Waking up was an experience that Arthur thought he knew backwards and forwards in three different languages by now. It was strange, but by now not really that surprising, that waking up with Merlin should be so… Different. A perfect mixture of decidedly odd, oddly exciting and somehow excitingly right, a notion that he wilfully neglected to explore at the moment. He could deal with that later. He had slept remarkably well considering the fact that he was sharing his bed with a still unfamiliar body. Usually, he would wake up at the smallest movement, but he felt rested now. Merlin was lying with his face buried deep in one of Arthur's pillows. Arthur ran his hand through the shock of dark hair, and the head it was attached to stirred so that a pair of sleepy eyes could peer suspiciously at him.

"Good morning," Arthur said. Merlin rolled his head over a little so that his face was fully visible.

"Morning, Arthur," he slurred, the suspicion replaced with a dopey smile, and Arthur felt the by now familiar tug to his heart. Every time Merlin said his name. Of course it wasn't fear at all. It was a kind of instinctive fondness that he'd never experienced for anyone else. That previously undiscovered instinct was to blame, he supposed, for his failure to report Merlin when he thought he was a stalker, and for the growing interest in the Great Emrys shows that had made a borderline stalker out of Arthur, and for the absolutely overwhelming attraction when he finally caught on to what was happening to him, far too late to avoid being seduced by this wretched creature. He didn't mention it. It was too early in the morning to be this soppy, and he didn't have the excuse of last night's wine anymore.

"Time for breakfast, woudn't you say?" he chirpily announced instead.

Merlin groaned and drove his head forcefully back into the pillow. Arthur could relate, he was not usually a morning person himself, but the way he felt today made being awake at - he checked the alarm clock on his bedside table - nine am on a Saturday seem completely normal.

"Just ten more minutes," Merlin begged pathetically, shoving Arthur away and making him chuckle.

"Lazy arse. Alright then, be like that."

He left the bed and journeyed into the kitchen. Hopefully Merlin would listen to his stomach and follow eventually. He should be hungry. He had reason to be.

Smiling a little to himself, Arthur looked through his food stores. He was annoyingly low on bread, but he had some frozen bagels. It would take a while to defrost them if he was to do it properly, and if at all possible he always did things properly, so it seemed Merlin was going to have a little extra time to wake up. Arthur tried not to be impatient.

Just as he put the bagels in the oven, however, he heard his doorbell go. That was unexpected. What would anyone want at this time of day? The bagels would take a while to defrost; he put a timer on them so they didn't need constant attention. "Just a second," he called out while doing so, and then hastened to the door, not without worry. Unexpected visitors were his least favourite kind, and this turned out to be a particularly awkward one. Looking through the spy hole, he immediately regretted making his presence known. Outside were wild, abundant curls, soft, light brown skin, a wide, easy smile and eyes that seemed to hold all the kindness in the world. Gwen. She had heard him call out, there was no doubt about that. He couldn't pretend not to be in, or to be asleep - though that wouldn't have worked anyway; she knew he was a light sleeper and would have been woken by the bell. He dreaded this conversation. He had planned to get it over with as soon as possible, he didn't want to lead her on or leave her hanging, but he had been planning to enjoy his morning first, have breakfast with Merlin, then see him off, and only call her afterwards. Now she had gone out of her way to surprise him, only for him to have to see her face when he told her. Hiding behind a phone line was not a plan that befit his courage, he supposed, but he truly feared her disappointment and would have done anything not to see it. Well, nearly anything.

There was nothing for it. He undid the locks and opened the door, willing his face to look friendly, but apologetic - not guilty and awkward, which was how he felt. This was an inconvenient misunderstanding, but just that - a misunderstanding. He'd not done anything wrong per se - except, of course, getting off with someone else while he was officially dating one of the most perfect human beings ever. What a a great guy he was.

And there was the moment, the door was open, and her face was there, closer, realer, more terrifying when not seen through a fisheye lense.

"Hey!" she greeted him warmly, her grin widening, "So I didn't wake you, I see. I was afraid I might, you're horrible in the mornings."

"I am not. This morning I am perfectly chipper." Except I'm about to be really horrible to you anyway, but that's hardly the morning's fault.

"So it seems."

"Um, yes. Well, hi! What a… What a lovely surprise."

"Yes, I thought I'd pop by and drag you ou - "

"Gwen."

She stopped talking, probably catching his pained tone, which he did nothing to hide, and he felt another stab of guilt at her alarmed expression.

"Arthur?" she asked, "Are you alright?"

He didn't answer her question, it was best not to get sidetracked. The quicker he got this out of the way, the better.

"I was going to call you," he said, "After breakfast."

"Oh."

Her face had devoted itself entirely to serious attention. The smile had vanished.

"Thing is, I - I didn't mean for it to happen, and I should have - I really should have done this all differently, shouldn't I."

"Arthur, you're not making sense. What is it that's happened?"

She reached out to touch his face and he backed away, startled.

"Don't. Please. Oh, god."

He was just about to come out and say it, tell her how sorry he was, how he'd met someone else, and it had happened so fast, and he hadn't been able to tell her, circumstances conspired, and really it was good that it happened now, before they got too tangled up in each other, or some other bullshit to explain or excuse himself. But before he had the time to do so, a voice sounded from down the hall.

"Arthur? Oh."

Arthur turned to see Merlin looking on in confusion and apprehension. He was wearing his own boxer shorts together with one of Arthur's older, more worn t-shirts that he'd picked out without needing encouragement. The sight had two opposing effects; it made Arthur indescribably content and giddy to see him like that, but also mortified, because there was no way in Hell Gwen would misinterpret this situation.

"Oh," she echoed.

The tense, stunned silence went on for a few seconds, then Gwen seemed gather herself. She took a step back, avoided looking Arthur in the eye.

"I, uh, well, I guess I should…"

"Gwen. Gwen, I'm sorry. I meant to tell you. I just didn't know how to…"

Quite frankly I was waiting to see how things went so that I wouldn't screw up my backup plan. And that realisation, the fact that Gwen, who had represented the pinnacle of beauty and happiness for so long, had been relegated into the position of backup, made him lose track entirely of what he was planning to say.

"It's alright," Gwen said, though it clearly was not, "I'll just - I think I need to leave now."

"Can we talk later?" he begged, knowing he'd done an absolutely shit job of dealing with this in any sort of emotionally competent manner.

"Yes," she mumbled, already moving away from the door, "We'll talk it out later."

He followed her out to the balcony and watched her leave, looking so disappointed it made his heart break. But before she quite got to the stairs, Merlin all but fell out of the door in front of him.

"Wait," he called, "Gwen!"

She turned in surprise.

"Yes?"

"I just wanted to, ah…" he held his hand in front of his face, and this close, Arthur could hear him whisper a muffled word into it before a small butterfly, not unlike his own, left his fingers and fluttered towards Gwen, landing gracefully in her hair. It was a regal shade of purple, and looked like a delicate accessory that matched her outfit expertly.

"I wanted to apologise," he finished.

"Oh," said Gwen again, apparently unsure of what to say. Arthur could sympathise; Merlin had a knack of leaving people speechless. "Thank you? I'll… I'll see you around, I suppose."

Then she left, for real.

"What was that?" Arthur asked when they were safely inside.

"What?"

"The butterfly."

"It was… I don't know. A peace offering, suppose. So she'll forgive me, I mean, I did kind of steal her boyfriend, I guess. Or…" he looked worried for a moment, "You're not going to go back to her, are you?"

"No! Of course not," Arthur replied, bordering on offended that Merlin could at all misread him in this. But then again… "I should, you know. It's the only sensible thing to do. I've loved her for so long. She was the woman of my dreams, quite literally so, she was on my mind waking and sleeping. I thought it was such a tragic love story that I could never have her. And then when Lance's accident and my father's heart attack… We both needed someone to lean on, and I thought… I mean, I knew I was a shoulder to cry on, but I needed to cry too, and I thought maybe he'd want it to end like that. Lance. He was gone, and he would have wanted us to be happy, to be together, you know? And I thought she'd… But it was too soon for her, and, well, you know that story, don't you, because you predicted that part."

"Not in detail, but yeah."

The urge to touch Merlin proved too great, and while holding his impromptu speech Arthur approached him and slid his arms around his waist. His skin was warm under Arthur's old t-shirt, and he smelled of sleep and sweat.

"And she asked me to wait, but when I got her back, it wasn't…" he sighed into the crook of Merlin's neck and mumbled, "I've moved on. I'd given up the idea that it was possible, but that's what's happened. And it's madness, and every tiniest bit of logic in me says to run after her and beg for forgiveness, but I can't, because I only want you. You've turned my world completely upside down." Merlin exploited his pause and kissed him. He leaned into it, pressing Merlin's body lightly against the wall before he erupted into a slightly hysterical laughter.

"This is ridiculous. Feeling like this has never gone so fast in my life."

"Never gone so fast?" Merlin's face matched his voice, aghast with disbelief. "I've been trying to get through your damned armour since the moment we met, you arse."

"Really? Then you've presented the most abysmal display of seduction skills I have ever come across," Arthur chided, receiving a small hit on the shoulder as a reward. But then Merlin laughed.

"I suppose you're right. You'll have to teach me how to flirt properly."

"Not a chance. If I have a say, you're never going to be needing it again."

It struck him then how close the words "never" and "forever" were to each other, and how deeply he really meant what he was saying. The heat of the moment and the high of the closeness aggregated it, but a jolt of awareness told him quite firmly that he could very easily fall, no, he was already in the process of falling in love with Merlin. Proper love, fairytales and forever love, serenades beneath the balcony love, turn the aeroplane around love, picking out living room curtains love, bickering over the remote control and tampering mischievously with each other's false teeth love, love, and probably quite a lot of pain, and a whole new dimension of bizarre togetherness. It scared him shitless, so he did the only thing he could think of and kissed Merlin some more.

He tangled his hands in his hair and pressed against him with force this time, to an enthusiastic response. He kept going until he lost himself in the kiss, and was infinitely startled at the sound of a loud, obnoxious buzzer going off. It was the timer in the kitchen, and it seemed impossible that it had only been twenty minutes since Gwen rang the doorbell. He let go of Merlin, who, as a result, had to flail and change his footing not to fall over at the loss of the pressure. He made an incoherent and rather grumpy noise.

"We have to eat," Arthur reasoned in reply, and reached out a hand to take Merlin's. It was childish, perhaps, but he very much enjoyed holding Merlin's hand. "I've made bagels," he added, trying to make circular bread sound as seductive as possible.

Apparently appeased by the affectionate touch, Merlin sighed and easily followed when led into the kitchen.

"Very well," he conceded, "Let's have some bagels."