Work Text:
David Webster wakes up, as he has for the past two years, to the sun shining its light through his open window. It still takes him a moment to remember where he is—or, more accurately, where he isn’t.
It's been a long time since he's woken up to the sound of an artillery attack, but sometimes he still has to fight the urge to jump immediately out of bed and reach for a gun that’s no longer there. He sighs and rolls over. The chirping of the birds outside his window provides a comforting background noise to try to fall back asleep to, even though he knows he won’t be able to.
Eventually he gets out of bed to pick out a book from his shelf, though he’s read them all at least half a dozen times. It’s Sunday, so he doesn’t have anywhere to be, and it’s not even six yet, which means it’s still too early to be up. He’ll have to start writing his article for the Post in a couple of hours, but for now, he can relax and enjoy the stillness of morning.
*
Adjusting to life back in the states had been difficult after everything Webster had seen. He’d had anger in his bones and agony in his heart, and there wasn’t anything he could do about either; his feelings about a war that’s already been won are unneeded and unwanted. He should forgive and forget, and if he can’t do that, he should pretend.
*
That night, Webster falls asleep to the sound of rain beating against his window. When he stirs awake, it’s still raining, and he feels as though he’s barely slept at all. A glance at his clock confirms that it’s just past one o’clock in the morning.
He considers, for a moment, attempting to try to fall back to sleep, but then he hears a pounding coming from outside. The sound is almost lost to the storm, but it isn’t, not quite. In fact, the sound of a knock on his front door is probably what woke him up in the first place. The only people who have ever visited him here are his parents, and they have never knocked on his door at one in the morning.
With that in mind, Webster crawls out his warm bed and trudges to the front hall. When he opens the door, it takes him a minute to process what he’s seeing.
“So, you gonna let me in or what?” Liebgott asks after a couple moments of Webster staring at him in stunned silence. He wonders vaguely if he’s actually still asleep, dreaming this.
Joseph Liebgott is waiting expectantly at Webster’s front door with a suitcase in his hand, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world, as if it hasn’t been over two years since Webster—or anyone else, for that matter—has seen him or even heard from him at all, as if he weren’t the last person Webster would have expected to find waiting at his front door.
And yet here he is, and he doesn't even seem to mind that he’s getting drenched by the rain.
“Uh, yeah, come in,” Webster finally manages, stepping aside.
Liebgott walks into the house and looks around before commenting, “Nice place you got here, Web,” and that’s all it takes to make Webster falter for a second time—this man reentering his life, calling him by a nickname he hasn’t heard for two years. There’s no protocol for a situation like this.
“Thanks,” Webster replies, and then, because he doesn’t know what else to say, “You’re dripping all over my floor.”
Liebgott ignores that remark and instead focuses on getting a box of Lucky Strikes out of his pocket.
“Got a light?” he asks, pulling a single cigarette out of the pack.
“Sorry,” Webster tells him, “I don’t smoke anymore.”
“Yeah?” Liebgott opens his suitcase and begins searching around. “Shame.”
“I guess,” Webster responds noncommittally.
He watches in silence as Liebgott successfully finds a lighter, and then brings the cigarette to his lips and cups his hand around the flame. Liebgott has enough time to exhale the smoke once before Webster impulsively reaches out and brings him into a short hug. The cold water soaks through Webster’s pajamas, but when it means having this—a moment of contact, empirical proof that Liebgott really is right here in front of him—then that doesn’t matter at all.
“It’s good to see you, Joe,” he says.
“Yeah,” Liebgott replies, giving Webster a smirk that almost looks like a smile, “you too.”
*
Liebgott had said that he needed a place to stay for a while, so Webster gives him one of his pillows and the use of his couch. His one-story house is too small to have any spare bedrooms, so it’s not the most comfortable set-up in the world; when Liebgott falls asleep immediately, it must be because of how tired he’d been.
Webster, on the other hand, lies in bed for a long time—it has to be an hour, at least—before he’s finally able to drift off to sleep, and even then, it’s a restless sleep that doesn’t last very long; the sun is still down when he wakes up. At this point, sleep is a lost cause.
He gets out of bed, goes to his desk, and sits down with his typewriter, and before he knows it, words are pouring out.
*
Liebgott is still asleep when it’s time for Webster to leave that morning. He almost leaves him a note, but can’t think of what it would say. ‘I’ll be back later’ sounds too obvious, and ‘Go ahead and make yourself at home’, too familiar. Instead he leaves him a spare blanket that he’d found buried in his closet. It’s chillier than usual today because of the rain.
*
Webster has barely sold enough articles to the local newspaper to be able to make a living. He should get another job—something more stable, more secure—but he can’t imagine doing anything else but writing for the rest of his life.
That’s why it’s so unusual for the hours he’s spending at work to be going by so slowly.
*
When he arrives back home, Webster notices that the blanket he’d left sitting neatly next to the couch has been spread out untidily over the cushions. Liebgott isn’t there anymore, but his bag still is.
He wanders to the kitchen and finds Liebgott sitting at the table, a cigarette in one hand and a book in the other.
“Hey,” Webster greets, when Liebgott doesn’t say anything.
“Hey,” Liebgott returns, and then looks up from his book and asks, “You don’t happen to have a TV hidden somewhere around here, do you?”
“No,” Webster answers, “sorry.”
Liebgott shrugs and goes back to the book. “Doesn’t matter. You’ve got some interesting stuff in this place, anyway.”
Then Webster notices that the book Liebgott is reading is his—in fact, it’s the book that he’d left on his bedside table two nights ago.
Startled that Liebgott had evidently gone roaming around his bedroom while he was gone, he stammers before saying, “Uh, I’m glad you’re enjoying it.”
“Well, it’s all right, but it’s no Flash Gordon,” Liebgott remarks, and then Webster has to laugh; he’s never heard anybody talk about literature the way Liebgott does.
“Oh yeah? How does it compare to Dick Tracy?”
Then Liebgott laughs, too, and says, “It’s even better than Dick Tracy.”
*
Webster ends up making dinner for them both a little while later, and they eat in relative silence that Liebgott only occasionally breaks to make a joke. It’s nice, though—comfortable instead of awkward—and he’s glad to avoid the small talk he always has to partake in when he runs into neighbors or friends of his parents.
Webster goes to bed that night feeling content.
*
The next day starts off precisely the same as the last: Webster leaves before Liebgott wakes up, and then he spends most of the day wishing that it would go by faster. But then when he gets home, he opens his front door to the smell of something cooking in the kitchen, and finds Liebgott in the midst of making dinner.
“Want some help?” Webster asks uncertainly.
“Don’t worry about it,” Liebgott replies, “but you can do the dishes afterwards.”
And then Webster notices his empty sink; Liebgott must have decided to wash the dishes that Webster had neglected the night before.
Webster nods. “All right.”
*
They get into a routine over the next week. If Liebgott hasn’t already started cooking when Webster gets home, Webster will make dinner and Liebgott will wash the dishes the next day. If he has, Webster will do the dishes that night. The simplicity of the pattern is comforting.
On Saturday, Webster washes Liebgott’s clothes along with his own.
On Sunday, Liebgott is gone.
It’s the first time in a week that Webster has woken up and walked by his living room without hearing the familiar mumbling of someone whose dreams won’t let him remember that he’s no longer at war. He looks and sees that even Liebgott’s suitcase has vanished from where it had been lying next to the couch, and then he takes a deep breath. After all, it was inevitable.
Webster decides to continue working on the book he’d started writing a week ago. He’d worked on it yesterday, too, but today he has trouble concentrating; yesterday Liebgott had been asking him what it was about and when he would be finished with it, and the change in surroundings is jarring.
About two hours later, Webster hears the sound of his front door opening, and he’s almost positive he didn’t imagine it. He entwines his fingers together to keep his hands steady and tries to think about nothing at all, and then suddenly Liebgott is behind him, saying, “Hey, Web, what’re you up to?”
“Nothing,” Webster answers automatically. He turns around to face Liebgott, and then asks, “What about you?”
Liebgott shrugs. “Just exploring the town,” he replies. “It’s pretty nice—the ocean’s practically in your backyard.”
“Right,” Webster says. He pauses for a moment to try to get his thoughts together before asking, “Where’s your suitcase?”
It comes out only slightly more frantic than he’d wanted it to.
“What?” Liebgott responds, momentarily confused, before remembering, “Oh, yeah, I put it in that spare closet you got out there.”
“Right,” Webster says again. He runs a hand through his hair, sighs, and asks, “Joe, what are you doing here?”
Liebgott stares at him for a second, then narrows his eyes and replies, “Look, if you want me to leave—”
“No,” Webster interrupts quickly. “That’s not what I meant. Just… why here exactly? Why now?”
Liebgott doesn’t say anything for a while, but eventually he pulls out a cigarette, and, when his full concentration appears to be on lighting it, answers, “No one gets it back home. Family, friends, whoever—they don’t understand anything.”
“Perconte gets it, too,” Webster replies. “So does Sisk, or Heffron, or anyone else.”
Liebgott looks up, meeting Webster’s eyes, and says coolly, “Well, it was your name I pulled outta my hat. Lucky you.”
*
Whenever Webster needs to try to clear his head, he goes to the coastline. The wind is sharp against his skin, and all he can hear is the sound of wave after wave after wave crashing against the shore. With the cold breeze and even colder water, there’s never anyone else here this time of year. There are also rocks where most people would prefer grains of sand, though, so it’s still rare for there to be more than one or two others even when the weather is a little bit better.
Webster looks out at the vast, infinite sea and breathes in the salty air. He’s alone, and it’s relaxing out here, so he stays until he doesn’t feel quite so much like he’s going to throw up. By the time he walks back home, the clench in his stomach is almost gone.
*
Around half past three, Webster suggests they go out for a late lunch. He doesn’t like to eat out at restaurants very often because the ones around here are too expensive, but he can manage every once in a while. Liebgott shrugs and says, “Sure, whatever you want,” so they end up walking to Webster’s favorite cafe.
They sit outside, and the ocean is visible out in the distance. That’s the main reason why Webster likes to come here.
He points at the lighthouse and says, “That’s my favorite place in town.”
Liebgott looks, and replies skeptically, “Really?”
“Yeah, it’s—” Webster starts, but he’s interrupted by the arrival of their waiter. After they order and the waiter leaves, he just says, “I’ll take you sometime. You have to see it for yourself.”
“If you say so,” Liebgott responds, rolling his eyes.
*
Over the next couple weeks, Webster realizes that Liebgott has effortlessly invaded every corner of his life. Even on the days when he barely sees Liebgott at all, he can always find comic books or packs of cigarettes lying around somewhere. It’s almost disconcerting how ordinary it’s beginning to feel to stumble upon someone else’s belongings in his own house.
Three weeks after Liebgott had showed up at Webster’s door, Webster is sitting on his couch and flipping through a random comic book that he’d found abandoned on the table. He’d gotten up early the morning before to go grocery shopping, so he’s decided to spend his Sunday relaxing and doing nothing at all.
A little while later, Liebgott returns from wherever he’d been, and drops himself into the chair across from the couch.
He glances at Webster and asks, “What’re you reading?”
“It’s yours,” Webster replies, and reaches out to hand the comic book to him.
Liebgott looks through it quickly, and says, “Oh, yeah, this is a good one.”
“Is it?”
Liebgott nods once and tosses it back.
Webster catches it easily, and then stares at the cover for a long time.
The unexpected realization that he’s happier right now than he has been in a long time has made him suddenly intent on examining and dissecting the feeling in order to hold onto it for later. This moment is tiny and inconsequential, but it occurs to him that the last three weeks have been made up of tiny, inconsequential moments exactly like this one.
“Hey, Lieb?” Webster says.
“Yeah?” Liebgott asks, but he’s examining the back cover of one of Webster’s novels, not really paying attention.
Webster can’t think of what he wants to tell him, though.
He stands and walks the short distance across his living room, and then places a hand on Liebgott’s neck, his fingers brushing over the scar that he knows is still there. Liebgott is staring at him now, frowning with his eyebrows furrowed in confusion, and Webster knows there’s no going back from this. He leans down and ghosts his lips over Liebgott’s, barely a kiss. It only lasts for a moment before Liebgott quickly stands up, causing to Webster to stumble backwards.
“Fuck, Web,” Liebgott says, and Webster has already begun trying to figure out how to apologize for something like this when Liebgott continues, “Warn a guy, would you?”
And then Liebgott closes the distance between them, and all Webster is aware of is the taste of coffee and cigarettes.
It’s rough and passionate and feels almost like fighting. Liebgott bites Webster’s bottom lip, and then grabs the collar of his shirt and pushes. He seems determined to shove Webster against the wall, but Webster pulls away, shaking his head.
“Come on,” he says, grabbing Liebgott’s hand and guiding him towards the bedroom.
They end up tangled in Webster’s sheets, frantically trying to tear each other’s clothes off.
They shouldn’t be doing this here, or now. If they were going to do this, it should’ve been in cold, filthy blankets in France or Germany or Austria, when they were desperate and didn’t have anybody else. Here, though, in the warm comfort of home, they have no excuses, and they both know it.
Webster runs a hand along Liebgott’s chest and stomach, continuing downwards until he reaches his cock, and then he pauses.
“Are you sure about this?” he asks.
“Are you seriously asking me that right now?” Liebgott says, his breaths coming heavy and quick.
“Um,” Webster replies.
Liebgott places a hand over Webster’s, grabs it and drags it even further down before responding, “Shut the fuck up.”
“Yeah,” Webster agrees, “okay.”
Then Liebgott puts his free hand on Webster’s hip and shifts his position so that their bodies meet. For a second, Webster doesn’t notice anything except the feeling of Liebgott’s warm breath right next to his lips, but then the friction between them becomes overwhelming. When Liebgott comes, he digs his fingers into Webster’s hip so hard that there will probably be bruises there tomorrow, and Webster comes not too long afterwards.
There’s a moment of silence as they both roll over and try to catch their breaths, and Webster notices the sound of rain pattering gently outside.
“This was fun,” Liebgott remarks. “Let’s do it again sometime.”
“Yeah,” Webster agrees, laughing a little.
It doesn’t take long for him to fall asleep after that.
*
Webster wakes up to the sun shining its light through his window, and a voice murmuring incomprehensibly in his ear. He turns over, and sees Liebgott facing towards him, still asleep.
Webster elbows him and says, “Wake up.”
After a few moments, Liebgott opens his eyes blearily, replies, “Fuck you,” and then closes them again.
Webster rolls his eyes, but there’s a smile tugging at his lips. “I’m taking a day off from work, and we’re going for a walk.”
“Sure we are,” Liebgott mumbles.
Eventually Webster manages to convince him to get up and get dressed, and then he drags him out the door. It’s a chilly morning—the wind is blowing and the ground is still damp from the night before—but they don’t have to walk too far.
Webster takes Liebgott to the lighthouse on the beach near where he lives. There’s a door on the side of it that leads to a narrow spiral staircase.
“Are you serious?” Liebgott asks, looking up at the two hundred steps.
“It’ll be worth it,” Webster assures him.
And then it’s quiet for a while, except for the echoes of their footsteps on the stone stairs, but Liebgott begins complaining when they’re about halfway up.
“Jesus, this is worse than Currahee.”
“No, it’s it not, and you know it,” Webster responds.
“Yeah, whatever,” Liebgott says.
Eventually they reach the top, where there’s light and open air, a sharp contrast to the dark, musty staircase. Webster breathes the fresh air in deeply, and looks up to see the ocean spread out all around him. The surface is calm and beautiful—the gentle waves are glistening because of the sunlight—but there’s so much more going on in the ocean’s depths.
“Isn’t it strange how there’s this whole other world underneath the water that we can’t see?” Webster says, almost breathless with excitement. “We barely know anything about it.”
He turns and sees that Liebgott is staring at him.
“What?” he asks, suddenly defensive.
Liebgott shakes his head. “Nothing. Yeah, it’s really strange.”
“Yeah.”
Looking out at the immense breadth of the sea, Webster tries to pinpoint the moment he started needing Joseph Liebgott in order to feel contented with himself and his life, but it’s as difficult as trying to pinpoint where the water ends and the rest of the world begins, and it matters just as little.
They head back down the stairs some time later.
“It’s even better at sunset,” Webster remarks.
“Yeah, and I bet you’re gonna make me see that at some point, too,” Liebgott mutters, and Webster doesn’t deny it.
When they get to the bottom and Webster opens the door, he has to raise his arm to shield his eyes from the sudden onset of light. The temperature has risen since the morning, and they can enjoy the warmth of the sun on their skin as they walk back to the house.
*
Liebgott is lounging on the couch, lighting a cigarette, when Webster walks in from the kitchen with two cups of coffee.
“Here,” he says, handing one of them to Liebgott. The gesture is partially an apology for waking him up so early, and partially a thank you.
“Thanks, Web,” Liebgott replies, taking the cup as Webster sits down next to him, close enough that their knees brush.
This moment is tiny and inconsequential, and Webster is happier now than he’s been in two years.