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Carl opened his eyes in Assad's arms.
In the fifth year that they met, technically facing the danger of separation Carl said that if they declared the farewell to each other, within a year they wouldn’t even say hello in any encounter. But things like that didn’t happen. Therefore, they made it for hundreds of days, until when the time was as long as Carl and Vigga had their seven-year itch and they had nothing to lose, they proved the fact that they loved each other like hell using actual moves in the backseat of their car which should be used as a tool from home to work—Carl was not really sober, Assad could only also pretend to be the same.
On the second day around four, Carl was wakened by tiny whispers like spells, he hardly opened his eyes and saw the world was still filled in darkness, so he fell back to sleep within three minutes. It was five past ten when he woke up again. He was in the bed, the sheets held him tight. Half a pot of coffee was put on the cooking table with some temperature left, Rose called him several times, his head was still in pain as always.
Then Carl arrived the headquarters like nothing had happened. He didn’t get much appetite but decided to pick up some food with his body memory and sit in the corner of the cafeteria. Assad found him as usual, sat in the opposite, and asked what would be the next step of their relationship.
Carl took his plate and went away. Not because he was afraid of letting other people in the bureau know that the drunk guy and the Arabic immigrant from the useless department confirmed their relationship, but for he didn’t know either, what’s more his hangover was still on. A large space of headache made him dead in the water, and it seemed like the situation of his bottom was much worse.
After a long time perhaps nearly a month, Assad pursued for a few times, but nothing *really* happened, except that Carl became the only person living in the house after Jesper graduated from college and moved out. And Assad still invited Carl for dinner, to the same restaurant and table. The food on in the plate of the Danish was still fried potatoes and chicken, he was still drinking, letting his company drive him home. Few days after they met for the first time Assad was accustomed to working as his driver when going out for work, only when Carl wanted to do something *unusual* would he sit on the that place.
Therefore, they finished the sex from the front seat to the back at the exact same spot as the last time they did it. That space was forced to stuff two middle aged men of more than 185 centimeters, and Carl crunched his teeth saying this will be the last time of their life when his head accidently bumped somewhere of the car. Assad caressed the aching spot gently, and gave a kiss on the scar that was exposed but not that stand out on the sweating forehead.
Aften then they spent some minutes finding their breaths inside. Carl pulled the window a bit down hoping to get some fresh air, but withdrew it as soon as the bitter wind attacked his wet clothes.
“Do you wanna get out after the clothes are dry?” Assad asked, caressing his neck.
“Don’t you think.” Carl was waking up and of course wanting to throw him out immediately. Assad is the one that never gets alcohol, but now he’s the one that draw him to this hot sticky dirty marsh, and this will only be a beginning. “Only if I’m staying with you.” The man with the puppy eyes smiled with nearly a bit of silliness. Is the smokey voice only this clear like being charm overload like now when Assad is tired? Carl let Assad put their clothes on meanwhile keep *touching* him. He frowned and stared at the other side of this narrow space. “We should talk about this, Carl.” Said Assad.
“Talk about what?”
“Don’t pretend to be a fool.”
“You’re not bad at this either.”
“Fine. We can start trying by now. If you can accept it when the vacation is finished, then…” said Assad in the winter of this year.
“We will go on like this.”
“Is it too fast?”
“Spending the rest of my life with the same guy? Kind of great.” He didn’t relax his eyebrows which stayed like this since god knows when. But no matter how many hurting words were spoken, he couldn’t forget how many times they fondled and said loving phrases to each other. Although most of them was from Assad, during this period he got to know that he was good at kissing, and maybe he really has beautiful eyes.
“If you don’t want it, you can end it anytime you want, Carl. It doesn’t matter.”
“Sure.” Carl replied with the classy “you are not the only one that have a brain” tone, lying against the door and lit a cigarette. Only god knows how he found one.
“Do you wanna live with me?”
“Do you often ask people this on the first day of the confirmation of your relationship?”
“Just answer the question, dear.”
“Jesper just moved out.” Carl blew the smoke right against Assad’s face, which was hard to be evitable, “And I don’t have the time for coffee if I go to work following your schedule.”
“I love you too.” Assad got through the smoke to kiss him.
Markus was very pleased with the decision of Carl taking his vacation on time which was totally beyond his expectation, and kept thanking himself for not taking Assad as a wrong guy—If Assad was adjusted to some economic crime department, his most pain-in-the-ass member would just be more anarchic. The day after Assad packed his things up as he should, but asked again in the basement trying to get some help from someone out of the situation:
“What will be your opinion, Rose?”
“You need to solve the problem on your own mate.” She stopped her work, taking back the rubber from Kat’s mouth, and patted on Assad’s shoulder with all confidence.
“I can teach you the stuff that I learned from the army.”
“Ah-uh, I got ways to learn that from you.” Then she put herself back to tidying reports.
“I can’t just go like this…” Carl watched Assad rushed to follow Rose. The distance between them wasn’t that much, plus the soundproof level of this place was only *better than none*, he was able to hear the secret planning that wasn’t really low, “We are in different countries after all. Isn’t it vital for you?”
“Then you have to ask him, Assad. Indeed no one *arranges* something so important at home in this country.” The only female member of the department said in a super-subtle way, didn’t expect Assad to understand this joke that wasn’t really hilarious, “Plus, Carl has got used to the life of rejecting people. Will you be afraid after all this?” However, at last, she gave him an encouraging smile while picking up a meowing bag, “Happy holiday.”
Though hearing all the stuff, Carl didn’t leave the office because of this. But the day and a half when started they were at a loss, and even more awkward before they were certain about the relationship. Carl said nothing as usual, led to a few conflicts when Assad stopped him from more drinking, eventually at the level for being able to have normal conversations. And Assad was considering if holding Carl in his arms for sleeping is too rush. They only made out for a couple of times in Carl’s home. Before that Assad couldn’t find any excuse to stay there all night.
Then they got the apartment key for Assad before the real holiday for foreigners began—something very important, but just being ignored before instead of representing *one step forward*. When they checked the mailbox after getting home, they even found a postcard with pretty letters from Rose. In the envelope there were also a picture of them three, surrounded by little radial tilt shift. Carl hated that TV station program because they were actually sent to spy on them, but this was one of the few things that they could keep as a *souvenir*. Assad knew that both the body and the character of Carl was in bad condition. He took effort to keep the types and the limitation of pills that Carl was taking in mind. Some of them were by Carl’s side, and almost made Assad transfer from a very nice partner to a *control freak* one. Was there any necessary *relation* between them living together and him caring way too much about this? Carl only asked him this when he was prevented from taking more pills.
At last Carl broke away and went to prepare the stuffs for bed at the coldest time of year when heaters couldn’t solve all the problems. And between the two seconds when Assad made the heater system let go a clear “clack”, which successfully light the trip switch up, Carl was moving the blankets from the balcony to the bed.
S So basically, they didn’t get too panic nor open the window, but the temperature of this large little building in the rural area dropped rapidly. Meanwhile as there was half a bottle of whiskey under the blanket which the top wasn’t put tight when Carl felt that he was holding a huge wet cloth with the smell of alcohol, he suddenly realized that the strong scent of liquid probably wouldn’t be the work of his daily hangover.
With half a brain shutting down, Carl would have skip to the *won’t care about shit* period directly—maybe just throw everything down to the floor and take a look at it three days later, no one cares—but Assad insisted on simply dealing with the blanket that experienced a disaster from nowhere before the washing machine went back to work. So he held the bottle perfectly before it fell, switched the flashlight of his cellphone, put the blanket into the basin with Carl together with some washing powder for about ten minutes, then watched each other with no words (but could spot that Carl didn’t reject trivial housework like this), and tried their best to twist it out from water at both sides, eventually threw it into the machine and let it wait until everything went normal. This was on the whole contrary to their expectations though—who wouldn’t prefer sheets soaked by pure love and lust if it needed to be changed.
“This was such a bad idea.” Carl lied in the bed saying. The distance of the vision he could reach was still dark, cold, and losing a blanket. In other hand, Assad held him tight before he got any attention for warming them up in the only quilt that they had. They had thought about the next thing that could happen on this bed, but at present, obviously most of the plans went whiskey-shaped.
“But can I continue to live here?” The voice was from Assaad close to Carl’s neck, in guilty.
“Only because if I throw you out now, next day I’ll be arrested in charge of attempted murder.” Carl sounded like reading a textbook.
“But…?”
“But, certainly, if you’re still willing.” They lost the appetite for hard exercise, but it would still be an emotional connection to hold together and fall asleep from one night to another.
“…Would you like to leave the lights on when making it?”
“Don’t mind at all.” Didn’t things like this always happen smoothly? He suddenly doubted that, “But not tonight, can’t use your insurance if something happens.”
“So what are we doing now?”
“I don’t know…” It was a bit rare for Carl to be *unsure*. In a way they should take half the responsibility for this accident. What’s more, these days didn’t go well and the night ended up like this. Was Assad still willing to talk about the future?
“Should we talk about what problems will come out after you give me the apartment key?”
“There is a word called ‘concubinary’, but yes, there are gossip about you and some local immigrant groups.” As they were going to do nothing tonight, it wouldn’t be a bad thing putting some serious topics on the table as soon as possible.
“You saw how I was getting along with the neighborhood of the same block, Carl, there’s no need doubting about this I think.”
“I think you understand crystal clear what we are talking about.”
“But you didn’t take any measures on me. You know that you won’t believe in any of these after all.”
“Do I have a choice? You are my only partner.” He didn’t point out any identity like *lover*, for it wasn’t something to be chatted during *working hours*, but each one of them did was the man that Carl almost *lost*--he would have said something like Assad should take the responsibility, but then what would he be like? Some helpless housewives? “I’m worrying about your safety, cos some things don’t need to happen again.” He added.
“If it did, I promise no one would come up to us. Look what we’re *doing* now.” So all things did *happened*, Carl thought. But just like all the conversations related to Assad’s past, he didn’t want to pursue any further.
“Plus god has given me enough punishment before I arrived here, I’m sure.” Yet Assad continued to speak like he was practicing making sentences.
“Do you have anything else for consulting?” Carl turned his back against Assad, so that the sigh wouldn’t be too obvious when the cloth was rubbing and the heat was interchanging. They got to know that tonight was going to snow heavily, back in the weather broadcast.
“…Have you thought of getting married?” Assad opened his mouth like he was testing something.
“If it will make your life more convenient.” Carl should have warned that he had much experience at ending relationship of this type. But sometimes marriage got no relation with love, anyway.
“And children?”
“Absolutely no.”
“Homestay either?” Now Assad sounded a bit sad.
“No.”
“I’m sorry.”
“What’s wrong?”
Then he heard Assad’s voice, sounded like he had been trapped, maybe with rubbing his hair, worrying, saying things like “I tried to have a vacation with you *together*, but now it seems that I messed up everything.”
“Me too.” Among these years similar accidents had happened too many times that he even couldn’t remember how many times did he spilled alcohol and learned nothing from it, so Carl only curled his lips a bit. Curtains in the house were thick enough to block the Sun hanging from three in the morning in summers. Therefore now not a inch of light was able to sneak in, making this conversation deeper with nothingness, “Plus if it wasn’t you, I won’t even be doing nothing for days like this.”
“Are you praising me?”
“I just want to tell you that my life is boring, Assad.” He said like he didn’t care, “With lots of alcohol in it.” Assad hated this more than anything, he thought.
“I can avoid this.” Assad replied determinedly.
“Which part?” Carl couldn’t catch up for this.
“The *lots* part.”
“You must be kidding.” Another joke for not practicing enough Danish? Carl was going to be bored.
But on the other hand he didn’t stop giggling, feeling that his life was *changing* for him after such a long time.
“No I’m not.” Assad giggled with him, making the answer more certain.
“…So how do you feel about these days?” Maybe the words gave him some emotion to spare, after a few seconds Carl picked up his courage and asked, imagining it would be the same as “Can you get this over with me” sort of things.
“I’m doing pretty well—” Assad raised his voice, but stopped for a moment and then lowered it, realizing it was hard to not fright Carl in this complete darkness. So he put his nose against Carl’s neck, thick whiskers made him struggle a bit but didn’t leave his arms,
“…Cos it has been so long since I missed you.” The depth of his voice went tenderly in the night.