Archive of Our Own ^beta

i)

Määnin wakes up when something hits his shin.

He can instantly recognise that the bed he is lying in, isn’t his own. The mattress is too soft. The pillow is too flat. 

For a brief fleeting moment, he is almost scared to open his eyes, to realize that he is once again in some foreign bedroom, with a person that he doesn’t even know or remember.

Just as quickly, the memories of last night start to flood his mind. 

Their gig, going back together to Tommy’s place, kissing him senseless in his small kitchen, the handle of the cupboard digging into the small of his back when Tommy kissed him back with enough force to slam him against the cupboard.

It feels unreal, even though he can remember the details so vividly.

The way Tommy’s lips tasted like sweat and salt and grease of the fries he wanted to pick up from the Grillen. The weight of his hands on his waist as he was pulling his Karhu t-shirt off, undressing him.The sound of Tommy’s laughter, the genuine one that he never lets out on stage, when they finally made it to bed and he couldn’t get his jeans off without falling. 

Määnin still fears it might just be a dream. 

It’s embarrassing as hell, but it wouldn’t be the first time he has dreamt of his best friend. Not all of the dreams are even sex dreams, they are domestic and shit. He is literally dreaming of a relationship.

It’s pathetic but he guesses that is what being in love with his best friend for most of his life does to a man. 

He opens his eyes slowly, only to see Tommy standing in the doorway of his bedroom.

His brown hair is sticking up, to all possible directions. There are deep pillow creases on his cheek and he is looking around the bedroom floor, as if trying to find something.

Määnin assumes he is looking for a shirt since he is wearing only his black boxers. 

Okay, maybe last night was real. 

Määnin stays quiet. Letting his gaze travel on Tommy’s body. He is going to indulge himself, as a reward of sorts for finally getting his act together and be brave enough to confess to Tommy that he has been in love with him for ten years. At least. Maybe longer. Probably longer.

It was a high risk move, to kiss Tommy, because he could have lost the person who is the most important to him, and he would have lost more than half of his world if Tommy would have not been into it. 

Anyone would deserve a reward after taking a gamble like that. Even if he was almost certain that Tommy reciprocated his feelings. 

He shamelessly stares at Tommy’s ass. His sunglasses are somewhere. Maybe on the floor with the rest of his belongings, and his vision is blurry, but he can recognise the curve of it anywhere, he has been staring at it a long time during their gigs. 

He sees it well enough, even now, and he lets his gaze wander. To his surprisingly jacked arms, to his neck and Määnin wonders if he left a mark anywhere last night, and to his hands as Tommy finally picks up his t-shirt from the floor.

Määnin almost wants to say that he doesn’t have to put it on, not on his account. 

“Morning,” Tommy murmurs, when he notices that he is awake, and for a brief moment, the corner of his mouth twitches into a smile, but it disappears quickly, “do you want breakfast or do you just wanna go?”

Määnin’s heart sinks. 

It’s not what he expected to hear. Or what he hoped he would say. He presses his lips together, tightly, because he feels surprisingly stupid and vulnerable lying there, hoping that last night's love confessions would have meant something more.

The sex was amazing, better than he even imagined,even though it was clumsy and fumbling, but he finally got to worship Tommy in his own way, but he wants more than that, more than just friends with benefits, who casually hook up when feeling like it.

Määnin has always wanted all of it when it comes to Tommy,  being the greedy bastard that he is. Everything that he could get his hands on, being his best friend, being his bassist. It feels needy and dangerous to even ask for more. 

He does get why Tommy might not want all of it. He doesn’t have that much to bring to the table, not the real him that resides somewhere underneath the image of toughest man in Vörå. 

Määnin musters his best fake smile and mock clutches his chest. “I just opened my eyes and you’re already kicking me out of your bed? That’s rude.”

He hopes from the bottom of his heart that it sounds like the easy going joke that he intends it to be and does not sound as pathetic as he feels. He can joke his way out of this. Be the nonchalant person everyone always expects him to be. 

“No,” Tommy says, and Määnin is almost certain that he is frowning and gesturing around them, “isn’t that kind of what you do with everyone? Don’t stick around?”

The realization hits him like a ton of bricks and Määnin sits up in the bed. He tries his best to focus his blurry vision on Tommy and look at him in the eyes.  

“What makes you think you’re like everyone else?” he asks, sincerely, as he tilts his head to side, daring Tommy to acknowledge that he has always been different to him.

Special.  

Tommy Tall has been the center of his universe, like a goddamn sun, since he decided to be his friend on the school yard when they were seven years old. 

He knows that outsiders think Tommy’s obsession with him is funny and that he probably tolerates it and him only because he likes the attention. That he is stringing him along. That Tommy is an overactive and clingy puppy who would do anything to get his attention in return.

It could not be further away from the truth. 

Tommy is the first person who liked him for who he was, thought his jokes were funny and that he was cool. Like he was enough, just as he is. That he was fun to be around. That he wanted him around. 

Määnin thinks he got addicted to that feeling, seeing himself through the eyes of Tommy, instead of his own, but it is not all that there is to it. 

He genuinely likes Tommy, loves him, thinks his stupid jokes are funny, that his laughter is one of those sounds he would happily listen to the rest of his life, and that he makes his life better and likes his eagerness and excitement about things that matter to him. 

He is endeared by him and Määnin has done everything in his power to keep Tommy’s attention on him, to be worthy of the praise he is always singing and bragging about him, and make him happy.

He wears goddamn double denim on stage because of him and plays in the background when he sings about his ass. It's proof that he has never been able to say no to Tommy, not to enable him on his stupid and less stupid ideas. 

If that is not love, Määnin doesn’t know what else is.

Tommy’s slightly blurry figure is moving once again, he is picking something up and sitting on the edge of his bed. The mattress dips slightly and something is placed on Määnin’s palm.

His sunglasses. 

Maybe for the first time in his life, Määnin feels dumb to wear sunglasses inside, but he is grateful to get his eyesight back, to make out Tommy’s face that is still frowning with confusion. 

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

He says it, so matter-of-factly. As if it would be obvious that he is just one of the many, that he wouldn’t have had Määnin’s heart in a chokehold for most of his life.

He sighs as he puts his sunglasses on. He sort of hopes he would have his regular glasses, the ones that his therapist insisted he used in rehab, but they are somewhere, buried in his junk drawer back at his apartment. 

He doesn’t really use them, but right now, his sunglasses feel ridiculous. They are a mask, something to hide behind, and hiding seems impossible right now.

He cannot hide because he needs Tommy to realise things, to realise that if it is up to him, this won’t be just hooking up casually. That he might be an asshole but he isn’t that much of an ass, not to him. Well, he tries not to be. 

The reason Määnin even wears the sunglasses is to hide the fact that he always looks at Tommy as if he is the fucking eighth wonder of the world. A softness that takes over his eyes every time he lets himself look at him. Hell, his eyes probably even light up when he sees Tommy smile.

The glasses hide all of that. They are practical like that, and make him look tougher and cooler when no one can really read his expressions or know what he is thinking. 

But right now, it would be convenient if Tommy could read all of that from his expression. That he wouldn’t have to use his words. Because no one would look at their casual hooking up partner the way Määnin is looking at him.  

“You’re my best friend,” Määnin reminds him, as if Tommy would not remember the past over twenty years, “you’re not just someone.”

It sounds lame, but Määnin doesn’t know how else to say it without sounding pathetic and love sick, and worst of all, clingy. 

He knows Tommy craves that, the approval from him, he always does, but Määnin isn’t sure how to give it to him right now. 

Tommy nods slowly, but the frown line between his eyebrows has not disappeared anywhere and before he even says anything, Määnin knows that he still doesn’t get it.

“That means we have different rules for– this?” Tommy asks, attempting to hold his gaze through the sunglasses and mostly succeeding. “Because we hang out anyway?”

Määnin wants to hit his head against the wall. It’s not his fault that his heart has chosen a person that can be so obtuse to be the one that he loves the most. He should not be the one to suffer from it. 

Tommy’s eyes seem bluer than normally in the sunlight that is flooding in from the little window. It is sort of killing Määnin that he looks so uncertain when it comes to them, to him, even though Tommy has been sure of them since they met.

That they are a team, unbreakable and tough, and nothing could tear them apart.

Määnin could use that kind of belief and trust right now. He places his palm on Tommy’s thigh, just below the hem of his boxers. It’s ridiculous how exhilarating it is even to touch him the way he wants to. 

“I never stick around because none of them are you,” Määnin says slowly, each of the words feel too massive for his mouth, “even though I wanted them to be.”

It is the simple truth and he hopes it is straightforward enough for Tommy to understand it. That everyone he has ever gone home with has been just a replacement, a distraction, a cheap copy. 

That he always measured everyone up to Tommy, and no one ever compared. Sure, someone had a nice laugh, but it was never as nice as his. Everyone else’s jokes always fell flat. No one was ever nearly as hot as Tommy, especially when grinding against a mic stand on stage. 

It was him Määnin thought of, with every person he was with. 

Realisation seems to finally dawn on Tommy’s face and the confusion is changing into something that is undeniably softer. It almost reminds Määnin of wonder, surprise and awe, and he cannot believe he is the reason for that expression.  

It makes fucking butterflies appear in his stomach. He is so far gone for Tommy that it is borderline ridiculous. 

“Oh.”

Määnin huffs as the short syllable is all that comes out of Tommy’s mouth, even though it looks as if he would like to say something more. 

Määnin wants to take it as a compliment that he is apparently one of the only people on the planet that can render Tommy Tall speechless. Who knew that all he had to do was to confess that he has always wanted him? 

“I want something more than this,” he continues, because he will lose all of his courage if he stops now. He gestures towards them, their bodies, and the bed, “all of it. To stick around. For a long time.”

Tommy just stares at him, as if he would have grown another head. As if he would have trouble deciphering his words. As if he would have suddenly switched into Finnish.

The silence stretches between them, and Määnin can hear his own heart beat in his ears. It’s loud, uncomfortable and he hates it. He hates that it’s out of fear, that he is instinctively bracing for rejection, for that sting that comes when someone doesn’t want him. 

“Is that okay?” Määnin eventually asks, quietly and straightens his sunglasses a little even though it’s unnecessary, but he cannot stand the silence. 

It’s so uncharacteristic for Tommy, and it is starting to make his thoughts spiral. Maybe he got it all wrong, maybe Tommy only slept with him because he thought it was only going to be meaningless sex. 

A way to blow off some steam after a gig that went well. That it was him only because he was there, available, willing and wanting. 

Määnin thinks he might want to break something if that is the case. 

A tentative smile spreads on his face, and Määnin is soaking up every second of it. Tommy has smiled less and less each year lately, and Määnin hasn’t been able to figure out if it is all because he wants to seem tough or because he hasn’t had that many reasons to smile. 

“More than okay,” Tommy says, eventually and quietly, placing his hand on top of Määnin’s and squeezing it a little clumsily. 

Määnin doesn’t mind, Tommy is looking at him like is worthy of something, of something good, and he wants to keep it that way. 

He strokes Tommy’s thigh with his hand, it’s solid and warm underneath his touch and Määnin thinks he is losing his ability to speak, too.

“Good.”

It’s all that he manages to get out. It’s better than good, but being wanted is a strange feeling. Overwhelming, really. Even if it is coming from Tommy who has always seemed to think highly of him, that he actually wants him.

That isn’t just an exaggerated joke. 

“If you’re sticking around, the breakfast options are still limited. Either dried up Vaasan Ruispalat or porridge–” Tommy starts, seemingly trying to get up from the bed, but Määnin is not having any of it.

“I’d rather have this,” he says, grabbing Tommy by his wrist and pulling him back on the bed, on top of him, and kisses him. 

He kisses him with everything that he has. Trying to convey everything that he cannot bring himself to say with that one kiss. Doing everything with his tongue that seemed to drive Tommy crazy last night. 

Finally, Tommy pulls away, mostly to breathe, and Määnin feels a splash of pride spread in his chest because Tommy looks so undone with that one kiss. His cheeks are red and his eyes are shining with want. 

Määnin doesn’t want to think about what he looks like, underneath Tommy. 

Instead, he kisses him again, only briefly, and ends it by biting Tommy’s lower lip, pulling it slightly. 

“I don’t think you listened to anything I said last night,” Määnin murmurs, amusedly, against his mouth. 

“I was maybe a little distracted,” he shoots back, sounding almost sheepish. 

Määnin wants to ask whether it was his tongue or dick that distracted him enough to lose his hearing comprehension abilities, but he bites his tongue.

The things they said last night, in between everything, are mostly a blur to him, too. But he is certain that he told him that he loves him, has loved him for a really long time, accompanied with various curse words for emphasis. 

He is even more certain that Tommy said it back, against his skin, his mouth, the mattress.

It was stuck in his head, a long time after Tommy actually said it. A long time after Tommy, half on top of him, fell asleep and started to snore. 

It was like his mind couldn’t give it up. Those three words that seemed life-changing. His mind wanted a replay of it, constantly, to hear the thing he has wanted to hear for so long, again and again, to decipher if Tommy actually meant it.

Määnin is fairly certain Tommy meant it.    

He rolls his eyes, and he tries his best to keep the fondness out of it, but he fails miserably. “Distracted enough not to hear me say that one word I never say to anyone?”

“Apparently,” Tommy murmurs, with a shit-eating grin on his face, as his gaze drops down to Määnin’s lips, “probably would help if I heard it again.”

He has been aware, since they were teenagers, that Tommy doesn’t have game. He is usually not smooth with his words, his flirting skills are non-existent, and Määnin doesn’t know what it tells about him, that despite all of that, it is working on him.

That it always has worked on him, and he has never really understood why anyone else hasn’t seen Tommy the same way, why the admiring gazes haven’t been more directed at Tommy when they are on stage.

Maybe people are idiots. 

“You better not write a song about this,” he points out, poking Tommy’s jaw with his index finger. 

“Promise,” Tommy laughs, all breathless, “even though it would be fyrbanna tough.”

Määnin huffs. He doesn’t bother to argue it. He would rather keep the facade up that he is a heartless and emotionless bastard. Tommy can keep singing about his ass in public, other things can be reserved just for two of them. 

It’s just a word. One single word. 

A short word, a simple word, but it is not one he is used to saying. He cannot even remember the last time he has said it out loud and directed it to another person before last night. He almost fears that now, when things are slower, and he isn’t trying to kiss him senseless, that it makes him choke up. 

That it won’t come out as anything intelligible when it leaves his lips. 

But älskar never has rolled off his tongue so easily as he murmurs it to Tommy’s ear, and his heart sings when Tommy laughs and says it back.  

ii)

It’s been a week since he kissed Tommy for the first time.

It feels like a small forever has passed, but at the same time, Määnin has to remind himself every morning when he wakes up next to Tommy in his small double bed, that it is real. That he gets to have this.  

He usually realises that he is not dreaming when he feels the dead weight of Tommy’s limbs on him, and is met with his stinking morning breath, but he wouldn’t change anything about it. 

It has been a week of things being good, but normal. Everything is still kind of the same between them, the dynamic and pull that has always been there, but now there is much less pretence.

A hell of a lot more kissing and fucking, too. 

It’s been surprisingly easy to let Tommy love him, to receive and give affection. In small gestures, in touches, in kisses, in the casualness of it all.

He squeezes Tommy’s knee in the backseat of Freppa’s car, he lets Tommy kiss his cheek when they manage to catch a fleeting moment alone during the band practice. He kisses Tommy’s temple when they first wake up. Määnin makes him coffee in the morning, in the way he likes it. They bump their shoulders together when brushing their teeth next to each other in the cramped bathroom. 

It’s so damn domestic and sweet that it would make Määnin disgusted if it was with anyone else. 

It is easy when it’s only the two of them. 

Tommy’s small two room apartment has become a sort of a bubble. Thirty five square meters of space that feels like it is completely theirs, separate from the rest of the world, and Määnin knows he has been able to let his guard down, a little.

He still cannot shake off the part of him that is just waiting for the other shoe to drop, for him to fuck up this good thing between them, or Tommy to realise that no, this is too much after all. 

He doesn’t want that to happen. 

He has learnt that good things don’t come into his life in abundance and when he has something truly good, he has to hold onto it, sink his fingers into it. 

So, he tries. 

He lets himself smile more, not trying to worry about what it looks like. He lets him relax, to do things because he wants to, and trusts that Tommy won’t somehow turn all of it against him. 

Yet, Määnin thinks he has hit a new kind of rock bottom as he stands in Tommy’s tiny bathroom and stares at himself in the mirror.

Not the kind of rock bottom when his rehab therapist said that he is drinking himself to an early grave. Not the sort of bottom that greeted him after his second alcohol poisoning. No, this is the ridiculous kind of rock bottom, the kind he has not yet met. 

This is the kind of rock bottom that people only meet when they are in love, when they are willing to do stupid things for the people they love and to make them happy. 

His sunglasses lie on the edge of the sink. There is a light blue stain of toothpaste next to it that Määnin can surprisingly see as he has his regular glasses on. The glasses that he has not worn since he got out of rehab almost two months ago. 

It makes him feel naked, the metallic frames offer nothing to hide behind, and it makes a different kind of vulnerability raise its head. 

It should not be such a big deal. Tommy has seen him without his sunglasses before. He is one of the only people who has. Because contrary to popular belief, Määnin did not wear sunglasses when they were kids. 

But he has worn his sunglasses since the end of ninth grade, since they started their band, and not wearing them feels foreign.

As does the fact that he is solely doing it for Tommy’s sake. To be better at this whole relationship thing. Helvete, it sounds so unlike him that it is becoming almost overwhelming. 

He does his absolute best to ignore the very familiar pang of fear in the bottom of his stomach. The fear of being laughed at. That by revealing a bit by bit more of himself, he will ruin whatever image Tommy has built of him inside of his mind. 

He runs his hand through his hair and sighs deeply. Määnin truly wishes he could drink again. To make his thoughts just a bit quieter. 

He doesn’t know how long he has stood there, but he refuses to look at himself any longer, the unfamiliar mirror image of him. 

He pushes the bathroom door open and steps right into the small room that is mostly occupied by Tommy’s bed. 

Tommy is already lying on it, half of the duvet on top of him, tangled in his feet and he seems to be scrolling on his phone. Tommy instantly drops the phone to the mattress when he sees him.

Määnin isn’t sure if Tommy knows how much his face gives away when he is not pretending to scowl all the time.

Once again, Määnin has a hard time comprehending that he can be the reason for Tommy’s face to be shining with something that resembles surprise, awe, and delight. It quickly morphs into a lopsided grin. 

“Don’t say a word,” Määnin grumbles, pointing his finger at him as a warning without any sort of heat behind it as he crosses the distance between the door and bed. 

He doesn’t want to hear one single joke about his glasses or that Tommy pokes fun at him for even trying. He already feels more self-conscious than he probably has in years. It’s all so so fucking dumb.

Määnin can feel the weight of Tommy’s gaze as it travels along his body. He isn’t wearing anything but his underwear, he would die of a heat stroke if he tried to wear anything else while sleeping when Tommy acts as a human furnace in the small double bed. 

Tommy props himself against his elbows and hums. “I can’t even say that you look hot?”

Määnin cannot stop himself from scoffing as he sits on the edge of the bed. He doesn’t want jokes, but he doesn’t want outright lies, either. 

He knows that he is good-looking, objectively, but he is sure as hell that the glasses do not increase his level of hotness. Especially in the eyes of Tommy, who has always made his toughness to be one of the defining characteristics of his sexiness. 

“Yeah, right,” he mutters, and lies down as soon as Tommy moves to make space for him on the bed.

He is tempted to take the glasses off already, put them on the windowsill that acts as a nightstand, but he resists the urge, especially when it doesn’t take long for Tommy to climb on top of him, astride. 

“You do,” Tommy insists, in a similar way that he does when he believes in something with his whole soul. When he talks about songs that he has written that he believes will be their next hits. 

It sort of takes Määnin’s breath away. 

“You keep wearing the sunglasses on the stage?” Tommy asks, his voice heavy with amusement, before kissing his neck. 

His kisses are eager, wet, and hungry. They are trailing lower and lower on his neck, slowly, and all the way to his collarbones. Maybe Tommy isn’t lying to him about how hot he is finding all of this.

He is probably leaving a mark or two behind on his neck. 

Desire is buzzing underneath his skin, mixing with pure pleasure, and it is the sort of feeling Määnin wants to focus on, to savor. There are not many things that could give him a feeling so strong now that he cannot drink.

The list of things that give him pleasure, happiness even, in a way that can quiet his mind down in a similar way that only a can of beer could before, is short. It has two things, really. Playing his bass at a stage, or even in their practice, and Tommy. 

He knew what the list would include already when he was asked that in rehab, but he refused to share that with anyone else. But he thinks it’s a good list, he isn’t sure what else he would need from life. 

Määnin squeezes his eyes shut and nods as well as he can while lying down. “I’m not wearing these outside this goddamn apartment.”

No one else needs to see them, Freppa maybe in the case of an emergency, but otherwise he is doing this only for Tommy. 

Even though he never asked him not to wear his sunglasses. Määnin just could not get his rehab therapist’s voice out of his head. She preached to him so many times about how people find connecting with him easier if they can see his eyes.

And maybe he wants Tommy to feel special, that he can see a part of him that others do not get to see. Besides, he has selfish reasons, too. Looking at Tommy becomes a whole another experience when everything is not just shades of black and brown. 

He can actually see his eyes now, properly. Not that he would ever admit that to another living soul. Not even to Tommy. 

Outside, he still wants to wear his sunglasses, to hide behind them. No one else needs to know that he looks at Tommy like he is the meaning of the universe or some shit like that. 

“Okay,” Tommy replies, accepting his reasoning without any sort of questioning, and continues to kiss his neck, but it doesn’t take long until they start to trail lower, onto his chest, onto his stomach and with his hands, pulls Määnin’s boxers down.

“What are you doing?”

The question is out of his mouth before he even thinks about it and the look that Tommy shoots at him conveys what the hell do you think I am doing perfectly without any words.

He has managed to pull his boxers down to his knees with relentless yanking. 

“Effort deserves a reward,” he still justifies, kissing Määnin's lower stomach now, his thighs and stroking his dick with his hand, and it feels like worship, “and you do look damn hot.”

Määnin quickly decides that maybe wearing the glasses around Tommy isn’t the worst thing in the world. 

iii)

Määnin doesn’t know what time it is when they actually manage to get into Tommy’s bed after a gig they played in a town an hour away. 

It’s late anyways, and the adrenaline of performing well is wearing off, and his limbs are starting to weigh like lead and he is almost grateful to be able to just lie down. Somehow not having the buzz of alcohol in his veins wears him down quicker. 

He probably could fall asleep pretty easily, there and then, but Tommy is still talking about the gig. He is lying right next to him, so close that Määnin can see the laughter lines in the corner of his eye.

Tommy is explaining something that Freppa said about their new song, something that he doesn’t agree with, something about audience reactions to their old and new songs, and his bass playing. 

Määnin listens to him, he really does, but Tommy talks a lot and fast, and is bouncing from one topic to another, something that he does a lot when talking about Vörjeans, and it’s so familiar that it doesn’t help to keep his eyelids open.

It’s comforting even. He has listened to Tommy talk about everything between the ground and sky since they were seven years old. He has mastered the art of listening to him, but still filtering out some of it.

It’s not until Tommy starts to talk about the fans that came up to them after the gig in the corner of the bar, about this one woman who had been praising a couple of their songs, that he opens his eyes.

“She was flirting with you,” Määnin murmurs, his voice coming out surprisingly low.

Jealousy isn’t exactly a new feeling to Määnin. It’s something that has gnawed at the pits of his stomach every time Tommy has given his attention to someone else, to a fan, to anyone, for years. 

It’s rooted deep in the fear, in the anticipation, of Tommy realising that there are better people in the world than him, people who are more fun to be around, not so fucked up, and just over all better. People who are not him. 

But it’s different now, now that he gets to have all of Tommy, to know that he wants him too.The jealousy is becoming something else, stronger even. It is morphing into need of everyone knowing that he is his. 

The only issue is that they haven’t actually told anyone of their relationship. Freppa knows because he is Freppa, and they cannot keep their hands to themselves all the time when they are out in public and Freppa saw them make out against his car on Thursday. 

But he cannot really push his tongue down Tommy’s throat every time a fan approaches them with the intention of going home with one of them.

Määnin was tempted to do that tonight, to kiss him, right there and then, to have Tommy to look at him as he always does after he kisses him in a way that apparently makes him forget his own name.

To say I get to have this, not you to all the over-eager fans that were touching Tommy’s arms as they talked. 

Instead, he just glared at people, and hoped it was enough off-putting. 

He knows the jealousy isn’t one-sided, that Tommy feels it, too, that the bile of it burns his throat as well. That they want to mark their territory, somehow, anyhow. 

It’s making them bolder on the stage. The flirting, the teasing, the longing is getting stronger, more palpable and visible to others. 

Määnin is convinced that they are stuck in a loop of psycho-sexual powerplay of who dares to make a bigger claim on the other in front of everyone while they are on a stage. It’s sort of hot, and it’s fun, too. To push Tommy’s buttons, to see him blush, and try his best not to lose his own nonchalant composure. 

He goes to sing in the same microphone as Tommy whenever he spots a chance, getting real close, pushing their shoulders together, leaning against his back when he plays his solo with his bass.

He places the strap of his bass over Tommy’s head, placing the instrument in his hands, every time they perform Marlene and he has to get rid of his bass to sing. It’s not as if he would let just anyone play it.

He has started to zip and unzip the zipper of his jeans as he sings, raising his eyebrows at Tommy every time he does it. 

He still stares at Tommy’s ass behind his sunglasses, no one sees it but he told Tommy about it one time right before going on stage. The blush that crept on his cheeks was a sight to behold. 

Tommy holds his gaze when he thrusts his hips during Volvoräägör. He keeps touching him more, clasping his hand on his shoulder, on his elbow, every time he walks past him on the stage.

At the end of one of their gigs, Tommy placed his cap on Määnin’s head. It was warm and wet with his sweat, smelling so strongly of just him, and he almost got hard on the stage, right there and then.  

Tommy keeps winking at him, and his stage banter keeps getting flirtier. Tommy proclaimed tonight that Määnin has the toughest ass in all of Vörå, that the jeans brand whose jeans he wears should pay him for making them look so good, and it took everything in Määnin just to nod nonchalantly. 

Määnin thinks they are a couple of shows away from Tommy grinding his ass against him on stage with the damn mic stand and him licking the droplets of Tommy’s sweat away from his neck when they sing into the same microphone. 

It’s sort of a miracle that anyone from their audience thinks that they have a shot, that they can flirt their way past whatever is happening on the stage. 

But tonight, there was this woman. 

She was pretty, Määnin could see that, with her brown thick hair and a smile that seemed to lit up half of the bar. 

Instead of saying anything, Määnin just scooched himself closer to Tommy on the half-circle shaped bar booth, and stared at the woman behind his black sunglasses as she laughed a little too loudly at Tommy’s jokes and kept constantly touching Tommy’s bare forearm, asking about the lyrics of their songs.

It did bring Määnin unadulterated satisfaction when Tommy’s lyrics’ explanations almost always went back to him. He let his mouth curl up into a smirk each time. Other than that he just shot her his most unimpressed glare.

At some point, he just placed his hand on Tommy’s thigh. 

It was impulsive and stupid, and he knew he was being possessive. The thing is that he wants Tommy to be adored, he deserves to get the attention for his singing and writing their songs, but Määnin knows how easy it is to want him, and his jealousy gets the best of him, often.

Tommy didn’t seem to mind, he didn’t push his hand away, only bumped their knees together underneath the table, and continued to talk. 

The woman finally got the hint that this isn’t going anywhere after a while and left their table. Määnin should be happy with that, he knows it. He is the one who is keeping Tommy’s bed warm, not a random woman he met tonight. 

“I think she was just being nice,” Tommy says, slowly, a frown line appearing between his eyebrows as he stares at the ceiling. It seriously looks as if he needs to think about the interaction, to analyse it. “She had done her research on the lyrics.”

“Flirting,” Määnin insists, in a murmur, into his ear. He runs his thumb along the elastic band of Tommy’s boxers. He slips his finger between his skin and the band, pulling the band slightly away from his skin and letting it go. It snaps softly against his hipbone. “It was flirting.”

Tommy turns his head to look at him. Almost half of his face disappears into the pillow, but Määnin can tell that he is glaring at him.  

“It’s not like you didn’t get your fair share of attention, too,” Tommy murmurs right back at him. The jealousy is filling every crack in his voice. 

It does things to Määnin’s stomach, making it twist into a knot. He isn’t sure if he likes it or not.

It feels nice to be wanted, desired. 

“Really?” he says, lazily and slowly, as he lets his hand rest on Tommy’s stomach, “I didn’t notice it.”

In reality, he did notice, but he couldn’t care less. There is almost always someone, hanging out at the bar or outside of it, suggesting that they would like to leave with him, and he knows that it’s his own doing. He has said yes too many times, creating a reputation for himself, and at one point that system worked.

Drinking and sleeping every time with a different person. Once upon a time, he probably would have excused himself from the carpool back to Vörå and went with the blonde stranger, just to get that momentary bliss and distraction. 

Now, he didn’t really spare more than a glance at them. He had a different place he wanted to be at, and that happens to be in this tiny apartment, in the cheapest bed that Jysk has to offer, in sheets that are just a little rough against his skin.  

Tommy suddenly looks away from him, his gaze settling back at the ceiling. 

“I thought you might have wanted to leave with her.”

His voice is quiet, but there is a certain edge of pretended nonchalance in it. As if he wouldn’t have cared if he went home with someone else.  

Tommy is clenching his teeth together, the tension in his jaw is visible, and all Määnin can do is to stare at him. He blinks, perplexed. 

It’s the sort of thing Tommy might have said to him months ago, when they were still pretending that they did not feel the irresistible pull between them, but it doesn’t make any sense right now. 

Not after a month of sleeping in the same bed almost every night, not after worshipping each other, in their own ways, for a month, not after they know exactly what the other tastes like everywhere, and definitely not when they both have said that there is love between them.

Not when the t-shirt that Tommy is wearing to bed isn’t his own, it’s literally Määnin’s old white t-shirt that has turned soft and almost see-through in certain places because he has worn it so many times. Määnin isn’t even sure if the boxers Tommy is wearing are his own or not. 

It doesn’t make sense that he is suggesting that Määnin could have so easily thrown all of it away just because he found someone else attractive and willing. Not when he literally smells like Tommy’s shower gel and laundry detergent.

Määnin bites the inside of his cheek. It stings to know that Tommy thinks so little of him, of the love that he has for him, of the devotion that he shoved into his hands on the night he first kissed him.  

“I don’t sleep around when I’m in love.” 

The words come out harsher than he means to, sharp and defensive, and he certainly doesn’t mean to say in love. The words just escape from his lips, he cannot really take them back. Not when they both know they are true.

Still, the words hang on between them, like a dark cloud, and the silence seems to stretch on between them.  

“We never defined this,” Tommy says, eventually, sounding surprisingly weary as he gestures between them, “you could have anyone you want.”

Määnin just stares at him. At his hair that looks softer than usual, at the corner of his mouth that seems to twitch with irritation as he even thinks about the possibility of Määnin wanting someone else, at his gaze that is still glued to the ceiling.

Tommy is definitely failing the nonchalant act, and Määnin’s stomach flips, in a good way. It’s sort of hot that Tommy is jealous.  

There are a lot of things he could say. 

He could tell about that one time in Närpes when he slept with a guy almost solely because the color of his eyes was almost the same shade as Tommy’s. He could question why Tommy doesn’t see that he doesn’t want anyone else. That no one else comes even close to what he is to him.

He could argue that Tommy has always over-sold him, and that just because Tommy thinks he is the toughest and hottest, doesn’t mean that everyone else thinks that a recovering alcoholic who plays bass in some band is the greatest thing in the world. That he couldn’t pull just anyone.

It used to be a fun challenge, though. 

But that was all that he was to people, a challenge. If they could make him leave the bar with them, and he was only good for one night and for one thing, Määnin made his peace with it.

But now, everything he wants is in the same bed with him. Anything else would pale in comparison and feel insincere and hollow. 

Määnin doesn’t voice any of this. Talking is difficult and he wants to come up with better ways to let Tommy know that he is the only one he sees.  

“Hmh,” he hums, dragging his fingertips along Tommy’s stomach, slow and teasing, “and I get to have you. Pretty happy with that.”

Tommy turns his head to glance at him, and Määnin takes the opportunity to kiss him. He kisses him the way he wanted at the bar, in front of all of those people, in the way that should leave no doubt in Tommy’s mind about who he wants. 

Tommy doesn’t take long to kiss him back, and it’s quickly turning into a series of kisses, and it’s difficult to think about anything else but Tommy, and all of his senses are full of him. 

The way Tommy’s jawline feels a bit rough underneath his fingertips, he probably hasn’t shaved in a few days. The way Tommy is holding onto him as if he would almost fear that he is going to disappear if he lets go. The way Tommy smells like sweat and he tastes something sweet on his lips. The little inhale Tommy does when he tries to breathe only through his nose. 

Usually, when he makes out with Tommy, his mind just quiets down, and Määnin likes it that way, but for some reason, it doesn’t happen this time. Tommy’s earlier words just echo in his mind, bouncing around, and Määnin cannot put his finger on what is bothering him about them.

He is on top of Tommy, straddling him, when his mind finally catches up. Määnin tastes bile in his mouth.

“You thought we weren’t exclusive?”

It’s the only conclusion he can draw from Tommy’s odd rambling, from talking so casually about him wanting to leave with someone else, as if it would have been fine and probable.

Määnin can only stare at him, again. Even in the darkness of the bedroom, he can see Tommy’s blush creep up on him and he squirms a little underneath him. 

He shrugs, as well as he can while lying down, and looks everywhere else but into Määnin’s eyes. “We didn’t define it.”

He has a point there, but Määnin didn’t think they needed to have that conversation. They still don’t talk about their feelings and shit that often, but he thought that the love confession covered all of their bases. 

Saying that he never stayed with anyone because he only ever wanted Tommy should have made things clear, for fuck’s sake. 

Määnin tastes something stronger than bile in the back of his mouth as he thinks of the implications of Tommy believing that they have apparently been in an open relationship for the past month.

“So have you–?”

He doesn’t really want to finish that sentence. He doesn’t even want to think about it, but he needs to know. It’s like a bruise he cannot stop poking, even though it hurts to touch. 

Määnin can hear his heartbeat in his ears again, but Tommy puts him out of his misery by not wasting a moment and shaking his head furiously. He even looks borderline offended that Määnin is suggesting it. 

“No.”

It’s the answer that makes tension disappear partly from his shoulders, the one that softens his heart just a bit. He can live with this answer, even though he still isn’t sure how they ended up having this conversation.

Määnin intertwines his fingers with Tommy’s and pins both of his hands on both sides of the pillow, against the mattress. He leans in, hovering his head near Tommy’s, close enough to feel his warm breath on his face and neck.

“Did you want to leave with someone else?” Määnin asks, his voice low, while holding Tommy’s gaze intensively and tilting his head.

He doesn’t like the question at all, he hates it actually, but he guesses it’s fair to ask. He won’t like it but he knows a thing or two he could do to him to make him forget anyone else that might be stuck in his mind. 

That’s a challenge he can take on, to make Tommy think nothing but him. 

Tommy shakes his head again, and looks longsuffering. “Fyrbanna, you have said so many times that you won’t settle down. That commitment is not for you. That you need to be free or you’ll suffocate or something.”

Määnin lets go of Tommy’s right hand to pinch the bridge of his own nose. He squeezes his eyes shut and suppresses the urge to groan or hit his head against the wall behind the bed. 

All of those are things he has said over the years. Most of the time when drunk or when Freppa and Gambamäänin were on his ass about never dating anyone. At the time, it felt like great reasoning. 

It fit the image of what he wanted to be, nonchalant and never wanting or needing anyone for more than one night. Being a free spirit with a bunch of commitment issues. 

He should have known that Tommy’s tendency to hang on his every word would come to bite him in the ass one day. 

Tommy is apparently taking his silence in the wrong way because he is squirming again underneath his hips and thighs. 

“I don’t want to suffocate you,” Tommy says, uncharacteristically quietly, as if it would be the founding principle of life. 

That he doesn’t want to cause any sort of discomfort or hurt to Määnin, if it is up to him, and Määnin has known that for a long time. Almost as long as he has known Tommy. 

He has always thought of him, his feelings, before his own, and done small and thoughtful things, and then pretended that he never did them because it’s not tough to consider someone’s feelings. 

It ruins the whole image of doing whatever he wants. 

For both of their sake, Määnin has tended to ignore it, or reciprocate it in a similar way, in a wordless way that can be easy to ignore. 

He hasn’t seen Tommy drink a drop of alcohol since he got out of rehab. It is as if he stopped drinking with him, even though Tommy never developed an addiction out of his drinking habits. 

Määnin knows that he stopped because of him, because he is thinking of him, especially now that he keeps tasting whatever Tommy has drunk every time they kiss.

Tommy did not even make a big deal out of it, he just swapped the Karhu cans to Pepsi Max cans without a word. Not complaining how boring it is that he cannot drink at gigs anymore, or every time when they hang out. 

Two weeks after he got out of rehab, he tried to talk about it to Tommy after a rehearsal. A rehearsal where he had kept sipping his Pepsi Max as if it was the best thing ever developed by the human kind. 

Tommy just shrugged and said that he thought it was tougher any way to stay sober, and kept drinking his soda, and that was the end of that conversation. 

Besides, Tommy can be a stubborn ass when he wants to be, and Määnin knows he couldn’t turn his head around, not in this. 

After that, Määnin has made a habit of paying for Tommy’s drinks every time they are out, in a bar after a gig or at the Grillen. 

It’s tempting to ignore this too, the fact that Tommy thinks he needs an open relationship, fuck, that Tommy is basically granting him that because he doesn’t want to make him miserable.

As if fucking a stranger could ever make him happy, when Määnin can have him. 

Määnin doesn’t think he can ignore it this time, not when there is something so important on the line, and he cannot let Tommy think that he wouldn’t be enough for him, that his eyes would eventually start to wander, because he gets bored and cannot keep it in his pants and commit to the person he loves. 

He needs to set the record straight, to make Tommy believe that he is so wrong, and that he is enough, a goddamn dream come true, but the words are failing him again. 

He is too overwhelmed to speak. He wishes there would be a way to get through Tommy’s oblivious and thick skull without words, that he could do something. Maybe he can, not right now, but in the future. Do the little things, the little gestures, when they are out, wherever, pay more attention to him, amp up his shameless flirting with him. 

Initiate the physical contact, the touches, have his hand on his knee, around him, on his shoulder, hold his hand or whatever to remind him that he is on his mind, no one else, even if he seems to flirt with someone, purely out of habit. 

Make sure that he knows that everything else but them is meaningless to him.   

“You’re not, Toms,” Määnin manages to say out loud, softness creeping into his voice. 

He doesn’t know how to say that if anything, being with him, being in love with him and not having to pretend that he is not, is allowing him to breathe easier than in years.

Tommy’s free hand has been caressing his bare thigh, but his hand comes to a sudden stop. 

Tommy blinks at him, studying him with his gaze, as if he would need to figure out if he is joking or not. 

Määnin doesn’t look away from him and Tommy seems to come to his conclusions quickly. 

“Really?”

“Really,” Määnin echoes. 

That word alone feels like another love declaration. Maybe that can become their thing, to figure out all the ways to say I love you without actually saying those words. He thinks he would like to keep a list of all the ways in his mind.  

“Huh.”

Tommy looks as if he has been hit with an epiphany, the good kind of that, his cheeks are growing redder again and he smiles in a way that reaches his eyes, and Määnin is so in love that it hurts. 

Määnin selfishly hopes that he never stops looking at him like that, and that loving him is enough for it.

Tommy’s hand keeps moving, up and down, on his thigh. All the tension that he was harboring earlier has melted away, and Määnin thinks he has succeeded in making himself understood. 

He could leave it at that, talking about feelings is sort of lame, but he knows that when he uses his words, actually try to voice how much Tommy means to him, he catches him off-guard and makes a blabbering mess of him. 

It is when his cheeks turn the brightest red Määnin has ever seen on someone who is not actively choking to death. 

Määnin loves it, because of the version of Tommy that no one else gets to see, to have, but him.  

There are no traces of that damn scowl and pretending that nothing fazes him. 

“For the record,” Määnin says, leaning in again, practically lying on top of him and murmurs into his ear, “you’re it for me. The exception, to– everything.”

The sudden sharp inhale that Tommy makes out of surprise is worth it all. 

It’s a promise, and even though Määnin has not been the best at following through, being the reliable one, worthy of his word, there are still some promises that he considers sacred. A list of promises he wants to keep as long as there is air in his lungs. 

There are two of them, and both of them he has sworn to Tommy. 

The first was when they were nine years old. They were in third grade and there were a bunch of new kids in their class, and for some reason, which Määnin couldn’t comprehend, they purposefully left Tommy out of their jokes,of their games, of everything.  

They were a bunch of mean kids, and it got to Tommy, as it does when one is nine years old, even though he tried to pretend that he couldn’t care less. Still, one time in recession, when they were hanging out underneath a basketball hoop, sitting on the damp ground, as far away from the rest of the kids as they could be, Tommy looked especially miserable about it.

Määnin still remembers how Tommy asked if he would rather be friends with the other kids, with the cool and popular ones, and Määnin did not miss a beat to say no, I like you more. 

Tommy offered him a smile at that, and that to his nine year old brain felt like the best thing in the world. It might be almost twenty years later now, but it still feels like the best thing in the world when he manages to make Tommy smile. 

Do you think we will be friends forever? Tommy had asked him next, and Määnin did not want to give him an answer that would make that smile go away, but he could promise him something, and it’s a promise he has kept ever since.

I promise we will be.   

It has worked well enough so far, even though someone might think that silly promises given in recessions are not binding or worth keeping, but for him, they are. 

The second promise was the one he gave to Tommy when he finally agreed to go to rehab, to get his life together, and get better, after Tommy staged an intervention with Freppa. 

He thinks he might remember Tommy’s words until the day he dies. Get better because I’m not fucking watching you die. So, he promised him, there and then, that he would get better, and the promise of it helped him to get through the rehab.

This can be the third promise that he gives to him. That he is the one he wants and that he is willing to throw all of his principles about relationships to the trash can when it comes to him, because he is special. 

Maybe in the future he promises something more, but right now it feels enough.

iv)

“Stay still,” Tommy orders, as he crouches next to the bed and applies a cotton swap drenched in disinfectant against a cut on Määnin’s left cheek. 

The smell of the disinfectant is pungent and Määnin tries his best not to flinch when the small cut starts to sting as Tommy wipes it. He is surprisingly gentle and careful with the way he touches his face. 

He only grunts as a response. 

Määnin thinks all of it is completely unnecessary. The cut isn’t larger than a couple of centimeters and it mostly stopped bleeding already at the bar. 

Määnin knows that he scared Tommy, and Freppa, when he got up from the bar’s sticky floor, half of his head covered in fresh crimson-coloured blood.

He has barely ever seen Tommy so pale. 

But it looked a lot worse than it was, wounds in face and head always bleed like nobody’s business, and it was mostly just outright embarrassing. 

To be hit in the stomach hard enough to lose his balance and hit his head against the corner of the stage is something he could have lived without. It’s really not the type of a tough bar fight that he wants to reminisce about any time soon. 

Especially afterwards when he was just holding his face, palms wet with his own blood, and Freppa had to hold Tommy back because he looked as if he could smash in the head of the guy who punched Määnin. 

He guesses it’s a good thing that they managed to play their gig before the punches started rolling. 

Besides, Määnin would like to make it known that it was not even his fault that he got punched. No, he has stopped looking for fights everywhere, and getting hit by a stranger and getting his own knuckles bloodied aren’t anymore the only ways he can feel something without alcohol.

He got roped into it, and he isn’t even sure what happened. There were a bunch of drunk people in the audience as they played their songs, yelling and shouting stuff that was unintelligible to Määnin, and they seemed to get agitated every time Tommy joked about the place they were playing in, or about anything, really. 

None of his jokes seemed to land. 

Once they got off the stage, the yelling continued, and Tommy with his big mouth was going along with it, yelling something back. 

Määnin just wanted to get out of there, but when one of the guys shoved Tommy, hard, he sort of instinctively stepped in-between, because he has known enough angry men in his life to know the exact look that takes over someone’s face before they start punching. 

And he would rather like if Tommy didn’t get punched, if he didn’t get hurt in any way. He acted on a pure instinct, really. Stepping in between the guy and Tommy was as natural as drawing his next breath. 

The only difference being that breathing doesn’t cause hefty bruising on his side. 

Maybe he should have punched before he got punched but he thinks his punching other people days are over. 

Freppa got them out of there pretty quickly after that, and Määnin spent most of the ride back home holding a bunch of napkins against his face to stop the bleeding, and in Määnin’s book that would have been enough.

But Tommy insisted that they need to clean the cut and found a pack of peas from the freezer to hold against his bruised side, and there he still is, sitting on the edge of Tommy’s bed, holding that partly melted pea pack against the left side of his ribcage.

Tommy finally stops wiping the wound with the cotton swap and throws it to a trash can in the corner of the room. 

He is still crouching in front of him, in between Määnin’s legs, and seems to be studying the cut with his gaze. As if he could make it better by just staring at it. It’s sort of sweet, actually. 

“You aren’t going anywhere tonight,” Tommy continues, matter-of-factly, as he picks up the first-aid kit and starts to rummage through it again, “Freppa said you’re on a concussion watch.”

Earlier today, Määnin made a big deal out going back to his own place tonight after the gig. Going on something about checking his mail, getting clean clothes, watering his plants.

All a bunch of excuses. 

The only mail he might be getting is bills, he has plenty of clothes shoved into Tommy’s closet and there’s a functioning washing machine, and his only plant is a plastic cactus Freppa gave him when he was discharged from the rehab.

He doesn’t need to go home, and he doesn’t particularly want to. His apartment has always felt a little hollow and gloomy and he has never really thought of it as his home. It’s got weird stains on the floor and the temperature is always freezing and it lacks any sort of feeling of belonging. 

It’s just a place he rented, the cheapest place he could find, when he wanted to move on his own, and most of his time there he spent drinking. It’s not a place he thinks fondly of, and even less now that he has spent most of his time over at Tommy’s place.

It reminds him of darker times, and being there alone makes him feel uneasy in a way that he cannot even describe. 

But he thought he owed Tommy a break, to give him some space.

It has been over three months since they kissed for the first time, and they have been almost as if glued together, attached at the hip as Freppa joked a couple of days ago. 

And if Freppa thinks they are being too clingy, up in each other’s space, it must be the case. 

Määnin thinks Tommy must want some space to breathe, not to spend almost all of their waking moments together, at the apartment or at the band practice or otherwise at Freppa’s place. 

He knows exactly how exhausting it can be to deal with him, and he doesn’t want Tommy to grow tired of him. To start resenting him just because he is always there. 

He is selfish, he knows, but he doesn’t want Tommy to start thinking differently of him, to lose that adoration that he has for him. It’s hard to think someone is the toughest and greatest if one sees too much of them, all the time. 

Tommy hasn’t seemed annoyed with him, or tired of seeing his face every day as a first thing, but he wants to take preventive measures. 

He has to try and protect the best thing he has. 

“Since when have we started to listen to Freppa?” Määnin mumbles, pushing the brim of Tommy’s cap hard enough to skew it completely on his head. 

Tommy still hasn’t changed his clothes from the gig. He deemed the whole wound tending to be the most pressing issue. Määnin stares at the sleeve of Tommy’s denim jacket, it has a dried stain of his blood. 

“Since I read what a concussion can do to a person,” Tommy shoots back, without missing a beat, and points at his phone that lies on the window sill. 

Määnin is certain that if he were to pick up the phone he would see a text thread between him and Freppa, complete with some link that lists all the symptoms of a concussion and what it might do if left untreated. 

Määnin is pretty sure he doesn’t have a concussion. Sure, his head hurts, but he has hit his head harder before and he isn’t sure how much more damage one fall does to his already jumbled up brain. 

Freppa and Tommy made it merely a bigger deal than it needs to be. He is fine, really. 

But he doesn’t know how to say no to Tommy, not when he is asking him to stay, and it is what he really wants to do. He wants to fall asleep next to him, feel the weight of his limbs and hear the sound of his breathing. 

He is selfish and greedy like that. 

Still, Määnin rolls his eyes, unable to keep the fondness out of it, “I guess I’m staying another night.”

Määnin doesn’t know if the sudden sharpness in his headache comes from rolling his eyes or from thinking about his own bed that he has not slept in ages. 

He can suck it up and sleep there alone the next night, then. Or maybe a couple of nights. It’s not like he hasn’t done it before. 

Tommy finally finds the plaster package and starts to shuffle though it until he picks up one of the smaller ones. Määnin wants to protest that he doesn’t even need a plaster, but the words die on his lips.

It has been a long time since someone has taken care of him in that way, full of gentleness in the way he is being touched and that the worry has been laced with love. It’s not the worst feeling in the world. Not that he would want to admit that outloud.

But it’s the kind of intimacy he hasn’t really experienced with anyone else.  

“You know, you could just move in, for real,” Tommy says, almost off-handedly, as if he was talking about the weather, as he peels the papers away from the plaster. He isn’t even really looking at Määnin.

But Määnin’s heart skips a beat. 

He is so sure he did not hear him correctly, that Tommy said something else, and his mind that only wants to hear what it desires the most, being wanted and belonging somewhere, is playing tricks on him.  

“What?”

He ends up sounding choked up. 

Maybe he has that concussion after all and he is hallucinating this whole exchange. Maybe he is unconscious and still lying on that sticky floor of the bar. 

“When is the last time you have been at yours anyway?” Tommy continues, apparently oblivious to his emotional turmoil as he places the plaster on his cheek and runs his fingers over it, making sure that it sticks. “It’s a shitty and expensive place and it’s not like you like it.”

He makes valid points, and Määnin knows Tommy. He knows the tones of his voice and that he has never been good at pretending. He is serious, he means it, and now that Tommy stands up and looks at him, he can look straight into his eyes. 

There is softness there, but uncertainty as well, and Määnin realises that he is really asking him, not messing with him, he is really putting himself on the line. Placing the ball on Määnin’s court. 

He can decide how they play this. If it will be a joke or something real. A joke would be easier, something real is terrifying.  

Määnin grabs the hem of Tommy’s Vörjeans t-shirt and pulls him closer, back in between his legs. He rests his hands on his hips. He slips his fingers underneath Tommy’s t-shirt.  

“I take a punch meant for you and you want to make me your sambo?” he murmurs, mostly against Tommy’s shirt, his chest. 

It’s easier than looking at him as he speaks. 

Määnin knows he probably should play it cool. Just nod and say sure. Maybe shrug and pretend that it doesn’t get to him as badly as it does that Tommy wants him there, that he wants that small two room apartment to be a home for him, too. 

His head hurts, he is tired and he is in love, sue him for being overwhelmed. For not being in complete control of the words that come out of his mouth. For using words like sambo like a fucking sentimental fool in love, for sounding like Freppa.  

It’s dumb, but he has been convinced for most of his life that no one would ever want to live with him. That he is not meant to be on the receiving end of love that desires something so domestic, so soft, as living together. That he is not cut out for it.

He’s good for a quick fuck in the bathroom of some shady bar after way too many beers. 

He never thought he would become anyone’s other half, let alone better half, that anyone could love him enough to always want more with him, for him to become anyone’s sambo.

That anyone could put up with him for that long or want him as something more than a boyfriend. 

But Tommy has always thought more highly of him. 

Määnin just doesn’t always agree with him about it.

The thing is that Määnin knows that Tommy loves him, he believes it with his whole soul. He feels it because Tommy has come up with way too many ways to show it. 

Once, he complained that Fairy makes his hands itch when washing the dishes, off hand comment really, but the next time Tommy came back from the grocery store, he had bought a different brand of dish soap. Something that smelled like citrons. The Fairy bottle disappeared pretty soon afterwards without a trace.

Tommy makes his coffee most mornings, and puts an ungodly amount of sugar in it, because he knows that he likes it that way. 

Tommy wears his clothes when they are at home, and pretends not to know what it does to him, to his heart and horniness. 

Määnin can’t prove it but he is almost certain that Tommy changed the lightbulb in his bedroom lamp after Määnin once told that it’s too fucking bright to see as a first thing in the morning. The light seems dimmer, more softer now. 

Maybe worst of all, Tommy looks at him like he matters. He can feel his love in his gaze, no matter where they are. He makes Tommy smile, he knows that, and it’s not always an easy feat, and he especially treasures the times Tommy smiles so hard, his gums become visible. 

When they told the band about them, after one uneventful band practice, Tommy made it clear that anyone who has a problem with it, will be kicked out of the band, with an especially pointed look thrown in the direction of Gambamäänin. No matter the fact that they had a gig in less than a week. 

Even his dad muttered something resembling congratulations when he left the practice with Thåossin as if they would have announced an engagement instead of telling them that they are dating. 

And Tommy doesn’t seem to be ashamed that people know that he is in love with him, he seems to believe that everyone thinks that Määnin is worthy of his love. That it would be one of the well known facts of the world that he loves him.

The sky is blue, Vörå is the best place on earth, and Määnin is worthy of Tommy’s love. All indisputable facts in Tommy’s mind, apparently. 

And it comes to him so easily. Like breathing, like he wouldn’t have to strain to make it happen. It’s the same way that Määnin loves him, but he cannot believe on some days that it is so easy for Tommy too.

Today is one of those days. 

“You didn’t need to take that punch,” Tommy points out, almost softly, and his fingers are suddenly in his hair, tangled up in his mullet, “and you don’t have to say yes.”

“You really want me here all the time?”

Fuck. 

Maybe he did hit his head hard enough to lose all common sense because the words just keep coming out of his mouth. He sounds needy, vulnerable and in the dire need of reassuring. 

Määnin sounds pathetic even to his own ears and bites the inside of his cheek hard. This is the kind of thing he wanted to prevent from happening. Tough is not a word he would use to describe himself right now.   

He is a goddamn mess. 

Tommy doesn’t seem to mind it, he pulls his hair, forcing him to look upwards, at his face. “Why wouldn’t I?”

It’s a loaded question. A heavy one, and Määnin doesn’t want to touch it even with a long stick. Especially when the back of his eyes are stinging and he is pretty sure it has nothing to do with his headache. 

He thinks about the time he told his dad that he is moving out, into his own apartment. He only said okay, when are you moving? He didn’t protest it, he didn’t say that he could always come back if needed, only helped him carry his stuff out.

Tommy might be the only person who has ever even suggested that he wants him in his space. 

Besides, Tommy’s words are a reassurance of their own. He cannot come up with one single reason not to want him there. He dares him to suggest something, and Määnin can see from his eyes that he would shoot down all of his reasoning.

Tommy has made up his mind, he wants him there, and he wants to live with him.  

Määnin sighs, quietly, and holds Tommy’s gaze, and stays quiet for a moment, letting the moment between them drag on. 

His love for Tommy has always felt too big for his body, ever since he recognised the feeling as love when he was fifteen.

It has overgrown and it hasn’t been able to reside inside of him, painfully somewhere inside of his ribcage, in a way that is unnoticeable and bearable. No, it has become something that has engulfed him completely and probably shines in his eyes in a way that is visible to everyone from Vörå all the way to Vasa. 

And right now, it feels like he can let part of it out, of that love he has trained himself so well to keep hidden and undetectable. To let that love reside outside of him, in their home, and suddenly his body feels big enough to handle it. 

“Okay.”

The word leaves his mouth easily, and he waits for a certain sense of dread to take over, to make him regret it, but instead nothing comes.  

Instead, he feels content. 

“Yeah?” Tommy says, hope weighing heavily in his voice, and his face breaks into a tentative smile, “I’m asking you tomorrow, again. You know, you could be disorientated after hitting your head.”

Määnin wants to curse whatever article Freppa linked to Tommy about the symptoms of the concussion. He isn’t making big decisions because he hit his head. 

“I’m never disorientated about you,” he points out, sinking his fingertips deeper into Tommy’s warm skin.

Even when he was completely wasted, he knew what was important. No amount of alcohol could make him forget his feelings for Tommy, and he sure as hell tried it many times. 

“Only dumb enough to take a punch for me,” Tommy huffs, but he places a kiss on the top of his head, in the middle of his hair that is still heavy with gel. 

Määnin is too tired to argue that is what he has been doing for a long time. Try to take the literal and figurative punches for him, so that he wouldn’t suffer. 

When they were eight years old, Tommy struggled with a task in maths class, making all the other kids laugh as he tried to solve it on the chalkboard. Määnin pretended not to know how to solve the task either when it was his turn to go up there. Kids still laughed, but at least they didn’t laugh at just Tommy.

When they were in confirmation camp, some boy had it out for Tommy. Everything Tommy said seemed to get under his skin and on the first night there, he punched Tommy in the jaw. 

Tommy didn’t think it was a big deal, but on the next day Määnin pulled the boy aside and told him, calmly, that he would beat him up hard enough to make him forget which hole he used for eating and which for shitting if he ever touched Tommy again. The boy didn’t even look at Tommy after that.

There has been only one time that Tommy has forgotten the lyrics on the stage. Määnin could see it happen, before he even messed up the lyrics. It was one of the bigger gigs and Tommy started to frown in the middle of Volvoräägör, which never happens, and there was a slight panic shining in his eyes.

Before the words even stopped coming out of Tommy’s mouth, Määnin played a wrong chord on his bass, loudly, and made an ear-splitting noise, drawing everyone’s attention to him. 

It bought a couple of moments for Tommy to pull himself back together and continue singing. Määnin only shrugged when the rest of the band was asking him what happened, how he managed to mess up something so simple.

It’s not even the first punch he has taken for Tommy in a bar fight. Even when drunk, Määnin’s brain seemed to be wired in a way that pushed Tommy away from the danger. 

It’s something he would like to keep doing for a long time. 

v) 

They are fighting and Määnin fucking hates it.

It feels as if the world has tilted from its axis, but the earth still keeps spinning and everything is familiar but feels so wrong. As if everything he has known has been replaced with a cheap copy.

It makes his insides twist up and barely existing becomes exhausting. As if he would be missing something vital from his body. Maybe a limb or half of a lung. The worst thing by far is that his mind refuses to quiet down.

It keeps replaying Tommy’s words on a constant loop, his mind refuses to forget anything about the fuming look Tommy gave him, and it was almost startling because the only emotion he could detect from him was pure unfiltered anger. 

Määnin hates that he got startled because he has almost gotten used to being on the receiving end of his love, the softer emotions, everything that makes his life a little brighter. 

He sighs as he fishes his keys from the bottom of the pocket of his denim jacket.

He should have known that he would mess things up sooner or later, that things have been too good between them to continue like that. 

Määnin stares at the door, the fucking door and the mail slot that has both of their surnames on it. Side by side, like they are supposed to be. Or were supposed to be, he doesn’t know where they stand exactly now.

If he has to file another change of address notification after just three months of living together. 

He should have known, things were too good, he was too happy, and he always manages to let people down, even Tommy.  

He doesn’t bother taking his sunglasses away, a ritual that he has followed nearly religiously  for almost six months now. He doesn’t even know if Tommy is inside, if he is at home. He could be anywhere.

Määnin hasn’t seen him in almost six hours, not since the backstage of a pub in Karleby. Not since the only words Tommy said to him after their gig was I’m not fucking talking to you.

He spitted it out with enough intensity, enough venom and fire and brimstone, for his dad to suggest that maybe he should ride back to Vörå with him and Thåossin after Tommy immediately stormed off the backstage. 

Sure enough, Tommy left with Freppa without saying a word and he was stuck with his dad and Thåossin for the hour-long car ride. Listening to them going on about how you have to be smart if you cheat, and Määnin was too weary and stuck in his own head to argue that he didn’t cheat on him. 

That he never would. 

The thing is that Tommy has every right to be pissed with him, he messed up, and he apparently messed up massively enough for it to become something big enough that it escaped the borders of them and became something for the whole band to witness. 

Määnin sighs again as he places his key in the lock carefully and turns it. He is met with an empty living room and kitchen. There are no lights on and Määnin has truly forgotten how dark everything is with his sunglasses on inside.

He is tempted to take them off, but he notices the shimmer of light coming from the bedroom. 

Tommy. 

A part of him wants to stay in the living room and not to face him. He probably heard the door open and close anyway, Tommy knows that he is there, and if he wants to talk to him, he can come out of the bedroom. 

Another part of him, a very persistent part of him, wants to leave the whole apartment, run away, and hide a little bit longer. He knows that wouldn’t make things better, only worse, and he thinks the old him, the one who hadn’t gone to rehab, would leave, make a real run for it. 

Disappear maybe for a week. 

A smaller part of him wants to walk to their bedroom, try to make things better, and ask Tommy if he is okay. 

Instead of doing any of that, he just stands there, in the middle of the living room, frozen on the spot. The uneasiness of his mind is becoming a physical feeling. His stomach is turning and his hands feel weird, almost numb. 

There are no sounds coming from the bedroom, and Määnin guesses they are in a standstill. The space between him and Tommy, the space between their bed and livingroom, being the no-man’s land and neither dares to move, to cross it. 

It has been almost four hours since he arrived back to Vörå, but he has stayed away for a reason, to allow Tommy let some of that anger and steam go, because he knows they won’t get anywhere if they are both stuck in their anger.

They will only end up saying things that they will probably regret later. 

And he is selfish, he doesn’t want to face Tommy because that way he cannot hear what he has to say. This way he can pretend a little longer, have him be his still for a little longer. 

Määnin doesn’t want to think if this is the kind of thing that would make Tommy break up with him, he hopes not, because it’s mostly a misunderstanding, but he did let him down, and this is uncharted territory for him, for them.

Because Tommy and him do not usually fight. 

They bicker. Tommy is the type of person to get mad easily, and fast, but it dies out quickly, and he hasn’t been blessed with the patience of a saint either, but Tommy’s zero to one hundred anger is usually not directed at him, but at everyone else. 

Tommy usually chooses his side, even in the smallest and most ridiculous things, like when he claimed that Freppa started corona, and especially in big things. 

Määnin knows that he gets away with some of his more annoying habits because Tommy loves him and tolerates more from him than from most people, and it goes both ways.

It drives Tommy crazy that he never takes the trash out and that he needs about ten cigarette breaks before they get anywhere, and they are always late. He knows Tommy wouldn’t put up with it from anyone else.

Tommy never stays still and always forgets to wash the dishes, forcing Määnin to do it, and it’s annoying, but Määnin can live with it because it’s Tommy. 

But things do not often get this bad between them, and Määnin doesn’t know how to make them better.

Their gig lasted about twenty minutes less than normally because Tommy refused to talk about him during his stage banter.

When he sang Moon Määnin Moon, it sounded like the lyrics would have been something Tommy desperately wanted out of his mouth, like he would have digested poison. 

Määnin sighs again and squeezes his hand around his key. It digs into his palm, painfully, but he doesn’t ease the pressure. Pain he can deal with, anxiety is a whole another matter. 

Määnin hopes that it would be Tommy who reaches out first, offers the figurative olive branch, but as the moments pass and nothing happens, he knows it has to be him. Serves him right. 

He kicks his boots off in the general direction of their hallway and walks quietly up to their bedroom door. He stops again, right in front of the door, and lets his hand hover over the door handle.

He inhales sharply through his noise and tries to think of a thought to hold onto, but he comes up with nothing. He knows he is being pathetic, his mind full of anxiety and fear that he apparently cannot damper, and the thought of that alone is enough for him to grab the door handle and push the door open. 

Tommy is sitting in their bed, duvets all rumpled around him, cross-legged, and he looks up as soon Määnin walks into the room, and no sort of joy or relief crosses his face, even for a second.  

Tommy has never looked as unhappy to see him as right now, and it makes Määnin’s heart sink. 

Maybe he should have stayed away a little bit longer, sleep somewhere else. 

Tommy’s hair is a mess, it’s sticking upwards clumsily as if he would have run his hand through it repeatedly, and his eyes are a little puffy and there are dark shadows underneath his eyes, as if he wouldn’t have slept a wink.

Määnin doesn’t know what time it is exactly, but he is sure it is well past four am. 

Tommy looks down right miserable and it feels as if someone has put Määnin’s heart in a bench vise and it’s turning it tighter and tighter.

He caused this.    

“You’re here,” Tommy finally says, laconically, and breaks the silence that seems to be so thick that it could be used to sharpen knives. 

“I live here,” Määnin replies, staring at the corner of the dark blue duvet cover, and is almost proud that he managed to drop the for now from the end of that remark, “didn’t feel like sleeping on a bus stop.”

It’s even more pathetic that he doesn’t have any other place to go. Technically, he could have gone to his dad’s place, but he didn’t want to go and watch him drink, and he is pretty sure he managed to piss off Freppa, too. 

At least there wasn’t much sympathy in the glance Freppa spared him when walking away from the backstage. 

Besides, he knows he couldn’t have slept anywhere else, and that he owes at least an explanation to Tommy. 

Tommy clenches his jaw so tight, Määnin is almost sure he can hear his teeth grinding together. 

“The girl you ditched the band for didn’t want to go anywhere with you?” Tommy asks, his voice heavy with animosity and irritation, with every intention of the figurative punch to land somewhere where it hurts. 

The coldness and meanness in his voice is far from familiar.

Määnin bites his lower lip, hard. He knows that he hurt Tommy, but it is becoming agonizingly clear how deep he managed to cut him. Even though he didn’t mean to. 

But he decides, there and then, that he doesn’t want to be the reason for his pain and misery ever again. He doesn’t think he could handle that, not at least in any way that wouldn’t be self-destructive. 

“I didn’t want to go anywhere with her,” Määnin points out quietly, unsure if Tommy even wants to hear it. 

He fidgets with his key and places it on top of a wooden drawer. He can somehow make out through the lenses of his sunglasses that the key’s sharp edges have left a mark on his palm. He couldn’t care less. 

Tommy just stares at him. 

Määnin is aware that it looks bad, that because of what it looks like, everyone has jumped to the conclusion that he is a cheater, that he would love Tommy so little that he could do that to him. 

That everyone else saw him leave the bar, a little bit before their showtime, with objectively hot blonde, and was out there, in the parking lot, long enough to miss the start of their show by fifteen minutes and only got on to the stage after the others had played three songs without him already. 

He has never before been late to their gigs, not even when he was so drunk that he probably was in no state to attempt to play the bass. 

Määnin gets that it looks bad, and that Tommy has a reason to be mad at him about missing the start of the show, but no one bothered to even ask him what happened in the parking lot, why he was late. Everyone drew their own conclusions. 

“If I wanted to sleep with her, I wouldn’t be here,” Määnin continues just as quietly and calmly, and hopes that his presence can work as some sort of reassurance of the truthfulness of his words. 

Tommy lets out a laugh that is so hollow and joyless that Määnin probably wouldn’t even recognise it as his laughter if asked.  

“Right because that’s so easy to believe. It’s not like you haven’t broken any promises already tonight,” he spits out and the words seem to gluck out of his mouth, and now that he has stared, he cannot stop, the anger is merely overflowing out of him.

Määnin is about to argue, but he closes his mouth abruptly when Tommy points his finger at him. He is still fuming with his anger, but something indefinitely heavier shines on his face. Sadness.    

It would probably hurt less if someone shoved a broken beer bottle in between his ribs. 

“You know, we wouldn’t even have this problem if you–”

Tommy doesn’t finish his sentence, he leaves it hanging in the air between them. He looks away from Määnin, deciding that the window is more worthy of his attention, and the atmosphere of the room is still charged, he can almost hear the electricity crackle in the air. 

Määnin rubs his hand against his mouth and jaw. He has a sudden urge to reach out, to touch Tommy, to take away some of his pain, wordlessly to say that he is there with him, but he knows it isn’t welcomed right now. 

It’s a strange and almost unsettling feeling to know that his touch is unwarranted, unwanted. 

“If I what?” he prompts when it becomes obvious that Tommy isn’t planning on finishing that thought. 

It’s a poor attempt to stall for time because he doesn’t know where to start, where to start explaining, and making him understand that he never meant to hurt him. 

“Didn’t convince me that I was enough,” Tommy responds, with a frown, as if each of those words was as sharp as a razor and cuts his mouth on the way out, “that you wouldn’t do this.”

Tommy manages to break his heart with that. 

It’s a strange feeling, to feel his own heart crack, and at the same time be wounded somewhere deep and be filled with anger, because Tommy isn’t giving him the benefit of a doubt, that he just assumes the worst, as if the last six months wouldn’t mean anything.

As if everything real between them, the love confessions, late night talks, learning each other all over again, acts of love, would have been just for shit and giggles.

Määnin bites the inside of his cheek and clenches his fist. This time it is his own fingernails that dig into the skin of his palm. 

There are a thousand things he could say, out of anger, to throw the ammunition used against him back into Tommy’s corner, but he is exhausted and he just wants this to be over.

He wants Tommy to stop looking at him like he is a stranger. 

Määnin knows that he broke a couple of promises tonight. Promises he has made about Vörjeans, about always putting the band before anything else, but he did not break any of his three sacred promises about Tommy. 

Especially the two of them that he could have broken tonight. He is still sober and Tommy is still the only one he wants. 

“I promise you I didn’t do anything,” Määnin says, softer than he probably intends to, taking a tentative step forward and shrugs. “It’s up to you if you believe it or not.”

Määnin knows that Tommy can only see his own reflection from his dark sunglasses, but something in his voice apparently gets through because Tommy falters. 

There is uncertainness shining in his eyes and he sighs exasperatedly and stares down at the mattress. Some of the tension he holds in his body seems to melt away. Määnin cannot look away from him.

From the way he hangs his head, from the way he drums his own calf with his fingers as he thinks, from the way his black t-shirt hugs his shoulders. 

Tommy finally looks up and holds his gaze with intent. Määnin isn’t sure how he does it through the sunglasses, but his gaze is piercing enough for him to believe that Tommy can see right down to his soul.

To see everything that matters.

“Swear on something that matters.”

“I swear on–” Määnin starts, knowing that there is only one real answer to it, in his mind, the most sacred thing, but he isn’t sure if saying it out loud will only make things worse. If he will be even believed. 

Saying anything else would feel spurious and untrue, and it would be meaningless. There is only one thing that matters to him that much, that he could swear on, that would compel him to keep his promises, no matter what. 

Tommy rolls his eyes and sighs impatiently.  

“On what?”

“On you,” he finishes, his voice briefly above a whisper, and he pulls his sunglasses away. 

The world blurs instantly and Määnin wonders if it would be easier not to put his glasses on, at least he couldn’t see the emotions written across Tommy’s face so clearly. He can tell just by Tommy’s blurry figure that he is still upset.

Eventually, Määnin fishes his glasses from the pocket of his jacket and the world becomes clearer again. A bit softer without the blackish glow of his sunglasses.

Tommy presses his lips together, he still doesn’t look happy and his expression softens only a bit. “Okay.”

It’s a start, it’s something, and it feels like a small victory of its own. That Tommy might believe him and trust his word instead of trusting only the unfortunate illusion of things. 

Määnin knows that things aren’t normal, there is still something that gnaws at the bond between them, threatening to snap it in half, and they still need to figure things out.

So that Tommy won’t say that he loves him, but they are done, that their love would not be enough.

Things are still awkward between them and neither of them seems to know where to look. Määnin resists the urge to touch him again, to flatten some of that hair on top of his head, because he still doesn’t know if it is unwanted.

He is pretty sure that the last thing Tommy wants right now is his touch. 

Moments pass in silence and it only gets broken by something that sounds like a muffled sound of a reversing garbage truck underneath their window and the soft whirrs that their fridge makes. 

Määnin doesn’t dare to climb to the bed, even though he can feel his exhaustion in his bones. 

They are not in the habit of banishing each other to the couch to sleep. They don’t fight that often and when they do, it’s usually something that they manage to solve before going to sleep. 

This doesn’t feel like something they can fix before trying to sleep.

“I’ll sleep on the couch,” Määnin announces and reaches to pick up his pillow. 

He thinks it is indefinitely better to offer than be told to go away. Protecting himself from that possible rejection. 

“No, the fuck you won’t,” Tommy retorts, yanking the pillow away from him and hitting him with it, “I haven’t slept at all because I didn’t know if you were dead in a fucking ditch and I cannot sleep if you’re on the couch. Get in bed. Now.”

Määnin looks at Tommy, unsure if he heard him right, and Tommy just glares back at him. He undresses himself silently and realises that Tommy probably thought that he relapsed when he didn’t come back home immediately. 

It’s not a thought that would be made from whole cloth. He wanted to drink tonight, badly. The itch to pick up a can of beer was stronger than it has been since the third day of his rehab.

If someone would have given him an opened can of Karhu, he probably would have drank it, in the hopes of forgetting and quieting down his mind. 

Fortunately, he got out of the bar quickly and in the pathetic reality, he sat in the desolated parking lot of the Vörå S-market and thought about things until his ass got numb and cold.

Määnin feels Tommy’s gaze on him when he strips down to his underwear. Either he is checking him out instinctively, without meaning to, or his anger might be evaporating quicker than he expected. 

Neither of them still says anything when he climbs to the bed. Tommy just lies down and with a sigh Määnin lies down next to him. It’s so quiet that he can hear the rustle of the sheet beneath them as they try to settle down. 

Määnin thinks it is a different kind of hell to be so close to him and not to be able to touch him. He guesses it’s another kind of punishment, but better than being kicked out.

Määnin is certain that he cannot sleep anyway and he wants to give a chance to Tommy to sleep. He turns his back towards him and stares at the white wall. 

The mattress underneath him moves a little as Tommy keeps tossing and turning, finding a comfortable position, until he presses his body against Määnin’s back.

It’s so familiar, but Määnin still feels his whole body tense up because it’s unexpected. He expected Tommy to build a damn pillow wall between them to prevent touching him, even by accident.

It doesn’t take long until Tommy has his arm around him, his hand resting on his stomach, and he presses a kiss on Määnin’s shoulder, like he does every night. 

Määnin is too perplexed to dare to move. He doesn’t want to move and remind Tommy of his collection of fuck ups he has executed tonight. He doesn’t want him to move away. 

“I’m still fucking mad at you,” Tommy mutters, against his neck, “but I believe you.”

Määnin can feel Tommy’s words, his breath, against his skin and it sends a shiver down his spine. 

The back of his eyes are burning again as he stares at the white wall. It feels good to be believed, that Tommy’s trust is strong enough to believe him when he says something. Not many people trust him so unconditionally. 

It is also a strange feeling to be loved so fiercely that love can be stronger than anger, that Tommy still wants him there, even when he is mad at him, and not somewhere as far away from him as possible. 

That one mistake, one fight, doesn’t mean Tommy is disregarding him completely. 

Määnin doesn’t know what to do with the feeling. 

“Noted,” he breathes out. 

Määnin knows that Vörjeans actually means a lot to Tommy, always has, but especially now that they are more successful. Actually get paid with money for their performances. And he knows that he let him down by missing a part of their performance, but that is something he can fix.

He can make new promises. Promises that he intends to keep. 

He doesn’t plan on verbalising the apology. It’s not something that they tend to do. Besides, saying sorry is just a bunch of words, and words can be meaningless. A real apology is something that changes things. 

Määnin is sure that never being late to their gig is a better apology than a bunch of lame words, and he knows which one Tommy prefers. 

Tommy brushes his lower stomach with his fingertips, Määnin lets himself relax against him, and silence falls between them. 

Määnin feels more awake than during the whole night. He listens to the sound of Tommy breathing and he is almost certain that he is still awake. That he struggles with falling asleep, too.  

The moments pass, in silence, and Määnin could trick himself to think that it is like any other night. Only if his mind would quiet down. His thoughts are not as sharp and malicious as before, but they still don’t give him a break. 

Besides, Tommy gave him his trust, he thinks should give something to him in return. 

An explanation.

“She was from rehab,” he starts, quietly, a little unsure if Tommy is even listening to him, “I lost track of time.”

It’s the simplest and shortest form of the truth. 

He could tell that her name is Maja and that she was in the same group therapy as him. 

He could tell that Maja was one of the only people he spoke to at the rehab more than a few words.

Määnin hated group therapy, he couldn’t think of anything more repulsive and pathetic than sitting in a small half circle, talking about his feelings to a bunch of strangers.

He spent most of the time just glaring at people.

Maja was different. She was determined to get better, to get her life on track, and she talked a lot about her best friend, Astrid. A best friend that she has been in love with since they were kids, but she was convinced that Astrid could not want her while she was an absolute mess and that she probably would have only dragged her below the surface with her.

Määnin thought that hit a bit too close to home, but stayed quiet in the group therapy. He could get better without pathetically pouring his heart out to six other people who cannot decline a drink if offered.

But he talked to her outside the therapy.

Well, it was Maja who started to talk to him. She seeked him out during a ridiculous weekly mandatory activity, a hike in the nearby forest, and Määnin thought something must be wrong with her, for voluntarily wanting to talk with him after he had done nothing but glare at her. 

Somehow, surprising even himself, he started to talk to her about Vörjeans, about Tommy, how he was his Astrid. 

It was the first time in his life that he ever acknowledged out loud to another living soul that he had feelings for his best friend.

It was sort of freeing.  

He could tell all of that to Tommy, but he doesn’t think it is necessary. Tommy will understand him without all the details, too. 

Tommy shifts behind him, his elbow digging slightly into Määnin’s hip, and he instantly knows that Tommy is awake. 

“It won’t happen again,” Määnin promises, “and I didn’t do anything I couldn’t tell you. We just– talked.”

Maja had seen the advertisement for their gig and had brought Astrid with her. Apparently, she had managed to confess her feelings and now they were in love, and engaged. Määnin mostly nodded during the catch up and told that he got his shit together too, that he is happily taken. That Tommy reciprocated his feelings, after all. 

It was an incredibly fucking sappy conversation to have in the parking lot, and there is a reason why he didn’t want to start explaining the real reason why he was late from the stage.

That he was late because he was talking about love, about happiness, with a person he met in rehab, and was genuinely pleased to hear she is doing well. 

That would have destroyed whatever last bits are left of his reputation as the toughest guy in Vörå. 

He is aware that Tommy might figure it out later, if he ever meets Maja, and that he will tease him about it to the degree of irritation, but he can live with it. 

Tommy sighs and his lips brush the back of his neck.

The almost kiss sends shivers down his body again, and Määnin cannot believe how embarrassingly gone he is for Tommy. It’s reaching new lows, and he thinks he can always go lower. 

That his love doesn’t have an expiration date or an end. It’s just something that grows every day, and has probably grown ever since he met Tommy on that one rainy day on the elementary school’s playground. 

“I’m– glad you’re not dead in a ditch.”

The corner of Määnin’s mouth twitches into a half-smile. It’s not much, but it’s better than nothing, and he can hear a different set of words echo inside of the words that Tommy chooses to use. 

That he is forgiving him. Maybe not yet, but he will. It is not an impossible feat for him. Not this time.  

His anger is no longer boiling over, uncontrollably, but more like simmering, and that’s easier to put out. 

Määnin elbows him. “The name of a new song?”

“Shut up,” Tommy mutters, without any heat behind his voice, “I'm still mad at you.”

Määnin places his hand on top of Tommy’s and squeezes it. He hears him, loud and clear, and knows how to read him between the lines. In the spaces between the words that are no longer filled with thorns that are sharp enough to cut them both, but softening around the edges. 

***

In the morning, Määnin makes him breakfast. The breakfast is abandoned after eating only half of it before they get to their favorite part of fighting, the insane make-up sex.   

If fighting with Tommy wouldn’t feel like his right lung would have stopped working, Määnin thinks they should fight just for the sake of having make up sex. 

It’s like one form of apology, and to get rid of all the pent up emotions and their residues, and maybe that is why, the words I’m sorry escape his lips almost involuntarily, when Tommy is deep inside of him. 

Tommy does look at him as if he would have said something completely unnecessary and surprising. He kisses him on the mouth, eager, but it lingers surprisingly long. “Fyrbanna, Määnin. I already forgave you.” 

And Määnin doesn’t know what to do with himself, with the feeling that he didn’t mess up things beyond repair, that he might be worthy of forgiveness, so he just kisses him again. 

vi) 

Määnin tries to breathe through his nose, hoping that it might be quieter. 

Despite his desperate attempts to do something as simple as breathe and calm down, Tommy fortunately seems to be still asleep in their bed.

At least Määnin can hear his soft snoring behind his back. He is almost grateful for it. 

He is the toughest man in all of Vörå and he can deal with his panic attacks alone. Even if it makes him feel like he is drowning. Even if deep down he hopes that he would know how to wake up Tommy and ask for something, for anything, that would help. 

Määnin thinks it might help if he would feel the weight of Tommy’s touch, in any way, but his mouth refuses to cooperate even when he thinks about the distant possibility of asking for it. 

It would be too needy, too clingy, too much of everything Määnin doesn’t want to be. Things that Tommy certainly doesn’t want him to be either.  

He takes another shuddering breath through his nose, but he fails and ends up coughing and almost gasping for air. 

His heart is pounding, uncomfortably hard against his ribcage, and his stomach is churning. It does feel as if his heart would be in his throat and it makes him nauseous.

Määnin looks down to his hands, which are starting to turn numb and his legs feel funny, too, like they would not be his own. 

Trying to suffer and breathe through the panic attack that woke him up from a nightmare obviously isn’t working, and Määnin is frantically trying to think of the techniques that his therapist tried to teach him in rehab. 

Five things you can see. 

Määnin can see the wooden floor beneath his feet, their bedroom door, Tommy’s cap on top of the drawer, his own bare thighs, his own hands.

Four things you can touch. 

The mattress beneath him, Tommy’s ankle that he does end up brushing with his slightly shaky fingertips, their soft grey duvet cover, and his sobriety necklace.

Määnin is about to start thinking the three things he can hear, when he realises that Tommy isn’t snoring any longer and that he actually kicks the small of Määnin’s back. He is definitely awake. 

Fuck. 

Määnin tries to blink his eyes furiously, he would rather eat small rocks than let Tommy know that he has tears coming out of his eyes because apparently nightmares, things that are not fucking real, are getting to him so bad that it makes his body think he is in mortal danger.

He bites the inside of his cheek so hard that he can taste his own blood, and he refuses to look over his shoulder at Tommy.

Tommy seems like he isn’t getting up either. But he is running his hand over Määnin’s back, clumsily. As if he could figure out why he isn’t asleep by doing just that.

It still feels good, better than anything in the moment, and Määnin sort of hopes that he won’t stop. It doesn’t make his heart beat slower or remind his lungs that there is nothing wrong with them, and that he can actually breathe, but it is a distraction. 

A working and pleasant distraction at that.  

“You okay?” Tommy mumbles, probably against the pillow, his voice heavy with sleepiness. 

Määnin takes another deep breath and hopes that it doesn’t sound as shuddering and weak to Tommy as it does to his own ears. 

“Go back to sleep, Toms,” he manages to croak out, his voice breaking a little, even though he is aiming for something soft and reassuring, “I’m fine.”

It might be one of the biggest lies he has told in a while.

He has gotten used to not having to lie to Tommy about anything, but he is as far from fine. But he doesn’t want him to witness this. Him being completely undone by something as pathetic as feelings and thoughts he cannot control.

Määnin cannot control anything about himself right now, and he knows for sure that this isn’t the version of him that Tommy has fallen in love with by some miracle. Tommy doesn’t need to see him like this. 

He bites the inside of his cheek again, when the mattress beneath them moves, and eventually dips a little as Tommy manages to roll out of the bed. 

In an instant, he is standing in front of Määnin, rubbing his own eyes and fighting off a persistent yawn. 

“You don’t seem fine.”

If Määnin was forced to make a list of all the great things about being in love with one’s best friend, it would be a long list and one of the points in it would be that Tommy knows him and can read him like an open book. 

He knows how to look and read in between the lines, too. 

The list of downsides of being in love with one’s best friend would be short, and it would include only one point since it is inconvenient that Tommy can see straight through him and tell that he is lying and not fine. 

“Well,” Määnin says, desperately attempting to make his voice sound as normal as possible, and clenches his jaw, “I am. I’m not a damn liar.”

Another lie followed by another lie. 

Määnin looks down at his own hands. He cracks his knuckles against his own palm and tries to ignore the weight of Tommy’s gaze on him. He only focuses on trying to get some air back into his lungs and trying to ignore the heartbeat he can hear in his ears. 

He is almost sure Tommy is growing frustrated, that he knows he is being lied to, and he doesn’t want to put up with that. 

Instead of calling him out, he sighs. 

“I didn’t say you were.”

Tommy’s voice is a lot softer than Määnin expects and it almost startles him. He is not used to whatever this is, being perceived when he is at his lowest, and only getting patience and kindness in return.  

He remembers when their high school school counselor called his dad about the panic attacks after he got one in the school’s bathroom and one teacher found him there. 

His dad’s only reaction was to stare at him, ask how he couldn’t stop it from happening and freaking out should be left for women. They never spoke about his panic attacks again, even though they kept happening, and probably were partly at blame for his alcoholism. 

That kind of reaction Määnin could understand. 

Tommy sits down next to him, leaving only a little bit of space between them, on the edge of the bed. He makes no attempts to lie down or try to fall asleep again, he just sits there. 

Määnin finally glances at him, quickly and alarmed. “What are you doing?”

“You don’t have to talk to me,” Tommy murmurs, while running his hand through his own hair, “but I’m not leaving you alone.”

Määnin knows that he could argue against it. He probably should, but Tommy is stubborn and he doesn’t change his mind that easily, not when it comes to him at least. 

Määnin thinks his life would probably be easier if he had fallen in love with someone else, with someone less stubborn, but his heart decided a long time ago that it wants Tommy, no one else. 

Not that he would want a life without Tommy. 

“Fine.”

Määnin wishes that he would have his sunglasses on. He knows that he could stand up and pick them up from the top of the drawer, but he doesn’t want to do that. Tommy would take it the wrong way, as a personal rejection, and Määnin is aware that he is already pushing the boundaries of Tommy’s patience.

He has to be. There is no way in hell Tommy would not be thinking that he is frustrating and annoying right now, a burden, and things would be easier if they could just go back to sleep. 

Besides, Määnin is fairly sure his legs would give in if he attempted to stand up. He still feels shaky and weak. As if all the energy would have been sucked out of him and his limbs are heavy as lead. 

The silence drags on.

The only sound is the clock that keeps ticking. Tommy occasionally moves his leg so that the heel of his foot hits the floor with a slight thump. Määnin can still hear his own breathing, even if his heartbeat is slowing down.

Or at least he doesn’t feel like he is going to puke. 

He is willing to take it as a victory.

He is also aware that Tommy keeps looking at him, glancing at him, when he thinks he doesn’t notice.

Usually, it’s comforting to know that Tommy’s attention is on him, but right now, it makes him uneasy. This time the glances are laced with worry and something Määnin cannot even name. 

Something that he probably doesn’t even want to name, and he doesn’t know which one he wants more, that Tommy would touch him, anywhere, or that he would walk out of the apartment and leave him alone. 

It takes a moment for Määnin to realise how badly his left hand is shaking, and he sticks it underneath his thigh.

This is not the version Tommy fell in love with and now he is forcing Määnin to show all the ugliest parts of him, the scars that still hurt, and the messiness that just keeps following him everywhere. 

As if it wouldn’t be enough that he is having a fucking panic attack, he has to bare the parts of him that are not meant to be shown for anyone else, not to a living soul, only because Tommy refuses to leave him alone. 

Frustration is building up inside of Määnin as he tries to count to five before exhaling. It is the kind of frustration that eventually boils over because it is created from something real, a real fear of Tommy seeing the truest version of him and deciding that he cannot deal with that, that he doesn’t love him anymore. 

It takes about a couple of minutes before that frustration does boil over, and he cannot keep it inside of him, even though he tries his best.    

“The toughest man in Vörå is a myth,” he snaps, the words falling out of his mouth rapidly, and he barely has a chance to think about them before they are out there, “a myth that you have created and kept up.”

Tommy looks at him for real now, stares at him, and Määnin can see the puzzlement shining in his eyes when he glances at him and catches a glimpse of his flabbergasted frown. 

“It’s not,” he retorts.  

He doesn’t elaborate further, and his tone of voice is still similar as before. Calm, soft and almost meek. 

Määnin cannot put up with it. His panic is being overshadowed by something hot and burning, something ugly, that keeps gnawing its way out from his chest, and he just wants Tommy to understand. 

Understand that he is not what he makes him out to be. 

“It isn’t tough when I need to go away for three months to stop drinking and it for sure as fuck isn’t tough to have nightmares and wake up with panic attacks,” Määnin insists, still spitting the words out of his mouth, even though his voice keeps fading out. 

He cannot look at Tommy, so he buries his face into his own hands and exhales loudly. 

Määnin is aware that he is being a prick, but it’s a thought that has been begging to be said out loud for a while now, and it is not like he could take it back. The words are hanging above them, like a sword, and Tommy heard him loud and clear. 

Määnin suddenly thinks of something that Freppa said to him months ago when Tommy went to a bathroom during their band practice and it was just the two of them in the garage. 

You know he is calling you tough because he spent so long unable to put it into words what he feels for you and that’s what his oblivious mind could come up with. 

Määnin had only grunted as a response. On some level he knows that Freppa is probably right, he is too perceptive and smart for his own good, and it makes sense. Everything around them has told them that being tough is good, necessary even, since they were kids. 

Deviation from that would be weak and bad. 

But on another level, he fears that Tommy has made up an idealised version of him and fallen in love with that person, not the real him. That their stage personas are bleeding too heavily into their everyday life. 

It’s a fear that has been in the back of his mind for so long, and most days it feels ridiculous, because he can feel Tommy’s love and knows it is directed at him.

Right now the fear doesn’t feel so ridiculous. It feels real, probable and terrifying.

Tommy doesn’t look away from him, he only crosses his arms across his bare chest, and kicks Määnin’s ankle.   

“When we were in third grade, we had that insufferable substitute teacher. He showed us a nature document. The baby birds died and you cried. I saw it.”

It is so far from what Määnin expects Tommy to say that he cannot help, but look at him so quickly that his world spins for a few seconds, and frowns confusedly. He doesn’t get what that has to do with anything. 

But Määnin remembers it. They were penguins. Baby penguins that almost made it to the safety but were then eaten by leopard seals. It was traumatizing shit. 

He doesn’t even know why it got to him that bad, but it is the only time he has ever cried in a classroom. He sure as hell tried to hide it from everyone. 

He doesn’t know what to say to that, but fortunately for him, Tommy isn’t waiting for his answer and continues talking. 

“I’ve sat next to your hospital bed when you passed out, they had to pump your stomach empty and you shat your pants while unconscious," Tommy points out, still holding his gaze, but he uncrosses his arms.

There are no traces of accusation in his voice, he is merely stating facts. Facts of all the times Määnin has messed up, not measured up to the standards set to him, he guesses. 

Määnin doesn’t like to think about the second time he got alcohol poisoning or the fact that his passing out was caught on camera and broadcasted. He knows that drinking beforehand and during the gig and then attempting to do the Langrad at the Vörodagar was a mistake. 

A mistake he doesn’t like to think about. 

It’s something he and Tommy have never talked about before. 

Tommy was there when he woke up, sitting at the uncomfortable-looking hospital chair at his bedside. One of the nurses off-handedly told him later that Tommy had refused to leave his side at any point, even when they threatened to call security on him. 

Tommy never brought it up and he was there to take him home, and brought clean clothes for him. 

Määnin presses his lips together. He doesn’t really have anything to add to it, it was one of the lowest moments of his life, and Tommy was there to witness it all. He cannot change that. 

“There are so many times I’ve made sure you don’t choke on your own tongue or vomit after you drank too much,” Tommy adds, even though his voice is growing more weary, “I’ve never seen anyone look as miserable and weak as you on the day we took you to rehab. You were all pale and shit.”

Määnin is suddenly met with a vivid flashback of being on his knees at some dodgy bar’s bathroom, puking his guts out, and Tommy being there. He is almost sure Tommy has patted him on the shoulder and told him that he is going to feel better soon. 

The thing is that Määnin knows that he has put Tommy through more than most people would have put up with. He knows that Tommy was worried every time he disappeared for days on end after a drinking bender or when he fucked off with strangers who could have done anything to him when he was in that state. 

In so many moments, he has thought about himself more than Tommy, and that he cannot undo that. 

Tommy is the one who staged the intervention and dragged him to the rehab, and made sure he stayed there as long as necessary. Tommy probably saved his life with that stubbornness, with that ultimatum of having to get better or losing everything that mattered.

And Määnin knows that he can do better, that he probably should be better, if he wants Tommy to keep him around. 

He went to the rehab, he got better, the panic attacks should be in the past already, but here he is, shaking pathetically, and probably tipping the scales in Tommy’s head towards the side of him being a burden. 

Määnin doesn’t dare to look Tommy in the eyes anymore. He lets his gaze wander lower, to Tommy’s hands, to his knee. 

Määnin is tempted to place his hand on Tommy’s knee, to squeeze it, to somehow get across the message that he cannot put into words. That he doesn’t want to be difficult, he is just messed up, and he doesn’t want Tommy to see it. 

That it is alright for him to have the easier version of him only, not the one that keeps them awake in the middle of the night. 

He briefly wonders if he should just kiss Tommy with everything that he has, push him against the mattress, and give him a reminder of the things he is good at, what he is good for, that he is worth having, and it would probably give him something else to think than his spiralling thoughts. 

He barely has time to push that thought off his mind when Tommy says something that gives him another emotional whiplash. 

“I have seen you get one of these panic– things before,” Tommy says, more quietly than before, and awkwardly and vaguely gestures at Määnin. 

Määnin just stares at him. 

“What?”

That word is the only thing he manages to squeeze out of his mouth, and it even comes out all weird-sounding, breathless and higher than he intends to. 

His panic attacks are something he has told no one. Not a single soul, not after the reaction his dad had. He has hid it from Tommy and Freppa, even though it has been difficult at times, but he has made sure that neither of them knows. 

At first, it was self-protection. Things were changing when they got out of high school, they had just put the band together, there were new people all around them, and he didn’t want Tommy to think that someone else would be more worthy of his attention, and that maybe it would be easier if he wasn’t part of the band. 

Later, it was just easier that way. Explaining his panic attacks would have required talking and it would have ruined the image of him that he had so carefully constructed in Freppa and Tommy’s mind. 

Cool, nonchalant, and tough do not go together with panic attacks. 

Now, it has been a way to make himself easier for Tommy to love, to take at least some of the challenge away from him. 

Realising that Tommy has known the whole time about them feels like someone would have punched him in the gut. 

Tommy merely shrugs and finally looks away from him. His gaze is bouncing around their little bedroom, from the door to the drawer and back to him. There is no cruelty in the way he looks at him. 

It is actually pretty similar to the way he always looks at him nowadays when they are alone. 

“It was our second gig ever, you tried to hide it, go for a smoke, but you were actually just sitting on the ground, shaking,” he starts and pokes Määnin on his left thigh, “and you never talked about it because you never do. I had to google why my best friend sits on the ground and shakes.”

Their second gig was well over twelve years ago. 

Tommy has known for twelve years about the thing he has tried to hide so badly. The thing that he convinced himself would make him hard, maybe even impossible, to love, the thing that would crush any false images of him that Tommy has conjured. 

The thing that would finally make him fall off the pedestal. 

His mind is flooding with all the times Tommy has called him the toughest, seemed to mean it, talking him up to anyone who was willing to listen even for a moment, and of the times he has told him that he loves him and meant it. 

Tommy has known the entire time. 

Määnin’s mind blanks. 

All he can think of is seventeen-years old Tommy googling the symptoms of his panic attacks because he wishes to understand. 

It is an image he cannot shake off, for some reason. 

“You–” Tommy starts again, but this time Määnin cuts him off. 

“What is this?” he asks, pinching the bridge of his nose, “a character assassination?”

His mind might be spiralling still, hanging onto the little details that stand out from Tommy’s speech, as if they were a life draft that would prevent him from sinking too deep into his thoughts, but he doesn’t still see the point of Tommy’s singlemindedness to go over the greatest hits of his fuck-ups. 

It is as if they would stand in a gallery of his fuck ups and Tommy is the guide that presents each piece with profound knowledge. Here we have a particularly messy and disastrous fuck up from 2017…

Määnin doesn’t like it and it certainly isn’t making him feel better. 

Even if he is starting to feel more normal. His heartbeat still isn’t to the normal level, he can feel it against his ribcage, and his hands are still numb. At least his breathing doesn’t sound weird any longer.

“No, this is to get through your thick skull that I’ve known you for most of your life,” Tommy mutters, exasperatedly, and bumps their knees together, “I’ve seen every version of you.”

Tommy has a point. 

It’s been the two of them for so long, from the playground of elementary school, to drinking their first beers together, from deciding that maybe they should start a band to touring around Österbotten, from rehab center in the middle of nowhere to the home that they share. 

Tommy has been the biggest and strongest constant in his life, and he has seen it all, the good and the bad. More than he ever intended to. 

It’s a terrifying thought. 

A thought he cannot let go off and the fear of it seems to spread like ice in his veins. A feeling that he desperately wants to shake off. 

“Yeah, you don’t like it?” he asks, daring Tommy to say something, something that would hurt and reveal something real, as he cocks his chin up. 

Tommy looks as if he would want to hit his head against the wall, multiple times. Määnin doesn’t blame him. If anything, he understands. 

He is not easy to love, not easy to be around, and it is a small miracle that Tommy is still there with him. That he thinks that he is worth of effort, worth of trying, worth of loving.

Just being himself sometimes makes him want to hit his head against something.

Tommy rubs his own neck and glances at the ceiling, as if he would need higher powers to deal with him. He tilts his head to the side and looks at Määnin as if he would have said something incredibly stupid. 

“Would I be here if I didn’t?”

It sounds like a rhetorical question, and Tommy moves closer to him, bumping their hips together, leaving absolutely no space between them. 

Määnin leans against him, almost instinctively, and he regrets it almost instantly. Because he thinks his body still doesn’t stay still. At least his hands are still shaking even though he tries to stop it. 

Tommy doesn’t seem to be fazed by it, he doesn’t pay any attention to it. His body isn’t tensing up and instead of saying anything about it, he is staring at their toes. Tommy nudges his little toe with his own. 

“I don’t know.”

Määnin doesn’t even realise that he has said it until he hears his own voice in his ears. He is aware that it probably would have been smarter not to say that. To think before opening his mouth. 

Because now it sounds like a confession. 

A confession that he would have kept inside of him this entire time. 

And it’s not the case. He knows on a logical level that Tommy wouldn’t be here if he didn’t like some part of him, that no one could force him, Tommy would have kicked him out already, but the part of him that keeps hurting, pulsating with pain and still raw from the panic attack, doesn’t believe it.

The vulnerable part of him, the part he has tried to hide for all of his life, refuses to go back beneath the ten layers of repression, no matter how hard he tries to shove it back, somewhere where Tommy cannot see it. 

Where Tommy doesn’t have to deal with it all. 

He hopes Tommy can see what he tries to do, that he is trying to give him a way out. Clean and neat. Just because Tommy loves him, doesn’t mean he has to love all of him, there are parts that he can leave alone, and parts that they can ignore decidedly together. 

To make things easier. 

That Määnin is always leaving the door open, emergency exit of sorts. If it all gets too much for Tommy one day.  

Tommy inhales sharply and Määnin can tell that his words got under Tommy’s skin. He is upset about them, and Määnin sort of hates himself for it. 

“Fyrbanna, are you really gonna force me to say something pathetic poetic shit? That you’re probably the love of my fucking life?” Tommy asks, his voice heavy with frustration, “‘cause you probably are.”

That is nowhere near what he expected him to say. He expected him to start throwing something resembling resentment at him, voicing that frustration that is residing under his skin. He didn’t expect a frustrated love confession, amped up all the way. 

Määnin is truly and utterly speechless. 

He knows he should say something, anything, but his mind is blank. As if Tommy’s words have short-circuited his entire brain. 

“Fuck,” Tommy mutters, under his breath, and drags his hand across his face, “the point is that– you’re tough because you are you. Not because nothing ever gets to you and you never mess up.”

His frustration seems to evaporate from him with each word. 

Määnin doesn’t trust his voice. He stays quiet and stares at his hands instead. He intertwines his fingers, then pulls them apart and presses his thumb against his palm as hard as he can.

“And whatever this is,” Tommy continues, sounding suddenly exhausted, and vaguely gesturing at him, “you’re not gonna scare me away, fyrbanna. I’m not that weak.”

Määnin only bites the inside of his cheek, again. There is already a wound there, something his teeth brush immediately, and he can taste familiar metallic flavour in his mouth. 

He doesn’t know how to argue that he doesn’t think Tommy is weak. That he isn’t protecting him, shielding him from all of this because he thinks he couldn’t handle it. He probably could. He just doesn’t have to. 

It’s not his burden to carry. Only Määnin’s. 

Even though it seems that Tommy is more than willing to take half of it on his shoulders. 

“And for once in your life, you could trust me,” Tommy adds in a mutter, as if it would be an after-thought. 

His words make Määnin’s head turn quickly and make him look at Tommy again. 

At Tommy who sits at the edge of the bed with him, shirtless and wearing his black boxers, his shoulder slouched forward. 

“I trust you.”

Määnin thinks that should be the most obvious thing in the world. He has always trusted him. He would follow him anywhere and he has followed him to a bunch of places he probably wouldn’t have ended up alone, and vice versa. 

The trust has been there, between them, since they were seven years old, and it has only grown, morphed it into something stronger and more durable than he could have imagined, and Määnin trusts him more than he trusts anyone on the planet.

He trusts Tommy with things that he doesn’t trust anyone else with. With the real him, him who doesn’t hide behind sunglasses and drinking. Hell, he trusts Tommy with his heart, too. 

He has given it to Tommy, willingly, and while knowing that Tommy could crush it if he wanted to. He just trusts that Tommy won’t do so. 

Tommy rolls his eyes at him and scoffs softly.

“Start acting like it, then,” he says, mostly against Määnin’s shoulder, before planting a kiss there.  

It is as good as a dare. 

Daring him to follow through on his words.  

Määnin can see the contradiction. Insisting that he trusts him unconditionally, but not believing and trusting Tommy when he says that he can handle all of him, even the uglier parts of him, and that he possibly can even love those parts of him, too. 

Insisting that Tommy possibly couldn’t love those parts, the messed up and vulnerable parts, he is essentially saying that he doesn’t trust Tommy with those parts. 

Määnin hates the thought of that, and something is crumbling inside his chest. 

“You hate talking about feelings,” he grumbles, with a slight hint of defeat echoing in his voice, as he bumps their knees together again. 

There is a scar on Tommy’s left knee. Right above his kneecap. He was eleven years old when he got it. Määnin was there. They were playing football at school and Tommy fell for reasons unbeknownst for him. There was a lot of blood and he had to go to the health center to have the wound glued. 

The scar is a shape of a half moon and Määnin runs his thumb across it. 

They both know where all of their figurative and literal scars are. There is intimacy in it, in knowing that kind of detail about one another.

Tommy seems to know all of his soft spots, the places where to hit, where to make it hurt, if he wanted to hurt him. He knows all of Tommy’s sore spots. Määnin guesses it is also some form of trust to reveal those spots and believe that it won’t be used against him later. 

“So do you,” Tommy retorts, as he places his hand on top of Määnin’s, “it’s lame and uncomfortable, but if it prevents you from ending up like you were almost over a year ago, then we try to talk. Fyrbanna.”

Tommy’s hand is just a bit smaller than his, it doesn’t cover all of the back of his hands, but he can feel the weight of his hand and warmth of his skin against his own knuckles. It’s almost comforting. 

He knows what Tommy means. It is almost the anniversary of him checking into the rehab center. 

He was in a horrible state on the night he agreed to go to the rehab. They both know that if he hadn’t gone, they wouldn’t be sitting here. Tommy would have attended his funeral months ago already. 

He gets why Tommy doesn’t want to see him end up the same way again, why witnessing his panic attacks might make him think they are sliding into that same ditch again. Määnin doesn’t want to end up in the same ditch ever again. 

Besides, he gave his word to get better, it is his sacred promise. 

Maybe part of that is showing every part of him to Tommy, even the parts he has kept hidden so far, and trust that he won’t run to the hills. Besides, Österbotten is flat, there are no hills for Tommy to run to. 

Määnin lets his head rest against Tommy’s head. “Can't bother to find a new bassist for the band?”

It feels easier to joke than to think how deep Tommy’s love for him runs. Besides, they both know what he means, what he is really saying. 

Tommy hums and wraps his other arm around him, pulling him even closer. Määnin doesn’t protest it. 

“No one plays as good as you anyway,” he murmurs, against Määnin’s hair as he places another kiss there. 

It feels good to be touched, and even though there are only the residues and shadows of the panic left in his body, he knows that he could start talking now. Explaining things he has never put into words, but he is far too exhausted to start thinking about it. 

He still thinks Tommy deserves some sort of proof that he heard him, loud and clear. 

Määnin lifts his hand from his knee. It is not shaking anymore, but there is a certain trembling visible, the kind of tremble he normally never has. 

A part of his mind is still protesting loudly, that he cannot be showing that to Tommy, not if he wants him to keep loving him, but he tries to ignore that persistent part of himself. 

It’s terrifying and he feels exposed, but he doesn’t want to back down. That wouldn’t be like him, he has never met a challenge that would have made him back down. This certainly won’t be the first one. 

“Later?”

He wants him to know that he isn’t refusing, he is just postponing it. Pushing it to somewhere in their future. To some other time when he doesn’t feel like his mind has been through a grater and they are not so sleep-deprived. 

“Later,” Tommy echoes. 

Määnin knows already that it will be a fucking uncomfortable conversation, and he isn’t looking forward to it, but maybe he will get through it, that they will get through it, if he just keeps thinking of trust. 

Of all the times Tommy has had his back through his life.

Of all the times Tommy hasn’t as much as blinked when he has learnt something new about him.

Of all the times Tommy visited him in rehab, even though Määnin told him that he doesn’t have to, it was almost two hours away from Vörå, and Tommy made that trip twice a week.

Maybe they will be okay, despite all of the ugly mess that still resides inside of his mind, and threatens to spill out sometimes. 

+1

It’s three am when someone knocks at the wooden door of Määnin’s hotel room. 

He doesn’t bother putting on a t-shirt that lies on the floor, he knows for a certain who is banging his knuckles against the door. 

Määnin briefly wonders how well one has to know someone to recognise them by the rhythm of their knocking. He doesn’t sacrifice too much time for the thought because he knows that he knows Tommy, through and through, just like he knows him. 

He hasn’t yet discovered a side of Tommy that he wouldn’t like, that he couldn’t love, even if he teases him about his annoying little habits, his refusal to get up in the morning, his tendency to get up in the middle of the night because he wants to write down a line that came up to him suddenly, and his snoring. 

Määnin opens the door and is instantly met with the sight of exhausted Tommy.

His hair is a mess, sticking to all possible directions, and he doesn’t have his cap with him to hide any of it. He is wearing an old and ratty t-shirt, with one of the earliest versions of Vörjeans logo on it, and a pair of grey sweatpants. 

Määnin instantly recognises them as his own. There is a stubborn stain on them, near the knee, where he once spilled sauce from his kebab that he picked up from the Grillen. 

He looks good in them, and they fit Tommy differently than him. They are tighter around the thighs, and Määnin knows that if Tommy would turn around, he would see the spectacular sight of the curve of his ass being hugged by the sweatpants’ fabric. 

Pure want flips in the bottom of his stomach, as it always does, inexplicably, when he sees Tommy wear his clothes.

He thinks it is about knowing that Tommy wants him close, that they know each other so well that they have no problem wearing each other’s clothes and finding comfort in that, and it is also incredibly hot when Tommy smells like him because of the clothes, and looks like he is Määnin’s. 

Määnin curses the hotel’s shitty booking system that assigned all three of them into different rooms. 

He rather prefers that Freppa has his own room, but he knows he and Tommy could have come up with something a lot more fun to do than toss and turn half of the night alone in the narrow bed, unable to sleep. 

He could have appreciated the curve of Tommy’s ass in his sweatpants a lot sooner if they had received the room they originally booked. 

It has been ages since he and Tommy have slept in different beds, in different rooms. They have been together for over a year, and haven’t had a reason to sleep separately. There are certain perks of dating your bandmate and best friend. 

Living together feels like a never ending sleepover with his best friend, in more ways than one. 

Määnin knows that having his own hotel room probably should feel like a luxury, it’s a hotel and he has his own space, own bed and it hasn’t been that long since they even have had the financial freedom to book hotel rooms instead of driving back home straight away, no matter how far away from Vörå their gig has been.  

It’s an objectively nice hotel room at that, too. No weird stains on the floor and the sheets on the bed seem clean. He even has a little window.

But he still felt a certain pang in his chest when Freppa gave them their separate keys to different rooms. Not that he would have let that show and only teased Tommy if he was able to survive a whole night without him. 

Määnin prefers their own bed anyway. The only reason they are stuck in Tornio for the night is Freppa who went on about not wanting to drive through Finland in the night in November. 

Thåossin and Gambamäänin left as soon as they could, saying that they could handle the five hour drive back to Vörå, leaving the three of them in the second cheapest hotel they could find. 

It has been about three hours since he last saw Tommy, when he left his room to go and sleep in his own bed.

Määnin knows that they could have tried to make something special out of it, something romantic. They are in Lapland, there is snow on the ground, and apparently a good enough chance to see northern lights, but that’s really not their thing. 

It seemed to be the height of romance that they found a grill and ordered some food, talked late into the night, debriefing about the gig, talking about anything that came into mind, and making out in the narrow hotel bed. 

He felt perfectly content while eating his slightly too salty fries, lying on the bed, staring at Tommy who went on ranting about the audacity of some fan who asked if he was related to one of the KAJ guys since they look so similar.

Tommy did not shut up about it until Määnin kissed him quiet. 

Määnin wouldn’t have wanted anything else. 

Except for Tommy to stay in his bed.

“You’ve ruined me,” Tommy declares now, while standing in the desolated hallway, and pointing at him with his index finger. 

Määnin can imagine that everyone else is asleep in the rooms around them, that is just the two of them. He quite likes the thought of that. 

It reminds him of the countless sleepovers he had at Tommy’s place when they were kids, and everyone else in the house was asleep, and it felt like the universe didn’t reach further than the two of them. 

“That’s pathetic,” he huffs as he places his hand on the doorframe, leaning against it, “and a nice way to greet the person who is supposed to be the love of your fucking life.”

It has been a while since Tommy said that to him, in a moment of frustration, when he was trying to get through to him, but Määnin still teases him about it. Regularly and always using the exact words Tommy said to him in their bedroom. 

He doesn’t think he could ever forget those words so he might put the extremely vivid memory of them into good use. 

Tommy rolls his eyes and looks as if he is about to shoot something back. Instead, he closes his mouth abruptly and studies him with his gaze.  

“Were you asleep?”

The light above them flickers and Määnin merely shakes his head. 

There is no reason to lie about it. Tommy can probably see it from him, the lack of sleep. Määnin doesn’t bother trying to hide anything that is going on in his head, the exhaustion, wanting him to step over the threshold into his room, wanting to kiss that stupid smile off his face, or at least feel it against his lips. 

Tommy can read him anyway, even when he tries to hide something. He knows him too well and sees through any sort of facade he puts up. Määnin likes that, too.

A smile spreads on Tommy’s face. One of those real genuine ones that seem to be reserved only for him, and be bright enough to personally compete against the sun. 

If the light above them goes out, the corridor won’t be dark at least. Not as long as Tommy is looking at him like that and smiling.  

Määnin tries to resist the urge to pull Tommy closer by the strings of the sweatpants. He wants to feel that smile against him. 

“So I’ve ruined you too,” Tommy says, happily and smugly, as if it would be a great personal triumph. 

Määnin offers him a half-shurg.

He thinks it’s public information already at this point that he is gone for Tommy, that he would do anything he asks from him, anything, move mountains or some shit like that. Not being able to sleep without seems a little tame and lame compared to it. 

But maybe he is ruined. 

He knows at least that there is no going back. He has already loved Tommy Tall for most of his life and he doesn’t think he knows how to stop. His love has been a part of him so long that it has integrated into him, probably on a cellular level. 

“Are you going to make me stand in the hallway for the rest of the night?” Tommy asks, snapping him out of his thoughts, and the brightness of the smile might be gone, but his voice is still heavy with amusement. 

“You have already stolen my pants,” Määnin murmurs, with a pointed look at the well-worn pair of sweatpants, “why should I let you in?”

“Please, you wanted me to steal them,” Tommy points out, with a shit eating grin and ducks to walk into the room underneath Määnin’s arm. “You literally left them on the couch for the taking.”

Tommy has a point. 

He does leave his clothes everywhere and he doesn’t exactly mind when Tommy steals them, and he doesn’t bother making a clear distinction of what belongs to him and what to Tommy. 

Their stage clothes are a different story. 

Määnin once put on Tommy’s white Vörjeans t-shirt while they were getting dressed up for one of the gigs. They were almost late because Tommy got instantly hard at the sight of him in that shirt. Their bathroom quickie turned out to last almost twenty minutes, much to the dismay of Freppa who was waiting for them in the car. 

Määnin still plans to wear Tommy’s shirt to the stage one of these days. Just to drive him crazy and have him look at him like he wants him and no one else. Maybe he will steal his cap, too. 

Määnin closes the door and finally allows himself to kiss him. Tommy smiles into the kiss right like he wanted him to. He finally has his laughter inside his mouth.  

It’s a good thing they have gotten skilled at backing into the nearest bed without having to stop kissing. It’s easier at their home, but Määnin manages to guide backwards walking Tommy onto the edge of the bed without slamming him against the small desk. 

It wouldn’t even have been the hot kind of a slam, but the kind that probably would have left bruises on the small of Tommy’s back. 

They keep kissing for a while, they have never known how to stop once they get to do it, and the fact that the ninety centimeters wide bed hasn’t been made to fit two grown adults doesn’t matter to them in the slightest. 

Määnin loses the track of time, as he often does when it comes to Tommy, but they eventually settle into the bed, after kicking the duvet away, and playing a game of tetris where each of their limbs should go. 

It’s tight and cramped. Määnin already knows that it is inevitable that one of them will fall down to the fitted carpet covered floor at some point of the night, and that they will mess up their backs just by sleeping in awkward positions, but he guesses that is the price they are both willing to pay.

He knows that now he has a chance to even fall asleep. 

“Better?” Määnin asks, unable to keep the smile away from his voice, as he yanks the duvet from the other end of the bed to cover them. 

Määnin thinks they might be doomed, but not in a bad way. More in a pathetic-we-are-so-domestic-we-cannot-sleep-without-each-other way. In a way that makes it seem that they would have been together for a lot longer than a year. 

It’s the kind of thing that could ruin their reputation as the toughest band in Vörå, but it’s a good thing that this is meant just for the two of them, not for the audience.   

“Yeah, a person needs to sleep, fyrbanna,” Tommy mumbles, half-against the impossibly soft pillow, “you’re not getting rid of me anytime soon.”

Tommy says as it would be a bad thing and as he would want to get rid of him. Määnin would very much like to keep him, for as long as Tommy is willing to put up with him. 

When they were kids, Määnin felt the pressure to be cool and interesting, he probably tried to do every possible trick in the book to keep Tommy’s attention on him, but he realised quite quickly that he didn’t have to do that.

Tommy didn’t mind if he didn’t have anything interesting or cool to say, he would show up anyway, and he would definitely come up with things to talk about once Määnin ran out of his rehearsed topics. 

It still feels like that, that they just enjoy each other’s company, and it doesn’t have to be anything special. It's enough that it is the two of them. 

Määnin tries to get comfortable, shifting a little, but he gives up on it as he already almost falls on his ass to the floor. It doesn’t help that Tommy is moving his legs and accidentally kicking him with his feet.

“I swear I’ll divorce you if you keep sticking your cold feet against my calves,” Määnin whispers, right into Tommy’s ear when he finally stops kicking him. 

The rest of Tommy’s body always runs hot, like a furnace, when sleeping, but his feet stay cold and he always tries to get them warm by stealing Määnin’s body heat. Määnin thinks he probably needs to buy socks for him for Christmas and force him to use them, for his sake.  

“We aren’t even married,” Tommy answers, amusement coloring his voice, and he raises his eyebrow at him, “unless you're proposing?”

Maybe one day he will put a ring on his finger, but that day isn’t today. 

“I’m not proposing to your cold feet, Toms,” Määnin shoots back, deadpan, mock-punching him in the arm, “I’ll find a way to make premarital divorce possible.”

It’s all talk. 

Määnin isn’t sure when they reached the point where they could joke about long-term commitment, but he guesses at some point it just clicked for both of them, that they were in this for the long haul. 

Määnin runs his hand through Tommy’s hair, a couple of times. 

“Whatever,” Tommy murmurs as he closes his eyes. 

Määnin doesn’t close his eyes right away. He doesn’t have his glasses on anymore and everything is blurry, but he knows Tommy’s face well enough to keep staring at it for a while. He has always liked to look at him, and he indulges him whenever he wants to. 

Once again, the one word echoes with a weight of something more, with the weight of things left unsaid, and it is so familiar.

Tommy’s whatever sounds a hell of a lot like I love you, too, as does his threats about premarital divorce. 

It works for them. 

Tommy immediately sticks his feet underneath and between his calves, his toes brushing Määnin’s ankles. They are ice cold, like someone would hold a bunch of icicles against his feet, and Tommy only sighs happily, as if he would be completely pleased with the situation. 

He probably is. 

Määnin ponders the possibility of kicking Tommy to the floor, out of the bed, but he abandons the thought of that pretty quickly. His threats are empty and they both know it.

Instead of kicking him out, he places a lingering soft kiss on his temple. 

He can live with this, with any sort of unpleasantry, if it means he gets to have this, gets to have Tommy and all of it, the good and the bad. 

Maybe one of these days he feels like he deserves it all. It does help that Tommy seems to believe it, completely.