Seabirds

The soft sunlight awoke Jonathan easily, its warmth wrapping around his face and pulling him from the deepest of dreams. It didn't even matter that his mouth was dry, or his skin slightly covered in a light sheen of sweat from the heating in the room; the sunlight, golden and pure, was so beautiful coming against his skin. It washed all over him, rubbing his muscles and working his nerves out of a frazzle.

"Morning," Patrick said, walking into the bedroom. "I made breakfast, if you want some." He smiled before ducking into the bathroom and turning the shower on, the water drawing attention from Jonathan's ears.

He stayed put, just lazily relaxing while he pushed his shirt up and rubbed the soft hair on his stomach; Jonathan sighed, almost humming, and yawned quickly. It was a Sunday morning made of perfection; even the shower in the background was soothing, making his eyes heavy again. Jon cleared his throat and rose up in his bed, rubbing his hair, and took a good look out the window that was directly beside his bed.

"Good morning," he whispered, smiling at the sight of the city alive beneath him.

Jonathan looked over his shoulder briefly, seeing the bathroom door close. Patrick was moving around in front of the door, his shadow dancing against the carpet, and Jon laughed when he heard a muffled, "fuck,, float out through the crack and hit his ears.

"You okay?" He listened intently, waiting for his friend's reply.

Patrick cleared his throat. "My fuckin' sinuses, dude, they're killin' me."

Leaving him be, Jonathan walked out and picked up Sugar, who was sunbathing much like her daddy had previously been. She yawned and went limp in his embrace, making Jon laugh softly enough to rumble his chest. Meow, Sugar said, eyes drooping when he rubbed behind her ears and carried her with him into the kitchen to see the breakfast that Patrick had supposedly made.

"Damn," he whispered. "He can cook."

There were a few things scattered across the center-counter, but all of it looked delicious; the bacon, the ham, the omelets and holy fuck, the biscuits with honey sitting precariously next to them. Jon knew that he really shouldn't eat too much, because it was still technically hockey season and he had to keep at least a decent-shape going to his body, but the food looked too good and he figured that Patrick had already ate his feel.

A handful of moments later, Patrick reappeared into Jonathan's presence, only this time he looked much more relaxed. His hair was still dripping wet, making Jon think about how children would always forget to dry themselves off completely after bathing, and then try to put their clothes on; the dry clothing would stick hilariously to their skin. It made him smile to see that Pat's shirt was clinging with suction to his chest, confirming this.

Patrick looked and felt better, his cheeks weren't as red as they had been the past couple of days and he wasn't clearing his throat nearly as much as he had been. He watched as Jon looked over the food and started to pick out things to put onto his plate; he had to smile, watching how he paused at the honey and then bit his lip.

"Eat it," Kaner laughed, rolling his eyes. "Who cares, we can work out later."

Jon frowned, moving away from Sugar as she weaved between he and Patrick's feet, almost making them trip. "I don't know," he whispered, rubbing at his still-sleepy eyes. "You're getting more?"

"I didn't eat," Patrick said, grabbing three biscuits and smothering them in honey. "I wanted to wait until you got up, I felt guilty. You know, like I got the best of it or something. I've always been like that, though, God. My sisters give me such shit about it."

Jonathan laughed. "Patrick Kane does have a heart, after all."

"Heart of a lion," he said, bouncing his fork between his fingers. "Table or couch?"

"Fuck," Jon laughed, "the couch. Are you crazy? I haven't ate at that table once since the divorce went through."

Patrick followed Jon as he lead the way into the living room, Sugar still managing to tangle them up a few times. "Here," he said, bending down just as Toews sat down onto the leather, comfortable couch. Jon watched as Pat tore off a piece of his biscuit and let Sugar have it, waiting until she'd ate it all before sitting down beside him.

"You hitting on my cat?" Jon joked, grabbing the remote to the television and hitting the small, red button to turn it on.

Kaner laughed loudly, almost snorting as his mouth opened and he breathed the way that only he could; borderline nerd, but attractive in the oddest of ways. "She's a nice pussy, what can I say."

They were silent for a moment before both chuckling, shaking their heads. Light conversation bounced between the two friends as they decided on what show they were going to watch, settling on Spongebob Squarepants, only if Kane promised that he wouldn't get choked laughing. Jon ate slowly, trying to enjoy the company of his best friend; he had gotten so used to being alone that he almost forgot what it felt like to have somebody who cared about him to go the distance and do something thoughtful, like making breakfast or watching Sunday-morning cartoons with him.

"I feel like I'm ten again," Patrick managed with a mouthful of food. "D'ya ever wish that you weren't a professional athlete?"

Every fucking second, Jon thought, dropping his fork softly against his plate. He felt his heart speed up a little, almost realizing how different things would be if he hadn't started skating; God knows where he'd be if his mother hadn't wanted him to get on the ice. It was almost impossible to imagine his life any other way, though, despite how much he may hate it at the times when it got the better of him.

"Yeah, I guess," he whispered. "Do you?"

Patrick let his cheeks swell with the exhale of his breath; he sat silent for a little while, eyes locked onto something that was either close to Jon's shoulder or it actually was his shoulder, and then he too nodded. "Yeah," Pat said, clearing his throat softly, wincing at how annoying it must be to constantly hear it. "I think I'd be better off, sometimes. Not all the time, you know? Just the times when I wish I could be normal, you know, have an average life."

Jonathan smiled, watching as Patrick shrugged just a little and went back to his breakfast. A comfortable, light silence fell over them, besides Sugar's persistent meow floating into the air every few moments; Patrick and Jon watched cartoons for what seemed like hours, sitting their plates on the wooden coffee table long after they had finished the food on them.

"You wanna do something tonight?" Jon asked, looking over to Pat during a commercial break, stretching his hands far above his head. His muscles danced beneath his skin like ballerinas, Jonathan's eyes shutting tightly as he felt his mind sway from the amazing feeling of his body expanding.

Patrick watched him, smiling softly. It was good to see Jon back to the way he had been before, even if the process was taking months; it made his heart genuinely happy, goddamn, and it'd been a long fucking time since Patrick Kane had admitted that.

See, Patrick always thought that there was something absolutely beautiful about the friendship between two best friends; his entire life, Pat had found beauty in the things that most people never did. He couldn't tell people this, mostly because he had a distinct reputation to live up to (even though he secretly hated it) but he still spoke softly within his mind and heart.

Kane figured that if two men could be as close as he and Jon were, love each other and respect each other, and literally be there unconditionally for the other when something bad happened, it was pure beauty. It was the thing that all those poets wrote about in countless stanzas, how the ocean and the moon worked together to create the waves.

He guessed, in some weird way, that was he and Jon. He wasn't sure who was which, but they were the moon and the ocean and the waves they made were they sounds of laughter that they made when one of them would fall or trip; it was the light conversations about Spongebob or what Perry the Platypus would be doing on the next episode of Phineas and Ferb. It might have seemed childlike to some people, but their waves went beyond those things, too.

It was the goals they made together on the ice; the Stanley Cup above their heads, and how the night they first won they both went straight for each other. If there was one person in this world that Patrick wanted to share that moment with, it was Jonathan, you know? Their waves were subtle, or they were gigantic and obvious; but that's the way the ocean and the moon worked. The waves on the beach were huge, tower-esque monuments, or they were tiny, soft prickles on the sand.

You take away the moon, or you take away the ocean, and there wouldn't be any waves. God, Patrick wasn't afraid to admit that he'd be a mess if Jonathan got traded. They were best-fucking-friends, they were practically living together, and he didn't care if people made fun of him; in a city were millions of people were living, Patrick Kane felt like only one person truly cared if he lived or died.

When Jonathan got divorced, Patrick felt the god-awful ache inside his heart that he felt when he got married; at the time, he hadn't been sure if it was because he was marrying a girl that he, too, had shared intimate moments with or something else, but it wasn't until their separation that Patrick realized he was aching because he knew Jon was going to get hurt.

It's weird; he couldn't describe it to anyone in the world. When you have a best friend, you know when they're going to get hurt; there's just this connection between the two of you, and when something goes wrong, you both feel it tremendously. Patrick felt the ache in his heart the day Jon got married, and it didn't go away until the day that he was divorced.

A new ache developed, though, when he saw how much the divorce was affecting Jonathan. It was killing him, literally eating him alive; he got pale and weak, his didn't eat for days at a time, and he never wanted to give interviews. It was when he told Patrick he wanted die that he made a decision to stay with Jon until he was happy again.

Patrick Kane had a lot more to him than what a lot of people assumed. He might have had an alcohol problem, or smoked weed, or slept around with girls like they were disposable, but he didn't let those things define him. He joked about himself, and started acting more and more like the thing people thought he was publically; it made others happy, that's all that he cared about.

"No," Patrick said, shaking his head. "Let's stay in."

Jonathan smiled, happy with his friend's answer. He hadn't quite felt like going out but he was considerate enough to ask Patrick because if he had wanted to do something, Jon would have pulled himself out of the darkness and went with him. It wouldn't have crossed his mind twice. "What d'ya wanna do, then?"

"Actually," Pat said, looking over at Jon. "I have an idea."

---

It was dark in Chicago by the time the boys found the pool, the air cool to the touch but warm with long exposure. Patrick had to sweet-talk a few women, but eventually he was given the key to the indoor swimming pool that featured an open, glass ceiling so you could see the stars while you swam. Technically, it wasn't open to the public; but then again, Jonathan Toews and Patrick weren't really the public, either.

Jonathan watched as the moon made the water look as black as the night that was around them; it was almost eerie, scary in the worst sense of the word. Demons lurked in black-water, the ghosts of his past and the ones that he never wanted to face; there was just something about the water that made him feel weak, so troubled and lonely.

They walked around the edge of the pool and Patrick wasted no time in diving it, tossing his bag down beside the door and pulling his shirt off his head. His necklace, one that he'd had for years, bounced against his chest before the water opened and swallowed him whole. It was amazingly warm inside the darkness, his eyes opening beneath the ocean to see nothing but black; Patrick felt his weightless body floating up, up toward the surface, and when he appeared he took his time in letting his breath out of his lungs.

It was like they were lying in an ocean of sun, the water so lukewarm but so black at the same time. Jonathan expected the water to be icy, to make him shiver and his skin bumpy with chills; he jumped in, head first, and felt the eagerness of the water swallow him whole. Jon's body sank down to the bottom of the pool, his feet sitting comfortably against the cement, before he looked up to see the moon still lurking above him. Blurry from the water and chlorine, but still so very visible, it hovered over him with a passion that made his heart ache inside his chest.

Patrick looked around, waiting for Jon to surface, and finally when his brown hair appeared before his face, Patrick knew he was crying almost instantly. His sobs were not obnoxious, or loud, but instead painful and hard and weak all at the same time. It made his heart hurt so badly that Patrick almost passed out right where he stood, his pulse jumping lividly as he pushed off the wall and made his way toward Jon.

"Hey," Patrick said, shaking his head, "it's okay."

But it's not, Jon thought, his shoulders heaving forward with each sob. It's not okay, I'm not okay, we're not okay, he repeated, over and over until each word seemed like they had been spoken inside his mind every single second of every day. "I can't do this," he finally spoke, choking almost instantly on the words.

Patrick wrapped his arms around Jonathan's shoulders, closing his eyes and listening as his best friend still cried, still sobbed at the ache that was present in his soul. Kane didn't talk, he didn't move; he moved his hands out of th water and onto Jon's back, rubbing it softly while Jon dipped his head into the crook of Pat's neck, ashamed that he was seeing him so vulnerable.

Jon's teeth were showing as his mouth opened with a deep breath, his lips stretching with another sob; Patrick looked up at the moon through the glass-ceiling and he prayed for the first time in a long while; whoever's up there, please help Jon, he thought, closing his eyes as he began to rock his friend's body back and forth. I don't know if you're listening to me, because honestly I wouldn't listen to me, either, but Jon needs strength. God, the moon, deity, whoever; please help.

Even then, as Patrick tried his hardest to calm Jonathan down, it was just the moon and the ocean all over again; for the first time, Pat realized who was what. The moon kept the tide in control; it held the ocean where it was at, it was what kept it grounded. Patrick was the moon, and Jonathan was the ocean, so weak and so fluid, drowning in his soul.