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Despite a rocky start, it’s been easy to sink into this new routine: the one where he’s happy, immersed in a life he never thought he’d have. He wants to savour every minute, whatever it may be, isolated from the world beyond this neon city.

When Joshua heads out, he doesn’t think twice. The moment the door closes and just enough time has passed that his brother wouldn’t double back to pick up a forgotten item, Clive ventures from the couch to the kitchen. He sidles up behind Jill and his thoughts feel bold even before he reaches around her with his other hand to take the knife, stilling her chopping. With his other hand he pinches the bow-tail of her apron and tugs it loose, head bent just enough to nose at her temple, the sweep of her hair behind her ear.

“This can wait,” he says. “Come lounge with me.”

While Joshua's arrival does draw attention to the cracks in the foundation of Clive, Jill must admit he's seemed happier. There is tension, there is a weight, but she thinks it's been good for him to have Joshua once more. With time, she knows he'll find his courage to approach the things pulling on his heart.

She's already breathing out a laugh when he slips behind her. The cucumber she's slicing can wait, she supposes--and she tips her head back enough to catch Clive's eyes with a warm smile.

"I'm convinced."

She holds onto moments like these like they might once more disappear.

He hums his approval, just a rumble from deep within his chest, and he takes the knife from her hand and sets it upon the countertop with a firm click. He gathers her hand in his and wraps it around her, and then the other, so he holds her around the waist between him and the counter’s edge. He presses a kiss right beside her eye.

“No resistance, hmm? No garden parties to get to, no errands to run?”

She leans back against him, letting him support her. An effortless thing for him.

"I had my garden party yesterday and ran errands earlier," she replies factually. Last night's dinner was out in the garden, and she purchased ingredients for tonight's dinner bright and early. "My day is to be spent here."

With him and Joshua, but the latter will be back before it's too late.

"Was the couch too lonely?"

“I would not say lonely,” he says.

It is hard not to think of it that way when she says it, though. How long had he laid there, on the cusp of sleep, listening to her chop vegetables and chancing looks toward the kitchen, like he might lure her out in hopes alone.

“I would say…” He nuzzles her. “I am never lonely when you are this close at hand.”

He gives her a little squeeze.

"Ah. You were not lonely. You missed my company," she says, just the slightest teasing tone in the words. She has felt far less lonesome with Clive sharing her bed, but she hasn't had so much of him that she's tired of him. An impossible thing.

"I missed yours, too. Vegetables are very poor at holding a conversation."

“I think I’m a little more capable than a vegetable,” he murmurs, and being bold is working, so he kisses the side of her face, and then again right by her ear. He adds: “Perhaps much more.”

"I do prefer you over vegetables, generally speaking," she says carefully, as if just realizing a thing. And then she laughs because it's a silly thing to say, and she tips her head back against his shoulder.

She likes this. This could be their every day.

Her throat exposed, he dips his face to kiss the side of it, lingering close after and breathing in deeply. She smells like summer and she tastes faintly like whatever's been slathered on her skin and he doesn't like that but he doesn't care because he likes to have his mouth on her no matter what.

"Joshua has stepped out for a bit," he says. Statement of the obvious.

"He has," Jill confirms, voice low. Clive's being sweet in such a way that makes her want to turn around and grab him and kiss him, but she refrains. But she does reach a hand up and back to comb her fingers through his hair, trailing down to his cheek.

There's an unspoken agreement that they Do Not Do This in front of Joshua.

"We might as well take advantage of it and... lounge together." How tame. She smiles to herself.

He hums some agreement, comfortable under her touch, content to be wrapped around her like a bear rug.

"I like lounging with you," he says. Having Joshua home with them is the ultimate prize, but it will be some time before he reaches to drape her legs over his while on the couch, or lays his head in her lap to watch a movie. "Even more than shopping for swimming suits."

"I prefer lounging, too." She laughs softly. That was a good day. More and more, the good is outnumbering the bad.

Finally.

"Were you going to nap?"

Curling up with him is one of her favorite things. It doesn't matter that they share a bed now--she'll never grow tired of it.

“I ought to, if I’m to leave later than usual,” he says, kissing her again, pausing to suck on a soft spot near her pulse. “But I can persist without for more time together.”

She shivers under his mouth, head tipping to invite more.

"We can get comfortable and if you fall asleep, you fall asleep. I don't like you going out tired."

Not after that one time.

He kisses her again, relishing how she trembles so subtly in his arms.

“I’d like that,” he murmurs, nosing his way back up just to kiss down again.

He's a terror. Were she not already leaning against him, she'd need to hold onto him for balance with the way he makes her knees feel weak.

"Clive," she laughs, retaliating by nuzzling her face against his. His scruff tickles. She loves it.

“Yes?”

He chuckles under his breath, lifting his head just enough that he can try to catch her on the lips.

She twists the rest of the way, giving him a playful kiss on the lips. The look she gives him is full of affection.

"I believe I require a carry, now."

“What the lady wants, the lady gets,” he says, and he stoops just enough to hook an arm behind her knees and sweep her up off her feet. He boosts her high in his arms, his face close to hers once more.

Jill happily wraps her arms around his shoulders, stealing a kiss from his lips.

"You look especially handsome today," she tells him. He looks happier.

Vegetables abandoned, he carries her across the house, feeling a lightness in him that is much brighter than he is often comfortable expressing. He takes her upstairs, to the room she’s made space for him in.

“I wonder why today in particular,” he remarks.

"It may just be my eyes," she teases. He's handsome every day, even when he comes home covered in muck, but she can tell something in him has been put at ease even with the looming conversation to be had with Joshua.

She takes advantage of being held in his arms to examine his face. The blue eyes under his mop of hair have always been her favorite, but she has a fondness for his scruffy beard and even the scar that mars his skin.

The corners of his eyes crinkle as he smiles, the scars on his cheek pulling unevenly as he does.

“Best get you to a doctor soon, I think.”

He turns them sideways to enter her room, and there he sets her down on the bed and crawls in after her.

She already thinks of it as their room. It's the way it should have always been--they may have needed their time apart, but it's only now that things in the home finally feel right. And it isn't only because of Joshua's arrival.

Clive is met with Jill's feeble attempt at bowling him over, arms going around his middle in a hug. She is quite determined to nuzzle in against his neck and get as close as physically possible.

She's been happier, too.

She pushes and he follows through, tipping over onto his back and taking her with him, offering up the length of his body as her personal bolster.

“Are you going to rest too?”

While terrible things happen elsewhere

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