You Are Alarming

tygermine

When Arthur first met Merlin, a small alarm rang in the back of his mind.

“Careful,” the alarm shouted. “This one could kill you.”

Arthur ignored the alarm and threw himself into Merlin and their mutual attraction.

The first time Merlin told Arthur he loved him, a second alarm joined the first one. “Love ahead! Love ahead!” It wailed. “Don’t fuck it up!”

He ignored the second alarm in favour of locking himself and Merlin in their bedroom for the weekend and only surfacing to eat and rehydrate.

They had their first big fight the week before Christmas in the glow of the lights from the Christmas tree in the corner of the living room.

The alarms in Arthur’s head increased with a third adding a bellowing “He doesn’t trust you. He doesn’t want to meet your family. He is hiding something. Get out! Get out!”

Arthur spent a miserable festive season lying on the sofa, ugly crying to Christmas movies and working on making a considerable dent in the corner shop’s whiskey supply.

When Merlin turned up on his doorstep on New Year’s eve, looking as pathetic as Arthur felt, the alarm bells rang again. “He’ll do it again. He’ll break you! Don’t take him back!”

“It feels like you constantly have one foot out the door,” Merlin murmured to him later that night as they lay entwined amongst the sheets and blankets.

“I’m sorry that you think that,” Arthur replied, pulling Merlin closer. “Maybe I do, but it’s not your fault.”

“Anything I can do to help you change that?”

Arthur shook his head then tried to distract Merlin into another round of orgasms.

The alarms seemed to disappear the day Arthur slid a ring onto Merlin’s finger with a promise to love and cherish him for the rest of his life.

Now, when Arthur kissed Merlin, the only alarm that went off in his head was the chorus “He loves you, yeah yeah yeah.”