Harold always keeps the line open when John is actively working a number, as has become their custom. He doesn't say anything if John doesn't take him up on the wordless offer, but over time, more and more, he has. It's indescribably comforting somehow, in a way Harold wouldn't dare put to words. He's all too aware of how thin a line they walk, how keenly sharp loss can be and how sudden.
Instead he just silently appreciates it, silently listens, offers up occasional commentary to let John know he's there. He's caught quite a few things this way, and today he catches that as John accepts a phone number written on his hand, it crawls into existence on his own hand, invisible pen strokes fluttering across his palm. It takes much longer than it should for Harold to understand the implications, and then his brain stutters and crashes to a halt.
Once their current number has left, Harold quietly instructs John to return to the library, staring down at the digits smeared into his skin, his other thumb mutely running over them, back and forth.
So many things he'd wondered about growing up piece together. The way nothing showed up for him for years, until after high school, after his father died; the way his soulmate had never tried to exchange contact information, never even offered a name, never chanced a word. Their writing marks were always purely incidental, never deliberate. Harold had-- tried a couple times, drunkenly or morosely or desperately, but he'd never gotten a response.
And now he knows why.
He can't keep this from him, much as he'd like to. That would be-- destructive to the trust they've formed. They keep secrets from one another, things about the past, but nothing that could be a real betrayal. Harold has to decide how to handle this with John, though his heart is lurching into his throat and pounding at the same time and he's full of wonder, of dread, of confused hope that a dream he'd given up on long ago may come true. And it makes sense, there's an of course about finding out it's John that's his soulmate, of course, the person Harold respects wholly and deeply, who saves Harold in equal measure as he saves John, who pries him from his traumatic isolation and loneliness, his one-man crusade turned to two--
Of course it's John. Now he's just not sure John will think, of course it's Harold.
That's why he gives him room and time to react when John reaches his desk in the library, ignoring the usual exchange of greetings to merely hold up his hand, palm out, an innocent seven digits scrawled across the skin.
John knows that something has transpired, there was no "Well done, Mr. Reese" in Harold's satisfied tone, or some other phrase to communicate a job well done on saving this number. Perhaps there's a new number already? Surely Harold would have mentioned it. But he was planning on returning to the library as usual, so this changes nothing. He'll find out what Harold wants soon enough.
He is not ready for this.
There had been an incident in high school where two sweethearts discovered they were soulmates and it was the talk of the school. There had been a flurry of writing on skin and an endless amount of drama and breaking up as a result. He'd pretended to be mature and above it all, but late one night had put put a dot right on the crease of his elbow, just to see if anything happened. Of course, nothing had, and that was that.
Surely not now, after all this time.
John's first reaction is to apologize. Harold's soulmate is him not Grace-- somehow he'd just assumed it was them. It wasn't rare for people to have a relationship that wasn't their soulmate, but he'd just-- he really had assumed they were. And now Harold is stuck with him. It hardly seems fair. Harold is so generous with John, has time and time again given him second chances, given him a chance at redemption, but-- when he wakes up in the dark of night sweating and shaking from a nightmare, he knows who he is. What he's done. Harold doesn't deserve that, he deserves someone like Grace, whose hands create things.
There is, of course, a part of him that rattles the bars of the prison he's locked it in, that's crying out in victory. The part of him that, when he wakes up from those nightmares, wishes that Harold was there to pet his cheek and tell him it's just a dream. It's an indulgent desire that cuts as much as it soothes; Harold will never do this for him. Only now there is-- there's just the slightest chance that he will get what he wants. It's a dangerous thought to explore so John locks it away again, quickly. He knows what he wants but he will never, ever ask Harold for it. It's simply not something that happens for people like him. John knows better than that.
Instead John settles on a smile that feels painful, that he knows Harold will see through. Harold does know him well enough for that, but John quite frankly doesn't know what he feels in this moment (terrified, a small part of his mind supplies).
"Well, now we have a backup method of communication if we can't talk for some reason. We should come up with a system." John stares down at his hand. His face hurts despite the fact that his mouth has barely moved. "I'll go wash my hand."
He walks past Harold without so much as a second glance, to the sink in the kitchenette, turns the water on cold, and starts scrubbing.
There's so much of himself that Harold keeps contained on a daily basis. Pithy quips, genuine sentiment, whole sides of his personality and his self that he doesn't dare show. What was once merely a personal affectation has turned into a crutch with which he keeps himself going. If he's doing his best to limit exposure to who he is, how can it be his fault when they die? With John it might seem absurd to perpetuate that illusion, given everything, but habit is its own inertia, and so Harold finds himself leaving windows open for John here and there but can never quite manage a door.
Now he realizes the door has been open all along, his soul left it that way, a focused tunnel just to John like an encrypted channel, and he's-- they-- have only been ignoring it.
Harold lets him go at first, have some space, but he follows. He knows he's not going to sneak up on John with his unsteady gait and the creaky floors, and he doesn't try, just lets himself into their awkward crash space and makes his way to John at the sink without apology. He goes to stop his hands with his own and feels how cold the water is, mouth tightening.
He will not be made an excuse for John to punish himself. Not now, not ever, not even in the most mild symbolic manner with cold water. Harold won't pressure John to do anything but he won't let him walk away with that rictus of a smile, either.
He turns the hot tap on midway before reaching in again.
"It doesn't need to be a backup method." They're standing beside one another hunched over the same small sink, avoiding each other's eyes in the mirror, close enough that a long line of Harold's bad leg is pressed against John and the water splatter is getting his cuffs wet and he doesn't care. "You can contact me at any time, using any method, John."
The use of first name is deliberate; his voice quiet but steady, the even tonal pace of Harold's typing an echo behind it, dependable; and his fingers lace through John's in the sink, tangled, keeping them still.
John hopes that Harold will leave it at that but he knows-- fears-- that Harold won't let this pass. All he can do is accept Harold's hand in his, staring at the water running into the sink. His eyes try to look everywhere but where their hands are joined as the water grows warmer.
He notices the slight discoloration around the drain in the sink, it's time to clean it again even though it feels like he did so just recently. He tries thinking back through the days, and-- yes, he did it five days ago when they were between numbers. The cleaner is in the cabinet, he'll put it on his list of things to do. He'd-- part of him wants to just do it now, but that would be-- too much. That would be too much. Harold is trying to face this and John is trying not to, but. That would be cruel to Harold and John wants to cradle Harold's hands so gently in his own that it's physically painful.
His eyes keep searching.
His own sleeves had been pulled up slightly so they don't get wet, but Harold's hadn't, so they're starting do darken at the edges from the splash of the water. Somehow that seems unacceptable -- Harold would hate having his sleeves wet, surely -- which gives John a course of action. He carefully untangles one of his hands and turns both taps off before reaching for the towel. John has a momentary vision of freeing his other hand, of carefully drying Harold's hands, all the little folds and crevices-- and his other hand lets go, moves to join its pair-- but at the last second he catches himself and simply presses the towel into Harold's hand, letting his own dripping hands linger for just the briefest moment before withdrawing them.
John doesn't look at the smudged remains of the ink on his skin as he grips the edge of the sink for support. He doesn't really lean on it, the weight its supporting isn't physical. He lets his fingers feel the smooth porcelain and tries to understand how this feels, but comes up wanting. It's incomprehensible apart from the knowledge that something in him is breaking under Harold's touch, under his words. He doesn't know what, or how to put it back together, or if he even wants to be whole again, or if maybe this is like setting a broken bone. He doesn't know.
"We should keep pens on us from now on, in case I lose my phone, or if there's interference." Both of those things have happened before, it's not an unreasonable suggestion. He can suddenly hear Kara's laughter ringing in his ears, mocking him. He feels ill. "But it's not safe, I'm in too many situations where it could be abused. You have to promise--" He'd done that before. They had intel that their mark had a soulmate and used the partner as bait-- he thinks of Harold alone in the library, calling his name over their private line-- he had felt like part of him died after that mission and he feels that again, tenfold, imagining Harold.
Harold doesn't know what he's getting with this deal. John does.
"You can't put yourself in danger because of this. Nothing can change in the way we operate."
For a moment Harold thinks John is going to dry his hands, too, make some overture of acceptance, of intimacy, and when he doesn't he feels unaccountably disappointed. It's true that he doesn't like having his sleeves wet, that this shirt deserves more respect than that, that ordinarily he would never do such a thing. But somewhere in Harold is still a boy who grew up in a cornfield town in the age before the internet, and he's not afraid of getting his hands dirty for good reasons.
"Oh, John. Is that what your concern is? All the danger I'm in is because I put myself there, before you were ever part of the equation."
His steady tone has crumpled into a softer empathy, holding but momentarily ignoring the towel. It can't be John's only concern, he's sure, but maybe just the one easiest to speak aloud. It's also the easiest for Harold to dismiss. He's been the engineer of his own circumstances, and going naively, half-blindly into it is no excuse, doesn't erase any culpability, doesn't bring Nathan back to life, doesn't let him see Grace again or have a real home.
"If you're worried about someone using you to get to me, well--" Harold smiles, wry, self-aware, lined with a sharpened edge that says he knows what it means to have a person as a weakness. "I'm afraid we passed that point long ago," he says gently. "And I'm not willing to live without you, unless you wished it. I think I've excised as much from my life as I can."
There's a painful bitterness to that statement. But Harold is brave, fearless in certain ways, always been willing to break down walls and defenses and limitations through the slightest possibility, a tiny patient worrying at the crack until he can slide through.
He dries his hands perfunctorily, and then holds them out, open, with the towel, in silent offer to dry John's, too.
"I'm not willing to live without you," Harold says and John feels something in his chest come undone. In a fit of-- he doesn't know what-- but suddenly it's all he can do to stop himself from falling to his knees in front of Harold, to stop himself from wrapping his arms around his waist and burying his face into his vest. He needs to-- take a breath. He needs to take a breath. This is too much, too fast. John had truly never thought this day would come, that he would have a chance at-- something. He had truly, truly been fine with the careful push and pull of their relationship, close but never overstepping some unspoken line, and now Harold is saying how John is his weakness and-- he really, really can't do this.
Harold's hands are open, waiting for his, offering something that John wants with all his painful, beating heart. If he gives himself over to Harold like this it will be a confession, it will be like prying open his chest and letting Harold see the want in him. He wants Harold to care for him, desperately, has wanted it for so long, has come up with so many justifications for all of Harold's actions, all his little smiles. All these treasures that John takes and hoards away for his moments of weakness where his only recourse is to pull these moments out and pretend that Harold sees him the way that John sees Harold. That maybe they're a binary star, locked together, not just John spinning eternally around the sun that is Harold.
John has a feeling there's a wretched look on his face, that he looks like his world has just ended, because it has. There's something new in its ashes, something he can barely look at, this thing Harold is offering him. His outstretched hands. Just waiting for John. And John. Doesn't know if he can take that step. Doesn't know if he can reach his hands out. He tightens his grip on the edge of the sink and looks at his knuckles, the way his fingers strain, as if somehow his life depends on holding on. In a way, he thinks hysterically, it does. If he puts himself in Harold's hands-- literally, figuratively-- then he's a changed man. There's no going back from this. But what choice does he have? Could he-- reject Harold? Could he even survive such a thing? The answer is immediate: no. He couldn't bear to do that to Harold. To his soulmate-- John feels sick again. "I'm not willing to live without you."
Slowly, in increments, John releases his grip on the sink. He has to will every muscle, every tendon, to unclench, to let go. He can feel his jaw clenching around all the things he cannot say, all the promises of devotion and apologies that of all people it's him. Wordlessly, he places his hands in Harold's.
The way John goes mute, complicated emotions flickering over his face between moments when it blanks alarmingly, is a sure tell that he's overwhelmed. Harold feels overwhelmed, too, but not hollowed out, dismantled. He can feel that, he realizes, with a distant awe, and it must be from John.
It makes his heart hurt as he dries John's hands and then discards the towel with uncharacteristic carelessness. It's done quickly, so Harold can take his hands with his own again -- is it a trick if they both know it's a trick? -- and tows him toward the sparse cot they keep in the corner for when one of them has to or wants to sleep in the most secure location they know.
"Sit with me, please," he says softly. "I've had, oh, a whole hour more than you to think about this." A ghost-whisper light touch of humor. "There's no rush, no rush at all."
There really isn't, is there? Harold feels almost dizzy with the sensation. He might get this, might get to have a soulmate, and if he is then they're going to decide it on their own terms. Soulmates aren't the epitome of human existence, he hadn't felt like he was missing something when he was with Grace, but he's always wondered. Harold is fascinated by puzzles and this has been the most personal one, lurking around the edges of his entire life. He's maybe grieved whoever his soulmate is a little, for lost chances.
All those chances were just waiting for the exact right moment, apparently. Harold doesn't believe in fate (not even with a soulmate) but he can see the perfect rightness in them not finding each other until now, when they're terribly alone and need each other most and already wholly trust one another with a delicate, stunning fragility, like a smooth unbroken pane of glass both of them protect jealously. Would Harold Wren of two decades ago have been able to accept John Reese, Army Ranger? Probably. He's sure he would have tried, and gotten there. But not with the grace he can now.
Not with the soft glow of unreserved joy shading his mind as he tugs John down to sit with him, keeping hold of his hands and staring at where they join. Trying to keep from staring at John's face so he can feel some modicum of privacy in his reactions, while Harold's emotions bloom into a fuller, quiet happiness shaded with piercing concern.
For a dizzying moment where the pit of John's stomach drops out, he thinks that Harold will lay down with him. He can't do that right now, it would be too intimate, but Harold just has him sit instead. That he can manage. Surely. Surely he can sit with Harold and have his hands be held. John's own hands are slack in Harold's, he can't make the leap to close his fingers, to hold on to Harold in the delicate way his deepest heart desires.
Harold is-- happy. Harold is happy about this. John can tell, can feel-- can Harold feel how he feels? John doesn't even know himself, can't tell anything past the pain that grips his heart. There is, deep down, under all the layers of agony, a shred of hope. Of desire. John has to look away from it lest he be undone.
His soulmate.
He doesn't deserve something like this. It's enough that Harold has given him a chance to atone for everything he's done, but this? It doesn't happen to people like him. Kara really would laugh at him in that sharp, mocking tone, would tell him-- has told him, that he doesn't get to come back to something like this. There's no happy ending for him. The best he can get is to be useful, to try to do some good with whatever time he has left.
His jaw hurts from clenching it around all these things he cannot-- does not want to say. But Harold deserves something. Deserves honesty. John opens his mouth and nothing comes out for a moment but finally he pushes some words out, quiet, raw, broken. "You can't-- not. Me."
The physical aspect of potentially developing their relationship a step farther seems far and away the least important part to Harold. He's not averse to it, especially if it's something John would enjoy, but it's never held a candle to the satisfaction he gets from simply spending time with his loved ones and spoiling them as best he can.
He's aware John has a dismal view of himself, but he's not expecting it to extend this far. Harold feels just a touch of the way John's hollowed out feeling starts to echo with acute pain, like hunger gone too far, stomach gnawing at itself in a sensation completely distinct from the normal experience of hunger. And maybe also like that, eating too quickly could make him sick. Harold already intended to take this slow but now he's worried he's somehow already gone too fast, just telling him the truth, following him, taking his hands.
Making him confront it at all could've been too much. Only... he's not sure he could bear making this, as he'd said, one more thing he's excised from his life. Harold has removed everything he possibly can with merciless, surgical precision. And even denying this is happening wrenches something in him that is so, so sick of deprivation. Perhaps he has his own too-harsh hunger.
But he will deny it, if that's what John asks.
Harold swallows tightly. "When I realized earlier, I thought... of course. I thought-- it was only surprising I had needed this direct proof." His voice cracks a little, a rare glimpse of vulnerability. Of Harold not always being composed and in control, not always having a plan.
He finds enough strength to finish, starting to pull his hands away. "If you don't want me as your soulmate, I won't press it on you."
John suddenly has to hold onto Harold as soon as he feels Harold letting go. His fingers close quickly, too tightly just for a moment, and then loosen again so he's just gently holding on with his fingertips. The thought of Harold letting go is unbearable. The thought of Harold walking away from him is unbearable. The thought of Harold thinking he doesn't want this--
There's a distinct difference between not deserving this and not wanting this. And Harold is being so brave for him, Harold who hates to give anything away, Harold who wears his suits like a shield sometimes. Who is willing to give this up if John-- John does want this, he just doesn't know how to accept that this is something he can have. He realizes that he's going to have to use his words even if it's physically painful to speak them.
"I do." It comes out wretched, quiet. A confession. "But I don't know. What to do. People like me don't get to have this. It should have-- you deserve better than me."
Even as he says it he knows Harold will disagree, will protest, will say something kind and gentle and he's already bracing for it, locking himself in place because it will hurt. He knows that there's a contradiction here in the way that he's holding Harold's hands and the way he's already rejecting Harold's kindness.
John grasping his hands no matter how lightly halts his withdrawal. He's his soulmate. Why wouldn't he take down a few layers of self-protective distance? Neither of them are ready for all of them to come down, not yet, but Harold assumes that would be the natural endgame of a healthy soul-to-soul communion.
"It's fortunate for all of us that we don't need to get what we deserve," he says with an insistent frankness, passionate that that is the case. Harold advocates mercy for killers, second chances, programmed the Machine to prevent loss of life wherever possible no matter whose life it is, no single one weighing more than another. And he himself is sometimes in his darker moments convinced he deserves to be dead.
But these are not sentiments to make decisions on. He remembers Alicia Corwin terrified in a car, and a phone ringing.
"Truthfully, John, I could not have less interest in what we should have. I am interested in what we can."
It's a familiar concept, or it should be: the people they can save now, versus the ones they couldn't. The often futile struggle to make a difference in a world that has never actually been keeping score. The strange asymmetry between the gratification of saving the person in front of you compared to the faces you see in the dark on the ceiling at night, how they never equal out. Because you can't weigh lives, Harold would insist.
You can't come up with a scale that will ever balance out.
Harold wants him. Harold wants him. John was right, it hits him like a wave, but he's braced himself. He knew this was going to hurt. Harold wants him. John doesn't even know what that looks like. How does Harold see him? Can he see all the parts of him that have broken off over the years, all the things he has killed in himself to make it to this point, to be sitting here and holding Harold's hands? Some days John wakes up and the only thing that gets him out of bed is knowing that there's a number out there. He does his best to pretend to be good but sometimes he has a second drink, and on rare occasions a third. Does Harold know this? Can Harold see this in him?
And yet, Harold wants him. Despite everything, Harold wants him. John doesn't know what he has to offer. What does this vision of the future look like for Harold? He always has some plan, is thinking something, is giving John guidance; and John takes it, trusts him, follows him. In this moment John can't even envision anything past, well, this moment. Past holding Harold's hands. He wants to cradle them to his chest like something precious, or maybe run his fingers over the smooth skin, the fingertips, the softness of his palm.
His heart had shuddered to a stop during all of this and now it picks up again, beating too fast, painful. John wonders if Harold can feel that in his delicate grasp. He hurts and something in him is still so broken and jagged and painful but it also means there's a crack in him and there's something he thinks might be hope dripping through that crack, a puddle barely forming, not enough to drink at yet.
"What can we have." He means it as a question but he can't get enough inflection out to make it sound that way. "Tell me," he begs.
Can he see all the parts of him? Can he? Harold isn't convinced that's the right question. True caring -- dare he say it, love -- is based on a leap of faith. On a jump and a fall that never hits the bottom. The line between nurturing affection and desperate fear of loss is thin indeed, and he knows it so well, knows it like the slip of every memory from his father, like the tacit lie after lie he'd told Grace.
He's not sure it matters. He doesn't take being soulmates to mean they're perfect for one another; no one's flawless, no one's beyond reproach. He just takes it to mean that it's worth the leap.
Harold's fingers tighten again on John's, unreservedly, head lifting and eyes meeting his without an ounce of shame. He's too cautious to answer directly, to dictate where they go from here with careless words. He won't let John walk away with a caricature of a smile on his face and he won't let him walk a step behind him into this future, either.
"I'd like us to find out together." Merciless, uncompromising. "You and me, and no one else." No ghosts. No regrets. Harold breathes out. "There is so much I want to give you, if you'll have it."
He feels like he's boiling over with what he wants to give, a multitude and universe of affection squashed down into collapsed atoms like a beautiful custom sports jacket crumpled into a ball to travel discreetly in a carry-on bag. Harold has been carrying it everywhere, hiding it as best he can, letting a precious garment get wrinkled.
For John, he wants to shake it out, try it on again. An old part of himself he's been frittering away like a secret for years, allowing out in tiny pieces, small corners, with enough couching that he can pretend it's something else. What if he's done pretending? What if he reclaims this?
When Harold says "no one else" does he mean-- not Grace? Who he has left, has voluntarily walked away from despite loving her? Surely she must factor in to this somehow? Or does he mean the specter of Kara, who he can still hear mocking him? Does Harold know that he drags her behind him, clinging and clawing at his ankles, waiting to trip him up? Or Jessica, poor Jessica who he abandoned in her moment of need, the memory of it causing him to jolt awake at night. John doesn't think he can move forward without these memories weighing him down, just as he knows Harold has watched Grace from a distance for a long time now.
But Harold says together and looks at him, and John feels compelled to tear his eyes away from where their hands are joined and look back. He knows that his agony must still show on his face but Harold isn't letting him run away from this and he-- he doesn't want to. John is hurt and scared and doesn't know what to do, but he won't run away from Harold.
He can feel something building in Harold like water swelling behind a dam and it scares him a bit, what Harold wants. John doesn't know how to take, how to receive, he only knows how to make himself be small, slip through the cracks, let it run off of him. But he's going to try, for Harold, for his soulmate. But, truthfully, he would do this even if they weren't soulmates; being so is just the catalyst for arriving at this juncture.
"Yes," he rasps out. "Whatever you want. I'm--" is he going to say this? Now? Can he say this? Is it allowed? He owes Harold-- honesty. He owes him honesty. "--yours."
They can't leave anyone behind, can't erase those memories or the impact they've had on who they are, and Harold wouldn't want to. But he refuses to let someone else, anyone else alive or dead, dictate his relationship with John.
He must have one thing that is his, truly his. He'd tried not to, tried to make himself survive on starvation rations, told himself that he should've died in the ferry bombing anyway. What does it matter if he's a ghost moving through the city, disconnected and unattached? It's just a matter of time until his strange afterlife existence runs out. No need to complicate things.
But now here is John. Saying he's his. A smile breaks over Harold helplessly, automatically, his relieved pleasure at getting through to John cresting into another wave of unreserved joy.
"And I'm yours as well," he responds without hesitation. He wants to kiss his hands to punctuate it, but Harold restrains the impulse. Too much too fast again, he assumes, so his grip only tightens, a pulse of reassurance. "We needn't decide anything definite right away. I'd rather wait until we've both had a chance to adjust. But yes, I very much want to."
Mostly he means he wants to wait until John is less shocked, hopefully less desperately accommodating to his wishes, because Harold doesn't foresee his position or feelings changing at all. But he suspects John will find that more palatable if he makes it a we.
John can see Harold's joy, can feel it because they're soulmates, and it's too much again. It's like staring at the sun. He turns his back to the wave that is Harold's joy and lets it crest over him. He's not sure what expression is on his face right now, he feels-- relief, terror. He's still broken up, still dripping hope out of that crack, and now he can go lap at it. It's muddied with his mind saying you don't deserve this, you don't deserve this, but it's hope all the same.
It feels like too much. He's not used to so many emotions. He's not used to hope and joy, even if that joy is Harold's. He wants to hide from them, to run away for just a moment. John brings their joined hands up to cover his face, turning them so Harold's hands are pressed into his forehead, his cheeks, as though Harold can protect him from this. Of course, it doesn't actually work, he still feels too much, but it does have the benefit of bringing Harold closer. Maybe one day Harold will do this for him, will place his hands on John's face, comfort him. John wants it desperately, has wanted Harold's touch for so long.
He wants Harold to hold him, to tell him that this will be okay, that this is good. But he also knows it would destroy him.
John takes a deep, shuddering breath. "Yes. Okay." He realizes that he's agreeing to wait while he still has Harold's hands pressed into his face. He takes one more moment to memorize the feeling of soft skin on his brow and cheeks, and then returns their hands to his lap, but cannot imagine letting go.
There's probably nowhere else this conversation can go that won't result in him pushing John somewhere he isn't prepared for in the name of appeasing Harold. For all they'd started their relationship on tenterhooks, feeling out each other's character like putting the edge pieces of a puzzle down first, Harold thinks he has a good idea of how John operates now. However mystifying it is to him emotionally, intellectually he can't deny based on prior actions that one thing is true:
He hasn't yet found the limits of what John would do for him.
So he coaxes him carefully and kindly back to earth, takes his time seeing John out the door, ensures he actually goes home and rests and perhaps even eats something. He does not monitor him remotely. Privacy is a gift whose sense of timing matters and Harold feels, somehow, that if this is ever to work, he has to give John space and time to adjust.
Maybe he needs it, too. They have a number the next day and Harold has to drag his mind back to focusing. Fortunately, he's good at compartmentalizing, so he manages fine. He's completely professional, despite John's fears that this might affect their work, that he might become more solicitous or fearful of his safety. Harold is exactly as concerned as he's always been (perhaps that's telling, honestly) and in between moments of action, when he's sitting at the library table surrounded by monitors and his hands are still on the keys, Bear snuffling a toy into his bed, it seems surreal. He's adrift, shocked himself. He's in his fifties and he's now finding his soulmate.
Harold keeps it together until they can assure the number is safe and the perpetrator is taken care of, and then he breaks his professional façade. It's been days of wondering if what had happened really happened, days of just the faintest edge of emotion coming from John, difficult to distinguish, and uncharacteristically he feels like he needs new proof.
He takes out a brush-tipped pen specially produced for skin-writing between soulmates -- something he'd procured just the day before -- and carefully inks a message onto his left forearm in elegant script, across the wrist, over the major artery.
418 W 160th St 8 PM If you wish
An invitation to an out of the way uptown townhouse, nice enough to meet Harold's standards but unremarkable in its sameness to those beside it. Communicated over skin so John knows precisely what the premise is.
And with a few hours to spare, so Harold has time to arrange things.
That first night is agonizing. John listens to Harold's instructions, goes home, eats two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (scraping the spreads on two pieces of bread is as much effort as he has in him), and showers. He's tempted for a moment to turn the water on cold but remembers how Harold had silently forbidden him earlier at the sink and turns it on hot instead, finally scrubbing the remaining ink off his hand. Once out he sits on the edge of his bed in only a towel for an unknown amount of time, just staring at the blank expanse of his arm, of his hand. He wants words to appear there. He wants to grab a pen and write Harold's name, a plea for-- something. He doesn't know what. Maybe just for Harold to materialize at his door.
Eventually he gets dressed for bed and lays there in the dark until an uneasy sleep claims him.
The next morning dawns with a number, and he's never been so thankful to have this job. He has no clue what to say to Harold about how his life is fundamentally different, how their relationship is irrevocably altered, but it's easy to fall back on this habit. It's easy to let his mind blank out on a stakeout, to focus on tailing their number, to focus on his hand colliding with a jaw, to focus on the solidity of his gun in his hand. He's so practiced at averting his gaze from what he feels.
But inevitably their number wraps up and John's distractions are gone with it. He can feel something vibrating inside him, rattling and wanting to break loose, but still he won't look at it. At least not until he notices the writing across his wrist in Harold's unmistakable handwriting. He stares at it and realizes what he feels is desire. The thing in his chest that shudders with every breath is want. Just to be with Harold, to have a chance at something. The terror from that first day is back in equal measure, but he feels more in control of it. With hands that shake, John pulls out the ballpoint pen from his pocket, pulls the cap off, and circles the time in acknowledgement.
This gives him enough time to shower, which he always needs after a number. Once out he's about to do his hair and hesitates before putting the product back away. He passes by his suits and puts on a t-shirt and jeans. He's not Mr. Reese right now, he's just. John. He doesn't think he's purposefully shown this part of himself to Harold before; the last time he dressed casually like this in front of Harold was that fateful first day when Harold kidnapped him and tied him to a bed. John grabs his leather jacket as he walks out the door in comfortable pair of boots.
This is how he is when he knocks on the door exactly at 8PM, heart in this throat, nervous and hopeful beyond measure.
Clothing became armor for Harold years ago, and his comfort level can be calibrated based on the number of layers he's wearing. He's shed his jacket, but still in a vest over his shirtsleeves, and he putters around restlessly while he waits. However certain he himself feels, he's still concerned with rushing John, worried about making a misstep and damaging something irreparably. The trouble with being so wholly trusted is that he feels immense pressure to live up to said trust.
He frets, distracted. Of course John uses whatever ballpoint he has lying around to confirm the time. Harold will really have to get him something better. If this continues. If John wants to write to him again. If...
Oh thank God, it's eight o'clock and John is punctual. He lurches to the door to open it. Although this is one of several residences, and Harold doesn't keep a longer-term home for more than half a year or so, John may be able to tell that this is a place Harold sleeps more often than at others: there's neat stacks of books, covert server racks, cleaned tea cups drying face down beside the sink. Harold invited him here intentionally as a gesture, and he's lowered the lights to decidedly ambient and tried to eat and failed due to nerves.
It should feel ridiculous, but it doesn't. It feels... like he's been waiting a very long time.
He breaks into another helpless smile when he opens the door and sees John. Being allowed to care is the single most precious gift he could be given with this discovery. Then he registers how differently he's dressed, and he flushes faintly, stepping back to let him in. All of the words he had planned dry up in his mouth.
"Oh. You've... well. I'm so very glad to see you. Thank you for coming."
It's awful and awkward and Harold means it completely.
John doesn't say anything as he steps inside, looking around eagerly. He can tell that this is not just any safe house, this is somewhere Harold lives. He had hoped-- that Harold might trust him with this. That it wouldn't be just a throwaway location. He can feel a smile spreading across his face, involuntary and light in a way he hasn't felt in a long time. Harold's blush, his awkwardness, are reassuring to John, put him at ease. John isn't the only one fumbling here. John is still so nervous that what they want might not be the same, that this won't work in some way-- but he's not nervous that Harold will reject him outright. That Harold will have decided over the past few days that he doesn't want this. He can feel that Harold is happy to see him.
"Thanks for inviting me." He wonders if Harold will be able to hear that he really means "there's no place I'd rather be." Suddenly he wishes he'd thought to bring something with him, John doesn't actually have a clue what to say now. What does one say to one's very private reclusive billionaire boss who ends up being one's soulmate? Especially when they invite you to their very secret home? Or whatever approximates as a home for Harold.
He could bring up their number, but that seems too impersonal for this moment. John is realizing, again, that he knows very little about Harold outside of the numbers. There's no easy thread of conversation to resume. If he's being honest, what he wants-- he wants to hold Harold's hand. He wants Harold to hold his hand and show him all the little things around the place he lives, all the things that make this Harold's home-- the fact that Harold has trusted him with this washes over him. He wants to hold Harold's hand in Harold's home and he thinks he might have a chance at that. It feels dizzying to think about. The fact that he might get what he wants.
Not what he deserves but what he wants.
John takes another look around from where he's standing but there's so much more to see-- what's his kitchen like? Does Harold cook? Does he leave books lying around on random surfaces? John is sure he won't find pictures, but there's personal touches everywhere in a place someone lives. But he knows how difficult it must have been for "very private person" Harold Finch to invite him over in the first place, so John doesn't push it. He wants to see but he wants to respect Harold's privacy more, wants Harold to choose to give him this.
And yet despite all of this, John still doesn't know what to say. He opens his mouth and lets something fall out to fill the silence he's created. "How was your evening?"
It's so awkward but this is uncharted territory and means so much to him. He doesn't want to push Harold-- doesn't want to push himself. Already his heart rate is rising but he owes it to Harold to hold it together better than he did the first day.
Seeing John smile buoys him further, and he can feel a greater sense of steadiness at the edges of his perception, like John is less likely to crumble into dust with a wrong touch. It gives Harold renewed confidence.
He closes the door behind John and activates a characteristically sophisticated security system before he turns back to respond to the question.
"Truthfully, I sat around fretting," he says dryly, "so I'm relieved you're here. Feel free to snoop; I expected as much."
He's not asking for self-restraint, is what he means, though it's frightening for him as well in certain measure, to let down his defenses and let John in. To deliberately reveal these aspects of himself that he's become so accustomed to keeping under wraps. But it's a reflexive discomfort, like removing a cast and being unfamiliar with the limb that's underneath. Harold has to get to know himself again with this in a sense. He remembers who he was with Grace and a few before her, but who is he now? Who has he become?
Harold guides them away from the entrance and toward a rather understated sitting area, furniture chosen for simple comfort rather than style. A familiar laptop is left open on the coffee table, surrounded by orderly paper notes and a variety of pens, including the brush-tipped one he'd used on his arm; a knitted throw blanket is tossed over the loveseat; and there is a surprising quantity of dog toys that Harold has collected onto a very luxe dog bed tucked in the corner.
John decides suddenly that if he's going to look around he'll do it the next time he's over. If he's allowed over again. He hopes-- thinks that there's a good chance of that, considering he was allowed here in the first place. It all depends on how tonight goes. He doesn't think Harold will reject him outright, he's said and shown already that he won't, but they... might not want the same thing. His mouth goes dry at the thought, and anxiety claws at his chest. He's glad Harold has offered a drink.
"Tea, please. I'll look around later." Certainly he wouldn't get drunk off one drink, but it feels symbolic. As if he's saying that he's committing to being fully present for whatever is about to happen. There's no denying that he can drink casually, but there's always the knowledge in the back of his mind that he doesn't always do so. Has not always done so. A score both he and Harold know.
When Harold goes to the kitchen John follows, trying not to look around too much and only partially succeeding. What he can see without opening drawers and cabinets suggests that Harold isn't much of a cook, or at least doesn't do it very much. He does spy some traditional tea-ware that he's guessing gets a lot of use.
Once again John realizes that he should say something, but he's filled with a certain... joy, at seeing Harold move around Harold's kitchen in Harold's house. It balloons in his chest, somewhat abating the anxiety from moments ago. It's a gift he thought he'd never get. He realizes that he could walk out right now and go to sleep wrapped in this warmth and be satisfied. But some part of him is greedy and is saying more, more so he just watches Harold and hopes he understands how much he's given John already.
Well aware that John usually drinks coffee as his caffeinated beverage of choice, Harold can't help but feel a little pleased himself at the chance to share tea with John. It's quite silly and trivial, but these little domestic moments are the things he's lost completely with his isolation. And he knows the same has to be true for John, too, can feel the echo of his warm pleasure as Harold puts together the tea things.
Mindful of John's taste for coffee and not wanting to fuss with proper technique too much under the circumstances, Harold selects a houjicha, a green tea that's roasted to impart a lovely depth of flavor and holds up well under lackadaisical brewing technique should he get distracted. He uses his standard tea pot and hot water from a water boiling appliance he has on his counter, something ubiquitous in Asia and a convenience he's learned he can't do without.
He sets a timer for it to steep and turns to face John as he waits, leaning his weight against the kitchen counter. Harold feels a bizarre, momentary impulse to start rambling about his taste for tea, how growing up he hadn't known there was anything beyond Lipton, and the journey he'd gone on discovering so many other tastes while at MIT. The way his whole world had expanded in so many ways in those years with Nathan and Arthur. Harold suppresses it because he assumes being so forthcoming out of nowhere might alarm John.
But... one day, maybe sooner than later, he'll tell him.
Harold grasps for a way to start this conversation and comes up inadequate. He doesn't know what thread to start pulling from that doesn't make presumptions about John. Finally, he admits in a tone of confession, "I didn't have a plan or an intention for tonight. I only wanted to see you. We can discuss whatever you'd like, or sit around like old men drinking tea, and I'll count it time well spent."
Perhaps it's unfair to lob it back into John's court, but Harold truly feels he needs some sort of signal for which direction to head.
Oh, Harold just-- just wanted to see him. Like how John wanted to see Harold. They-- maybe they do want the same thing. John doesn't know if-- he can feel the anxiety bubbling up again and quickly looks around the kitchen, finding something to focus on. He choses the water heater-- examining the buttons, noting the little details, the shape of it, thinking about how this is part of Harold's life, how Harold drinks enough tea that he has on demand hot water-- until he calms down enough to take a breath that doesn't shake. He's not going to fall apart here. He should do something about this.
"Maybe we should talk about what we want," and he's sure Harold will hear in his voice how much that terrifies him, but John has always needed something concrete. An answer. A direction. Left to his own devices he knows what direction he'll go (the cold water, a run until his lungs feel raw, the bottle) and he doesn't want that right now, doesn't think that Harold would want that either. So they only option that leaves him with is forward.
"Let's start from the basics, shall we?" Harold responds, as if only waiting to be asked. Ground rules, as it were, for stability. "Perhaps it should go without saying after the last few days, but I think we both want to ensure we can continue to work on the irrelevant numbers to our usual level of efficacy."
He's spent this time mulling over various potential options for their relationship in his head, weighing them, forming his own opinions. He finds there's very little he wouldn't give John that he can imagine John wanting from him in the first place, which means his primary task is gently sussing out what that is. If John even knows himself.
"I understand your concerns about this being used against us." A momentary pause as Harold thinks of how to phrase this. "Which means we should be circumspect with this information, but... if you wish to tell anyone, I trust your discretion."
In other words: Harold doesn't feel the need to keep it a secret except for practical reasons. It would be foolish to hand their enemies leverage so easily, but if John wants to tell anyone for personal reasons, Harold doesn't mind at all.
The timer beeps and he turns in place to shut it off and remove the strainer from the tea pot.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Instead he just silently appreciates it, silently listens, offers up occasional commentary to let John know he's there. He's caught quite a few things this way, and today he catches that as John accepts a phone number written on his hand, it crawls into existence on his own hand, invisible pen strokes fluttering across his palm. It takes much longer than it should for Harold to understand the implications, and then his brain stutters and crashes to a halt.
Once their current number has left, Harold quietly instructs John to return to the library, staring down at the digits smeared into his skin, his other thumb mutely running over them, back and forth.
So many things he'd wondered about growing up piece together. The way nothing showed up for him for years, until after high school, after his father died; the way his soulmate had never tried to exchange contact information, never even offered a name, never chanced a word. Their writing marks were always purely incidental, never deliberate. Harold had-- tried a couple times, drunkenly or morosely or desperately, but he'd never gotten a response.
And now he knows why.
He can't keep this from him, much as he'd like to. That would be-- destructive to the trust they've formed. They keep secrets from one another, things about the past, but nothing that could be a real betrayal. Harold has to decide how to handle this with John, though his heart is lurching into his throat and pounding at the same time and he's full of wonder, of dread, of confused hope that a dream he'd given up on long ago may come true. And it makes sense, there's an of course about finding out it's John that's his soulmate, of course, the person Harold respects wholly and deeply, who saves Harold in equal measure as he saves John, who pries him from his traumatic isolation and loneliness, his one-man crusade turned to two--
Of course it's John. Now he's just not sure John will think, of course it's Harold.
That's why he gives him room and time to react when John reaches his desk in the library, ignoring the usual exchange of greetings to merely hold up his hand, palm out, an innocent seven digits scrawled across the skin.
no subject
He is not ready for this.
There had been an incident in high school where two sweethearts discovered they were soulmates and it was the talk of the school. There had been a flurry of writing on skin and an endless amount of drama and breaking up as a result. He'd pretended to be mature and above it all, but late one night had put put a dot right on the crease of his elbow, just to see if anything happened. Of course, nothing had, and that was that.
Surely not now, after all this time.
John's first reaction is to apologize. Harold's soulmate is him not Grace-- somehow he'd just assumed it was them. It wasn't rare for people to have a relationship that wasn't their soulmate, but he'd just-- he really had assumed they were. And now Harold is stuck with him. It hardly seems fair. Harold is so generous with John, has time and time again given him second chances, given him a chance at redemption, but-- when he wakes up in the dark of night sweating and shaking from a nightmare, he knows who he is. What he's done. Harold doesn't deserve that, he deserves someone like Grace, whose hands create things.
There is, of course, a part of him that rattles the bars of the prison he's locked it in, that's crying out in victory. The part of him that, when he wakes up from those nightmares, wishes that Harold was there to pet his cheek and tell him it's just a dream. It's an indulgent desire that cuts as much as it soothes; Harold will never do this for him. Only now there is-- there's just the slightest chance that he will get what he wants. It's a dangerous thought to explore so John locks it away again, quickly. He knows what he wants but he will never, ever ask Harold for it. It's simply not something that happens for people like him. John knows better than that.
Instead John settles on a smile that feels painful, that he knows Harold will see through. Harold does know him well enough for that, but John quite frankly doesn't know what he feels in this moment (terrified, a small part of his mind supplies).
"Well, now we have a backup method of communication if we can't talk for some reason. We should come up with a system." John stares down at his hand. His face hurts despite the fact that his mouth has barely moved. "I'll go wash my hand."
He walks past Harold without so much as a second glance, to the sink in the kitchenette, turns the water on cold, and starts scrubbing.
no subject
Now he realizes the door has been open all along, his soul left it that way, a focused tunnel just to John like an encrypted channel, and he's-- they-- have only been ignoring it.
Harold lets him go at first, have some space, but he follows. He knows he's not going to sneak up on John with his unsteady gait and the creaky floors, and he doesn't try, just lets himself into their awkward crash space and makes his way to John at the sink without apology. He goes to stop his hands with his own and feels how cold the water is, mouth tightening.
He will not be made an excuse for John to punish himself. Not now, not ever, not even in the most mild symbolic manner with cold water. Harold won't pressure John to do anything but he won't let him walk away with that rictus of a smile, either.
He turns the hot tap on midway before reaching in again.
"It doesn't need to be a backup method." They're standing beside one another hunched over the same small sink, avoiding each other's eyes in the mirror, close enough that a long line of Harold's bad leg is pressed against John and the water splatter is getting his cuffs wet and he doesn't care. "You can contact me at any time, using any method, John."
The use of first name is deliberate; his voice quiet but steady, the even tonal pace of Harold's typing an echo behind it, dependable; and his fingers lace through John's in the sink, tangled, keeping them still.
"I will always answer."
no subject
He notices the slight discoloration around the drain in the sink, it's time to clean it again even though it feels like he did so just recently. He tries thinking back through the days, and-- yes, he did it five days ago when they were between numbers. The cleaner is in the cabinet, he'll put it on his list of things to do. He'd-- part of him wants to just do it now, but that would be-- too much. That would be too much. Harold is trying to face this and John is trying not to, but. That would be cruel to Harold and John wants to cradle Harold's hands so gently in his own that it's physically painful.
His eyes keep searching.
His own sleeves had been pulled up slightly so they don't get wet, but Harold's hadn't, so they're starting do darken at the edges from the splash of the water. Somehow that seems unacceptable -- Harold would hate having his sleeves wet, surely -- which gives John a course of action. He carefully untangles one of his hands and turns both taps off before reaching for the towel. John has a momentary vision of freeing his other hand, of carefully drying Harold's hands, all the little folds and crevices-- and his other hand lets go, moves to join its pair-- but at the last second he catches himself and simply presses the towel into Harold's hand, letting his own dripping hands linger for just the briefest moment before withdrawing them.
John doesn't look at the smudged remains of the ink on his skin as he grips the edge of the sink for support. He doesn't really lean on it, the weight its supporting isn't physical. He lets his fingers feel the smooth porcelain and tries to understand how this feels, but comes up wanting. It's incomprehensible apart from the knowledge that something in him is breaking under Harold's touch, under his words. He doesn't know what, or how to put it back together, or if he even wants to be whole again, or if maybe this is like setting a broken bone. He doesn't know.
"We should keep pens on us from now on, in case I lose my phone, or if there's interference." Both of those things have happened before, it's not an unreasonable suggestion. He can suddenly hear Kara's laughter ringing in his ears, mocking him. He feels ill. "But it's not safe, I'm in too many situations where it could be abused. You have to promise--" He'd done that before. They had intel that their mark had a soulmate and used the partner as bait-- he thinks of Harold alone in the library, calling his name over their private line-- he had felt like part of him died after that mission and he feels that again, tenfold, imagining Harold.
Harold doesn't know what he's getting with this deal. John does.
"You can't put yourself in danger because of this. Nothing can change in the way we operate."
no subject
"Oh, John. Is that what your concern is? All the danger I'm in is because I put myself there, before you were ever part of the equation."
His steady tone has crumpled into a softer empathy, holding but momentarily ignoring the towel. It can't be John's only concern, he's sure, but maybe just the one easiest to speak aloud. It's also the easiest for Harold to dismiss. He's been the engineer of his own circumstances, and going naively, half-blindly into it is no excuse, doesn't erase any culpability, doesn't bring Nathan back to life, doesn't let him see Grace again or have a real home.
"If you're worried about someone using you to get to me, well--" Harold smiles, wry, self-aware, lined with a sharpened edge that says he knows what it means to have a person as a weakness. "I'm afraid we passed that point long ago," he says gently. "And I'm not willing to live without you, unless you wished it. I think I've excised as much from my life as I can."
There's a painful bitterness to that statement. But Harold is brave, fearless in certain ways, always been willing to break down walls and defenses and limitations through the slightest possibility, a tiny patient worrying at the crack until he can slide through.
He dries his hands perfunctorily, and then holds them out, open, with the towel, in silent offer to dry John's, too.
no subject
Harold's hands are open, waiting for his, offering something that John wants with all his painful, beating heart. If he gives himself over to Harold like this it will be a confession, it will be like prying open his chest and letting Harold see the want in him. He wants Harold to care for him, desperately, has wanted it for so long, has come up with so many justifications for all of Harold's actions, all his little smiles. All these treasures that John takes and hoards away for his moments of weakness where his only recourse is to pull these moments out and pretend that Harold sees him the way that John sees Harold. That maybe they're a binary star, locked together, not just John spinning eternally around the sun that is Harold.
John has a feeling there's a wretched look on his face, that he looks like his world has just ended, because it has. There's something new in its ashes, something he can barely look at, this thing Harold is offering him. His outstretched hands. Just waiting for John. And John. Doesn't know if he can take that step. Doesn't know if he can reach his hands out. He tightens his grip on the edge of the sink and looks at his knuckles, the way his fingers strain, as if somehow his life depends on holding on. In a way, he thinks hysterically, it does. If he puts himself in Harold's hands-- literally, figuratively-- then he's a changed man. There's no going back from this. But what choice does he have? Could he-- reject Harold? Could he even survive such a thing? The answer is immediate: no. He couldn't bear to do that to Harold. To his soulmate-- John feels sick again. "I'm not willing to live without you."
Slowly, in increments, John releases his grip on the sink. He has to will every muscle, every tendon, to unclench, to let go. He can feel his jaw clenching around all the things he cannot say, all the promises of devotion and apologies that of all people it's him. Wordlessly, he places his hands in Harold's.
no subject
It makes his heart hurt as he dries John's hands and then discards the towel with uncharacteristic carelessness. It's done quickly, so Harold can take his hands with his own again -- is it a trick if they both know it's a trick? -- and tows him toward the sparse cot they keep in the corner for when one of them has to or wants to sleep in the most secure location they know.
"Sit with me, please," he says softly. "I've had, oh, a whole hour more than you to think about this." A ghost-whisper light touch of humor. "There's no rush, no rush at all."
There really isn't, is there? Harold feels almost dizzy with the sensation. He might get this, might get to have a soulmate, and if he is then they're going to decide it on their own terms. Soulmates aren't the epitome of human existence, he hadn't felt like he was missing something when he was with Grace, but he's always wondered. Harold is fascinated by puzzles and this has been the most personal one, lurking around the edges of his entire life. He's maybe grieved whoever his soulmate is a little, for lost chances.
All those chances were just waiting for the exact right moment, apparently. Harold doesn't believe in fate (not even with a soulmate) but he can see the perfect rightness in them not finding each other until now, when they're terribly alone and need each other most and already wholly trust one another with a delicate, stunning fragility, like a smooth unbroken pane of glass both of them protect jealously. Would Harold Wren of two decades ago have been able to accept John Reese, Army Ranger? Probably. He's sure he would have tried, and gotten there. But not with the grace he can now.
Not with the soft glow of unreserved joy shading his mind as he tugs John down to sit with him, keeping hold of his hands and staring at where they join. Trying to keep from staring at John's face so he can feel some modicum of privacy in his reactions, while Harold's emotions bloom into a fuller, quiet happiness shaded with piercing concern.
no subject
Harold is-- happy. Harold is happy about this. John can tell, can feel-- can Harold feel how he feels? John doesn't even know himself, can't tell anything past the pain that grips his heart. There is, deep down, under all the layers of agony, a shred of hope. Of desire. John has to look away from it lest he be undone.
His soulmate.
He doesn't deserve something like this. It's enough that Harold has given him a chance to atone for everything he's done, but this? It doesn't happen to people like him. Kara really would laugh at him in that sharp, mocking tone, would tell him-- has told him, that he doesn't get to come back to something like this. There's no happy ending for him. The best he can get is to be useful, to try to do some good with whatever time he has left.
His jaw hurts from clenching it around all these things he cannot-- does not want to say. But Harold deserves something. Deserves honesty. John opens his mouth and nothing comes out for a moment but finally he pushes some words out, quiet, raw, broken. "You can't-- not. Me."
no subject
He's aware John has a dismal view of himself, but he's not expecting it to extend this far. Harold feels just a touch of the way John's hollowed out feeling starts to echo with acute pain, like hunger gone too far, stomach gnawing at itself in a sensation completely distinct from the normal experience of hunger. And maybe also like that, eating too quickly could make him sick. Harold already intended to take this slow but now he's worried he's somehow already gone too fast, just telling him the truth, following him, taking his hands.
Making him confront it at all could've been too much. Only... he's not sure he could bear making this, as he'd said, one more thing he's excised from his life. Harold has removed everything he possibly can with merciless, surgical precision. And even denying this is happening wrenches something in him that is so, so sick of deprivation. Perhaps he has his own too-harsh hunger.
But he will deny it, if that's what John asks.
Harold swallows tightly. "When I realized earlier, I thought... of course. I thought-- it was only surprising I had needed this direct proof." His voice cracks a little, a rare glimpse of vulnerability. Of Harold not always being composed and in control, not always having a plan.
He finds enough strength to finish, starting to pull his hands away. "If you don't want me as your soulmate, I won't press it on you."
no subject
There's a distinct difference between not deserving this and not wanting this. And Harold is being so brave for him, Harold who hates to give anything away, Harold who wears his suits like a shield sometimes. Who is willing to give this up if John-- John does want this, he just doesn't know how to accept that this is something he can have. He realizes that he's going to have to use his words even if it's physically painful to speak them.
"I do." It comes out wretched, quiet. A confession. "But I don't know. What to do. People like me don't get to have this. It should have-- you deserve better than me."
Even as he says it he knows Harold will disagree, will protest, will say something kind and gentle and he's already bracing for it, locking himself in place because it will hurt. He knows that there's a contradiction here in the way that he's holding Harold's hands and the way he's already rejecting Harold's kindness.
no subject
"It's fortunate for all of us that we don't need to get what we deserve," he says with an insistent frankness, passionate that that is the case. Harold advocates mercy for killers, second chances, programmed the Machine to prevent loss of life wherever possible no matter whose life it is, no single one weighing more than another. And he himself is sometimes in his darker moments convinced he deserves to be dead.
But these are not sentiments to make decisions on. He remembers Alicia Corwin terrified in a car, and a phone ringing.
"Truthfully, John, I could not have less interest in what we should have. I am interested in what we can."
It's a familiar concept, or it should be: the people they can save now, versus the ones they couldn't. The often futile struggle to make a difference in a world that has never actually been keeping score. The strange asymmetry between the gratification of saving the person in front of you compared to the faces you see in the dark on the ceiling at night, how they never equal out. Because you can't weigh lives, Harold would insist.
You can't come up with a scale that will ever balance out.
no subject
And yet, Harold wants him. Despite everything, Harold wants him. John doesn't know what he has to offer. What does this vision of the future look like for Harold? He always has some plan, is thinking something, is giving John guidance; and John takes it, trusts him, follows him. In this moment John can't even envision anything past, well, this moment. Past holding Harold's hands. He wants to cradle them to his chest like something precious, or maybe run his fingers over the smooth skin, the fingertips, the softness of his palm.
His heart had shuddered to a stop during all of this and now it picks up again, beating too fast, painful. John wonders if Harold can feel that in his delicate grasp. He hurts and something in him is still so broken and jagged and painful but it also means there's a crack in him and there's something he thinks might be hope dripping through that crack, a puddle barely forming, not enough to drink at yet.
"What can we have." He means it as a question but he can't get enough inflection out to make it sound that way. "Tell me," he begs.
no subject
He's not sure it matters. He doesn't take being soulmates to mean they're perfect for one another; no one's flawless, no one's beyond reproach. He just takes it to mean that it's worth the leap.
Harold's fingers tighten again on John's, unreservedly, head lifting and eyes meeting his without an ounce of shame. He's too cautious to answer directly, to dictate where they go from here with careless words. He won't let John walk away with a caricature of a smile on his face and he won't let him walk a step behind him into this future, either.
"I'd like us to find out together." Merciless, uncompromising. "You and me, and no one else." No ghosts. No regrets. Harold breathes out. "There is so much I want to give you, if you'll have it."
He feels like he's boiling over with what he wants to give, a multitude and universe of affection squashed down into collapsed atoms like a beautiful custom sports jacket crumpled into a ball to travel discreetly in a carry-on bag. Harold has been carrying it everywhere, hiding it as best he can, letting a precious garment get wrinkled.
For John, he wants to shake it out, try it on again. An old part of himself he's been frittering away like a secret for years, allowing out in tiny pieces, small corners, with enough couching that he can pretend it's something else. What if he's done pretending? What if he reclaims this?
no subject
But Harold says together and looks at him, and John feels compelled to tear his eyes away from where their hands are joined and look back. He knows that his agony must still show on his face but Harold isn't letting him run away from this and he-- he doesn't want to. John is hurt and scared and doesn't know what to do, but he won't run away from Harold.
He can feel something building in Harold like water swelling behind a dam and it scares him a bit, what Harold wants. John doesn't know how to take, how to receive, he only knows how to make himself be small, slip through the cracks, let it run off of him. But he's going to try, for Harold, for his soulmate. But, truthfully, he would do this even if they weren't soulmates; being so is just the catalyst for arriving at this juncture.
"Yes," he rasps out. "Whatever you want. I'm--" is he going to say this? Now? Can he say this? Is it allowed? He owes Harold-- honesty. He owes him honesty. "--yours."
no subject
He must have one thing that is his, truly his. He'd tried not to, tried to make himself survive on starvation rations, told himself that he should've died in the ferry bombing anyway. What does it matter if he's a ghost moving through the city, disconnected and unattached? It's just a matter of time until his strange afterlife existence runs out. No need to complicate things.
But now here is John. Saying he's his. A smile breaks over Harold helplessly, automatically, his relieved pleasure at getting through to John cresting into another wave of unreserved joy.
"And I'm yours as well," he responds without hesitation. He wants to kiss his hands to punctuate it, but Harold restrains the impulse. Too much too fast again, he assumes, so his grip only tightens, a pulse of reassurance. "We needn't decide anything definite right away. I'd rather wait until we've both had a chance to adjust. But yes, I very much want to."
Mostly he means he wants to wait until John is less shocked, hopefully less desperately accommodating to his wishes, because Harold doesn't foresee his position or feelings changing at all. But he suspects John will find that more palatable if he makes it a we.
no subject
It feels like too much. He's not used to so many emotions. He's not used to hope and joy, even if that joy is Harold's. He wants to hide from them, to run away for just a moment. John brings their joined hands up to cover his face, turning them so Harold's hands are pressed into his forehead, his cheeks, as though Harold can protect him from this. Of course, it doesn't actually work, he still feels too much, but it does have the benefit of bringing Harold closer. Maybe one day Harold will do this for him, will place his hands on John's face, comfort him. John wants it desperately, has wanted Harold's touch for so long.
He wants Harold to hold him, to tell him that this will be okay, that this is good. But he also knows it would destroy him.
John takes a deep, shuddering breath. "Yes. Okay." He realizes that he's agreeing to wait while he still has Harold's hands pressed into his face. He takes one more moment to memorize the feeling of soft skin on his brow and cheeks, and then returns their hands to his lap, but cannot imagine letting go.
no subject
He hasn't yet found the limits of what John would do for him.
So he coaxes him carefully and kindly back to earth, takes his time seeing John out the door, ensures he actually goes home and rests and perhaps even eats something. He does not monitor him remotely. Privacy is a gift whose sense of timing matters and Harold feels, somehow, that if this is ever to work, he has to give John space and time to adjust.
Maybe he needs it, too. They have a number the next day and Harold has to drag his mind back to focusing. Fortunately, he's good at compartmentalizing, so he manages fine. He's completely professional, despite John's fears that this might affect their work, that he might become more solicitous or fearful of his safety. Harold is exactly as concerned as he's always been (perhaps that's telling, honestly) and in between moments of action, when he's sitting at the library table surrounded by monitors and his hands are still on the keys, Bear snuffling a toy into his bed, it seems surreal. He's adrift, shocked himself. He's in his fifties and he's now finding his soulmate.
Harold keeps it together until they can assure the number is safe and the perpetrator is taken care of, and then he breaks his professional façade. It's been days of wondering if what had happened really happened, days of just the faintest edge of emotion coming from John, difficult to distinguish, and uncharacteristically he feels like he needs new proof.
He takes out a brush-tipped pen specially produced for skin-writing between soulmates -- something he'd procured just the day before -- and carefully inks a message onto his left forearm in elegant script, across the wrist, over the major artery.
418 W 160th St 8 PM
If you wish
An invitation to an out of the way uptown townhouse, nice enough to meet Harold's standards but unremarkable in its sameness to those beside it. Communicated over skin so John knows precisely what the premise is.
And with a few hours to spare, so Harold has time to arrange things.
no subject
Eventually he gets dressed for bed and lays there in the dark until an uneasy sleep claims him.
The next morning dawns with a number, and he's never been so thankful to have this job. He has no clue what to say to Harold about how his life is fundamentally different, how their relationship is irrevocably altered, but it's easy to fall back on this habit. It's easy to let his mind blank out on a stakeout, to focus on tailing their number, to focus on his hand colliding with a jaw, to focus on the solidity of his gun in his hand. He's so practiced at averting his gaze from what he feels.
But inevitably their number wraps up and John's distractions are gone with it. He can feel something vibrating inside him, rattling and wanting to break loose, but still he won't look at it. At least not until he notices the writing across his wrist in Harold's unmistakable handwriting. He stares at it and realizes what he feels is desire. The thing in his chest that shudders with every breath is want. Just to be with Harold, to have a chance at something. The terror from that first day is back in equal measure, but he feels more in control of it. With hands that shake, John pulls out the ballpoint pen from his pocket, pulls the cap off, and circles the time in acknowledgement.
This gives him enough time to shower, which he always needs after a number. Once out he's about to do his hair and hesitates before putting the product back away. He passes by his suits and puts on a t-shirt and jeans. He's not Mr. Reese right now, he's just. John. He doesn't think he's purposefully shown this part of himself to Harold before; the last time he dressed casually like this in front of Harold was that fateful first day when Harold kidnapped him and tied him to a bed. John grabs his leather jacket as he walks out the door in comfortable pair of boots.
This is how he is when he knocks on the door exactly at 8PM, heart in this throat, nervous and hopeful beyond measure.
no subject
He frets, distracted. Of course John uses whatever ballpoint he has lying around to confirm the time. Harold will really have to get him something better. If this continues. If John wants to write to him again. If...
Oh thank God, it's eight o'clock and John is punctual. He lurches to the door to open it. Although this is one of several residences, and Harold doesn't keep a longer-term home for more than half a year or so, John may be able to tell that this is a place Harold sleeps more often than at others: there's neat stacks of books, covert server racks, cleaned tea cups drying face down beside the sink. Harold invited him here intentionally as a gesture, and he's lowered the lights to decidedly ambient and tried to eat and failed due to nerves.
It should feel ridiculous, but it doesn't. It feels... like he's been waiting a very long time.
He breaks into another helpless smile when he opens the door and sees John. Being allowed to care is the single most precious gift he could be given with this discovery. Then he registers how differently he's dressed, and he flushes faintly, stepping back to let him in. All of the words he had planned dry up in his mouth.
"Oh. You've... well. I'm so very glad to see you. Thank you for coming."
It's awful and awkward and Harold means it completely.
no subject
"Thanks for inviting me." He wonders if Harold will be able to hear that he really means "there's no place I'd rather be." Suddenly he wishes he'd thought to bring something with him, John doesn't actually have a clue what to say now. What does one say to one's very private reclusive billionaire boss who ends up being one's soulmate? Especially when they invite you to their very secret home? Or whatever approximates as a home for Harold.
He could bring up their number, but that seems too impersonal for this moment. John is realizing, again, that he knows very little about Harold outside of the numbers. There's no easy thread of conversation to resume. If he's being honest, what he wants-- he wants to hold Harold's hand. He wants Harold to hold his hand and show him all the little things around the place he lives, all the things that make this Harold's home-- the fact that Harold has trusted him with this washes over him. He wants to hold Harold's hand in Harold's home and he thinks he might have a chance at that. It feels dizzying to think about. The fact that he might get what he wants.
Not what he deserves but what he wants.
John takes another look around from where he's standing but there's so much more to see-- what's his kitchen like? Does Harold cook? Does he leave books lying around on random surfaces? John is sure he won't find pictures, but there's personal touches everywhere in a place someone lives. But he knows how difficult it must have been for "very private person" Harold Finch to invite him over in the first place, so John doesn't push it. He wants to see but he wants to respect Harold's privacy more, wants Harold to choose to give him this.
And yet despite all of this, John still doesn't know what to say. He opens his mouth and lets something fall out to fill the silence he's created. "How was your evening?"
It's so awkward but this is uncharted territory and means so much to him. He doesn't want to push Harold-- doesn't want to push himself. Already his heart rate is rising but he owes it to Harold to hold it together better than he did the first day.
no subject
He closes the door behind John and activates a characteristically sophisticated security system before he turns back to respond to the question.
"Truthfully, I sat around fretting," he says dryly, "so I'm relieved you're here. Feel free to snoop; I expected as much."
He's not asking for self-restraint, is what he means, though it's frightening for him as well in certain measure, to let down his defenses and let John in. To deliberately reveal these aspects of himself that he's become so accustomed to keeping under wraps. But it's a reflexive discomfort, like removing a cast and being unfamiliar with the limb that's underneath. Harold has to get to know himself again with this in a sense. He remembers who he was with Grace and a few before her, but who is he now? Who has he become?
Harold guides them away from the entrance and toward a rather understated sitting area, furniture chosen for simple comfort rather than style. A familiar laptop is left open on the coffee table, surrounded by orderly paper notes and a variety of pens, including the brush-tipped one he'd used on his arm; a knitted throw blanket is tossed over the loveseat; and there is a surprising quantity of dog toys that Harold has collected onto a very luxe dog bed tucked in the corner.
"Tea? Whiskey?"
no subject
"Tea, please. I'll look around later." Certainly he wouldn't get drunk off one drink, but it feels symbolic. As if he's saying that he's committing to being fully present for whatever is about to happen. There's no denying that he can drink casually, but there's always the knowledge in the back of his mind that he doesn't always do so. Has not always done so. A score both he and Harold know.
When Harold goes to the kitchen John follows, trying not to look around too much and only partially succeeding. What he can see without opening drawers and cabinets suggests that Harold isn't much of a cook, or at least doesn't do it very much. He does spy some traditional tea-ware that he's guessing gets a lot of use.
Once again John realizes that he should say something, but he's filled with a certain... joy, at seeing Harold move around Harold's kitchen in Harold's house. It balloons in his chest, somewhat abating the anxiety from moments ago. It's a gift he thought he'd never get. He realizes that he could walk out right now and go to sleep wrapped in this warmth and be satisfied. But some part of him is greedy and is saying more, more so he just watches Harold and hopes he understands how much he's given John already.
no subject
Mindful of John's taste for coffee and not wanting to fuss with proper technique too much under the circumstances, Harold selects a houjicha, a green tea that's roasted to impart a lovely depth of flavor and holds up well under lackadaisical brewing technique should he get distracted. He uses his standard tea pot and hot water from a water boiling appliance he has on his counter, something ubiquitous in Asia and a convenience he's learned he can't do without.
He sets a timer for it to steep and turns to face John as he waits, leaning his weight against the kitchen counter. Harold feels a bizarre, momentary impulse to start rambling about his taste for tea, how growing up he hadn't known there was anything beyond Lipton, and the journey he'd gone on discovering so many other tastes while at MIT. The way his whole world had expanded in so many ways in those years with Nathan and Arthur. Harold suppresses it because he assumes being so forthcoming out of nowhere might alarm John.
But... one day, maybe sooner than later, he'll tell him.
Harold grasps for a way to start this conversation and comes up inadequate. He doesn't know what thread to start pulling from that doesn't make presumptions about John. Finally, he admits in a tone of confession, "I didn't have a plan or an intention for tonight. I only wanted to see you. We can discuss whatever you'd like, or sit around like old men drinking tea, and I'll count it time well spent."
Perhaps it's unfair to lob it back into John's court, but Harold truly feels he needs some sort of signal for which direction to head.
no subject
"Maybe we should talk about what we want," and he's sure Harold will hear in his voice how much that terrifies him, but John has always needed something concrete. An answer. A direction. Left to his own devices he knows what direction he'll go (the cold water, a run until his lungs feel raw, the bottle) and he doesn't want that right now, doesn't think that Harold would want that either. So they only option that leaves him with is forward.
He thinks Harold will understand.
no subject
He's spent this time mulling over various potential options for their relationship in his head, weighing them, forming his own opinions. He finds there's very little he wouldn't give John that he can imagine John wanting from him in the first place, which means his primary task is gently sussing out what that is. If John even knows himself.
"I understand your concerns about this being used against us." A momentary pause as Harold thinks of how to phrase this. "Which means we should be circumspect with this information, but... if you wish to tell anyone, I trust your discretion."
In other words: Harold doesn't feel the need to keep it a secret except for practical reasons. It would be foolish to hand their enemies leverage so easily, but if John wants to tell anyone for personal reasons, Harold doesn't mind at all.
The timer beeps and he turns in place to shut it off and remove the strainer from the tea pot.
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)