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by elfin


"At the FBI we call this 'avoidance behaviour', Chuck."

Don watched his brother swap a dead piece of chalk for a fresh piece, pushing it into the red holder he'd given Charlie years ago; a birthday gift, back when he'd found buying presents for his genius younger brother an almost impossible chore.  This year it had seemed ridiculously easy.

"In teaching we call it 'playing hooky'."

"I thought that was when you skipped classes."

"Give me a class over tonight any day."

Don laughed.  "Give me a break, Charlie.  It's just dinner."

"Dad will insist on singing.  And a cake with candles."

"So?  What's so terrible?  It's your birthday, not a wake."

Turning from the board, Charlie looked pleadingly at Don.  "I haven't asked you for anything for a long time…"

"Oh, no.  Absolutely not.  Dad would never forgive me.  He's back home preparing a seven course meal."

"In my kitchen!"

"And when do you ever use it?"

Charlie shook his head.  "Don't you start.  Dad's giving me a hard enough time as it is."

"Over the life choice thing," Don nodded, "tell me about it.  You're not the only one, you know.  I don't remember him being this bad when I was a teenager."

"Oh, he was definitely this bad when I was a teenager."

"You were at Princeton, he had reason to worry."

"You are kidding, right?  Mom had me on such a tight leash I didn't even get my hands on a beer until I was in the final year."

He turned back to the board and it gave Don a chance to look at him - really look at him - as intelligent brown eyes danced over the flowing equations scrawled there in handwriting so incredibly neat it always amazed Don anyone could write so legibly with such an archaic tool like chalk. 

Throughout their lives, it seemed, they'd been at odds with each other.  But in the last couple of years they'd managed to find some peace between them, an understanding; a respect for what each other could do.  When they'd been kids, Charlie had been a burden - what eighteen year old wanted their thirteen year old brother hanging around them, never mind in the same class?  Charlie was always being picked on, always being bullied, although rarely did the bullies ever follow through.  It was one thing to hate your brother for being special, and therefore a pain in the ass, it was another thing for other people to hate him because he was special and to make him suffer because of it.  After Jason Kelly and his friends cornered Charlie one afternoon after school, punching and kicking him so hard he had to be taken to the hospital for x-rays, Don had waited for the same gang of boys the following day and had made himself perfectly clear when he explained with the aid of a baseball bat that no one touched his baby brother without serious ramifications.  In Jason's case, a broken femur. 

To his credit, Jason had never told, and he'd never laid a finger on Charlie again.  For years Don had believed no one else knew what he'd done.  Until one night when Charlie - a lot older then - had thanked him, told him he'd always known and that secretly he'd loved him even more for doing it.  Because as much as Don resented Charlie for what he was and the attention it got him, Charlie loved and worshipped Don simply because he was his big brother.  And that handed Don an advantage, a hold, over Charlie, and sometimes he'd used it against him just to feel like the older child, just to make Charlie cry.

He regretted every one of those times now, as he watched his brother just thinking, watched as the cogs spun faster than they did in most people's brains.  He was starting to lose track of the number of cases Charlie had helped them solve, impossible to calculate the number of lives he'd saved.  Don had signed up for it, Charlie hadn't but he helped anyway because in Charlie's mind this was the first time Don had ever needed him and as difficult as that was for Don to admit, he did love the way it made his brother bounce.

"He keeps saying I need to take on the responsibility of the house," Charlie said suddenly, slightly randomly as far as Don was concerned, "so that I'll be ready for when I have a wife and kids."

Don nodded his sympathy.  "Me too.  He seems intent on marrying us both off."

"Yes.  To good girls like… like Amita."

"You like Amita."

"Yeah but she's… she's like the only friend I have who's in my age group.  I don't want to screw it up by dating her and it all going wrong."

"Why do you think it'll go wrong?"

Charlie's tilted his head, looked right at him.  "I know it will.  You know it will too."

"I don't know anything of the sort."  But even as he said it he was reading the truth in his brother's eyes and it made an odd kind of sense.

"When Susan Berry was back in town I couldn't keep my hands off her.  When we slept together it was electric.  I don't feel that with Amita."

"But you did love Susan, lived with her for what… two years?"  Maybe he'd read that expression wrong.

"Yeah."  He dropped his voice.  "But I wasn't faithful." 

Don couldn't help his eyes widen, the surprise he felt.  "You?  I always imagined you'd be as faithful as a p-…."  He shut his mouth.

"As what?"  The penny dropped.  "Were you going to liken me to a puppy?!"

Don blushed.  "It's the hair, and the eyes, you know?  It's… it's you, Charlie.  You're a good guy, you… you're the faithful type.  Everything I've done to you and you stayed faithful to me."

His face creased and he said, "You're my brother," like it was the most obvious explanation in the world.

"And Susan was your girlfriend, your lover."

Putting the chalk down, Charlie moved to lean against his desk, opposite where Don was standing.  "I wasn't unfaithful with another woman."

He felt unbelievably - almost inappropriately - proud; he had read it right!  "A guy."

Charlie nodded.  "You're not… disappointed?  Angry?  Disgusted?"

Don smiled, shook his head, muttered his brother's name, "Charlie… you think me of all people is in any place to judge you?"  The curly head ducked again and he leaned forward, tapped one narrow shoulder with an open hand.  "You're my brother."  If Charlie could use that to explain away everything, he could too.  "Why don't you bring someone tonight?  Anyone.  Bring Larry if you have to."

"I think Larry's invited anyway.  He's asked Megan."

"Course he is.  I knew that.  When Dad told me to bring someone, I asked her too."

"You asked her?"

"Only because she's… safe, you know?  She's dating Larry and she's never shown the slightest interest in me."

"So who are you bringing?

Don shrugged.  "Maybe I should ask Amita."  He watched his brother's face fall and grinned.  "Only kidding.  But I'm serious about you.  Bring someone - a guy - and maybe it'll get Dad off your case."

Charlie chuckled.  "You think I have guys queuing up to go out with me?  To meet my Dad?"

Considering that, considering Charlie's brilliance, his reputation, not to mention the face which wasn't difficult to look at, and his body, which while not sculpted or muscled left so much to the imagination and wouldn't disappoint.  He nodded, "Actually, Chuck, I think you probably do."

#

Despite himself, he was nervous waiting for Charlie to turn up.  This morning it had seemed like a great idea, Charlie turning up with a male date and putting to rest once and for all Dad hassling him about settling down and having the standard 2.4 children ("That's a ridiculous statistic, Don, how can any couple have a fraction of a child?").  Now the time had actually come, he wasn't so sure.  He himself had failed to find a date.  Not that he really cared.  He'd pre-emptied Charlie anyway and asked Colby to join him.  He liked Colby, and he knew Colby liked Charlie even if he did irritate the hell out of him.  Charlie fascinated most people he met, and did so without usually acknowledging it, so it made curiosity worse.  If he wasn't Don's brother, he was sure Colby would have made a move by now, and maybe flaunting Charlie's sexuality in front of the guy wasn't such a good idea, but it still didn't change the fact that if Colby laid a finger on Charlie, Don would kill him.  And besides, if Charlie did bring a guy but lost his nerve, he could take inspiration from Don's choice of a "+1" and say the guy was just a friend.

The door opened.  "Hey," Don glanced up from setting out the cutlery on the dining table.

"Hey."  Charlie stepped inside, and a taller man with short, straight dark hair followed him.  "Erm, this is Stephen, a friend of mine."  Stephen crossed the room, leaned over the table and shook his hand.

"You must by Don.  I've heard everything about you."

Don grinned, glancing at Charlie and watching the blush spread over his cheeks.  "Not everything, I hope."  He kept his tone light, pegging 'Stephen' at a couple of years older than his brother.  He was wearing an expensive dark suit over a deep blue shirt, open at the neck, which set off his eyes perfectly.  Charlie definitely hadn't disappointed him.

The kitchen door swung inwards.  "Hey, here's the birthday boy!"  Their father's exuberance faded slightly when his gaze alighted on the strange in his son's house.  "Who's this?"

"Dad, this is Stephen, a friend of mine.  Stephen, my father."  Another strong handshake. 

"It's good to meet you, Sir."

Alan accepted the handshake, but his eyes were firmly on his youngest.  "So, this is how it's going to be, is it, Charlie?"  There was something dark in his tone, but it was overwhelmed by the humour.  "Okay."  He looked directly at the man in front of him.  "Good to meet you too, Stephen.  I wish I could say Charlie's told me all about you…."

"It's my experience that the only thing Charlie's tells anyone all about is his Math, because it's what's important to him."

Don had to cover his mouth, biting his top lip to prevent himself from laughing.  He liked the guy already.  Behind Stephen and Alan, Charlie was hanging up his coat and as he turned the grin was wiped from Don's face.  There was nothing specifically special about the shirt he wore - blue, brown and white downwards stripes, curving over his shoulders - but unusually he was wearing it with the top two buttons undone, and it seemed like it was slightly too big for him, all of which meant that as he turned to smile at Don he got an eyeful - a scalene triangle of olive flesh, dark hair dusting the obtuse angle, collar bone dissecting two sides.  His own reaction surprised him.  It had been a while since he'd looked at his little brother and felt anything like what he felt right at that moment - heat, want, desire, need.  Each time it happened he put it down to stress, to something specific happening in his life.  And in retrospect that was easy to do.  But apart from the obvious issue of having to take a male co-worker to his brother's birthday meal, there wasn't anything particularly stressful in his life right then.  Even his caseload wasn't putting any real pressure on him.

So where the hell had this come from? 

In a discussion with people he really trusted, who were drunk and wouldn't remember anything in the morning, he would have been the first to admit that Charlie wasn't hard on the eyes, that he got the looks and the brains of the family while Don got… Don got the brevity, Don got the social skills.  And Don got the freedom to have a relatively normal life, even if he didn't.

"You okay?"  Charlie was at his shoulder, concern and worry shining clear in his eyes. 

Not able to help himself, Don leaned in, mouth next to his brother's ear.  "He's… very good-looking, Chuck.  I'm impressed."

Predictably, Charlie blushed, turned when there was a knock at the door, shoulder brushing Don's chest and again he couldn't help it.  He wrapped a casual arm around Charlie's waist, eliciting a squeak from his brother, hanging on a moment before bending his fingers and tickling him just under his ribs as Larry and Megan walked in, Larry's face lighting up immediately - Don could understand that - Charlie's laugh could make living worthwhile.

Stephen turned out not to be a surprise to Larry, who, while he hadn't always known Charlie had swung both ways, took it completely in his stride to find out that he did.  Megan seemed to find the idea quite sexy, and Don caught her staring at Stephen and Charlie - who definitely weren't all other each other although there were a couple of touching moments - several times during the wonderful meal cooked by their father.

He was a senior research fellow at CalSci, it turned out, specialising in statistical analysis with a particular interest in human behavioural modelling.  When Don made some off-hand comment about finding him useful at the FBI he noticed a sharp look from Charlie and smoothed things over quickly by confirming with Megan that, unfortunately for Stephen, they already had the best consultant available working with them.  Deep down he was ashamed of constantly needing confirmation from Charlie that they were okay now, however he elicited it.  But he did need it. Years of estrangement from his brother meant that having him so close now was a thrill, a pleasure, something that sat warm in his heart that he thought might never wear out.

He too found himself watching the birthday boy and his… friend.  To have someone who could understand him must have been a relief for Charlie, Don got that.  But on the couple of occasions that Stephen touched his brother he felt a surge of protective jealousy.  Once or twice he glanced at their father to gauge his true reaction, and even though Charlie's duel preferences apparently weren't a surprise there earlier, Don did begin to think that Alan's earlier humour could be put down to him imagining Charlie had done this just to get him off his back, and maybe now he was starting to realise that Charlie wasn't kidding around.  Still, he remained polite and jovial, and his usually intense son did look relaxed and happy.  They would both forgive a lot just to have him like that.

Alan retired to bed just after midnight, citing an early-morning meeting.  Megan and Larry took off half an hour later, with Stephen saying his goodbyes immediately after.  Don watched he and Charlie through the window, standing by Stephen's SUV, sharing a quick kiss and no doubt a promise to call one another sometime.  They both watched the headlights back out of the drive and vanish, then Charlie came inside and locking the door he started to clear up the table.

Don gave him a hand, not saying anything, just working together in a comfortable silence until the quiet dish-washer was running and Don emptied the final bottle of wine equally into their glasses.

"Happy Birthday, Charlie," he said, clinking his glass to his brother's.  Charlie smiled, accepting the toast and taking a mouthful of wine.  "You okay?"

"Dad didn't freak out."  Don could hear the slight slur on the third word.  They'd drunk their way through several bottles; they were both on the wrong side of sober.

"You expected him to?" 

He shrugged.  "I think he might tomorrow."

Don shook his head.  "Stephen's a nice guy."  Another shrug, and he recognised the dismissal.  "You're… not gonna call him again, are you?"

"He's just been asking me to go for a drink for a couple of months.  You told me to bring someone, he was the first one who came to mind."

"If he's the first just to come to mind, you don't have anything to worry about.  Besides," Don closed in on him, resisted the urge to touch, "you deserve the best."

Charlie looked up at him.  "Why?"

The question threw him for a moment.  "Because you're my brother."

A slow nod, like he was processing the answer.  "You didn't always feel like that."

Rolling his eyes, Don closed the gap between them, the wine making him braver - stupider - than usual.  With others, Charlie would back away if the gap between he and whoever else got too small.  But with Don, he didn't move, didn't back away.  Maybe because Don was the only person in the world he trusted not to get violent with him.  Even their father had smacked him once or twice.  The one time Don had attacked him had been out in the garden, the second case he'd worked on for his brother, the time he'd almost caught a bullet.  And he hadn't attacked him per se, he'd just crossed a line he hadn't crossed before, grabbed Charlie's jacket, shaken him….  He was sorry the moment he'd seen the hurt flick across that usually open face. 

"It's weird, seeing another man touching you so… intimately."

Immediately on the defensive, Charlie's head snapped up.  "Don, don't…."

Don touched his fingers to Charlie's lips, hushing him.  "It's not… that's not what I meant."  He took a deep breath.  "Remember what I gave you for your thirteenth birthday?"

How many times had he made his brother blush today?  A nod, then surprisingly Charlie's chin came up, eyes almost defiant.  The look went straight to Don's libido.  "I liked that.  Best present you've ever given me."

Don thought it might be his turn to blush.  But he remembered that night, after the party their Mom had thrown that Charlie hadn't wanted and that only the children of their parent's friends had turned up to.  And he remembered why he'd done what he'd done, how he'd done it, the feeling behind it, the tears in Charlie's eyes even as he'd pushed into Don's hand.

"It wasn't the best I could have given you.  I… hurt you, that night."

Charlie's forehead wrinkled.  "You didn't!"  Rose tinted glasses - Charlie always had had them where Don was concerned.  And Don didn't want to destroy a memory his kid brother obviously held dear, even if he was holding it wrong.

"I want to give you another birthday present."  This was something he definitely shouldn't have been saying.  "I want to do it right this time."  His thumb definitely shouldn't have been tracing the line of his brother's throat, from behind his ear down to the hollow between collarbone and shoulder.  This shirt was sin incarnate.  Charlie was making no move to stop it either; head tilted slightly to the right to give Don better access, eyes wide though, watching, waiting for Don to meet them.  And when he finally did, he said,

"We shouldn't.  I'm not thirteen anymore."

It made him chuckle.  "You're saying it was okay when you were thirteen but not now you're thirty?"  He slipped the tips of his fingers under Charlie's shirt, feeling smooth, warm skin and no resistance.  "That can't be right."  Putting his glass down on the nearest available surface, Don took two steps forward and lowered his mouth to the skin where his thumb had heated up a trail of skin.  He heard, felt, Charlie moan, felt the movement of him disposing of his own glass before the solid warmth of a hand was pressed against his face, his head was turned and a hot mouth sought his own.

Kissing his own brother should not have been this good, this intoxicating.  It should have felt weird but it didn't.  Sometimes, just… sometimes, when they looked at one another there was a heat and a tension there which definitely should not have been there, one they'd never questioned, never spoken about.  Never acted upon.  Until now.  Now Charlie's tongue was in his mouth, hands were at his waist, and Don wanted - more than anything - into that shirt which had been distracting him all evening.

Sliding his fingers down he pushed two small buttons through their respective holes and pushed the material further down from Charlie's shoulder, revealing more skin which he ached to taste, to lick, to bite.  Suddenly Charlie's face was in his shoulder, trying to keep quiet, trying not to make the sounds Don knew he made when he was excited, aroused.  The risk-taker inside him wanted to make Charlie to let lose those sounds but he needed to keep that side of him restrained as he dragged his mouth down to a pink nipple surrounded by soft dark hairs, tonguing the hard nub, strong fingers clawing at his back, whispered pleas into his neck.

Then he was being pushed back but not away, Charlie's knee gently in his thigh, so that he got an arm around his brother's waist and walked him back to the sofa.  They dropped into the leather cushions together, Charlie's mouth bouncing off Don's, teeth clashing, leaning back so shirts could be removed.  Don got both arms around Charlie's bare torso and pulled him forward, skin to skin, moaning softly into his brother's mouth.

Sliding fingers into dark curls, Don gripped gently and drew back Charlie barely half an inch, nipping on his bottom lip, getting his hand between them to unfasten the button fly, stroking Charlie through the cloth of his underwear.  Certain hands were all over him, nails flicking across his nipples, thumbs tracing the lines of his ribs, a nip at his shoulder before Charlie's head dropped back and he was pushing into Don's hand.

This was what it had been like seventeen years ago - quick and dirty, too much wine and Dad's single malt, swinging wildly between hating his brother and loving him, both emotions so intense that when everyone else had gone to bed Don had pushed him into the garage, on to the sofa in the cold, and hushing Charlie's protests had pushed his hand into his jeans and jerked him off, as impersonally as was possible for two brothers.  That was how Don remembered it.  At that moment he'd have given a lot to have Charlie's memory instead.

"Naked, Charlie," he breathed, stopping them.  This was already far from that first time; there was no hatred inside him now.  But he didn't want any similarities with it.  Charlie nodded, scrambled off to kick his pants to the carpet while Don wriggled out of his own, then he pulled his brother into his lap, Charlie's knees straddling him, sliding down until their cocks were pressed together, Don's hand wrapped around them both, watching Charlie's wide eyes watching his hand.

"That okay, Chuck?"  It came out a heated whisper, and his answer was a quick nod, beautiful brown pupils locking with his gaze, a look that sliced into him.  Hands clenched on his shoulders and he brought Charlie's head down to steal another long, deep kiss, fist working on them, gripping and releasing, keeping the pace steady and slow.  But Charlie had other ideas, thrusting forward, upwards through his hand, the sudden intense friction setting off stars behind Don's eyes.

"Please…."

"Don’t… don't want it to end so soon."

"Then we'll do it again, just… please. I need this."

Do it again?  The idea of this being a second one-off immediately skated from Don's mind and he gave Charlie what he was begging for, speeding up his hand, leaning forward to suck on Charlie's left nipple, desperate fingers clutching at his head to hold him in place, feeling the strain through his brother's body.

"So come for me, Charlie."  Reaching around, he dragged his fingernails down Charlie's back, following the curve of his spine, finishing just above the swell of his ass.  Charlie made a gorgeous sound in the back of his throat, raised his hand to his mouth and bit into the flesh below his thumb, presumably to stop from shouting as he thrust up once, hard, through Don's tight grip and came, his whole body shuddering in the duel embrace.  Don was a single thudding heartbeat behind, the hot slickness of Charlie's orgasm coating his cock and hand sending him flying over the edge, tightening his arm around his brother, mashing their mouths together in a kiss that seared them both. 

Charlie slipped off Don's lap but he didn't let him get far, let him settle in the crook of his arm, head on his shoulder, hands and stomachs sticky.

"What if Dad…?"

"If he slept through that?"  Don smirked, kissed his brother's head, then his lips, watched them rise into a smile.  So much better than last time.  "We'll hear him if he gets up, I'll squirrel you out into the garage."

Dark eyebrows rose.  "Hey! It's cold out there."

"I'll keep you warm."

"Umm, promises."

Dropping his head to the back of the sofa, Don closed his eyes.  "Happy Birthday, Chuck."

He felt one arm wrap around his waist, one arm insinuate itself between the small of his back and the sofa cushions. "You know, you'll never be able to top this present."

"I wouldn't say that, Charlie.  Just wait to see what I've got you for Hanukkah."





fin

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