Chapter Text
“Dinner was great. Thanks for cooking.” It had been a long time since he’d had such a good home cooked meal. He and Stevie made passable dinners, but Patrick legitimate cooking skills.
“My pleasure. I like cooking for you.”
It didn’t hurt as much that time to think about their former life. “You’re good at it and I always enjoy good food.”
“The perfect audience.” Patrick leaned back against the counter as David washed the dishes. They fell easily into their old routine.
“I’ve really missed this.”
David froze, halfway through scrubbing a plate.
“I’ve really missed you, David.”
He dropped the plate in the sink, but barely heard the clatter over the heartbeat thundering in his ears. There were so many things he could say. Wanted to say.
It’s your fault you missed me.
I should have fought for you. For us. Our friendship.
I’m sorry we kissed and ruined everything.
I love you.
You’ve got a lot of fucking nerve to say that.
I want you back in my life.
I’m still so angry at you.
I’m still so angry at myself.
“Me too.” He let a single tear fall down his cheek while he kept his face away from Patrick. He halfheartedly washed the other plate while he waited for Patrick to continue, but silence swelled and filled all the gaps in his studio. Somehow both comfortable and the most awkward silence of his life. At least it was out there now. A verbal confirmation that things had changed and they were both sad about it.
The screenshot Stevie sent filled his mind like a wallpaper to all his other thoughts. The words froze on the tip of his tongue. Why did you go out of your way to Schitt’s Creek?
“How are your parents?”
Easy conversation about Patrick’s parents preparing for retirement and the Rose family drama took them through the rest of the bottle of wine and some hot chocolate.
“Want to watch something?” David noticed that their feet touched on the couch between them. He kept still to not draw attention to it for fear of Patrick shifting away.
“Sure. What’s my short list?”
David shook his head. He’d forgotten what it was like to have someone around who knew him so well. Stevie knew him pretty well, but she never cared to notice the little details like how he took his coffee or his thoughts on rom-coms versus love stories or how he liked to sneak spinach into his pasta sauce for a vegetable boost without the work. He couldn’t sit through anything with romance without sobbing or yelling and obviously no sports. “TV shows. True crime, reality baking or Queer Eye.”
“Easy. Queer Eye.”
David arched an eyebrow.
“What? It’s a good show.” Patrick stared at him for a long moment as a blush crept up his neck.
“You’ve watched it?”
“Yup.” Patrick reached over to the coffee table and picked up the Roku remote.
David supposed that shouldn’t be very surprising. It was an extremely popular show and didn’t have to mean anything. Once again he was looking for clues that weren’t there.
The lights flickered during the second episode. Not a good sign. “Last time the lights flickered like that during a storm, I lost power. I’m going to collect a few things.” He pulled his spare candles out, found his lighters, a headlamp Stevie had bought him as a birthday joke when she’d tricked him into think she was taking him camping (traumatizing), his extra blankets, and his warmest house sweaters. He plugged his cell phone in to charge and saw Patrick do the same. He knocked the heater a few degrees higher as a preemptive strike.
The power lasted through another episode.
“Well.”
“Guess you called it.”
David stood from the couch to grab a couple of blankets and check the time on his phone. Only a little after eight. He took the blankets back to the couch and passed two to Patrick. “It gets cold quickly when the heater goes off.”
“What about the fireplace?”
“My landlord keeps promising to fix it.” He lit a couple of candles on the coffee table, another on a shelf near the bathroom, one in the bathroom, and another on a nightstand next to his bed. It went from creepy to romantic and intimate. Ugh.
He settled back on the couch and tucked the blankets under his feet and around his shoulders.
“This reminds me of the time we lost power during that big storm. Remember that?”
David snorted. “I remember you had flashlights but no batteries.”
“And you had all those candles and warm blankets.”
A small smile tugged at David’s mouth. That had been a fun night. Crowded together under a pile of blankets as they drank whiskey. Eventually too drunk to realize how cold they were and how closely they sat under the blankets. “I’m a sucker for warm blankets.”
“You’ve saved my bacon with your blankets twice now.”
“I’m a very generous person.”
And just like that, the dam was broken. They swapped stories about college, their time living near each other before Patrick moved away, the good times they had. All carefully avoiding anything leading up to two years ago or the time since.
Despite the creeping cold in his studio, David started to feel warm and relaxed. He started to feel like maybe he and Patrick could become friends again. The kind who actually did stop for coffee together when passing through each other’s towns.
Patrick yawned, and David caught it and reciprocated immediately. “Guess the day is catching up with me.”
“Driving in a blizzard sounds exhausting.”
“It was intense.” He untucked from the blankets. “Going to grab a sweatshirt and get ready for bed.”
“Okay.”
“Mind if I use a couple of these? I can fold one up and use it as a sleep mat.”
Fuck! David had been so focused on being in Patrick’s presence that he hadn’t thought about the sleep part of Patrick staying with him. He looked down at the hardwood floors that would probably chill Patrick to the bone and the tiny touch that would probably give Patrick a permanent back injury.
“I’ve got a queen bed. You can take half of it.”
“I’m fine on the floor.”
“You must have been a shit Boy Scout.” He caught the laughing sparkle in Patrick’s eyes. “Didn’t you learn that sleeping on cold ground can give you hypothermia?”
Patrick laughed. “I think I missed that badge. And the couch?”
“We don’t have a chiropractor in Schitt’s Creek, but if you want to risk your spine health, be my guest.”
“Okay, thank you, David.”
“You’re welcome. We’ll be warmer anyway if all the blankets are over there.” He caught the widening of Patrick’s eyes. “Not that we have to share them or anything. I just mean—“
Patrick squeezed David’s shoulder as he passed. “I’m going to get ready for bed.”
David reached up to put his hand over Patrick’s, but held back just in time. The touch was so casual, like how it used to be. Shoulder squeezes and hands to the back while walking through doors and casual half hugs.
After a few deep breaths, David stood and carried all of the extra blankets to the bed. It would probably be warmer if they shared the same ones, but he wasn’t sure that was wise for either of them. He left them piled at the foot of the bed and carried the headlamp over to his dresser to pull out his warmest sleep clothes.
When Patrick finished in the bathroom, he took his place and made sure to brush his teeth extra thoroughly. Not that he had any plans of sending Patrick running for the hills a second time with a kiss, but if their faces were going to be on the same bed, he damn sure would have minty fresh breath.
Changed into his cozy joggers and warm sweatshirt, he walked into the room and found Patrick sitting on the edge of the bed.
“I wasn’t sure which side you slept on.”
David noticed that he’d unfolded all the blankets and laid them out on the bed. So they were sharing then. Okay. “Uh, that side.” David pointed.
Patrick pulled back the covers on the other side and climbed in. “Toasty.”
When David woke up that morning, he’d expected shit weather, having to take extra care to clean his clothes to prevent snow damage, and some grumpy people coming in to the store. Not even in his wildest dreams would he have ever guessed that he’d be sharing a bed with Patrick Brewer.
He climbed in the bed and kept a respectable distance between he and Patrick.
“Thanks again for putting me up. I’ve- I’ve had a good time tonight.”
“Me too, surprisingly,” David replied. The only two words out of the thousands threatening to tumble out that he could manage.
Patrick laughed. He appreciated Patrick always handling his snark.
As David settled into position on his back, he realized Patrick hadn’t asked about when the garage opened or what time David needed to go to work or anything. Planner Patrick didn’t seem to be in a hurry to make a plan to get to his parent’s house.
“Goodnight, David.”
“Goodnight, Patrick.”
Any hint of exhaustion David felt from the stressful day at work and Patrick’s sudden reappearance in his life fled as soon as it was time to sleep. His mind raced and heart pounded as his anxiety tried to process what it all meant. Why Patrick had come to Schitt’s Creek. Why now. Why he hadn’t reached out at all in the last two years. Why he’d acted happy to be around David all evening like things hadn’t changed, but careful enough to acknowledge they had.
Now that the silence forced him to confront his thoughts more directly than he wanted to, he realized two things.
1. He was still hopelessly in love with Patrick.
2. He wanted Patrick back in his life as a friend.
David was prepared for the unrequited love thing. He’d had a decade of practice and had prepared himself for a lifetime of it because he always thought Patrick and Rachel would end up married. He’d expected to be Patrick’s best man and the godfather to their red-headed kids and get accustomed to the constant, dull ache in his chest of being in love with someone who didn’t love him the same way. That would have been fine.
Loving Patrick in that way had been a gift because David wasn’t sure he’d had the ability to love someone like that. He wasn’t naive enough to expect the first person he loved to love him back. Maybe someday he’d be able to love someone else because of all the practice he got loving Patrick.
But. Still. Why was Patrick in Schitt’s Creek? In David’s bed? The question nagged at him. Burrowed into the deepest crevices in his psyche. Wormed its way into his heart. He had no idea how much time had passed as he tried to wind down and fall asleep. Surely enough for Patrick to be snoring by now, but he could practically hear Patrick’s blinking.
“Patrick, are you awake?” David whispered.
“Yes,” Patrick whispered back. They didn’t need to whisper, but David felt like any overly loud noises would burst the bubble around his bed.
“Schitt’s Creek is out of the way to your parents house.”
Silence stretched for a long moment. “It is.” Patrick’s voice was a little firmer that time.
David gathered every scrap of strength and dignity and self-respect and self-love he could find. “Why are you here?” He stared at the ceiling. Seconds ticked by, but he didn’t dare look at Patrick.
“Because.” Patrick sounded breathy. “Because I missed you and I hate not having you in my life.”
David wrapped his hands tight around his stomach. “Were you even on your way to see your parents?”
“No.”
No.
“So you came here to-to see me?”
“I did.” Patrick’s voice was firm, confident. “I woke up this morning and Instagram showed me the photo from that weekend and I fell apart. I couldn’t go another day, another year, without talking to you.”
David’s heart fucking pounded. “And you decided to drive out to the middle of nowhere during winter and on a day there’s a blizzard instead of, oh, I don’t know, calling or texting or sending me a DM?”
He felt Patrick’s eyes on him. “For all I knew, you blocked my number. And if I came in person, it would be a lot harder to ignore me.”
David’s mind tried to keep up and continue processing. “I’m going to keep asking questions.”
“I know. I want you to. Ask anything you want.”
He kept his attention on the ceiling. “You decided the best way to get me back into your life is to show up unannounced and corner me into putting you up for the night.”
Patrick huffed out a laugh. “When you put it like that, it sounds creepy.”
“Does it.”
“I was going for a gesture? And I also wasn’t really thinking clearly? I guess I worked on autopilot to get here.”
“A gesture of spending an evening hanging out with me but not actually bringing up why you’re here and making me do all the work.” It felt good to be honest and push Patrick. Really fucking good.
Patrick rolled to his side, but David stayed on his back. He wasn’t ready to face Patrick. “I guess I hoped the storm would continue tomorrow and you’d have to deal with me for another day. Or that I’d wake up with the nerve to bring it up.”
David was annoyed, but he also had to recognize that Patrick had made a pretty huge effort coming all the way to Schitt’s Creek. If he really wanted Patrick back in his life, he needed to make an effort too. He could have fought for Patrick. Forced them to have a conversation about the kiss back then, but he’d been just as scared. He needed to stop lying to himself and blaming it all on Patrick. Though, to be fair, Patrick had been an asshole.
He turned on his side. “What do you want?”
David’s eyes had adjusted to the dark and he watched Patrick study him. “You.”
“I don’t know how to go back to how things were. I’m a different person now, and I was really hurt.” His eyes stung. “Really fucking hurt. It felt like a decade of our friendship meant nothing to you.”
Patrick reached out and found David’s hand. David didn’t pull away, but did have to fight back tears. “I am so sorry I hurt you. I know I reacted poorly.”
“Understatement of the goddamn decade.”
Patrick chuckled awkwardly. “Fair. And I’ve regretted that every day since. I don’t want to go back to how things were though, I want to start fresh with you. I want us to build something together.”
David had ached to hear those words for twelve years, but he knew Patrick didn’t mean them in the way he wanted to hear them. David heard build a relationship, but he knew Patrick meant build a friendship. That was okay though, he wanted to be friends with Patrick again. His life was richer with Patrick in it.
“I’m scared,” David whispered. “I’m scared you’ll pull away again. I can’t lose you like that again.”
Patrick’s hand cupped David’s face, and his thumb gently swept back and forth across the apple of his cheek. “I promise you won’t lose me.”
David closed his eyes and leaned into the touch. “But how do I know?”
Patrick’s hand slid to cup the back of David’s head like it did that night when they kissed. “Because I love you, David. I love you so much,” Patrick’s voice broke. “I have for a long time.”
David pulled back and scrambled to sit up on the bed. “You what?”
Patrick dragged himself to a sitting position next to him. “I love you.” He looked David right in the eyes as he said it with a steady voice.
“I’m going to need you to tell me a little bit more than that before I spiral.”
Patrick reached out and grabbed his hand like he had dozens of times before when helping David through an anxiety spiral or panic attack. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“Fucking anywhere. Start talking, please.” He tugged his sleep shirt away from his neck and tried to swallow through the thickness forming in his throat.
“I’m gay.”
David’s brain short-circuited. “That’s one hell of a place to start.” He wanted to hug Patrick and celebrate his deeper understanding of his identity while also scream for all the tears David had shed thinking he loved his straight best friend.
“I didn’t figure it out until, um, about two years ago.”
David turned to look at him. “What are you saying?”
Patrick bent his knees and tucked them to his chest. “I’ve imagined having this conversation with you so many times and in so many ways. It’s a lot harder to actually say the words.”
“You’ve always been able to talk to me.”
Patrick scoffed. “Yeah, until it really mattered, and I didn’t. I thought I’d lost you forever.” His voice cracked at the end, and David couldn’t stop the tears from falling. “When we kissed, everything changed for me. It was like a key slid into a lock and some sort of box opened and revealed a part of myself I didn’t know was there or didn’t think to look for. But now I know it was always there, but I didn’t recognize it.”
David hauled his own knees to his chest and hugged them as he listened. As he dared to hope.
“I thought our friendship was what normal best friends were like. That it was normal for best friends to find the other one attractive when they’re objectively gorgeous like you. Or that it was normal for people to want to spend more time with their best friend than their girlfriend. Or that they would rather spend a Saturday night watching movies with their best friend than go on dates. Or they almost turned down their dream job and broke up with their girlfriend because the thought of moving away from their best friend led to multiple panic attacks.”
“Y-you had panic attacks?”
“I did. It should have been a big fucking clue.”
David had thought many of the same things, but at least he’d been able to spot it for what it really meant. He had no idea Patrick had felt the same all those years.
Patrick let out a long breath. “I thought about you all the time and sometimes had dreams about us. Together. I brushed it off as it being a side effect of how much time we spent together or me being frustrated with Rachel. But I know that wasn’t it. When we kissed?” Patrick turned to look at David. “When we kissed, I knew. I knew that it was because you weren’t just my best friend but that I liked you in other ways. Bigger ways.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me? You spent the rest of the trip avoiding me and could barely look at me. And the wedding? You were such an asshole. You could have said something. Anything.” The tears fell fast.
“I was terrified. I spent my whole life assuming I was straight, then in one moment, that entire identity shattered. I-I lashed out. I didn’t know how to handle it, and you took the brunt of it. I’m so sorry, David. I’m so sorry for how I hurt you.” Patrick barely choked the words out between his sobs. “I would completely understand if you never wanted to talk to me again because I didn’t treat you with the respect you deserved or honor our friendship.”
David wrapped an arm around Patrick’s shoulder and pulled him in. He slid his fingers into Patrick’s hair and massaged his scalp as Patrick’s crying ebbed. Scalp massages always calmed him down, and he hoped it worked the same for Patrick. He was struck with an overwhelming urge to learn all the ways to comfort Patrick he hadn’t been able to explore as friends. “That’s a big realization, and it helps me understand your drastic reaction.” Going three decades without knowing that about himself then being smacked in the face with it? Of course Patrick lashed out like that. Patrick had never been strong on the communication front. It all made so much sense. It seriously fucking sucked, but at least David could view everything that happened with a new lens.
David swallowed the lump in his throat. “I’m sorry too. I should have tried harder. I could have reached out a thousand times, but I was scared. I should have fought for you. You deserved that. We deserved that. It was easier to be angry with you than accept some responsibility.”
Patrick draped his arm across David’s lap and gripped his knee. “We both fucked up, but I fucked up more.”
“Is this a competition?”
“Isn’t it always?”
David leaned his head against Patrick’s. “I’ll let you win this one. You fucked up more.”
Patrick squeezed his knee. “It took me a while to come to terms with my sexuality. I’m sure there are stages to it that lots of people go through. I was in denial for a while, definitely anger. I was so fucking angry, David. I’m glad we weren’t talking then. It wasn’t a good time for me.”
“Don’t forget avoidance.”
“Rachel?”
“Yeah.”
“Last chance grab at heterosexuality, I guess. No, that’s not true. That’s not fair to her. For a while, I thought I was bi. Intellectually, that made a lot of sense to me. How could I be gay if I’d spent most of my adult life in a happy enough relationship with a woman?”
“There are different kinds of happy. You two seemed to have a strong companionship, but I think there is more to a relationship if people want there to be romantic and sexual components.”
Patrick nestled his head further into the crook of David’s shoulder. “I eventually figured that out with the help of a therapist.”
“You went to therapy? Mr. I don’t need a doctor unless a bone is sticking out of my arm voluntarily went to therapy?”
Patrick shifted his body more closely to David. “I knew I couldn’t sort it out on my own. It wasn’t fair to ask Rachel for help and it wasn’t fair to ask you for help after how I’d treated you.” He went silent for a moment. “I started going to weekly therapy a couple months after everything happened. It started with me figuring out my sexuality and learning not to beat myself up for taking so long to figure it out. And then dealing with the anger I felt toward my family and our society for raising me assuming I was straight until I figured something else out. Then working on my communication issues and how I really hate hard conversations.”
“You’re doing pretty well right now.” David felt Patrick smile against his shoulder.
“My therapist is pretty great. But the thread through it all, through every session, was how I feel about you. That I want you back in my life, but I knew I needed to work on myself before I reached out to you. I didn’t want to fuck this up again. I knew I’d be lucky to get one shot at it, and I needed to be ready.”
Warring sensations rolled through David’s body. Nausea at the thought of Patrick waiting to reach out all this time. What if David had met someone and never got a shot with Patrick? Someone David settled for? The thought of that made him ill. But the idea of Patrick taking their possible future so seriously that he prioritized his own mental health? If that wasn’t the sexiest thing David had ever heard.
“I’m really proud of you.”
“Thanks. It’s been really hard, but worth it. I’m really happy in my own skin for the first time in a long time. Maybe ever. Things I never quite realized were off now feel right.”
“What did your therapist say about pining after your best friend? Surely they advised you against that. I mean, if you want to share. No pressure.” Please share.
Patrick squeezed David’s knee again. “She was very pro you. Well, how I always felt around you. She helped me realize how I’m my best self when you’re in my life. You push me to be a better person. I feel like a better person when I’m around you.”
David closed his eyes and wrapped Patrick’s words around himself like a wool blanket. “I feel the same about you. Since that first day of business 101 actually.”
Patrick’s head snapped up. “Seriously?”
“I knew you’d be trouble. A smartass in cheap jeans teasing me about my satchel and clothes who turned so goddamn needy when the tables were turned and he sat next to me in art class.”
“You have no idea how happy I was to see you in that class. I thought my heart was going to beat out of my chest.”
“Really?”
“I was so stupid. I should have known something was different. That there was more to me than I realized. More to us.”
“It’s okay.” It wasn’t, not really, but it would be.
Patrick sat up and grabbed David’s hands. “I know I showed up out of the blue and have dropped a nuclear bomb on your life with this. I will go to therapy with you. Keep going on my own. Both. Whatever it takes to figure this out and make us work.” Patrick sucked in a shaky breath. “If that’s what you want. I only want this, want us, if you do too. I know it’s wildly unfair of me to march in here on my own timeline and expect you to—“
David hauled Patrick into him and kissed him. Kissed him like he’d wanted to for twelve years. Kissed him like it was their first kiss. Kissed him like he knew Patrick would kiss back and not run. Because he knew Patrick wouldn’t this time.
“I love you too,” David said against Patrick’s lips. “I love you so fucking much, Patrick Brewer. I want us too. Let’s figure it out.”
They held each other the rest of the night and made up for two years of missed kisses. The next day, Patrick helped David around the store and they started talking about Patrick moving to Schitt’s Creek. That night, Patrick cooked dinner for David and Stevie, and David didn’t even mind the imbalanced social dynamic of how quickly his two favorite people teamed up to tease him. A month later, Patrick was officially moved to Schitt’s Creek and they were thriving, thank you very much.