Fic: Not Completely Cast Away 12/12 + Epilogue
Title: Not Completely Cast Away
Rating: PG-13 (this chapter)
Word Count of entire fic: 53,000
Synopsis: Nick has been missing presumed dead since September 2010, this is the story of what happens when he turns up alive and well five years later.
Author's note: Finally finishing up my posting of the edited version after computer meltdown meant I had to do a lot of it over again.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Didn't really happen and is unlikely to.
Chapter Twelve
On Friday night at a quarter to nine, David was sitting in his office amidst a stack of papers, methodically sifting through them while he decided which of
them absolutely could not wait until Monday to be dealt with. He worked carefully, with deliberate attention to the task before him, and was not
particularly mindful of the time since he had no other plans for the evening; no matter what time he went home he would still find himself fretting over
what he was going to say tomorrow.
Tomorrow!
David's heart leapt at the thought and for a moment he lost the thread of what he was reading. It was something he had found happening at regular
intervals, the frequent flurries of restless excitement becoming increasingly pronounced as the week wore on and the day of Nick's return drew ever closer.
He had considered meeting Nick at the airport, with visions of Nick's face brightening as he saw David waiting for him and the frankly ludicrous idea of
launching himself into Nick's arms like some over exuberant young lover would do to their sweetheart.
When he had dismissed these thoughts as ridiculous, the product of his lovestruck state of mind, David had left a faltering message on Nick's voicemail
asking Nick to call him as soon as he got back, along with the tentative suggestion they could meet with each other on Saturday afternoon.
That was the reason why David was sitting silently in his office at such a late hour, flipping through all manner of paperwork; he was taking the weekend
off.
Simon had been instantly receptive to the idea of taking charge of the country for the weekend, and David had flushed scarlet at Simon's reaction to his
blatantly transparent reasons for wanting Saturday and Sunday away from the office; the older man had smiled slyly, his brown eyes twinkling as he
commented it would not be a problem. David had almost expected to be patted on the arm and told to 'go get him, tiger'.
David was immensely grateful for Simon's understanding. His concern for Nick, and to a lesser degree David, had an air that was almost paternal, as though
he were a worrisome father watching over an only child, determined no one would have the chance of hurting them if it could be helped and doing what
he could to ensure their happiness.
Shaking his head as he realised he had become lost in his thoughts, David set his mind back to his work, hearing the muted chimes of Big Ben from
outside the window as it struck nine o'clock. Shortly after the sound ceased, David heard a small knock on the door that connected his and Simon's offices
via the short corridor.
‘Come in,’ David called, his attention still turned to the papers before him. He began to order them again, not really concerned with whatever Simon
wanted, but after a few moments had passed and Simon still had not spoken, David looked up with an impatient frown. ‘I'm busy here, Simon, so hurry up
and–’
Nick was standing in the doorway, a nervous look on his face as he waited in silence. He was holding a large object wrapped in heavy cloth and eyeing David
with uncertainty.
‘Nick,’ David gasped.
‘Simon said it would be okay for me to stop by,’ Nick mumbled, dropping his gaze to the floor. ‘If you're busy I can–’
‘No,’ David blurted, jumping up from his seat. ‘I wasn't expecting, I mean, I thought you would be back tomorrow. Come in, come in.’
‘I managed to get a direct flight from Los Angeles,’ Nick said, closing the door and taking a few steps forward. ‘I won't take up too much of your time. I
only came to give you this.’ He placed the cloth covered item on David's desk and backed away a few steps. ‘It's one of the things I brought back with me.
I wanted you to have it.’
Moving to the other side of his desk, David stretched out his hand to unwrap the object Nick had left there.
‘What is it?’ he asked.
‘I made it,’ Nick answered softly, hovering about a foot away from where David was standing. ‘Took forever to get it right but–’ Nick stopped abruptly as
David unfolded the edges of the cloth and looked at what was inside. When he continued, his voice was a little too loud.
‘Too much time for thinking and all that,’ he said, and waved his hand.
‘Nick, this is exquisite,’ David breathed, staring down in shock.
The old, battered piece of driftwood wrapped in the cloth had been smoothed down, and carved into its surface was a near perfect representation of
the Houses of Parliament. David ran his hand over the image, feeling the coarse wood beneath his fingers and admiring the level of detail. It must have
taken months to make with the tools that were available to Nick.
‘I–It seemed right, for–’ Nick said falteringly. As he spoke, Nick's eyes were closed, and each word was said slowly, as though it took considerable
effort. David looked at him curiously, frowning.
Nick was lying to him; alternately clenching and unclenching his hands at his sides as he recited the fabricated reason why he had brought the wood carving
to David's office.
‘–for you to have it. You being Prime Minister.’
‘Nick,’ David said quietly, gently taking hold of Nick's arm.
‘Unless you'd like a chess set instead,’ Nick continued, opening his eyes to look at David and smiling widely. There was no happiness on Nick's face, even
with the smile; he looked like he was about to cry, and seeing it made David feel slightly heartbroken. ‘I have half a dozen of those so if you'd rather–’
‘Nick,’ David repeated, taking one step closer and bringing his hand to Nick's face.
At the touch, Nick inhaled shakily, turning his head away and breaking the contact.
‘Don't,’ he whispered sharply, his face screwed up in pain. He shook his head, hands clenching again and beginning to tremble. ‘I shouldn't have come.’
With his head bowed and his shoulders slumped, Nick turned away, nearly tripping over his own feet in his haste to leave. He made it to the door before
David had a chance to react, but once there the frantic, uncoordinated movements of his hands left him tugging on the handle as he unsuccessfully attempted
to get it open. It gave David enough time to catch up with him, and he grabbed hold of Nick's hand, using it to spin Nick around to face him.
‘David, please,’ Nick implored, his voice small and urgent. ‘Let me go. I have to go.’
David tugged Nick to him and wrapped his arms around Nick's shoulders, hugging him close as Nick began to babble rapid, upset words against his chest,
repeating his plea that David let him leave but not struggling against David's hold on him.
‘Please, I can't do this. I told him I didn't want to do this. I told him it was... Please, David? I need more time, that's all. Just a bit, a bit more
time and then I'll be able to see you without, without it hurting that I don't get to have you. I know I don't get– Please, I know, I–I–I–’
Unable to stand the misery in Nick's voice, the terrible stuttering of his words as he begged for more time to lessen his heartache, David did the only
thing he could think of to stop it; he lifted Nick's chin and kissed him, brushing the backs of his fingers across Nick's cheek.
‘You already have me,’ he whispered against Nick's lips.
‘You don't mean that,’ Nick choked out, clutching at the material of David's shirt, his expression hopeful and hopeless all at once.
‘Every word,’ David answered, kissing Nick at the corners of his mouth. ‘Every word. I love you.’
‘David, don't say that,’ Nick sobbed, though at the words he leaned into David's upper body and wrapped his arms around David's middle.
‘I thought I'd never see you again,’ David confessed, holding Nick tightly and running his fingers through the smooth strands of Nick's hair. ‘I thought
you had gone back to stay. God, Nick, don't ever scare me like that again.’
‘I'm sorry,’ Nick said, his words muffled against the material of David's shirt. ‘I didn't know how to tell you. I didn't– because I didn't want to call
you when, when– Arthur said I had to let go, that's why I went back. Only I didn't want to let you go, too, and I kept telling him I wasn't
ready to see you.’
‘Shh,’ David soothed, crushing Nick against him, only half-understanding what Nick was talking about. He puzzled it over in his mind while they stood
silently embracing each other and realised Nick had be coerced into coming to his office, had not wanted to do so at all.
Confused, David asked, ‘Didn't you get my messages?’
‘What messages?’
‘I left messages on your voicemail while you were away,’ David explained.
‘I don't know how to check it,’ Nick said. He lifted his head from David's shoulder to look at him, biting his lip in embarrassment. ‘I tried to listen to
them but the phone kept asking me to record a message first and– What did they say?’
‘I'll show you how to listen to them later,’ David replied. He hugged Nick again, sighing happily and staying quiet for several minutes before asking,
‘Will you come home with me?’
Nick laughed quietly, nodding against David's shoulder.
‘Yes.’
‘Let me put these reports away. Won't be a minute,’ David said, letting go of Nick and smiling at him. Nick smiled back, his gaze soft and happy.
‘I left some things in Simon's office,’ he told David, stepping toward the door. ‘I should get them, if you, that is if you don't mind me dragging them up
to your flat?’
‘No, not at all,’ David smiled. He began to pick up the papers that were scattered over his desk as Nick left the room, placing them hastily and a little
untidily into folders and stacking the folders on the corner of his desk. He was almost finished when Nick came back, and David turned to see he had a
holdall slung over his shoulder and was carrying a large box with pieces of wood sticking out of the top. Placing the last folder on his desk, David walked
over to Nick.
‘What's all that?’ he asked, puzzled.
‘Six chess sets, a lot of carved animals, cups, a bowl, a half made–’
‘Why did you make six chess sets?’ David interrupted.
‘I had a lot of time on my hands,’ Nick said, shrugging. ‘You'd be surprised how quickly staring at the ocean gets boring when you can do it whenever you
like.’
‘But six chess sets,’ David commented as he grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair. He opened his office door and gestured for Nick to follow him
into the corridor. ‘You didn't even have anyone to play against.’
‘I didn't make them to play chess,’ Nick explained, waiting as David closed the door and started toward the stairs. ‘I made them to keep busy.’
‘Right,’ David said, though he did not really understand.
The security guard at the door of number ten looked momentarily shocked at seeing the prime minister leading his former coalition partner toward the upper
floor, but as David turned the corner and started up the steps, he saw the man's face quirk with amusement and felt like he was back in university,
sneaking someone up to his room for the night. The thought made him smile.
Inside the flat, David closed the door and turned to Nick, taking the box Nick held and setting it down carefully on the sideboard. Nick stood by the door
as David quietly put his jacket on a hanger. When he turned around, Nick was smiling at him.
‘What?’ David asked.
‘You redecorated,’ Nick said, dropping his bag on the floor out of the way.
‘Yes,’ David nodded. ‘I forgot you never got to see it before you left.’
‘It's nice,’ Nick complimented, looking around. ‘Very homely.’
‘Would you like a tour?’ David offered politely. He walked over to Nick and held out his hand for Nick to take, grinning as Nick slid his own into it. But
when David went to lead the way to the kitchen, Nick stood fast, tugging David back until they were facing each other in front of the door.
‘I don't think I want a tour,’ Nick said, looking at David intently, his eyes round and sincere. He took a step closer. David felt his stomach flutter
restlessly as Nick's hand came to rest on his hip.
‘Tea?’ David asked dumbly, mouth dry. Nick shook his head, another step bringing his and David's bodies together, their chests touching. David's head
clouded, and he responded with surprise as Nick kissed him, the nervousness and uncertainty David had grown used to in Nick's manner gone completely;
Nick's movements were not shy or hesitant but bold and demanding.
‘Bedroom, David,’ Nick whispered against his lips, hands already unbuttoning David's shirt and making David realise he was simply standing there as
Nick stripped him of his clothes, along with the ability to form coherent thought.
Stepping backwards, he dragged Nick with him, trying not to stumble as he forced his hands to stop shaking. He tugged Nick's top over his head, moaning as
Nick's lips found his own again before the t-shirt had even hit the floor.
Backing along the hallway to the bedroom, David grabbed frantically behind himself for the door handle. As he pushed it down, the door flew open, sending
him and Nick spilling into the room. They stumbled, Nick holding on to him and guiding him toward the double bed, where they fell onto the mattress,
shifting until they were facing each other with their heads on the pillows.
David smiled, kissing Nick tenderly to hide his growing nervousness. He could feel his heart thumping in his chest, each beat pounding loudly in his ears
as he started to register something like fear and desire and urgency all rolled together, combined into something that made him tremble and robbed him of
the ability to speak.
No one had ever looked at him the way Nick did, with eyes that seemed to see him as the world and everything in it, and he had never taken someone to his
bed knowing they loved him; that he loved them in return.
‘You're shaking,’ Nick said softly, moving until they were flush against one another, his arm resting on David's side.
‘I, uh,’ David stammered, closing his eyes. Nick kissed him, slow and sweet.
‘I thought being nervous was my thing,’ he whispered.
‘Seems not,’ David answered. He gulped, wetting his lips with his tongue and opening his eyes. ‘No one's ever looked at me the way you do.’
‘How do I look at you, David?’ Nick asked, the soft grey of his eyes shining as he held David's gaze.
‘Like that,’ David breathed. He buried his head between Nick and the pillow, his mouth close to Nick's ear.
‘Should I kiss you instead?’ Nick whispered, lips brushing gently across David's neck, softly trailing kisses along his throat and bare shoulder, in a line
over his collar bone.
‘I love you,’ David whispered, feeling it then, the emotion behind the words swelling in his chest. His stomach flopped wildly as Nick made a high pitched
noise against his skin, breath hitching loudly in his throat.
‘David, I–I–’ Nick gasped, his expression uncertain for the first time since they had left David's office.
‘Tell me,’ David pleaded, desperate to hear the words, for Nick to say them on purpose when he knew David was listening. Biting his lip, his eyes shiny and
brow furrowed in the middle, Nick looked at him longingly, as though he were gathering his courage within, struggling against the last part of himself that
said he could not have this happy ending after all he had been through.
David touched his face, brushed away the beginnings of tears at the corner of Nick's eye and whispered again, ‘Please, tell me.’
‘I love you,’ Nick breathed, soft and quiet, closing his eyes as more tears gathered in beads along his eyelashes. David kissed him; once, then twice,
leaning up from the mattress with his neck aching.
‘I'm yours,’ David said unevenly, aware he was babbling but not caring. ‘Nick, I'm yours.’
His eyes were watery and his body shaking; his hand on Nick's face as he drew Nick a little closer, kissing him as deeply as he could while he drew
shallow, uneven breaths. Nick moaned his name, and David felt a tiny, almost imperceptible shift, an inflection in the tone of Nick's voice indicating
he had accepted, finally believed, that it was true.
The mood moved, moulded itself around the change, transformed into something more evenly balanced, where each of them was equally loved and loving, equally
vulnerable.
The preceding years and all the things that had happened since Nick came home flashed through David's mind; the search and rescue operation, the funeral,
crying alone in this very bed with his heart aching, and the helplessness of his fight to deny his feelings for Nick all laid bare for what it was. What it
had been all along.
David held Nick to him, laughing and crying and allowing the feelings that had lain dormant in his heart for so many years to come to life at last,
lighting up like the sun after a long, cold winter. He kissed Nick's face, pressed their cheeks together, and whispered words he had never said
before.
‘Make love to me.’
Much later, when they had collapsed, shaking and sweating and panting, for a second time, and David had pulled the duvet off of the floor, settling it over
both of them, Nick lifted his head to look at David in the half-light of the bedroom.
‘David?’ he whispered.
‘Mm,’ David hummed.
‘What are we going to do now?’
David turned on his side and kissed Nick tenderly, smiling.
‘I'm getting on a bit, you know. I don't think I can manage three times in one night.’
‘That's not what I meant,’ Nick blushed, pressing his face to David's bare chest.
‘Ah,’ David said. ‘Time for me to be serious, is it? In that case, I thought you could stay here tonight.’
‘Really?’ Nick squeaked, looking up in surprise. ‘What about– I mean people would know, about you and me.’
‘They already know,’ David answered. ‘At least, Simon knows. George knows, which means Danny knows, and the entire Treasury likely does as well.’
David grinned and rubbed Nick's back, chuckling, ‘And after the noise you were making earlier, I think it's safe to say everyone here knows, too.’
‘David,’ Nick snickered, once again hiding his face.
‘That would be precisely what they heard,’ David teased, kissing Nick's temple, which was the only part of Nick he could reach.
‘Do you have to be so, so flippant about it?’ Nick mumbled.
‘I dare say they're used to it, and you must sound a damn sight better than Cherie Blai– Ow, did you just pinch me?’
‘It was the only way to get you to shut up,’ Nick said, raising his head and regarding David sternly.
‘Not the only way,’ David winked. Nick shook his head, his expression perilously close to a smile, and flopped down onto his back.
‘You're incorrigible,’ he said to the ceiling.
David leaned up on his elbow, resting his head on his hand and looking down as Nick pretended to be cross.
‘What will you do?’ David asked, stroking Nick's chest and enjoying the sensation of Nick's chest hair tickling his fingers. ‘Do you think you will go back
into politics?’
‘No, I don't think I could,’ Nick replied, though he did not look saddened, merely thoughtful. ‘I'm still... not doing so well at being around people. It's
getting better but– Anyway I've been contacted by a publisher, they want me to write a book about Penrhyn.’
‘What kind of book?’
‘Something about how I survived, what it was like, that sort of thing,’ Nick answered. He turned onto his side and nuzzled his face against David's neck.
‘Don't worry, I'm not going to write that I spent five years dreaming about the prime minister giving me a hug.’
‘That's good,’ David chuckled. ‘It would be very short if that's all you had in it.’
‘Oh, I don't know,’ Nick said, smiling slyly. ‘Some of my dreams were very detailed.’
‘Were they?’ David raised his eyebrows.
‘They were,’ Nick nodded. He pulled David down for a kiss, grinning as he whispered, ‘And for some of them, I wasn't even asleep.’
‘You definitely shouldn't put those in your book,’ David laughed. He stretched his arm out behind Nick's head, lying down fully and yawning as
Nick settled comfortably.
‘So you're going to accept the offer, I take it?’ he asked soberly.
‘I think so,’ Nick answered. ‘Arthur says it will be a good opportunity to, how did he put it, finish that chapter of my life, or some such. But I want to
do it. If anything, at least I will have it clear in my head.’
‘This would be the same Arthur who sent you to my office to give me a parting gift,’ David muttered.
‘I know you don't like him,’ Nick said calmly, shooting David a stern look when he tried to protest. ‘You don't, and it's obvious you don't, so stop
denying it.’
David closed his eyes and fell silent. He did not like Arthur, did not like the way he pushed Nick to do things that hurt, even if he could see that
sometimes Nick needed to be pushed. Nick stroked David's cheek softly.
‘He only does what he thinks I need, David.’
‘What does he say about me?’ David asked.
‘That I fixated on a fantasy of you,’ Nick answered honestly. ‘That my feelings are more for the idea of you than they are for you, and that I'm trying to
cling to something familiar because nothing else is.’
David felt unexpectedly hurt at Nick's therapist's view of their relationship. He rubbed his forehead, scratching an itch with his fingernails, and lay in
silence.
‘It's not true,’ Nick whispered in his ear. ‘Maybe it was when I first got back, when everything scared me and you were the only friendly face in a sea of
confusion, but I– Christ, you're about ten times more annoying than anything I ever pictured. You're stubborn and pig-headed. It takes you forever to admit
when you're wrong about something. You make terrible jokes at all the wrong times and you keep silent when you should be speaking up, and–’
‘This isn't really making me feel better,’ David pouted.
‘–and,’ Nick repeated. ‘You make me laugh, even your daft Star Trek jokes make me laugh. When I'm with you I feel happy for no reason at all other
than you're there. You're not perfect, you're not anything at all like I thought you would be, but you're real, David, and it's you I love, not some
fantasy.’
‘I get the idea,’ David said softly, stopping Nick's words with a kiss.
‘Good, because whatever problems I have, none of them are about you and me. The rest of it; not eating properly, sleeping on the floor, being scared...’
Nick gestured with his hand, falling silent for a moment before continuing. ‘That will get better with time. And whatever Arthur thinks about this, I still
need him.’
‘I know. I'm sorry.’
Nick sighed, resting his head on David's shoulder. He took hold of David's hand and entwined their fingers.
‘I'll be ready to tell you one day, David.’
‘I'll be here when you are,’ David mumbled. He curled himself a little tighter around Nick's body, kissing Nick on the forehead. ‘However long it takes.’