Literally all I want out of life today is Merthur cuddles tbh, which is p much my only excuse for writing this. Well that and cookies; I also want cookies, but I don't feel like making any atm, so the Methur cuddles will have to do.

Disclaimer: I don't own except my exhaustion tbh.

Twenty Minutes

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"What are you doing?" Arthur's voice is all exasperation and disbelief as he asks it, and Merlin can picture perfectly the look on his face even though he can't see it, buried under clothes as he is.

"Merlin," he adds when Merlin doesn't reply, because if Merlin simply pretends that he is sleeping, surely Arthur will leave without him and allow Merlin his nap in peace. His nap that has only lasted all of five minutes at that, which is hardly any sort of nap at all. Really, if Arthur loves Merlin as much as he likes to claim he does, he will leave Merlin in peace for twenty more minutes at least.

At least.

"We're going to be late," the persistent Pendragon sighs, not getting Merlin's obvious hint. Doesn't he know that when a person is lying in bed with their eyes shut and doesn't respond to what any one is saying, they're definitely napping and should be left alone? Whichever schools he attended as a child have clearly failed him terribly.

"I know you're not sleeping, Merlin. You can never fall asleep until you've had my dick up your—"

"Oh my god, shut up," Merlin as good as growls, though it must come out as something else, from the way Arthur lets out a low, almost triumphant laugh. Foolishly, Merlin almost thinks that that sound means Arthur will leave him alone and let him finish his nap.

Very foolishly, he discovers not a second later when Arthur walks over and slowly starts pulling the clothes off of Merlin. He doesn't question for a moment the fact that Merlin is semi-buried under half the contents of his closet—Merlin was meant to be getting dressed right now but, well, none of his clothes really appealed to him as much as their bed had, and he'd found that they would be much more useful as a makeshift sort of blanket—simply removes them and throws them to the floor like a prat; those were still clean, they might have been acting as a blanket but they had been clean, damnit, and they do not belong on the floor at all.

Prat.

Too soon, Merlin feels exposed to the world and, what is worse, to Arthur. And feeling exposed means he will probably be forced to get up, to get dressed, to leave. And Merlin does not want to leave, he wants to nap, and has he mentioned yet what an absolute prat Arthur is?

"We have to leave, Merlin, otherwise we'll be late. And you don't want to be late, do you?"

"There's an easy way to avoid being late," Merlin insists, cracking his eyes open to glare up at Arthur, sure that the effect is lost when Arthur smiles down at him in that damn way of his that melts Merlin's heart.

"And what's that?" Arthur asks with no small amount of amusement in his voice.

"We don't go."

From the sound Arthur makes, Merlin is all too aware that he doesn't agree with the suggestion at all. Which is too bad, really, because Merlin is a strong advocate of not going, and Merlin is rather good at getting what he wants when it comes to Arthur. His fate has already been sealed, he just needs to accept it already.

"She's my sister, Merlin, we can't not go."

"It's not like it's the actual wedding or anything, it's… a pointless party to celebrate the fact that there will be a wedding in a year or so. It's totally idiotic, and really just a ploy to get more gifts. We can afford to miss it," he insists back.

"Says the guy who's been planning our engagement party since our first date?" Arthur raises an eyebrow and moves his hand to card through Merlin's hair, voice nothing more and nothing less than challenging as all hell. "If we miss it, she'll kill us. My father will kill us. Her fiancé will kill us. Her fiancé's family will probably kill us. This is an important moment for them, Merlin, we cannot miss it."

Merlin lets out a whine at Arthur's too good point; there really should be some sort of law about prats having good points while non-prats named Merlin are trying to have a nap. Really, there should be, and as soon as Merlin is actually awake, he's going to see who he needs to talk to about fixing that.

Arthur's hand moves from Merlin's hair to trail over his face softly and carefully, causing Merlin's eyes to close once again as he revels in the warmth that the other's fingers leave as they over him, the exact opposite of what Arthur wants to happen.

"Maybe," Arthur sighs then, some of his resolve clearly having been broken some way or another without Merlin really noticing before this moment. His eyes pop open and he stares up at Arthur, pleading that whatever is to follow that word is pleasant, and will mean good news for the fate of his nap. "we can afford to be a little late. Just a little though, alright? Twenty minutes tops," he says firmly, giving Merlin a gentle shove to get him to move over without another word.

With that, Arthur moves to lay down next to Merlin, draws Merlin's head to his chest as Merlin turns on his side and slings an arm over the prat who is admittedly much warmer than his pile of clothes had been.

Merlin grins against Arthur, somewhat triumphant in that he will at least get a bit of a proper nap now. And it is a nap with Arthur, so it's worth at least three naps in the scheme of things, he tells himself as Arthur's arm wraps around him and pulls him closer, and he presses a kiss to the top of Merlin's head as Merlin drifts off, his final thought concerning Arthur and how the prat is definitely going to have to do the wash when they get home that night to make up for throwing Merlin's clean clothes all over the damn floor.

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