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Harry hadn’t even thought about it. He’d seen Cisco rub palms over goosebumped forearms, pointedly did not let his wolf brain compare Cisco’s cool, rising flesh with fresh meat, and shrugged his coat off. I told you it was going to be cold today, Ramon, he’d said. I told you it was colder in these labs than you’re used to, Ramon, he’d said. He’d been so smug.
He’d taken a moment to appreciate the weight of his black coat on Cisco’s broad shoulders. Admire the tapering of Cisco’s waist underneath the fabric so much more practical than Cisco’s usual jacket choices. Cisco had snuggled into it, commenting on the warmth, and Harry had tucked a smile behind his tablet as he read the morning news and allowed Cisco to work on an algorithm that Harry couldn’t comprehend quite yet.
That had been that. Harry had been pleased about being right, about starting the morning off with Cisco’s high pitched bitching, and about being the one to offer Cisco the comfort and warmth he needed. He let his thoughts drift along his daily to do list. The other tasks Cisco would complete and pretend Harry finished. Where they would go for lunch. If Cisco would stay in the Wells spare room tonight the way he did the night before or if the team would make their break in Cicada’s case earlier than expected.
Everything had been fine. Exactly fine. Cisco had been humming to himself and Harry had been tapping his toes and the world had been spinning exactly fine. Until Cisco brushed his arm.
Harry thought his wolf was in its cage. After the dark matter ravaged Harry’s intellect it unhinged the wolf’s maw, let animal and intelligence and ego and id bleed wildly together. Cisco saved him from becoming nothing more than a frothing thing of want, but there were still days when Harry’s claws itched under his nails. Some of the bricks he’d laid from puberty to mid-life crisis, the ones that kept him safe from becoming a moon howling hippie in the forest, were still cracked. He thought he’d spackled them whole again.
Until Cisco brushed his arm.
Now Harry’s wolf is scratching at his forearm, right underneath the hair Cisco moved past in his leisurely dance around Harry’s workshop. Right underneath the skin Cisco had touched. The place Cisco pressed their mingled scents and alerted Harry’s stupid hunger that, hey, Cisco is wrapped in his smell. In his clothes. In his warmth and in him and in his his his.
“I was thinking sushi for lunch,” Cisco says easily, tilting his head at Harry’s old laptop, pursing his lips in thoughts without a care in the world to Harry’s agony. “Do you guys have P.F. Chang’s?”
Harry doesn’t know. He can’t remember. The only thing that is relevant at this moment what he and Cisco would smell like together. He knows what scents would cling to their skins. It’s so strong on his tongue that he almost knows what they would taste like, their hands and mouths and necks stained with each other. But the sureness of it is just out of reach. All Harry would have to do to get it is lift his throat. Snap his teeth until they extended then snap then again, just an inch, and he would be certain of Cisco’s aftertaste when mingled with his sweat.
“Harry? Buddy?”
It’s been months since Harry’s done this. Cisco’s Earth was all dull senses. None of the scents or sounds that excited Harry’s animal screeched in that Central City, except for Cisco himself. Everyone born under the wolf moon who rejected their wolf but hadn’t learned to control it the way Harry had would’ve found it a paradise. Harry’s teeth ached there. But it was easy to remain in his human skin, even when his mind was melting under dark matter. Coming home had been like the first change all over again.
He’d conquered it. Mostly, anyway. Enough that he only growled at a few new interns and only smashed his bones going animal at the height of the full moon. It was under control. He was under control.
“Harry?”
He’s losing control. Scent has always been his trigger, always made his head swim with howls, and he’s never gotten to just breathe Cisco in on his home turf. Not without the world crumbling beneath them. Now all he can think of is ripping Cisco out of his jacket and covering Cisco instead with his hands, his open mouth. He wants to shift and he wants to pin Cisco to the wall and lick and rut and rupture until neither of them will ever smell alone again.
The sound of Cisco’s sneakers on the floor pops like bone in Harry’s ears. He hears Cisco say his name again like he’s under water. Cisco moves closer, but Harry holds up his palm. Cisco halts.
“You feeling okay, dude? You look a little… breakdown-y.”
“I’m fine,” Harry grits through his canines. He is. He can calm himself down. This is a moment he wasn’t prepared for, but he can adapt. That’s what he’s been doing his entire life. That’s what he’s been doing since he returned home. “I just. Need a second.”
He clenches his fists and his jaw and his stomach. He’s not going to jump on Cisco like a rabid dog. Like a puppy whose owner has just gotten home. It’s undignified, and it would scare Cisco away, and Cisco would call him Fido for the rest of his life. Cisco knows what he is but he’s never seen it. There’s no way Cisco wouldn’t make 70 dog jokes a day if he did.
“You don’t look fine,” Cisco says. His voice is so calming, and the combination of how Cisco soothes him and the lifetime of terrible wolf puns he’ll face if he changes now eases the animal inside him.
“I will be,” Harry promises, clamping on his tongue and instincts. “Just. Grab me a water from the caf, okay?”
Cisco frowns, his soft, well meaning mouth dipping in disappointment. “But that’s your thing. You always get me drinks.”
“Ramon.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll get your water.”
Harry’s breath presses closer to human the further Cisco gets from him. All he needs is a minute. Remove the blood, remove the lust, avoid writhing against Cisco like a panting animal and destroying the thing that keeps gentling between them. Before Cisco steps past the door, Harry’s brain does its first useful thing it’s done all day.
“And leave my coat in my office.”
He doesn’t have to turn to see Cisco’s face slip into a pout. “But I’m still cold.”
“You should’ve brought a jacket.”
“Uh, fine. You’re the boss on this Earth. But you’re buying me lunch. So much sushi.”
“All the sushi,” Harry agrees.
With a final look of concern, Cisco leaves. Harry takes drowning gulps of air. Their mingled scent lingers but the most immediate wound has cauterized with Cisco’s absence. Harry misses it immediately.
He coaxes himself down. Focuses on his human teeth and human knees and human weaknesses. By the time Cisco returns with cold water and the heavy bleed of Harry’s smell, Harry thinks he can make it through the rest of the day in his human skin. He doesn’t know what he’ll do with the rest of the time Cisco remains on his Earth, or how he’ll wash the sheets from Cisco’s room without ripping them to shreds.
He’ll file those fangs when they grow. Now, he owes Cisco sushi.