Notes on a Scandal: I – Last Night's Regret

Thomas

He woke up to the lingering smell of last night's cologne on his pillow.

He made an attempt to turn his head away from the strong scent stained beside him, catching instead the sharp morning light streaming from the room's sole window.

The screaming pain coming from the back of his skull as his eyes burned inside their sockets forced him to stop, forced him to assume his previous position with a defeated sigh.

Averting his gaze from the sunlight, he turned his attention to the still mass snoring softly beneath the blanket beside him.

Thinking it was easier on the eyes than the first glimpses of sunlight, he had yet to discover the dangers behind this vision- the meaning of it and the repercussions that will follow.

For now, he only took silent inventory of what he was seeing beside him at face value.

Shaggy dark hair spilled onto the pillow next to his.

A forearm draped over the eyes of an unidentifiable face.

A small, slightly upturned nose rested above a slackened mouth, outlined by a thin set of lips, from where the source of the soft wheezing came.

The neck beneath the angular jaw lead to a flat, bare chest, rising and falling with every breath, sparsely decorated with hair in the center that trailed down beyond the boundary of the covers.

It was an unfamiliar scene, finding a body next to him in his bed.

At least, it had been a while since he last found himself in this predicament.

Two years, three months, and nine days since, to be exact.

Not since the day Robert decided to effectively end their seven-year partnership by sleeping with somebody else.

Even since then, he remained faithful—to what, he didn't know now that everything he had believed in had dissolved in wake of his lover's departure.

He dutifully went to bed alone every single night since then, never once bothering to fill the empty void beside him even when the nights grew long and the bed loomed lonely after a hard day's work.

Until now.

He closed his eyes, willing himself to remember the previous series of events that transpired to this moment but not being able to see past the drunken haze of last night, couldn't recall anything beyond opening his eyes to the morning's harsh light and the cologne on his pillow.

It wasn't until the body of the man—no, a young man—beside him stirred, removed his arm away from his face and blinking his sleepy eyes back at him, did the entire night come back to him.

"Julian," he whispered in a gasp, shocked by the sight of the familiar face staring back at him.

Sleepily, Julian smiled back at him and touched his face.

"Good morning, Teach."