Archive of Our Own ^beta

Fairs are loud, is the first thing Mafioso notes.

The bright, flashing lights lining every immense ride; the overwhelming scent of unhealthily fried food that sticks in the back of his throat, deep and cloying, on his coat, in his fur; the shrill sound of children screaming, laughter, overwhelming and raucous, carnies raising their voices to be heard above the music that vibrates and crackles through the speakers; the faint creaking of the rides as they circle around and around and around, colors burning through his eyelids. He must have stepped on chewing gum at some point because his shoe keeps sticking to the ground as he walks, and someone jostles him every other second in a rush, and it’s a nauseating experience. He should hate it. He’s almost certain he does.

His ears twitch as a kid closer to him screams in excitement, or pain, or both— he can’t tell. It all sounds the same, anyway, grates on his ears and drills into his head. He’s only here for one reason, and it’s the man currently tugging his hand, fingers slotted between his own.

He glances to the side; Chance squeezes his hand reassuringly, golden eyes flashing in the lights as he looks over his sunglasses at Mafioso. “Y’alright?” He asks, voice low, but loud enough for Mafioso to hear him. He gives him a nod in return, wrinkling his nose as a child runs past holding some fried abomination on a stick. The smell sticks, even after the child has wormed his way through the crowd, and Mafioso resigns himself to a night of laundry after their time at the fairground has ended.

Regardless of the negatives, it is nice. Chance is pressed close to him, fingers slipping against his palm, and Mafioso feels a buzz down to the tips of his claws, almost drunk off of the heat, the proximity, the lights. He has never been to a fair before; too much time away from his studies, away from his life, to even consider going. He’d never had someone to go with him, either, but Chance had invaded his life like a particularly insistent parasite, latching on with no need to let go.

(Mafioso may be one of the most powerful bosses in town, has held himself to high standards, has never fallen for anyone before he had careened off of a clifftop for Chance, but the gambler holds his heart between his fingers as he does his favorite gold coin and he doesn’t even know it.

Chance has him stupefied. It would be unsettling, and it was, for a while, but Mafioso has come to terms with the way his palms sweat and his heart thuds uncomfortably fast in his chest, and the way his ears will instinctively swivel in Chance’s direction whenever he enters the room, and the way that he will always listen, even if he doesn’t understand, to what Chance has to say, and the way that Chance’s eyes, doused in the spilled light of the sun, have seared their image into his brain, his chest, his lungs, his heart, his soul.

The way that he would do anything for him, even what some would consider depraved. The way he’s left aching when Chance returns to his own home, even after the days they spend together. He wants, he wants. He feels like a rabid animal sometimes, with how much, how hard he wants.)

((He thinks, oftentimes, of what he’s discovered. That Chance’s irises are a deep, blooming red, the color of blood spilled on asphalt, when Lady Luck is not on his side, when She does not cradle him to Her chest, Her hands gentle and guiding as She leads him to victory. Thinks of the way that every time he looks at Mafioso, his eyes are that brilliant molten gold, the same color of his lucky coin, warm and inviting and loving, easily melting Mafioso where he stands.

Thinks of how lucky he is to be considered one of Chance’s wins.))

Chance makes a happy little noise in the back of his throat, eyes locked onto his target. He clutches Mafioso’s hand tight, dragging him deeper into the fairgrounds. The contact makes his face bloom a bright red, though he ducks his head, the shadow his fedora casts obscuring the flush increasingly darkening.

Chance has always been— touch-hungry. He’s tactile, slinging an arm around Mafioso’s shoulders, holding his hand in crowded areas, curling into his side, a leg slung over his thighs at the casino, pressing his back to Mafioso’s, gun drawn and breaths coming heavy from deep within his lungs. Mafioso doesn’t mind, could never mind, not when he relishes the touches as if he’ll never feel them again.

Still, it’s embarrassing, truly, how he reacts to them; how his breath catches in his throat, how his face burns, how his palms sweat. He feels like a teenager, really. Gangly and awkward, tripping over his own feet in pursuit of a boy who will always look, but never see, never love, not in the way that he wants him to.

(Except—

Except, Mafioso could be wrong. There’s a good chance he may be wrong.)

“Look’t this, Mafi!” Chance beams, flashing the gold covering on his canine. Mafioso is briefly overcome with the urge to just— bend down and run his tongue over it. “I’m real good at Russian roulette– ‘m sure I could win you just about anythin’ you set your pretty li’l eyes on,” He smirks, hand on his hip, eyeing the prizes hanging above them nothing less than hungrily, in the rawest sense of the word.

“I’m sure you could.” Mafioso says (and did his voice waver too much? Is it noticeable, just how much Chance affects him?), rolling his eyes almost affectionately. Chance pushes his bottom lip out in an exaggerated pout, tucking the loose strands of hair that frame his face behind his ears, careful not to disturb his sunglasses, before he digs into his pockets for the wad of cash he’d brought for this purpose.

Before anything, Chance is a gambler. He believes in no god aside from Lady Luck, clasps his hands together in the dead of night and whispers soft words of praise to Her, to the belief that She will bestow Her light and Her luck and Her fortune upon him as the sun rises. Kisses his lucky coin before he flips it, rubs his fingertips reverently against the carvings, murmurs nothings that are carried away by the wind before they reach anyone’s ears. He picks up any penny on the ground that has landed heads up, brushes it off and tucks it carefully into his pocket, relishes every black cat and ladybug he comes across.

Chance has gambled with money, with his life, with his words, with his heart. He gambles as if he doesn’t know how life would be without it, and yet, and yet, Lady Luck is almost always on his side.

Now, he gambles against a fair-game. Despite never having the opportunity to visit one himself as a child, Mafioso has heard it all from his crew; the games are so rigged, Boss, they weigh down most of the targets you’re s’posed to hit so you can’t knock ‘em over! Still, Chance drops his hand to focus on his target, shifting his stance to aim the fake gun.

Mafioso clicks his tongue. His stance is all wrong, too loose, too wide. He steps behind him, his chest pressing into Chance’s back; he knocks his foot into the gambler’s, one hand coming up to tug on his wrist, feeling the thrum of blood beneath skin as he adjusts his position— he nudges Chance’s feet further in, until he’s standing with them shoulder-width apart, digging his fingers into the other’s waist and pushing, until his right leg is slightly forward. “Bend your elbow.” He murmurs, sliding the hand on his wrist down, down, until he does so.

He brings one of Chance’s hands up, closing his fingers around his until he’s properly supporting the pistol. He ignores the closeness, how he craves more and more, everything that Chance is willing to give him, and with a reluctance that weighs heavy on his chest, suffocating and thorough, steps back, steps away. Chance’s warmth had burned a hole through his coat, lingering even as he’d moved, too desperate, too eager.

(The rabid animal locked behind his ribcage writhes and screams and claws at his bones, wanting to sink its teeth deep inside of Chance’s skin. He’s desperate for it in a way he’s never been desperate for anything else, claws sinking deep inside of his lungs. It’s suffocating.

He thinks, often in the shadow of night, just— digging his claws into Chance’s chest as deep as they’d go, thinks about consuming him, wholly, fully. He’s disgusted and he’s repulsed by his nature, the inherent violence that comes with wanting, but he can’t help it. There’s something wrong with him, there must be, but he can’t help it. He wants an excuse to be closer, impossibly so, to melt their bodies down and cast them as one.

The gnawing hunger in his chest grows stronger by the day. He wants to feel ribs give way and bones crack and the warm, wet heaven of blood soaking his fingertips, wants to feel organs give way to the hot and heavy flush of flavor on his tongue, wants to devour thoroughly. His guilt for holding these thoughts, giving them the time of day, will eat him alive before he ever has the chance to eat Chance. Those nights are the nights he gives in, clasping his palms together, praying to a god he had once believed in.

His teeth itch.)

Chance clears his throat. Under the lights flashing above their heads, his face looks almost pink. The carny raises a brow impatiently, and Chance grins cockily, aiming the fake pistol at the first bottle. Mafioso watches, intrigued, as he fires; his shoulder jerks, and the bit of hair he’d swept gently behind his ear falls at the kickback. He knocks the first bottle over, and Mafioso hums quietly, head tilted to the side. He shifts, aims at the second; misses by just a fraction.

Chance makes a soft, sodden sound. His brows are drawn tight together, fingers flexing on the gun, but he looks up at— something Mafioso can’t see, whispers a soft, bless me, and fires again. The fake bullet clinks off of the glass bottle, and it falls. Three more to hit, Mafioso muses to himself, watching the cocky smile slip back onto Chance’s face, almost as if it’d never left.

Mafioso watches, enraptured, as Chance aims and fires again almost immediately, knocking the third glass bottle down. It hits the grass with a soft thunk, and the carny rolls his eyes as he leans down to pick up the fallen targets. He seems much too smug for someone whose game is about to be beaten, though when Chance shoots again and the bullet connects, only for the bottle to wobble ever so slightly, yet remain standing, Mafioso guesses why.

Chance huffs. “That’s two fails, man. Pay up or get outta here.” The carny grins, expecting Chance to return the gun sullenly.

“How foolish,” Mafioso murmurs under his breath; Chance digs his gold coin from the pocket of his vest, pressing his lips to the surface gently. He flips it in the air, nimble fingers catching it before it can hit the ground, and presses it to the back of his hand. He’s confident in his abilities, even with crowds of people that infiltrate his senses, the endless chatter and chimes and jingles that fill his ears, even with the mass of bodies that wriggles and writhes not unlike a snake.

(He’s confident to a point, and has the experience and the talent to back it up. Perhaps that is why Mafioso finds himself so infatuated with him.)

A happy little sound slips from his mouth as he reveals what the coin has decided. He grins over at Mafioso, a flash of gold that sends Mafioso’s heart pounding in his ears, swept away as he turns away from the taller man. He presses more money into the carny’s hand, accepts the reloaded gun and waits until every bottle is set up exactly the way it was before. He starts on the right, this time; shifts his stance without the use of Mafioso’s hands, something that makes the taller man’s lips twitch downward. His first shot connects with the neck of the bottle, and it wobbles precariously where it stands before tipping over. He does the same with the next, smoke warbling out of the fake gun, Chance’s eyes flashing gold as the bullet strikes the middle of the glass.

The next three are knocked out in quick succession. Mafioso can’t help the swell of pride that blooms in his chest, latching deep inside of him. “Hell yeah!” Chance cries out, and a father presses his hands over his son’s ears, shooting Chance a look that he does not see, too busy tapping his feet against the ground, eyeing the prizes.

“I want… that one.” He points up, too fast to have landed on one without already having a selection in mind. Mafioso watches the carny roll his eyes once more, before reaching up and tugging a— quite frankly, large— stuffed rabbit from the hook above. Chance accepts it with a grin, waving a two-fingered salute to the ill-tempered carny before he turns to Mafioso, flashing him that bright, brilliant smile that Mafioso would (and has) commissioned someone to paint, to immortalize.

“Here,” Chance says, voice carrying over the noise of the crowd; not that Mafioso can hear them, with how the dulcet tones of Chance’s words drill into his ears, tuned to his frequency. He’s holding the stuffed bunny out to Mafioso, and it takes him a moment to realize that it’s— a gift.

The tips of his ears burn, and he’s sure there’s a flush spreading across the apples of his cheeks; his fingers tremble as he reaches out, skimming his hands over the soft fur of the plush. It smells like fried oreos and bubbly soda, but Mafioso can’t bring himself to mind, not when Chance is looking at him as if he’d hung all the stars in the sky in his name. He takes it gratefully, careful to keep his claws from digging into the thin fabric holding guts of fluff inside, cradles it to his chest as he would do one of his own rabbits. It’s soft.

He feels like a smitten teenager. He knows he should hate this, but instead, he feels an indisputable heat spreading across the apples of his cheeks, and his palms are sweating as he thumbs over a stuffed paw. Those stupid beady eyes look back up at him, and in the glossed reflection, he can see the faintest impression of just how red he is. It’s embarrassing. He doesn’t hate it.

He should hate it, but instead he feels like he’s in some hopeless teenage fantasy, a normal kid in a normal school, going to events and parties and fairs with a group of people that will fall apart as soon as the year lets out, spending his week’s pocket money on games he doesn’t even like, just because it has the nicest prizes, just because he wants to impress a girl who will hardly give him the time of day as the sun sets in the horizon. He has to fight with himself to feel, but he does— the blooming giddiness in his chest rises like smoke from a chimney, and he’s overcome with the urge to bury his face in the off-white fluff of the stuffed rabbit because—

Gods.

Because a boy won it for him.

(That isn’t something that happens to him. Not to him. Not when he was a child, born and raised into a life of organized crime, kept carefully hidden away from the cruelty of the outside whilst conforming to the rules and cruelty of the mafia. Not when he reached adolescence, still secluded, but willingly, handing his safety, his comfort, his life, over to the family who had raised him. Not as a young adult, preoccupied with collecting debts by any means necessary, not when most on the streets would shudder and cower, whisper prayers under their breaths as he passed by, not when his hands trembled, stained no matter how hard he scrubbed, bloody bubbles of soap cursing him. Not when loss had stuck its fingers deep into his veins, up to the capillaries of his brain, twisting and turning and writhing, a virus infecting him so profoundly he had lost himself in the haze of it all.

But Chance does so, and he does it effortlessly, without a second thought, as if he weren’t standing next to a man feared by all, as if he had been waiting for this moment for years, as if—

as if he wanted.

God, does he want Chance. He wants him more than he’s ever wanted anything; wholly, body, mind and soul, because when Mafioso wants something, he doesn’t want half-way— he wants all or nothing, and he wants Chance with everything he has in him. Wants so badly it hurts, curls up inside of his chest and presses between his ribs and his lungs, expanding and contracting; wants so badly it crawls down his throat and glues itself to his trachea in a desperate attempt to suffocate him. It’s dangerous, inexplicably so, because wanting is a disease, it’s a weakness, it’s terrifying and it’s true, so strikingly, horrifically true. Mafioso thinks he would rip his heart from his chest, tear open his ribcage for Chance if that’s what he asked for, if that’s what he wants.

And he wants, desperately, pleadingly, for Chance to want him back just as much.)

He’s lightheaded with the feeling, dizzied by the lights, by the overwhelming feelings swelling in his chest, nestled carefully behind his lungs. He lets himself feel, for a few moments more, and then he stifles it, grips it by the neck and silences it until he can be alone in the safety of his home, allow himself to indulge, to grieve what he cannot have, in fear of losing the only person in his life who has ever made him feel human.

He takes a moment to steady his hands, his breathing. Opens his eyes, focusing solely on the rather large rabbit in hand. He makes a soft, affirmative noise. “Cute.” He murmurs, his quiet voice swept away by the teeming crowd around them, but Chance’s face softens as if he’s heard it all the same. “Thank you, Chance.”

Chance beams, brighter than the sun; the purple-pink-blue-orange-green hues bouncing off of his face make him look even vivider, outlining the bridge of his nose, the shade of his eyes shifting from red to gold when he looks at Mafioso, recoiling off of the silver streaks in his hair, against the burnt orange of the sky, and he looks. He allows himself to look, to soak in every detail, etch it into memory, carve it into stone.

He will run his fingers over this memory when he’s alone, will dip the points of his fingers into the dimples in Chance’s cheeks, over the curve of his teeth, the swell of his mouth. He imagines, he lets himself imagine for just a moment, what it would be like to lean in, dip his chin, kiss him. In a perfect world, Chance would let him, would lift his head and bring a hand to rest on his jaw, soft, gentle. He always is careful with Mafioso, always just gentle enough to make him feel as though he’s breaking apart where he stands, defenseless in the onslaught of emotions that course through him like a wildfire.

He imagines it, and closes his eyes for a breath; the tip of his nose pressing into his cheek, his glasses bumping into Mafioso’s malar, sweet sugar lacing his lips that Mafioso will gently lick away, the stuffed bunny squished between their chests, fur tickling the underside of their jaws, hiding the frantic beating of Mafioso’s heart. He imagines pulling away just so, only far enough to take a breath, and feeling the brush of Chance’s lips against his own as they tug up into a smile.

He imagines it, and then he opens his eyes.

(It hurts, aches deep between his ribs, blooms bright red hyacinths behind his eyeballs, deep in the pit of his chest as if his body had carved out a space for his longing to sit, to become a part of him.)

Chance is still there, still smiling lopsidedly at him. It has something unspeakable blooming in his chest, knowing that there is someone, someone important to him, that finds his presence bearable, that wants to be around him as much as he possibly can.

Chance reaches a hand out. His fingers are thin, scar tissue wrapping around to the back, from where his shoddy flintlock has exploded again and again. Beautiful.

Mafioso hesitates, but takes it and revels in the feeling of slick skin atop his palm, in the warmth that washes over him at the sight of Chance’s smile. He lets it carry him through the crowd as Chance pulls him along; he can’t find it in himself to complain about their surroundings, not when Chance just looks so happy to be with him.

(Maybe the fair isn’t so bad, after all.)

((That’s a lie, it’s terrible. Chance’s presence just makes it more bearable, is all.))

He doesn’t mean for the stuffed rabbit to gain a spot.

It’s just— it’s large, and he’s always been on the more frugal side, preferring his boys to have more space; they’re young and they need a place to collapse after a rough mission, to patch each other up and celebrate, or sulk depending on the circumstances. He’s more than content to share his space with Gubby in the smaller room. Still, it is quite big and he needs to figure out what to do with it, because it was a gift and he’d rather die than throw it out, so he sets it at the kitchen table. Just until he puts something together for dinner, cleans up after, rearranges his room just so.

He’s stood at the stove, tossing rigatoni in amatriciana, when Capo comes in, tossing his shades on the table; they hit the side of the plush rabbit, and Capo inhales sharply, taking in the scene before turning to Mafioso, a brow quirked up inquisitively. “Chance?” He asks, voice lilting up in faux-innocence, though Mafioso can pick up the underlying tease lacing his words.

Mafioso’s ears burn, twitching under his fedora. Caporegime has been in his life since he was a tot, one of the only cousins he was allowed to interact with, which comes with its own healthy dosage of teasing. “He won it.” Mafioso murmurs, acutely aware of every flutter of his nose, of how relaxed he is, even with the gentle prodding of his cousin. Capo makes a soft little noise in the back of his throat, picking up his glasses and nudging Mafioso with his hip.

“What else d’you need for dinner?” He asks, and Mafioso breathes, tension easing from his sore muscles.

Then, he sets it on his dresser before the others can come and tease him about it, too. He knows they wouldn’t have given up as fast as Capo did. Gubby watches the plush curiously, ears flat against her body, pawing at the strange creature before she realizes it’s not going to move, flopping down next to it with a soft huff. It stays there for a few days, right in Mafioso’s line of sight when he’s laying down, a few feet away and a million miles away; until Mafioso and his boys come back late from a mission, the moon spilling silver through the cracks in his blinds, and there is something unsettling digging underneath his skin, shoulder so heavy they feel as though they don’t belong to him.

His eyes catch on the stuffed rabbit. He remembers, something close to fond simmering in his chest, the way Chance’s eyes had gleamed as he took the rabbit, how the soft fur had felt against his face, his hands, as he’d held it tight, how he had felt visceral comfort. He reaches out, picks the fluffy white thing up, and the next thing he knows, he’s waking up at noon with the rabbit’s head tucked to his chest.

He certainly doesn’t mean to give it a spot in his bed.

But that’s where it stays, where he finds it the next night as he stumbles back into his room, tipsy from the wine he and Chance had shared, the skin of his wrist tingling where Chance had caught him before he’d been able to dodge, smiling that stupid, soft smile at him as he thanked him for letting him sleep in one of the spare rooms, his face flushed from the alcohol, eyes wide and glassy and brilliant gold. His slurred words stick in Mafioso’s brain, even after Chance had left, had shuffled his way into the spare right next to Mafioso’s own room.

The stuffed rabbit is right there, and Chance is a wall and a million miles away, and Mafioso can be so weak sometimes.

He wishes, not for the first time, that he could hold and be held. Reach out unrestrained, palms slipping against each other, breath washing against his jawline as they slept. That he could run his hands through silver-grey hair and breathe in the scent of gunpowder and smoke and whiskey and expensive, yet subtle cologne, that he could feel a heartbeat that mirrors his own against his ribs, trace his thumbs over matted cicatrix and brush his lips over scar tissue, and sit awake in the dead of night and just listen to the sounds of deep, even breathing. He falls asleep cradling the stuffed rabbit Chance had gifted him, once again, heart heavy in his chest.

Night after night, he continues his routine. Showers the work of the day away, dark swirling the drain, brushes his teeth, dims his lights and curls up under his blanket, Gubby beside him, the stuffed rabbit under his arms. It works, until—

Until he’s faced with Chance in the entrance of his bedroom, hair mussed and his glasses slipping down the bridge of his nose, something frantic written on his face until he catches sight of Mafioso, sleep-rumpled and rubbing his eyes, an arm curled around white plush.

“Um,” Chance mumbles, blinking in the scene. Mafioso’s addled brain takes more than a few moments to catch up, but it does, and his ears fall flat against his head, whiskers twitching and teeth grinding against each other. His face burns with embarrassment, shame trickling smoothly through his veins, and he realizes just how improbably lucky he’s been the past week.

Chance frequently drops by. He likes to hang out with the boys and bother Mafioso while he’s working, often spending the night when he drinks too much wine, stumbling into rooms to flop down and sleep, leaving Mafioso to carry him back to the spare room he has quietly designated as Chance’s, unofficially. He hasn’t been in Mafioso’s room, hasn’t slammed the door open with something on the tip of his tongue in a while— since the night of the fair, his impromptu invitation, excitement sparkling on his face.

“I, uh,” Chance slumps where he stands, eyes fixed on the rabbit still clutched in Mafioso’s arms, “I didn’t realize you kept it,” He says, killing any hopes Mafioso had of talking about the giant stuffed animal in his room. He knows what he is; a killer, a family man in the most literal sense, big and intimidating and terrifying, when he wants to be. The amount of blood that marrs his hands should have stained the snow white fur of the stuffed rabbit, but he has refused to let it, because he wants, and it is the closest thing he will get to what he wants, even if he doesn’t deserve it.

Mafioso’s nose twitches. “Of course I kept him.” He mutters out indignantly, fingers twitching against the plush fur, “You thought I’d throw him away?” Chance scoffs, rolling his eyes dramatically behind his shades.

“You’d never, it’s too much of a waste, an’ I know how much you hate wastes.” He retorts, and oh, Mafioso loves him so, but he’s gotten it so perfectly wrong. “I figured you would’ve given it away t’ someone, or— y’know, stuffed it in a closet or somethin’. Never would’ve thought you’d keep it with ya on your bed.”

The reminder has Mafioso’s cheeks burning. He resists the urge to bury his face in the soft fur, still remembering the feelings, the sights of the lights washing against Chance’s face, the smell of burnt sugar and fried oil filling the air around them, the way his eyes had shone as he fired, as he picked the plush, the way his cheeks reddened as he held out the rabbit to Mafioso, the overwhelming feeling that had filled his chest as he’d taken it, clutched it tight, buried his face in the scent of fair dust and fried sweets and spilled pop. He remembers the music, ear-piercing and crackling over the speakers, remembers wanting to reach out, remembers reaching out back, sweat-slick palms sliding against each other as he had taken Chance’s hand, remembers feeling giddy, holding the stuffed rabbit.

“You won him for me,” is all he says in response to that, his voice low, full of feeling he cannot distinguish, cannot hide. Chance blinks, head tilted to the side like a curious dog, as if he’s wondering why it matters. As if that simple sentence isn’t Mafioso baring himself raw, flayed and exposed for his whole world to see. As if it’s not enough for Mafioso to want to keep the gift he was given.

He expects— teasing. A laugh, a cocky retort, adjusting his sunglasses whilst he does so; or a rebuttal, a, why does that matter, you’re grown, you shouldn’t be sleeping with stuffed animals, or even a joke; he knows, rationally, that Chance wouldn’t make fun of him in any way that could hurt— his ears are flat, nose twitching, whiskers jerking in the air, nervous impulses that he knows Chance will recognize. He expects Chance to ask why, why he’s keeping a stuffed animal in his bed, why it matters that Chance had won it for him, why he’s so pathetically, inherently nervous about it, why his grip on the rabbit hasn’t slackened since Chance had stumbled in on him with it, possessive and guarded. The answers to all those questions are the same, however shameful it may be.

He doesn’t expect a soft exhale of breath, Chance’s shoulders slackening where he stands, hands stuffed in his pockets, gazing at him so gently it takes his breath away. There’s the slightest smile on his mouth, grazing at the corners of his lips. “That I did,” he says, stepping fully into the room, movements careful and yet confident, as if his very presence isn’t enough to make Mafioso’s heart beat a tune in the confines of his ribcage.

He perches on the edge of the bed, and Mafioso catches the tremor in his hand as he reaches out to pet the stuffed rabbit. “I knew, when I set my eyes on ‘im, I had to get ‘im for ya.” Chance muses softly, more to himself than to Mafioso. The words still reach his sensitive ears, his face burning a deep crimson. He averts his gaze, the words bubbling up inside of his chest, eager to be freed, but he can’t.

He can’t ruin this. He does nothing but enforce pain, and Chance has lived a life full of it, and he cannot be the cause of more pain. He cannot stand above Chance, his hands stained with bitter cruor, and watch as he succumbs, whether it be by his hand or a hand enforced by his existence in Chance’s life.

Still, as he drowns in pools of amber and gold, light spilling in a flood in his irises, he wants. He can’t stop himself from wanting, no matter how hard he tells himself it is a terrible idea, that want only leads to hurt only leads to disappointment only leads to death. It is just a way of life. He has loved him for so long that it has become a part of him, as easy as breathing, as hard as living.

Chance fiddles with his lucky coin, something unreadable in his expression (and Mafioso is more than aware of how emotions flicker across his face, how he expresses himself, and he cannot place it, and it is terrifying). His eyes flash as he flips it up in the air, mouthing something to himself that Mafioso cannot read as he does so. He catches it, nimble fingers closing around the coin; he brings his hand to his mouth, kisses it. Opens.

And then—

And then he is leaning in, a gloved hand brushing against his cheek, thumbing through the fur on his face. Mafioso’s whiskers twitch. Chance is so close. So close. He’s staring at Mafioso, soft and open and raw, and when he opens his mouth to speak, his breath ghosts across Mafioso’s lips.

“Tell me t’ stop?” He asks, earnest, honest. Aching, just as Mafioso is. Mafioso says nothing, and Chance smiles, and he can feel the quirk of his lips as they press into Mafioso’s, gentle, head-spinning, everything he has ever wanted, has ever dreamed of in the dead of night, has woken up with the bitter-sweet feeling swept away by the wind.

Mafioso makes a cracked, broken noise in the back of his throat. His hand shifts, resting on Chance’s blazer, pulling him closer. Chance shakes under his touch, rearranging himself so he is knelt on the bed in front of Mafioso, pushing his mouth more insistently into his.

It feels like hunger, like starvation soothed, like a reckoning. It is soft, with an edge of restlessness underlying, that is alway sleeping under Chance’s skin. It feels like warmth, like spilled blood, like an April shower. Like home, and love, and flares of the sun and everything to the edge of the universe and back.

Chance’s knee digs into his hip, shoulders knocking together as he presses closer, as if he has something in his hands he cannot fathom letting go, losing. Mafioso reaches a hand up to cover Chance’s, holding him there, holding him close. He has dreamed of this for so long, and Lady Luck has shone Her light upon him, has gifted to him a taste of what is to come, and he is nothing less than grateful to Her.

Mafioso does not have to wonder if this is real. He could never quite imagine this, the sensations of Chance’s scarred hand against his face, the feeling of his bony knee pressing into his bare hipbone, the way he breathes into Mafioso’s mouth as he kisses like he wants to consume, shaky and desperate and eager. How could it not be, when he is mapping out the divots in Chance’s back, feeling every dimple and scar that he has been curious about, not when Chance responds by dragging his teeth over Mafioso’s bottom lip, rippling out a sound he only half-manages to hold back?

One day, one day, Mafioso will show him the extent of his love; for now, he pulls back to rest his forehead against Chance’s, breaths mingling together. He holds, and he is held, and he can feel the weight of Chance’s heartbeat through his shirt, and he loves. He wants, and he is wanted.