Archive of Our Own ^beta

He has a vivid memory decades old:

It's mid-summer, a sweltering hot July, and they are somewhere down south. Bradley's lived in so many places he's lost count. He's wading around in the knee-deep weeds outside the house, poking a crooked stick at random bits on the ground while Maverick talks to Iceman on the wooden porch. It's one of the rare occasions both of them have come to visit around the same time. Iceman’s not Admiral Kazansky yet, but there is a shiny new gold band on the ring finger of his left hand that Bradley's mother had squealed over earlier. She's gone inside to fetch them drinks, and Maverick has Bradley's stack of report cards from school balanced over one knee, brimming with pride as he shows Ice his stellar grades.

He catches Bradley staring and lifts a hand, beckons to him with that dazzling Hollywood smile and says, "come here, baby."

Bradley runs over, scrambles onto Maverick's lap, and feels his large hand settle on his right knee. There's a big bloody scab there from when he'd fallen off his new bike (a 10th birthday present from Mav) two days ago. He puts his head against Maverick's shoulder, soaking in the familiar comforting warmth of him, and peers curiously over at the other blond man.

"Straight As," Maverick beams, "I'm telling you, Ice, the kid's going to Harvard. Mark my words."

There's a flash of exasperation on Iceman's face. "Isn’t it a little soon to be talking about college? Even if he skipped a few grades, Bradley’s still nine years old, Mav."

"He just turned ten," Maverick corrects, "and it's never too early to plan for a doctor in the family. Right, Bradley?"

"Uh-huh," He says just to see Maverick's pleased smile again. Bradley realized a long time ago that he'd do anything to make Uncle Mav happy, including learning to ride his big-boy bike without training wheels, eating all his veggies even though he hates them, and going to medical school or whatever.

"Is that really what he wants?" Iceman asks gently, "You can't...design someone's life for them, Maverick."

The hand over Bradley's knee tightens suddenly, sending pinpricks of pain over the tender skin around the congealed wound. He looks up, startled. Maverick's no longer smiling. The line of his pretty mouth is pressed flat.

"I know what's best for him, Ice," He says firmly, "Bradley's not following in Goose's footsteps. Not in a million years."

It's as if their hookup never happened, like Rooster had dreamt the whole thing, which honestly would have been the most plausible explanation if he didn't have the scratch marks down his back and burning muscle aches to prove it.

Maverick can't be any better off. Rooster knows his own strength. He hadn’t held back that night, couldn’t resist eating his fill like a starved man knowing there was zero chance in hell he would ever get to touch Maverick like that again. He’s got to be black and blue beneath that drab flight suit, still feeling the phantom imprint of Rooster’s dick in his ass every time he takes a step. Instead, the old man's strutting around like nothing happened, and it’s getting on Rooster’s nerves.

"Afternoon, ladies and gentlemen," Maverick says from where he's leaning against Hondo on the airway, aviators shielding his eyes from the sun's glare and a cold coffee in hand. He flashes a quick smile at the group that has just come from a full morning of Warlock's lectures and adds, "Hope your shoulders aren't too stiff from all those push-ups yesterday. Ready for Day Two of your field training?"

Yale and Phoenix glance at Rooster. It's clearly aimed at him even though Maverick hadn't named names. He's the first one in their entire cohort to have done the two hundred push-ups yesterday.

Hondo doesn't bother hiding his amusement as he pulls out his pen and clipboard. "Hangman, you're up first with Coyote and Fanboy. The rest of you are on standby."

"Dream team," Hangman crows, slapping Coyote a high-five, practically overflowing with smug confidence. "No offense, but you're going down today, sir."

"We'll see about that," Maverick says.

* * *

He doesn't go down like Hangman had promised. He gets Coyote and Fanboy before Jake can even finish running his big fat mouth.

"You're done, Hangman," Maverick says over the radio, "teammates are dead."

"Coyote, what the hell? I didn't even get to actually fly!"

"You two, two hundred push-ups each when you land. Next team, Rooster, Phoenix and Bob. Meet me up in the air in thirty."

"You have to let me try again. Come on, old man, I can beat you."

Everyone listening to the radio in the game room freeze as one. Rooster catches Halo's gaze as she lifts her eyebrows at him as if saying are you hearing this guy? Is he for real? She's three years below their class and has no idea what an adrenaline junkie slash egotistical maniac Jake "Hangman" Seresin truly is. He envies her ignorance.

There's a soft chuckle over the line, the sound of it tickling invisible fingers over Rooster's ribcage and stoking the irritated fire burning in his chest. Maverick sounds fucking... smitten with this douchebag.

"Alright, I'll bite. Phoenix and Bob can stand in for your second shot."

"Sorry, Phoenix, but I'm taking this one," Rooster's up on his feet before either of the named pilots has time to make a move.

"Rooster?" She stares at him in disbelief. He knows this is entirely out-of-character behavior for him, but Rooster doesn't care. He wants to act out, wants to rip Maverick's attention from Jake to where it rightfully should be — on him.

Maverick owes him as much.

"Old man's giving Hangman a second shot. What's he gonna do, ground me?" He's blazing on the inside, a cloying tsunami of feelings choking around his lungs like thorny vines.

"What the..." Hangman mutters over the radio when he spots Rooster in the cockpit twenty minutes later, but Maverick doesn't react. He's dead silent and too far away for Rooster to make out his expression as he waits for him to make the first move.

"Fight's on," Rooster snarls and sends his plane into a sharp nosedive.

Without an ounce of hesitation, Maverick follows.

* * *

"The fuck was that, Rooster?" Hangman's on him the moment they climb out of their planes, red in the face and furious. Rooster shoves back. He's got at least fifteen pounds of muscle on Jake and a few inches of height. Hangman’s the one that stumbles.

"That's enough, break it up! This is just a practice drill," Hondo shouts behind them, "Hangman, you're free to clock out for the day. Rooster, come on over, you have two hundred push-ups."

He's at one-fifty-two when he hears the sound of familiar footfalls. Rooster doesn't need to look up to know it's Maverick. He can recognize the man by his steps alone. Dirt-caked boots appear at the edge of his vision. Maverick's too close, purposefully so to make the defeat extra humiliating. Rooster's on the ground by his feet, red, straining, and so damn out of breath, beads of sweat dripping onto the hot tarmac.

The same way he'd poured sweat fucking Maverick that night.

"Hondo, I'll supervise the rest," Maverick says in that deceptively light voice of his, "you can go."

"You sure?" Hondo asks reluctantly.

"Yes."

Rooster puts his mind towards counting the push-ups inside his head to distract himself from Maverick’s heavy presence.

One-ninety-eight. One-ninety-nine. Two hundred.

He's finally done. He can leave now. A boot lands on Rooster's left shoulder, applying enough hard pressure to send him sprawling back down onto the ground with a startled grunt. His aching muscles scream in protest.

"Keep going," Maverick orders.

Maverick's standing in the grass with him, baseball glove in one hand and a Red Sox cap pressed low over sea-green eyes. His hair's gotten longer, dark curls lapping at the edges of his hat and sticking out in soft tufts behind his ears. It's been nine months since his last visit, and Bradley has made shortstop on his Little League team.

His batting's still weak, so Maverick had offered to help. They've been at it for hours. The sun's coming down over the horizon. Bradley can see it through the dappled leaves. It's a blinding orange disk in the distance. Days with Maverick tend to fly by so fast Bradley hardly has time to savor them. His mom's usually there too, taking some of Uncle Mav's attention away from Bradley. Not this time, not here where they are alone. Right now, he has Maverick all to himself.

"Come on, baby, keep going," Maverick says, ready to toss him the ball again. Bradley's hands hurt. He'd put bandages on the blisters from practice, but a few of them are wet and stained pink now.

Keep going.

Maverick's word is law. So he wipes the layer of sweat from his brow and hobbles over to grab his fallen baseball bat. It feels like grasping a live wire, but Bradley ignores the pain, tightens his fingers around the wooden handle and slides into position.

Later, much later, Maverick sets him down on the toilet lid in the guest bathroom and cleans off Bradley's bloodied hands, tells him what a good boy he is for pushing through the discomfort, and presses a warm rewarding kiss to his brow.

"It's what a man's supposed to do, Bradley. You push through, no matter what," Uncle Mav says, smiling from his spot crouched between Bradley's knobby knees.

He looks so proud. All the pain suddenly become worth it.

Bradley's team wins the championship two weeks later, but Maverick's deployed and out of the country by then. 

Rooster throws up in the shower. Four hundred push-ups will do that to a man.

He’s sick in the head. Sometime in all those confusing hormonal teenage years after Maverick had left, a wire had crossed somewhere. It's not his dead dad that had messed him up. Bradley doesn't know Nick Bradshaw. Nick Bradshaw is a distant blurry concept that lived in his mother's memories and musty tomes of old faded photographs. He’s not the one Bradley busted his ass to impress growing up; the one he bled and cried for, and whose attention he spent his entire childhood obsessively trying to capture like lightning in a bottle.

It’s Maverick. It’s all for Maverick.

His dead dad’s best friend Maverick, who’s a badass pilot, cool beyond words, and so fucking handsome he looks like he’d come straight out of some Hollywood big-budget action movie. This current Maverick, who even at the age of fifty-five is still a walking wet dream and moans hotter than a professional whore in bed. The old Maverick, who’d pushed Bradley to his limits, expected too much out of him, and personally set him back four whole years in his military career.

That Maverick. That irritating, stubborn, controlling hardass Maverick.

He’s so fucking tiny now.

Twenty years changes a lot of things, but Bradley has never really grasped how much his own body had filled out until he had Maverick on his knees in the drab gray motel carpet choking on his cock. Maverick used to be able to balance Bradley’s entire body weight in the crook of his arm. Now Bradley can grab both of the old man’s wrists in one hand, hold him down and make him scream; make those pretty green eyes go wide, fill with tears; fuck him so hard his mind goes blank…

Someone bangs a loud fist on the bathroom door of their shared dorm. Phoenix’s muffled voice shouts a “Yo, Rooster! Wanna go bar-hopping with us tonight?” at him.

He stares down at his straining dick. It’s hard from just thinking about Maverick and jutting out against the warm spray from the showerhead like a wet log that’s about to free-dive off the edge of a waterfall.

There’s definitely something not right with Rooster.

He swallows down the lingering taste of bile on his tongue and manages to croak out a weak reply, “uh, you guys go on without me.”

They go to Uncle Ice’s place for Thanksgiving one year. He’s Admiral Kazansky now, and Mrs. Kazansky is seven months pregnant. They are all gathered in the spacious open kitchen working on some task she’d assigned. Inside the house, she’s the Admiral Kazansky everyone takes orders from. Bradley’s glued to Maverick’s side, handing him peeled potatoes that he cuts into smaller chunks.

“Do you know how many people yelled at me over the phone for that crazy stunt you pulled over the Pacific, Mav? Fifteen and a half. Don’t ask what the half means, I’m not telling you,” Iceman says, rips off a piece of paper towel and dabs at the growing wet patches on Bradley’s left sweater sleeve. He lifts both arms and lets Uncle Ice pull them up to his skinny biceps.

Maverick cocks his head, “How many were above you in rank?”

“Six.”

“Gotta work harder then, Rear Admiral Kazansky.”

“Your flying is still too reckless, Maverick. You could’ve gotten yourself ki—” He cuts himself off when Maverick kicks at his leg, eyes flickering to Bradley who’s staring intently at them, potatoes forgotten. Ice sighs, “I’m worried, is all. You are getting older and no one’s out there watching your back.”

“Yes, I do. I got Goose looking out for me,” Maverick smiles, tosses Bradley a roguish wink, “your old man’s my backseater, and he always will be.”

“Pete, I’m serious.”

“So am I, Tom.”

“Honey, can you check on the turkey for me?” Mrs. Kazansky calls from the sink, and the conversation comes to a standstill. Bradley’s mind, however, doesn’t.

“I can,” He says later that evening while they are all huddled together watching football. Mrs. Kazansky had gone upstairs to rest, and there’s plenty of space on the couch he’s sharing with Maverick and Iceman, but Bradley had decided to cling to Maverick anyway. Uncle Mav’s arm is heavy across his shoulder as he turns to grin at Bradley. His eyes are a little unfocused from all the “adult grape juice” they’ve all been drinking that night.

“You can what, baby?” He asks with laughter in his soft voice.

“I can watch your back,” Bradley says solemnly, “when you’re up there in the air. I want to be your wingman.”

It’s as if a switch had been flicked. Maverick’s entire face goes blank, the warm light in his eyes snuffed out in an instant, pretty sea-glass turns button-like and hard. None of them move. Then, his mom lets out a muffled noise and walks quickly from the room. Maverick pulls his arm from Bradley’s shoulder and rises to his feet, looking anguished.

“Carole, wait.”

And then, he’s gone too, leaving Bradley alone with Iceman, who puts a hand on the back of Bradley’s neck and squeezes gently. It feels vaguely sympathetic. Distressed tears blur Bradley’s vision.

“Uncle Ice,” He sniffles as he confesses guiltily, “I…I don’t think I want to be a doctor. I just…I just want to be with Mav.”

“Yeah,” Iceman says, sounding tired, “I know.”

"You fly exactly the way I did in the eighties," Maverick tells Hangman over the radio. "It's like looking in a mirror."

"Flattery will get you everywhere, Pops," Hangman laughs. The flirty banter makes Rooster seethe on the inside. He’s gripping the edges of the table so hard his knuckles have turned white.

Another low, intimate chuckle. "Oh, that wasn't a compliment, son."

Rooster knows that’s the signal of Maverick going in for the kill.

"Shit. Phoenix, I can't see him. How close am I? Phoenix?"

"I'm dead, dickhead.”

"See you in the afterlife, Bagman,” Bob adds.

"Fuck, where are you? Come on..."

"And that's a kill,” Maverick's cheerful voice announces to a roomful of groans, "don't forget to update the scoreboard when you're done with your push-ups."

"Damn," Harvard mutters, walking over to the small blackboard and picking up the stub of chalk to add two hundred push-ups to their three teammates' scores. Rooster's still in the lead at six hundred (eight hundred if he counts the extra set Mav made him do). He’s going to have the Incredible Hulk’s arms by the end of the week.

* * *

“Sir,” Coyote lifts a hand ten minutes into Maverick’s lecture. It’s the first time he’s given one. Everything involving Maverick had been in the air these past three days.

“Yes, Coyote?”

"If you don’t mind me asking, what was the point of those earlier flight exercises, Captain Mitchell?"

“I wanted a preliminary impression of the best pilots for the mission.”

“Well in that case, the chalkboard in the game room can tell you the answer,” Hangman says, shooting Rooster a shit-eating grin. He rolls his eyes and turns his gaze to the window. It’s a sunny day out. He’s itching to get out into the late summer air.

“It does,” Maverick agrees, “it tells me who is and isn’t a teamplayer. Let me ask you this, Coyote. If it were up to you, would you want the man with the lowest number of push-ups on that board to be your wingman when enemy fighters are on your tail?”

Rooster looks up and finds Maverick staring straight at him, expression unreadable. He holds Rooster’s gaze for a moment, and Rooster lets him. Then, he strides back to the screen and says, “unfortunately, your teammates are not your biggest problem. Time is.”

Maverick doesn’t come by the house for a long time after the Thanksgiving fiasco. Bradley knows he calls. He’s seen his mom sitting by the kitchen table chatting with him for hours on end. There’s another phone in Carole’s bedroom connected to the same landline. Sometimes, when Bradley’s feeling daring, he’d listen in on their conversation. It’s mostly mundane stuff: the weather where Maverick’s stationed, how big Ice’s kids have become, Uncle Slider’s wild retirement party, someone named Wolfman getting into trouble for drunk driving, Bradley’s grades and extracurriculars (he’s learning the piano and guitar).

Until one day it’s not.

“So, are you seeing anybody?” Mom asks.

There’s a pause on the other side before Maverick chuckles and says in an almost shy voice, “yes, actually.”

“Really?” She sounds delighted at the news. Bradley’s heart drops into his stomach and stays there.

“It’s Admiral Hill’s daughter.”

“Grace Hill? Mav, isn’t she some underwear model? Ice mentioned-”

“Just model, not specializing in undergarments, Carole,” Maverick laughs, “she’s great. I, uh, I really like her a lot. Ice was the one that put us in touch.”

“That’s so sweet of him. You deserve someone great,” Bradley’s mom says happily, “bring her with you for Christmas this year.”

“Are you sure about that?” Maverick suddenly sounds uncertain. “Will Bradley be OK with me bringing someone? You know we’ve always done Christmas with just the three of us.”

“Of course he will, he’s gonna be so excited to meet-”

Bradley slams the phone down onto the receiver.

Spoiler alert, he’s not ok with it. Not one bit.

The terrain exercises are a hundred times worse. The debriefs after? A million.

“Why are you dead?” Maverick asks him, and Rooster’s all of ten again, holding back tears under the crushing weight of Uncle Mav’s disappointment. He digs fingers into his thigh, the pain somehow grounding, and manages to hold Maverick’s hard gaze without looking away.

“Sir, he’s the only one who made it to the target,” Phoenix says, trying to defend him like a loyal friend. It doesn’t work on Maverick.

He rounds on her. “A minute late. He gave enemy aircraft time to shoot him down. And that is not good enough, because he is dead.”

He’s never going to be good enough. Not since he’d stopped following Maverick’s carefully designed path of going to an Ivy League college and medical school, marrying some faceless young woman and popping out two-and-a-half children, and then buying a house with a pretty white fence. Living the fucking American Dream.  

“You don’t know that,” Rooster squeezes out past the hot lump in his throat.

“Don’t I?” Maverick turns back to him, “tell me how you would be alive after a superior enemy aircraft intercepted you on your way out.”

“We’d still stand a chance in a dogfight,” Rooster says defiantly.

“Against 5th generation fighters. In an F-18?”

“It’s not the plane, sir. It’s the pilot.”

“Exactly!” Maverick snaps, eyes blazing. He leaves out the you’re not a good enough pilot, but Rooster hears it anyway.

“There’s more than one way to fly this mission.” He swallows thickly and soldiers on. Too bad his voice cracks and betrays his emotions.

“Not if you want to come home.”

“That’s fine by me,” He says, rising to his feet and sending the flimsy chair toppling to the floor with a deafening bang, “I don’t have anyone to come home to anyway.”

Maverick’s eyes widen. He looks stunned for a brief moment. “Roos-”

Rooster just wants to get out of there, but Maverick fucking follows him out of the classroom. Ironic that he’s finally got the man’s attention when he least wants it.

“Bradley, come back here,” Maverick shouts after him, “Lieutenant Bradshaw!”

He stops in the middle of the corridor and bites out, “Permission to be excused, sir?”

“Denied,” Maverick spits out, grabbing him by the arm and dragging Rooster into an empty office. “Alright, I’m done pretending the thing between us didn’t happen. I fucked up, alright? So go on, say your piece, let’s get it over with.”

“What piece?”

“Just…drop the act, Bradley.” He sounds exhausted. “Give it to me. Whatever that’s been on the tip of your tongue all this time.”

Rooster lifts his head and says instead, “You really didn’t recognize me?”

Maverick stills. Then, he exhales, long and deep, and explains tiredly, “you were thirteen when I last saw you. That’s…twenty-two years ago, kid.”

“And you never thought to seek me out in over two decades? You left, and that was it.”

“Who was the one that told me to leave in the first place, hmm?” Maverick asks, quiet and accusing, “the one that refused to open the door when I came back to apologize for being happy and finally wanting to settle down with someone I lov-”

Rooster grabs him by the jaw, cuts off Maverick off mid-word and drags him close. He can do that now, shove the legendary Maverick around like he weighs nothing, pick him up and make him come on his dick. “It wouldn’t have lasted, old man. She can’t possibly satisfy a cockslut like you.”

Maverick’s fist in his diaphragm forces the air out of Rooster’s lungs and he lets go, staggers back with a wheezing cough. Maverick looks more pissed than he’s ever seen him, and it’s somehow still stunningly beautiful.

“That’s it?” He snarls, “that’s the only thing you can lord over me? That I liked sleeping with you?”

“I’m sure you won’t mind me sharing with the class then, sir,” Rooster hisses, vicious and mean. Their relationship is so beyond fucked at this point, he might as well make things worse with another empty threat.

“You want to so badly, let’s do it right now,” Maverick says, glancing toward the hallway where Hangman is clumsily attempting to eavesdrop. He throws open the door and jerks Jake inside by the front of his uniform. "Go on. Tell him."

"Tell me what?" Hangman asks, staring between them, his collar askew from Maverick’s rough handling, "What's going on, sir?"

"Nothing," Rooster snaps at the man without taking his eyes from Maverick's furious face. "Get out, Hangman. This doesn't concern you."

"Put your money where your mouth is, lieutenant," The old man growls at him, "Do it or I will."

Panic rises in Rooster. He can’t possibly be serious. "Mav-"

"Either follow through with your threat or back off and listen to me," Maverick says coldly, "I don't need you to like or respect me, Bradley. All I want is to complete the mission without getting blood on my hands. That's it. After this, I'm out of here. You won't ever have to see me again." He glares at Hangman and adds, “and you, Seresin, keep being this cocky and stirring up trouble, you’ll be the first one I cut from the mission. Understood?”

Hangman blinks, looking rattled at the abrupt shift to him, “yes, sir.”

“You’re both dismissed,” Maverick mutters, “get out of here.”

Puberty hits Bradley late, but it hits like an eighteen-wheeler. He expands practically overnight. He’s starting to attract the attention of girls in his highschool class, and it should be a fun time for a teenage boy, but Bradley’s too busy running to and from his part-time job and the chemo clinic to actually date anyone. He still gets straight As, a habit branded into his psyche by now, he just gets a lot less sleep.

The thought of Maverick doesn’t cross his mind anymore. Maybe once or twice a year during the holidays, he’d think of the man and feel the crippling regret for what he’d done. But no amount of tears can change the past, and Bradley has slowly come to accept that reality.

Mom dies his senior year.

Bradley had thought his mother's funeral would at least draw Maverick back one last time, but it's Iceman that emerges from the black military SUV, not Maverick.

"Bradley," Admiral Kazansky calls out and opens his arms.

Bradley breaks, cracks wide open. Everything bubbles forth in a painful wet mess.

"I'm sorry," Iceman says into his hair, smoothing a gentle hand over Bradley's trembling back, "I'll take care of everything. I'm here now."

Maverick never shows.

Adm. K: Can you come by? I need to talk to you. It’s not about Maverick. It’s about me.

Iceman knows him too well, knows he’d never show up for Maverick. So Rooster goes, drives the couple of hours over to the Kazansky house, waves to the kids in the front yard, and kisses Mrs. Kazansky on both cheeks before walking into her husband’s study.

The cancer’s come back. I don’t have much time left.

He’s struck dumb, feels cold and numb all over as he sits there and stares stupidly at the two simple sentences flashing over the computer screen.

“How long?” He finally squeezes out after what feels like an eternity.

I’m sorry. Iceman types instead. I said I would always be here for you. Looks like I will have to break the promise sooner than anticipated.

“Don’t joke about that,” He breathes, shakily wiping at his wet cheeks. “God, I- You should have told me earlier, I would have-”

I am telling you now.

“Yeah, but-”

Uncle Ice lifts a hand to silence him.

I have some things for you. He pats the white cardboard box on the desk next to Bradley. I want you to read them when you are ready to put the stuff with Maverick behind you. It might not be today, or next week. But promise me that one day you will.

“Ok,” He swipes a hand over his mustache and says. “I promise.”

Admiral Kazansky turns in his chair and peers at him, opens his mouth and says his name, quiet and strained. “Bradley.”

Rooster shifts uneasily, “Sarah said you shouldn’t tax your voice-”

Iceman lifts both eyebrows at him and he falls silent.

“Then don’t make me repeat myself, lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’ve wanted to be Maverick's wingman since you were twelve years old. I’m giving you that chance now. You need to keep an eye on him, Bradley. It has to be you, because it's your father's ghost that he keeps chasing every time he goes up in the air.”

He grounds his jaw and mutters, “He doesn’t think I’m good enough.”

“Show him,” Iceman orders, “I’m never wrong, kid.”

“And you’ll be here when I get back?” He asks.

“I will try.”

“Did you know?” He can’t help but ask after a pause, “about Maverick pulling my application to the Naval Academy.”

“Does it matter anymore?” Iceman leans back in his chair. Rooster thinks about it for a moment, seated there in Admiral Kazansky’s spacious office, surrounded by all the man’s life accomplishments.

“I suppose not,” He eventually says.

* * *

Rooster puts the box in the back of his Bronco and returns to his dorm. The rest of his teammates are out bar-hopping again. He pulls out the old copy of the F-18 NATOPS manual under his bed and stares at it. There has to be another way.

He screws his eyes shut and runs through the mission parameters in his head once more.

Altitude less than 100 feet. Airspeed more than 660 knots. Two-and-a-half minutes to target. That’s one hundred fifty seconds. Half the time Rooster can hold his breath under water.

How can it even be done?

He never gets a rejection letter. There’s radio silence from his USNA application even though he’d gotten an actual navy admiral to write one of his personal recommendation letters.

Ironically, the acceptance from Harvard arrives in the mail first. Maverick would have been so proud. The Kazanskys certainly are. He’s never seen Iceman this happy before, and for a split second, Bradley almost caves, almost takes the easy way out and tells them he’d go, that starting September, he’d uproot his whole life and move to Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Then, he recalls Maverick and all his impossible expectations and thinks, no.

He finds out, sometime late August, that his application files never made it to Annapolis. Maverick had someone pull it out before it even got to the recruitment office. They don’t even have a Bradley Bradshaw on record.

By then, the only standing offer left for college is UVA.

The mission prep gets shortened by one week. Maverick starts them on Phase Two and bombing target practice. It’s a mess. They keep missing over and over. Rooster’s pretty much got the entire canyon mapped out on the backs of his eyelids by now. All he sees night and day are the simulated curves and dips in the terrain. He even draws out the shape of it with toothpaste on the bathroom mirror while scrubbing his teeth clean every night.

Yet, he’s still a full thirty seconds over the time limit.

And then, the training accident happens mid-practice. Thankfully Phoenix and Bob aren’t injured and it’s not even Maverick’s fault, but Rooster wants to lash out at him, pull up old unrelated wounds and dig his fingernails into faded scars until he draws new blood. He’s never blamed Maverick for his dad’s death (another unfortunate accident), but it’s the only thing that’ll get under his skin, so he brings it up like the heartless bastard he is and sees Maverick’s face crumple with hurt.

He regrets it before he even finishes the sentence.

“Maverick,” A voice calls from the doorway, pulling them out of their death spiral, “it’s Admiral Kazansky.”

Rooster’s heart drops as he turns to Admiral Bates. “What about him?”

* * *

Rooster stares at the white box in his car. The stiff collar of his dress uniform is digging into his neck. He’s just come from the funeral, but he can't remember anything. It's all been reduced to a painful blur in his mind.

I want you to read them when you are ready to put the stuff with Maverick behind you, Iceman had said.

But opening that box will not fix things with Maverick. He brushes a hand over the lid, touches Admiral Kazansky’s sloping graceful cursive For Bradley and blinks back tears. Then, he squares his shoulders, slams the trunk shut, climbs into his car, and drives back to base.

* * *

Maverick gets removed as their instructor. He steals a plane and blazes through the simulated mission with time to spare, smacks Beau Simpson right in the face with fifteen seconds left on the clock.

Rooster sits there with the rest of his Dagger teammates, in absolute awe of the man and the legend — Pete “Maverick" Mitchell. He's stunned speechless and hard enough to bust concrete in his uniform pants.

“Damn,” Hangman voices for all of them.

* * *

The mystery box has migrated up to the passenger seat.

Rooster’s sitting in the back lot of that motel they fucked in, contemplating whether he wants to join the rest of the Daggers for one last drink before heading out on the aircraft carrier first thing tomorrow morning or check up on Maverick. Ice had given him the number, but Rooster’s never tried calling or texting him before.

He pulls up the blank text window and types in a quick Hey Mav, just wondering if you’re ok. He stares at the letters for a long time. Then, Rooster deletes everything and tosses his phone aside. He really should go and get drunk instead. Rooster’s halfway out of his Bronco when he catches sight of Maverick across the street.

The old man sticks out like a light beacon in his dress whites. Maverick’s dark hair is slicked back and everything is immaculately clean, like he’d stepped right out of a dream. Rooster watches Maverick carefully weave his way through the crowded bar and go up to Penny Benjamin. He leans in and says something in her ear; and Rooster sees in her place: Charlie, Grace, and all the beautiful women Maverick’s failed to keep in his life. She’s no different, he thinks, hopes. She wanders outside with him, and they sit on the front steps for a while before she pulls her small convertible around and Maverick gets in.

He doesn’t know why he’s acting like a creep and tailing their car from a distance, but he does it anyway. It’s a few hours drive to Fort Rosecrans where Rooster’s father is buried. He realizes that’s where they’re headed two-thirds way into the trip. It’s nearly midnight when Maverick climbs out of Penny’s car. He stands there while she adjusts his uniform and smooths out the creases in the fabric from the long ride. Then, he turns, a small solitary figure framed against the night sky, and slowly makes his way into the cemetery.

I loved him more than anything else in the whole wide world. I still do, Maverick had confessed to him that night, caged beneath Rooster’s heavy bulk and still dazed and soft from their shared orgasms.

His cell phone buzzes then. Rooster flinches and fumbles it out to squint at the single line of text from Phoenix.

Nat. T : Cyclone made Maverick team leader! He’s flying the mission.

And it suddenly makes sense why Maverick’s here paying Nick Bradshaw one last visit.

It has to be you, Iceman had said, because it's your father's ghost that he keeps chasing every time he goes up in the air.

Maverick’s going up in the air again, and Rooster might not be with him. He's fucked up his chances by being too greedy. Rooster looks to that innocuous package in his passenger seat. He heaves a sigh and starts the car.

It had taken him years to get where he is now, sitting in the Hard Deck bar stateside with a special mission lined up in two days. Called back to TOPGUN as one of their elite graduates, finally getting the validation he so rightly deserves. He’s looking to relax and have a little fun before the rest of the cavalry gets here.

And then, Maverick walks into the bar and all of Bradley’s plans (and his sanity) get thrown out the window. He doesn’t realize how hard he’s staring until Maverick’s within touching distance, peering down at him with a flirtatious edge to his soft smile.

“Like what you see?” He asks Bradley.

Maverick doesn’t recognize him. Bradley has a split-second to make a decision. The dormant twisted thing inside him stirs, famished, seeking to devour.

He swallows thickly and says, “yeah, I do.”

“Oh it’s you again,” The old woman at the motel front desk says, “where’s your friend?”

“What friend?” Rooster snaps, towering impatiently over her with a scowl. It's 0300. He's supposed to be on the aircraft carrier by 0700. 

“The older, shorter- Never mind,” She mutters and walks over to the wall to grab a set of keys, “same room ok?”

Rooster puts a hand over his mustached top lip and nods choppily. “Yeah, whatever.”

There are no remnants of their night in Room 215, nothing to hint that he’d spent hours in there taking Maverick apart and making him shake with pleasure. It’s just an vacant space with a dusty box-spring bed and mystery stains in the gray carpet. Rooster toes one that looks like a chicken nugget and chuckles a little to himself. He sets the box carefully down on the lumpy queen-size mattress and wipes his sweaty hands over his clothed thighs.

“Here goes nothing,” He mutters to no one in particular and eases off the lid.

Letter upon letter come spilling out onto the white motel sheets. They’re all addressed to him, his full name printed in loving strokes of Maverick’s neat all-caps handwriting. No stamps or street addresses. Rooster grabs one and pulls it open, wincing at how his big clumsy fingers crease the delicate paper. In the envelope, there are two polaroid pictures along with a hand-written letter. He stares at the photos for a long, long time, his eyes mapping the pretty edges of Maverick’s Hollywood smile. Then, Rooster picks up the folded letter and opens it. 

Dear Bradley, it reads.

* * *

“You alright?” Phoenix asks the next morning when she catches him on the carrier, “Jesus, Rooster, you look like you’ve been crying all night.”

“I’m fine,” He mumbles hoarsely and squints at her through blurry eyes, “can we not do this today, Natasha. I just want to be left alone.”

“Well that’s never gonna happen if Hangman sees you going in there looking like you got stung by half a dozen bees,” She sighs, taking his wrist and dragging him down the empty mess hall to a vending machine. He watches her pop in a few quarters in to retrieve an ice-cold soda. “Put that on your face. It’ll help with the swelling. Halo says a cold overnight teabag is even better, but we work with what we got.”

“Ok.”

“Stop pouting like a kicked puppy,” She says, frowning up at him. “Do you need a hug?”

“Yeah actually, a hug would be nice, thank you,” Rooster mutters after a pause, sagging gratefully into the warm embrace and squeezing her petite body tightly to him.

“Better?”

“Mm-hmm,” Rooster hums against her shoulder, “hey, you got any advice on how to tell someone that you’re in love with them after you, uh, accidentally fucked them?”

“What?” Phoenix pulls sharply back to stare at him, “how do you accidentally fu-”

The overhead speakers crackle to life then, cutting them off and ordering all Dagger members to report to Deck C.

It’s time.

“Talk after?” Rooster asks as he starts running toward the C deck.

“Jesus, Rooster, what the hell did you do?” Phoenix sputters, tight on his heels, “I mean, uh, sure?”

* * *

Maverick picks him.

He’s Maverick’s wingman.

There’s no time to process that information. Rooster’s whisked off into the next room for three hours of detailed mission briefings. Maverick’s seated a few spaces ahead of him, within touching distance again, but he forces his attention from the back of the man’s head to Warlock. Now’s not the time to think about anything other than the upcoming mission.

Rooster doesn’t get much shut-eye that night on the carrier, too busy running the terrain and mission parameters through his head: Altitude less than 100 feet. Airspeed more than 660 knots. Two-and-a-half minutes to target. Altitude less than 100 feet. Airspeed more than…

Maverick’s already standing beside his own plane when Bradley staggers onto the top deck the next morning.

“Sir,” He calls out to him, stumbling over the avalanche of words wanting to burst from his chest, “I just wanted to say-”

The overhead speakers interrupt with a loud “Pilot to Dagger 2. Repeat, pilot to Dagger 2.”

“We’ll talk when we get back,” Maverick promises, one hand still on his F-18.

“Alright,” Rooster relents, moving to leave when his callsign comes up on the announcements once more.

"Hey Bradley! Bradley!"

He glances back at the sound of his name, and Maverick's standing there with that desperate look on his tired face, chapped lips slightly parted. He finally looks human, dragged down from his saintly altar and ruined, tainted by Rooster's sick want and yet somehow still so petrified he's going to lose Rooster to the skies above them. He wants to fall to his knees and beg for Maverick's forgiveness, but he can't make anything in his body work, so he just stares back like a fool.

Maverick swallows, lowers those wet green eyes to Rooster's shoulder and says simply, "you are, kid, you are good enough."

He's struck stupid. The world comes to a standstill between them.

I'm sorry. I love you. I always have. He should tell Mav now. He might never get another chance.

The speakers crackle again. Hondo takes Maverick's arm, and things come alive. He's missed his mark, hesitated too long and lost his only chance again.

Same old Rooster.

No, not this time.

"Mav!" He yells over the chaos around them, fights his way past the flight crew herding him in the opposite direction. "Wait, Captain Mitchell! Sir!"

Maverick turns and looks at Rooster.

"I-"

Love you.

"I'm right behind you, sir. I got your back."

Just like my old man.

Maverick nods, a single jerky gesture, and finally allows Hondo lead him away.

* * *

Rooster’s behind by fifteen seconds.

He’s clearing all the bumps and curves in the terrain. That part’s been seared into his muscle memory. He’s just not fast enough. The enemy bandits are closing in. His own ragged breaths are deafeningly loud in the echo chamber of his helmet.

Talk to me, Dad, he thinks, desperate.

Then, Rooster hears Maverick’s low voice over the public channel, right in his ear, “come on, baby, keep going. You got this. Don’t think, just do.”

Keep going. 

Maverick's word is law. 

Suddenly, it’s not the control stick against his palm; it’s that old ashwood baseball bat, and he’s in the ninth inning of the last Little League game. It no longer matters whether Maverick's there to see him hit that home run. He's trained too long and too hard to fail now.

Rooster breathes in, pushes all the way to 800 knots, and lets his instincts take over.

* * *

They successfully bomb the target, but Rooster runs out of flares while evading the SAMs. Maverick takes the missiles meant for him, goes down in a fiery plume of smoke and debris, and Rooster loses his mind. He abandons a direct order and goes hurtling after Maverick's downed plane, thinking to himself the entire time: No, no, no, you can't have him yet, Dad. We haven't talked. We haven't-

He’s on the ground folding his used chute when Maverick comes running, and for a brief second, he thinks the old man’s going to hug him, mother him a little, then they can cry together a bit and make up, Rooster will apologize and the making up can hopefully turn to making out and-

Maverick shoves him so hard he falls flat on his back. All the little pink bubbles burst as the old man straddles Rooster in the snow, looking absolutely livid, and launches right into another lengthy lecture. Their faces are inches apart, so Rooster does the only logical thing. He hauls Maverick down by the front of his flight suit and kisses him quiet. Maverick bites him, draws blood; and it devolves into the two of them mauling each other's mouths like wild animals until Rooster groans low in his throat and grinds his erection up into the seam of Maverick’s pants.

“Fuck, Bradley,” The old man shoves off of him and retreats to a safe distance, “what the hell were you thinking?”

“You told me not to think!” He shouts back, hard dick still proudly saluting the open sky deep in enemy territory.

“I didn't- I didn’t mean it like that! You were supposed to be back on the carrier by now. I promised Goose I’d get you home safe and-”

“Yeah well, I promised Iceman I’d keep you from doing more suicidal shit, old man,” Rooster interrupts, staggering to his feet, “you’re not the only one with extra homework on this mission, ok?”

They glare at each other in the ensuing silence, breaths fanning opaque clouds of steam in the cold snow.

“What now?” Rooster finally asks.

“We finish our homework together,” Maverick mutters, smacking Rooster's bicep on his way past, “come on.”

* * *

“How do we know if that museum piece can even fly?” He asks beside Maverick as they survey the enemy base’s only unattended aircraft from afar. It’s an F-14, a literal fossil, as Hangman calls it.

“Hey, be respectful,” Maverick slaps the back of his head, the sharp gesture mashing Rooster’s unsuspecting face in the powdery snow. He points to himself and says, “this museum piece can still fly circles around you, kid.”

Rooster rolls his eyes and wipes the melting snow off of his mustache, “You know that’s not what I meant, Mav.”

“Let's go,” Maverick grunts, already on his feet and running down the canyon.

* * *

They're close, near success. Rooster has yelled so many "Holy Shit!"s over Maverick's insane flying and lightning fast reflexes that he’s lost count. Hangman has shot down the last enemy aircraft, swooping in last minute to save them like the dramatic asshole he is.

They’re on their way back to the carrier, so Rooster looks to the sky and thinks, Dad, if we survive this, I'm going to take it as a heavenly sign that I get your blessing to go after your best friend.

The left engine goes out.

"Shit, Dad, chill! Mav’s here, too!" Rooster yells, throwing his hands up to steady himself as the ancient F-14 dips sharply.

Maverick half-turns to look at him, "What?"

"Nothing!" Rooster says guiltily, "you just concentrate on doing your pilot thing and getting us down alive."

* * *

The thing is, if Nick Bradshaw were here, he’d probably beat Rooster bloody for taking advantage of Maverick the way he had. Too bad his old man’s not here to smack some sense into him.

Rooster leans over the balcony of the mostly-vacant motel, a cheap cherry-flavored lollipop he’d nicked from the bowl at the front desk sticking out of his mouth, and scrolls through his Instagram feed. A text notification from Phoenix pops up.

Nat. T : You coming to the Hard Deck tonight, right?

What’s at the Hard Deck tonight? Rooster types back. He cracks the hard candy between his teeth and peers up at the bar across the street. Payback and Coyote are already there, lounging on the back porch with drinks.

Nat. T: Everybody! Bob ships out tomorrow. Even Mav’s coming to celebrate with us.

As if on cue, Rooster hears the distant rumble of a motorcycle thundering down the street. He watches the Kawasaki Ninja roll to a graceful stop outside the joint. Maverick’s smiling as he pulls off his aviators, pins them to his white shirt, and locks up his bike. He’s about to go inside. Rooster has to do something or else he'll be gone again. 

So he swallows down his nervous insecurities, shoves all his old demons and past regrets like shards of glass down his throat, opens his mouth and calls out in a wavering voice that doesn't carry far over the damp ocean air.

"Hey, stranger."

Maverick hears him anyway, turns his head and spots Rooster on the second floor of the shitty motel. It's their shitty motel. A mixture of emotions surface on Mav's face, and it feels like a millennia before his expression softens and opens up. A tender furtive thing that feels a lot like hope unfurls in Rooster at the sight of it.

"Like what you see?" He asks, heart in his throat.

Maverick laughs. The sound is lost in the noise of the bustling bar and endless waves crashing behind them. But he sees it anyway, files the lovely sight of it away to savor on lonely nights, and waits with bated breath.

Those lips Rooster's loved since he was a child curl up. Haloed in the soft evening light, Maverick turns fully toward him.

"Yes, I do," he says.

Maverick brings a pretty platinum blonde woman with striking blue eyes and blood-red lips to Christmas that year. She’s shiny and new, and they look really good together, better than Maverick looks with Bradley and his tired mother who never remembers to fix her hair and put on lipstick anymore.

The woman can’t seem to stop touching Maverick all the time, leaning into his personal space and brushing fingers over his jaw, his neck, and the insides of his wrists.

They’re in love, his mom explains to Bradley in the kitchen, looking genuinely happy for them. Like your dad and I once were.

But Bradley doesn’t want Maverick to be in love with Grace Hill. He wants Maverick’s sole attention on him in that amorphous way little boys crave the undivided attention of their heroes.

“What if he has a baby with her and forgets about me?” He follows Carole around the kitchen, bugging her with a million important follow-up questions. “What if they move somewhere far away and I can’t ever see him again? What if-”

“Bradley, honey, it’s not going to be the end of the world. Your actual father died, and guess what, the world kept turning,” Mom sighs, wiping her hands on a dish towel. She pauses, peers over the top of Bradley’s head, and adds, “besides, Mav can answer those questions himself.”

Take him off of me, please, she mouths at a smiling Maverick hovering in the doorway.

“Hey buddy,” Mav says, and Bradley realizes things have already started to change. He’s not “baby” anymore. Maverick calls him “buddy,” “kid,” and “Bradley” now.

“I’m never going to love you any less, ok? I swear on my pilot license,” Maverick says, crouching down in front of a frowning Bradley. The words make Carole laugh, and it almost feels like the old days with just the three of them.

“But-”

“Bradley, listen to me,” Maverick cups his cheeks, “you are more special to me than you will ever know.”

“Why?”

“Well,” A hint of melancholy slips through Maverick’s sea-green eyes. It’s gone before Bradley can understand its meaning. “You are Nick’s legacy.” His mom comes over, and Bradley watches as they share a fond little smile together. She puts her arm over his shoulder, and Maverick says, “so that means you are a gift, Bradley. A gift your father left us. It makes you the most special person in this world to me.”

“Wait a minute, what’s this?” Carole suddenly asks, swiping something off the floor. A small blue velvet box had tumbled out of Maverick’s jacket pocket during the conversation. She gasps when she realizes what it is, “Pete, are you really proposing tonight?”

“Carole, give that back,” He groans, neck flushing dull red as Bradley’s mom cackles, “I was gonna wait until the right time to-”

“Oh, sweetie, I’m so happy for you!” She exclaims, peppering his crimson face with kisses, “Have you rehearsed what you are going to say? Here, run it by me.”

And the scene should have ended there. Bradley should have stayed quiet.

But of course he doesn’t.

By the end of the evening, Maverick's gone and his mom is in tears.

“Bradley,” Maverick gasps, fingers scrabbling weakly over the short hairs at the back of Rooster’s head, “you, ah, you have to let up. I’m going to-”

He doesn’t let up as instructed, just shoves forward some more and takes Maverick’s dick deep down his throat, swallows around it long and slow. He hears a muffled whimper overhead, Maverick’s thighs jerking up to box Rooster’s ears as he comes. He keeps sucking on Mav’s slowly softening cock, pulling quiet sighs and hisses from his parted lips. Rooster looks up and finds Maverick hiding his face in the crook of his elbow, refusing to even look at him.

“Really, old man, you’re shy all of sudden?” He rears up, wipes his mouth and sits back on his haunches to get a better look at Maverick’s expression, “This is kindergarten stuff compared to what we-”

“Don’t,” Maverick kicks him in the shoulder. “Don’t finish that sentence.”

“Ok, something’s clearly making you uncomfortable. Tell me how I can make it better.”

“What?”

“You used to say that when I was little. I’d tell you what was wrong, and you’d make things better.”

“Why would you remind me of that, Bradley?” He groans, trying and failing to close his spread legs. Rooster’s body gets in the way. He huffs and gives up, goes limp on the bed. “You were so little… I- I have memories of you as a freaking baby, and now you’re this massive towering…” He gestures wildly with his free hand before petering off, “...thing. It’s just all so inappropriate.”

“Wow, such eloquence, Mav,” Rooster deadpans, crawling up the mattress, "you’re apparently an old Cantholic nun now.”

“And so mean,” Maverick complains as an afterthought, swatting at him.

“I can be sweet,” He mutters, leaning over and putting some of his weight over Maverick’s smaller body. Rooster kisses him, soft and slow. “See?”

“Why do we keep hurting each other?” Maverick wonders against his mouth.

“Because we are the only ones that can,” Rooster shrugs, “I don’t think there’s another person on this planet that makes me feel the way I do about you.”

“What’s that?”

“God, where do I even begin?” He laughs, laying wet kisses over Maverick’s face and neck. “I’ll tell you more if you take your shirt off.”

“Not falling for that, brat,” Maverick murmurs, trying to dislodge Rooster with a palm against his sternum. He takes Maverick’s wrist and sucks two of his fingers inside his mouth. Maverick turns his head, closes his eyes like he’s scared to watch, and bites down on his lower lip.

“What about you, Mav?” Bradley asks, leaning back to strip off his own sweat-damp tee, “what went through your head when you came up to me in the bar that night?”

Maverick’s brows furrow. “I didn’t know it was you.”

“I know,” Rooster grabs the old man’s wrist again, takes Maverick’s hand and puts it over his bare chest, “did you think I was hot? Don’t lie.”

“...yes,” Maverick finally admits guiltily.

“What else?” He asks, grinding his hard dick against Maverick’s leg and reaching into the bedside drawer for a packet of lube.

“I thought you had a funny little mustache,” Maverick murmurs, smiling absently as he reaches up and brushes his fingertips over the hair above Rooster’s lip. His breath hitches when Rooster slips a digit inside him. “B-Bradley!”

“Want to know what was going on in my head?” He slides another finger into him, jags them deep and feels Maverick's hot insides contract around him. Rooster thinks back to the dizzying cocktail of bitter resentment and heady desire as he lines his straining cock up to Maverick’s wet hole, “I wanted to ruin you, wanted to tell you who I was when I was balls-deep inside and make you come anyway.”

Maverick moans, a shocked wounded sound that punches out of him as Rooster thrusts home.

“You would’ve,” He pants against Mav’s ear, wrapping his huge hands over the tapered length of the old man’s torso and squeezing at the tight muscles beneath the white shirt. “You loved my cock, didn’t you, Mav? So hungry for it you didn’t even lock the door before getting on your knees and putting your face between my legs.”

“Wanted, ah, wanted to get you out of those ugly-ass blue shorts,” Maverick gasps back, raking blunt nails down Rooster’s flushed chest and throwing a leg over his ass to grind him deeper. “You have sh-shit fashion sense, Bradley. Can’t believe my immaculate tastes didn’t r-rub off on you.”

“Fuck,” Rooster laughs, catches his mouth in a brutal kiss, and pushes Maverick’s left knee up to his chest, “never thought I’d get to do this again. I jacked off so many times to the memory of that night I’ve lost count.”

“Those extra push-ups didn’t get it out of your system?” Mav groans, eyes fluttering shut.

“Nah,” He slicks sweat-damp curls off of his forehead with a grin, “only made me want to fuck you more.”

“Jesus, kid.”

“Yeah, I’m messed up,” Rooster shrugs. He’s fine with that, as long as Maverick doesn’t leave again, as long as-

The lax body beneath him suddenly shifts, and he’s forgotten just how strong Maverick is because Rooster finds himself on his back on the lumpy mattress, the old man perched on top of him, both hands lifted to cradle his face.

“You are not messed up,” Maverick says firmly. He looks so serious, like he’s talking to Rooster’s angry inner twelve-year-old again, talking to the little Bradley Bradshaw who’d hung his head all the way home after Maverick had missed seeing his spectacular home run all those years ago.

“You’re perfect, baby,” Mav tells him. “Perfect.”

"You really mean that?" 

Maverick knocks his forehead against Rooster's. "Yes." 

“Ok,” he exhales, feeling his eyes starting to water a little. Crying is the least sexy thing to be doing right now, but there’s a weird hot gooey feeling expanding inside his chest, and Rooster can’t for the life of him stop the waterworks.

“I’m sorry, Mav,” He finally says, pushing his face into Maverick’s shoulder, “I never meant to with that lady you were seeing, I just...I wanted to keep you to myself a little longer.”

“That’s all in the past,” Maverick says, running his fingers softly through Rooster’s hair. It feels nice, maybe even nicer than sex.

“Can we start over? From the very beginning,” He asks, peering into the pretty sea-foam green of Maverick’s eyes. “Just Pete Mitchell and the guy with the funny little mustache who's hopelessly in love with him.”

“That’s not the very beginning, Bradley,” Maverick laughs.

“It is,” He insists.

“Alright baby,” Maverick indulges him, brushing the tips of his fingers tenderly over Rooster’s cheekbones and down his wet face, “we’ll start from there.”

He sits there on the dull gray motel carpet, surrounded by all those unopened letters without destinations, tears flowing down his face.

They all begin with Dear Bradley. 

And then, in between the lines of Maverick's neat handwriting, love pours forth.

“Can you read them to me?” Rooster asks one morning a few weeks later. Sunlight is filtering through the thin curtains of the Airstream, painting each and every little hair on Maverick’s exposed thigh a lovely shade of gold.

“Read what?” The old man groans, lifting his messy bedhead off the pillow to squint at Rooster and the stuff on the floor, “are you making a collage down there?”

He holds up the letters. “These.”

“What are- Jesus fuck!” Maverick shouts when he realizes what they are, “that back-stabbing bastard. Ice did not give you those!”

“He did,” Rooster confirms, hunching protectively over his treasure trove like a possessive dragon over gold. “They’re all addressed to me. Why are you so worked up about it?”

“They are not exactly addressed to you, kid,” Maverick mutters, slowly sliding down the bed onto the carpeted floor and wedging his head between his knees. “They were meant for the imaginary Bradley in my mind. You were never supposed to actually read them.”

“Well, too late, old man. They’re mine now,” Rooster declares, “you’re going to have to fight me and pry them out of my cold dead hands.”

“Can’t I just smother you unconscious and burn them in the back lot?”

“Pete Mitchell!”

“Just kill me.”

“How is this more embarrassing to you than our one-night stand?”

There’s a quiet pause as Maverick weighs the two options. Then, he shakes his head and says, “no, this is still more embarrassing.”

“Too bad, I love them, and I’m gonna read one each week for the rest of my life and live forever.”

“Can’t I just blow you each week instead?” Maverick asks desperately.

“Tempting, but no,” Rooster replies, “wait, you should read them to me while we have sex.”

“You need therapy, Bradley. Or a good old-fashioned exorcism. Those letters and more sex aren’t going to help,” Maverick mutters, rising to his feet, “come on, hand 'em over.”

“Hell no. Hey, back off, old man!”

* * *

Two months after he reports back to NAS Oceana, a letter arrives in the mail for Rooster. He sees the familiar neat handwriting and feels a wide smile break over his face. They text constantly, talk over the phone, and send each other weird memes and pictures. But a letter feels special.

His old man’s secretly a romantic at heart.

Rooster waits until he’s done for the day to read it. The letter is smudged with engine grease and less emotive than the ones addressed to Imaginary Bradley (his new nemesis). Mostly, Mav just rambles about his day, complaining about the brass breathing down his neck and how Amelia still won’t drop her guard around him when he interacts with Penny. Rooster probably has to put a ring on Maverick before she truly believes the old man’s spoken for. Toward the end, he tells Rooster he’ll be up in Virginia Beach in a week's time.

A week's time.

He checks the date on the stamp. Mav had mailed it out roughly a week ago. Rooster whips out his phone and types a quick Hey Mav, just got your letter in the mail. Need me to pick you up from the airport?

Yes please, Maverick types back almost immediately and sends along his flight info.

It’s set to arrive tomorrow afternoon, so Rooster spends the evening cleaning up his apartment and getting groceries stocked before making the drive over to Norfolk International Airport the next day. He keeps checking his phone and running to the men's room, the latter the unfortunate result of the three massive Starbucks coffees he’d chugged earlier.

His phone finally pings with a text. Maverick sends I’m in baggage claim.

And he is, wearing that old leather jacket with a million patches, Ray-Ban aviators pinned to the white t-shirt beneath. Maverick waves when he catches sight of him, letting out a soft ‘oof’ when Rooster picks him clean off the ground in a crushing bear hug.

“Hey, Bradley,” He laughs, hugging Rooster back.

“God, I missed you so much.”

“I know, baby. I’m here now,” Maverick tells him, pressing a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Grab my bags for me?”

“Yeah. How long are you staying?”

“As long as you’ll have me,” Maverick says, cheerfully falling into step beside him as they make their way to the parking lot.

“Did you get Cyclone to transfer you to Oceana?” He asks, “are you going to be flying again or teaching?”

“Neither,” Maverick says, “I’m officially retired as of two days ago.”

“What?” Rooster pauses to stare at the man. “No way, really? What made you finally decide to retire?”

“You, actually,” Maverick smiles, “I figured this would give us more time to spend together. After all, we have over twenty years worth of it to catch up on.”

This is the very beginning:

Sitting in the luggage pickup area of the Dallas Fort Worth Regional Airport with his mom, fully-decked out in his cowboy hat, red bandana, and little brown boots as he watches throngs of busy travelers hurry past. Carole knocks Bradley’s giant hat over his eyes when she suddenly jumps to her feet, her husband's name rolling sweetly off her tongue. His arms are tangled in the numerous straps of the child seat, so Bradley misses the exact moment his grinning father steps off the escalator. He's squirming in his carrier to free himself when someone tips the hat up and Bradley’s finally able to see again.

It’s his dad’s pilot friend standing over him. The dark haired one with porcelain skin and eyes the color of dappled summer leaves.

Hollywood-handsome. 

“Hey Goose,” Maverick calls over the shoulder of his leather jacket, “cute kid you got under here.”

The End.