against the mattress with a heavy sigh. Brian bites back the discomfort dragging against his body as they’re separated again, and he shuffles away from the older man. He feels dirty. He feels like a traitor to Mama and Dex. He’s disgusting—this man killed her, ruined them, split them apart. And what does he do? Get in bed with this asshole the moment that he has the opportunity to choose who he sleeps with. He’s a revolting traitor to his family, and he should be shot like the animal he is for betraying everyone he’s ever loved.

But Brian doesn’t do that, doesn’t go for Harry’s service gun and put a bullet in them both or go to strangle the bastard the moment his hands stop shaking. He doesn’t even consider it. Instead, he heaves out a great, shuddering noise that’s an inch away from a pathetic cry for help and buries his hands in his hair. He lets Harry catch his breath after the exertion of fucking, turns onto his side to create some distance.

“Brian?” The man asks, voice gentle but probing.

He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to respond. How is he supposed to say that this revolting act of treachery against the only two people who loved him is the best he’s ever felt? How is he supposed to reconcile the ravenous, starving creature behind the mask—the one that’s only cared about finding Dexter and killing Harry for years—with this intense, new desire for the only adult in his life who’s shown a shred of kindness, as self-serving as it is? There isn’t a book or a therapist he can ask to learn what a human would do in this situation. There are no guidelines, and he’s deprived

“Kid?” Harry asks again, and this time, his voice has real fear in it. “Are you...?”

“I’m fine.” Brian states, dropping his arms to lie at his sides. “That’s just—eugh—it feels gross.” He explains, face scrunching up in disgust, and gratification explodes in him when Harry’s face sinks with guilt. The bastard deserves to feel guilty for everything he’s done, even if all he feels bad for is making a mess of his insides without asking like an animal.

“Do we need to worry about contraception?” Harry asks, looking somewhere 

“No,” Brian responds, eventually, “I haven’t had my period in months. No need to worry about that from me.”

That gets a horrified, stricken look for some reason, but Brian doesn’t care about it at all—all he wants is to take a shower, and he says as much before digging through Harry’s dresser again. He’s not going to wear this fucking nightmare of a nightgown any longer, and he certainly can’t wear his own clothes to commit murder. Eventually, he settles on an over-large T-shirt that looks like it’s been worn to sleep for decades, and he moves to the bathroom. The tile floor is cold beneath his feet, and he shudders as he flips on the lights and the bathroom fan to absorb the steam before he moves towards the shower. Brian snatches one of the towels from a hanger and drops it on the closed seat of the toilet—it’s close enough that he’ll be able to reach it easily—and then, he twists the faucet on, letting water roar down with the noise of a sudden thunderstorm.

The shower is nice. Brian doesn’t have another word for it. He’s had showers for years now—the institute couldn’t have suicidal people using baths—but there’s far more that’s different between the inside and the outside, as far as showers go. The temperature range is absolutely extraordinary. Like the institution showers, it starts at hellishly cold, but it quickly warms up into something akin to those hot springs he’s heard about in different parts of the world, unlike the discomforting lukewarm temperature that signalled the hottest institution water could go. He stumbles into the shower, and bites back a gasp of shock and excitement—it’s warm and pleasant, like standing as soup’s poured through a colander instead of shivering and scrubbing himself up as quickly as he can, hoping for the water to wash the suds off.

In here, Brian gets to stand under the warm spray as long as he wants—no ten-minute rules here!—and the soap and shampoo that are in the bathroom actually smells decent, like cedarwood and lemon, instead of the sterile, almost disinfectant, stench of the old soaps. He’s excited, almost like a little kid, at the opportunity of using good soap and a loofah that’s probably Harry’s. Even the shampoo smells good, and it doesn’t cling uncomfortably to his skin when he pours some in his hands before submerging his head under the warm spray and threading his hands through his hair. From there, it’s a simple matter of scrubbing until his scalp is pricking at the soap and soaking himself until there isn’t a fizz when his hair meets the water anymore. He takes a moment to clean himself out before finishing up—Brian doesn’t think he’s physically capable of carrying a child at this point, but the idea makes him so ill with nausea and anxiety that he keeps it up until physical discomfort forces him to stop.

It’s unpleasant to turn off the shower and step out onto the mat in front of it, but it’s eased somewhat by being able to wrap a towel around himself and towel off in privacy, and Brian takes his time rubbing against the softness of the towel until he’s comfortable again. Then, he’s pulling on his once-abandoned boxers and the oversized shirt on as quickly as he can. He digs through the hamper of dirty towels, pulling up all the old ones until he’s only a towel or two above the bottom of it; then, he drops his own towel in before re-burying it like a dog with dung—if only to better hide the most obvious traces of DNA from notice.

When Brian returns from the bathroom, most of the tension is gone from his body. He’s tired and stressed, and he’s had a particularly overwhelming day of freedom—all he wants is a moment to himself before he returns to the plot of killing the man who ruined his life, and he easily finds that when Harry, after a soft kiss pressed against his mouth, goes to the bathroom to shower, as well. He chokes back a yawn, scrubs at his eyes to stop them from slipping shut before he can complete his goal. Brian’s just going to wait for Harry to finish up and come back—give him a bit of time to settle and let his guard down—and then, he’ll attack the man once he’s asleep. He slips under the covers, shivering when he’s not chilled by the now-bracing air, and pulls the black sheets up until they’re tucked around his throat. Yes, he decides, he’ll take a couple minutes to shut his eyes before Harry comes back. Then, he’ll kill him.

…

Brian wakes up in the middle of the night. He surfaces with a weary groan around one in the morning, mouth painfully dry, and stumbles towards the bathroom on shaky legs. He can’t really see anything, and he doesn’t want to leave fingerprints, so he curls his hands into fists and runs his knuckles along the wall. He doesn’t actually know everything that the cops look for—he knows the basics after seeing a few crime dramas on the motel television, but he doubts that’s how gathering evidence at a crime scene actually works. Still, he spent fifteen years in a cage, and he has no desire to make the bars physical this time around.

So, he navigates his way around the room with his knuckles brushed against the wall, until he finds the door to the en suite bathroom. The tile is cold against his bare feet, but he ignores it to extend his curled-up hands towards where he thinks the faucet should be. It’s not—his hands land flat against the wall, and Brian huffs out a sigh of irritation despite the comparatively minor nature of the issue. His stomach gnaws with hunger as much as he yearns for water, and his head is pounding with a violent beat akin to that of a drum.

His hands fumble along the wall, reaching up and down before he moves vertically to ensure he doesn’t miss anything, and Brian stiffens when his knees knock against the porcelain of the toilet bowl. That means he’s close, and he readjusts until his search once he scoots to the side. Then he fumbles along the wall until his skin finally comes in contact with icy porcelain instead of the cool, semi-smooth surface of the half-wall wood paneling. Finally! Brian huffs out a victorious breath, and a grin stretches across his face.

His head is pounding, and he has to bite back a groan of discomfort. Is this what a hangover feels like? Is this what happens every time people drink? Brian can’t even begin to understand why people drown their sorrows in alcohol if it causes such pain in the morning. (Or, maybe, it’s because it’s later that those side effects are felt and not immediately. The people who drown their sorrows in alcohol tend to be focused on instant relief rather than future consequences.) All he wants is to quench his thirst and stumble his way back to bed—he's so fucking tired, and he aches unlike anything he’s dealt with in years.

Left is hot, and right is cold, he reminds himself as he paws for the faucet handles. He half-pushes, half-pulls the handle into the on position, and the sound of rushing water fills the room, draining down the porcelain bowl in a smooth, steady stream. Brian leans forward, tilting his head to the side, and slurps at the water coming from the faucet—it was a habit he picked up as a little kid, when standing on a stepstool to drink was quicker and easier than going to ask for a glass from Mama, that he never really outgrew.

The water tastes funny, the way all city water does—there’s a different mix of fluoride in it from Tampa’s water, and it shows. He doesn’t actually know if more fluoride is better or worse, but it’s different, and Brian is definitely noticing it. But he isn’t privileged enough to afford being picky about water, not when he knows that it’s safe, because that’s more than enough for him. He twists the knob further, and the temperature plunges towards arctic—or at least as close as it can get in summer in Miami without ice—and Brian laps at the water like a dehydrated dog until his thirst finally abates.

He pulls back with a sigh, pushing the handle with his closed fist until water stops pouring from the faucet, and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. The worst of it is over, and Brian can go back to bed now. His feet pad across the tile floor of the bathroom and back into the bedroom, and he pauses. The door is ajar, now—Harry had opened it following the end of their sex, letting the warm light of the hallways spill into the bedroom and across the floor. It illuminates the room around him, light hitting the bed and faintly highlighting the older man lying asleep beneath the covers in that stupidly attractive undershirt. Brian stands there for a minute, just watching his chest as it rises and falls. And, as he does so, he’s struck by how much he hates the man he fucked.

He hates him. He hates him. He hates Harry Morgan, hates that stubborn, infuriating bastard who let him get sent to that hellhole—he hates the man who got his Mama killed, who didn’t even care about her, despite how he claimed to love her. He hates the man who held prison over her head and made her risk her life for stupid fucking information that could have been done by actual trained officers. He hates the faithless, dishonest bastard who gave her promises of safety and a future, only to rip them away. He hates that he didn’t even notice they were gone, that he didn’t even care that they vanished until he found the crime scene. He’s the reason every single thing in his life went wrong, and Brian doesn’t think he can live in a world where Harry exists.

He inhales raggedly, hands trembling against his thighs, and bile burns in his throat before Brian chokes it back, swallowing it down before he can vomit. He’s ending this. Tonight.

He’s trembling as he walks down the hallway and into the kitchen—everything in order and turned off for the night—but it’s partially illuminated by the light of the moon and mostly lit from the light of the adjoining hallway. His entire body is alight with electricity, arching up every single nerve and in a grotesque type of anticipation of the crime he’s about to commit. And some part of Brian just knows that he’ll be proving Harry right, that he’s proving that all he is and all he’ll ever be is a monster. But he can’t afford to care about that, not when his humanity has long since been destroyed with his childhood.

Brian hesitates, staring at the knife rack as he tries to pick out which one is the proper knife for the job, picking up a dish cloth to cover his hands before he inspects each of the knives. There are several of them—seven, to be exact—of various sizes and lengths: there’s a chef’s knife, bread knife, a utility knife, a cleaver, a carving knife, a paring knife, and a boning knife. They’re completed with a carving fork settled in the block as well, and it’s a handsome set—though Brian is no judge. Instead, he picks them up one at a time, testing their weight and comfort in his hands with several mock stabs. Eventually, he settles on the carving knife, its long and slender blade seeming a good choice when combined with its use to separate flesh from bone. He puts the towel back, wrapping his fingers around the handle—he doesn’t know if he’ll wash the blade and put it back or run away with the knife, but Brian knows that he won’t be leaving it to be found.

He makes his way back to the bedroom as quietly as he can, wishing he had put on socks, which he’s long known are quieter on floors than bare feet. But there is no response to his movement, so Brian’s either quiet enough to avoid attracting attention, or there’s no one else in the house besides sleeping Harry to hear and be awoken. Hopefully, he notes with a wry grin, it’s a bit of both.

His body is trembling the way it did back when his room wasn’t safe, the way it did when he still woke up screaming and sobbing from nightmares, certain the men who murdered Mama were coming back for him and Dexter now. It’s like every receptor in his body’s been forced into overdrive, and the world around him feels like far too much. The darkness around him swallows him whole, drives the light from his eyes and the warmth from his skin, leaving him suspended in all-consuming emptiness—a void of everything the world should be. The Dark Passenger screams against his senses, overwhelming him in such a raucous cacophony that his body tries to shut down, and he can’t tell if the agony consuming his stomach is genuine starvation or the insatiable Need that puts him in enough pain to puke up what little he’s had in the past twenty-four hours.

Still, he needs to do this, and he can’t afford to just give up—he's come much too far to chicken out now. Hesitantly, awkwardly, he shuffles forward, barely daring to lift his feet from the ground for fear of the loss of balance. The coolness of the tile turning into wood floorboards that feel almost unfamiliar in his newfound freedom. But he keeps moving, keeps forcing one foot in front of the other until he’s standing before the bed, watching the asshole who ruined his life sleep once again. He’s panting softly, gasping as he attempts to force himself back into the composure that saved his life for so many years, but it seems to all fall short in the face of the significance of what he’s about to do.

If he does this, he’s exactly what Harry said he’d be all those years ago. If he does this, gives into the insatiable Need and ends a man’s life (No matter how awful the aforementioned man is), he’s exactly the monster they called him. If he kills Harry Morgan, he’s proving every single one of them right, justifying all they’ve done to him for his darker nature. But Brian can’t imagine another way—can’t imagine a world where this doesn’t end in death—and he knows it needs to happen, deep down in wherever his soul used to be.

Brian tucks the knife in between his arm and against his ribs, crawling up onto the bed in a way that’d probably be considered lewd if not for the weapon. It makes sense—he needs to get a good enough angle to be able to kill him, and that means he needs to climb on top of the man. His entire body trembles the way it did after electroshock, and he feels the slow, steady build of anxiety in him. What if he messes up? What if he fails? He can’t go back to that place, can’t go to a place where the bars are physical as well as mental. It won’t get to that, he promises himself, though it rings false even in the privacy of his own head. His chest burns with discomfort, and Brian realizes he’s been holding his breath—he can’t tell if it’s to avoid being heard (or felt) by the sleeping man or if he’s getting too anxious, that he’s out of control.

He’s scared. He’s still so fucking scared.

But Brian knows what happens if he doesn’t do this.

If he doesn’t do this, he’ll never be safe. If he doesn’t do this, the threat to his life never ends.

The fabric digs against his knees, tripping him up, and Brian pauses to disentangle his legs from the too-large shirt he uses like a nightgown—and that is an outfit he definitely won’t be repeating, but at least it’ll keep the bloodstains off of his clothes—before he continues. Then, he’s perched right at Harry’s, legs on either side of his torso in a way that’d be sexual if he didn’t have a knife tucked against his ribs. His thighs tremble violently—almost painfully—as he tries to keep himself steady. If he just drops down on the man, then he’ll wake up, and Brian’ll lose the desperately-needed element of surprise. He squeezes his eyes shut, takes a deep, shuddering breath to ground himself. The air is cool against his skin in the way that only happens at suburban houses in the middle of summer, and he tries to get into a more stable position.

Carefully, carefully—oh, so carefully that he thinks he’s going to scream—Brian lowers himself onto Harry’s abdomen, adding on his weight bit by bit in an attempt to prevent the man from waking up too early. But, he eventually finds himself sitting on the man’s stomach, shifting slightly with his every breath. Harry’s warm against him, body somewhere between soft and firm with his flesh a mixture of muscle and the softness of older age. (He’s older than Brian knows he’ll ever get to be.) He looks younger in his sleep, but even that can’t rid him of the worry lines that come from whatever it is he’s dealt with, silver hairs from stress unknown. It works for him in a way he hadn’t noticed at their past meetings. Then, as if summoned by the mere mention of attractiveness, there’s a part of him that reacts to it before he even has time to fight with his body, and he’s humiliated to note the heat in his stomach at the way Morgan’s spread out beneath him. Now is not the time to be getting turned on—his newly discovered libido has decided to make itself a problem. Nope. Not going to happen. He’s not going to let it, Brian decides—he's going to wake the bastard up, make him see what he’s going to do. The quickest method for that, he concludes, is slapping him.

“What the—Brian?!” His voice is slurred with confusion and sharpened by pain, but it quickly vanishes when the older jolts into awareness.

“Shut up.” He snarls, lip curling with disgust at the man’s pathetic reaction. “Shut up. I’ve listened to you enough. I’m sick of your voice. I’m sick of your fucking face.”

His hands tremble as he pulls the knife from where it’s tucked between his arm and side, and Harry startles at that, the confusion and shock on his face giving way to fear—and all Brian can think is good. He deserves to be afraid—he deserves to be confused and isolated and terrified the way he was. The older man begins struggling then, but, even as light and malnourished as Brian is, Harry cannot throw him off, especially once he wraps a hand around the bastard’s throat—not yet strangling him, but pinning him down and holding him still as he guides the knife down with a shaking hand.

“It’s your fault—all of it!” He snarls, and he wraps his fingers around the spine of the knife, pressing the blade against Harry’s throat until he can see the thin line of crimson trailing down the skin of his throat. “You’re the reason Mama died, the reason she’s gone! She’d be alive if you’d done your fucking job!”

There’s the familiar, nauseating noise of someone choking on their own breath, and Brian eases up until the man can speak unimpeded. He wants to hear whatever pathetic excuses the man has cooked up to justify the slaughter he caused.

“I did what I could with the information I had!” The disgusting, lying pig pleads, eyes wide with a terror that Brian’s seen a hundred times now. (He’s never been the cause of it before, and there’s a part of him that’s revolted that he’s 

“She told you she was caught, told you they knew—she begged you to get her out of there, but you made her keep going. You told her you’d keep her safe!” His voice goes pathetically high and whiny, breaking on the last word like a child—and, suddenly, it’s as if all those years hadn’t happened to him, or, at least, not in a way that matters. He’s six years old, covered in blood, and all he wants is Mama.

There’s no response from Harry, and Brian uses it as an excuse to continue in a low snarl, disguising the weakness in his voice.

“You didn’t even look for us—don't lie, don’t say you did! It was days—days—of sitting in the fucking shipping container, choking on the taste of Mama’s blood! You should’ve looked, should’ve checked, even just once.” Brian’s vision is blurring, now, but he can still see the older man beneath him—the world’s narrowed down, field of vision dimming until all he can see is Harry. The liar, the bastard, the fraud.

“You’re right.” He whispers.

“And after that? You left me in that place—I told you what they were doing, told you what happened, and you still left me there!” Brian’s expression crumples in on him, and he tries to blink back the tears until they end up spilling down his cheeks. “Do you know the things they did to me there? Can you even imagine it?”

“You could’ve been lying—you'd do anything to get back to your brother!” Harry snaps, finally sounding furious, and that sentence alone sends him over the edge.

“He’s my fucking brother! We're family! Of course I want to be with him—he's all I have!!” He screams, and bears his weight down in an attempt to force the blade through Harry’s jugular. He hates this man, hates the bastard that left him in such a horrible place, let his mama die, and separated him from every single person he’d ever cared for in one, swift move. But Harry seems to have training about keeping a knife off of himself, because he wraps both of his hands around Brian’s wrists and starts pushing them up—and he’s shocked to realize that it’s working.

“I know, Bri, but—” Harry starts, and Brian pushes back enough that he can slam his knees towards each other, the breath leaving the older man in a pained huff. The bastard doesn’t deserve that, doesn’t have the right to talk like they’re close or act like they’re something good. All there is between them is pain and rage—and one 

“Don’t do this!” Harry begs, and his voice is harsh with fear and desperation. “I’ll do anything!!”

Brian pauses.

“Anything, you say?” He asks, eyeing the older man warily. “Anything like what?”

“Anything you want—whatever it is! I won’t send you back, won’t call and tell them what you’ve done—or call the police and get you locked up.” Harry’s frantic, clawing at his 

“Anything?” He checks again, and Harry nods emphatically.

“Everything you desire. Just, please, don’t make my kids bury their father, too.” He’s crying now, and the sight of it makes Brian feel a bit sick—he doesn’t like crying, doesn’t like weeping or begging or anything like it. It makes him think of little kids pleading to be left alone, makes him think of Mama, begging for all of their lives before they carved her up and left both of them behind. It makes him think of pain, not power.

There’s only one thing in the world that matters to him at this point, and Harry’s just sworn that he’ll do whatever he wants, as long as he gets to keep living.

“I want to meet Dexter.” Brian states, and Harry winces. The gesture makes his blood turn icy, and he shoves the blade down again, pressing it until he sees beads of scarlet pricking at his throat. 

“Brian—!” He starts once more, but everything else is lost in a rush of rage and terror.

“What happened to him?! What have you done?!” He shrieks, leaning down until he can hear the ragged, terrified sound of his breathing, can feel the traitorous pumping of the man’s heart. “What did you do to him—Is he even alive?”

The conclusion seems certain now, and the idea that anything good could ever happen to Brian is entirely impossible. He’s cursed—he doesn’t get to have people that he loves. And, in a world like this? He has nothing to live for without Dexter. Then, the idea that comes to him makes the world fall out from beneath him, and, suddenly, Brian’s choking back tears, the air in his lungs colder than the fridge unit, and trying to keep his awareness from tumbling away from him like his self control at a high-up ledge, and Brian is just left with nothing tying him back to the ground below and the urge to jump.

“Did you kill him?” He asks, voice rasping on the whisper before he’s shouting in an attempt to stop himself from sobbing. “Did you kill him, too?!”

There isn’t an answer, and Brian shoves aside the knife entirely to wrap his hands around Harry’s throat.

“No! Stop—he isn’t dead; I didn’t kill him.” Harry babbles out between clawing at his hands, and Brian, lost between the devastation of losing more family and the blinding hope that he might still be alive, can’t do anything but listen to him, tears dripping onto the older man’s face like a leaky faucet. “He’s alive—he’s okay, I’d never do anything to hurt him!”

“You’re a liar—you lie—you just tell people what they want to hear, regardless of the truth!” He snarls, though he doesn’t wrap his fingers back around, waiting for the man to prove himself or sign his own executioner’s warrant.

“No—no, no, no, Brian. He’s alive—he’s here.” Harry explains, and it’s like the sun comes out after a decade and a half of eternal night.

“Here?” He breathes softly, blinking in surprise when Harry nods once again.

“Here—in this city, in this county. He’s here, Brian.” The man explains, and Brian’s astounded to recognize the truth in his face—his voice. They ring true the same way they did when Harry told him that it wasn’t his fault, that he didn’t do anything wrong.

“Then why—why hasn’t he come for me? If he’s so close, why hasn’t he visited me?” He can’t imagine a reason that Dexter would choose to stay away from him—ever since he was a child, he’s desperately clung to him, like Brian’s the only safe thing in the world aside from Mama. They’re meant to be together, no matter what, and Dexter was just as upset as he was when they were separated. None of that matches up with what he knows about his family, and Brian’s rarely had a poor understanding of any of them—even, after all these years, Dexter’s love of him shouldn’t have changed entirely. Surely, it can’t have shifted to indifference. Then, he notices it.

Harry looks guilty.

“What?” Brian asks, face settling into a scowl of displeasure. “What did you do?”

“So…He doesn’t, exactly, know he has a brother.” Harry explains hesitantly, and it’s only through a feat of monumental self-control that he doesn’t slap the man across the face and send the knife through his throat, though he does wrap his fingers around the handle once more. Dexter doesn’t know he has a brother? Doesn’t even know that Brian exists? It’s awful—it’s preposterous—and it’s a complete violation of his right to know about himself and his history. Seeing his confusion, Harry once again speaks up. “He’s forgotten what happened, Brian. He doesn’t even remember how Laura died.”

“I want to meet him.” Brian restates, going back to Harry promises of whatever he wants to survive. “I want to meet him, and you’re going to tell him who I am to him.”

“Are you genuinely going to put your brother through all the trauma you experienced, because you don’t want to be alone?” Harry asks, and he can all but hear the derision in his tone.

“No! Of course not—I love my brother; of course I don’t want him hurting.” He rushes to defend himself before he finally voices his reasoning, hoping that it might ease Harry’s judgment towards him. “I just want him to know he’s my family!”

The line comes across as frail and childish in the silence between them, and Brian feels his cheeks go scarlet with shame once again. He keeps doing this, keeps falling apart when he’s meant to be in control, keeps showing weakness when he’s supposed to be at the strongest he’s ever been. It doesn’t make sense—it goes against every rule he learned throughout his childhood, each lesson to keep every emotion locked up and hidden so that it can’t be used against him later. He’s had years to practice—to perfect—his craft; it’s the only reason why he’s still alive today. So why is he falling apart? Why is he breaking down, now, after everything he’s survived?

But, for some reason, that line is what makes the furrow of Harry’s brow smooth out once again, and his eyes go from fury-filled to something more akin to concern.

“I don’t want him to be a stranger.” Brian repeats, trying to make sure Harry understands what he’s saying before they try to make any commitment.

“I’ll introduce both of you. I understand,” The man replies, voice remarkably steady for someone who was just being strangled.

“Soon—I don’t want to wait for months while you put things off and try to gather evidence to have me put away again.” Brian’s not stupid—if Harry’s given the chance to get rid of him again, he will, regardless of any claims of guilt, remorse, or shame. It’s human nature, and Harry has no reason to like him.

“I can do it tomorrow, if you want.”

The statement’s so surprising that Brian loses his hold on the man entirely, blinking with shock. Tomorrow? Even if his most hopeful and expeditious estimates were around a week or two. But tomorrow? It sounds impossible, like a fairy tale, something that can happen if the stars align, and everything falls into place. And Harry’s said it like it’s obvious, like it’s the only natural conclusion. He wants an explanation, and he’s so surprised—gobsmacked, really—that he barely reacts to the older man sitting up to lean against the headboard of the bed, just moves his hands to balance himself on the man’s shoulders.

“Tomorrow?” He asks, echoing his thoughts. “How is that even possible? Don’t you have to make arrangements with the foster parents?”

Harry pauses, clearly trying to psyche himself up for whatever it is that he’s about to say, and it makes Brian’s stomach twist with nerves once more. But he doesn’t respond; he doesn’t react. He can be patient, can be mature. As long as Harry tells him in the end, he can wait a minute or two for the man to pull himself together. He’s rewarded for his patience when Harry takes a deep, steeling breath and speaks once more.

“I’m the foster parent—adoptive parent. I took him in after what happened to Laura, and I’ve raised him ever since.”

Brian doesn’t punch him.

Brian does not punch him. No matter how much he wants to.

What he does do is give the man a look of utter disdain and concern.

“Dexter. Your son is Dexter. Your son, who ‘might be home, but he probably snuck out,’ according to you.” He clarifies, never breaking eye contact with Harry while he speaks. The man’s eyes go wide with terror, and his pupils dilate rapidly to absorb more light. “That son is my Dexter?”

“…Yes.” Harry pauses, but eventually eventually responds, and Brian gives him a derisive look.

“You don’t know where my brother is—my brother, who witnessed a murder. Who lives in the same city as one of our Mama’s killers.”

“Well, when you say it like that—”

“It’s shitty.” Brian states firmly, and Harry exhales in a sharp hiss.

“He’s safe.” Harry promises, and he scoffs disbelievingly. “I’ve taught him self-defense, and he’s more than capable of taking care of himself.”

That’s a good thing, if the man’s telling the truth, but Brian can barely imagine Dexter wanting to fight or defend himself. Then, he remembers that he has no basis upon which to build an image of what Dexter’s like, no knowledge about the way his experiences have changed him from the shy, sweet boy that he was so close to in childhood. He’s suddenly and painfully aware that he doesn’t know anything about his baby brother. Last time he’d seen Dexter, he was sweet and shy, the kind of boy who could melt anyone’s heart with a single conversation—and now? Now, he’s an adult, a teenager with hopes and dreams and fears that Brian might never be privy to, and the idea of being such a stranger to the most important person in his life. It makes him mad—it hurts, though Brian knows he’s being stupid for expecting a traumatized three-year-old to remember him—and he takes shaky, jagged breaths through gritted teeth to stay calm.

“What’s he like?” He questions, tilting his head.

“He’s a bright boy—incredibly smart—but he’s a bit antisocial, flat affect.” Harry explains to him, and Brian absorbs the words like they’re the only sacred thing he’ll ever need. Of course Dexter’s still clever, Brian thinks fondly, he was filled with incredible wit and creativity when he was young, but the comments about Dexter being antisocial leave him with a sour taste in his mouth. He knows those words, those descriptions—he had all of them applied to him, after all, without any regard for the fact that Mama had died only days ago and that his brother had been ripped from his arms. Those words—antisocial, flat affect—set off alarm bells he didn’t know he was still attuned to, and it makes Brian look at Harry oddly.

“Is he…okay?” He questions, trying to ignore the way his fingers flex around the handle of the knife—he needs to stay calm, needs to be in control of himself right now. “Is he safe?”

Harry seems to know that he’s stumbled onto something that might have been better left alone, but he acknowledges the fact that he’s made that mistake with enough grace to make it tolerable, and Brian watches the man’s face ripple with uncertainty before he starts composing what he’s going to say. His heart thunders in his chest like an over-excited drum, and he waits with bated breath for Harry to speak.

“He’s okay—he’s safe. Dexter’s fine.” The man says, hedging around the issue a bit. “He has some emotional difficulties; I think they’re a remnant of the trauma, but we’re handling it.”

A breathless chuckle leaves him without his consent. He’s thrilled; he’s relieved—Dexter isn’t hurt or injured or so damaged that his every waking moment is haunted, not the way Brian is, and that’s all he can ask for.

And then he remembers that he has no proof of anything, no way of ensuring that Harry’s telling the truth right now—Dexter could be halfway across the world; he could be dead right now, and the only thing that he has to go off of is Harry Morgan’s notoriously unreliable word.

“You’re telling the truth—you swear you’re telling the truth?” Brian asks warily, raising the knife once more to put it against Harry’s throat—but the man locks a hand around his wrist, stops him in his attempt to threaten him without a single sign of effort plastered across him. He struggles, twists his wrist and writhes—even digs his nails into the flesh of Harry’s arms!—all, to no avail. He just doesn’t react, giving him a stony look. When Brian’s brain finally lets him acknowledge that he’s not getting his last hand free, he reaches up with his other hand, and Harry grabs that one, too! Without any effort, the man restrains him, and he becomes 

“No,” Harry tells him, with a look that’s annoyingly parental for someone who just fucked him. “No—we’re not going to do that.”

“You’re not my fucking dad! You don’t tell me what to do!!” Brian hisses, peripherally aware that he did, in fact, do things that violated both of those claims only hours ago—still; Harry has no control of what he’s doing outside their one tumble in the sheets, and he won’t tolerate being treated like an unstable, unruly child. He won’t let the bastard pretend he’s someone Harry cares about. That hypocrite had years to intervene, years to try to help him, years to do something—anything—to get him out of that god-awful place. And he didn’t. He chose to do nothing. So he’s robbed himself of any basis to pretend that he gives a shit.

“I’m not,” Harry agrees, “But we’re going to put that down.” And he tightens his grip on Brian’s left wrist until he’s biting back whimpers of pain, until the sharp, needle-like prickles off his circulation going blurry have his hand twitching like he’s suffocating. But he doesn’t want to give in—doesn’t want to give up, to prove that he’s not a threat and get thrown back in prison. His muscles twitch and recoil as heat starts stinging him with a wasp’s fury, and Brian lets out a frustrated groan, making a final futile attempt to escape his new, flesh bonds.

“Let go of me.” He orders, though he once again feels stupid, feels helpless. He feels like the same little kid he was before, trying to get adults to stop deciding what they’ll do to him without any voice of his own.

“Brian, we have an arrangement here.” The older man states, and Brian scoffs—they haven’t shaken hands or written a contract; there’s no bond or proof. They have bargaining attempts, but no agreement. Still, he lets Harry continue. “I’ll introduce you to your brother—tomorrow morning, first thing after we get up and eat breakfast. I’m going to introduce you honestly, tell him you’re his brother and explain the situation to him. In return, you’re not going to kill me. Deal?”

His words are phrased like a question, but the tone he takes tells Brian more than that. It’s an agreement, his sole way out of a doomed situation. There’s no chance of escape—not when Harry’s as strong and skilled as he is, and Brian’s still having fainting episodes. Slowly, hesitantly, and entirely aware that he’s giving up his sole means of defense, Brian releases the knife from his dominant hand, letting it drop onto the twisted blankets between them. Then, Harry releases his wrists, snatching the knife away and leaving him to rub at his wrists to coax the circulation back into them.

“First thing in the morning?” He repeats warily, arranging for enough confirmation that the man can’t convince him he’d imagined the conversation.

“First thing.” Harry promises, and he wonders if it’s any more sincere than the last thousand he made to fools like him and Mama. He wonders if he’ll end up any different than her in the end.

“I’m going to haunt you if you kill me.” Brian swears, though he has no idea if that’s even possible—he’s haunted in every sense of the word, sees visions and hears voices of the past when things get too similar to the way things were; he sees Mama in everything he does, hears her whispering to him, hears the guttural noise of her screams ending as she chokes on her blood. He’s haunted. There’s no escape from it. But Brian doesn’t know if he—or Harry—believes in ghosts enough for that to be a deterrent from killing him in his sleep.

“Sure you are, kid.” Harry just laughs, and he fights back the instincts that urge him to bristle at the comment. But, he’s tired, and the bed is softer than anything he’s ever felt before. Brian burrows underneath the covers once more, skin prickling with gooseflesh at the encounter that just occurred. (He’s almost there. Just a little longer—he just has to be strong a little longer.) He closes his eyes and prays—though he doesn’t know to whom—that he’ll wake up in the morning.

——

Harry looses a sigh the moment he can tell that Brian’s finally drifted off to sleep—he can’t bring himself to let his guard down after what just happened with him—and decides to contemplate the situation he’s found himself in more thoroughly. He has three and thirty reasons to be concerned and wary. Looking at the boy again with a more critical eye, he’s noticed more and more wrong with him than he initially expected. Brian’s body is made up of the sharp curves and jutting angles that come with food deprivation—and, God, the boy said he hadn’t even had his period in months. Whatever happened to him during the missing time between their meetings left its mark.

He wasn’t sure what he expected to happen when he left Brian Moser at the institute in Tampa, but he knew it wouldn’t be anything particularly good. (He remembers pleas for help, a high, childish voice breaking as he said, “The people here aren’t good.” He feels like he’s going to be sick.) Maybe, he had hoped, the doctors would be good enough to stamp out the trauma he knew would rear its ugly head, making Brian a threat to himself and others. Perhaps he’d grow up, overmedicated and unfeeling—and an outsider to all—but ultimately safe to the people around him. In his darkest, angriest moments, he’d even hoped that Brian would take care of the issue himself—that the memories of what had happened would be too much, and he’d kill himself before he could ever hurt a living being.

(Though, several years later and faced with Dexter, he’s appalled that he could ever think that way about a child.)

Now, though, there are very real consequences to the choice he made as a younger man, to his decision to hide from his guilt rather than face it. Harry doesn’t know exactly what’s happened to Brian, but the most important parts are clear to see. The institution didn’t fix him, didn’t even try if he was able to get out while planning a murder. It didn’t acknowledge any of the trauma he went through or help him cope—if anything, it made him worse, left him with wounds that make him more dangerous than he was before. But there are two facts that are more important than anything else: One, Brian has the Need in his eyes, that same desperation for violence or blood that haunts Dexter; and, Two, Harry hasn’t spent a decade and a half teaching him to kill the right people.

What is he supposed to do with this?

He can’t just tell Brian to fuck off again, can’t tell him to go away or else he’ll call the cops, can’t just bo him up and send him to another institution that could more easily rip his psyche into a thousand jagged pieces than put him back together again. The boy’s dangerous; he’s violent, and he’s going to kill people, no matter what.

Fuck. How is he supposed to explain this? Tell Dexter and Debbie that Dex has an older brother that he lied about for fifteen years? Say that he left him, because he thought that he was too old to be helped the way he wanted to do for Dexter? That won’t make the situation any better—especially considering the fact that Brian won’t do anything to portray what Harry did in a positive light unless he’s forced too. (And he’s now very aware of the possibility that getting too controlling with Brian would be a very bad idea, too—the boy’s glutting himself on freedom after years of enforced order, and being too similar to the institution would turn a tempermental

No matter what he does, things are going to go wrong. Things are going to be different. Dexter will be confused—angry—for the years of lying. Debra will be filled with that righteous fury that makes her think she’d be a good cop. (But he knows; he joined up with that fury, that burning desire to make the world a better place. And how has he ended up? Teaching his son how to commit murder and not get caught by the cops. No, Deb can’t become a cop, much less a detective—the job would break her.) Things are going to change, and they can never go back.

He has one thing he has to do, no matter what: introduce Brian to Dexter honestly, consequences be damned.

He’ll have to wait for tomorrow to see what happens for the rest of it.