Chapter Text
It started innocuously enough.
Lucky was fussy, cranky, cried whenever Arthur tried to put her down. So Arthur was holding her, making dinner one-handed and narrating for her as if it was a cooking show, and he happened to glance at her to notice her nose running.
He thought nothing of it at first, grabbed a tissue and wiped it away. She made a face and a short protesting cry and tried to wriggle away from him, and then Eames walked in, portfolio in hand and loud garish shirt intact, because this was Eames’s Artist Persona.
“E!” exclaimed Lucky in delight, and tried to leap from Arthur’s arms into Eames’s.
“Hello, poppet,” Eames said, accepting her easily, and then, “Hello, love.”
“Hi,” said Arthur, and automatically shifted for Eames’s brief kiss. Eames kissed him hello and kissed him good-bye and Arthur had gotten used to that, somehow. He hardly thought about it anymore. “How’d it go?” he asked, and turned back to the stir-fry he was making.
“They loved me,” Eames said.
“Of course they did,” said Arthur.
“They want more,” said Eames.
Arthur turned to him and grinned and said, “Of course they do.”
“If you’re trying not to be smug, you’re not achieving it,” Eames told him.
“No, I always embrace being smug,” said Arthur. “I told you the art was good.”
“I thought that was just a line to get into my pants.”
“You’re easy,” Arthur said, turning back to his food. “I don’t need lines.”
“Arthur is smug,” Arthur listened to Eames tell Lucky. “Can you say ‘smug,’ Lucky? Sssssssssmmmmmmmuuuuuuuugggggggg.”
Lucky started crying instead.
“Hey now!” Eames exclaimed. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?”
Arthur glanced over his shoulder. Eames was pulling Lucky up off the floor where he’d tried to put her, Lucky calming in his arms. “She’s needy tonight,” he said. “Wants to be held.”
“Hmm.” Eames sounded thoughtful, but Arthur turned the stir-fry out of its pan and dinner was on the table and then it was bath time and book time and bedtime and then Arthur stripped Eames out of his pretentious artist outfit and they huffed laughter into each other’s skin that dissolved into groans and oaths and then fell asleep sprawled and tangled and Arthur didn’t think about how Eames had been thoughtful and Lucky had been fussy.
They woke to Lucky crying in the middle of the night, which was something she’d seemed to have grown out of weeks earlier.
Arthur said, “I’ll get her,” already on full-alert concerned wakefulness.
Eames mumbled something into his pillow, and Arthur slid out from underneath the arm he had flung across him.
“Hey there,” Arthur said, making his way through the moonlight spilling into Lucky’s room.
Lucky was standing in her crib. Upon seeing him, her cries subsided to whimpers, and she lifted her arms up for him. He picked her up and she cuddled in and he tried to determine the source of her distress. Her diaper wasn’t wet so he went to fetch her a bottle, even though Lucky didn’t normally need middle-of-the-night bottles.
“What’s up?” he asked her softly, keeping his voice down for Eames’s benefit, as he made her the bottle. “Dinner was unsatisfactory?” He brushed a kiss over Lucky’s downy dark hair.
Lucky mumbled something in which Arthur thought he heard the telltale th sound that represented his name in Luckyspeak. Lucky could manage the E sound at the beginning of Eames’s name but she was still bewildered the letters and consonants that jumbled together to form Arthur’s name. She usually made some vague noises and stuck a th in there, and that was how Arthur knew she was speaking to him. There was a part of him that was going to be sad when Lucky got a better handle on words and no longer said his name as just a vague th noise.
He tried to put her back in the crib with the bottle he made for her but she protested, so he picked her back up and settled in the rocking chair that he and Eames used to read to her before bedtime. Lucky liked rocking, and she was passed out in his arms before she’d sucked on the bottle more than a few times. Arthur rocked a little while longer to make sure she was really asleep, and then put her back down in the crib.
“She okay?” Eames mumbled groggily when Arthur crawled back into bed.
“Sleeping,” said Arthur.
Eames yawned and colonized Arthur’s chest.
When Lucky cried again, the room was slightly lighter, although it was nowhere near dawn yet. Arthur sat up, frowning.
“My turn, is it?” Eames asked, stretching beside him.
“No, I’ve got her,” said Arthur, because now he was worried. He knew Eames thought he worried too much, but Arthur was pretty sure he worried just the right amount, and this was very unlike Lucky.
“Hello,” he crooned to her, as he picked her up from her crib and she cuddled into him again. “What’s the matter, Lucky? Bad dreams?” In Arthur’s experience, bad dreams were the root of all bad things.
Lucky snuffled into his chest, and Arthur settled in the rocking chair and listened to her heavy breaths, rocking them haphazardly with small taps of his foot against the floor. She was quiet and still enough eventually that he thought she must be sleeping, but he didn’t want to put her back down. If she was suffering from nightmares, he wanted to keep her close, wrap her in safety. So he snuggled into the curve of her against him and closed his eyes and let himself doze.
He woke with a start at Eames’s step over the nursery doorway.
“What’s wrong with her?” Eames murmured.
“Bad dreams, I think,” said Arthur. “I don’t want to put her down.”
“I’ll take her,” Eames offered.
“I’ve got her,” Arthur said.
“You’ve also got wall-to-wall conference calls and clients today,” Eames reminded him.
It was true. It was why Eames had scheduled his meeting with the gallery for the previous day, because Arthur’s day had been more open; he was swamped with work today.
“Go,” Eames told him, already bundling Lucky into his arms. “I’ll take the sprog. You get your beauty rest. I hate when you look hideous across the breakfast table.”
“Shut up,” Arthur grumbled, and looked anxiously at Lucky, now sleeping soundly against Eames, not even registering being manhandled from one set of arms to the other.
“She’s fine,” Eames assured him, voice all hushed and soothing.
“I know that,” Arthur said, feeling self-conscious and embarrassed, because he hated to feel irrational about Lucky but he couldn’t help it that he was a point man by nature and he knew all of the millions of things that could go wrong with such a precious, delicate, tiny human life.
Eames brushed his fingers over the back of Arthur’s neck as he left the room with Lucky, which made Arthur feel like a little less of an idiot but only because Eames’s touch just there was magic.
***
The apartment was quiet in the morning when Arthur woke up. So he took a shower and got ready for his day and eventually found Eames sprawled out on the couch with Lucky on his
chest. They were both sound asleep, but only Lucky was snoring.
Arthur leaned over her, brushing her hair back from her face. Lucky’s snoring hitched for a second, but she just adjusted her position on Eames, snuggling into him harder, and resumed it.
“You’re in Daytime Arthur mode,” remarked Eames, stretching a little bit, “so it must be morning.”
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” Arthur said, straightening. “I’m surprised she’s not up yet.”
“It was an eventful night.”
“Does she seem warm to you?”
Arthur watched Eames’s big hand cup Lucky’s face gently. Then he said, “Hard to tell. It could just be because she’s right against me and it’s warm in here with the sunlight coming in now.”
Arthur frowned.
Eames said casually, “What time is it, love?”
Arthur glanced at his watch and told him.
“You have a conference call in fifteen minutes,” Eames informed him.
“How do you know my schedule so well?” Arthur asked suspiciously, because Eames was fond of claiming that he couldn’t possibly be expected to remember things about Arthur’s complicated life, whenever he crashed meetings he didn’t approve of or showed up late to things he didn’t like.
Eames ignored him. “And you haven’t even had coffee yet. You cannot possibly conduct a conference call on no coffee. You’ll get a dreadful headache and take it out on the poor souls trying to work with you.”
“I’m a joy to work with,” Arthur informed him.
“As I always used to tell everyone in dreamsharing. ‘Arthur,’ I used to say, ‘is a joy to work with.’”
“You’re so insufferable in the morning.”
“Only before you have your coffee, petal. Off with you. Lucky and I will be fine.”
Arthur looked back down at Lucky, still steadily snoring, checked his watch again, and decided there was nothing for it.
He went to work.
***
Arthur worked out of a close, cozy space up on the roof. It was like a little slice of landed-British-gentry-dom in the middle of Portugal, and it amused Eames. Although he also recognized that it suited Arthur. Arthur loved the sunlight, yes, and his office had tall wide windows that he kept open to the breeze off the sea in the distance but the rest of Arthur was all dark bookcases filled with books, an imposing old desk with a bunch of cubbyholes that Arthur actually used. When Arthur had found the desk in an antique shop and insisted on having it wrestled into the office space, Eames had gone along with it out of fond indulgence, thinking that Arthur didn’t have many impractical whims and he liked when he came across one. But Arthur used every inch of the old-fashioned-ness of the desk and Eames knew he was an idiot for having doubted his practical need for such intense organization. Arthur was a modern man of the digital age, but Arthur still took notes in moleskines; of course he would need an old-fashioned office.
The advantage of having Arthur’s office right in the flat with them was that Eames could remind him to stop working in person, which he always found was the most persuasive way to get through to Arthur. He didn’t really bother him during the day, when Arthur either taught militarization to clients who Arthur took to the rooftop through a circuitous route that kept Eames and Lucky’s existence a secret, or spent the day in conference calls, consulting on other militarization projects that he was overseeing. Eames tended to spend his day with Lucky. Sometimes they roamed around Lisbon together, visiting favorite parks and shops and cafes, or sometimes Eames set them up playdates with the people he’d become friendly with. When Lucky napped in the afternoon, Eames snagged the baby monitor and went up to his own rooftop space: his studio.
Eames’s artist’s studio was the opposite of Arthur’s space. It was of identical size and had the same tall windows but Eames had purposely kept it light and airy and mostly empty. He had paint and he had canvases and he had not much else. He painted by the very excellent light that flooded the space, and every once in a great while Arthur would stride across the rooftop garden that separated their workspaces—they were optimistic in calling it a garden at present, but they both had very grand plans for it that they usually discussed mainly when they were drunk—and ask if Eames wouldn’t mind doing a quick forgery for him with the current client he was working with. On even rarer occasions, Arthur walked across the garden to press Eames up against the wall and then fuck him on the canvases.
So Arthur worked from home, but it wasn’t like they saw each other a great deal under normal circumstances. Eames left him to his devices, usually, and Arthur left Eames to his. So Eames thought it was actually the first time he had ever knocked lightly on Arthur’s office door and poked his head around it. Usually he disturbed him at off-hours when he knew Arthur shouldn’t be working and had got caught up, and on those occasions he barged his way in as his right.
There were voices coming from the laptop in front of Arthur, and Arthur looked up from it and lifted his eyebrows in surprise.
“Uh, sorry, guys, give me a second,” he said to the laptop, and pressed a button that presumably muted them. “Something wrong?”
“I don’t want you to panic,” said Eames very calmly.
“I don’t panic,” said Arthur. “I never panic.”
“But I knew if I didn’t tell you until the end of the day you would be angry,” continued Eames, “so I thought I would just tell you now but it’s not a big deal at all.”
Arthur looked at him steadily. “What enormous deal are you referring to?”
“No, no, the opposite of an enormous deal.” Eames paused, and then just said it. “But I think Lucky might be sick.”
Arthur’s eyes widened. Then he turned back to his laptop and said, “Something’s come up, I’ll be in touch later,” and closed it.
“You’re panicking,” Eames said. “I told you not to panic.”
“I’m not panicking,” snapped Arthur as he came around his desk and looked at Lucky.
Lucky sniffled as pathetically as she could, because Lucky was a little bit manipulative and being raised by Eames wasn’t helping with that.
“Her nose is running,” said Arthur, appalled.
“I think you’re panicking,” Eames told him. “It’s just a little cold.”
“Let me see her,” said Arthur, now sounding icily calm, and Eames recognized exactly what this was, he was familiar with it from dreamsharing days gone by. Arthur had gone into point man mode. From hereon out there would be A Plan.
Eames handed her across, and Arthur produced a handkerchief, because of course Arthur always carried a handkerchief, and wiped at Lucky’s nose. Then he passed a hand over Lucky’s forehead, around to the back of her head, cupping it lovingly.
Eames said, “I know she’s warm, but I just took her temperature and it isn’t very high—”
“It’s not unusual for babies to get mild fevers when they have colds,” Arthur said. “They have to work harder to fight off colds than we do. Let’s go.” Arthur turned and carried Lucky out of his office, clearly expecting Eames to follow.
Which Eames did, aware that his role was now to do as Arthur asked so that Arthur kept feeling capable and in control and didn’t panic. Eames didn’t relish Arthur in a panic over Lucky.
Arthur, back in their flat proper, went to the desk he kept in the living area, unlocked it, and ran his fingers along the collection of moleskins neatly stacked within it. Then he selected one.
“What’s the plan?” Eames asked him calmly.
Arthur walked over to Eames and said, “Can you take her for a second?”
“I can take her for the rest of the day,” Eames said, as he cuddled her back in. “You should go back to work and not worry about this. I’ve got it covered.”
“I know you’ve got it covered,” Arthur said.
“But you have it more covered,” said Eames.
Arthur just flipped open his moleskine.
“And what’s that?” Eames asked, as Lucky sniffled again and Eames utilized Arthur’s handkerchief again.
“It’s the ‘In the Event of Lucky’s Illness’ notebook.”
“You have a notebook for that?”
“I have a notebook for everything, Eames,” answered Arthur absently, flipping through the pages. “How long have you known me?”
Eames glanced over at the desk and wondered at what the other moleskines were. He never snooped on Arthur, because he was aware that snooping destroyed relationships—he’d certainly destroyed his share that way—but he really wished Arthur would see fit to tell him.
Instead, Arthur had pulled out his cell phone and was now speaking polite, perfect Portuguese to Lucky’s pediatrician, explaining the situation, proposing a method of treatment. Only Arthur would call a doctor and tell the doctor how he thought treatment should proceed. Eames shook his head fondly and tried to make Lucky smile by tickling at her cheeks. He succeeded; Arthur said Lucky couldn’t resist Eames’s charm.
Arthur ended his call and Eames glanced at him and said, “Did the doctor agree with your assessment?”
“Yes,” said Arthur shortly, already dialing again.
“Who are you ringing now?”
“Stephen.”
Eames absorbed that. “In New York?”
“Yes.”
“For what?” asked Eames blankly.
“Second opinion,” said Arthur.
“Oh, of course,” said Eames, and tickled Lucky again.
Arthur went over his proposed treatment again, in English this time, and Eames listened, amused, as Arthur said, “Shut up, just tell me if you agree.”
When Arthur ended the call, Eames said, “What did Stephen say?”
“He agrees.”
“What else did Stephen say?”
“Nothing,” said Arthur sulkily. “I’m going to run out and get medicine.”
***
In spite of Arthur’s diligent medicine, by bedtime Lucky seemed slightly worse, cranky and fussy and kind of copiously gross.
“I suppose it’s good that she’s getting it all out,” remarked Eames, when Lucky sneezed all over him as he dressed her for bed.
Arthur fretted a little bit, feeling her skin almost compulsively, and then said defensively, “I’m not panicking,” when he caught Eames looking.
Lucky kept waking through the night, and they took turns retrieving her from the crib and cleaning her poor face. Eventually, Arthur took a turn and never came back, and Eames found him sitting in Lucky’s bathroom with the shower on as hot as it would go, steam filling the tiny space. Arthur was sitting on the floor, back against the wall, Lucky sound asleep on his lap, leaned against his chest.
“She’s coughing now,” Arthur said wearily when Eames poked his head in. “I thought this would help her breathe.”
“Good thinking,” said Eames, and walked in and closed the door behind him.
“You can go back to bed,” Arthur told him. “No need for both of us to sit here.”
“No need for you to sit here alone,” rejoined Eames pleasantly, and sat on the floor as well, leaning on the wall opposite Arthur, next to the toilet.
Silence fell. Eames tipped his head back and watched the shower pour water into the tub, steam billowing upward.
Arthur said, after a moment, “I trust you.”
“Thank you for the lovely non sequitur,” Eames said. “Did you think I needed to be told that?”
Arthur looked awkward and fidgety, the way he did with anything approaching emotion. Arthur’s heart either revealed itself in torrents of words when he finally reached a point where he couldn’t hold back anymore, or in dribs and drabs that he had to pull out of himself. They were apparently in the latter situation.
Arthur said, “I didn’t want you to think—I know you’re perfectly capable of taking care of her.”
Eames looked at him fondly. “Darling, I say this with love, but you’re a terrible control freak. If that bothered me, we would never have even reached the situation we find ourselves in.”
“I just don’t want you to think…” said Arthur. And then he said, “One of the moleskines is for if anything ever happens to me. It has my parents’ contact info, information about where all of our money is stashed and how to get to it, what Internet accounts you should close and what you should keep open.”
Eames’s eyes were sharp on Arthur, evaluating. “What makes you think anything is going to happen to you?”
Arthur shook his head. “I don’t. I’m just…prepared for any eventuality. I’m a terrible control freak, or so I’ve heard.”
“It’s truly one of your more adorable attributes,” Eames assured him.
“I don’t have one for you.”
Eames felt like he wasn’t keeping up with this conversation very well. “You don’t have one what?”
“I don’t have a moleskine. For if something were to happen to you. I…I tried to make one, I tried to organize who I would have to contact, and where you leave your loose aliases so I could be sure none of them were stolen, and whether there would be any legal issues with Lucky, and…I couldn’t. I just—couldn’t. I tried to and I—You’re my one eventuality I can’t imagine, Eames. You went and told me that I’m a ‘we’ and now I can’t ever go back to being an ‘I’ and I just want you to know that. Every time I do something that makes it look like I don’t trust you, I want you to remember that I need you to know that I trust you to never doubt how much I trust you.”
Eames looked across at him for a moment. And then he smiled. “You’re such a sappy, romantic idiot.”
“Stop it,” said Arthur, the tips of his ears turning pink, and he leaned down to hide his face against Lucky’s head.
“Come on,” Eames said good-naturedly, standing and shutting the shower off. “Let’s try sleeping again. Take her into bed with us. You’ll feel better if she’s right there.”
“You’d better not crush her,” Arthur warned him.
Eames rolled his eyes. “Like either of us is an irresponsible sleeper.” He offered his hand, which Arthur accepted, and he pulled him to standing. And then he cupped his hand around the back of Arthur’s head and kissed him and murmured, “I love you, too.”
“Sappy, romantic idiot,” Arthur told him, and kissed him back.