Arcade managed to smile. “I sort of guessed that, if I’m honest.”
Jimmy gave him a lopsided smile. “Yeah, I thought so. I’m not good at that.”
“But honestly? I don’t want any gifts from you. None needed, really. Verbally expressed thanks is quite enough.” Liar, liar, pants on fire.
“Uh...” Jimmy ran a hand through his hair and suddenly, looked like the scared and broken boy again that he had been. He swallowed and ran the other hand through his hair as well before he looked up at Arcade, his face set in determination. “You... I was meaning to ask you... do you believe in... oh shit, you’re going to laugh at me.”
“I shall not laugh.”
“It sounds ridiculous and...”
“So far it hasn’t sounded anything because you haven’t said it.”
“Do you...” Jimmy took a deep breath and blurted it out. “Do you believe in love on first sight?”
Not before I met you. “I... I didn’t. At least, not until I met that one guy who...”
They stared at one another for a moment, both at a loss for words.
“That one guy who?”
Arcade moistened his dry lips with his tongue. “Who... ah... he had to leave shortly after we met and nothing ever came out of it so...”
“Ah.” Jimmy hunched his shoulders and stared at his feet again. “And you... never saw him again?”
“I did... but at that time... It seemed like we were both too gutless to do anything about it.”
Jimmy looked up again, his jaw working. “I can’t imagine you to be gutless.”
“You have no clue”, Arcade replied with a shaky laugh. “Be that as it may, I also... I firmly believed at that time it had to be him making the first step.”
“Uh-huh...”
His throat almost too dry to swallow Arcade looked away first, staring at the mouth of the alley into the sputtering lamp light. He heard the rustle of cloth as Jimmy moved and when he turned his head again Jimmy was standing directly before him.
“That man”, he whispered huskily. “What would you have done if he had attempted to kiss you?”
“I would have wanted nothing more”, Arcade replied, his voice trembling.

They stared at each other again, an endless moment of agony before Jimmy swallowed, rolled his shoulders and took Arcade’s face in his hands to pull his head down. When their lips met, Arcade could do nothing else but sling his arms around Jimmy’s shoulder to pull him close. Jimmy in turn opened his lips and the sounds and lights of Freeside faded into nothing as he slung his arms around Arcade.

They parted only reluctantly after a while, not before they both needed some more oxygen, and they kept touching their lips together in small, soft kisses while Arcade buried his hands in Jimmy’s hair. After a moment he ran his hands down Jimmy’s cheek and cradled his face in his hands, looking at Jimmy with a small, disbelieving smile.
“You have no idea how long... and how much I wanted this.”
Jimmy moved his hands under Arcade’s lab coat and moved them up his back. “Believe me, I do. Oh, I do.”
“I think you do, yes”, Arcade said with a breathless little chuckle, running his thumbs over Jimmy’s cheekbones. “These last two years have been... well, maybe not hell, but not a long shot from it.”
Jimmy closed his eyes and swallowed heavily. It almost looked as if he was fighting back tears. After a moment of gritting his teeth, however, he opened his eyes and Arcade could see the moisture brimming in them. They stared at each other for another moment before they both threw their arms around each other, and while Jimmy buried his face into Arcade’s shoulder, for he was a head taller than him, Arcade buried his face into Jimmy’s hair. They remained like that for another long while, holding on to each other and trying to grasp the fact that this was really happening.

They shared another kiss after peeling themselves away from each other and with Arcade’s arm draped around Jimmy’s shoulder and Jimmy’s arm around Arcade’s hips they made their way back to the Fort.