It didn’t take long. Diwa came first, his hips stuttering, and felt Colin follow a few strokes later with a shudder that ran through his whole frame as his small teeth bit down into the muscle of Diwa’s shoulder.
Colin went boneless against him. His forehead rested heavy against Diwa’s neck, his legs still hooked loosely around Diwa’s waist. The water held them both. Diwa manoeuvred them slowly towards the shallow end, one hand cupping the back of Colin’s head.
“All right,” Diwa murmured. His free hand skimmed over Colin’s spine, fingertips skating across the border between his sunburnt skin and the untouched.
Colin made a sound of assent. His body was loose in a way that Diwa took as a sign of his success as an alpha. He let Diwa hold him against the pool wall, let Diwa’s thumb trace the shell of his ear, and let himself be kissed on the forehead and the bridge of his nose.
Diwa looked at him. His omega, naked, flushed, and heavy-limbed in the shallows, his face gone soft and satisfied.
“I love seeing you like this,” Diwa said. “When you’re not all tired from work.”
The change that those words brought in Colin was immediate. His shoulders pulled back, and his hands flattened and pushed Diwa away. He unlocked his ankles from behind Diwa’s back and settled his footing on the pool floor, immediately putting six feet of warm water between them.
“What do you mean by that, Diwa?”
Colin’s voice remained level and unhurried, and that was a problem. Angry Colin was manageable. Angry Colin went quiet and clipped and you could ride it out by leaving him alone for a little bit to stew. This Colin wanted an answer to his question, and clearly meant to interrogate what Diwa had unthinkingly blurted out.
“I didn’t mean…Colin, I wasn’t saying your work isbad! I just…I know how much your body takes on. Every day. All that lifting, the kneeling, the dealing with chemicals, all of it. Yourhands, Colin.” He gestured at the space between them. “I just meant that here, right now, you’re not wrecking yourself for someone else’s bathroom grout. You’re resting. You’re eating properly. Your shoulders aren’t up round your ears.” The words were coming faster than he could vet them, which was never ideal. “I like seeing youhappy. That’s all I meant. You deserve this. All of it. The very best of everything, Colin.”
“So you prefer this version of me,” Colin said. “The easy one you’ve bought.”
“No! That’s not what I meant at all!”
“Because I like my work, Diwa.”
“I know you do.”
“I’m good at it.”
“I know.”
“But I also likethis…” Colin couldn’t quite meet his eyes as he gestured to their lush surroundings. “I like being here, and being looked after. I like all of it more than I’ve got any right to, and it scares the shit out of me that I could get used to this so easily, when I went forty years without even a taste of it.”
Diwa kept still. His hands stayed beneath the surface.
“Your family, Diwa.” Colin’s throat moved around the words. “That massive bloody circus of uncles and cousins.” He breathed out through his nose. “That’s what I used to dream about. When the twins were small and it was just me, trying to sort everythingout for the holidays, that’s what I wanted for them. A room full of people who’d show up for them. Do you know how fucking scary it is for me to want what you’re offering me this badly, Diwa?”
Diwa crossed the six feet of water between them, put both hands on the sides of Colin’s face, and kissed him with the sun on his back and the taste of salt on Colin’s mouth. Colin’s hand came up and gripped his shoulders, holding him there, and neither of them said anything else for a long time.
When Colin pulled back, he said, “I know my life looks small, compared to yours. I didn’t build a multi-national company in my twenties like you did. All I’ve got to show for my work is a two-bed flat in Barking and a van I bought off a bloke in Dagenham for eight hundred quid.” The water lapped between them. “But I also kept my boys and me going. I built my life from nothing, Diwa. From absolute nothing. And it means something to me that I managed that.”
Diwa’s eyes burned. The sun was behind Colin’s head, so he blamed the tears on that. Just a little bit. Diwa couldn’t speak properly, because everything he’d said in the last five minutes had come out wrong, and he was terrified of making it worse.
“That’s not what I meant,” his voice cracked. “Colin, I wouldnever! I didn’t mean to say your life was small.”
“I know what you meant.” Colin’s voice was level. “I know that hurting me is the last thing you would ever want to do. But I need you to let me tell you what I heard.”
Diwa pressed the heel of his hand against his eye. The salt water stung, but he deserved it.
“I like that I can make my own way, Diwa, but it has taken a toll.” He said it quietly, directed at the water between them rather than at Diwa’s face. “My body hurts all the time. My knees, back, and shoulders have been shot to shit. I wake up stiff every morning, and it takes longer and longer to get moving. I’m forty, Diwa. Not sixty. I shouldn’t feel like this.”
Diwa kept still. His hands stayed beneath the surface so he couldn’t give in to the temptation to reach out to Colin.
“I’ve spent a lot of time wondering what else I could’ve done with myself. What I could’ve been, if things had been different. I used to do my living through the boys, if I’m honest. Stephen was so bloody smart, making something of himself. Lysander too, in his own way.” The corner of his mouth pulled sideways. “I wasn’t thrilled about the OnlyFans, Diwa. I’ll be straight with you about that. But he’s come through the other side of it, and he’s set, and that’s what matters.”
Once Diwa was sure he could keep the tremor in his voice under control, he let himself speak again. “If you had a choice, if you could do anything you wanted, anything at all with no limits. What would you do?”
Colin looked at him properly then. “I think I’d make sure I stick around you,” he said. “Because god knows you need looking after.”
