Snowy Embrace

Confession

"I'm surprised," Fenris said, his fingers digging at the polyester bedspread, "that you even dared to approach a man like that."

"What were you screaming? It was that...that guttural one with the v."

"Venheedis?" Fenris asked tipping his head.

Hawke snapped his fingers, "That's it! I almost wanted to ask what it meant, but you didn't seem to be in an explaining mood. Damn near kicked me when I approached."

"Sorry," Fenris blanched. How did he forget that was Hawke? The mountain of the man shrugged, as if a stature as scrawny as Fenris' could be any threat to him. "Why did you stop?"

While he never forgot the random passerby that did him a good deed, Fenris couldn't understand why. He'd also been in such a state, he'd barely glanced at the man's face. Fenris was well trained in not meeting someone's gaze in his previous life.

"Figured it was the chain, the way the wheel was spinning all woo-woo-woo," Hawke tried to twirl his beer in the air but the alcohol dulled his usually sharp reflexes. The empty glass tumbled from his fingers and bounded against the carpet. Both men watched it fall, before Hawke resumed explaining. "Used to fix 'em when I was younger. My brother, Maker's sake, he was the worst with his shit. Thought he was some kinda DMXer, always ramping his bike. Then throwing a shit fit when he'd dent the frame and demand a new one."

Silence thundered into the room, blanketing over the light air like an avalanche of snow. Fenris fiddled with his hoodie string, yanking it back and forth in his fingers while Hawke did what Hawke drifted inward. He never talked about the family issues, whatever they were or had been. A few in the group knew he had siblings, twins, but not much more. Sometimes merely mentioning a sister or brother shut Hawke down.

"I always thought we met in the bar," Fenris confessed, needing to find any change of subject. "And, truth be told, was confused about you approaching me even then."

Hawke chuckled, "I do always seem to bump into you when you're about to rip someone's throat out. For a time I thought that was your default setting."

Shrugging, Fenris glared at nothing. He was a bundle of knives haphazardly knotted together with leather. It could lash out at his enemies as readily as it'd cut him. No wonder he was always running from job to job, hoping to hide and struggling to stay out of trouble.

A thought rolled inside Fenris' gut as he took in the man who kept allowing the jumble of blades in his life. "And now?"

"Don't get me wrong, you're a prickly sonnofa when you want to be. Which seems to be most times of the day, and night." Hawke laughed to himself, a sting rising against Fenris' cheek at the truth. "But," Hawke continued, "you've got your reasons and...there's more under there too."

The sting transformed into a full on blush, Fenris fumbling with his hands to grab onto anything to support him. It was as if Hawke's brash tongue stripped him to the bone. Fenris despised being exposed, even in the safest of places.

As Hawke gathered up the mass of bottles they'd swam in and moved to tuck them into the bag for returns, Fenris glared down at the man's phone. It'd been left off, or on silent mode, but Hawke would occasionally check it and frown. At first, he feared it might be Varric giving the man shit for missing his big moment. But as the missed calls and texts continued on into the third and fourth quarter, Fenris knew who it really was.

The reason Hawke could never truly be safe.

Biting on his lip, Fenris plunged into the mix of gin and beer sloshing through his veins to ask, "Have you told Anders about me?"