la la la. i'm going to faaaaaaaaail.
Feb. 14th, 2006 07:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quigonejinn
Hornblower had not been expecting Bush to have a woman.
It was blindingly obvious in retrospect -- the address in Sheerness was not a boarding house or an inn, and upon arrival, it was obvious from just looking at the place that it had been an old, larger house subsequently subdivided. No sign that there was a landlady on the premises to do the cooking or cleaning or laundry, only hallways that were empty at this late hour in the morning, and there she was at the door.
She had blue eyes and slightly curly hair, and she was holding a shawl around her. Hornblower had a moment where he thought that she might be one of Bush's sisters. That could be a family resemblance around the mouth, though he couldn't imagine any of Bush's sisters answering the door in a shift, and perhaps Bush had a younger sister in addition to his older ones. Perhaps.
And then Hornblower saw, across the room and behind the woman, Bush. He was lying in a bed that had obviously been slept in by two, and Hornblower could see Bush's shoulders, the queue, the back with its scars from the retaking of the Renown and other engagements, scars that Hornblower had never asked about in all the times that he had seen them. The sheets were pulled up, the wooden leg and all its buckles dropped on the floor the night before, and part of the blankets were pulled up over Bush's head to keep the light out.
Bush was still shaking the sleep out of himself an hour later, when they were having an early dinner together at a tavern near the Dockyards.
"Mostly waiting at this job," he said as he sawed into his mutton. They were the only ones eating in there, and these were the first words that Bush had said about the Dockyards all morning.
"Yes," Hornblower said and stared at the table. His plate was in front of him, untouched and still clean except for the chop laid down smack-dab in a puddle of grease at the center.
Later, he maneuvered Bush around to talk about the quality of inns and boarding houses in Sheerness and the wretched expense of hiring someone to clean a house and cook meals. The subject was a more cheerful one for Bush, it seemed, and he held forth with some degree of detail. Eventually:
"Why do you think I got Ann? Cheaper that way," Bush said, laughing, but as Hornblower kept looking at him, he looked down at the mutton, laughed again, and eventually admitted, with a twitch of a smile in the corner of his mouth, that it was actually more expensive to keep a mistress who would, in turn, keep house.-
Hornblower did not put Bush to bed in his clothes -- it wasn't economical, and it certainly wouldn't be comfortable in the Kingston heat, so Bush's coat was on the wall. Now, the sword in a becket, and now, there was the necktie with Bush holding himself up against the side of the ship and Hornblower bending a little because the light was not very good. Square knot in front, Bush leaning his head to the side after Hornblower had undone the knot.
"Can you get the rest of that?"
Bush was still humming a little, and his head was tilted to the side. He broke off the humming to give Hornblower a smile, and the black cloth was still lying against his neck. The light wasn't very good, but Hornblower could see that there was a bit of pale skin in between where the cloth was lying and where the tan from the quarterdeck started. Bush was surprisingly pale; Hornblower remembered coming to visit Bush on the day that Buckland had gone off to make his first report, and he remembered the lines at Bush's wrists and neck. He'd been able to see them even underneath the sheet.
Hornblower realized that he was staring with his mouth open, so he shut it, and then, there was another moment of Bush smiling at him without saying a word.
And then Bush closed his eyes. He was still smiling, so he wasn't asleep, and Hornblower stepped a little closer. "Raise your arms, and I'll help you off with the shirt."
Bush was still too drunk to say anything, so he just lifted his arms and started humming again. Low, something soft, nothing with words that Hornblower could pick out, and they were standing very close now. Bush was still smiling with his arms up over his head, and Hornblower, looking him full in the face, reached up for the ends of the sleeves.
Before the shirt was entirely over Bush's head, Hornblower had kissed Bush hard, across the mouth. By the time that he'd gotten the shirt pushed back to the wrists, he was pulling the neckcloth off of Bush with his teeth. Bush had managed to push, by himself, his pants down to the middle of his thighs, and he was humming in between kisses.
The humming got louder when Hornblower took him in hand; the humming stopped for a measure or so of beats when Hornblower laid his tongue full-on against the scar that ran down from Bush's shoulder, across his collarbone and slanting across his chest. It hadn't been deep enough to stitch up, but Bush let out a gasp when Hornblower lifted his mouth back off and just skimmed his lips over it. Hornblower would have taken it as a sign of pain except Bush licked his lips and rocked againt Hornblower's hand -- he looked a little less drunk now even though his eyes were still half-closed, and that was how it went.
Hornblower, bent a little because Bush wasn't quite as tall as he was, his hand wrapped around Bush's cock and his mouth on a scar that jumped over Bush's sternum. Bush, holding his best shirt in a ball in his right hand and hanging onto a beam over head for dear life with the other and trying to keep humming because somehow, that seemed to be the thing to do, and eventually, the room began to sway when he got hard enough to drive himself against Hornblower's hand. Eventually, Hornblower held him against the bulkhead with his shoulder so that they didn't go slipping all over the room. This made Bush made moan partially because there were half-healed scars on his back, but mostly because he could no longer push so well against those long fingers that were wrapped around him, that sometimes pulled off to stroke other, less important parts of him for no apparent reason, and Hornblower had to lean against him even harder, grip Bush even more tightly, and eventually, Bush bit his lip and went still.
Silence, then a shiver, a gasp, and a sound that, somehow, to Hornblower's ears, actually sounded like the last note on For He's A Jolly Good Fellow.
Afterwards, Hornblower gave up the notion of getting Bush into a nightshirt, so he just tumbled Bush into the cot and tried to work off the breeches and stockings before giving it up as a hopeless task. Bush kept trying to pull Hornblower into the cot with him, and Horatio had to settle for getting Bush's shoes and stockings.
"The room won't stop swaying," Bush said.
He had his eyes closed, and he sounded more than half asleep, but he was still smiling. He also had a hand stretched out over the side of his cot -- he kept it there, made a vague reaching motion, so Hornblower leaned and squeezed those hard, callused fingers. Before he let go again, though, Bush had fallen asleep, so Hornblower was able to sit with him a little while, holding his hand like that, and he watched. Every now and then, he thought he heard the faintest bit of humming or a sound from Bush as he slept. The ship would rock, the cot would sway, and Hornblower would find himelf smiling and marveling at a universe that let him have a friend like this as well as a sloop-of-war, a ship of his own.
In all truth, Hornblower, too, remembered that evening as one of the most succesful he had ever had.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 03:03 am (UTC)WHOO-HOOO!!! YEA!!!
that's about all i can articulate right now.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 04:44 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 05:45 pm (UTC)there needs to be more fic about kingston debauchery
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 03:50 am (UTC)Hornblower would find himelf smiling and marveling at a universe that let him have a friend like this as well as a sloop-of-war, a ship of his own.
Aw.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 04:52 pm (UTC)Until he has, like, a THREESOME or something with Bush and his woman. XD
And yay. Sap. ^_^ I'm glad you enjoyed these.
HH makes me fail at real life ... repeatedly LOL!!
Date: 2006-02-15 04:13 am (UTC)And thank you for some Bush!happiness in Sheerness.
"For he's a jolly good fellow" -- YES, they are. And so are you for writing it. Because this so happened.
Re: HH makes me fail at real life ... repeatedly LOL!!
Date: 2006-02-15 05:06 pm (UTC)All of this is to say that I refuse to believe that Hornblower left Bush that night aboard the Renown until Bush really and truly was asleep in his cot.
And Bush deserves some happiness in his life that isn't connected with the saucy wooden girls, dammit. Blasphemous as it is, he ought to have more than that. :/
good luck good luck
Date: 2006-02-15 05:29 am (UTC)And I loved the second one, it was hot and so *vivid* and lovely. But this bit: those long fingers that were wrapped around him, that sometimes pulled off to stroke other, less important parts of him for no apparent reason, was the winner. OMGyes. And Horatio watching Bush sleep. <3 <3 <3
If you fail can we rhodnap you and make you write us more fic?
Re: good luck good luck
Date: 2006-02-15 05:11 pm (UTC)It is kind of messy, isn't it? I'm going to have to fiddle with it when my brain is a bowl of banana pudding.
And GOD. Once this spate of exam and work hell is over, Idkjfghdf. So much fic that I want to write. SO PAINFULLY MUCH FIC. INCLUDING ENDLESS PLOTTING FOR CAPTAIN ARCHIE.
Re: good luck good luck
Date: 2006-02-15 05:11 pm (UTC)i <3 banana pudding
Date: 2006-02-15 09:59 pm (UTC)Which is lucky because there are so many people to choose from, not least Captain AUpants Archie.
Hope your exams go well. Remember to take off your hat if it is v crushed.
Re: i <3 banana pudding
Date: 2006-02-16 02:57 am (UTC)I fear I will be dismasted with the Dover Cliffs to lee anyways. :( *gently extracts crumpled hat from under arm*
Re: i <3 banana pudding
Date: 2006-02-16 05:34 am (UTC)Apparently the Kennedy motto is 'consider the end.'
*builds fire ships to interrupt your exam*
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 06:08 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-15 05:13 pm (UTC)