#se ak tomgreg

[ezlebe]

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Greg finds consciousness with a jerk, eyes darting around the dim cabin, then blinking blearily up at Tom, who’s pulling back from shaking him awake. He rubs into an eye while reaching out with the other hand, catching weakly on a curve of Tom’s fingers, half asleep and eager to stay that way, so hoping maybe he can distract Tom from making him get up.

Tom barks a quiet laugh, briefly squeezing back with a shake of his head. He leans in, heavy and half-pinning Greg to the bed, as if to play along. while shoving words low and taunting into Greg’s ear. “No,” he says, disappointingly, “You got to go get your wallet and buy us coffee.”

Greg feels a groan at the back of his throat. “But you’re –”

“Uh-uh, I’m the boss,” Tom interrupts, pulling away with a smack at Greg’s thigh, then turning and grabbing a hanging hoodie to throw in his face. “Up and at ‘em. Go get me a coffee, wage slave.”

“Isn’t that –” Greg tugs the hoodie crookedly over his head, “Like, a conflict of interest?”

“While you’re out getting the coffee, you can complain to whatever raven hanging around that’s HR.”

“I think it was an eagle,” Greg mumbles, as he grabs and pulls on a pair of crumpled jeans with a bleary blink. “Marketing was a gull… And accounting was that… weird duck.”

“What the hell are you – ? Oh, oh… forgot we even talked about that,” Tom says, reaching up and scratching under his chin. He looks across the slip through the window. “What was the raven?”

“Legal? I-I don’t remember,” Greg says, digging out a boot from where it’s wedged under the table. “Should have… written it down.”

Tom hums lowly and looks back down to an orange on the table, as he peels a segment off, then offers it with a wag. “I want just an americano, maybe some syrup.”

Greg takes the segment with a heavy sigh.

“Oh, cheer up,” Tom says, overly chipper and definitely who should be going to deal with the café at… whatever time it is, later than usual, since Greg was woken by Tom, not an alarm. The flat of his palm makes contact with Greg’s side with a squeeze. “You slept in for three hours.”

Greg realizes exactly why they didn’t go out when he sees the full effect of the night’s freezing rain storm. It’s not the worst they’ve ever got, but definitely the worst it’s been without ever leaving the protection of the marina, and he braces himself up to fall from stepping off the vessel and every step on the way into town.

He feels some surprise and relief when he crests the ramp to see someone from the city came through the lot. He jogs up to the Forester, carefully stepping on melted patches, while breathing pale puffs of vapor into the cold, foggy air. He reaches out and jerks the handle of the car, then grimaces when it snaps against his hand, as the door sticks fast, staying determinedly closed. He squints through the window, confirming the lock is popped on the inside, and shoves hard into the door to try to crack the ice around it, as well as what’s frozen inside – he doesn’t even know how water gets into it, but it’s probably something wrong with the rubber seal.

“Problem?” A voice asks, wry and a bit smug.

Greg turns around with a start. He blinks at Shiv in a navy blue coat, slightly puffed with layers to keep out the cold, a reusable coffee mug in one hand and the other in a pocket. He raises his brows, as he looks from Shiv to the car door, then back again, clearing his throat. “Uh, it’s… frozen.”

Shiv offers a slow, judgmental blink. “Don’t you have a spray?”

Greg tilts his head down toward the marina.

Shiv huffs low under her breath, jerking her chin slightly backward at the café. “Stew does.”

“Right, yeah,” Greg mutters, ducking his chin a bit, as he glances toward the café with a quick blink.

“Not going out today?” Shiv says, proceeding into, somewhat incredibly bafflingly, continuing the conversation. “Or you just hang back and let Tom go out alone?”

Greg feels his brow furrow at an unexpected note of a scold in her voice. “Oh, uh – no? We’ve actually been out a lot, really, without breaks? And it’s… maybe sort of that time of year like where he decides he hates the seine.”

Shiv blinks and quirks a brow, plainly bemused, then her brows relax while she exhales a huff through her nose.

“And, you know, it’s really icy today,” Greg mutters, peeking down at the car, completely encased in a thin layer like a pottery glaze. “Like, more than usual.”

Shiv oddly tenses a bit more while taking a sip from her mug, as her face tightens and loosens, then she clears her throat with a cough. “But not quite like the Bering Sea. Real crabbing.”

Greg feels his face pinch, “I-I guess not, no. We do still get kind of iced up in the gulf, sometimes – ”

“It was the ice, alright,” Shiv interrupts, tight, followed by a weak scoff. “That shit.”

Greg looks over with a blink, now his turn to be bemused. “Like, today is – What?”

“The stupid argument about his job,” Shiv says, shifting her weight on her feet with a sneer somewhere to the side of Greg’s shoulder. “With my dad, when we broke it off? I know he told you.”

“Oh,” Greg intones, exhaling a weak cough into a loosely curled fist. “Um… I do vaguely remember –”

“Jesus, Greg, I know he’s still pissed I changed the plan on him,” Shiv says, taking an arch sip from her mug, now staring so hard into Greg’s face that it almost seems intended as oppositely avoidant. “But I had to sit through… a lot of footage, doing some temporary outreach work with the AMSEA board, and it – I overreacted, maybe, but it wasn’t because I didn’t think he couldn’t do it. I just… I decided I would feel better if he didn’t.”

“Sure,” Greg mumbles, feeling his hands curl awkwardly against his elbows, as he glances toward the marina, then to the café. It is pretty clear that Shiv has decided he could be a Tom proxy? And that is… very unexpected, near to the point of fight or flight.

Mostly flight; maybe all flight.

“Apparently, it’s selfish, or whatever, giving a shit if he drowns a thousand miles away,” Shiv says, exhaling a harsh breath through her nose. “But the cannery job made just as much money and Dad needed someone, and I – ” She takes another sip, jaw clenching, “I really didn’t think he’d take it so fucking personally.”

“No, I-I get it,” Greg says, hurriedly, then immediately regretting it when a sharp look gets narrowed up toward him. “You can track the vessel, you know, but it’s not the same; not like knowing… If it’s not too appropriate that I – ”

“I think everyone is pretty aware by now,” Shiv interrupts, flat and sneering, but she doesn’t sound half as venomous as the last time similar words crossed between them. It had seemed like a good reason for the c-store to spontaneously produce a second check-out, if there ever was one.

“But even if it wasn’t, you know, like that,” Greg continues, insistent while lifting his shoulders in a shrug and exhaling a weak, awkward cough. “I think I still would have…” He drags his teeth across his lip, looking down across the pebbly gravel thrown out across the lot for traction. “I wasn’t, uh – wasn’t forced to? But I searched up a lot of stuff about… that sort of unwelcome, unlikely occurrence, too.”

Shiv tips her head, breathing into the lip of her mug. She makes an odd noise, somewhat pained and reluctant, then sharply clears her throat. “I got interested in it in a sick sort of way, actually.”

“Oh, uh – yeah, same,” Greg admits, weakly, looking away while shoving his hands into his pockets. “It’s, like… sort of educational?”

Shiv stares into some middle distance, thumb scraping along the edge of her mug. “I found a pretty good one a couple days ago.”

“You did?” Greg says, stretching his fingers in his jacket.

Shiv drops her head in a tight jerk, digging into her pocket for her phone. “It’s not amazingly produced, or anything, just some nosy asshole, but it’s got cliff notes from a recent investigation of an incident out in the Aleutians: diagrams, 3-D models, displacement math, a lot of NTSB hearing clips for good measure.”

“Oh, that’s, uh –” Greg looks down, as his phone buzzes faintly in his hip pocket. “Thanks?”

Shiv leans slightly to peer in the Forester’s icy window, as she takes a sip that’s decidedly more savoring than any previous. “Looks like that’s your wallet?”

“Like, maybe,” Greg admits, then once again bodily shoves into the car door. He hears a faint crack and tugs the handle, but it’s still stuck fast; could he have forgotten to – No, yeah, it is unlocked. He already checked it.

“I’m in a good position to know you can replace this shit box.”

Greg curls his nose, a bit, as he looks over and down at her with a limp shrug.

Shiv holds Greg’s eyes for a quick beat, then rolls her own, as she turns around toward her particular SUV of the month. She gestures backward at him around her phone. “Let Tom know what I said, alright?”

“Um, yeah,” Greg says, looking down and flicking at ice on the edge of the window with a nod. He listens to a door slam, then an engine start up, and peeks up to watch her circle wide out of the lot.

He isn’t really sure why Shiv decided now to say all that – probably it was the timing with the weather, or something – since it’s been months. He rubs at his brow, feeling a little vaguely irked that she cared about that, about Tom’s safety, but not the him of it enough to just like say she didn’t want to get married to him.

…Greg is a bit grudgingly appreciative, in any case, though; it didn’t happen, and like everyone is far better for it, but it wouldhave made him feel better, if it did. He could’ve weathered endless, complaining calls, as long as he didn’t have to wonder what happened when they stopped, even if it was just a day with crappy weather for signal.

He gives the door another yank, then inhales cold, damp air deep into his lungs, slumping back toward the marina ramp. He can probably get Tom to think it’s like funny to have to come up here and get it out for him? If the door breaks, then like it’s Tom’s fault, too, so he has to fix it.

And the ignition, finally, and maybe even the clunky sound with the passenger rear wheel.

Tom is leaning against the rail of the deck, swiping at something at his phone; he looks up when Greg climbs up, face brightening, as he shoves the phone into his bibs. “Where the hell did you go – get lost in the fog? Are you actually some organism now come to spore me with your fiddlehead?”

“No, uh – like, I was…” Greg grimaces, reaching up and tugging nervously at the lip of his hood. He could lie, only like Shiv did ask him to relay what she said, plus he doesn’t exactly want Tom to hear from Stewy they were talking, then really jump to some like super weird conclusion. “Perhaps conversing with Shiv about how we’re like both happy that you aren’t dead?”

Tom stares for a few beats, expression twisting with befuddlement, as a brow swiftly raises up his forehead.

Greg scrubs at his hair under his hood. “We like got talking about ships icing up, um… because of the weather.”

“Oh, what a cheery topic.” Tom mutters, under his breath, as his hands settle into his pockets across his hips.

“Like, when you first told me, right, you were going out there? I watched and, uh – and read a lot about the dangers of the whole procedure, and like got super… concerned you were going to sink?” Greg says, briefly biting at the inside of his lip, while slipping his hand down his cheek to scratch against his upper jaw. “And I guess Shiv did, too, because she was on some committee, so that’s… I guess, the real reason she asked Uncle Logan to put you in Naknek. Or something. Not, like… because she didn’t think you were a good captain?”

Tom blinks slow, then his eyes flick toward the other end of the marina and the parking lot. “What the hell do I even say to that?” He asks, elbows cocking out with a jerky shrug. “I appreciate the sentiment, but fuck off I didn’t grow up fishing out there to get stuck in a cannery?”

“I-I think she just wanted you to know? And even texted me this…” Greg pulls out his phone to tap the link to the video. He feels his face fall, gut clenching, as it opens to a clip of a tight-voiced captain calling mayday minutes before… like, before he dies; he hears between his ears, against his will, an echo that sounds too close to Tom.

“We don’t need to listen to that –” Tom wrestles the phone from Greg and pauses the video just as the narrator voiceover starts up. He glances down at the screen for a beat, then looks up with a deeply furrowed brow, throwing his other hand out in askance. “What the hell is wrong with you two? If you want to get sad, then watch My Girl; don’t talk about my untimely death over fucking coffee – which is where, by the by?”

“The cash is still locked in the car,” Greg mumbles, rocking back on his heels. In a queasy way, he really sort of just wants to watch the video even more after the intro. “Door is sort of stuck… from the rain.”

Tom sighs hard through his nose, head dropping and tapping the phone to his forehead.

Greg feels himself hunch closer into himself with a glance to the deck.

“Okay, let’s just…” Tom’s hand lifts and sweeps chilly up Greg’s nape, pulling him into the slightly rough collar of his work coat. He neck is prickly with his beard, but Greg turns his face into it anyway, like he always does, swallowing thickly from the back of his throat; he wonders how his face must have looked, though it doesn’t exactly take a lot for Tom to go in for a hug. “It’s not like that never happens here – jeez, we’re standing on it. The shit that manages to get you emotional. And her. Mind-bottling.”

Greg snorts weakly, breathing for a few beats. “It’s not even, like… real cold, out there,” he says, thinking about back home with freezing eyelashes and crispy wet hair. “But it-it’s got the potential of worse?”

“Trust me,” Tom says, squeezing at the back of Greg’s neck with a shift of his thumb. “I’ll get you out to St Paul for Christmas, and you’ll wish you were back in Whitehorse.”

Greg hums a soft disagreement. “We go hunting –”

“In September,” Tom says, shaking Greg a bit with a gentle, if jerking shift of his arm. “That’s not even the same.”

Greg thinks that the weather probably still won’t be as bad on the island, as it could be out on a vessel. It’ll be like here, where it’s just sort of annoying until it’s open water rocking the boat, ice freezing in layers with every misty, crashing wave to cement everything to the deck.

“Alright, now,” Tom says, pulling back and looking Greg in the face while his brows rise up his forehead, clapping him across the shoulder. “I’ve got my wallet, greenhorn, if I don’t get some caffeine, I’m going to throw a – ” He abruptly jerks, unbalancing and hand yanked from Greg’s shoulder, then just as swiftly he turns on a heel. “Excuse me, Mondale.”

Mondale moves to shove at Tom again, back hard against his knees in a vaguely punchy manner.

“Are we not the center of attention, hm?” Tom says, crouching down and rubbing at Mondale’s jowls with both palms. “Or you mad about us taking vacation, you workaholic?”

Mondale pulls from Tom after a few pats more with a shimmy, then bounds toward a crack between pots a few feet away. He emerges with a familiar red rubber toy that he tries to shove in Tom’s hands.

Greg furrows his brow, leaning in, as Tom lifts the oblong sort of ball with a tut.

“I thought we lost this?”

“Maybe, a – “ Greg lifts a shoulder to shrug. “Uh, a seal brought it back?”

Tom hands it back to Mondale while lifting his other hand in a vague waving assent.

“Look,” Tom says, a wry curl at the edge of his mouth. “I do appreciate it, alright, but – ” His brow furrows, as he looks over suddenly with a sharp narrow of his eyes, taking a turn for legitimate concern. “You’re not scared of being on the Como now, right?”

“No, like – A lot of it was I wouldn’t… be there to know, you know,” Greg says, looking over at Tom, then away, tipping his head into his shoulder. “I’d just like be freaking out every time you went dark.”

“Would you?” Tom says, leaning in with a condescending tut to smack his fingers flat against Greg’s jaw. He bounds off toward the edge of the deck. “That’s so sweet.”

Greg flattens his mouth.

“Ships go down, planes go down, cars turn into flaming wrecks,” Tom says, hopping off down onto the dock with a spin of one hand. “You going to lock me up in a box?”

Greg rolls his eyes, feeling an irked tug just behind his sternum. He is like at least concerned about Tom’s actual safety, not like… say, trying to keep him away from certain people. “Seriously? You get like so…” He exhales hard, while trailing Tom toward the ramp. “You don’t even like when I go out with Kendall to –”

“That’s different,” Tom interrupts, voice lilting into a mocking scold while shaking his head.

Greg sweeps his eyes up toward the white, foggy sky. “Why?”

“Because he’s going to teach you bad habits,” Tom says, turning around at the waist to actually wag a finger.

“He doesn’t even… do anything,” Greg says, catching up with a shuffle of his feet. He likes the boat and the crew, but not a lot about the Captain Kendall part of it; he’s okay at charts and inventory stuff, sure, it’s the rest of it – he gets seasick. “He just – I mean, you know. He never gives me anything to do.”

Tom abruptly loops his arm around Greg’s neck, barking a laugh into his ear with a bodily shake. He smacks a loud kiss across his jaw. “I do like that whenever you sneak away with him, it makes you appreciate a real captain.”

Greg awkwardly angles his chin to look across Tom’s shoulders as they halfway stumble onto the wood walkway toward the café. He clears his throat, as Tom lets up on the chokehold to grab the door to pull open. “He’s got his own, uh – his mini espresso machine, though.”

“Oh, fuck off and go order,” Tom says, shoving Greg toward the counter with a sharp tut. “I spoil you in better ways.”

“Trouble in paradise?” Stewy says, head popping up with an undeniable glint to his eyes. 

“Latte and americano,” Greg says, somewhat hurriedly, just as Tom opens his mouth to respond. He looks down at the display case, furrowing his brow down across the shelves. “With vanilla? And uh, no gingerbread… you’re out of gingerbread?”

“It’s almost February,” Stewy says, dry, as he taps out grounds into the portafilter. “Do you need at calendar, Baby Roy? I got a couple wallet ones from the fuel station lady, maybe might interest you if – ”

“No,” Tom interjects, turning his head to make eye contact with Greg, cheek twitching, a smirk badly hidden at the edge of his mouth. “How about you leave angling to people who can catch something. Just make the coffee.”

Stewy widely rolls his eyes, starting up the machine, and proceeds to pull the shot somehow sarcastically, then opens his mouth again while he pours the shot into a cup of water. “Come on, I saw him talking to Shiv outside.”

“Seriously?” Greg mutters, tilting his head, as he reaches up and scratches at the side of his nose. He think Stewy might like have some addiction-to-drama issue.

“You did, you did,” Tom says, dropping his head with a nod while he take a step forward, leaning into the edge of the counter with both palms on the silver edge. “They’re simply both glad I’m hale and hearty.”

Stewy appears dubious, as he steams milk, expression only deepening as he presses the grinder for the next shots. His eyes sweep away from Tom, over to Greg, as he slides the portafilter a second time into the machine. “Is that code for planning his murder?”

“Hah, uh… no,” Greg says, shaking his head, lifting his voice while the machine hisses between them. “We, like – we had parallel concerns about an incident that never came to pass?”

Stewy blinks slow, mouth twisting at the side. He looks down, as the shot finishes and he has to pour it into the milk. “That’s way more boring than what I texted Jess.”

[ezlebe]

[ezlebe]

1

“You would like it embroidered?”

“What?” Greg says, as he looks down at the coat in his hands with short shake of his head. “Uh, no, that’s – ”

“It is with the purchase, you know,” Marcia says, lowly, gesturing at the sewing machine, then offering a small, unreadable smile. “If you like, I can do… Wambsgans on your hood.”

“You – what?” Greg wets his lips, raising a shoulder to his ear in a tense shrug. “Uh, sure?”

Marcia stares for a heavy moment, then blinks once before she slowly raises an eyebrow. “Ah.”

Greg leaves the shop with Wambsgans curlicued in navy on the hood of his jacket and the knowledge that he is never, ever going to wear it on the deck.

2

“Hey, where’s your hubby?” The attendant asks, leaning out of the marina door with a pair of raised brows.

“Oh, uh –” Greg stares for a beat, then swallows hard, deciding in a split second that it won’t like hurt to just lean into it, again, “Uh, he… uh, yeah, he – he’s just working on the rigging?”

The attendant nods, then hooks a thumb over their shoulder to point backward at the computer. “Cool, tell him he owes like $480.45? He asked me last Friday, but the system was down.”

“…Right,” Greg says, hearing his voice crack. “Bills.”

3

“But I – I should go, like it’s not a whole – ” Greg exhales hard, feeling frustration beat against the inside of his chest. “It’s li-like my own family, man.”

“Look,” Karl rolls his eyes, pulling out one of the invitations and tapping at a line toward the middle. “It says spouse as a guest. Tom’s your voucher, alright?”

Greg stares at the line for a beat, then up at Karl, then down to the invitation. Okay, but if he – like, Karl should know that’s not true, right? He’s like Uncle Logan’s… whatever he is, postmaster, so he’d know if anyone in town was married. “…Sure, yeah.”

“They probably just thought you’d come with Tom,” Karl says, reaching out and grabbing an envelope labeled Kellman, shoving the invite into it, then smacking it with his paid postage stamp. “Plus it is a whole captain thing, Greg. You knowthat.”

4

“Are you the spouse?”

Greg stares for a beat. “Y-yeah? Greg.”

“Alright, come with me,” the receptionist says, taking a step back and gesturing with a turn of their hand.

Tom sits on an exam bench, legs kicking against the bottom of it, and looks up with a wide smile that does everything to show that they’ve given him the good drugs. “Greg!”

“Oh, fuck,” Greg says, when his eyes land on Tom’s hand across his lap swathed heavily in pinking gauze. He reaches up and presses his palm to his forehead with a hard swallow. “Your hand.”

Tom shakes his head woozily, his voice dropping into a careless sing-song. “It’s fine.”

Greg feels his jaw tighten, a buzzing frustration at the back of his mind. “It got super like cut up, Tom!”

“It’s just a little… cut up,” Tom says, his voice a bit slurring and eyes dull, waving his injured, wrapped hand up at Greg, who gingerly grabs it to put back down. “The bandage just makes it look bad.”

“I was – like… Tom,” Greg says, hearing his voice harden enough that the nurse glances over, but Tom, annoyingly, is apparently way too high to notice it. “I was there?”

5

“Ah, there he is,” Tom says, hooking an arm across Greg’s shoulders and yanking him down to kiss sloppily across the temple. “My man of the hour.”

“I think it’s kind of a – uh, a joint thing,” Greg says, hiding a smile in Tom’s shoulder, as Tom spins him in a slow circle, settling a hand to balance low across his wide back.

“Semantics,” Tom says, then leans in closer to Greg’s ear, lips brushing up against the lobe. “I can barely feel the rocking on this thing – it’s like a dream of a dream of boat.”

“It is kind of like weird,” Greg agrees, glancing across the deck of the yacht, then back at Tom, only for his eyes to catch on the band around Tom’s scarred finger across his own shoulder; he leans forward on impulse, pressing his lips against the band, then immediately feels heat burst up his cheeks.

“Aren’t you a sap,” Tom says, laughing brightly, squeezing Greg closer and smacking another kiss against his jaw. “Husband of mine.”

5

“Hey?” Tom asks, reaching out for the nurse and a bit startled when they’re actually nowhere near him. He flexes his fingers again, but they’re still far off, so he drops his hand back to his lap alongside the useless one, and raises his voice. “Is there a real tall guy out in the waiting area?”

The nurse glances toward the front of the building. “The one who brought you in?”

“Oh, yeah,” Tom says, flicking out his hand to flap back and forth, then with a following gesture down at the other. “He who overreacted. Can you go get him, please?”

The nurse rolls their lips together, then, “We don’t have a lot of room, back here; we try to keep – ”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever, family – he is my family,” Tom says, attempting to be forceful, but fairly sure he just comes off a bit droopy. “Just him and the damn dog. Please.”

“Mr Wambsgans – ”

“Exactly that,” Tom interrupts, ignoring the resulting catch at the back of his throat, but maybe he's a little desperate. “I know he doesn’t look it, but he can disappear into a corner like nobody else. A totem-sized, multifaceted freak of nature.”

The nurse stares for a beat, then reaches for the phone affixed to the wall.

4

“So, you know,” Greg says, pointing down at the invitation with a pair of raised brows in a begging curve. “I can just go with you, yeah?”

Tom drops his eyes and confirms the Wifeys & Hubbys Welcome added on by someone whose name probably rhymes with Roman. “If you say so.”

“It’s so dumb,” Greg says, puffed up, presumably because he’s been snubbed on the invite front, if he’s trying to slip in using Tom as his ticket. “Roman’s not a – a captain of anything, but he’s there – And technically like, neither is Uncle Logan?”

Tom raises a brow high up his forehead and looks sharply across the small galley counter. “Bet you won’t say that to his face, Gregory.”

Greg immediately glances toward the door, as if Logan’s got someone sneaking about the vessel.

3

“Greg let me know,” Tom says, counting out the bills and setting them across the counter.

“Oh, your boy,” Eva says, dropping her head in a nod and scooping the money up, turning toward the computer with an eye still on Tom. “I remember now – I had Marky catch his arm when you got fuel yesterday.”

“Yeah,” Tom says, stuffing his hands in his pockets while waiting for the invoice. He wonders if the system will go out, again; it’s always such a joy being stuck in this stuffy room here staring at a printer.

“You landed a keeper with that one,” Eva says, looking up, after she’s organized the bills in the drawer, and touching at side of her nose. “I can tell you two’re the kill rather than divorce sort.”

Tom blinks hard before he raises his brows, feeling yanked between divorce and kill. “Excuse me?”

“You know,” Eva says, waving a hand, as she puts a hand over the printer for the invoice. “Like one of you’d rather kill the other rather than get a divorce.”

Tom widens his eyes further. “…And is that good, Eva?”

Eva hums cheerily, handing Tom one of the papers that prints, then stuffing the other under her keyboard. “I think so.”

Tom folds the invoice slowly over his fingers, trying to remember if Eva has ever been married.

2

Tom looks up just as Greg pulls his hood over his head, then pauses, staring hard in disbelief. The hoodie has got Wambsgans embroidered in navy across the grey hem, obvious where it flips over his damp hair. It’s definitely the new one, too, still crisp and clean…

Did Greg…? He got Tom’s name sewn in it. He asked to…

He did that on purpose?

“Tom?” Greg says, a bit strained, peeking under his hood with a concerned curve of his brows. “Can you like, you know, grab it?”

“Uh, sure,” Tom says, taking the pot, then swallowing hard and looking down at the squirming crabs inside it. Simple, simple creatures; he envies them.

1

[ezlebe]

Greg freezes at a thunk on the deck somewhat above and to the aft, mid-pulling a hoodie over his head. He peeks up slowly, scratching hard at the stubble at his cheek. “Fuck,” he mutters, looking around his small berth with a sharp drag of his teeth. “Fuck.”

He reaches out and vacillates between worldly objects for a few seconds, then hastily grabs for his aluminum water bottle at a sharper clunk, and ducks while holding it close to his chest. He pauses at the bottom of the stairs, looking out to the pale light of the sky, just crossing into 6AM and blue stretching into a sunny morning. It’s a weird time to break onto the boat, for sure – he’s usually the last one up, so like is everyone docked around just like watching this happen?

(Including Mondale, who probably took a salmon skin snack and fell back to sleep.)

He inhales a deep, hopefully silent breath, then swallows hard, cursing Tom’s pre-neymoon, or whatever he called it, leaving Greg to like get blamed for the boat suddenly getting robbed. He reaches up and grabs around steps into the upper level, peeking up, only to stare at a familiar pair of shoulders hunched at the back near the hold and winding repair knots into a crab pot.

“Tom?” Greg says, faintly, blinking hard and feeling the tension drop to his toes.

“I said you had to fix this,” Tom says, without looking up, yanking another knot into the net.

Greg drops his eyes to the pot, then glances to the three others he’s let sit for the past couple days. “Oh?” He tries, lifting his voice into a question. “You did?”

Tom raises his eyes with a look that contains very little humor, so that’s… great. The pre-neymoon did not go well, clear enough.

“You’re like not supposed to be back until – uh, Monday,” Greg says, dropping back under the deck and setting the water bottle to the side. He briefly scrubs a hand through his hair, then forces himself up and into the morning light; he hasn’t even had a coffee yet, or even like… a snack bar.

“I did the seine,” he says, pointing to the big wrapped net and the few mismatched lines of repair in the hatch.

“We barely use that thing,” Tom says, which is like not even true, and yanking so hard on a knot that even Mondale looks up at the jerking motion. “The fishery starts in two weeks, Gregory; you want to be caught with our fucking asses red in the air?”

Greg stares for a pair of beats, a little frustrated, but mostly feeling relief like he’s never felt in his life. “I thought you were going to – uh, to captain Uncle Logan’s – ”

“Nope, sorry,” Tom says, brows going up, though he doesn’t like look away from mending the pot. “I realized you were too incompetent to do this yourself. You still hit your head on the deck, for fucks’ sake.”

Greg tries to look offended, rather than letting the concern slowly tossing up his chest appear on his face. He briefly glances to the other dock, full of the bigger seiners and trollers, a few bearing the Roy crest; the pre-neymoon went really bad.

“I’m going to, uh…” Greg wets his lips, backing into the small galley and pulling open a cabinet with a yank. He stares at the layers of colorful boxes, then tugs out a yellow one. “Make pancakes?”

“Great,” Tom mutters, without even making a crack about the pre-mix.

Greg pinches his face for a beat, then ducks back in the galley. He kneels down and opens the fridge for the milk, already wincing, but it’s still got a couple of days, so he doesn’t have to go for the shelf-stable stuff. He separates the batter and slices in the last bruised banana into his own, then sets it aside after a piling the cakes atop his plate. He glances down to Mondale, begging next to him, then peeks out to the deck, finding Tom staring at the water instead of the pot. It’s definitely… working up to a tense morning, but at least he is back? Maybe?

He finishes frying Tom’s with all his accoutrements, then stares at the dirty dishes, eventually wedging them into the small sink and hoping Tom won’t get his hackles up about it. He will eventually, definitely, but like maybe after he tells Greg what’s like going on with him.

He ducks his head out and catches Karolina sipping coffee and jerking her head at Tom in the opposite slip. He waves her off, exhaling a nervous laugh, which seems to grab Tom’s attention all by itself.

Tom doesn’t exactly take the plate aggressively, too polite for it, probably, but he does scowl when he slips into his usual side of the table. He cuts out a sliver, tines scratching against the hard plastic, then shoves it in his mouth, only to pause, then chew slow, as his eyes lift to Greg. “You put the cheese and bacon bits?”

“Yeah, and onion. I know you like them like a – ” Greg curls his nose, mostly for effect, because he’s eaten one by force and he knows it not bad… but it is wrong. “Like, a baked potato.”

Tom nods with a short drop of his head, tapping briefly at the edge of the plate, then cuts another sliver with a pair of careful movements. He eats it, then his shoulders hunch, as he exhales harsh through his nose. “Fuck, Greg.”

Greg blinks and raises his brows, then jumps a bit when the banana on the bottom of his fork falls to his plate. He stabs it back up, shoving it in his mouth and speaking around it. “Tom?”

“They want to send me to Naknek.”

Greg nods slow, wracking his mind, but – no, he doesn’t know what that means? Is it a term he’s never heard? “What?”

“Shiv, and your uncle,” Tom says, chewing on his cheek, finger tapping at the edge of his fork in an uneven tune. “Kendall. Are talking about sending me there – as in, after I got married – to Naknek to head some new cannery they got out there.”

Greg raises his brows; okay, so it’s a place, but: “I – I don’t know where – ”

“Jesus, Greg,” Tom mutters, as he lifts his hand, doing the sign-symbol thing where it looks like the state, then pointing at the crease of between his curled middle finger and jotting pointer finger. “Out the fuck here.”

“Oh jeez, that’s – ” Greg reaches out and touches lightly at the vague location of their Catherine Island against Tom’s thumb. It’s technically closer than Akutan, but Tom sounds far less enthused than he had about that new position. “And you wouldn’t be on a boat?”

“Uh, no,” Tom says, dropping his hand to pick up his fork, cutting out a neat triangle of pancake. “No, the fuck I would not, Greg.”

“But you – that’s like your job?” Greg says, trying to remember if Tom has ever mentioned doing anything else but fishing, or wanting to, and suddenly concerned he missed some hint. He hears his voice emerge fainter than he’d like, “You don’t want to fish anymore?”

“I do,” Tom snaps, as he shoves another bite in his mouth and sweeps his opposite hand up in a frustrated gesture.

Greg blinks rapidly, “Oh.”

“Honestly?” Tom mutters, rubbing at his forehead while stabbing at his plate. “I hope to one day go down with this boat, Greg,”

“I kind of don’t?” Greg says, swallowing pancake with some difficult down a dry throat. He’s had way too many thoughts and like actual nightmares, recently, about Tom capsizing under ice out in the Bering Sea to be totally comfortable just joking about it.

“I’d make sure you got out,” Tom says, waving the fork, as if that’s anywhere near the point. “You’ve got your life suspenders.”

Greg stares for a beat, then scoffs softly under his breath. “Like, I meant you? I – ”

“As a compromise, you ninny, let’s imagine you stick me out here on the deck when I’m a ninety-year-old vegetable, and sink it and me both out in the Gulf,” Tom interrupts, as he gestures now around the entire boat, leaning around with enough force to rock it. “Either way.”

Greg tips his head to the side, suffering a brief imagining of that situation and – It’s like way too early to be contemplating mortality. It’s totally bumming him out. “I don’t want to think about it, like is – is all I’m saying.”

Tom exhales a harsh sigh, head shaking while muttering something unintelligible under his breath. It sounds a bit derogatory, and even if it isn’t, he’d probably make something up that is if Greg’s tries to ask.

“So are – what are you going to do?” Greg asks, swirling a banana in the syrup, then popping it into his mouth.

Tom markedly pauses, fork going still on the plate, and stares at at it for a too long time. “I think I’m just having a tantrum, Greg. Throwing a big fit over something, before I just… I do it.”

“Oh,” Greg says, his earlier relief fully fading against the anxiety that’s already been eating at him since Tom ceded the boat. It’s way more than anxiety, really, but he would rather take a swig from Uncle Logan’s chew can than admit it. “So th-that’ll be Shiv, then? Won’t it?”

Tom takes a sharp breath and looks up with a start, his eyes suddenly wide, breath oddly punching out of him. “What?”

Greg scratches a hand through his hair, wishing he hadn’t opened his mouth. “Uh, like. Um, pushing you and – and the boat out… to sink when you’re ninety.”

Tom blinks hard and drops his shoulders, staring a beat, then looks markedly past Greg’s head. “No, that’s on you. Unless this is some clumsy way you’re trying to give it back.”

“No, like I – I’m like honored, or whatever, you know,” Greg says, shoving his hair behind his ears and shifting on his side of the table, then dropping his hand and digging his thumbnail into the usual groove in the table. “But really, Tom… it won’t be the same, I guess? Without you.”

“Oh,” Tom intones, as he exhales a deep sigh, briefly scraping his fork against the plate before dropping it entirely with a heavy clank. “I really wanted to take you with me, Greg, don’t get me wrong – get you in the real intense places, dragging up kings and opilios and getting iced around by the spray, have someone I could trust out there… but I don’t want anyone else with the Lady Como and – ” He shakes his head once hard. “And I can’t have both.”

“No, I – I get that,” Greg says, dropping his head in a nod, “I like can’t imagine… anyone else with it either.”

It would be some kind of wrong to watch see Lady Como go out and know it wasn’t Tom, whose been crabbing and fishing on her for twenty years, but some stranger who doesn’t know about that engine idle thing that’s just sort of annoying or that the handle has to be jerked twice on one of the hold hatches. And what would happen to Mondale? Shiv is in and out of town so much, too, so would he just be someone else’s dog for half the year?

“But I’m apparently not slated for that anymore, anyway,” Tom says, clearing his throat, then clearing it again, louder, “Instead, I’ll get to sit in some packing plant and make sure no one cuts off their hand.”

Greg swallows, hard, “Are you – ?”

“Did you know we’re not exclusive?” Tom interrupts, his voice suddenly halfway cracking, as he speaks to the table between them. “Me and Shiv.”

Greg drops his own eyes and stares at his plate for a beat, breath briefly shallow – is this…?

“I just…” Tom exhales a croaking laugh, absent any humor and almost wheezy. “Found that out yesterday.”

Greg lifts his head while his stomach turns to a rock. “Tom.”

“No big deal, though. We’re… adults, I guess,” Tom says, in a galling imitation of a brush off, as he squares his shoulders against the back of his bench seat. “It’s a perk of being in a relationship with a fisherman. There’s not a – no reasonable expectation of monogamy.”

Greg stares for a few beats, letting something uncomfortably like pure fury wash over him before he buries it with a pair of shallow breaths. He digs his thumb into the furrow between his brows, then bites his tongue hard, still unable to really speak.

“But did you know?” Tom repeats, his voice pitching tight toward cracking.

“Sort of, Tom,” Greg reminds, a low ache blooming under his ribs, “I – I told you about that thing with that guy from Juneau, remember? At your engagement party?”

Tom glances out the windows, as his face crumples wholly, somewhat horrifyingly, and he shakes his head. “I shouldn’t have pushed you off the boat.”

Greg wets his lips, then tilts his head to the side. It had been… a really bad day, all around, but he’s honestly not sure to this day if Tom was more upset for the rest of it because he broke safety protocol, because of Shiv, or because he lost his temper. Greg had been wary, afterward, really put off, but more hurt that Tom stopped looking him in the eye for so long.

“I – I just –” Tom says, then lifts a hand to rubs the heel of it up and down his forehead. “She’s still there?”

Greg raises his brows

“In Juneau,” Tom adds, mouth flattening and turning, as he offers a wan tilt of his head. “Remember? Because that’s where we went.”

Greg nods weakly and drags his hand from the table to curl at his front. He almost wants to text Roman, get him to ruin Shiv’s trip, but he would just turn around on Tom, too, when he got bored. “Fuck.”

“I lied to her,” Tom says, plainly ashamed, as if it’s on any kind of the same level as what Shiv has been doing to him. “Said you had an emergency with Mondale.”

“I mean, I-I do now sorta?” Greg says, looking toward the deck with a belated wince for the whole conversation. “Mondale is here.”

Mondale just looks like he’s thinking about dropping his toy in the water, though, which if he does at this very moment, then Greg and he are going to have an emergency.

“Tom, seriously, if you’re not cool with that –” Greg shakes his head. “Why would you – you’re still getting married?”

“You just don’t…” Tom falls quiet for a beat, staring at some middle distance through the windows behind Greg. He looks at Greg, again, something awful and resigned in his eyes. “Maybe, she’s right, I should be grown up about it. I’m on the other side of fucking forty. I don’t have a wife, or kids, or – or… shit, I’ve never even had a real house.”

“Is not having any of that so bad?” The words escape from Greg’s throat not entirely with his permission. He looks down at his hands, as he uneasily cracks the knuckle of his ring finger.

Tom is quiet for a long few moments, then his voice returns with a croak. “Greg, you can’t say that to me.”

“Why?” Greg asks, barely above a rasp himself.

“Because you – ” Tom pauses, then takes a shaky breath, his next words even less defined. “D-Do you?”

Greg lifts his shoulders weakly and gestures around them at the cramped galley slash pilothouse slash living room of the boat – their boat. He only briefly manages to make eye-contact with Tom, before he’s scratching hard at the inside of a brow and dropping his gaze back to the dregs of syrup in front of him. It swims in front of his eyes, and he drops his chin further, clenching his jaw when Tom stays silent across the table.

“No, you – hey, Greg, don’t – ” Tom cuts himself off, as his hands suddenly curl around Greg’s shoulders, drawing him bodily into Tom’s chest in a solid movement nothing like his fumbling words.

Greg only manages to keep himself from grabbing back for a few seconds, squeezing hard while he buries his head in Tom’s shoulder. He can’t be any of those things for Tom and he’s been aware of that from the beginning, hired on as a favor with no experience on any boat except a summer on a Princess cruise, but he hoped that he was something else, different but maybe as important, knowing how much Tom loves Lady Como and the work. He just never thought he’d end up being left with it.

“You want to know a fucked up secret?” Tom says, his mouth pressed hard to Greg’s ear, so every word is clipped and clear despite the low murmur of his voice. “From the moment I landed in Juneau, I just kept thinking about what you were up to. I was knocking shoulders with fancy fucks in a luxury tourist trap of a restaurant, eating an eighty dollar meal with someone I’m supposed to marry, but… But you were too fucking far away, Greg.”

Greg swallows hard at the evident catch in Tom’s voice.

“And then,” Tom pauses, to take a deep, guttural breath, “When Shiv gave that little speech on what she does and why she can do it, I thought…” He abruptly buries his nose into Greg’s hair with a squeeze across his shoulders. “Why should I try so hard to stay away from what I really want? So I didn’t; I came home.”

Greg tightens his hands in the sides of Tom’s jacket, soft and knitted, always slightly too nice for the work they do. “Could you stay home?”

A quiet, familiarly weighted splash echoes from the aft of the boat, then a beat later, a low, sad whine.

“I’m going to have to kill him,” Tom whispers, comically disappointed, his mouth still pressed to Greg’s ear.

Greg huffs wetly, an epiphany edging at his mind; Tom loves his boat, and the job, and Mondale, all of that is true, and just weeks ago he sat them down to carefully put it all in Greg’s hands.

Tom’s hand lifts from between Greg’s shoulder blades and presses into the back of his head, offering a soothing pair of scratches deep into his hair. “If you’re asking, I will.” He releases a lengthy breath. “I will, Greg. We’ll figure out our own mess.”

Greg nods into Tom’s shoulder, then slowly turns his head into his neck. He feels a smile breaking across his face. “Charter?”

“Oh, sure,” Tom says, tone lifting with real humor for the first time all morning, as he shifts his hand again and curves it against Greg’s nape, briefly squeezing to scold him for uttering the most cursed word. “Great plan, jot it right down between gold dredging and hawking painted seashell earrings.”

Greg huffs closes his eyes and briefly considers insisting they should do gold dredging, just because Tom watches too much of that show to actually hate it, then listens to Mondale make a louder, mournful noise for his deliberately lost toy. He lifts his head and looks out toward the deck, then regrets it immediately when Tom seems to take that as a sign to get up. “No, hey?”

Tom squeezes at Greg’s elbow, then he’s completely off the bench. “Alright, time to bite the bullet.”

“But like, we could – ” Greg flushes, a bit, when Tom raises a brow high up his forehead. He drags a lip across his teeth and feels somewhat chafed, as his body cools where Tom had previously been pressed so close. “What like do you need to do?”

“We just established I need to make a fucking awful phone call,” Tom says, pulling the phone out of his pocket to wave with a near miss at the edge of the table. “And then I… I’ll have to get all my crap out of Shiv’s before she tells her brothers and Roman pisses on my clothes, so find some garbage bags, buddy.” He looks down at the phone for a few beats, then takes a deep breath and throws his opposite hand up. “And, obviously, schedule a complete breakdown in between all that somewhere when the dissolution of the trajectory of my life fully hits me.”

Greg tips his head one way, then the other, as he peers up at Tom with a blink. “We can like get a coffee, too.”

“Oh, I’m going to need to,” Tom says, opening the screen on his phone with pale, flat pinch forming at his mouth. “Especially with all this lard and sugar in my stomach.”

Greg sighs hard through his nose and rolls a reluctant smile between his teeth. “Such a dick.”

“I know you love it, but it’s Bisquick, Gregory,” Tom says, leaning back in to the bench and pressing a shock of a kiss to Greg’s forehead, then dropping his own to meet it and breathing hard across the corner of Greg’s mouth, before pushing away from the little table. “And that will never change, no matter how bottomless the pit of affection is that I hold for you.”

[ezlebe]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Succession (TV 2018) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Greg Hirsch/Tom Wambsgans Characters: Tom Wambsgans, Greg Hirsch, Stewy Hosseini, Siobhan "Shiv" Roy Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fisherman, Alternate Universe, Anal Sex, Getting Together, First Time, Comfort Food, Alternate Universe - Small Town, Confessions, Awkwardness Summary:

Greg inhales a deep, hopefully silent breath, then swallows hard, cursing Tom’s pre-neymoon, or whatever he called it, leaving Greg to like get blamed for the boat suddenly getting robbed. He reaches up and grabs around steps into the upper level, peeking up, only to stare at a familiar pair of shoulders hunched at the back near the hold and winding repair knots into a crab pot.

“Tom?” Greg says, faintly, blinking hard and feeling the tension drop to his toes.

“I said you had to fix this,” Tom says, without looking up and yanking another knot into the net.

Greg drops his eyes to the pot, then glances to the three others he’s let sit for the past couple days. “Oh?” He tries, lifting his voice into a question. “You did?”

Tom raises his eyes with a look that contains very little humor, so that’s… great. The pre-neymoon did not go well, clear enough.

[ezlebe]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Succession (TV 2018) Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Greg Hirsch/Tom Wambsgans Characters: Tom Wambsgans, Greg Hirsch Additional Tags: Shower Sex, mild exhibitionism, Cold Water, Alcohol, Fluff, PWP, Hand Jobs, Bathing/Washing Series: Part 2 of Waystar Township Summary:

Tom looks up at an undeniable commotion building up down the dock. He wanders over to the rail of the boat, squinting over, and realizes at a second uproar of laughter mixed with urges for a rope that someone’s fallen into the water. He hesitates a few beats, then hums an upward pitch and swings out of the Lady Como and onto the dock with a click of his tongue. It’s his right to mock some idiot, as well, and it’s not like Greg is here to get pinchy about it.