Clear as snow
Title: Clear as snow
Recipient: afra_schatz
Pairing: Viggo Mortensen/Eric Bana
Rating: R
Summary: Christmas is near and Viggo is having doubts even two years later. AU
Notes: Set in Idaho. Viggo is 42 Eric 29.
Notes 2: This is my first fic in this fandom. It has been fun/exciting/nerve wracking!
"I still can't believe you don't want to go home for Christmas."
Eric looks up from the cookies he is frosting with a piping bag, lining trees with green sugary goodness. There is a streak of flour on his forehead, a bit of frosting on his cheek too. He's dressed in a pair of comfortable and worn jeans, a white t-shirt adorning his chest. Perfect winter-time lazy wear.
"And I still can't believe you're bringing this up, Viggo. I don't want to go back to Australia. I want to be here with you. I don't know why that is so hard to understand."
Viggo is leaning against the doorway of the kitchen, his grey streaked hair falling into his face. There's a slight frown on his lips though his eyes are smiling. How can he not be after such an admission? He pushes off the wall and walks up to Eric, stopping in front of him. Viggo brings a hand up to Eric's face and wipes the frosting on his cheek with his thumb, licking it away when he has Eric's full attention.
"I just want you to be sure," Viggo says lowly, his eyes softening. "I know how close you are with your family and you haven't seen them in over six months."
Eric drops the bag of frosting to the counter and pulls the older man towards him, pushing their bodies impossibly close, not caring that he has frosting all over his fingers. "I'm going back from my mom's birthday. You know this." Viggo opens his mouth to protest but Eric cuts him off by pressing their lips together. It's not much but a quick kiss but he can feel the older man smile against his skin. "Now, what time will everyone be over? I still need to shower and find something to wear." He pulls away to admire his little forest of sugar cookie trees.
Viggo laughs as he slides right next to his younger lover, pressing their hips together. He turns his head and kisses his cheek, just below his ear. "We have plenty of time."
**
In the dark, the red bright numbers of the clock stick out like a sore thumb. It's 2:43 in the morning, Christmas morning and Viggo still wonders why Eric is with him.
He knows the topic is annoying and beaten to death with Aussie native but something inside Viggo feels like he's taking away from the younger man. Their relationship has been running off pure luck ever since they met two years ago. Viggo had been in town that day, picking up a few supplies he needed to build a fence (the previous one keeping the cattle in tact had fallen apart in the last storm). He was just about to leave the shop with his purchase when he heard a fuss outside. When he went to see what it was all about, Viggo discovered a young tall burly looking man with scruff on his cheeks arguing with one of the respected seniors of the town. Viggo, ever the peacekeeper, swooped in and calmed both parties down. It seemed that there was just a misunderstanding and that the young man, Eric he soon discovered, was just asking around for employment. The respect citizen didn't like his accent.
Viggo took him in and put him to work on his farm. Eric was a young boisterous man (27 years old at the time) from Australia, looking for a new like in America in like many others. He somehow made his way to Idaho after trekking across the country for eight months, doing odd jobs and such to pay his way. Eric was quick to do any task Viggo asked of him, especially anything that had to with horses. He is a big man but his gentleness with the animals had surprised Viggo the most.
And then somewhere along the way, just a few months after Eric moved onto the farm, something developed between them. It started off with an innocent yet drunk kiss on Viggo's 40th birthday. The older man had been pitying himself with alcohol and Eric had joined in. Somewhere been the bottle of rum and the bottle of vodka, the two men found themselves locked in a kiss that had them shedding their clothes. They would have fucked that night if it weren't for both men falling asleep on each other. The hangovers they had the next morning weren't pretty at all.
That was what took for them to start taking the glances and looks they were giving each other seriously. It had been the older man that finally took the final step and kissed Eric when they were both sober on a normal wet Wednesday in October. Viggo may have initiated but Eric was more than eager to explore the possibility of a relationship with him. They had their faults of course. Viggo was too into his work, too focused on others than himself and Eric was too in love with the idea of being in love. Fights ensued; fists were thrown yet two years later they are still together.
And going strong.
Except now at the age of 42, Viggo is starting to question why someone who is only nearing 30 would want to be with him. It's a normal concern, Viggo reasons with himself. When he was thirty, he was happy with exploring everything life had to offer at the moment and not settle into a relationship. Yet now, he and Eric have been in a relationship for two years and as much as Viggo can't imagine life without the young Aussie, it puzzles him as to how they have gotten to this stage.
This stage of comfortableness, where Eric no longer asks Viggo what needs to be done because he already know, where they finish each other's sentences at times, where Viggo can stare at Eric's sleeping form for hours and think of poetry to accompany his thoughts. It scares him beyond everything because he has never felt this way. Never in his 42 years of life.
It's 2:51 when Eric turns around in his sleep and reaches out for him. Viggo smiles in the dark before allowing himself to curl around his young lover. He'll make sense of it in the morning.
**
When Eric fucks him -- makes love to him -- Viggo always feels like he is closer to understanding. Eric is such a passionate person and it is ever evident the most when they are intimate. He is all consuming and Viggo never wants to let go.
When he wakes up on Christmas morning, the first thing he sees is Eric's smiling face. They greet each other with a whispered "Merry Christmas" before kissing softly. Eric's larger hands slide over his body gently, a bare caress and it makes Viggo forget everything he was worried about at three o'clock in the morning.
Their bodies come together, flowing together in such synchronization that neither one of them has to ask the other what he wants. Eric touches him so purposefully, so perfectly that Viggo doesn't know what to do other than arch his body and seek more of it. And when he opens up his body, Viggo knows that as much as he tries to push the younger man away, Eric will never let go of him.
It's slow and languid but not devoid of passion or purpose. Their lips are locked in a kiss that doesn't end, not even when Viggo comes first, covering his fist. Eric just drinks in the quiet whimper before his follows with his own climax, sighing into his mouth.
They don't move for a while, simply drink in each other's knowing gaze in silence.
**
When the dishes have been dried and put away, the house now clean and spotless, they curl up together on the couch, watching 'Miracle on 34th Street'. Eric has his head in Viggo's lap, loving the feel of strong, weathered fingers in his hair. His eyes flutter for better half of the movie but they don't move. He likes how he feels right now. Comfortable.
Something has changed with Viggo within the last 24 hours and though Eric isn't sure what caused it, Viggo has been... more relaxed than he has ever been before, he doesn't want to disrupt the ease that has settled into his lover, into their relationship. He hopes this means he gets the one thing he only wanted for Christmas.