Work Text:
They aren't men much given to casually touching each other. A pat on the back here, a brush of their shoulders when they're walking together. Anything more would be extravagant, in an unacceptable way. It would uncomfortable, intimate where intimacy would be inappropriate. It would encourage a habit.
And Frasier daren't wander too far down that road. He doesn't think the destination is a promising one.
And yet. There is one night, and it is covered in Seattle rain and the low vibration of distant thunder, which unsettles his stomach and brings on a migraine which half his personal pharmacy isn't even making a dent in. A knock on his door, and he already knows the caller. Niles is wet through and his face is lifeless, in the middle of a shutdown. Frasier knows a Maris story is coming up, sometime. He knows a Maris-face when he sees one. But Niles refuses sherry, scotch, even the strong Colombian coffee Frasier was in the middle of brewing when he arrived. He only sits on the couch, staring at nothing.
And Frasier sits beside him, shorn of the appropriate hostly duties which keep his brother a safe arm's length away from true intimacy, with no idea what to do. Niles' breathing is soft and measured, exactly like it always is before he has a breakdown and retreats under the piano, or flees to the nearest antique emporium to buy himself something expensive and beautiful which won't fill the cold space in the middle of his marriage.
Frasier puts a hand on his shoulder, testing. Testing what he doesn't know. Niles makes a little sound, a noise like clearing his throat. Frasier thinks he hears his own name under his brother's breath, low and dark and desperately unhappy. Niles falls against his body like a felled tree, collapsing in a perfect arc. Frasier, who is trying not to notice the way his hands are shaking, puts his arms around him. Niles remains still, not crying or calling out anymore, only inert, with his hair covered in the scent of the rain. Frasier kisses his hair, gently, as he might Frederick's, to say goodnight, and as he does so hears the breath flow out of his brother's body, like letting go.
"Niles?"
"I'm ... I'm alright."
"Are you sure?"
"No, not really."
"Would you like to stay? I can make up the couch."
"Yes, please, Frasier."
"Is it Maris?"
"Would you mind if ... we didn't -- "
"No, no. Of course."
Frasier shifts his body, slightly, his mind on spare blankets and a pillow, on making sure Eddie doesn't escape in the night, on anything but the warm, thin body next to his own; frantically pushing its need and fragile, unspoken pleas for tenderness out of his head.
"Frasier?"
"Yes?"
"Don't go."
"Of course not, Niles, if you'd ... I'll stay right here."
Niles closes his eyes before Frasier is done with his sentence. He lays his head down on the rise of Frasier's chest and lets out another long sigh.
"I think," he says, in a small voice which Frasier has to strain to hear over the sound of the rain, "I sometimes think if I can be close to you, Frasier, then perhaps I won't go mad. Which is completely mad, ironically enough."
Frasier has never been so unsure what to say. Any response seems wrong, too indulgent or not enough, terrifyingly close to a confession or to a shamefaced lie. He fits the palm of his hand around the curve of Niles' head, strokes his hair, wondering why this small kindness fills up his heart with a desperate pressure, a longing to protect and make well that goes beyond the responsibilities of an older brother towards a younger, even such a pair of brothers as they are.
Niles' cheek is smooth; no trace of stubble and the sort of perfect softness which comes from a grooming routine which wouldn't disgrace a Vogue model. Frasier's fingers stutter across his cheekbone. Along the cleft in his chin, lifting his face as he would a woman's, perhaps. Across his mouth, two fingers, like asking for silence. His lips are even softer and they part under the touch. His mouth is wet, hot, shockingly open and his eyes are dark, frightened, but determined. And Frasier hasn't seen love like this for longer than he would like to admit, for as long as he can remember.
And he can choose now, to hurtle towards the true thing in his life, inexorably falling towards that he would never lose, never wreck so irretrievably as he will the others but would instead change and twist, into something he would be ashamed to name.
Or he can take away his hand, and lean back in his seat and put his palm in the centre of his brother's chest, and kiss his forehead, softly, and whisper,
"I love you."