Tight Quarters (Out of Uniform 6)

I know you’re in love with my mattress, but I have to tell you I don’t think it’s doing its job anymore. It seems too big now when you’re not here, and I tossed and turned last night, so hard to fall asleep after having had you all weekend. Guess my body is used to you wearing me out before sleep or something. Which is all a convoluted way of asking, what days are you off this week? I want to make pozole, and I know how much you like Mexican food.

Take care,

Spencer

Bacon liked that Spencer was slowly becoming more open about missing him, and he loved that Spencer kept dreaming up things to cook for him. It wasn’t just Spencer’s mattress and shower that Bacon had an increasing fondness for, and he liked knowing he wasn’t the only one counting the days.

Are you making tortillas from scratch again? If so, I suppose I could come up on Wednesday—got 36 hours off Wednesday and Thursday. And if it makes you feel better, my bed at the barracks feels ridiculously tiny these days, and my pillow is a piss-poor substitute for you.

See you soon,

Del

Traffic had been bad that week, getting him there late in the evening, and they’d ended up eating bowls of pozole in Spencer’s bed with a news show they both liked in the background. They hadn’t even fucked until morning, something Bacon was oddly proud of. They were crossing a line where it wasn’t just sex or friends-with-benefits, and it filled something that had been missing a long ass time in his life. Sure he had friends, but no one he could be himself around the way he could with Spencer. No one who relaxed him like Spencer. No one who cared for him like Spencer.

He still had to be careful about what he said about his duties, but they’d found a place where Bacon could talk about stuff without revealing too much. And Spencer was the one person he was okay with admitting when things were hard.

Shit day. Screwed up on a swim. I’m okay, but man, I can’t wait till I see you tomorrow.

Del

Sorry to hear about the rough day. What can I do? I’ve got a hot shower with your name on it, and some really nice organic chicken I’m roasting with lemons and rosemary. Do you need to talk tonight though? We can video chat whenever.

Spencer

Just having Spencer around made the bad days that much easier to take. It wasn’t Spencer’s chicken that had warmed Bacon through, reminding him how good it was to be Del, the guy Spencer cared for. Spencer was the space where he could let everything go, just be. And after this practice mission, he’d have another few precious hours in LA before he was on red-alert for deployment for the real deal.

“Drop zone approaching,” someone called, and it was time to triple-check his equipment and get in position as the rear hatch on the plane opened, air whooshing in.

“Five seconds.” The boat was first to go, sliding down the ramp in a carefully timed maneuver to launch the heavy cargo. He was able to see its four chutes deploy on schedule, then the SWCC crew was away. And then it was his team—the group that would carry out the mission they were prepping for, headed up by the XO again. Team Bravo would be providing additional support from a Mark V, but it was up to them to get into a tight spot undetected.

There was no room for error, so he stuck to protocol, racing out the hatch with zero hesitation. The chilly wind rose up to meet him, whipping through his clothes as he waited for the right moment to deploy his chute.

“Boat is in position.” His headset crackled to life as he approached the water.

Fuck. This was the part he hated. He’d have to find a way to tell Spencer about it later. And funny enough, thinking about seeing Spencer settled him, turned his grimace into more of a smile right as—

Splash. He was down and back into autopilot mode, freeing himself from his chute, getting to the boat, checking equipment on the boat, most notably guns and ammo, because on the real mission they were going in hot. He’d spent countless hours leading up to this on the range, working on keeping his sniper skills sharp.

The boat sped to one of their practice islands. The XO was timing everything down to the millisecond so that they could pull off the mission without a hitch. And he wasn’t happy with their approach, so they ended up practicing three times before he seemed satisfied with their timing getting to shore and in position.

Finally, after a long day in the sun, the extraction helicopter arrived. On the actual mission, they were slated to leave by water, but for training they got a faster lift back to mainland. Of course, the LT and XO needed to debrief the training mission afterward on base with the full team, so he had to sit through that before he was finally free.