It was nine-thirty in the morning and he hadn't even gotten dressed yet. That, right there, was as much of an omen as he could ask for. It was going to be a good, good day. The kind of day where you sat on the couch in your sweats and watched TV and ate junk food and no one bothered you, because you weren't on call for the first time in almost two years.

Hunter put his feet up on the low table in front of the couch and pulled his bowl of dry cereal closer. Cocoa Puffs were like chocolate popcorn, and whoever had decided that they counted as breakfast food was a genius. As was the first person to realize that sweatpants were more than just the "exercise" clothes they were marketed as. And the person who'd invented the remote control.

Yeah, he decided, resting his head against the back of the couch. He couldn't really see the TV screen that way, but then again, he didn't really need to. It was definitely going to be a good day.

Something meowed. He rolled his head to one side to glare at the cell phone beside the couch just as it burst into an electronic jingle that was completely unrecognizable. The phone meowed again, and he narrowed his eyes at it.

No good. He couldn't read the display from where he was. He lifted the Cocoa Puffs and sat up, rescuing the phone just as another meow interrupted the music. He silenced the sound before he had even registered the name: Tori.

You win the answered call lottery, he thought, lifting the phone to his ear. "Hey, Tor. What's going on?"

There was a brief pause. "Hunter?" she asked, sounding a little more surprised than he thought she should. There were only so many people who answered this phone. Who was she expecting?

"Yeah," he said anyway, because she seemed to be waiting for a reply. He didn't elaborate. He was not on call, damn it. He was officially off duty. He had the clothes and the TV and the snacks to prove it.

"Is Cam around?" Tori wanted to know.

He looked around the room, mostly as a way to keep himself from snapping at her. "I don't see him," he drawled, deliberately slow and maybe a little more pointed than he'd wanted it to be. He wasn't trying to be short with her.

"Well, do you know where he is?" she prodded. "It's about the demo."

She might have won the lottery for answered phone calls, but she'd just lost the one for helpfulness. "I got up late," he told the phone. "I'm still tired, I haven't had any coffee, and right now I'm completely alone. I don't know what else to tell you."

"All right, okay." Tori did know when to back off. "I'm sorry; I just have some questions and I was hoping Cam would be able to help me out."

"Yeah, well." He used his free hand to fiddle with the remote, turning the volume up just a little. "He'll be at the academy this afternoon, right? For dinner. You can ask him then."

"Right," she agreed, and he could hear her reluctance. "Okay. I guess I'll see you later, then."

"Yeah." He hung up and tossed the phone back where it belonged, settling himself comfortably on the couch again. Chocolate popcorn and a remote control and the whole day off. Life was good.

The muted rattle of a doorknob and the sound of a door being pulled open made him glance in that direction. A familiar figure shuffled out, emerging from the relative dimness and quiet of the bedroom into the light of day. His dark hair was rumpled, his feet were bare, and his sweats and t-shirt looked remarkably wrinkled for clothes that hadn't actually been slept in.

"Morning," Hunter offered, turning back to the TV and slouching down a little further on the couch. With any luck, he'd have company on the cushions in a few minutes. Days really didn't come any better.

"Hey," Cam answered, his voice still rough with sleep. "Is that--" He cleared his throat and tried again. "Who was that on the phone?"

Hunter didn't look away from the TV screen. "No one."

"Was it Tori?" Cam was disturbingly quick for someone who had just woken up. "I should call her... see how things are going."

"You'll see her tonight," Hunter reminded the television. "She'll be back at the academy before we leave."

Cam made a noncommittal sound, but he wasn't reaching for the cell phone he'd left out and that was at least partly a win. There was a long moment where he might have been considering the issue more seriously, but then he asked, "What is this?"

Hunter glanced over at him and Cam tipped his head at the TV. Hunter reached for the remote, clicking the volume up a little more now that Cam was awake. "Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade," he said, trading the remote for his bowl of cereal as he leaned back on the couch again. "You don't watch it?"

"You do?" Cam countered. His skepticism was mitigated by the fact that he had wandered over to the couch and dropped a hand onto Hunter's shoulder while he considered the screen. "I guess I expected something more... football-like."

"Doesn't start till afternoon," Hunter said, resting his head on the back of the couch as he looked up at Cam. "Cocoa Puffs?"

His saw Cam's eyes flick toward the bowl on the couch beside him. "Those are candy, not cereal."

Hunter tried to suppress a smile. "Yeah? And?"

That got an eye roll from Cam, but the effect of his supposed disdain was muted by a yawn. He was wearing his old killer monkeys t-shirt, the one Hunter had given him as a joke more than a year ago now, and it made him look more like a gamer than a geek. Hunter reached back and fisted his fingers in the shirt, tugging gently. "C'mere."

Cam might be sleepy, but he knew an invitation when he heard one. He braced his hands against the arm of the couch as he leaned down for a kiss. Hunter didn't try to make it into anything familiar, just let Cam figure it out on his own. And after a moment, he did. Their mouths fit together, warm and easy and comfortable, and when Cam pulled away Hunter was already missing the closeness.

Yeah, he thought, satisfied with the experiment. Cam could even kiss well upside down. He released Cam's shirt and nodded at the space beside him. "Wanna join me?"

"Is that your new euphemism for 'make out'?" Cam asked, lips twitching when Hunter pretended to be offended. "Because I was up late last night and I don't have enough energy to really participate."

"Is it my fault if you have sex on the brain?" Hunter countered. "I'm watching TV. I figured maybe I could get you to watch with me. That's all."

Cam was smiling, and lately, that was all he asked. "In a minute," he agreed.

Hunter watched him wander across the room, disappearing into the bathroom briefly and then stopping in the kitchen to rifle through the mail they had tossed on the counter the night before. It had been so late when they got in that they didn't even bother to look through it. The academies forwarded mail from places that hadn't gotten their change-of-address forms weekly, so it tended to come in bursts.

"Huh," Cam said, holding up an envelope as though Hunter could read it from where he was. He added something that was possibly an explanation, or maybe a name, but was rendered incomprehensible by his yawn.

"Didn't get that," Hunter told him.

"Nena," Cam repeated, looking around the kitchen. "Coffee?"

Assuming those were two separate statements, Hunter shook his head. "Don't need it," he replied. "Don't have to wake up today."

Cam hesitated, as though there was something fundamentally debatable about that point... but he didn't contest it. Instead he came over to the couch, dropped his envelope on the table beside Hunter's feet, and then headed back toward the bedroom. Hunter raised an eyebrow, but he didn't say anything.

A moment later, Cam reemerged with a sweatshirt and a blanket, and Hunter smiled. He moved the bowl out of the way and put the remote on the arm of the couch, making room for Cam. Cam dropped the blanket at the other end of the couch and pulled his sweatshirt on before sitting down next to Hunter. He picked up the envelope and tore it open, and Hunter could see the handwritten note on a piece of notebook paper as Cam leaned back.

He looked away, watching the TV in case this was one of those things that Cam didn't think was any of his business. Sometimes he seemed annoyed by Hunter's willingness to involve himself in any situation and sometimes he didn't. Today it wasn't really worth arguing over.

When Cam was done, though, he passed the note to Hunter and reached for the bowl of Cocoa Puffs. Hunter read it, then handed it back rather going to all the trouble of sitting up to reach the table. "Nice," he remarked.

"Yeah." Cam set the paper down and pulled his legs up to sit cross-legged on the couch. It was an annoyingly ninja thing to do, mostly because it kept him from leaning against Hunter in any way, but Hunter knew him well enough by now to know that he'd probably just done it to keep his feet warm.

"She's right, you know," Cam added. He took another handful of Cocoa Puffs before offering the bowl to Hunter. "It's a good time of year to tell people what they mean to you."

"Is that a hint?" Hunter wanted to know. He took some cereal but left Cam with the bowl, because having someone else serve him food was way better than having to hold it on his lap. The parade had gone to commercial, and he had to turn the volume down a little because this was a particularly obnoxious one that Cam was going to complain about if it didn't stop soon.

"No," Cam said quietly, and for once he didn't seem to be paying any attention to the commercials. "It's a preface to something I'm about to say."

"Oh." Hunter considered that, then turned the volume on the TV down even further. "Okay."

Cam smiled a little at his sudden attention, but he must have planned what he was going to say before because he didn't hesitate. "Thank you for telling me the truth about the academy," he said. "Last year, when I said I wasn't ready to give up my place there..."

Cam paused, then shook his head. "I wasn't doing what I wanted to do. I was doing what I was expected to do. You were right about that, and I was wrong."

Hunter looked at him for a long moment. "I didn't say you were wrong," he said at last.

Cam raised an eyebrow at him. "You strongly implied it."

Hunter tried not to smile. "Maybe."

"I didn't belong there," Cam said quietly. "And no one even saw that, because I was so good at it. They only saw what I did for the school--not what it did to me. Except you," he said, lifting his gaze from the cereal bowl to Hunter's face. "Once I knew you were right, it meant a lot to me that someone knew me that well.

"And of course," Cam added, looking away, "having you around kept me from having a nervous breakdown, so thanks for that."

He couldn't keep from smiling at that. "Yeah, well. Anything I can do."

"You've done," Cam finished softly.

"Hey." Hunter caught him just as he would have pulled away, realizing too late that he was just reaching for the blanket. He cleared his throat, shrugging uncomfortably. "I had an interest, y'know."

When Cam just looked at him, he clarified, "In keeping you sane, I mean."

The hint of a smile touched Cam's face, and Hunter said impulsively, "I would've tested. If you hadn't stuck around."

Cam went very still. "I didn't ask you not to."

"I'd never have seen you," Hunter muttered, shrugging again. "I didn't want to... y'know, give you up. If I didn't have to."

There was a long moment where the TV was the only thing talking. "You might not have seen me," Cam agreed at last. There was another pause, and then he said, "You would now, though. Even if you went pro."

He knew that, and it was one of the biggest reasons he had for not trying. Cam had already said he would work around Hunter's schedule if he wanted to race professionally, and Cam was not an accommodating person. If he said he'd do it, then he had to have as much invested in this relationship as Hunter did. And Hunter had zero desire to walk away from that--even temporarily.

"You said," he reminded Cam. "But it turns out there's stuff I want more."

He paused, but Cam had been all sentimental first, so maybe he owed him that much. "I guess I have you to thank for that, too," he blurted out. "Cause this is my home now, and I thought I was ready to give that up, but maybe I wasn't."

He stared at Cam, but the man he had stayed for just smiled down at the table, so he added, "Thanks for... y'know. Making me realize that."

Cam lifted his head, shooting him an amused look that was as warm as his tone. "Anything I can do," he echoed lightly.

Hunter recognized the joke and was actually pretty proud of himself for figuring out the right response. "You've done," he finished.

Cam smiled more easily these days, but that didn't make the expression any less desirable. And this time when he reached for the blanket, Hunter let him, and he was rewarded by a very comfortable Cam pressed up against his shoulder while the parade continued. They mocked it idly for a while, which was easy and familiar and more entertaining than the parade itself.

When Cam slouched down further and closed his eyes, Hunter finished off the Cocoa Puffs and set the bowl aside quietly. He didn't say anything, satisfied to have his boyfriend dozing the morning away in their shared apartment. The apartment thing had been a little more spontaneous than Cam's dad would have liked, but pleasing Sensei Watanabe had always been an uphill battle. It was working out all right so far.

He thought Cam was asleep until, out of the blue, he remarked, "Tori will be a better head teacher than I was."

Hunter glanced at him, but his eyes were still closed. "You think?" he said, because he didn't know what else to say.

Cam just nodded.

Hunter considered that. "She won't be teaching under the same conditions," he said at last. "Not much of a comparison."

Cam opened his eyes then, and he looked thoughtful. "You were a better head teacher than Ethan will be."

Hunter raised an eyebrow. "Where did you get this gift for seeing into the future? And why do you want to rank everyone, anyway? We all do the best we can with what we've got.

"I did," he added. "You did. Now it's someone else's turn."

"I could have done better," Cam muttered, shifting to pull the blanket closer around him.

"No, you couldn't have," Hunter said firmly. "Because you didn't. Whatever you did is what you could do, okay? Just figure nothing's perfect and move on, 'cause you're not gonna make things any better by obsessing over the past."

Cam turned his head to look at him. "Is that your life philosophy?" he wanted to know. He sounded less guilty, though, maybe even a little bit appreciative when he added, "Stuff happens. Move on."

Hunter thought about it briefly, but Cam didn't seem to be looking for more so he just shrugged. "Seems to fit my life so far," Hunter told him.

He heard Cam let out an amused breath. "Yeah. Mine too."

They watched the parade mill on for a few minutes before Hunter said, "Okay, forget moving on for a second, 'cause I have something to say about your predictions."

This time, Cam actually laughed, and that was a cool thing to hear. "Go for it," he agreed. He sounded happy and warm and more relaxed than he had been even a few minutes ago, so Hunter continued.

"One, Ethan is more traditional than I am, better with weapons, and has more experience teaching, so don't underestimate him." Hunter glanced over at Cam, who was sitting up and rearranging his blanket. "He'll make things run more smoothly than I could.

"Two," Hunter went on, narrowing his eyes a little, "if Tori's better than you, it's only 'cause you've made her co-dependent. What's she doing calling you on Thanksgiving morning?"

Cam paused, then cleared his throat. "Well, I did mention that she could call me any time if she needed help with the demo. Since I have more experience with it, and I didn't have to do it last year."

Hunter just stared at him, because he could tell from Cam's tone that he already knew what was wrong with that explanation. When Cam didn't say anything else, though, he decided to remind him anyway. "Do you remember what you were dealing with last year?"

"Indelibly," Cam said dryly. "Yes, I know. It wasn't--"

"The year-end demo wasn't even a possibility," Hunter interrupted, talking over him. "We were still trying to find places for them to live! Tori and Ethan don't have to provide grief counseling or reintegration services or mess tents, so I think they can handle one demonstration!"

Cam was giving him a tolerant look. "Bad memories?" he inquired gently.

Hunter blinked, surprised by the idea that maybe he was angry on his own behalf instead of Cam's. Then he heard the question--really heard it--and he relaxed enough to smile at Cam. "Nah. Not all of them."

That made Cam smile too, and so it was worth it.

"It was worth it," Hunter repeated aloud, without really thinking about it. "The whole year."

Cam surprised him by not hesitating. "Yeah," he agreed. "It was."

Hunter shifted where he was, getting more comfortable, and Cam settled back into the couch beside him. A moment later he asked, "Any more Cocoa Puffs over there?"

Hunter glanced at the empty bowl automatically. "Nope." Inspiration struck, and he gave Cam a speculative look. "I could make some pancakes, if you're hungry."

Cam returned his look with a knowing expression of his own. "With jam, I suppose."

Hunter passed the remote to Cam before he got up. "I don't think we have any jam," he admitted, snagging the empty cereal bowl on his way to the kitchen. "You might have to settle for chocolate chips or something."

"I guess everything changes," Cam called after him. Hunter could hear the smile in his voice, and he figured it was a good thing that was true. Because a year ago last week he'd been awake way past midnight--the only time he had to himself--trying to figure out what exactly it was that he wanted.

Today it was almost noon and he hadn't even gotten dressed yet. Cam was sprawled on the couch in his sweats, watching TV and making fun of him, and no one had bothered him all morning. Because for the first time in almost two years, they weren't on call.

He knew what he wanted now. And it was a good, good day.