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Before the machine starts a fresh pot of coffee, but after Gavin slaps his alarm clock so hard he hears the plastic creak, is always the hardest part of the morning. Nines pulls the blankets around their shoulders for a little longer. He knows Gavin won’t fall back asleep, not while Nines is there, running his fingertips along the stubble on his jaw, but it’s enough. The slow, steady motion and the warm comfort works wonders to put Gavin in a good mood.
Or at least a better mood than Nines usually finds him in, this early in the morning. They take their time getting out of bed. Nines gets up first, as he often does, and Gavin reluctantly follows soon after.
“Fuckin' weekends, am I right,” Gavin mumbles as he wanders out of the bathroom with a toothbrush in his mouth. "Wha’you wanna do today?"
Nines folds his hands in his lap and considers. It looks like he’s just focused on one point in the middle distance, but Gavin knows that means he’s thinking. Always thinking, processing his surroundings at a speed that makes Gavin’s own head spin just watching him. He gives it a minute before nudging the back of Nines’ head with his free hand.
“You blue screening on me?”
“Would you like to carve pumpkins with me?” Nines says suddenly. “Decorative gourds are in season.”
Gavin chokes on a mouthful of toothpaste. Of all the things Nines could have come up with, he chooses one that makes him sound like a craft store billboard.
Nines tuts back at him before he can catch his breath, and there's just enough tease in his voice to make Gavin’s ears grow warm. “As a law enforcement officer, you should be able to handle yourself with a little more composure, detective.”
"Composure my ass." Gavin flips him off with his free hand. "Where do they teach you guys this shit? Do you come preprogrammed with an arts and crafts module?"
"I simply thought it sounded like a good time."
"Yeah, a good time to take a nap," Gavin says to no one but himself.
But by the time he wanders away to rinse the toothpaste from his mouth, splash some water on his face, and return to the living room, he feels prepared. Gavin Reed is ready to take on whatever wholesome fall activity Nines has in mind, no matter what long-abandoned Pinterest mood board he found it on.
Wholesome isn’t usually how Gavin would describe his weekends, especially not since a certain android started living in his apartment, but here he is. Fresh off of his 37th birthday, and he’s pulling on his jacket and boots to head to the farmer’s market with his boyfriend. He’s never been much of the sentimental type, and even less of the type to shop somewhere that sells $13 jars of artisanal apple butter, but he can’t bring himself to complain.
He might put up a fight, but he knows he can’t deny giving Nines this experience. How could he, really? This is the first autumn he’s ever seen. Nines came into this world fresh off the assembly line in the dead of winter, and for the first time he can walk through the fallen leaves while the sun goes down, or go apple picking, or put on a warm flannel shirt and spend all day inside under the blankets. And now they can carve pumpkins together.
It’s with a strange mix of anticipation and dread in the pit in his stomach that he realizes he wants to do these things. Together with Nines. All of them, every year.
“Your scarf.” Gavin holds it over his shoulder to Nines as they stand in the entryway, dressing to leave the apartment.
“I don’t get cold, Gavin.” Nines replies as he takes it from his outstretched hand. “You know this.”
“Yeah, and you still whine like a baby if you don’t wear a sweater and a jacket. The scarf just makes you look stupid hot, okay?”
“I see.” Nines loops the blue plaid scarf around his neck in a loose knot.
“Don’t get smug.” Gavin buries his own face in his collar as he zips up his jacket. “Just put it on.”
On a warmer day, they might take Gavin’s motorcycle out to pick something up from the market. But today is chilly, especially with the bite of the wind at his cheeks, and instead Gavin decides they’ll take his old Jeep. Nines is sitting patiently in the passenger seat, looking out the window with a surprising amount of interest.
“We’ve never been this far outside the city for personal business.”
“Yeah,” Gavin fiddles with the radio. “This is what I get for dating a guy with a built-in GPS.”
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed, Gavin. You’re a creature of habit.” Nines turns to look at him with that smug half-smirk again. He doesn’t pull many playful expressions, but this is what passes for playful with his usually serious demeanor. A little cocky and self-satisfied, barely noticeable unless you have an idea of what you’re looking for. “This is a new experience for you, as well.”
Gavin hates the way his stomach flips at that smirk, and he hates that he wants it to happen again and again. “I’ve been here before. Been a few years, at least. Probably since before I started working on the force.”
Nines shifts to stare out the window again. Probably tracking and charting their location, Gavin thinks. Building a map out in his mind of where they are, the most efficient route back home. Nines doesn’t speak for a while, and Gavin takes to tapping his fingers on the steering wheel, following the beat of whatever is on the radio.
“We should integrate this into our weekend routine.” Nines breaks his silence. “The fresh air and socialization will improve your mood.”
Gavin snorts. “What do you know? We haven’t even gotten there yet.”
“I think you’ll find I know what best suits you, Gavin.” Nines glances at him from the corner of his eye, smile turned predatory and just barely soft around the edges.
If Gavin flushes fully pink in the cheeks, Nines doesn’t say anything. He just trains his eyes on the highway and keeps driving.
“Is that the pumpkin you’ve chosen?”
The sentence itself is neutral, but the voice that sneaks up behind him is icy enough that Gavin freezes in place.
“Fuck you, tin can.” Gavin catches a glance at a customer on the other side of the aisle as their face pinches in disdain. He decides to stay on his best behavior and ignore it. “Yes, this is my pumpkin.”
“It’s quite…” Nines steps around from behind him and flicks the stem. “Stumpy.”
Truth be told, Gavin didn’t intend to settle on this pumpkin— he had just picked it up for a closer look. But the idea of protesting and putting it back in the bin made his sense of pride burn hot. He only answered out of reflex.
“It’s all about the girth, right?” He chuckles at his own stupid joke. “Just trust me, I know what I’m doing.”
“You say that often, but I’m still waiting for it to pay off.”
Gavin grips his squat, lumpy pumpkin and watches as Nines takes his turn shuffling through the large cardboard box. The LED on Nines’ temple spins slow and steady, and Gavin can almost hear him thinking again, lost in the tangle of processing data.
The fuck is taking him so long, Gavin thinks as he chews the inside of his lip. A gourd is a gourd.
When Nines finally straightens, it’s with a shiny, smooth pumpkin held between his palms. The color is rich, so orange it’s almost red, and it stands tall and thin. It suits him perfectly.
“Is that the pumpkin you’ve chosen?” Gavin parrots back. He tries for the most noisome tone he can muster, but Nines really does look pleasantly proud of his selection. It makes the mockery fall flat, even to his own ears.
“Yes,” is all Nines says, and he tucks both of their chosen pumpkins beneath one long arm.
“Alright. Let’s go find out where they keep that apple butter, then.”
The kitchen table in Gavin’s apartment looks out of place, cleared off and covered in newsprint. Gavin hefts both pumpkins up on the surface and sets them down with a grunt. He’s gathered a few steak knives and a big soup spoon, and he tosses them down in a pile as well.
It’s been a long while since he’s done something as crafty as carving a goddamn pumpkin, and he did pretty good getting everything together, if he says so himself. Nines had offered to help prepare, but truthfully, Gavin feels a hint of pride to be the one doing this for him. Something they can share together.
Instead, he shoved him off to the living room and sat him on the couch, tossing the remote in his lap. Nines pretty much never watches television— even when Gavin has the t.v. on, both of them side by side on the couch, he knows Nines has fucked off into his own robot brain instead of paying attention to the screen.
But now Gavin sneaks a look at Nines’ face to see him focused on the screen with a placid, eager expression on his face. If anything, it reminds Gavin of Connor, and the comparison between the two makes a bark of laughter snap from his chest.
Nines whips around to stare Gavin down. Clearly. he didn’t expect he was being watched. His expression is back to its typical cool demeanor. “Is something the matter, detective?”
“You enjoying Hocus Pocus?”
“I am.” Nines manages to answer without a hint of defensive tone in his voice.
“You’re in luck, ‘cause they marathon that thing, like, all week.” Gavin gives the pumpkin in front of him a hollow-sounding thwack. “Ready to gut this thing?”
As it turns out, Nines is very good at gutting pumpkins. He carves around the stems in a smooth, clean circle, and scrapes the inner walls clean quickly and methodically. They gather the seeds and fiber in a big glass bowl, and Nines makes Gavin promise to clean and roast the seeds later.
Gavin picks up one of the knives and gets to work. With a low, round pumpkin like the one he has in front of him, there isn’t a ton of room for creativity. He knows he can make it work though, and he points the tip of the knife to carve out thin, sketchy lines in a rough approximation of a cat’s face.
He’s nearly halfway through with the features, drawing out little almond shaped pupils before he notices Nines trying to sneak a look at his pumpkin.
“Mind your own business, Iron Giant,” Gavin mutters. He holds up a hand to the side of his pumpkin in a half-hearted attempt to block his view.
“Simply exercising a healthy curiosity in your handiwork. Besides, I’m nearly finished.”
“Fuck off, you are not. It’s barely been five minutes.”
“I happen to be a very efficient worker.”
Gavin cranes his neck as far as he can across the table. It doesn’t yield much in the way of results.
“Best to mind your own business, detective.”
“Oh, fuck you again. Lemme see.” Gavin bounces up on the balls of his feet to try to get a better look. Nines obliges with a shrug, and spins his pumpkin around towards Gavin.
Gavin somehow finds himself to be amused, impressed, and underwhelmed all at once. On the face of Nines’ pumpkin are two perfectly carved equilateral triangle eyes, and a broad, toothy grin. It’s perfect. Literally perfect. The kind of pumpkin that exists only on magazine covers, next to a plate of spiderweb cupcakes and bright mountains of candy. He’s speechless.
Nines doesn’t seem to notice. “I would like to give him a nose, I think.”
A bubble of laughter escapes from Gavin’s mouth before he even realizes it. He tries to smother the rest, but he ends up doubled over in a peal of uncontainable laughter. Gavin knows he’s an unapologetic asshole, and he wouldn’t change that for the world, but even he feels a little cruel laughing in his boyfriend’s face over a goddamn jack-o-lantern, of all things.
Gavin looks up at the worried frown tugging at the corner of Nines’ lips, and it’s enough to make his amusement die down to a simmer. If Nines has ever pouted, this is what it looks like.
“It’s—“ he cuts himself off to smother a chuckle. “It’s fucking perfect. It looks great.”
“Based on the data I’ve collected, this is the ideal design for a jack-o-lantern.”
“No kidding,” Gavin manages to keep a straight face. “It really is perfect.”
He goes back to working on his own pumpkin again, knife in hand, and finishes up carving out the thin lines of three whiskers on each side. They’re fairly jagged, not exactly even or straight, but they certainly get the point across.
When he looks back up, he sees Nines sitting quietly, lost in thought again. He’s carved the nose out like he said, a slimmer triangle placed dead center, just as impeccably cut as the rest of it.
“What do you find funny about my pumpkin?” Nines asks.
“Nothing,” Gavin says in earnest. “You knocked it out of the park.”
“No.” Nines stands up and forces Gavin to meet his eyes. “Your work isn’t precise, but it carries charm and character in a way that I can’t seem to communicate.”
“Hey! You weren't supposed to look!” Gavin makes a barricade around his pumpkin with his arms.
Nines ignores the commotion and circles around behind him. He places one hand on Gavin’s shoulder and squeezes to relax him, and reaches out the other to run along the cut edges of the pumpkin cat’s mouth. “It’s very cute.”
Compared to Nines’ work, the cat that Gavin carved is lopsided and rough. It’s got two vague points cut out near the top to represent ears, and the mouth has a tiny set of fangs poking from the bottom. The details are what catches Nines’ eye, and he traces across them as he hums in thought. “I see where I’ve gone wrong now.”
“Yeah?”
Nines pulls himself from where he’s wrapped around Gavin’s shoulders and moves back to his own side of the table. Without as much as a word, he picks his knife back up and gets to work. Gavin studies him as he goes, watching him make a few quick, clean cuts to the pumpkin in front of him. Nines has that playful look again, the one that makes Gavin want to punch him and kiss him all at once.
“While technically correct, my pumpkin lacked the unique features that make jack-o-lanterns captivating,” Nines begins with a pensive hand resting against his chin. “And it seems that the true purpose is to make it look either cute or scary.”
“And?” Gavin prompts. “What did you do?”
Nines turns his pumpkin around again, and this time there are two thick, angry eyebrows set in a furrow over each perfectly triangular eye. The grin from before still looks just as goofy, but the furrowed eyebrows change the expression into something wild and raucous. It's silly, Gavin thinks, how two little lines make a difference in this situation.
"I decided the best course of action would be to make it both cute and scary." Nines places one index finger in the crease between Gavin's eyebrows.
Gavin pinches his face together. "What?"
"I made it look like you, detective."