Chapter Text
Adam moved to Bucharest four months ago. He found a small apartment at a decent price near the city centre. He got a job at the observatory, he was the guide for people from abroad there. He liked that, it helped him brush up on his social skills.
He liked his new life. It was calm.
His apartment was rather small, neat, and tidy.
Once a week, in the night, he’d go out to the balcony, to stargaze. Yes, the light pollution was horrible there, but enough was visible, and it was better than New York.
That was his favourite time of the week, and he never missed it. Now, autumn came, so he added two new elements to his routine - a warm blanket and a mug of hot cocoa.
Whenever he sat down, at his usual time - eleven in the evening, for an hour and a half - he noticed another dark silhouette appear on the balcony of the neighbour who lived across the hall. Adam reckoned that was said neighbour. Their schedules were so different that they never saw each other - except for eleven in the evening on Saturdays, when Adam would watch the stars, and the man would smoke his cigarettes.
One of those evenings proved to be colder than the previous ones - after all, it was November. Adam put his mug of cocoa on the small table he put on the balcony soon after moving in, and he set his folded blanket down on the chair. What he was left with, was another mug of cocoa in his hands. He heard a balcony door open and looked to his right, where he saw his neighbour coming out into the chilly night.
Adam stepped close to the railing that divided their balconies.
“Hi”, he said softly.
The man, surprised, looked at him.
“Hello?”, was more of a question than a statement.
“I am Adam. I live across the hall from you”, he spoke matter-of-factly.
“And what am I to fucking do about it?”, the man sighed, lighting his cigarette.
“Oh… I’m not sure”, Adam’s brows knitted together in consideration.
The man took a drag from his cigarette and looked at the pale boy in front of him. He sighed.
“I’m Nigel.”
Adam smiled.
“It’s cold.”
“Yes, it’s fucking cold, it’s fucking November”, he scoffed.
Adam looked at the man, but it was too dark to distinguish any specific features except for his muscular and tall built.
“I made cocoa for you. To warm you up a bit”, he stretched his hands out to Nigel, offering him the mug.
“For me?”, Nigel raised his eyebrows in surprise.
“Yes.”
Adam looked at Nigel with those big, blue, hopeful eyes.
Nigel, with another sigh, accepted the mug.
“Thanks, kid”, he nodded softly.
“I’m not a kid”, Adam frowned. “I’m an adult man.”
“Alright, then, Mr. Adult-fucking-man, how old are you?”
“I am twenty-eight years old. And how old are you, sir?”
Nigel blinked twice.
“Sir? Fucking sir? Gorgeous, I ain’t no fucking sir. Jesus, I may be forty-seven, but I’m not a fucking sir”, he sounded exasperated.
“Okay, then, Nigel”, Adam turned to watch the sky, leaning against the railing. Nigel threw away his cigarette butt and sipped the beverage.
“Shit, that’s some good fucking cocoa, pretty boy”, he said.
“I’m glad you like it”, Adam looked to Nigel, then his chair, and then back to Nigel. He got the blanket and wrapped it around himself, but he didn’t sit down as he usually would - he stood at the railing again, close to Nigel, but not exactly touching.
They stood there, enveloped by a silence that wasn’t awkward, and the boy looked up at the sky while the older man looked down at the street.
“Why do you come out here?”, Nigel asked.
“To stargaze.”
“Just that?”
“Just that.”
“And you drink cocoa?”
“When it’s cold.”
Nigel looked down at the street, up at Adam and back down at the street.
“I could make cocoa next week”, he said quietly - shyly, almost.
The brunette looked at him, trying to make out features in the darkness. He grinned.
“That would be nice”, he managed to utter.
“Yeah, it would, wouldn’t it?”, Nigel smiled absently.
And then, there was the silence again, devouring them and enveloping, like the dark sky above and the warm lights of the street lamps below, making them the only two souls in the universe - alone, together, and one.
Adam shivered as the chilly wind blew through the street, its cold fingers making their way to the balconies, treading through the men’s hair and caressing their faces.
“You should go back inside, pretty boy. Or you’ll fucking freeze here”, Nigel interrupted the silence, and the faded sounds of a night in the city also seemed to come back.
“I don’t want to. Not yet”, Adam responded, as it wasn’t yet his time to come back inside.
The older man sighed and put his arm around Adam, pulling him close; the railing between their balconies was now Adam’s only chilly reminder that anything in the world existed besides Nigel’s warm body. Nigel was taller, broader, and warm. Safe.
Against himself, Adam curled into the touch, into the sensation, closing his eyes and inhaling the warm scent of cigarettes, whiskey, and something else, something… natural, in a way, he started considering, thinking, and didn’t realise he was pressing his face into Nigel’s chest for a good minute.
“Everything alright, gorgeous?”, there was amusement in the man’s voice.
“Oh, uh, yes, right, of course, yes”, Adam grunted and straightened his back, but didn’t shy away from the embrace. “You just… smell really nice.”
“You smell nice, too, pretty boy. You use some nice fucking shampoo”, his face was resting atop Adam’s curls. “Now go back inside. You’re trembling. I’ll go, too”, with these words, Nigel stepped away, and Adam felt cold, and looked at the man. Nigel opened his balcony door and the light from his apartment finally let Adam see his features, the sharp jaw, the hooked nose, the blonde greying hair, the amber eyes of which colour resembled whiskey in which Adam wished he could drown.
Nigel said one last thing before going back inside:
“See you around, stargazer.”