The Stains Beneath Our Skin [mxm] ✔

38.1 | You've Finally Gotten...

"Casper?"

"Mhm?"

"Will you marry me?"

The entire mouthful of noodles he'd been slurping up fell back into the bowl of ramen with a splash. The little shop on the corner in the city was empty apart from them. Late Sunday night, perhaps one in the morning, with the streetlights blurred through the murky windows and the streets outside winding down to quiet. Three of the other wooden tables were empty, and only Jia with his long beard and kind eyes sat behind the counter.

"You've still got noodles in your mouth, love. Are those stuck in your throat?"

Casper hacked and yanked them free, the strings tugging uncomfortably at his throat, and went right back to staring at Cain, completely wordless and agape. Sure dickhead played calm, placing a shrimp in his mouth with his chopsticks, but that smile as he chewed said he knew exactly how much he'd just slapped Casper out of nowhere with that. Like a fish hurtling out of a wave smack into his face.

Marry him.

"Mm—" Cain wagged the chopstick at Casper and shifted on the chair to dig in his pocket— "I got this." And this was a fucking black velvet ring box. Despite all the broth still swilling around under his tongue, Casper's mouth went barren as a desert. "That's how it's done, isn't it?"

He had a ring box. Ring box probably meant ring. He couldn't have a ring that totally wasn't allowed what was Casper supposed to say to this bizarrely casual proposal anyway? Was Jia looking? Jia was looking, smiling, and the motion let the last of the broth in his mouth dribble over his lips.

A napkin met his lower lip as he turned back, and smiling all soft and doey, Cain dabbed the broth off Casper's chin, because apparently, he was totally brain dead now. It was only in that motion that Casper noticed how much his hands shook.

Nervous. Casper took a deep breath in through his nose and just about managed to shut his mouth. The question, right. Marry him.

Oh my god.

Then as if he'd been halfway to getting his thoughts together, Cain popped the lid of the box, and... Casper pressed his hands to his mouth, utterly breathless. It was beautiful.

Two snakes biting each other's tails, one silver and one gold, stacked on top of each other so it sort of formed two bands except where the heads crossed over to snap at the tail. And through each of them, the other metals threaded dorsal bands no thicker than sewing thread traced through them.

This time, when he spoke, the slightest tremor came into Cain's voice, wobbling around the edges. Sharp-edged tears pricked his eyes. "I know it hasn't been that long, Cas, and you know, I know you don't want anything like a wedding. It's not about that anyway."

Cain took a deep breath, and his eyes shone so bright Casper really stopped breathing as Cain leant across the table to brush their hands. "We're fated, my love, and I can't ever dream of being with anyone else. At this point, I can't even dream of being with another you. You're it for me, love. You're my soulmate. We were made for each other, and I thought it in my first life and I still bloody think it now. So ... that's what I'm offering you with this. I've never ... done all this normal traditional stuff. You know that. And I haven't done this since ... since the first time. But I think maybe it makes it ring even more potent for me. Us. Forever. Through death and between worlds and through centuries. This is me, telling you I want to be with you forever. I'm not so much asking as ... offering. If you want me as well. So ... will you marry me, Cassie?"

And what else could he say? Not that he could actually say it. Hand still smothering the trembling in his lips, Casper nodded. God, he nodded way too hard with way too much enthusiasm and it kind of hurt his neck, and then the sob he'd been really trying to avoid burst from his lips and he flapped his free hand at Cain and he had no clue what that even meant but it was just too much.

Cain wanted to marry him. That was so stupid and corny and wonderful and the stupid idiot would probably love to have the big wedding and watch Casper walk down the aisle, and he'd probably happy cry even if Casper walked down in the scruffiest clothes he owned while he stood there in his stupid white shirt and black slacks looking like the most beautiful human being on the planet.

Cain snared his flapping hand, so gentle and his fingers warm against Casper's skin. Probably from the bowl, and he'd probably been warming them on there while he worked up to the right moment. "Is that a yes?"

"I can't nod any harder!" Casper cried from between his fingers.

A wobbly smile spread across Cain's lips, a tremulous mix of so many things in his eyes. The streetlights outside shone an amber halo behind his head, softened by the mist steaming up the window. "Say it for me, Cas. Please?"

"Yes!"

The light of his smile took Casper's breath away. Just like the way he'd looked at him in another life, a couple of years ago now but the memories were still so fresh. Those first few meetings when everything was beautiful and simple and new, the way he fumbled everything he said outside the Chinese, the city lights illuminating his face as they sat on that bench above the world, the way he shone brighter than anything Casper had ever seen when he first spotted him at that bar that no longer existed.

His arms around Casper and the whisper in his ear outside his building. Remember me like this.

And he'd never forgotten.

Casper bolted out of his chair around the table and threw himself in Cain's lap. Arms around his neck and the searing press of his kiss. Forever. Casper sobbed against his lips. An eternity of this with someone he loved so much ... it was like a dream.

Cain held him tight until his breathing calmed down, all silent but for the rumble of traffic and the sweet strumming of some instrument from the speakers. Jia had disappeared into the back, leaving them in peace.

With one last shaking breath, Casper pulled back from Cain, although that breathless smile that bloomed on Cain's lips as their eyes met almost had Casper crying for real. Grinning himself, Casper pinched Cain's cheek.

"Don't I get a ring?"

"Well—"

"Well?"

Cain laughed. "Well, if you let me finish my sentence, then well, I thought perhaps you might just want to do it now."

"Now?" Casper's brow furrowed. "In the Chinese place?"

"Well, see I got talking to Jia – you know, because I decided to do it here – and it actually turned out he knows the owner of the chippy down the way and he's an ordained priest and—"

A giggle slipped Casper's lips. Then another, and a moment later he was collapsed against Cain howling with laughter.

"Oi! Cas, you—" Cain shoved him back, but Casper just slithered down out of his lap to press his face there while he knelt, shaking, on the floor. "Get off me! I take it back, you can absolutely piss off you little—"

Wheezing, Casper got the laughter under control just enough to beam up at Cain. Felt like the fucking sun shined out his mouth and his cheeks ached. Casper grabbed Cain's hands and pressed them tight to his chest. "I love you so fucking much. You're perfect. You're just absolutely perfect. I have literally never wanted anything more in my life than to get married to you in our Chinese place by some random guy from the chip shop. Like, I can't even express how much I want that, you big stupid blue-footed booby."

"Well, I'm certainly not marrying you if you're going to keep calling me a booby. Consider it called off."

Casper shook his head, grinning. "Too late, you already asked. No pre-nups either. Then I can divorce you in a year and take all your stuff and my ultimate plan will have been—"

The bell on the shop door rang, and he probably should have expected someone to come in really, with the bars closing soon. He'd gotten halfway to his feet when Cain hauled him up the rest of the way and shoved Casper behind his back.

The stench of rot lifted high and sick in the air. A physical thing that curled Casper up in its wickedly cold arms.

"No." Cain's voice broke on the word. "No. Not again."

And Casper couldn't quite make himself say or do anything, because he sure hadn't expected it to be Levi.