Chapter Text
Simon has a problem, he’s certain of that. It haunts him all hours of day and night. The worst is when he’s reminded of it out of no where. The more he thinks about it, and he can’t stop thinking about it, the stronger it roots itself into every fiber of his being. And he’s suppressed it to the point where now it feels like it’s going to smother him and it has him fighting against his old defense mechanism. He can’t act like that, especially not when Grace is simply just existing and Simon is the one who’s been ignoring this feeling he has, this problem.
He hates how inappropriate it feels to be like this to the man who opened his life and home to him. The man who gives and gives and gives. Who doesn’t expect anything in return. Who has shown up for Simon time and time again, given him a space so safe it took Simon a lot of work to accept it. And it’s all led to Simon being unable to focus on his own research because he can’t stop imagining holding the scientist close to himself, or how he would react if Simon kissed and left his mark all along his neck. And he feels like the shittiest person for thinking about his friend that way.
Stealing a glance across the living room, Simon takes in how Grace sits criss-cross in the plush chair, laptop cushioned on a pillow propped on this legs, arms crossed, a twizzler still hanging from his mouth as he absentmindedly chews on it in thought with his brows furrowed. Simon has to quickly tear his gaze from the sight, glaring down at his own work. Not fucking helping.
The engineer stands abruptly, shoving his work onto the couch. “I need to go for a walk.”
Attention pulled from his own work, Grace beams at Simon and that does something worse to his chest. “I’ll come with you! I need to stretch my legs.” Grace isn’t as rough with his computer, but he isn’t careful either as he stands to meet Simon at the door.
This is backfiring. He needs space to clear his head of the man, push the stupid fucking fantasies away again, but he isn’t about to tell Grace he wants to be alone, because disappointing Grace would be worse than anything.
So he just hums, evading the sight of the other as he stretches. Hopefully, the fresh air will still be better. The openness of the beach, surprisingly, has been soothing to him. He also likes how cool the water is, even if he refuses to venture far out into it. Having the tide ebb and flow over his feet is helping him clear his mind. At least it’s better than being in a much smaller, enclosed space, which was not helping his cagey mood. It’s helping him hold back a snappy attitude as Grace walks beside him, half of him wanting his friend closer while the other half prays he goes back inside the damn house because he can’t stand not being able to close the distance.
And Grace, unaware of the turmoil Simon is fighting for the air in his lungs over, is telling him about Adrian leading their team and has recently made contact with beings a solar system over and is consulting with Grace about helping with translating. And despite all the tension in Simon’s body, watching Grace talk so animatedly about the new project pulls a chuckle from him. Grace has the same look on his face as when the Eridians finally replicated a coffee bean.
Everything else is still weighing on Simon, but now the lighter feeling is simply added into the mix. He gets an idea that may help shove the cagey feeling away more. “What do you want for dinner? I’ll cook this time.”
“You sure? Today’s your day off, and I know what we have as far as food is still limited-”
Rolling his eyes, Simon grins, “Yeah, I haven’t done much of anything today and I’ve been going a bit stir crazy. Besides, what we have is still far more than what I’ve worked with in the past. I’m pretty sure I can figure it out.”
“Hmm alright,” Grace shoves his fists into his cardigan, slowly blowing out a deep breath as he thinks over his options, “spaghetti and meat balls? It’s a classic. Even better since you’ve gotten into gardening.”
“It’s a good thing that your ship had hundreds of seed packets and I have free access to your computer.”
“Hey,” Grace puts his hands up in a weak defense, “You get into gardening? And I don’t have to only live off of synthetic me-burgers anymore? Simon, you can have literally anything you want.” Chuckling, Grace bumps their shoulders together, “Adrian is extremely interested in your hobby and about to invest more space for an extension of the biodome.”
Simon adds quickly, “No more houses.” He follows after the brush of warmth Grace gave him, not ready or willing to let it slip away just yet. “A greenhouse would be more than appreciated, I’m not ungrateful for that.” He doesn’t want his own house. The emptiness, just the thought of him being the only one in it, it makes him nauseous.
Grace follows along with Simon, pressing his arm against Simon’s with a content hum. “No, I get it. I’m glad you prefer staying with me because I’d be pretty lonely if you moved out,” the other adds hurriedly, “even if just next door. I- yeah.” He rushes onto his next sentence, not giving the thought time to settle. “Besides I asked Adrian about their plans and they immediately said the same thing as you, actually,” Grace laughs, his smile bringing Simon more comfort than the waves and the shore and the breeze. There’s just something gentle about Grace’s expression, a softness that Simon could never possess. And the breeze, even if artificial, wisps around around Grace, as though to return that gentleness in kind.
Before the sight has it’s chance to do something awful to his chest, Simon turns back toward the house- their house, his mind corrects. “I’ve had enough air. I’m going to go start dinner.” The loss of warmth from Grace is immediately cooled by the early evening breeze. Though somewhere in the back of his mind, Simon rotates the thought of the breeze that surrounds Grace being the same one that twirls around him now, comforting that mutual loss. The gentle illumination Grace envelops Simon in is worth the moments of ache he feels to hold Grace. Simon may never be able to offer the gentleness Grace does, but he’ll give everything he has to him.
…
While Simon cooks, Grace sits on the counter next to the stove, rambling about the astrophage levels in the nearby star systems are going down exponentially at the success of the Eridian Expeditions he and Rocky started planning when they arrived on Erid. It somehow led to Grace talking about how social celebrations work on the planet. Which, naturally, led Grace to talking about when Rocky explained Eridian courtship and Adrian choosing Rocky to court.
“They were pretty much the equivalent of high school sweethearts, kinda. I had thought that Rocky was a little bit of a romantic until I finally met Adrian. They dote on Rocky and its just the cutest, but I think part of it is making up for lost time,” Grace helps Simon by gently pulling Simon’s hair back into a hair tie to keep it out of his face while he cooks. “It’s the sweetest. I used to never really understand that sort of thing.”
The brush of Grace’s hands along his skin sets every nerve on fire, burning in a way that’s too much but not damn near enough. Simon is at such a loss of what to do because this is the first time in his life he’s felt like this. Everything he’s been realizing the past month or so is a first for him. So he keeps his eyes on the simmering pot in front of him, humming to Grace’s story and thoughts, using too much of his attention to be very intentional about unclenching his jaw. Rocky is constantly telling him that he’s doing it so much that it makes him uncomfortable standing just a little too close to him.
“Si?”
The engineer glances up to his friend. God this man is beautiful, his glasses hanging from where he rests them off his ear because he hates how the product in his hair smudges them, his five o’clock shadow patchy in some spots carelessly, and his hair sticking up in all different directions. And then the smile that haunts Simon, stealing too many hours of his night. Throat dry and breath caught there, he swallows harshly before answering, “Yeah?”
Simon can’t tell if Grace actually glances down to his lips as he puts his glasses back on his nose or if it’s just his own wishful thinking, as it happened in the blink of an eye, if it happened at all. “I, uh, was wondering, only if, well, I-,” Grace quickly averts his gaze, shaking his head with a nervous laugh, “You know what, never-”
Still reeling too much from his debatably imagined glace, Simon reaches across Grace’s space, placing his hand down in the space between Grace’s thigh and his hand. “Use your words, Grace.” One of his brows twitch, not nearly as patient as Grace is. “I hate guessing games, so spit it out.”
The nervous grin never leaves Grace’s lips and the bulb above the stove highlights the way blood rushes to his cheeks.
Oh… oh no. Fuckshitdammit. I’m such a du- Simon curses himself for the position he’s just forced them both into, but isn’t able or maybe isn't willing to pull away. He’ll pull away once Grace says what he needs to say. Yeah. He steels himself, standing his ground as he looks up at Grace expectantly.
The other breathes in, seemingly calming his own nerves. “I wanted to know if,” he drags the opening of his request out slowly, still trying to put together the best phrasing for his question, “you would be interested in, like,” pausing for a moment, Grace chews on his lower lip as he thinks over his next words, or maybe debates whether or not to say them at all? Knowing that Grace feels more confident with physical reassurance, and setting his own fucking feelings aside because Grace is more important than his own fears and bullshit, Simon slides his hand over onto Grace’s, where it’s resting on the counter, trying to encouragingly rub his thumb over the other’s. “Can we, or… I want to, you can say no,”
“Grace, I won’t do anything that I don’t want to do. The worst I’ll say is no. Stop worrying that you’ll lose me because, dammit,” Simon sucks in a sharp breath, unable to tell which one of them laces their fingers with the other, “you have me, I promise.” Too close, too close, too close. Simon fights against every fiber of his being not to bolt from how close the words and actions are, just boiling beneath the surface.
“Would you be willing to hold me?” Grace’s eyes are glued intensely to the pots on the stove, his interlaced fingers tight on Simon’s. “Like, more than just a loose hug? Maybe kis-” Grace cuts himself off, his breath becoming shaky and wavering. “No, actually this is probably the stupidest-”
His mind finally catching up on the moment, Simon squeezes Grace’s hand with just as much strength in return, surging forward to place a kiss on his cheek. Just as he moves forward, though, Grace turns to look at him and-
Simon’s lips land on the corner of Grace’s.
Neither of them move for a tense moment, and just as the doubt begins to pour in on Simon, and he’s about to pull away because he misunderstood, and he has finally taken too much, Grace snakes his other arm around Simon’s shoulders, pulling them closer to one another.
Simon presses another kiss to Grace’s lips, this one stronger and more intentional than the last. Grace returns the kiss with just as much force, just as much eagerness, inching his body closer to the edge of the counter. Letting go of Grace’s hand, Simon wraps his arm around Grace’s waist, under his cardigan, like he has been itching to do all month, pulling Grace as close to his own body as possible, every nerve lit ablaze now.
Tilting his head, Grace deepens the kiss by parting his lips. Simon follows his lead, copying his actions. When he feels Grace’s tongue brush against his own in the same moment that Grace slides his free hand up, tangling it into the hair at the base of Simon’s skull, Simon damn near loses his mind. He pushes his own tongue into Grace’s mouth, but with more aggression than Grace had done, clutching the cotton fabric of Grace’s shirt tightly in his fist, trying his damnedest to pull him closer. The heat making his head swim, Simon thinks he can’t possibly be driven over this edge any further, as the two of them fight to kiss one another, hold on another closer.
But then Grace makes this sound that Simon couldn’t name if he tried. But he’s a damned man if he never hears it again. He tries to deepen the kiss again, but Grace pushes away just enough to break the kiss with a wet sound. Simon drinks in the sight of Grace’s flushed face, glasses fogged to hell and more crooked than he’s ever seen them, his lips a goddamn mess, parted as he desperately tries to catch his breath. There’s this haze clouding Grace’s eyes as he studies Simon’s face just as intensely over the rims of his glasses, leaving Simon marveling over how the hell this man manages to become hotter by each passing second.
“Ryland,” Simon’s voice strained and something akin to a gasp escapes Grace’s throat as his thighs squeeze around Simon’s waist, god, “you are going be the to end of me.”
A shiver courses down Grace’s body, arms pulling tighter around Simon, “Well, uh,” Grace finally seem to find his voice, “that would actually be very unfortunate, and, you know, probably counterproductive.”
Simon snorts as he presses kisses along Grace’s jaw.
“Si, the sauce is gonna burn.” Despite the protest, Grace makes absolutely no move to let Simon go. And like hell is he going to let Grace go first.
“Then turn the burner off,” Simon presses another kiss to the side of Grace’s neck, just underneath his jaw before leaning up to whisper in his ear, “we can get back to it later.” He smirks at how violently Grace shudders at the feeling of his breath ghosting over him as he returns to pressing another set of kisses down his neck.
Grace squirms under Simon, almost trembling, “But the pasta will get mushy and gross.”
Sighing, Simon pulls back before he even has the chance to try sinking his teeth into Grace. He refuses to let go of his shirt, to loosen his hold just yet. “Like I said, you are going to be the end of me.”
Grace smiles awkwardly as he finally releases his grip on Simon, “We both hate when it’s mushy and you hate to waste food and I hate to let you eat food you don’t like.” Grace’s smile softens into something more apologetic. “We can pick up where we left off?”
“Hmm.” Simon feigns thinking it over, though like hell is this the end of this. “Maybe.” He teasingly presses a kiss to Grace’s cheek as he pats the side of his thigh.
Once Grace releases him from the lock that Simon didn’t even realized he had him in, Simon works quickly to finishing dinner. Being the one who eats faster gives him the advantage to teasing the other through the remainder of his meal.