Archive of Our Own ^beta

It was starting to become something of a habit, finding Obi-Wan in his bed—though not quite in the way Qui-Gon had long wanted. It might not have been a problem but for one thing: every time it happened, Qui-Gon’s room smelled of Obi-Wan for what seemed like days, a warmth of sandalwood and spice and something he couldn’t quite place except to say that it was Obi-Wan. It lingered in a way that wasn’t just olfactory, rooted somehow in Obi-Wan’s near-blinding presence in the Force.

It was a scent that Qui-Gon could easily lose himself in, one he wanted to wrap tightly around the jagged pieces of his own being.

It reminded him of things he wasn’t sure he could ever have, though really, it wasn’t as if the want ever actually went away.

Truly, Qui-Gon didn’t mind. In the months since Naboo and Obi-Wan’s Knighting, it had been difficult to accustom himself to silent rooms and empty quarters. Obi-Wan’s presence was a balm, in any way Qui-Gon could get it.

That didn’t mean it wasn’t going to drive him insane.

The first time it happened, nearly four months after Naboo, it was nearing midnight. Qui-Gon had returned to his quarters after a quiet dinner with Adi and Mace to find Obi-Wan fast asleep in the centre of his bed. Obi-Wan was still fully clothed and sprawled on his stomach, one side of his face pressed into a pillow above the trim arch of his body. What Qui-Gon could see of his brow was lined with fatigue even in sleep.

The weight of his limbs made creases in the carefully stmoothed covers that Qui-Gon never wanted to erase.

Qui-Gon stood there, perplexed and unmoving, for a full sixty seconds. He hadn’t even known that Obi-Wan was returned from Yanath; to see him so unexpectedly, and in a place Qui-Gon had wished to have him for years, was a little like drowning.

In the end, despite the fact that it was late and Qui-Gon wanted nothing more than to sleep in his own bed, he couldn’t bring himself to wake his former padawan. The exhaustion on Obi-Wan’s face was troubling; perhaps he had taken on too much, too soon.

Yanath, Qui-Gon knew, was not an easy planet.

So instead, he spent the night in Obi-Wan’s old room, uncomfortably curled on a too-small mattress in a too-small frame that hadn’t been used in months, and tried not to wonder why Obi-Wan was sleeping in his bed. To wonder was to remember the lines of Obi-Wan’s body with an intimacy he had no right to.

It felt wrong, somehow, in the close confines of this bed that had once been Obi-Wan’s.

The next morning, when he emerged from Qui-Gon’s sleeping chamber, Obi-Wan flushed a deep red that reached from the roots of his hair to the sweep of his collarbones, one of which was just visible above the skewed neckline of his robes. He mumbled an apology and something about the uncanny effects of exhaustion, and Qui-Gon managed—just barely—to keep himself from kissing the sweet span of skin where Obi-Wan’s neck angled into shoulder. Instead, he shook his head in bemusement and made tea for breakfast and did not tease Obi-Wan overly much.

Yanath had been his first solo mission, after all. Perhaps it had touched something deep within, spurred a loneliness that Qui-Gon himself felt all too much these days.

The second time, a few months later, it was the middle of the day. Word around the Temple was that Obi-Wan had just finished briefing the Council on the hostilities on Cantra. Qui-Gon had seen his ship come in, had spent long minutes searching him out to inquire about his well-being—and when he had finally given up and retreated to his own quarters, found Obi-Wan curled up on one side of his bed. The edge of Qui-Gon’s blankets were tugged partially over his body as if he had run out of energy halfway through covering himself.

Qui-Gon stared at him, eyes narrowed in confusion, for a moment that seemed to stretch indeterminately. He had assumed that last time had been an aberration, a mistake—that Obi-Wan had simply returned, on autopilot, to quarters that were familiar to him after the exhaustion of a long mission. That he had somehow accidentally ended up in Qui-Gon's bed.

He had thought he would never again be confronted by Obi-Wan’s presence within this most intimate space.

But whatever the reason Obi-Wan was here again in Qui-Gon’s bed, there was no point in waking him now, not simply to satisfy Qui-Gon’s own puzzlement. So he carefully settled the blankets more fully around Obi-Wan and left him be.

He pretended to read in his sitting room until Obi-Wan emerged much later with a wary look to his eyes and a flush to his cheeks.

Qui-Gon had meant to broach the subject, he truly had. He had planned to make light of it, to smile and to ask if Obi-Wan was not sick of him yet. But Obi-Wan’s eyes were a little too haunted, his shoulders a little too slumped, and when Qui-Gon pressed, he spoke of the way no words had been able to bring peace to a war-torn planet. Qui-Gon didn't have the heart to make light of anything, after that, so he made dinner instead and listened late into the night.

Later, after Obi-Wan had left, Qui-Gon spent the night drifting in a half sleep while his traitorous body strained to feel the ghost-heat of Obi-Wan upon the sheets.

Over the next several months, it happened again and again and again, a third time and a fourth time and a fifth. Qui-Gon would return to his quarters and, if Obi-Wan was also in residence at the Temple, would occasionally find his erstwhile padawan wrapped within his blankets, stretched out on his sheets, buried in his pillows.

Over the years of their acquaintance, Qui-Gon had seen Obi-Wan sleep on tiny cots in crowded rooms, upright seats on transport ships, the worn couch in Qui-Gon’s sitting room—a million places and more.

Somehow, this was different. The dishevelled, peaceful look of him in a place where no one but Qui-Gon had ever been…

He wondered, once or twice or three hundred times, if it ever happened when he wasn’t there. If Obi-Wan ever slept in his bed while Qui-Gon was off-world, curled into sheets that Qui-Gon hadn’t touched in days or weeks but still held his lingering scent.

He wondered, once and exactly once, if the reason he never put a stop to it was because he was pretty sure this was the only way he’d ever have Obi-Wan in that bed.

It was the sixth time that finally changed things.

It was late, and Qui-Gon was tired. He had only just returned from a follow-up assignment to Naboo—a courtesy visit, really, but one he was best-suited to conduct due to his acquaintance with the Queen. He had planned to sleep, to shower, and to debrief the Council, in that very order.

Somehow, deep within, it almost wasn’t a surprise to find Obi-Wan stretched out on his back, Qui-Gon’s covers pooled low enough on his chest to reveal the worn shirt he wore beneath. The unguarded look on his face made Qui-Gon’s heart ache, a little, as he hovered on the threshold of his own sleeping chamber.

His plans, very suddenly, went out the window. After over a year without Obi-Wan’s continual presence, over a year of subsisting on the crumbs of mere visits between missions…

Perhaps it was his own exhaustion. Perhaps it was an assignment that had brought his mind back to the place and the time that had been his last mission together with Obi-Wan. Perhaps it was simply the want and the need to hear Obi-Wan’s voice. But instead of leaving Obi-Wan to his rest as he had done so many times before, Qui-Gon crossed the space between them. He carefully lowered himself to the edge of the bed, sitting close enough to feel the electricity of Obi-Wan’s skin but not quite close enough to touch.

He pitched his voice low in an attempt not to startle. “Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes slowly blinked open, and even in the dimness, Qui-Gon fancied that he could see the blue of them.

“Qui-Gon?” Obi-Wan’s voice was a little hazy with sleep, catching roughly on the consonants in a way that went straight to Qui-Gon’s gut. Qui-Gon wondered if he should have just gone to sleep after all, creeping into Obi-Wan’s old room and spending the night in that too-small (too empty) bed like he had in the past. There was little chance he would soon forget the sound of Obi-Wan’s voice, sounding like that, in the confines of Qui-Gon’s own bed.

He thought it might haunt him to the end of his days.

Qui-Gon managed to keep his voice light. “You keep materializing in my bed.” He smiled as he spoke, to remove any sting that might be construed in his words. There was just enough light coming in through the open doorway that he knew Obi-Wan could see it. “And while I truly do not mind, I find I cannot help but wonder why.”

Obi-Wan seemed to come awake all at once, his body tensing into a frozen tableau. Qui-Gon could see the instant when he forced his limbs to relax back to looseness. Still, he sat up quickly enough that Qui-Gon felt his own head swim in sympathy, and reached out instinctively to steady Obi-Wan with a hand on his shoulder.

He wondered if it was just his imagination that Obi-Wan leaned in to him for a moment.

For a brief time they sat like that, close enough that Qui-Gon could feel the air stir between them as Obi-Wan breathed. The spicy sweet scent of him was almost overwhelming.

Finally, Obi-Wan broke the silence.

“Master, I….” his voice stuttered to a stop, and Qui-Gon waited patiently for him to start again. When he did, his voice was calmer, more even. “I owe you an apology, Qui-Gon.”

Qui-Gon slowly drew his hand back from Obi-Wan’s shoulder and rested it on the mattress beside him. “Whatever for?”

Obi-Wan huffed incredulously and raised both hands to scrub through his hair. It was long enough, now, to tangle a little around his fingers. “For invading your privacy, for starters. For entering your chambers unpermitted. For sleeping in your bed.”

Qui-Gon shook his head slowly. “You are welcome in my quarters anytime, Obi-Wan. You know that.” He smiled again and tried to tease gently. It was very difficult, with Obi-Wan so close and his scent all around, when all Qui-Gon wanted to do was bear him down to the mattress and press him against the sheets. “Though I might point out that there is still a very serviceable bed in the next room. One that is currently unused, I might add—and is a little too small to be comfortable for me.”

“Yes, I…I know.” Qui-Gon suspected that there was a distinct flush on Obi-Wan’s face. He wished there was more light in the room, that he could see the way it spread across the fairness of his cheekbones. “I…the first few times, I truly don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t, I suspect.” His voice fell hollowly into the small space between them. “It just felt like the only place I could actually sleep, and you never told me to go.”

Qui-Gon noted the qualification, and the way that it invited a very specific question.

“And this time?”

Obi-Wan wouldn’t meet Qui-Gon’s eyes, gaze fixed on the way his fingers were smoothing the covers where they draped over one knee. “This time,” Obi-Wan finally said, and there was a hesitant but stubborn set to his jaw that Qui-Gon wanted to soothe away, “I was tired of missing you. Of wanting to be in your company. I thought that….” He lifted his gaze to settle on one of Qui-Gon’s shoulders. “I guess I wasn’t thinking much this time, either. I thought it might be better, somehow, in a place that felt like you.”

And Qui-Gon—

Qui-Gon wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. Was Obi-Wan speaking to a friend sorely missed in the hectic patterns of Jedi life? A former Master whose presence was no longer the anchor it had once been? Or…

The very thought, unarticulated though it remained, was enough to make his head spin.

In the end, Qui-Gon supposed it didn’t really matter, at least not to what he had to say next. Honesty deserved honesty, and Obi-Wan had made himself vulnerable even if Qui-Gon did not quite understand how.

He deserved something of Qui-Gon in return.

“It has been difficult seeing you in my bed,” Qui-Gon began quietly, “when what I want—“

He fell silent for a moment, searching for the right words.

Obi-Wan finally prompted him to continue. “When what you want is what?” His tongue peeked out to briefly touch his bottom lip, as if he was hungry for Qui-Gon’s answer, and Qui-Gon had to momentarily close his eyes before opening them once again.

“Is to keep you here,” he finally admitted.

“How…how long do you want to keep me here?” Obi-Wan asked, the words almost tumbling over one another, and somehow the shakiness in his voice left Qui-Gon no longer in doubt.

“Hours,” he said simply. “The whole night. A lifetime.”

Obi-Wan let out a breath, and it felt like the easiest thing Qui-Gon had ever done to reach out and brush the backs of his fingers against the curve of Obi-Wan’s cheek. The world dwindled down to the feel of skin against skin, expanded to eternity when Obi-Wan quickly turned his head to purse his lips against Qui-Gon’s knuckles.

He felt a protest rise in his throat when the warmth of that mouth moved away, but it faded to silence when Obi-Wan tucked the fingers of one hand beneath the belt of Qui-Gon’s robe and tugged until they both fell, ungainly, to the mattress. It was unexpected enough to unbalance Qui-Gon, though he managed to catch himself on one forearm so that he was hovering just above Obi-Wan on the bed. The covers caught awkwardly between them, but Obi-Wan was kicking them away even as he busied himself pressing kisses to Qui-Gon’s mouth.

“Are you sure?” Qui-Gon asked hoarsely in between presses of lips, and Obi-Wan only tugged him closer. Qui-Gon could feel it as Obi-Wan’s mouth curved momentarily into a smile.

“You’re never getting me out of this bed.”

Indeed, they kept each other there for hours, the whole night, again and again across the brief, vast span of a lifetime.