Two

There’s a honk outside the house and Dylan recognizes the distinctive sound of Benny’s pickup pulling up the driveway, idling for a couple minutes, then pulling away. Bas is finally home. Dylan could have planned his day better, as he’s elbow-deep in flour and cookie dough, rolling out gingerbread. But whatever, Bas is home and that’s all that matters.

The butterflies in his stomach increase their flapping while the sounds of Bas unlocking the door and shucking his coat and shoes in the mudroom filter into the kitchen. Dylan keeps looking away from his rolling pin toward the kitchen door. There’s a thump like Bas has dropped something heavy on the ground, and for Crissake, can the man not just get in here?

It’s not like they haven’t been apart before—there was that month when Bas went back to his law firm in San Francisco, before he quit for good, and Dylan’s been on short trips to a handful of car shows in the fall—but the newness of Bas being his for good still hasn’t worn off. Dylan hopes it never does.

The door from the mudroom to the kitchen opens, and finally—finally—Bas’s broad shoulders fill the doorway. Dylan gives one last roll with his rolling pin and sets it aside the slab of dough.

“Hiya, Bas,” Dylan says.

“Hi.” Bas just stands there for a minute, and a slow smile blooms over his face. “It smells like Christmas in here.”

He’s looking Dylan up and down like it’s been years instead of just over a week since he’s seen him, and Dylan’s looking right back at him. The skin around his eyes is papery and thin—poor bastard probably didn’t get any sleep on the plane—and his hair is mussed and tucked haphazardly behind one ear and flopping over the other one. He’s the best-looking thing Dylan’s ever seen.

“Get the fuck over here,” Dylan says. He turns away from the island countertop and stretches his arms wide. Bas crosses the kitchen and steps right into his embrace. Dylan keeps his floury hands and forearms from messing up Bas’s shirt, but squeezes him close with his elbows. Bas wraps his arms around Dylan and squeezes back just as hard.

His face is tucked into Dylan’s neck and Dylan’s is mashed against Bas’s collarbone, and he just breathes in Bas’s scent, under the stale, recycled plane smell. He’ll want a shower before long, but Dylan’s not ready to let him go just yet.

“I missed you so much,” Bas murmurs against his neck, and Dylan can feel the big sigh he lets out against his chest. “I know I wasn’t away for that long, but…”

Dylan squeezes him harder until Bas grunts a little. “Missed you more,” he says and kisses Bas’s collarbone through his shirt.

Bas pulls back and takes Dylan’s head in his big hands. His nose is cold, but his lips are warm, and so are his hands. He presses his lips against Dylan’s and licks at the seam. Dylan opens up for him and then they’re kissing like they’re starving for each other, swapping spit and nipping at each other’s lips, and Dylan’s head swims with how glad he is that Bas is back home where he belongs.

He pulls back reluctantly after what feels like ages, but is probably only a minute or two. His lips are tingling and Bas’s cheeks are pink. He kisses Bas on each cheek, then plants another one on Bas’s lips, but then squirms out of his hold and jerks his head at the island countertop.

“I gotta get these cookies in the oven, man. We can kiss more later.”

Bas lets him go and takes a few steps back. He comes around the island and surveys the gingerbread dough rolled out on the counter.

“You’re making cookies?” He pinches a bit of dough from the rolled-out slab and Dylan swats his hand away. “For me?”

“No, jackass, for the holiday market tomorrow. Krystal’s coming by later to pick them up. It’s why I couldn’t come get you at the airport.”

Bas blinks and looks like a kid who just found out that Santa Claus isn’t real.

“Jesus, Bas, I’m kidding. Of course I’m making some for you, too.”

Bas’s face clears. “Oh. Good.” He pops the bit of dough in his mouth, then pulls out a stool and parks his ass on it. He picks up the cookie cutter, turns it upside down, and cocks his head at it. “But why are you making octopus-shaped cookies? Is that a Greenville thing?”

“The hell are you talking about? That’s a reindeer cutter.” Dylan points to the cookie sheet where he’s set out the cookies ready for the oven.

Bas turns the cookie cutter right side up, then back to upside down. “Um, Dylan, I hate to break it to you, but this is an octopus.” He holds it up with the rounded part on top and the jagged, irregular shapes on the bottom. And then he traces around each shape and counts out loud. “See, eight arms, for an octopus.”

Dylan grabs the metal cutter from him and turns it right side up. “Antlers, dude,” he says, poking his finger at each point. “And a freaking reindeer face.” He gestures at the batch of already-decorated cookies on the dining table. “They get red noses on ‘em. You know—for Rudolph?”

Bas looks from the cookies to the cutter and back again. “Huh. I guess I can see that. But I’m telling you, man, this is sold as an octopus cutter. I should know; I bought it in a set of sea-themed cookie cutters as a present for Ellen a couple years ago. Didn’t you notice that when you bought it?”

Dylan rolls his eyes and resumes cutting out his reindeer cookies. “Bought it at a second-hand store last year. Didn’t have any packaging on it.” He shimmies the spatula under the cut-out forms and fills the rest of the cookie sheet. With reindeer cookies, not freaky octopus cookies.

He slides the pair of cookie sheets into the oven and, when he turns around, Bas is staring at his ass with that look on his face. Dylan sets the timer on his watch and ignores him. He wants to—fucking hell, he does—but he really needs to finish these cookies. And if he lets Bas start something now, the cookies will burn.

“Ten minutes,” he promises Bas. “Then the last batch goes in.”

“And I can bend you over the table?” There’s a gleam in Bas’s eye and he raises his eyebrows suggestively.

Dylan snorts without answering, but he feels his cheeks go pink, and he rolls out the last of the dough faster than the first two batches, combined.