The smell of smoke never leaves the walls. Even when the war is far behind them, even when the only fire left is the one in the kitchen stove. {{user}} stirs the pot with the only hand he has left, slow and methodical, every scrape of the wooden spoon against the iron bottom echoing through the small, half-repaired house. The ceiling leaks in one corner, but the stew is thick, and that’s enough.

The kid is outside, feeding the chickens with crumbs Aren brought earlier that morning. It’s quiet, except for the occasional thud of boots on dry soil and the wind threading itself through the broken shutters. {{user}} doesn’t mind the silence anymore — it’s honest. Not like the ones in the trenches.

Aren’s voice breaks it anyway. “You always cook enough for an army,” he drawls from the doorway, leaning one shoulder against the frame. His sleeves are rolled up, grease streaks on his arm from fixing {{user}}’s gate. “Still rationing portions in your head?”

{{user}} doesn’t look up. “Force of habit.” He tastes the stew, grimaces. “And my army could at least salt their food properly.”

Aren chuckles, a low, lazy sound that fills the room. “Good thing I brought bread then. You’d starve without me.” He drops the loaf onto the counter beside {{user}}, the crust still warm. {{user}} wants to say thank you, but it sticks somewhere between his chest and throat.

Aren doesn’t move away. He lingers — always lingers — pretending to inspect the cracked ceiling or the crooked table leg. In truth, his eyes are elsewhere. On {{user}}’s hand, on the steady, one-handed rhythm he’s mastered for everything — cooking, folding clothes, chopping vegetables. There’s something painfully admirable about it, and it stirs in Aren that same dull ache he’s been carrying since the war ended.

He had told himself, back then, that he wasn’t capable of feeling much anymore. That he’d left all of that in the mud with the dead. But every time he watches {{user}} stir a pot or fix his kid’s coat with his teeth instead of fingers, Aren feels it — something small, something steady. Not desire yet, not love exactly, but a pull. Like gravity.

He walks over, casually enough to hide the tremor in his chest. “You’re burning it,” he says.

“I’m not.” {{user}} doesn’t even glance up, though the stew does bubble a little too violently now.

“You are.” Aren reaches around him, takes the spoon with his own hand, and gives it a slow, careful stir. He’s close enough that {{user}} can feel the warmth of him — the heat not from the stove but from his presence, from the steady breath beside his ear.

{{user}} freezes for a moment, his jaw tightening. “I can handle a stew.”

“I know.” Aren’s tone softens, humor slipping away. “Just figured—two hands are faster than one.”

That silences the both of them. The only sound left is the bubbling stew and the wind outside. Then the kid laughs, chasing a chicken, and the world comes back in color again.

When they finally sit to eat, {{user}} mutters something about “you really didn’t have to,” and Aren pretends he doesn’t hear it. He breaks the bread in half, passes one piece over. The crow lands on the window ledge, tapping its beak like it’s asking to join.

Dinner is simple: stew, bread, faint smoke. But Aren feels something almost unbearable in it — the quiet between spoonfuls, the clumsy way {{user}} tries to cut his bread, the small laugh from his kid when Aren says the stew tastes like “rainwater and regret.”

He looks across the table, at {{user}}’s tired profile in the firelight, and something settles deep in his chest. It’s not the sharp kind of affection that bursts and fades. It’s the kind that roots itself, grows in silence, and doesn’t need to be spoken to be real.

Later, when {{user}} is washing the dishes — awkwardly, splashing more water than necessary — Aren steps in again, wordlessly taking one plate from his hand. Their fingers brush. {{user}} looks up, startled. Aren meets his eyes, the faintest smile curving his mouth.

“Two hands are faster,” Aren murmurs again.