Moments

Reclamation

Summary: Revisiting an important moment can lead to an even bigger one.

***

Even is in the kitchen at the flat share, cleaning up after Hurricane Eskild's attempt to make Bolognese sauce. The dinner was relatively edible, but the kitchen is now a war zone. This process would go a whole lot faster if Even could hose down the entire room. Or if he had another set of hands helping him.

As if on cue, Isak enters. He's swapped out his tomato-stained Simpsons t-shirt for a black one that immediately sets Even's blood to simmering. He knows that tee.

I'M

ILLUMI

NATI

Oblivious to the wave of lust and nostalgia that is threatening to drown Even, Isak grabs a cloth and begins to wipe down the counter. He's standing exactly where he stood that night, the night that could have started everything between them. The night that should have been the beginning of them, but instead was The Almost.

The Almost had haunted Even for a full week.

What if he had moved just a little quicker, brushed his lips over Isak's a second or two before Noora's unexpected arrival? What if he'd stopped him from leaving the kitchen and claimed what they both so clearly wanted? What then? Would they be where they are now?

Even thinks about Isak's fascination with parallel universes and wonders if, somewhere out there, there's another Even and another Isak who did kiss that night. Who started from there and took a different path to being together. A universe where he'd had the courage to tell Isak the truth from the start, sparing them at least some of the heartache and pain.

He still doesn't like it, the idea that there are other streams of time, perhaps even somewhere he and Isak aren't together at all. Had never kissed. Had never met. Had never...fallen.

Nope, Even doesn't like it at all. But it doesn't stop him from wanting to reclaim The Almost. Fuck, if he doesn't feel like he was robbed of it.

Isak is...not dancing, exactly. He's moving along to the music drifting in from the living room. He's so sweet, and beautifully unaware of it. God...Isak.

Isak, Isak, Isak.

He'd been so fucking gorgeous the night of the neon party, with his pink-streaked cheeks, and his plump lower lip, and his hair - sans hat - revealing a million different shades of captured sunlight.

And he is gorgeous now. He is always.

"What?" Isak's voice grounds Even firmly this universe. "You're staring."

"I was thinking about Sonja." Even sets down the half-empty bottle of Turborg in his hand.

Isak's eyebrows lift and then crinkle together. "Oh?"

Even nods as he wipes his hands on a towel. "Yeah, and her aluminum leg."

Isak's blush is immediate and creeps over his cheeks, the shade almost an exact duplicate of the stripes that painted them that night.

"I didn't know she had one."

"Yep." Even inches closer, his gaze locked in Isak's. "She stepped on a land mine in Tjøme. I thought I told you about this."

"N-no." God, his baby is trembling. This is too good.

Even slides along the counter until he's standing over Isak, who can barely meet his eyes now. At first, Even thinks he's just playing along but, no. Isak's breathing is too fast, too ragged.