Re: [After: The Lieutenant/Noah NW]
At some point, in the more chill and calm future, Holly would feel insanely bad about needing what amounted to rescuing, right? I mean, that was what this was. He was on his knees, inside the station, people all the fuck over and arguing with each other now, and he wasn't thinking about how absolutely weak this was of him. He would think of it later, right? But right now he was just ugly sobbing. He couldn't even manage to make himself talk in Noah's head. It didn't even occur to him to try, but he soaked up the echo of Noah's voice like some dried out desert husk sucking up moisture and glutting himself on it. And maybe that should've chilled the ugly tears, but, nah, it just made him cry worse. And he was a serious fucking mess. Dried tears from the night previous, lips bitten cracked and red, snot soaked and his nose like something that could light Santa's sleigh.
And then Noah was there. There.
He felt him before he saw him. I mean, it was a physical recognition, right? It was enough to make Holly snap his head up in time to see Noah coming his way. Even with his vision tear blurred, he noticed that Noah looked like he'd been outside for way too fucking long. So, ridiculous as it was? As Noah grabbed him and hoisted him to his feet and into a hug, Holly managed to find his rough-jagged voice. "You're gonna get sick."
His voice? Yeah, his voice was wrecked. 'Yelling all night' wrecked, and the words were kinda like gravel and growl at Noah's shoulder, because, yeah, he'd found his voice, but he'd also grabbed the other guy with, like, every bit of strength he had to him. And he wasn't physically hurt or anything, so he could grip Noah just fucking fine. So, he let Noah feel him up, and he just held on. Nose to the side of Noah's neck, nudging aside the high collar of the sweater the guy wore, arms around Noah's upper arms. He clung. "You're cold. Your ear. Your cheek." Riveting conversation, but he needed a few more minutes of this to actually articulate anything.