#on the line lumosinlove

[lumosinlove]

On The Line

Part Four

ONE YEAR LATER

Logan went through his usual routine—well, his new usual routine as he was preparing for a tournament. The U.S. Open was quickly approaching, but he still had time. Weeks. Even after two years his life still felt new. What had once been yanking himself out of bed for a protein shake and a run was now pushing into Finn’s side while he fried a few eggs and burrowing into the warm crook of his neck.

“Mm,” Finn said around the piece of watermelon he was chewing. He wrapped an arm around Logan’s waist, hand giving his butt three hard taps. With the other, he flipped the sizzling eggs then turned to press his lips to Logan’s forehead. “Do we still have blueberries?”

“Ouais—smoothie?”

“Yeah. Wait, there was mint in the garden, that’ll be good in it. And I bought that yogurt you like.”

Logan tilted his head up and Finn smiled.

“Hi, gorgeous, hi,” he whispered, and then kissed him. “Go get me my mint.”

Logan stepped out into the morning. He nodded to Alice and Pete, whose team helped manage his courts and house while he was away. They hadn’t seemed very surprised when Logan first brought Finn home and Finn had just…never left. They’d seemed happily surprised when Finn consulted them about planting an herb garden.

It was barely eight in the morning and it already felt like it was nearing eighty degrees. It was going to be a hot practice. Logan found the patch labeled mint in Finn’s slanted handwriting and picked a few stems.

The kitchen window opened behind him and Finn shouted out, “chives!”

Logan smiled and reached for those, too. He took his phone out and snapped a photo, sending it off with a little swooping sound. A moment later, a reply arrived under the banner of Leo Knut’s name.

I’m very impressed!!!

:), Logan typed back. what are you up to where are you now

Logan waited for a reply, but none came. He must have been busy and Logan went back into the kitchen to Finn.

Logan wasn’t sure how it had happened, or even exactly when. Sometime after the Wimbledon ball—Finn called it the Wimbledon dance—Leo Knut had slowly but surely become their friend. He ate with them at most meals during tournaments. He came out to dinner with them sometimes, when he wasn’t eating with his team—who seemed nice enough, if not a little strict. Finn always rolled his eyes when Logan said that. We can’t all have a two-for-one boyfriend, Tremblay.

They texted when they were apart in a group chat that had somehow acquired the name Loginn & Leo that made Logan smile every time he saw it. Finn and him went back and forth constantly about books and TV shows. Logan mostly just listened and read through their conversations, but he liked talking to Leo about his cooking the most. He enjoyed hearting the pictures of delicious meals he made. Him and Finn tried to recreate some of them with Leo instructing them over FaceTime, but Logan had a feeling it would never taste the same unless it was made by Leo’s hand.

Tennis was carefully avoided. Maybe out of respect, or out of balance, Logan didn’t know. But he was almost glad. It kept Leo as a friend. It kept their minds off the court when they didn’t need to be there.

They ate their breakfast on the back porch that overlooked the pool and Logan had half a mind to forget training and lay here all day with Finn. The pool’s surface was still and gleaming in the morning light, the fan above them rotated slowly for a gentle breeze, and Logan had his feet in Finn’s lap. Finn was idly rubbing Logan’s ankle with one hand and eating with the other. Logan knew he’d be a mess of sweat and sore muscles later, so he pushed his toes into Finn’s thigh for more attention.

Finn pushed against a particularly sore spot in Logan’s arch and grinned at Logan’s noise. “Gonna run you so hard today, get ready.”

Logan popped his last bite of toast into his mouth. “Can you please not say it like that?”

“What?”

“It sounds like I’m going to do other things than run, and I know that I’m not.”

“Hm,” Finn took a sip of his iced coffee, obviously hiding a smile. “Maybe you better work really hard, then.”

Three hours later, Logan was flat on his back on the clay of his personal court. He closed his eyes, chest heaving, and enjoyed the dusty-scratch feeling of the clay on his skin.

A shadow fell over him. Finn had been inside the house, taking some calls while Logan did sprints. When Logan opened his eyes, Finn looked the picture of cool and unruffled. He held out a water bottle, and when Logan took a sip, he was pleased to find the water ice cold and slightly lemony.

“I think I found someone for you to hit with,” Finn said. “He’s hoping to get in some good time on the clay and, oh look,” Finn spread his hands. “Clay, right here in the USA.”

Logan opened his eyes again questioningly. “What?”

“I found someone for you to hit with.”

Logan propped himself up on an elbow, confused. “I hit with you.”

“I know, I know. What, you don’t even want to know who?”

Logan took another sip of water, swishing it around in his mouth. “Who?”

“Leo.”

Logan smiled, pushing himself up on his elbows. “Leo’s here?”

“Ooh-way.”

“He didn’t say.”

“You spoke to him?”

“I sent him garden pictures and asked but he didn’t respond.”

“Maybe because he was flying.”

“Leo doesn’t have to be flying not to answer my messages.”

“No, I’m saying I have his flight number, he was flying.”

Logan raised his eyebrows. “You tracked his flight?”

Finn shrugged. “I like to know where people are. I used to track your flights all the time. Before I was on all of them.”

Something about that made Finn’s words begin to set in. Playing Leo was one thing. Being his friend on tour, texting, FaceTiming, trying to learn to cook from him. But training with him…

“Well…Là.” Logan shook his head. “He’d get to know me too well. My game. He’s so good, it’s—”

“You’d get to know his, too,” Finn said. “And he’s gonna be around for a while. The rest of your career, certainly. He’s too good not to be.”

Logan hesitated. He picked up his hat from where it had been knocked to the ground and pressed it between his hands.

“We avoid tennis,” Logan said. “I don’t…I don’t want it to come between us.”

Finn sighed and knelt down on his good knee, right between where Logan’s were splayed. “Look, Lo. Bottom line, I can’t run you around like you need. My knee won’t have it. And I don’t need someone to just lob balls at you. I don’t need you to whip some half-ass hitter’s butt. We need someone who will push your every boundary. Who will put you to the test—especially on clay. It’s your home, it’s where you dominate. It’s where people are the most scared of you and I’m gonna keep it that way. Also, Leo’s a beast on hard court and you could learn a few things.” Logan narrowed his eyes and Finn smiled. “I’m telling you this as a kindness, boyfriend and coach.”

Before he knelt on his bad knee, he’d stretched his hands out on either side of Logan and slowly lay him down on the hot court. Logan smiled as he lay his head back. His entire back through his t-shirt was warm and Finn’s chest felt warmer.

“Is that a yes?” Finn bent to kiss Logan’s neck. He was soaked in sweat but Finn didn’t seem to care.

Finn pulled back to look at him. “He’s coming at noon tomorrow.” He pushed himself up on his hands, straightening his arms and blocking out the sun just enough so that Logan could open his eyes and see his red hair get turned to bronze by the halo of rays. They looked at each other for a moment, until Finn laughed, soft and closed-lips, and couldn’t help himself anymore. He let himself back down and kissed Logan in the sunshine.

“Yes?” Finn asked again, bumping their noses together. “Yes. Yes, yes?”

Logan hooked his arms under Finn’s and hauled him fully down. “What if we can’t turn it off again?”

Finn frowned, but allowed himself to rest against Logan. “What does that mean?”

Logan let his head rest fully in the clay. It would be all in his hair turn the shower tiles rusty later when he scrubbed it out—or when Finn did, hopefully.

“What if…” Logan sighed. “What if once we train together, we’re always competitors and we can’t be friends again?”

“Did you feel any less my friend when you played me?”

God, that was something he hadn’t thought of for a while. Finn, across the court from him. Trying to beat Finn. Well, usually beating Finn. And Finn sticking his tongue out at him when he thought the cameras weren’t looking—the cameras were always looking.

Finn read his mind like that.

“Cause for me, you know what happened to me when I played you?” Finn asked.

“You fell in love with me?”

Finn feigned a gasp. “How did you know?” He grinned as he kissed Logan again. “So, don’t worry about Leo. He’s not petty. He’s not stupid. He’s your friend. He knows what comes with your jobs. And he wants to train with you anyway.” Finn tilted his head. “Some would call that wanting to spend time with your friends, too.”

“It’s hard work.”

“Do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.”

Logan tightened his arms around Finn. “Ouais, well, I’ve been asking you to do that all day.”

“Oh-ho.” Finn’s laugh was delighted and he ducked his face down against Logan’s neck. “Shut up.”

Logan hooked his foot around Finn’s waist and rolled them over until he’d pinned him against the soft clay. His hands left reddish smudges of Finn’s cheeks when he took his face to kiss him again.

“Mm,” Finn mumbled contentedly. He pushed his hands up under Logan’s shirt.

“Allez,” Logan whispered, biting down gently on Finn’s lip. “I want to do what I love.”

“Leo,” Finn said, the name cutting off in a gasp as Logan pressed his hips against him. “Tomorrow. Noon.”

“Yes,” Logan said. He nosed against Finn’s jaw until he got Finn to tilt his head back so he could get at his pale neck. “Yes…”

~

Logan felt restless the next morning. He was out at dawn, running the familiar path near his property, Finn biking beside him. They stopped in a shady spot where a food truck served breakfast sandwiches and iced coffee.

“We should take Leo here,” Finn said around a mouthful. “He’d fucking love this sauce that is burning my mouth off right now.” Finn swallowed and stuck his tongue out, panting. “Ack. It’s delicious just man-oh-man.”

“It’s not that bad.”

“You just took out an entire potato because it was covered in it.”

“Fuck off,” Logan said, and slouched further with his back to Finn’s chest.

They rode back and showered. Finn laughed a bit at the fact that Logan never seemed to not have a bit of clay in his hair or behind his ears.

The restlessness didn’t ease up.

As they waited for Leo to text that he had landed, Logan walked laps around the living room couch where Finn was reading. One circle. Two. Three. Four. He paused and came back with a handful of popcorn. Five. Six. Finn looked good reading. Glasses resting on his nose, casting faint speckled shadows among his many freckles. Seven. Eight. Nine. Logan kissed the top of his head before coming back around to look at his face again. Ten. Eleven.

“Lo…” Finn said his name all drawn out without looking away from his pages.

“He really asked to come?” Logan asked. “You didn’t ask him?”

Finn turned a page. “He asked me.”

“You should be careful what strategies you use when he’s here. Who knows what he’ll say to his own—”

“Logan,” Finn laughed. He rubbed at his eyes beneath his lenses before taking his glasses off. “You think I don’t have a plan for that sort of thing?”

Logan paused. He worried a popcorn kernel in his teeth. “I don’t want to have to whisper in front of him.”

“We won’t. You know us. A lot of the time, we don’t need words.” Finn let his book rest against his chest. “Listen to me. Will he learn some things about us? Yes. Will we learn some things about him? Yes. But that’s not the point. The point is you’ll get even better than you are because you won’t be worried about hurting me, and it won’t be easy for you.”

“What if I have to use something new against him in a match?” Logan said. “Something I learn now. Here.” Logan sank into the cushions at Finn’s waist and Finn set his book and glasses on the table so he could grab Logan’s hips and haul him into his lap. Logan put his palm flat on Finn’s chest. “What if he hates me for it later? Even without meaning to.”

“Do you wish I’d told him he couldn’t come?”

“Non,” Logan said. “I just…”

“He’s not going to hate you. “This is the game. It’s the game. And you’re both part of it. He’s not going to hate you.” Finn shook his head, tapping playful fingers against Logan’s cheek. “Get out of your head, pretty little green eyes.”

Logan sighed. “Do you think we have food he likes?”

Finn tisked, but pulled Logan forward to kiss his forehead. “Yes, you sweetheart. God, do I tell you I love you enough?”

“Those chips,” Logan said, sitting up a bit. “Those spicy chips that he packs in his suitcase—”

“Ordered them,” Finn said. “But, Lo, he probably rented a house that he can fill up however he likes.”

“But he’ll be over here. On my courts.”

Logan got a little warm all over, picturing Leo out there. Walking past his pool. Maybe he’d even man the grill that didn’t get nearly enough use. He’d bring his long, lean limbs and sit on this sofa and…

Logan could still feel the touch of his hand on his lower back. We’re just dancing, Logan.

Finn’s phone began to ring from inside his pocket, making Logan jump from his place on his lap. He tried to think what Finn would say and it came easily. “Happy to see me, or something?”

Finn snorted and tapped his hip to tell him to move. “He’s landed.”

~

It was just as good as Logan imagined it would be. Leo had hugged him tightly the second he walked through their door. He’d hugged Finn tightly, too. Logan liked the way Leo had to stoop a little even to hug Finn. He liked the way Finn’s hand were firm on Leo’s back, just like they were on Logan’s after a win or loss. Finn sat Leo down outside on the patio by the pool and Logan trailed after, watching them. Finn offered food and drink, Leo chose a Cola, and Finn brought it to him on ice with a red and white paper straw because he was Finn and this was Leo and Logan didn’t know why it felt so very important that Leo was here but it did. It really did.

“The plane was fine,” Leo was saying. “And the city’s nice, but it’s gorgeous out here, though. You guys got a spot.”

“Yeah,” Finn said. “Lo picked well. Where did you rent?”

Logan perched on the edge of the chair Leo had chosen. He sort of wanted to look at him while he was distracted by Finn. He already looked sun-golden and relaxed. He had that blue shirt on and his hair was shorter just now. The gray tuft looked like it had gotten sun, too. Logan still hadn’t asked him about that.

“Hm? Oh, I didn’t rent. I got a room at the Lion Hotel.”

“Non, non, non,” Logan said at the same time as Finn made a protesting sound.

“You’ll stay with us, then,” Finn said. “Leo. C’mon.”

Leo hesitated, sipping his drink. “It’s a nice hotel.”

“Non,” Logan said again. “You’ll just have to drive here everyday anyway.”

“I wouldn’t want to intrude, or…” Leo’s eyes went between the two of them. “Really?”

“What are we supposed to do,” Finn said. “FaceTime you to help us cook dinner while you’re in the same city?” He smiled. “No, really, though. We’d…” He looked at Logan. “We would love to have you here with us.”

“Why didn’t you say you were coming? When I texted you the garden.” Logan realized he had almost started touching Leo’s hair—a habit with Finn—and pressed his palms to his thighs instead.

Leo tilted his head back to smile up at him. “Because you would have told me that we’d get to know each other’s games too well and that we shouldn’t.”

Finn let out a laugh from his chair across from them and crossed his socked feet on the table. “Oh, would he now, Leo? Do you hear that, Lo?”

Leo placed his straw between his teeth as he smiled. “Did I get it right or word for word?”

“Word, for, fucking, word,” Finn said pointedly. “Sprinkle in some worry that we won’t have any food you like.”

“Finn,” Logan hushed, and Leo laughed. He put a hand over Logan’s.

“You’re sweet.” Leo looked at Finn. “You’re both sweet. But yeah, I figured I’d go straight to Finn.”

Finn stuck his tongue out at Logan. “He knows I know I good idea when I see one.”

“Well, you took this one on, didn’t you?” Leo squeezed Logan’s hand before letting go. Logan wished he had turned his palm up into it.

Finn’s brown eyes darted between the two of them. He was biting his lip against a smile and messing with the condensation droplets around his soda. “I did.”

“I guess I’ll have to go get my things sometime tonight,” Leo said.

Finn waved a hand at the setting sun. “Do it tomorrow. We probably have everything you need here.”

“Ouais,” Logan said. “And you have, like, six rooms to choose from.”

“Oh yeah,” Finn said. “Do you want the tour?” He rolled his eyes at himself and put his glass down. “I say like it’s my house.”

“It is your house,” Logan said. “Like, this is your house, I am your house.”

Leo laughed as they went back inside. “Yeah, Finn, he’s your house.”

“You know what I meant.”

Leo swung an arm around Logan. “Do we?”

Logan gave him a shove, but not hard enough to dislodge his arm.

They took him through the house first and Leo put his phone down in the bedroom beside the master, so Logan figured that’s the room he wanted. It was the one Noelle chose whenever she visited. They went to the theater room, the basement that had a lower deck and a pool table. It was a lot of impressive stuff, but Leo seemed to appreciate the kitchen the most.

“Oh.”

Logan tucked his hand into Finn’s as Leo turned around in a slow circle, taking in the large kitchen. Finn squeezed.

“I bet y’all hardly use this beauty,” Leo said, brushing a hand against the stove.

“I’ll have you know I make eggs there every morning,” Finn said.

“Where’s your private chef at?” Leo arched a brow.

“She has the day off,” Logan said.

Finn scoffed. “I was about to tell a joke!”

Logan shrugged. “She does.” He looked at Leo. “But don’t worry she left a lot of prepped things in the fridge, so we’re good for dinner.”

Finn coughed jokingly over the words Leo’s risotto.

Leo smiled at him. “I’m happy to make you that, it’s one of my favorites.”

“Non, we wouldn’t invite you and then put you to work,” Logan said.

“Oh?” Leo walked back towards them, around the kitchen island. “I’m not here to work?”

There Logan went again, cheeks flaming. Finn squeezed his hand harder.

“Do you want to see the courts?” Logan asked hoarsely.

He squeezed Finn’s hand back.

~

A week went by in a flash. It felt like that first week with Finn, when he had grabbed Logan by both hands and yanked him out of the lonesome dark. It felt old as time, and brand new. Logan’s heart pounded, his laughs tumbled, and yet he’d never been calmer. Never more at ease. He’d never trained harder in his life, either. Finn on the sidelines, demanding more, more, more. Leo standing opposite him on clay, on hard court, in sun, in shade, in the night lights, demanding more, more, more. And Logan wanted to give. It filled Logan right up to give it to them.

He’d never felt stronger. He’d never played better. He’d never slept better, Finn cradling him, tightly pressed all along his back. He’d never eaten better, Leo’s delicious handiwork, Finn mixing him a drink, Logan helping him chop and prepare. Card games. Movies. And the laughter. Logan would live and swear by their laughter.

He was standing behind the outdoor bar by the pool and Finn and Leo were in the shallow end with a water set of paddle tennis. Watching them, listening to the tic tac of the light ball…Logan had never wanted to see two people play more. Really play. He’d give anything to match Finn’s grace with Leo’s lighthearted strides on a court in front of an audience. Anything at all.

“Did you just topspin this fucking ball?” Leo laughed. He was wearing sunglasses and his hair was darkened and slicked back by the water. “How the fuck did you do that?”

“I did use to play professionally!” Finn fired back.

“Honey, I had your poster on my wall—I know!”

Logan dropped the ice cubes he was holding and the clattered down to the floor in every direction.

“Oh did you now?”

Logan smiled to himself as he stooped to pick up the ice. He’d told Finn that and Finn knew it. They still smiled about it sometimes after spending a day with Leo in whatever city the three of them were lucky enough to be in.

And that one night. Staring up at a dark ceiling with Finn, just the two of them. Finn had asked what had felt, at the time, like a daring sort of question. Do you think he ever wished he could be with one of us? And, who do you think he liked better? Probably you. You always played better.

Logan had had so many words in his head that he could only get out a few. But he plays more like you.

~

Logan and Finn stared up at their dark bedroom ceiling on the tenth day. The next tournament was fast approaching. U.S. Open. Not far to travel. Hard court. Leo’s surface. But for now it was quiet. Leo in the next room.

This might’ve be Logan’s favorite part of life, actually. Though it was so hard to choose. But this. Finn’s head resting against his chest, nudging into Logan’s fingers through his hair while Finn said anything and everything that came into his mind…This had to be in his top three.

“You’re drop shots are stronger,” Finn mumbled. His fingers were, maybe without him fully realizing it, leaving goosebumps across Logan’s chest and stomach in the trail of his fingertips. “You have more control, it’s really good. It’s like Leo’s.”

“I think so, too,” Logan said.

“You’re the strongest you’ve been.” Finn pressed his palm over Logan’s core. “Here.”

“Leo’s hard to play over and over.”

“It’s beautiful to watch.”

Logan turned his head to run his lips along Finn’s forehead. “I like it when you watch.”

Finn smiled, turning his face into Logan’s chest. “Lo.”

“Yeah?”

“Do you get the sense…” Finn began. “That…Hm.”

“Hm?” Logan reached down and pulled Finn’s thigh further across his hips, smoothing a palm under the hem of his shorts.

“Do you get the sense that Leo…” He was whispering.

Leo, in the next room.

The sense. Logan’s fingers pressed into the muscle of Finn’s thigh, trailing down towards the bend of his knee.

Finn adjusted so he was looking down at Logan. He reached up and brushed a thumb against his eyelashes, then under his eye, then over his full bottom lip.

“You know that I’m yours,” Finn whispered.

Logan gave a small nod.

“And you’re mine.”

“Toujours.”

“If I were to say to you,” Finn whispered. “That I want to watch Leo kiss just…” He bent, aiming for his favorite soft part under Logan’s jaw, the part that spent more time pink from Finn’s teeth than not. “Here…As much as I want to kiss it myself…”

Logan drew in a slow breath, calming himself with the feeling of Finn’s hair slipping through his fingers. “Remember our Wimbledon dance? Leo and I.”

“God. Of course I do.”

“There’s this…feeling.” Logan cleared his throat a little, heat rising through his core. “With you. When you’re…” Logan squeezed his eyes closed and laughed. “Ugh, stop looking at me like that.”

Finn was grinning, eyebrows raised.

“Tell me,” Finn said, then dropped to a whisper again. “Tell me.”

Logan covered his eyes with a hand. “Non, c’est—embarrassed.”

“Hey, hey, c’mere…” Finn whispered, then took one of Logan’s wrists, then the other, and held them above his head. “When I’m what?”

“You know.” Logan’s hands flexed in Finn’s grip and—there it was. Light. The ball on his racket. Finn kissing him in velvet curtains. Finn gripping him in a hug so tight after a win that it took his breath away. Leo’s hand under his jacket. Finn’s gentle fingers massaging his sore ankles after a long day. Finn winning at cards. Leo winning at cards. Their faces when Logan won at cards, so so beautifully competitive, all of them. Finn’s head on his chest and dark ceilings. Leo pushing his head under the water in the pool, then pulling him back up again to breathe and laugh. Leo falling asleep against his shoulder half way through a movie.

“I do.” Finn had been watching him quietly. Brown eyes. Chocolate. Sugared espresso. Sweet. “I do know…”

You know what I’d choose? You. You. You.

“Leo, too,” Logan said. “Dancing…Laughing together these weeks. Leo, too.”

“Look at what this talk got you all like…” Finn whispered as he kissed Logan’s hot cheeks. “Look at you.”

Logan let out a short breath, hands tightening and loosening in air. He felt like he’d burn up if he didn’t get a grip on something, but Finn’s body pinned him.

“Settle down, I got you.” He captured Logan’s next sound in a kiss. “This? You want Leo doing this?”

“Shh,” Logan said, but his eyes slipped closed. He felt heavy. And light. “If he hears you he’ll think we’re—we’re weird or something.”

“Oh baby,” Finn whistled low, giving his head a slow shake. “I think weird will be the last word on his mind.”

“How do you know?” Logan worried.

“How many hours do you think I’ve spent watching the two of you play each other?” Finn kissed his jaw, his ear, his temple. “You think I don’t know how he looks at you?”

“How?” Logan swallowed a desperate sound. “How, how?”

“The way I look at you.” Finn’s mouth dragged along his cheek, back to his. “You think I don’t know how you look at him?”

Logan’s fists clenched in Finn’s hold and Finn let him go so they could tumble onto their sides with Logan’s arms around his waist.

Finn smiled. “It’s how you look at me.”

[oneluckygoose]

O'Knutzy Week Day 4

AHHHH DAY 4 MY FAVORITE OF EVERYTHING, ALL OF THESE FICS ARE SO GOOD Y'ALL!!!! [Again, this is a scheduled post and was written in June :')]

Credits to the writer, the myth, the LEGEND, @lumosinlove for all of these lovely characters and to @oknutzy-week-2024 for just being wonderful, (I'm sure they are, I don't actually know them, I've put them through enough at this point with the hell it is to schedule these things, and they haven't yelled at me yet, so I take that as a win)

Part two of my racing fic When We Can't Pretend (the name will probably make more sense now, poetic title and all) is out officially now, congrats to everyone who didn't read it yesterday as well. To all those who did, how'd ya like it? As with all Harvard Era FinLo, things are good and happy until they really aren't, this is the "really aren't" part, fair warning. ANYWAY, enjoy!

Summary: Finn confronts Logan about what happened in the car a few hours earlier and he gets his soul crushed.

Characters: Finn O'Hara, Logan Tremblay, Percy Lastname

Warnings: Cursing, Pain, Mentions of Past Injury, and emotional damage

Word Count: 2,096 (Preview of 238 under cut)

“Now explain to me again about this ‘natural talent?’” Percy questioned as they all settled at a table. They had decided to go to the nearby country club for dinner: it was large, doubled as a weird rich hangout, but it was supposed to have some good food, with a nice eating area. “I told you, not natural,” Finn retorted, rolling his eyes, “My grandparents lived next to a track up in Maine. Me and Alex would race all the time when we were up there for the summers.” Focus, focus, focus, Finn’s mind screamed at him as Percy kept talking. God, Finn couldn’t stop thinking about Logan, his mouth, his hands, the fire in his lips. It didn’t help that Logan was now pressed up against him in the tight booth. A waitress came up to get their drinks, and soon the conversation moved on from the racing. Finn could feel Logan beside him, reaching his hands up constantly to mess with his hat. It drove Finn wild, but he kept his eyes anywhere but Logan. He couldn’t look. Something, something, simmered inside of him; he couldn't name what, though. It got stronger every time Logan elbowed him, or threw his hand around his shoulder, or simply acted like everything was normal. Like Finn couldn’t still feel Logan’s hand in his hair and his teeth and tongue. It hurt, this game of pretend they were both playing.

[itsaash]

[podfics] of Spark, and Praise you Like I Should, written by fruitcoops

If you've read @fruitcoops' stuff, just reading those titles might be enough to know what lies ahead!

Continuing with the theme of post valentine's day - maybe you wanted something comforting like the last one, maybe you want something nice and spicy. So here's that option 😏

First Burn & Spark - 35min firefighter/EMT au

Praise You Like I Should - 22min, origin of Remus' praise kink. Sweater Weather-verse

these are rated explicit. please only click through if you're an adult!

[fruitcoops]

Please, Please, Please

Cubs beach day in Nice and prompt C4: "Sunscreen" for day 2 of @oknutzy-week-2024! Characters belong to @lumosinlove (except Colette)!

“You,” Logan began, rubbing his hand faster until an aggressive thwap-thwap-thwap punctuated his words. “Are not going to be embarrassing me here, ouais?”

“Okay—Jesus, Lo—yes, alright, I got it.”

Logan pulled back and examined his handiwork. Functional. For now. Down the beach, Leo already looked half-asleep in the sun, and Finn’s longing glances toward him were not even slightly hidden. The breeze ushered a cloud further along; the sudden sunburst made Finn squint.

Logan huffed and squirted another dollop of sunscreen onto his palm, aiming for Finn’s shoulder this time.

“Oh my god, Tremz.”

“You’re going to burn!” he insisted. Finn squirmed away, but he had never been able to shake Logan. Not on the ice, and certainly not on a pebbled beach he’d been traversing since literal infancy. He smoothed out a stray arc of white over Finn’s spine and watched goosebumps flare on his arm. “What would you do without me, eh? Crisp? Like toast?”

“You sound like your grandmother.”

“If I bring back a lobster boyfriend, she’ll think I don’t know how to take care of you!” Logan wiped the excess on Finn’s waist and nodded, satisfied. “Bon.”

Finn quirked a grin at him. “Am I free to go?”

He was so sweet in the sun. So sparkly, copper and amber and caramel catching in his hair where the salt air had starched soft waves. Logan came close and pressed a kiss to each of his summer-warm cheeks. “I love your freckles too much to let them roast.”

“Hmm.” Finn turned his head slightly to the side, pushing his smile into Logan’s cheek. “Just my freckles?”

“And maybe you, a little,” he conceded.

Finn’s hands were pleasantly cool when he ran them along Logan’s sides in a long up-and-down. “A little?”

“Maybe a little more.”

“Enough to bring me home.”

Logan scrunched his nose at him. “I had to bring you, or the hot blond wouldn’t come.”

Finn slapped the sunscreen bottle from his hands with Logan’s favorite wordless sound of affronted disapproval—nearly a squawk, mostly a whine, almost his name. He snatched the bottle just before it hit the coarse sand and took off at a jog, dodging driftwood and clumps of drying seaweed.

Nice was beautiful in the summer. There was a reason he had brought Finn here, years ago. Finn hadn’t known a lick of French and Logan had hardly known what to do with himself watching the autumn reds of Harvard against a backdrop of blue and purple, but it was perfect. Still was. He knew just where to step to make the dock silent as he slowed and made his way to the far end, matching the steady rock of the current as it broke on the sand below.

“Bonjour.”

“ ‘Jour.”

A lazy smile spread over Leo’s lips when Logan knelt to straddle him, knees sinking into the soft towel they had brought down from his grandmother’s house. She utterly adored Leo, with his cherub curls and his good manners and (most delightfully) the ability to speak French. They hadn’t stopped chatting in nearly a week. Logan could listen to it forever.

Leo stretched, torso arching, arms overhead, ankles popping behind Logan—and relaxed, one wildflower-blue eye peering up. “You’ve got a halo,” he murmured. “Mon ange.”

Logan sighed through his nose and let his weight rest heavy across Leo’s waist. His breaths were measured with the comfort of a beach day. The sun had been kissing him golden since the first hot day in June; a week lounging on the coast of France practically made him glow.

“Le mien.” He drew a line down the center of Leo’s chest, where tiny freckles peeked through if you knew where to look. Mine.

Leo’s smile widened until his eyes crinkled. “You sound different here.”

“Mm?”

“C’est, um…” He raised a hand with great effort, tapping his fingers together like a crab claw. “Taffy. Smoother. Fancy.”

“You don’t sound like anybody here,” Logan laughed, relishing the judder of Leo’s belly beneath him. “But, my grandmère loves you anyway.”

“Yeah, she does,” Leo said, prodding him in the chest. “We talk all day long and she doesn’t say I sound funny once. You, on the other hand…”

“Ah! Un petit caneton! Ouais-ouais-ouais, coin-coin-coin-coin,” Logan mimicked.

Leo’s laughter nearly unseated him; he had hardly caught his breath when a shadow cooled Logan’s shoulder, and he leaned blindly into Finn’s thigh. “Are you being bullied into proper skincare, too?” Finn asked.

Leo tilted his head back with a hum. “We’re discussing how Madame Colette likes me better, thinks my French sounds exotique, and calls her only grandson a duck because he speaks like un canadien.”

Finn tapped the bill of Logan’s hat, knocking it off his head. “So you’re Frenching without me and not manhandling Leo into sunscreen? Preferential treatment, much?”

Logan blinked up at him with all the emptyheaded innocence he could muster. “C’est quoi? Je ne parle pas l’anglais, j’regrette.”

Finn’s lips pursed—his ears reddened. “He’s so sorry,” Leo translated before Finn could open his mouth. His hands slid up Logan’s thighs, high enough to edge on indecent but steady enough that Logan really didn’t care. “He just came here to swim and hang out with his hot boyfriend. Doesn’t know a thing about sunscreen, do you, baby?”

A gentle flick to the forehead was a small price to pay for propping his chin on Finn’s knee. “Here in France,” he said, laying on a thick false accent. “We don’t…’ow do you say…burn? I have never ‘eard of zees sun-screen you speak of.”

Finn looked at him for a long moment, then down at Leo. Chocolate-brown eyes fell on Logan again and he batted his lashes. It drove Finn fucking crazy when he did that, less in the sexy way and more in the don’t you give me those eyes you menace way. Logan employed it often for petty crimes like leaving one chip in the bag and putting it back in the pantry, just to watch Finn’s head explode for his own amusement.

Finally, Finn clucked his tongue. “I’m getting on the plane home without you. Good luck finding a redhead in France.”

Logan caught him around the calf with both arms when he began stepping back. Finn pulled, but he stood no chance when a featherlight kiss found the base of his thigh. “You’ll love me in the morning,” Logan countered. “When you aren’t stuck inside with aloe all over.”

“I happen to like staying inside and doing puzzles with Madame Colette.”

“Grandmère will keep trying to teach you French,” he threatened.

Finn narrowed his eyes, though he had long since stopped trying to free his leg. “Maybe this time I’ll learn, and then we can make fun of you together.”

“You won’t get to see the surprise,” Leo singsonged.

Logan frowned down at him, confused. “What surprise?”

Leo took his lower lip between his teeth and looked up at Finn, plucking at the hem of Logan’s swim trunks. “Remember when Lo and I went into town for bread yesterday?”

“…yes,” Finn said slowly.

“He got a really tiny swimsuit.” Logan watched Finn’s eyes widen. “And if you burn, you won’t get to see it.”

“It’s green,” Logan offered helpfully.

The corner of Finn’s jaw worked. “That’s a hard bargain,” he said at last. He beckoned Logan up with one finger and took the sunscreen back from him, setting it down by Leo. There was a curious, analytical look in his eye that made Logan want to know everything and nothing all at once. “I’ll think on it.”

“Can I help you make up your mind?” he teased.

“Yeah, actually,” Finn said, brightening. “You can.”

Logan’s pulse kicked. One week here with them had left him feeling like he’d been soaked in honey, and it only seemed to get better. He had barely been nineteen when he first brought Finn along. This future had not even been in his best daydreams. “Quoi, rouge?”

“You can cool off.”

The sudden shove to his chest caught him by surprise—the clash of the ocean around him silenced Leo’s bark of laughter in a blur of bubbles and blue. He could see Finn’s wobbly outline sketched out by the sun. Where the water drew him down to smooth gray pebbles, they drew him up, and he kicked off the bottom with the world waiting above.

[sophsicle]

there's a scene in vaincre by lumosinlove, where these two characters (leo and finn) are talking about relationships they've been in where they've had to hide, and leo says something like "it wasn't his fault, he was just scared. we were all just scared." and finn says "still, there's a way to treat a person"

and this is how i know that i am deeply emotionally repressed.

because no mcd has ever made be sob as much as that line.

it's not even a particularly sad moment in that fic (like it is but it isn't)

but.

there's a way to treat a person.

we were all scared. but you didn't need to cut me open like that. you didn't need to shove me aside. you didn't need to look through me. we were all scared but you still could have been kind. surely. kinder, at least, than the things we were scared of.

there's a way to treat a person.

[imjusthereforwolfstar]

So I attempted a thing, and I can’t believe I actually got it done in time for O’Knutzy Week.

Title: What Did You Do?

Prompt: Column B- B1 Romance Novels, B2 Vacation, B3 Surprise Visit, B4 Babbyyyyy and B5 Good Morning to Me

CW for Food, squint and you might miss it joke about weight, General Vaincre Spoilers

Big thanks to @oknutzy-week-2024 for organizing this amazing week, and always huge thanks to @lumosinlove for the characters and this world we get to play in.

Leo woke because the bed was vibrating. Confused, he cracked open one eye to see it wasn’t the bed, exactly, that was vibrating. Finn was perched on the edge of the bed, struggling to contain his excitement while Leo slept.

“Oh! Hey Sunshine! You’re awake! We have to leave in 45 minutes.”

Leo blinked rapidly. “Leave? Finn, it’s the week before training camp starts. We don't have to be anywhere until we go to the hardware store this…” he trailed off, staring at Finn and his poorly concealed grin. He narrowed his eyes. “Finn. What did you do?”

“Me? Do something?” Finn asked innocently. Then he clapped his hands once. “Now up! We’ve got a day ahead of us.”

Leo ran through his morning routine faster than usual, then found Finn in the living room. Finn was sitting on the couch, finishing up his coffee, with two small, overstuffed duffle bags on the seat next to him, and a mischievous look on his face. “Ready Butter?”

“I guess so? Finn, what’s-”

“Great!” Finn clapped his hands again and rubbed them together. He jumped up, but as he grabbed the two duffles, a smaller canvas tote next to his foot slid to the floor. “OH! I can’t believe I almost forgot!” He handed the bag to Leo. “For entertainment and nourishment during our travels.”

Leo peeked in the bag. There were four boxes of his favorite candy, two cans of favorite sweet tea (almost as good as Eloise’s) and 3 brand new romance novels. Leo's face lit up. “You got the newest ones?” Finn grinned at the excitement on Leo’s face. “Waited in line to snag them the day they came out.”

They settled into the car and Finn pulled out of the parking lot. “Finn, what’s going on?” Leo tried again, but Finn just smiled a vague smile and wagged his eyebrows.

Finn pulled onto the highway and headed south. Leo saw no use in asking again where they were going, so he contented himself with watching the city slide past the window.

They had been on the road for a while when Finn turned off the highway. He drove a few miles off the main road, through a small town, and pulled into a parking lot. “Thomas told me about this place,” he explained, “they bake everything fresh, their pastries are amazing, and they are just next door to this neat crystal shop. Oh, and the coffee shop down the street is supposed to have the best lavender lattes.”

Finn and Leo spent a pleasant hour sampling the pastries (Leo’s favorite was the lemon meringue tart, Finn enjoyed the peach turnovers, and they both agreed to bring Logan back for the salted caramel brownies) and Leo and the woman at the register chatted and swapped baking tips when they paid, while Finn petted a strangely friendly orange cat. They wandered up the street, poking in the shops (“Finn, look at these crystals! I wonder what these are for?”) before getting coffee in gorgeous handmade mugs from the shop down the road. Finn paid and he and Leo settled in the squashy chairs.

“Finn.” Leo started again. “This has been a lovely morning, but what is going on?”

Finn took a long sip of his latte. “It’s the week before training camp. You get edgy. You wander around, straighten things that are already straight and organize sock drawers that are already organized. And Lo’s gone back a week early to settle himself in before camp starts. I… I can’t keep you settled in the way he can, so I thought a short little surprise vacation might take your mind off of things before everything starts again.”

Leo blinked. Did he really do that? He thought back to last year and the feeling of unsettledness came back to him. Wandering from room to room, reworking the kitchen, picking up a book only to put it down a few minutes later because he couldn’t focus. He muttered a sheepish apology, but Finn just laughed. “Don’t apologize! It gives me an excuse to spoil you and take you on a mini trip.” Leo smiled and leaned and gave Finn a kiss. “Thank you Fish.”

Finn smiled. “Shall we, then?�� Leo nodded. They got back in the car and drove for another while, until Leo started to smell sea air.

Finn pulled the car into the driveway of a gorgeous beach house. Leo got out of the car and looked up at the house. It was huge. White clapboard, black shutters with little hearts cut out of them, and a royal blue door. It sat on a bluff overlooking the ocean. He saw a small, fenced in yard in the back with a patio and fire pit. The late summer breeze ruffled his curls as he walked up to the edge of the bluff and stared out at the water. The waves were blue and sparkling and crashing up against the beach and Leo was suddenly struck at how different it was from the Bayou back home.

Home. He missed home. He missed the heat and the humidity and the smell of spices in the air when he walked up on the porch of his parents house. And he missed his parents. The start of the season always made him miss the love and support he got from Eloise and Wyatt. They had been with him though so many season starts and they knew just what Leo needed to help him get his head into the game. And although he knew they still loved him and supported him, it was somehow different hearing it through a speaker. Leo sighed, and turned back to the car to help Finn with the bags. He pulled the canvas bag from the front seat. He was looking forward to cracking open the newest novel, snuggled up with Finn in the hammock he spied in the backyard, taking turns reading chapters out loud to each other.

Leo was walking up the front steps when the front door opened, and a familiar blond head poked out. Leo’s jaw dropped and he turned to Finn with wide eyes.

“Surprise!”

“Finn. What did you do?”

“Surprise!”

The door opened the rest of the way, and Leo was enveloped in a hug he was just now realizing he needed and missed. Eloise smelled like home. Magnolia perfume and outside and fresh baked muffins. Wyatt ruffled his hair and Leo could feel the roughness of his hands, reminders of childhoods past, hours in the garage and even more hours on the ice. Leo took a deep breath and let the feeling of peace wash over him. Leo was still learning that he didn’t have to be strong for everyone, all the time. It was okay to let it go and let people take some of the weight, and right now, with his parents this close, he knew it was okay to let them carry the weight of the season for him for a little bit.

Leo took another deep breath and caught a whiff of something amazing. He pulled back from the hug. “Mama…is that your gumbo I smell?”

“Sure is, love. Been cooking since 10 am.”

Leo followed his nose straight to the spacious kitchen. Copper pots hung on the rack over the light gray island. There was a massive slate farmhouse sink in front of a window that had gorgeous views of the ocean. And there, on the stove, was a pot full of Leo’s favorite. Bowls and spoons were already next to the stove, so Leo took a big scoop of rice and an even bigger scoop of gumbo, and sat at the island savoring Eloise’s exquisite ability to balance flavors. He already could see Finn doing his best to politely eat a few spoonfuls while slowly turning as red as his hair.

Finn did indeed politely eat a few spoonfuls of gumbo before Eloise laughed and took pity on him and pulled some cold fried chicken out of the fridge.

It was a lovely afternoon. The weather was just starting to cool off, and there was a wonderful breeze in the air. They ate, and chatted about everything and nothing. Finn and Leo sat in the hammock and passed the book back and forth, laughing at the absurd parts and discussing how much better they could have written the ending. Leo and Eloise found the path down to the beach and skipped rocks in the water, while Wyatt and Finn watched late season baseball. In the early evening, Leo opened the fridge and discovered it was packed with all his favorite ingredients. He cooked up a storm, making blackened catfish sandwiches with homemade remoulade sauce and green beans, with peach cobbler for dessert. After everyone was pleasantly full, Wyatt lit a fire in the fire pit, and they sat around the crackling fire, cups of tea or warm apple cider, and discussed the Lions prospects for the season.

It was almost the perfect evening. It was late summer and the nights were just starting to cool off, but the fireflies were still winking at them from in the grass. The stars were brighter here than in Gryffindor, but still not as bright as home. The only thing missing was Logan. Logan and Eloise would be comparing notes of French Canadian vs French Creole by now, and he and Wyatt would have already made plans to work on the car the next time they visited New Orleans.

Finn’s hand caught his and squeezed, like he knew what he was thinking. Logan had texted back when they sent him pictures of the house and the ocean. He and Alex had made plans for dinner now that he was back in NYC and Leo was happy he was settling in so much better this year than last year.

Leo slept better than he had in several weeks. He woke for a few minutes when Finn slipped out of the bed for his morning run on the beach, and drifted back to sleep listening to the murmur of voices in the living room.

The smell of Wyatt’s biscuits and gravy snaked its way under the bedroom door, and lured Leo from bed. He shuffled down the stairs, and rounded the corner into the kitchen. “Well, good morning to me. Dad, they are going to have to get me a larger jersey after…” he trailed off. Sitting at the counter, tucking into a pile of fluffy biscuits and creamy gravy, was a head of chocolate curls he would have known anywhere.

“Lo?” Leo croaked. “What? Why are you here? You were in New York?”

Logan turned his head to face him. “I’m here for you. Well, you, and the promise of Eloise and Wyatt’s home cooking. But mostly you, Soleil.”

Leo rushed forward and wrapped his arms around Logan's back. He buried his face into Logan’s neck and breathed in the familiar scent of cologne and mint tea and Tiger Balm and finally felt everything fall into place.

The back door clicked open. “Babyyyyy?” Leo called out.

“Yes?” Finn came around the corner, in shorts and running shoes, headphone case in one hand and the tops of his shoulders a little pink.

“What did you do?” Leo asked for the last time, and Finn smiled his biggest Finn smile. “Surprise?”

[lying-onthe-couch]

An ode to fanfic writers.

Regulus Black has saved my life.

A character that has not more that three lines in cannon has become my saving grace. When I became completely indifferent for the outside world and couldn’t find a reason to wake up everyday he was the only reason I tried. I’m not saying it’s healthy or a healthy coping mechanisms but he was the only reason.

I thank every day to the generous fanfic writers that gave me a reason to keep living (honorary mention to MesserMoon, MsKingBean89, Solmussa, chazzledazzlethem, wrongcaitlyn, zeppazariel, lumosinlove) for giving me a reason to keep going. To force my soul to appreciate life in a way I was unable to do for myself at the moment. I wish every fanfic writer knows how much love I have for them, for the simple act act of sharing their most true self.

I try to comment in every fanfic I read full of appreciation for your work but if it was untouched, even if I haven’t have pleasure I reading your work, THAK YOU, in name of every person’s life you’ve touched.

Genuinely, I love you.

[klairwritesthings]

So I demolished all of the cannon Sweater Weather content in like four days and have been reading fan content non stop since. So here's my little take on it. Thank you so much to @lumosinlove for creating this beautiful universe and letting us play in it. I would love any requests for other ideas, seriously I can't get enough of these hockey boys.

TW for overworking oneself to the point of collapse, mentions of nausea and vomiting (no one throws up), and general angst

Skate, strides long, smooth, fast but don't rush. Bounce the puck off the wall, catch it, cradle don't scoop, loop around the goal, shoot, ping, who misses the net without a fucking goalie, surely not a professional NHL player, go again, watch your lines, take the shot, what the fuck is wrong with you, Sirius leaning on the boards with that sleepy look in his eye, go again- wait, what?

Remus halted so hard and fast that if he hadn't been on artificial ice shavings would have sprayer all over his boyfriend. Remus panted, taking a panicked look at the clock that hung on the wall. Had he lost track of time? But no, 6:07 blinked at him in harsh red. Sirius never got up earlier than nine the morning after a game, which should have left Remus plenty of time to shower and sneak back into bed like nothing had happened.

"What are you doing up so early?" He gasped out, lungs heaving. Fuck, he ached. No, burned. His thighs were on fire, calves cramping, joints shaking at the mere act of holding himself up. Not to mention his shoulder twinging at every little twist and pull, forcing him to hold back a wince.

Sirius just rose an eyebrow, "I could be asking you the same thing." Remus shrugged, bypassing the question, knowing that actually I never went to sleep because I snuck out of our bedroom to watch two hours of tape and then run drills for three hours would not be an acceptable answer.

"How long have you been standing there?" How many open goals did you see me miss.

Sirius mimicked his shrug, maybe a little mockingly, and Remus swallowed thickly. So he was in trouble, then.

"I woke up and you weren't there." Remus licked his lips and tried to come up with an answer that wouldn't end in a fight. Sirius beat him to it. "Baby, what are you doing? You practically spent the whole night on the ice," If only you knew how true that was. "You need rest after a game like that."

"I just need to get this play right. I'm almost done, go back to bed." Sirius' eyes went from worried to hard in less than a heart beat, Remus shrinking under the heat of his gaze.

"Non."

"No?"

"Non, you're not going to get that play right, Remus." Remus nearly flinched. He knew he'd played badly last night, but to hear the unbelief from Sirius himself stung. Sirius' face softened a little, holding out his hand. "Come here, mon amour."

Remus hesitated for a moment, unsure, but eventually skated the distance to the board, his knees and ankles groaning in protest. Sirius took his hand, removing his glove and gently kissing his finger tips.

"You aren't going to get that play while you're still exhausted and over worked. Your body needs rest, baby. It can't work on empty. You taught me that." Remus closed his eyes, taking a breath and trying to hold back the tears that suddenly burned behind his eyes.

"I'm sorry."

"For what, love?"

"The game." The silence stretched on so long that he opened his eyes, Sirius' face blurring before him. He had that little furrow between his brows he only got when he was worried, or trying to figure out a particularly complex play.

"I'm not following." Remus' breath hitched and he could feel a lump growing in his throat.

"I missed your pass." Sirius' brow furrowed further.

"And? I missed a goal, Remus, it's hockey, it happens."

"Not to me." Sirius' eyebrows shot up, incredulous. Remus had to close his eyes against the judgement he was sure had to be brewing there. "It didn't use to happen to me... before." His voice had grown small, shaking. There was a pause, and then his face was being cradled between warm hands, callused from holding a stick all his life, fingers crooked from where they had bent around the shape of it. Warm lips pressed against his brow.

"Mon loup, you are an incredible hockey player. You were before, and you are now." Remus shook his head, feeling the first traitorous tears begin to slip down his face.

"I'm so out of practice, Sirius. I can't catch up all of you, I can't even catch up to myself, to what I used to be able to do."

"You don't need to catch up to anyone, you're already there. You played beautifully last night, you always do. We lost as a team. You cannot carry every loss by yourself, let us shoulder it with you, baby." Remus couldn't help but laugh a little, listing forward to rest his forehead against Sirius'.

"Now where have I heard that before?" Sirius smiled into the kiss he pressed against Remus' lips."

"A very wise physical therapist told me that." Remus chuckled, hand coming up to rest where Sirius' were gently cradling his neck, fingers running through the sweat damp hair that curled there. "Why don't we shower and go back to bed, ouis?" Remus nodded a little.

"Yeah, yeah, that sounds good." Sirius smiled, holding out a hand to help him over the boards.

Remus got one leg over before the world started spinning. Sirius caught him under the shoulders, taking most of Remus' weight while he tried to get his feet back under him.

"Merde," Sirius grunted out. "Baby, you okay?" Remus blinked hard, realizing the blurry halo surrounding his boyfriend's face wasn't just tears.

"Yeah... yeah sorry, I'm just a little..." Remus trailed off, body suddenly feeling heavy as black dots floated in his vision. He could hear Sirius' panicked voice, feel him lowering Remus to the ground, cupping the back of his head.

Remus felt like he was floating, vaguely feeling the ache of his sore body but unable to get it to move. He wasn't sure how long the world stayed out of focus, Sirius' strained words muffled. It felt like the TV static he remember zipping through his fingers when he touched the screen as a little kid.

Finally, slowly, things began to sharpen. Unfortunately that meant the pain in his legs and shoulder amplified ten fold. He couldn't help but let out a groan through clenched teeth.

"Remus, mon amour, can you hear me?" Remus went to nod but another wave of dizziness over took him, forcing himself to snap his eyes shut again and work through the growing nausea. He settled on a strained "Mhmm". He felt the gasped breath of relief over his flushed skin.

"Talk to me baby, what's happening? Do I need to call Hestia? Moody? An ambulance?" Sirius was sounding more and more panicked with each rambled word, hands flitting nervously over Remus' body as if he would break him.

Remus swallowed a few times, making sure he wasn't about to be sick, before grunting out, "M' fine." He squinted up at Sirius' face, unable to keep up with how quickly it was switching between incredibly worried and furious.

"You are not fine. You just collapsed." Sirius was angry, but Remus could hear the tears in his voice.

"I'm sorry". Sirius' face crumpled.

"No, baby, don't- don't be sorry, just tell me what to do." Remus nodded, licking at his chapped lips.

"Can you get me a gatorade?" Sirius slumped a little, seemingly relieved at having a task to complete.

"Yeah, yeah une seconde". He scrambled up, all of his usual grace disappeared, and jogged over to the stocked fridge they kept within reaching distance. In seconds he had returned, already uncapping a yellow gatorade. Remus couldn't help the little grin that quirked at his lips.

"My favorite."

"Of course. Here, let me help." Sirius rested a hand at Remus' back, slowly helping to sit him up before tilting the bottle to his lips.

Remus forced himself to take slow sips, even though he was suddenly so thirsty he felt like he was dying. He was pretty sure Sirius would combust if he threw up right now. The liquid soothed his throat and slowed the spinning of the world.

"Better?" Sirius asked, Remus humming in reply. They sat in silence for a few minutes, Sirius holding the bottle until Remus stopped shaking enough to grasp it on his own. He moved down to Remus' skates, beginning to untie them.

"How long have you been down here?" Sirius didn't look up from his task, and Remus was grateful for the space he was being granted.

"A few hours." Sirius winced, but just slid his first boot off.

"Did you sleep?"

"Not really."

"Eat?"

"...No." Sirius' eyes slipped shut, hands resting on Remus' ankles as he drew in a deep breath. Finally, he looked up at, grey eyes imploring.

"Baby, do you know how dangerous that is?"

"It wasn't that bad". The words felt week, even to himself.

"You could have hurt yourself, love. Or what if I hadn't been here? Do you know how terrifying it would have been to come down here and find you like that?" Tears prickled at the back of Remus' eyes.

"I'm sorry." Sirius sighed, Moving up to sit between Remus' thighs, legs bent to rest on either side of him. Remus all but slumped forward into the embrace, melting into the feeling of Sirius' hands working out the knots in his curls.

"You can't do that. You can't punish yourself, and you can't beet your body into submission. Trust me, I've tried, it doesn't work." Remus sniffled, hiding in the soft skin of Sirius' neck.

"I know." Sirius' arms tightened around him.

"Let me help, ouis? If you want to run drills we'll rest and then do it together. Okay?" Remus nodded, relaxing further as Sirius pressed a kiss to his temple. "Tell me when you're ready and we'll get you something to eat and get you to bed."

"Okay, just... Give me a minute."

"We have all the time in the world, love."

[arrowofcarnations]

Fic-O-Ween 2023 Day 4: Dead End

Some Luke/Logan friendship for day four of the fest (@noots-fic-fests)! Thanks to @lumosinlove for creating these two, and special thanks to @fruitcoops for beta-reading this and being an all-around excellent friend and hype noot. <3

Title: Birds of a Feather Characters: Luke Deveaux, Logan Tremblay Rating: G

(Contains Vaincre spoilers!)

“Luke and I have been running along the river. You know, the Hudson River path? It’s been kinda warm so sometimes we lay out after. There’s a park with grass. It’s nice.” (Logan, Vaincre, May Part Two)

~

They didn’t have a set schedule or anything. It would happen like this: Luke would text him something like “Run tomorrow? Gonna be nice out,” Logan would send a thumbs-up, and they’d pick an access point along the path to meet—sometimes a familiar one, sometimes a new one way uptown or downtown so they could try out a different route. That’s how it happened in the beginning, at least. Now Logan texted first sometimes, too.

Neither of them were runners the way Finn was, both preferring to keep it down to a few easy miles at most. Sometimes they’d stop so Luke could pet a dog, or so Logan could take a picture of the view to send to his boys. It was…well, nice, like he’d told Leo. Grounding. Head-clearing. Nice, too, to hang out with Luke outside of practice, travel and team dinners.

He had other real friends in New York, of course—with Alex, Percy and Will as his teammates, it still kind of shocked Logan just how many friends he had here—but there was a level of understanding with Luke that was unique. Alex and Percy were loud, outgoing, hearts-on-their-sleeves people. Will was a thousand times more patient and level-headed than Logan could ever be. But Luke—Luke was a lot like him. A hundred silent thoughts for every one said aloud. Guarded around new people. Tough shells, Leo had said of the two of them. Logan supposed that was as good a phrase to characterize it as any. He just knew he was thankful for it.

On this particular day—the warmest they’d had since they’d started doing this together—they hooked up with the path near the George Washington Bridge and headed south, flanked by rows of still-blooming cherry trees lining the river. They’d timed it late enough in the afternoon for the crowds of cyclists, families and dog-walkers to have thinned slightly, but with enough daylight left so they could finish before dark. Streaks of orange and pink were starting to paint the sky by the time they reached Riverside Park. They found an empty spot and planted themselves there; the grass was cool on Logan’s skin as he flopped down on his back, only raising his head to take a sip of water before going boneless.

“Do you have a good route in Gryff?”

Logan’s gaze traveled from the wispy clouds overhead to Luke sitting beside him, bent over his own thigh in a stretch.

“Ouais, kind of,” he replied. He liked that Luke never used the past tense when they talked about Gryffindor, about his life there. “I usually go with Finn—he has his favorites. There’s one we do in the old part of the city that’s good. You know the Godric’s Hollow neighborhood?”

Luke nodded, switching to the other leg. “Hazard dragged us to a bakery there on some little dead-end street once.”

An ache Logan was now familiar with pinged briefly in his chest. Race you to the door. Damn, I can smell those croissants. C’mon, Lo baby, I’ll buy you something sweet. “I know the one. Pretty sure he built the route around that bakery. Even when Knutty and I sleep in, he’ll bring us back something.”

It was a relief to not have to pick and choose his words when it came to Finn and Leo. So new, and still so strange. Had there ever been a time before the last few weeks when he didn’t have to worry about implications?

Finished with his stretch, Luke sat up straight and rolled his neck and shoulders a few times before grabbing his own water bottle. “He’s a morning guy, eh?”

Logan nodded. “Annoyingly so. He needs a coffee in one hand and a book in the other just to keep him in bed past eight.”

Luke gave a hum of acknowledgement, then chugged the rest of his water. He was quiet long enough that Logan was about to ask something else, but then Luke, staring out at the water, said, “Saint’s the same way.”

It was a good thing that Logan had already noticed, that he’d already suspected as much, because it was easy to keep his expression neutral. He was surprised, though; not because Luke and Saint were a thing, but because Luke had told him about it.

“He’s a morning runner?” he asked, staying put in his casual sprawl as though no big news had just been dropped.

“No, yoga. Out on his balcony, ass crack of dawn, with this ugly tie-dye bandana on his head.”

Logan laughed, loud and bright, and it startled a little laugh out of Luke, too. “Goalies are crazy.”

Luke’s shoulders, which had been creeping up toward his ears, dropped; his whole body seemed to relax by several degrees, and he smiled. “They’re nuts.”

They both let the lull in conversation stretch for a little while after that. Luke eventually laid down under the waning sun like Logan was, both of them watching the sky as the city provided a familiar soundtrack of birds, dogs, people and distant traffic. Logan thought about how Luke helped make New York feel like a home away from home. About how nice, how necessary, it was to carve out new routines and memories in a place that was so tangled up with his memories of Finn, and how Luke seemed to know that, how he’d been helping Logan do that without ever discussing it. Though, he guessed part of it was that Luke simply wanted to hang out with him because he liked him.

Liked him and trusted him. Logan wasn’t sure how he’d earned that, but he knew he’d do his best to keep it.

And because he liked Luke, too, he had to turn his head on the grass to look at him and find out what the two of them were dealing with, even if it was awkward.

“Do the other guys know?”

Luke shook his head.

“Your families?”

Another head shake.

“Have you talked about it? You and him.”

Luke glanced away, then snapped his eyes back to Logan like he was making himself stick this out. Logan understood that more than he could put into words. “Not really. It’s—a thing, but not…no one’s said boyfriend. It’s not like Black and Lupin. Or you three.”

“D’accord.”

Luke didn’t ask him not to tell anyone. He didn’t need to.

“You don’t seem surprised,” Luke said after a moment.

Logan shrugged. “Not because—I didn’t hear anything from anyone. I think maybe I can see it because I lived it for so long.”

Luke looked like he was taking that in for a second. Logan hoped he got it right. He wasn’t Finn, who always knew just what to say to anyone, or Leo, who made people feel comfortable with the kindness that radiated from him like sunlight. But Luke nodded, tossed him a stick of gum, and started talking about their upcoming game on Tuesday, so Logan figured he hadn’t fucked it up too badly.

They talked hockey until they really started to lose the light, then made their way through the park toward the street, walking fast to keep warm as dusk ushered the spring chill back in. They lived close enough to share an uber, and Luke called one as they reached the curb.

Logan pulled out his phone as they waited; Finn had correctly guessed where he was just from a blurry picture of one of the pink-petaled trees from earlier, and Leo sent a selfie of the two of them with goofy grins from ear to ear and a love you, gonna kiss you in 2 days!!!. He forgot all about the weather, warmed from the inside out at the sight of them. He wanted that for Luke and Saint, too. He wanted it for everyone who still had to hide, who still told themselves they weren’t allowed to have it.

The car pulled up in front of them and, just before they got in, Luke put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing briefly.

“Thanks, Tremz,” he said, tone casual but green-brown eyes sincere. “For real.”

“No worries,” Logan said, a phrase he’d picked up from Leo. “Get in, I’m fucking freezing.”

Luke shoved him, then climbed into the car. Logan followed his friend close behind.

[tea-moon-ster]

Courage, dear heart

hello! have some Kasey/Alex angst set during SW. that ginger took rainbow tape out at All Stars and you can't tell me Kasey didn't have a little crisis when he saw. read it on ao3 here. all characters belong to @lumosinlove.

The night of All Stars, Kasey’s brain switched off the moment he saw Alex skate around with rainbow tape around his stick, opening a line of colorful players behind him. And it was unfortunate, because it happened right at the beginning of the night. Kasey hadn’t thought about much else for the few hours spent at Remus’ place, only offering vague comments every now and then. Natalie’s eyes finding his over the Cubs’ heads had been the one thing keeping him at bay.

Then Logan had called his boys, and that’s how they found out. The tape had been Alex’s idea.

Kasey wanted to say something, anything to him. He wrote ten texts or so on his phone, feeling stupidly self-conscious as he erased them all. Hey, Al, nice tape. Hi, loved your idea. Hey, Alex, good gesture. He sighed, wondering how did he always make everything so complicated. And why he’d never had the courage to do something similar.

And now there they were, in Dumo’s backyard, with the Lions’ team and their families surrounding them.

The Lions were going to the finals, and they felt invincible.

The air was electric even outside of the rink, following them everywhere and rising every time they met. Kasey could see it in Thomas’ grin, in the little jumps Finn made any time he was on his feet. Leo told him it was a mixture of things for him. We’re so close, and my parents are here, and I have two boyfriends, can you believe it? Because I can’t. I feel like I could climb the Everest in one morning. Kasey shared that excitement, but he had to admit that it was nowhere near to the thrill of his first seasons in the league. It tasted bitter in his mouth. Most things about hockey did, now. Leo’s sparkling eyes had brought fresh air in hockey, at least for Kasey, and he was glad for it. A little push to go on until he couldn’t.

And Alex was there.

 I wouldn’t miss it, he’d said. How ever it goes. He was standing by a bush with Timmy and Olli, and Kasey couldn’t hear their conversation, but they were laughing and shaking their heads. He never failed to make people laugh.

Kasey saw the moment Alex’s eyes spotted him, leaning against the wall. He watched him excuse himself with a warm smile and one last joke. His eyes followed him to the drinks table, and saw him grab two beers. He came to lean next to him and handed him one without a word.

Kasey took a sip as they watched the sun go down, drawing golden stripes on the surface of the pool. It was still too cold to jump in, but just standing next to it built the vibrant energy of the beginning of summer. Air of anticipation really was everywhere, these days.

Kasey stole a quick glance of Alex.

The same man standing in front of him had convinced half the players at All Stars to wear rainbow tape relying on sheer force of initiative, and a great deal of courage. Even if Kasey had been surprised to see it, he realized, looking back, that there really was no reason for it. Everything about Alex translated into actions, and watching him skate around and wave his hand at the fans with pride tape, he couldn’t see a difference between him and the boy he’d fallen in love with. The boy he’d shared playful glances in the locker room with, that made him laugh loud and messy, with the little snort, and that took him for long walks on the beach every time he played in Florida. Seeing colorful stripes on his stick had moved Kasey more than he cared to admit. What does it mean, and were you thinking of me?

Of course, Natalie had noticed, too. Natalie noticed everything and she was good at not making a big deal out of things. Kasey loved how she’d immediately understood whatever was going on between him and Alex, and how she’d kissed him gently after. It’s okay if you have love for both of us. Gentler than he could ever be with himself.

That night, they’d shared a surprised look as everyone commented the tape and the players, and he’d seen her gaze going from him to Alex-in-the-TV as she tried to figure it out with him. Was it a message? Or simple support? They’d held hands in silent reassurance, wondering what it all meant.

After a few minutes of comfortable silence—Alex was good at those, too- Kasey cleared his throat. He stole a glimpse of the redhead’s golden profile against the setting sun, serene and warm.

“Sick tape,” he blurted out. “At All Stars. Logan said it was your idea.”

Alex’s eyes darted on him, as if looking for something. But it was just for a moment. Then the usual lively grin crept in, for him to relax into.

“Yeah. I thought your captain could use some support, you know?”

Kasey turned to glance at Sirius, standing on the other side of the garden, smiling at something Adele was telling him. Remus was there, holding hands in a newfound sweetness that was delightful to see. Kasey swore it had all seemed impossible until it happened.

“He really did,” he nodded. “I’m glad he had it. It meant a lot.” Kasey stopped before adding to Cap, because they both knew that it wasn’t just that. It meant a lot to me.

Alex nodded, maybe not sure on how to answer. He looked around, and his smile softened when he found the Cubs over the snacks table. Finn had an arm around Leo’s waist, talking a mile a minute, while the other two were looking at him smitten happy. Kasey studied the redhead in front of him as he looked fondly at them.

“And, you know, it wasn’t just for Sirius. For Finn, too. And his boys.” He shook his head, smiling. “You know, Finn called me the morning of All Stars, all excited, saying Alex, big ass news, I’m so happy I’m gonna die, and told me everything.” He took a sip of his beer, eyes returning to Kasey with a raised eyebrow. “Well. I already knew something was up between him and Logan, like, ages ago. I was waiting for him to tell me. And he did, so I felt like I needed to show him that it was okay. On and off the ice.”

Kasey thought back at All Stars night, when eight people had crumpled into Loop’s living room. How Finn had shouted That’s my big brother, and the way his eyes were shining in front of the tv. Kasey had allowed himself to linger on those eyes for a few moments, while everyone else focused on the screen, thinking about the twin pair that Alex bore. He remembered their warmth on his skin, shining like a jewel in the sun. Kasey thought about those eyes a lot.

Bring your eyes on me and I’ll wear your stares like the most precious stones, an old song played in his mind. He didn’t remember the name.

Alex bit his lip, sobering, and those wonderful eyes moved to his shoes. His voice came out lower this time, a vulnerability that people didn’t get to see often.

“And—you know. I had to do it for myself, too.”

Kasey felt a wave of heat rushing to his head, his heartbeat growing faster. He tightened his grip around the beer, only for the icy glass to send shivers down his spine. But Alex looked calm—like he always did.

“I just thought, what’s the point, you know? ‘S not my problem if someone cares.”

He paused for a moment, and everyone else would have thought that he was waiting for a reply from Kasey. But Kasey knew he didn’t. Alex never expected anything from him. And in that moment, Kasey was glad, because he felt petrified.

Alex sent him a small, reassuring smile. Why was he reassuring him and not the opposite, Kasey wasn’t sure.

“I’m not gonna do a big coming out. I’ll just…stop hiding, I guess.”

Then he looked up, and snorted, shaking his head as he’d just told the most amusing joke. He took another sip. Kasey could see his ears blushing as he ripped off a corner of the beer’s label.

“I mean, nothing’s really gonna change, and there’s nothing to hide. But still.”

He said the last words with his usual calm, nonchalant serenity. He threw Kasey a helpless smile, and then returned to watching the people around them as if the conversation had never taken place.

That was what Kasey had never understood. What he’d never comprehended, what he could never do.

How Alex could appear, bright and warm and wonderful, throw a few smiles and jokes around, be what people needed him to be, and then drop bombs like that. Nothing’s really gonna change. There’s nothing to hide. And then he returned to normal, like his own words, his feelings, didn’t matter more than chitchats about the weather.

Kasey just looked at him.

Nothing’s really gonna change.

Alex had never been one for holding back. He’d never been afraid of what he felt, and at the same time he’d never expected anything in return. He just felt, and loved, in his warm and easy way, without taking or holding anything against him.

Kasey was the reason nothing would change. He knew it in his heart.

He knew it every time someone tried to ask Alex about eventual partners, or dates, hookups even, and he just shrugged and smiled. Nothing significant. Not really my thing.

He knew it every time they met or talked on the phone, and Alex inevitably asked about Natalie, but then he’d stay quiet for a bit.

Alex hurt quietly, and Kasey knew, and hurt even more quietly, and none of them would do anything about it.

Alex loved Kasey. He wouldn’t need to come out if it wasn’t Kasey at his side, simply because he didn’t want another man. So, nothing would really change. And the redhead looked like he didn’t mind.

Kasey could swear he was going to go crazy.

Did he know Kasey loved him back? They’d never spoken about it enough for the goalie to understand it, let alone about Nat’s feelings, or their deep conversations about love and guilt and pain the middle of the night. Did he know they watched all his games, traced his helmet on the screen with their fingers? That they whispered his name, like a secret just for the two of them?

Kasey just looked at him, even if it hurt to stare at a soul that didn’t know how to love without hurting. Or how much love and sleepless nights bore his name.

After a moment of silence too long, Alex must have felt Kasey’s stare on him, because he turned, and his smile softened.

“Oh, Kase, don’t look at me like that. I’m fine, really. I just meant…there’s nothing to notice, you know? But it’s fine.”

Kasey looked at him with pleading eyes, even if he didn’t really know what he needed from him. To stop talking, to stop caring, to stop being so nice about it.

Alex sighed, rolling his eyes back, his expression dropping for a second. He took a breath before wearing his smile again.

“Listen, let’s forget it. I just wanna have a good time with my friend, alright? Haven’t hung out in forever, you and I,” he said, nudging their shoulders together. He paused for a second, before taking another sip. “Hey, what are you doing at the end of the month? You know, after you and your team get your hands on that shiny thing.”

Kasey hurriedly looked around for some wood to knock on, but had to settle for the wooden piles under their feet, forming a path to the pool. He gently tapped one with his shoe a few times, ignoring Alex’s disbelieving scoff, and shrugged.

“Dunno,” he said, a small smile returning to his face. “Nothing planned yet.”

Alex grinned. “Well, in that case,” and Kasey rolled his eyes at the old joke, “I have the house at the Hamptons to myself for, huh, a long time. If you wanna come, with Nat of course, I’d be happy to have you two.”

Kasey looked in the crowd by the pool for Natalie, and found her with her feet in the water, talking to Katie as the she moved her tiny feet energetically, sending splashes all around them. The grip in his throat loosened a bit. He nodded.

“I’ll ask her, but you already know the answer.”

“Great,” Alex grinned, leaving a pat on his shoulder. “I’m gonna go grab another beer, want one?”

Try four or five. “I’m good, thanks.”

He returned the smile as Alex walked away, taking away with him a bit of the warmth in Kasey’s body. He let out a sigh, gulping down too much beer at once, and then looked around for a bit. There was something in spring nights that always made tears burn more as they sat stubbornly still at the corner of his eyes.

He glanced at Natalie again, and realized she’d been looking at him for a while, a frown worrying her brows. He bit the inside of his cheek, maintaining eye contact. He didn’t feel like shaking his head and scrolling it off. He didn’t have it in him, not that night. Not after that conversation. And in all honesty, he was tired of dismissing pain like nothing could scrap him.

So, he just shrugged helplessly and made a discrete hand gesture that meant later. She nodded, not fully convinced. Love you, she mouthed. He mouthed it back, and she finally focused on Katie again when he sent her a little smile—more like an imperceptible raise of a corner of the mouth, but she knew him.

He then glanced at the Cubs, still by the snacks table, where Finn was trying to make Logan dance to the rhythm of a low background song. Tremzy looked like he was protesting, but he let the redhead move them, nevertheless. Leo, leaned on the table, was filming them with a smile of his own.

They looked so happy, Kasey thought, glancing back at Natalie, and then searching for Alex, now chatting with Noelle and Thomas.

Kasey looked at the Cubs again, and then at his girlfriend, and then at the man he loved, and decided there was something he could do. Or at least try. He’d talk to Natalie that night, in the quiet comfort of their bedroom. They would figure something out.

Something could change.

.

.

.

[lumosinlove]

On The Line

Part Five

Once again, Logan was on his back with his chest heaving, only this time it was on the hard court, not the clay. After a moment and a brief shadow falling over him, someone lay beside him with a huff. Logan peeked out eye open to see the way the sweat tracked down Leo’s temples.

“Well, damn.” Leo asked. “Lo?”

Logan smiled. He’d picked that up from Finn. Now the nickname came at him from both of them, morning and night. Soft and loud. Finn, hollering from the side of the court. Pick your feet up. Lo! Pick your fucking feet up! Logan wondered if Leo could imagine, or wanted to know, how it sounded when Finn said it in bed. Little breaths of his name every time their bodies drew together. Sometimes Logan lived for those sounds. He wondered what it would sound like as Le instead, which Finn had taken to saying.

“We’re about to be yelled at,” Logan said.

Leo snorted. “Oh yeah. Three, two…”

“Hey, hey,” Finn shouted from court-side. “Did I say you could stop?”

They’d been doing sprints. Logan knew it was good for his game overall, but the sun was hot today, and Leo’s long legs were hard not to look at.

“He thinks he’s so tough,” Leo whispered.

Logan laughed lightly and glanced at Finn, who was walking towards them.

They had to leave in just under a week for New York. The draw had worked out so that, if all went to plan, he and Leo could meet on the court. Logan had been trying to reconcile training with Leo, knowing he’d have to beat Leo, and trying to find the right moment to kiss Leo.

He felt a light kick to his foot. “Hey. Hey, hey.”

“Come here,” Logan sighed, he held out his arms. “It feels good on our backs, the ground’s warm, allez.”

“You want a hug when Leo’s gonna whip your ass in a couple weeks?”

“Ooh,” Leo said. “He’s not wrong.”

Logan groaned at sat up, turning to glare at Leo, who just smiled that sunny smile at him and held up Logan’s hat which had fallen off. Logan snatched it and reached out a hand to Finn.

“Help.”

Finn hesitated and Logan shook his head. “I wouldn’t pull you down with your knee, Rouge.”

Finn’s palm fit into his and helped him up. Logan completed the motion with a push up onto his toes for a soft kiss to the corner of Finn’s mouth.

“Lunch,” Finn said more softly. He curved his fingers through Logan’s hair, feeling how hot it was from the sun. Then, he reached out a hand to Leo. Logan watched their palms clasp as Leo got back to his feet. Finn gave Leo three hard taps to his chest. “You might be able to beat him now. Just you wait, Sunshine.”

“Oh, I’m waiting,” Leo laughed. He mimed tapping a watch on his wrist and began walking towards the house. He turned, arms outstretched. “This place is like a zombie bunker. You could so easily never leave!” He grinned once more, and jogged towards the pool. 

Finn looked at Logan with raised eyebrows. He leaned close as they collected the water bottles.

“Lo,” was all he had to say, slightly pleading, for Logan to nod.

Logan hushed him. Finn’s hair was sweaty when he pushed his fingers through it, ending with his arms looped around his neck. He kissed him hard, and when he felt Finn’s matching grin he knew he’d read his mind. The quick nip to his lip meant he wanted Leo just as bad, and he was also running out of patience.

“We could never leave,” Logan said.

Finn smiled. “It does feel like that.”

It had been difficult to think about the outside world, when Logan had first brought Finn here. Finn had been an anchor, a magnetic field—at Logan’s home the pull of him became ten times stronger. Logan had wanted nothing other than Finn in his arms. Finn between his legs, Finn pressed up against his back. In his memory, those first few days were a swirl of Finn’s laugh and smile, his hands and his body. Evening, easy matches. Hikes up to lookouts. Morning coffee and pastries. Long drives and finding small diners to stop at. Finn’s skin against his mouth, Finn’s needy breaths and low moans. Sweaty sheets and cool showers. Whispers in the kitchen at midnight making toast and box mac and cheese, Finn standing between his legs with Logan on the counter, laughing in the moonlight. It was pleasure so blinding that Logan’s hearing turned cottony and he seemed to regain awareness—woken up?— later with Finn overcome too, his entire weight heavy on Logan’s body, and still inside him. Logan hadn’t known it was possible to feel so close to someone. Curled up and sugary.

Finn was remembering, too. His laugh was soft and whispery as he dipped his kisses down to Logan’s neck. Logan closed his eyes. The sex had been quiet and mindful of Leo lately. Quick, too. Logan liked it drawn out. He wanted to not have to be mindful. He wanted Leo to know exactly what was going on because he was there, too.

Logan knotted his fingers into Finn’s t-shirt and needed so badly he could taste it.

Finn hissed a breath in through his teeth and wrapped an arm around Logan’s shoulders, directing him towards the house. He pressed a kiss to his temple.

“You make me crazy,” Finn said in a low voice.

Logan grinned and locked his arms around Finn’s waist to squeeze.

They ate by the pool, then decided to spend the heat of the day in the weights room and save the rest of their court training for the evening when it had cooled down. Leo was gorgeous shadows and lines in the relief of the bright lights.

Their game would have gone far too long if Finn hadn’t called it. It would have turned into something that tired both of them out rather than helped them. Logan tried to think past all of this and into the future where Leo would be his opponent once again. They were a bit famous for it now, their maddeningly even match ups. Their hours and hours of tennis. Even the crowds get tired, commentators liked to say. Imagine how those two feel!

Except Logan didn’t get tired. Not really. Physically, sure, but in his heart of hearts, he got more riled, more competitive, with every point. The longer it lasted the more he wanted to win. The more glances he stole at Leo, the higher his adrenaline peaked.

Logan rolled his shoulders as he finished up in the master bathroom. He felt good. Pleasantly sore in his shoulders and thighs. Cool in the light AC coming in from the bedroom. He flicked the light off and found Finn with his reading light on and his glasses slid a little down his nose so he could read lying down.

Logan tugged off his t-shirt and threw back his side of the covers. Finn made a pleased sound. He took off his glasses and set his book down.

“Hi,” Finn said as he flicked his light off. “Hi, yay, hi.”

No sooner had Logan leaned back into the pillows than was Finn rolling over and throwing his arm over Logan’s chest. He pushed his nose into Logan’s neck and Logan felt everything in him release. Finn’s quick bursts of kisses to his jaw, his hand running up and down Logan’s abs and chest.

“Hi,” Logan tucked his fingers into Finn’s hair. He reached out to tap Finn’s hip until Finn hooked his leg over his hips, too.

They were quiet for a moment. Just breathing. Logan looked down as Finn’s closed his eyes. He could feel him thinking, about to start the spill of all of his thoughts. He traced light fingertips over the scar on his knee. It was as familiar to him as anything now. White with age and raised under Logan’s touch.

“I don’t know why,” Finn mumbled. “But that always feels really nice.”

“I know,” Logan said.

Finn’s laugh felt rumbly against his chest and Logan squeezed him tighter.

“You know this is my favorite part of every day,” Logan whispered. “Right?”

Finn picked his head up to look at him. “This is?”

Logan brushed a thumb over the indent his glasses left on his nose sometimes. “Yeah.”

“I didn’t know that.” Finn pushed himself up on an elbow, eyes delighted. He leaned forward for a soft kiss, nudging their noses together.

“I love your nose,” Logan whispered. Freckles. Pointed. Glasses-imprinted. “Regarde moi.”

“I am looking at you.”

“Ah,” Logan said. “I knew you understand me more than you say.”

Finn just leaned forward and bit gently at Logan’s jaw. “I am always looking at you.”

“This is my favorite thing in the world,” Logan said. “This. And—we want Leo.”

“Mhm,” Finn grinned into another kiss. “When did we get so greedy?”

Logan laughed but put a hand to his face to keep him where he could see him. “Finn.”

“I’m listening,” Finn said. “I’m getting hard, but I’m also listening.”

Logan pressed a hand over Finn’s mouth and Finn kissed his palm, bit at his pointer finger. Finn’s brown eyes looked at him over his own tan knuckles, scraped up from a brush with the hard court.

“Wanting Leo isn’t because you’re not enough for me,” Logan said. Finn blinked in surprise, lips parting. “You’re everything to me.”

“Oh,” Finn said softly. He pushed further up on his elbow. “Baby…I know that.”

“I know you probably would,” Logan said. “But I wanted to tell you anyway.”

“You too,” Finn said. “You know that. When I first met you, I would have never thought I’d get to…” He looked down at their bodies, intertwined.

Logan nodded. “Ouais. But…you tell me these sorts of things all the time. I just…” He shrugged, smiling a little. “This is the best part of my day.” He closed his eyes when Finn pushed their foreheads together. “Love you.”

“Love you,” Finn whispered, and his kisses turned to waterfalls down Logan’s cheeks and neck. “Love you, love you…”

Logan closed his eyes and basked in it.

“Do you think,” Finn whispered. “This could be Leo’s favorite, too? Some day. Soon.”

“What, hearing you talk and talk and talk…”

“Duh.”

Logan smiled up at the dark ceiling and thought of Leo, just in the other room. “Yeah. I think it could be.”

~

“Out!”

“Non!” Logan pointed his racket at Finn. “That wasn’t fucking out.”

Finn pointed his water bottle back at him. “You gonna lose it at me? Cause if you’re gonna lose it at me, you’re going to have to give me twenty thousand dollars.”

Leo laughed from the other side of the net, his hands up in victory. He had won the mini-game they usually ended practice with. It was about 50/50 between them. Infuriatingly so.

Logan squinted at the betraying line, furious that they weren’t on the clay court and he couldn’t see the ball’s mark as proof he was right. At least, he was pretty sure he was right.

“Does this mean dinner time?” Leo asked. Logan looked over and watched him give his racket a quick spin against his palm. “Cause I love winning and all, but mostly I’m fucking starving.”

Logan just tossed his racket towards Finn, who caught it deftly with a grin.

“Yeah, Le, it’s dinner time,” Finn said. “Where should we take him, Lo?”

“Actually,” Leo spoke up before Logan could reply. He straddled his way over the net with ease. Logan and Finn glanced at each other. Those long legs.

“There’s something I want to make you.” Leo reached behind his head and undid the white cotton band keeping the sweat from his eyes. “Something new. I got the fish from that cute market this morning. Thought we could be outside with the grill, since it’s a nice night.” He raised his brows at Finn. “It’d go nice with margaritas.”

“Well, damn,” Finn said. “You take home to a five-star hotel.”

Leo reached out and flicked the brim of his baseball cap up. “Thanks, Red.”

Logan had to go pick up all their spare balls then, just to hide the look on his face. Not that he really wanted to hide the look on his face. Red. Did Leo know Logan called—of course he did.

“Wow, look at that,” Finn said from the sidelines. “Superstars doing the dirty work.”

Logan looked to see Leo cleaning up his side of the court and laughed. “We’ve been doing your dirty work all afternoon, Rouge.”

Finn narrowed his eyes at him, knowing exactly what he was doing. He waved Logan off with a hand, grinning, and began the trek back up to the house.

Leo met him at the benches near the net. With his own bottle empty, Leo grabbed Logan’s for a long pull. Logan put his back against the chain fence and waited his turn. The neck of Leo’s t-shirt was a damp gray from his sweat.

“Good game,” Logan said, watching a bead join in darkening the color.

Leo held out the bottle for him. “It’s getting easier for you to say that to me.”

“Shut up.”

Leo grinned, hooking his fingers in the chain fence so he could lean over Logan. “When we first met, you couldn’t even tell me your name.”

“You knew my name.” Logan looked up at him, back against the bumpy metal. “You threw food at me.”

Leo gave the fence a playful shake, jostling Logan, then pulled back, bashful. “I got nervous.”

“Ouais, I know.”

Leo just laughed as he turned away. He shouldered both his own and Logan’s bags, and they followed Finn.

Leo fit. Seamlessly. Logan hoped he knew just how seamlessly. Logan looked forward to things he never had before. He looked forward to grocery shopping if Leo was there. He looked forward to runs because there was Leo beside him now with his stupidly long legs and telling him to keep up.

He didn’t like to think about what existed outside of their bubble. He didn’t like it when Leo retreated somewhere to take a phone call from his team.

Just then, it was outside to pace the pool with an AirPod in his ear. Finn was sitting on the sofa with a book and Logan walked around him, tracking Leo’s movements out the window. He did little jumps every once in a while like he was waiting for a serve. He mimed backhands.

“He looks upset.”

Finn turned a page. “You know windows work both ways, right?”

Leo wasn’t looking at him though. He was staring into the dark blue pool water, eyes vacant. He nodded once in a while, argued some, nodded again.

“Finn, what are they saying that makes him look like that?” Logan mumbled.

“That’s not how windows work,” Finn said, and Logan hit him lightly on the back of the head. “Lo, they’re probably talking strategy, business, whatever, it’s not exactly fun. Lucky you, I know you so well I can think like you. Leo’s team might do stuff he’s not exactly happy with.”

“His coach never smiles. Never celebrates.”

“I know.”

“I don’t like it when they tell him what to eat when we take him out to dinner.”

Finn sighed and closed his book. “I know, baby.” He reached out for Logan’s hand, guiding him to sit on the edge of the sofa beside him. “He’s happy here, though.”

Logan jumped, eyes wide. He put both hands on Finn’s chest. “You should take him.”

Finn raised his eyebrows. “Right. ‘Hi Leo, we would like you to be our boyfriend, also may I work for you?’”

“It worked for us.”

“Yeah…We were naked and in love already, were we not?”

“So?”

Finn laughed, bringing Logan’s knuckles to his mouth. “Little bit different, but whatever you want.”

“I—” Logan looked up when the patio door slid open.

Leo stepped through, snapping his AirPod case closed. He looked far more tight-shouldered than he’d been before.

“Hey,” Finn said, tilting his head back to see him. “What’s up?”

Leo sighed and came to sit on the back of the sofa. “Nothing really. Oh, is it okay that I’m sitting on this, sorry—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course.” Finn took his reading glasses off. “Everything okay?”

Leo thought for a moment, wavering his head back and forth. “They think I’ve been here for too long.” He’d looked at Logan. “Think I’m giving up all my advantages on you.”

Logan knew he’d worried about that, but it just felt plain stupid now.

“I’m not going to suddenly be able to read your mind,” Logan said. “Every shot is different.”

“That’s basically what I said.” Leo rubbed his hands over his face. “And then they were just kind of like, why are you still there anyway, like—haven’t you overstayed your—”

“No,” Finn said firmly. He reached up and put a hand on Leo’s knee. “No, you haven’t. You know you haven’t.”

“I know, but they don’t. They don’t know you two, and they don’t think we’re training as hard as we are.” Leo looked down at Finn. “My Coach really doesn’t like that I’m—” Leo rolled his eyes, “under your thumb.”

“Oh for the love of—no.” Finn tossed his book onto the coffee table. “That’s not true, but Le, I also don’t want to make things bad for you. What can I do to help?”

“Ouais, me too,” Logan said. “I don’t like that he doesn’t trust you.” Because that’s what it was. Leo’s team seemed to think of him as a machine rather than a player. “It’s also—not like you’ve been here for months and months.”

Logan wouldn’t mind though, if he stayed that long. Or forever.

“If I called him?” Finn asked. “We could just sort out that I haven’t changed your training plan at all.”

Leo flashed him a small smile. “Yes, you have.”

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him. How do you feel about how we’ve been training? That’s all that matters.”

Finn asked them these questions every day, but didn’t seem inclined to stop. Logan loved it. How’s that? That feel okay? Got one more rep in you?

Leo always looked so taken aback by Finn asking him what he wanted. Sure, Finn told them to sprint, to run a drill again, pushing them harder and farther, but there was the flip side of jogging over to them with water, breaks to jump in the pool, or how’s that ankle that was bothering you doing today?

“Finn…” Leo said now. He looked out the window, shaking his head in disbelief. “I’ve never felt better.”

“Good,” Finn said. “Well, that’s something your team should know.”

“If I tell them that, it will just piss them off.”

“It’s not about them,” Finn said. “Seriously, I’ll take that bullet for you. They can’t touch me. Want me to speak with them?”

“He’s really good at talking to people,” Logan added. “I’m horrible at it.”

Leo laughed. He had a hand pressed to one of his cheeks, blue eyes bright and glancing between them. “He can get pretty mean.”

“What’s the worst he can do? Hang up on me?” Finn shrugged. “Good for him.”

“Really?” Leo asked softly. “I…” He nodded, short and sweet. “Okay. Thank you. Seriously, thank you.”

Finn clapped his hands together and send Leo a smile. “I’ll go before dinner. Be right back. I have some other stuff to check on anyway.” He swung his legs down to the ground around Logan and kissed him on the cheek. As he walked around the back of the couch, he took a surprised Leo’s face in his hands and pressed a kiss to his cheek, too.

“Oh,” Leo said, laughing.

Finn grinned. “See you in a bit.”

Behind Leo’s back, Finn sent Logan a wink.

Leo let himself fall down onto the couch while Logan settled himself into the warm spot where Finn had been. 

“You found yourself a good one,” Leo said after a moment. “A really good one.”

“Ouais. I try to deserve him.”

Leo kicked at Logan’s shin in a way that was probably meant to be protesting but only tangled their legs together. “You do deserve him. You’re a good one, too.”

“So are you,” Logan said. A small, sharp hit of fear bloomed right in his chest. “Leo?”

Leo tilted his head. “Logan.”

“You’re not seeing anyone. Right?”

The question seemed to take Leo by surprise. He straightened up a bit. “Am I—no. No, I’m not. Why?”

Logan could feel his face getting hot. He looked down at where he and Leo’s socked toes were touching. That shouldn’t make his heart pound as hard as it did. “Just—If there was someone missing you, I would be—um. Sad.” Logan shifted, then realized Leo could probably feel it every time he moved and tried to hold still, wrapping his arms around his knees.

Leo stared at him. Slowly, his mouth pulled into a bashful smile. “Well…No one misses me. But sounds like maybe you…would?”

“We would.”

“Is that why you keep wiggling your toes at me?”

Logan’s laugh took him by surprise and he squeezed his eyes shut, head falling against the couch. When he looked again, Leo was smiling at him. He wiggled his socks and Logan did it right back.

While Finn disappeared to the office, they started on dinner. Finn would probably make a few dinner reservations for when they were in New York, too—Logan hoped for three people. They’d see Finn’s family and hopefully Logan would take his matches all the way and…maybe come back to the hotel at night with Finn and Leo both waiting for him? Or, if he was knocked out, he’d get to sit in the stands with Finn’s hand on his thigh and watch Leo take it all the way home.

“What are you thinking about so hard over there?”

Logan looked up from where he was supposed to be shucking corn for Leo. He had a paper grocery bag between his knees and some corn silk sticking to his calves. He pulled off another smooth green husk.

“Nothing,” Logan said. “Just always feels like a lot, thinking about traveling.”

Leo was wearing one of those blue shirts that matched his eyes perfectly and cutting up some fruit. “All we do is travel.”

“Je sais, but I like being home. I always did, mostly so I didn’t have to talk to anyone anymore or answer fucking questions about why I’m so angry all the time and why I don’t have a coach and why, why, why…”

“Amen,” Leo said, and Logan flicked a smile up at him.

“But it’s different now with Finn with me. He’s…” Logan pulled another husk. “All I did was play tennis and think about tennis. Now I think about…”

“What do you think about?”

Logan laughed, shaking his head. “ That it’s nice being at home. With someone. This has been nice. Right?”

“Lo.” Leo raised his eyebrows and went to take a bowl down from the cupboard. He seemed to know exactly where every little thing in this house was, as deftly as if it were his own. “You know it’s been nice. Really nice.”

Logan looked down, pleased. He messed with a healing blister on his finger from his racket, pressing his nail against the forming callus. Finn would smack his hand away if he saw him doing that—Leo just threw a blueberry at him.

It’s been perfect because you’re here. Logan drew in a slow breath. Maybe he shouldn’t do this without Finn here, but he’d die if Leo didn’t know. I would miss you so badly if you left—

Leo held the bowl out to him, now filled with various fruits. “Here.”

Logan paused, blinking. “What?”

“That’s to hold you over so you don’t steal all my chopping while I start on dinner.”

Logan just stared at it. Leo’s beautiful, tanned fingers. The perfect cubes of mango and watermelon. Bananas. Wedges of orange. There were even mint leaves sprinkled in from the garden.

“Hello?” Leo laughed, giving the bowl a small shake. “Here.”

Logan took the fruit bowl, but he set it down and slid off his counter stool. Leo watched him, confused, as he rounded the kitchen island. Logan pushed up as high as he could on his socked feet, took Leo’s shoulders in his hands to pull him down, and kissed him.

It felt a bit like Finn’s first kiss. A kitchen, not a locker room. Logan hadn’t been simmering with frustration only moments before, but his blood still cooled into an easy river. He’d surprised Leo, he could tell that much from the way he was holding his breath. The way, when Logan broke the kiss just enough to look up at him, his blue eyes were wide. The way Leo let his breath out in a rush and put his hands on Logan’s waist—two warm centers of gravity.

He pulled Logan flush against him in one motion. When Logan sucked in a breath, Leo angled his jaw and turned the kiss warm and needy. Logan knew his head was tilting back, pliant for it, but he couldn’t help it. It felt good. Better than good. Leo’s hands felt massive, and he smelled like the hot sun and rubber of the court.

“Wow,” Leo whispered in between one kiss and another. “After everything, this is what gets me a Logan kiss? Fruit bowl.” Another kiss, ducking down so far that Logan should be embarrassed, but he wasn’t. On the court, maybe he clocked other people’s height as a disadvantage for him. Here, it was just plain nice. Preferred. “Fucking fruit bowl beats everything.”

“Everything?” Logan breathed.

Leo smiled. “Don’t worry about it.”

Logan ended up perched on the counter with his ankles locked around Leo’s waist. It had probably been a couple minutes, but Logan swore the sun had lowered some in the sky. His lips felt kissed raw and he wanted more. He wanted to wake up with that nice redness on his jaw like he got from Finn’s scruff. Eventually Leo’s mouth began working just below his chin and Logan had to make a sound, broken low in his throat as it was as he blinked at the warm, dimming kitchen in a daze—and met familiar, toasty brown eyes.

How long Finn had been standing there, Logan didn’t know. He was leaning against the kitchen doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. His cheeks and ears were pink and his lips looked shiny from being bitten.

As Finn rubbed a thumb against his bottom lip, he looked back at Logan, even when Logan ducked to get at Leo’s neck. He scraped his teeth there, gently, softening it further with a kiss just the way Finn liked. Leo moaned softly and Finn rested his temple against the doorframe like it was too much. Logan never wanted him to look away. He wanted to press himself into Leo’s hips, kiss his salty skin, and keep Finn looking at him like that.

“I know you’re there,” Leo managed to say just before Logan kissed him again. His words turned Logan’s kiss harder, desperate. It felt like he was going to burst with how much he wanted this. How long had he wanted this, even without entirely realizing?

How long had Leo wanted this?

Finn?

“I know you know,” Finn said. His voice was unwavering. Logan didn’t know how he did it, but it sent Logan’s heart kicking, as did Leo’s soft laugh. For the first time in what felt like hours, Leo pulled back and looked down at Logan. Logan reached up, pushing his fingers through his blond hair. He wanted him back that close again, but paused. The sight of him. He looked like he did after a match that went his way. Adrenaline and sun and happiness.

“Sunburned,” Logan said.

Leo shook his head, smiling. “All you.” He turned towards Finn, and Logan rested his head on his shoulder to look, too. Finn looked like he was breathing fast. Logan could see him worrying the inside of his cheek. His brown eyes were dark, mostly pupil, and Logan felt hooked just like he always did when he discovered what got Finn. He likes this, he thought. He really likes this.

“Finn…” Leo swallowed. “Tell me I read all the signs right.”

“The signs?” Finn repeated. He walked forward towards them in strong strides. His fingers pushed gently through Logan’s dark hair, tilting his head back. “There’s your sign. Look at Lo.”

“I’ve been looking,” Leo replied. “Now, I’m looking at you.”

Finn laughed and ran a hand over his face. “What the fuck happened? I left you two alone for not even an hour.”

“Fruit bowl,” Logan said, not that that would explain anything to Finn. Honestly, he felt a little tipsy off of Leo’s kisses alone.

Contrarily, Finn’s lips parted in understanding. “I see.”

Logan scoffed. “See what?”

Finn’s hand was still in Logan’s hair, now at the base of his neck, where he squeezed with a smile. “You’re a pretty intense person to try and understand, but once one can crack your code…” His eyes slid to Leo. “Nice one.”

“I actually wasn’t even trying right then.”

“Trying?” Logan asked. “What do you mean you trying?” He gestured to Finn. “We’ve been trying.”

Finn and Leo exchanged another look in front of Logan. It was the easiest, most exasperated pair of smiles Logan had ever seen. Logan looked between them, trying to figure out what they were beginning to laugh about. Even without knowing, it began to bring a smile to his face.

“Quoi?” he asked, but they didn’t look away from each other. “Hey, what?”

Finn didn’t give him much more room to wonder. His left hand tightened in Logan’s hair, effectively stealing his breath, while his right slid behind Leo’s neck and pulled him in, still laughing. He fit their mouths together like he’d done it a thousand times.

Logan wasn’t sure he was really breathing, watching that. Watching the way Finn kissed. He knew how it felt, he knew how good it was, but seeing it was something else. Seeing it and not being jealous was something else.

He reached out and put his fingertips against Finn’s cheek, his jaw, feeling him kiss Leo, then let his hand fall to press over Leo’s chest. Finn’s palm pressed harder into his neck, and Leo’s hand found his hip again and yanked him right up against him, just as Logan had been, as they kissed. Logan tightened his legs around Leo and pushed his mouth against the cotton of his t-shirt while he watched.

Leo laughed a short, disbelieving breath, his lips parting as Finn’s became more insistent. Leo’s hand pressed into Logan’s thigh, supporting himself, but Logan wasn’t sure he knew just how high up his palm was as his fingers bunched up his shorts.

“Have you two kissed?” Logan heard himself say, because there was no way this could be the first. Had he and Leo looked that good, just now?

Finn took his time answering, Leo chasing his mouth—oh, did Logan ever know that feeling.

“We have now,” Finn finally said.

Leo pressed his hand over his eyes. “What the fuck.”

Finn nodded. “Yeah, yeah, it took us—”

“It took you long enough!” Leo burst out. “What the fuck, we’ve been flirting our fucking asses off for weeks. For a year. I thought I was just being stupid for a while, but not many married couples flirt back, you know.”

“We’re not married,” Logan said.

Leo huffed. “Well—not technically, maybe.”

Finn dropped Logan another wink, like he had in the living room.

“We flirt back,” Logan said. “But we’re—us. We weren’t sure you’d want…”

“Oh, weren’t we though?” Finn said. “Weren’t we pretty fucking sure?”

“Recently. But before, I didn’t think…”

“Go ahead,” Finn said, at the same time as Leo said softly, “What, Lo?”

Logan looked between them.

“I didn’t think it was allowed.” He reached for Finn’s hand on his neck and took it in his own. Married couple. He touched his ring finger. “I have so much already. I didn’t think I was allowed to want more, that’s…Is—Is…”

“Is this something you can have,” Leo said for him. “Or is it just something you want?”

Logan looked up at him, surprised. “I…”

“If it means anything, I’ve stayed up so many nights with that particular question. Especially recently. And I come to the same conclusion each time.” He tilted his head briefly to rest his temple against Finn’s. “If it wasn’t okay, why would it feel this much like a life that I could have?” He turned his head to look at Finn, jaw sharp, mouth soft. Finn’s eyes darted to each part and plane of his face and Leo swallowed before continuing. “It doesn’t feel like lust. Doesn’t feel like a crush. Believe me, I’ve had both for you two.”

Finn smiled softly, pushing his chin forward for a barely-there kiss.

“Feels like a life,” Finn whispered.

Leo nodded. He turned back to Logan.

“Does that help?” Leo asked, then he dropped his voice and took Logan’s face in his hands. “Did I get it right?”

Logan wanted to try what Finn had tried. He put his chin up and let Leo kiss him soft as paint strokes.

“I think,” Finn said, leaning into them. “You got it word for fucking word.”

Evening would turn to sunset would turn to dusk, and Logan needed this night to stay as long as it could. Leo let him down from the counter and held him tight against his body for a moment. There was something sharp in the point of Finn’s canines when he smiled at them, and when Leo pulled away to start on dinner, Finn’s hands found Logan’s hips and he pulled him backwards, back flush against Finn’s chest. He kissed Logan’s neck over and over and over.

“Game,” he said between each kiss. “Set,” he said, and Leo began to laugh, getting it. “Match.”

“You think you’re the winners here?” Leo looked them up and down and gestured to himself. “I won.”

“Mm, non,” Logan said. “It’s definitely us.”

Leo pulled back on his smile, turning to the pantry.

“Chop this for me, O’Hara,” Leo said. “I’m still cooking you dinner.”

Finn caught an onion Leo tossed against Logan’s chest.

“You want to…eat?” Logan asked.

Finn laughed. “Why, did you have some plans?”

Logan thought of those kisses. Leo’s hand on his thigh. “Ah…Non.”

With his free hand, Finn pushed two fingers into Logan’s jaw to turn his head for a real kiss.

“You sweetheart,” he whispered.

Logan reached up to flick his cheek. “I feel like I missed a large part of this game.”

“You didn’t miss any of it,” Leo said, pushing the silverware drawer closed with his hip. “You maybe were a little oblivious sometimes.”

Logan spluttered as Finn slapped his ass then stepped away to take a cutting board down and pull a knife from the block. “To what?”

“Mostly a whole lot of Leo-Finn eye contact,” Finn said, and sliced in. “Oh Jesus, I’m gonna cry. Thanks for the worst job.”

“Aw, I’m sorry. Come here.” He kissed him, quick. An every-day kiss. Finn pumped his fist in victory and Leo rolled his eyes.

“Eye contact?” Logan asked.

“Yes, Lo,” Finn said. “Once I was for sure you were on board—oh fuck, here it comes.” He pressed an elbow over his face. “Ow. Ow, ow, ow.”

Logan walked forward and pulled Finn’s arm away. His eyes were all teared up, turning the brown to syrup. “Once I was on board—”

“He basically gave me the green light with those brown eyes of his,” Leo said. “I mean, not so many words were spoken, but actually,” Leo pointed a fork at Finn. “You kissed my neck in the pool one day.”

“Yes…” Finn sniffed, eyes closed. “I lost some willpower for a second, sorry.”

“Well, no, don’t be sorry,” Leo said.

Logan reached up and wiped a tear from Finn’s cheek. The onion was beginning to sting his eyes, too and he squeezed one shut to look at Leo.

Leo laughed. “Oh my God, look at you two. Hopeless. Okay, here, one second.”

He disappeared through the doorway to who knew where.

“I think he knows this house better than me,” Logan said.

Finn blinked down at him, Logan sniffled and tried to look up at him, but eventually Finn laughed, gave up and closed his eyes against the burn. He pressed their foreheads together instead.

“Did that really just happen?” Finn whispered. “I love you. Way to go, Tremblay.”

“It was easier than I thought. I didn’t know he was so—wanted us, too? I was worried he didn’t. Or wouldn’t. Or not as badly as we…”

“Oblivious.”

Logan punched Finn in the arm. “I’m not.”

Finn pulled back and looked down at him. He wiped at Logan’s damp cheek.

“Look at you,” Finn said. “How could he not want you?”

Logan leaned forward onto his toes, palms flat on Finn’s chest. “What was that about me having codes?”

“Grumpy until Finn kisses you.” Leo strode back into the kitchen as he spoke. “Irritable until someone brings you food after a workout. Happiest when someone is touching you somehow—but you’d never admit it—and always, always, worried,” he stopped in front of Logan, “about the people you love.”

“That’s not a code,” Logan said.

“It is when you need to know what you’re looking for,” Leo said.

“Looking for? Looking for when?”

Finn tighten his arms around Logan’s waist. “When you’re hoping to make the legendary, tough-as-nails Logan Tremblay melt in your arms.”

“Been there,” Leo said.

“Done that,” Finn added.

They clasped hands like they did sometimes on the court and Leo held up three objects. “Candles. For the onions.”

“I have candles?” Logan mumbled. He couldn’t imagine where they had come from.

Before he could really blink, Finn had dimmed the lights and there were five candles set up around the kitchen, giving it a soft glow. Onions were sizzling soft and fragrant in a pan along with oil and mushrooms. Logan felt a little dizzy. Finn put his hands on Leo’s hips to step behind him and mimed forehands to him when he handed him objects like a zucchini to chop or a wooden spoon. Logan stayed on his counter stool, making his way through the fruit and leaning back into Leo’s chest when he came over to wrap his arms around him from behind.

They moved out to the patio and pool when it was time for the grill, leaving behind the pleasant, smoky smell of blown-out beeswax in favor of charring vegetables and fish. The sun had turned the world and its pool reflection orange and Finn put a glass of white wine in his hand. Logan’s mind turned slow, watching the way Finn slipped his arm around Leo’s waist. He wouldn’t stop touching Leo, and Logan wasn’t sure how, but it felt like he could feel every slip of Finn’s fingers over Leo’s back and shoulders. At one point, when there was nothing left to do, Leo turned quick and pinned Finn against the stones of the house to kiss him—they were the harder kisses of a late, hot night, and stood stark in the lingering sunlight they were bathed in now. Finn looked over at him while he was catching his breath, Leo having left him with a smile to go plate their dinner.

Wow, Finn mouthed at him, and Logan had to rest his cheek in his hand just to feel how hot it was.

The solar lanterns went on around them as they sky turned to purple and blue. Logan was hungry, a deeper sort of hungry. Their empty plates stacked on the table in front of them and Leo’s mile-to-go tanned legs were stretched out and crossed on the table. Logan maybe looked at them for too long, because when he looked up, Leo was watching him.

“One more code,” Leo said. “Quiet Logan.” Leo raised his eyebrows at Finn for answers.

“Furious or horny,” Finn said. “Occasionally both.”

“I’m not furious,” Logan said, just to be difficult.

Leo let his head rest back against the canvas cushion of the patio couch. “Oh, no?”

“Non.” Logan finished off the last sip of his wine and looked into the glass. “What did the other eye-contacts say?”

Finn’s arm stretched behind Leo along the back of the sofa, and Leo’s eyes flicked up to look at him.

“Lots of silent conversations, you and I,” Finn said. He curved his wrist to tussle with the golden ends of Leo’s hair.

“Hm.” Leo thought. “First it was Finn making eyes at me and me trying to be, like—is this in a gross cheating way or—but he’s Finn and you’re you and he’s obsessed with you so there was no way.” He pointed his glass towards Logan. “I mean, then you started making eyes. But I also kind of thought you just kind of…”

“Stare really hard at everyone he looks at,” Finn finished.

“Exactly.”

“What?” Logan cut in.

“In a cute way!” Leo said hurriedly. “It’s also really hot. I mean, not across the court—across the court it makes me want to strangle you.”

Logan couldn’t help it. He laughed. “I make you want to strangle me? You do the annoying shirt thing before every serve!”

“What annoying shirt thing?” Leo asked.

Finn laughed. “Lo, baby, that’s not so much annoying as it is…frustrating.”

Logan just stood up and picked up the hem of his shirt, pretending to wipe sweat up his face. “As if we need you to flash your stomach every two seconds.”

Leo looked delighted. “Oh, you don’t like that?”

“It’s not needed,” Logan said, crossing his arms and moving to stand in front of Leo. “It’s a distraction. I mean, who are you Sascha Zverev?”

Leo narrowed his eyes, obviously biting back a smile.

Finn had his knees spread, relaxed as he looked up at Logan, too. “Furious and horny.”

Without sitting up, Leo flatted his hand low against his stomach and pushed up the hem of his shirt, revealing a light sprinkling of blond hair and his tanned, toned stomach. “Now that you told me, I guess I’ll have to stop using it on the court. Unfair advantage and all that.”

Finn hummed and reached forward. He hooked a palm behind Logan’s closest thigh and pulled, sending Logan forward and straight into straddling Leo’s lap. Logan caught himself, hands on Leo’s bare skin. It had sent both of their breaths out of them in a rush. Leo was grinning, almost too widely, and panting through a light laugh. His hands curved over Logan’s lower back. Finn leaned back again and took a sip of his wine.

Leo was warm beneath him, and he didn’t seem to mind the weight so Logan let himself relax, sinking off of his heels and fully onto his lap. Leo squeezed his hips in reply.

“This is much better than eye-contact,” Leo said, but the last syllables were quiet and jumpy because Logan had started pushing his palms up his chest, under his shirt. He flipped his palms up and gripped the fabric. Leo didn’t need him to say anything. He sat forward enough for Logan to pull it over his head. The gold chain he wore spilled like water back to his throat, but Logan only had a moment to look before Leo was doing the same to his shirt. Logan shivered at the feeling of Leo’s hands on his bare ribs. Blue, blue eyes met his. Leo’s face held a timid, burning fire. He breathed in, trying to press into his hands, and Leo’s fingers slotted into the spaces in between seamlessly.

Logan looked at Finn. He had set his glass down and had that hand resting low on his stomach, thumbing the band of his shorts. He arched a brow at Logan.

Leo, when Logan found his blue again, was breathing more shallowly now, lips parted. He liked feeling Leo breathe beneath his hands. He liked being able to see where the sun touched his skin.

Logan leaned forward slowly, holding Leo’s gaze, before ducking his head to take that gold chain between his teeth. He pulled gently until Leo’s head tilted back for him, baring his neck, and then pressed his lips there right over a pounding beat.

“Huh,” Leo breathed. “That belonged to my grandfather.”

“D’accord,” Logan said, pressing his lips over the metal, now warm. “What do you want me to do, thank him?”

Leo’s laugh was loud and breathless. Heat spiked through Logan’s entire body when he felt Leo’s hand, large and warm, cup the back of his neck. “God, Logan.”

Logan pulled back to look at him, leaning into his hands. “What’s my code now?” Logan pushed his hips down and watched Leo’s eyes flutter shut then open again. “What am I thinking now?”

Leo just laughed and pulled Logan to him.

Warm. Leo’s mouth was warm and sweet with the wine. Something pushed against Logan’s shoulder and the world went a little lopsided. Logan though it was just Leo’s kiss making his head spin until he felt his back hit the soft cushions of the couch and realized it had been Finn pushing them. He laughed into Leo’s mouth, letting his lips drag down his neck, and opened his eyes to see Finn kneeling beside them.

Finn looked like he had looked in the kitchen, flushed as he leaned forward to kiss Logan quiet again, only dragging his mouth out of Logan’s reach to kiss Leo.

“Your knee,” Logan panted. “Don’t—” He broke off, watching them kiss. “Don’t kneel like that…”

Finn didn’t reply, but Leo made a concerned sound and pulled back.

“O’Hara,” he said sternly.

“Well, then get me off the floor.”

“You pushed,” Logan said.

Finn rolled his eyes and stood up with a groan. Logan hooked an elbow around his legs, keeping him there so he could press kisses to the scar. When he looked up, mouth on his skin still, Finn looked more flushed than before. Logan thought it was him, but then he noticed Leo’s hand, pulling at the strings of Finn’s shorts.

Leo’s teasing smile brought Finn sinking towards them, but Logan wasn’t sure which one of them kissed Leo first.

Time pinned and froze. A note on a door in Finn’s handwriting that Logan might’ve just kept forever. One of Finn’s steamed-up hearts traced through windows at him. Logan wanted to sign his name on the scene in front of him. He wanted to magnet it on a fridge, wanted Finn to seal it on that bulletin board he kept in the office with all of their plans. He wanted to fold it up and keep it in his wallet. He wanted a video, a grainy one that would smudge Leo’s blue eyes as he looked up at Finn with his fingers digging into his pale hips.

It was finally dark outside, and Logan wanted to relive the way the three of them had stumbled through the house a thousand times. Finn pushing Leo against a doorframe, Leo stopping Logan with his arms wrapped tight around his waist to kiss him until Logan felt he’d have to ease them down to the floor right there. Finn’s heaving chest in the light coming in through the moon with Leo gasping beneath him was a movie in itself. Logan didn’t know what to do with himself half the time. He ran his fingers over every inch of skin exposed. Kissed the sounds out of Leo’s mouth, watched Finn’s face in a way he’d never gotten to before. He was gorgeous like this, shoulders braced with his hands sinking into their bed, red hair sticking to his temples. Sitting up and back in a way that made Leo’s back arch and let Finn pull Logan under one arm. It wasn’t a kiss he got from Finn exactly, more like he was using Logan to try and catch his breath, to steady himself.

Logan let his eyes slip closed and turned blindly for Finn’s mouth. He felt Leo’s hand on him and reached down to hold his wrist, just to feel the way it moved. Quick and sure with his strokes as he was on the court. When he stretched out along Leo’s side, he could feel the snap of Finn’s hips in the way Leo’s body shivered. They had been giddy earlier, laughing and tumbling, but at one point Logan had been pinned so tight between their bodies that the laughter broke in his throat and some sort of fever had lit inside him. He needed closer and again. He needed them kissing each other over his shoulder and feeling like he’d been drenched over his head in something this sweet smelling.

He couldn’t take it anymore. He swung his leg over Leo’s hips and was up, balanced on Leo’s chest. His world was Leo’s voice, oh, Lo, yes, yes, and Finn’s chest to lean back on once the two of them sent Logan sinking again, plunged him into his own personal, warm, weightless, sea.

Next he knew, their breathing sounded as rhythmic as the AC, and Logan was on his side, but he was sure, somehow, that his head was at the wrong end of the bed. He was warm, though, perfectly so, like someone had thrown the comforter over him. He opened his eyes and found Finn beside him, on his back. He was panting hard, chest rising and falling quickly, and Logan tried to piece out exactly what had made him like that. He meant to lay his palm on Finn’s heart, just to feel, but his muscles didn’t quite obey and he ended up slapping it there, making Finn jump.

“Jesus fuck,” Finn said. His breathing paused as he swallowed around a dry throat, then took up again. His hand covered Logan’s. “Hi. Hi, baby.”

“Leo?”

“Ya,” Leo’s voice came, somewhere from the head of the bed so Logan had to raise his head. He was in a mess of pillows, bare and breathing as hard as Finn was. Logan frowned at him. He felt as calm and serene as morning waters.

“You might have missed some action at the end there,” Finn read his mind. “But you looked so peaceful and…and I just needed…” Finn looked down the bed at Leo and laughed. “Well, that one more time. Jesus, Knut.”

Leo grinned and let his head fall back into the pillows.

Logan pushed himself up onto his forearms and tried to shake some of the fog from his head. He hadn’t been asleep exactly. Just…everything had felt good. The sheets. Their hands. Their sounds. He remembered, now that he was thinking about it, feeling safe with their warm voices right there, their hands on him even as they were drawn together. Finn’s gentle words, separated by kisses Logan hadn’t quite been able to open his eyes to look at. You know you read the signs right. You know you did. We’ve wanted you. You should have seen Lo the first time we really talked about it, I thought he was ready to go and find you right then. The way he lights up whenever you call. The way he quiets on the court when he plays you, you push him so well. I’ve wanted you. I thought I had it all until I watched you walk right up at that ball and ask to dance. Oh my God, you’re brave, you’re brave, of course we want you.

Already, Logan knew when one of them was missing. He could feel it when he woke up sometime later. He heard the bathroom door squeak slightly and opened his eyes. Finn was asleep, rolled onto his other side with the sheets slung low across his hips. Leo had pulled boxers on and was crossing back from the bathroom. Leo saw he was awake and jogged over to him quicker, making Logan laugh and check to make sure he hadn’t woken Finn. When he turned back, Leo was sliding back under the sheets and Logan shuffled over to press close to him. Sharing a pillow like he’d done a thousand times with Finn.

“Your blue eyes look different in the dark.”

“Hm,” Leo whispered back. “Different how?”

“I don’t know, I like it, though.” He ran a hand up and down Leo’s bare side. It was cool, no lingering warmth from the bed. “You’ve been up?”

Leo sighed and shrugged like he was resigned to it. Logan inched closer. This was new.

“I know all about your routines and your days,” Logan whispered. “But I don’t know about your nights.”

“Guilty insomniac here,” Leo whispered, then smiled. “Sure you still want me?”

“Shh,” Logan soothed. “Of course I do.” Leo humphed and pushed his cheek into the pillow, but his eyes did flutter closed as soon as Logan began rubbing his back. “Of course we do…”

“I was mostly joking,” Leo whispered. “I just—I don’t know, something keeps me up.”

“You’re worried about something?”

“No, no,” Leo said. “I mean, sometimes that’s it. Mostly, it’s just—there. I’m just awake.”

“What can I do?” Logan asked. He traced a thumb over Leo’s full bottom lip. “I’ll do anything.”

That soft mouth smiled right into Logan’s touch. “I know you would, sweetheart.”

“Pst, pst, pst, pstpstpstpstssst,” Finn grumbled suddenly, then rolled over to press against Logan’s back, throwing an arm over him to reach Leo. “I’m getting you up for a run at six, go to sleep.”

Leo gasped even before Logan could. “You are not.”

“Now it’s five for talking back.”

“It’s three in the morning right now. We’ve been asleep for two hours.”

“Maybe we should just get up now then,” Finn said, and Logan could feel that teasing grin.

Logan elbowed Finn gently in the ribs. “Go away, no cuddling for you.”

Finn just tossed a leg over them, and Logan watched Leo’s eyes brighten as Finn peppered a dozen hard kisses over Logan’s neck and shoulder.

“Oh, baby, you don’t know how to send me away, nu-uh,” Finn whispered. Logan felt a weak little tug of arousal in his gut, not enough to be urgent, but, God, Finn. Finn would always do Finn things to him. Then, just as suddenly as he’d woken, Finn was leveraging himself over both of them and locking Leo between their bodies. “But my Leo’s not being sleepless, not on my watch.”

“Hm,” Leo said softly, eyes slipping closed. He let Finn tuck his knees up behind his own, let Logan stretch his arm out under his head to act as a pillow instead. “Well…If there was ever a place I could sleep…”

“It’s right here,” Finn whispered, lips against Leo’s shoulder. His brown eyes flit to Logan. “It’s right here.”

“Can I have some of those peppers?”

“What…” Logan and Finn looked at each other. “What peppers?”

“Those,” Leo said softly.

“Peppers,” Finn repeated to himself, then laughed. “Oh, peppers.”

He started slow, placing gentle kisses to Leo’s neck, then got faster as he reached his jaw and cheek.

“Peppers,” Logan mumbled, watching Leo’s pleased smile.

Logan settled a kiss on the corner of Leo’s mouth and blinked in the blinding, rolling urge to tell Leo that he loved him. Now, before their breathing all evened out and he’d have to wait. But Leo was falling into a lull again and Logan didn’t want to ruin that. On Leo’s hip, Finn’s fingers found his and locked tight. Finn squeezed once, twice, brown eyes so dark and deep in the night. Logan squeezed back, hard, finally understanding.

[oneluckygoose]

FinnLo Math

Hi, welcome to Lucky's hyper fixation at the current moment

For the past two weeks I have binge read Sweater Weather, Vaincre, and Coast to Coast by the lovely @lumosinlove and just want to say, Jesus Christ. I have actually fallen in love with O'Nutzy SO HARD and they are amazing and I'm absolutely a slave to Harvard Era FinLo. To @lumosinlove, this is a masterpiece and now I want to watch hockey, you've infected me.

Anyway, with credits out of the way, I did some math, (get ready for Harvard era FinLo math under cut)

*Disclaimer: None of these characters are mine and I did not create this story, so everything I say may be completely incorrect. Any of this may be disproven in Breakaway, which I don't/won't have the ability to read. Most of this is based off cannon times and events within the Sweater Weather universe, but I have made clear where cannon ends and my assumptions begin. Again, these are not my characters and all credit goes to @lumosinlove, This is not making fun of, patronizing, or degrading the all around fantastic story they have created, and is simply pointing out things I have noticed.*

Now in Coast to Coast, I noticed some strange things that Finn says. He tells Logan he's been in love with him for eight years, right? And over the course of the story Logan mentions he's loved Finn for 7 at some point (that may actually be in Vaincre, if it is the math lines up so that's a testy point). And when they kissed in part V of Coast to Coast it said it had been four years since they last kissed. This threw me off, because I knew this was, what, early January of 2020 in universe.

So I did some digging. Finn is a year older than Logan, meaning when Logan came to Harvard in 2014 (codified in Coast to Coast part VII, the very start, includes sexy Batman during Logan's first Halloween party at Harvard), he would have been a Freshman while Finn was a Sophomore.

Now it isn't clear whether their first kiss in 2015 was when at the end of the 2014-2015 school year or the start of the 2015-2016 school year (though Logan doesn't have a car, so that lends a little more credibility to Logan still being a Freshman, but it kinda seems like Logan never has a car in general, even in Sweater Weather and Vaincre). I tend to think it's the start of the 2015-16 school year because that's when Finn met Hanna, and those sorts of things don't really carry over after being apart for the summer. Anyway, this means it would be Finn's Junior year.

Now their last kiss before Finn leaves is supposedly in May of 2016, which was part II in Coast to Coast, but that doesn't make sense because it is stated that they are only one year apart,

[I'm pretty sure at least. Later in Coast to Coast it mentions Finn's rookie year and it's said that it was only one (1) really bad year without Logan (same goes for Logan as a senior) before Logan is drafted to the Lions after he graduates. This means they're only one year apart, so the 2016 thing I believe to be wrong]

and if you do the math with Logan being a Freshman in the 2014-2015 school year, he would be a Junior when Finn is a Senior in the 2016-2017 school year (I have a whole timeline trust me on this, it'll be at the bottom). So theoretically their last kiss would have been in May of 2017.

Now their next kiss in in January of 2020. Based off of the very beginning of Sweater Weather, the time period of the fic is the 2019 NHL season, so starting in September, it would be January of 2020 when Remus and Sirius' photos got leaked, right before All-stars, which Logan was going on. The same day the photos are leaked, Finn and Logan kiss for the first time since May of 2017.

If you tally it up, it would be 2 years and 7 months since they had last kissed: Seven months left in 2017, plus all of 2018 and 2019 {Essentially (7+12+12)/12}. Notably, not four years.

[If we are going on the timeline where the last kiss is in 2016, it would be 3 years and 7 months, which would be much more reasonable to say four years; however, that timeline is a little jacked so.]

The other thing that threw me off is Finn saying he'd been in love with Logan for eight years, which I also believe to be wrong.

Finn says to Logan when they are officially getting together in part V of Coast to Coast that he'd loved Logan for eight years, which doesn't make sense if they only just met in August of 2014.

To put it simply, they wouldn't have known each other for eight years. Again, if you tally it up, that's five months in 2014, five years, and then about half a month in 2020. {Essentially (5 + 12 + 12 + 12 + 12 + 12 + 1/2) / 12}. Let's just say they've known each other for 5 years and 6 months. Again, not eight years.

There is the concern of not loving each other when they first met, but Finn does say that he had loved Logan since the moment he saw him at the training camps in 2014, which would have been when they first met, so we can disregard any buffer time.

[And I am about 90% sure that August of 2014 was when they first met because during the Halloween party scene in part VII of Coast to Coast Logan talks about how Finn is his "new roommate" and they'd only just met. I could be wrong.]

And about Logan saying he'd loved Finn for seven years, I don't remember if it is in Coast to Coast which ends in 2020 or in Vaincre which goes until summer of 2021. If it is in Vaincre, this is a totally moot point because it's correct for about 7 years, but if it's in Coast to Coast (thinking on it now it may even be in Sweater Weather, either one would be off), then it wouldn't have been 7 years, but anywhere between 5-6 years. I would need to go back and find the part.

Other Interesting Math Things I figured out while Hyper fixating:

Alex O'Hara:

In Vaincre it says that Alex had to come from somewhere other than Harvard to see Finn in the hospital after he had gotten his first concussion, meaning he wasn't attending Harvard at the time. Vaincre also introduces a whole gang of people who were all on the Harvard team at the same time, which included Alex and Logan. So there had to be at least one year where they were on it together, and I assume it's probably Logan's freshman year.

When Finn's concussion happens is never explicitly stated, but I am assuming it's Finn's Junior year based on Finn and Logan's relationship at the time (pinning and extremely reserved while not awaiting Finn leaving (all this is coming from Logan talking about the concussion in Vaincre)).

With all this to say, I can assume Alex was a Senior in the 2014-2015 school year, left to join Florida's team in 2015-2016 and met Kasey down there in their rookie year. (Obviously they proceeded to fall in love as all good O'Hara's do: fall in love with their best friend.)

Leo Knut:

*open's mouth* *closes mouth* *opens mouth again* *looks down at the ground* Leo was in 8th grade when Finn and Logan met.

Leo was 18 at the start of Sweater Weather (2019) with a birthday somewhere in Nov-Dec, so theoretically he would have been a Senior in High School the year before. If you just tick back the years, that would put him in 8th grade during the 2014-2015 school year.

Not anything important I just stumbled across it and thought it was worth sharing, may as well make this post longer.

All in All List of Math:

Logan and Finn's last kiss before Finn left for Gryffindor would have been in May of 2017 not 2016

Their next kiss would be 2 years and 7 months later, not 4 years later

Finn and Logan have been in love since they met in August of 2014, meaning they've been in love for 5 years and 6 months, not eight years.

Alex O'Hara shared his Senior year at Harvard with Logan during Logan's Freshman year

Leo Knut was in 8th grade when Finn and Logan met

Timeline

[ttylfedora]

April Fools with the Lions: Best Bits

Omg. Hello? It’s so nice to be back! In honour of April Fools and the discord having a bit of fun with it, I bring you��� April Fools with the Lions: Best bits!

All characters belong to @lumosinlove. Happy April Fools!!

Logan rubbed his eyes, waking up fully. Leo curled into his neck at the movement. He looked over to find Finn’s side completely empty. Leo stirred once again and looked up at Logan with a sleepy smile.

Logan squinted at Leo, wondering if he was seeing things.

“Leo, why do you have lion face paint on?” Leo’s face was fully painted, as though he had been to Katie’s birthday party and had been forced to sit down and have his face painted during it.

“Why do you look like a zebra?” Leo asked, just as confused as Logan.

Logan grabbed his phone off of the nightstand and opened up his camera. Sure enough, an intricately painted zebra looked back at him.

He messaged Finn, asking if he woke up the same.

All that was sent back was a smile emoji sent by Siri.

-

“You’re going to walk into the rink like that?” Nat asked Kasey, who was sporting a dolphin and a rainbow across the side of his face.

“I need to find Finn before Finn finds me.” Kasey called back. “I know Alex didn’t do this on his own. He has about as much artistic talent as I do in my little toe.”

Kasey and Nat never did find Finn before practice. They did, however, find a Lion stood dead centre of the locker room looking at the Goalies TPed stalls.

“If this was you, you need to do better next year.” Kasey laughed, clapping Leo on the shoulder. Leo laughed.

“No no no. This was Cole and Layla. They were round the corner watching me come in here thinking I didn’t see them.

“Time to recruit Nat, I think,” Kasey whispered to Leo and pulled out his phone.

-

“Layla I have no clue what to do. I can’t go out on the ice like this. I thought I was being nice by just TPing Kasey’s stall!”

Layla only covered her mouth to suppress a chuckle, watching Cole panic over his now upside down name and number on his jersey.

“All is fair in love and war, Rookie!” Kasey howled through the door, Nat howling after him.

-

Pascal let out a frustrated groan. Some the start of practice, not a single one of his shot found the back of the net. Timmy let out a similar sigh, taking his helmet off and wiping the perspiration off his head.

“It’s playoff season! We can’t be doing this,” he gridded out. He watched Finn line up a perfect shot, only to miss as well. Looking over to Coach Weasley, he wondered why he wasn’t angrier. He looked amused, even.

Pascal looked down at his hockey stick. Something felt… off. He held it out in front of him, Timmy and Kuny doing the same.

“It feels small.” Evgeni stated.

Pascal looked up at the rest of the team to find the Triple Threat of April Fools, Remus, Sirius and James, grinning back at them.

“You know, when I locked Remus and Sirius in my basement, I did not expect to be paid back like this.”

-

“Luke! Luke!”

Luke ran into the bathroom, only to burst out laughing upon finding Saint with bright red hair.

“Was this you?” Saint’s face like thunder, he pointed to his bright red hair. Luke fought to keep a straight face and shook his head.

“I promise it wasn’t. Now hurry up, I need to shower as well.”

Two hours later, Saint and Luke rocked up to practice, looking like Rangers biggest fans sporting bright red and bright blue hair. Logan was unable to make a shot that practice, for he was laughing so hard at the coloured sweat dripping down both their necks. He snapped a pic for Leo, his only partner in fools it would seem…

-

Remus and Sirius made a habit of turning up to practice early. Maybe it was the quiet before the storm, maybe it was the control of having the rink to themselves. One thing they did know, however, was that they liked the rink before anyone started playing the practice session joint playlist. ‘Game Day Vibes’ they called it. A playlist comprising of songs from everyone’s repertoire.

Once the rink was full, Coach allowed the playlist to be put on. Except all that rang through the rink was… a nursery rhyme?

Remus looked over at Finn who was in charge of the playlist. He pressed skip. Finn looked up in confusion as a musical rendition of ‘incy wincy spider’ played out.

“Who, in the ever loving fuck put this in the playlist?” Jackson called out, skating round next to Finn as he frantically scrolled through the playlist. “It’s just nursery rhymes…”

James was doubled over in the far corner, something akin to ‘don’t diss my son’s music taste’ coming out in amongst gasps of laughter.

James had his playlist privileges revoked for 6 weeks.

-

“So we did the ducks last year, what are we doing to Remus and Sirius this year, Dumo?” Julian asked, placing his cereal bowl in the dishwasher.

Pascal thought on it, scratching his head.

Katie bounded in with multiple chain links in Rangers colours.

“Look what I made for Logan, Papa!” She held them up with a big toothy smile. Well, almost toothy. She had a visit from the tooth fairy the previous night.

Jules’ eyes widened and looked over at Pascal, who responded with his own fully toothy grin.

“Go get your brothers and sister, Katie. We have work to do.”

Remus and Sirius returned from practice to find their entire front room decked out in Rangers merch, chain links hanging from each light and across the ceiling.

“I swear as soon as Logan and I meet on the ice again…” Sirius looked over at Remus, “it’s war.”

Remus chuckled and pulled out his phone to find a message from Dumo.

‘Thanks for the key, it’s under the flower pot’

-

Everyone was gathered in Sid’s for their monthly get together. Some of the Rangers had made the trip down as well. Thomas was sat at the bar, his arm hooked loosely around Noelle’s waist.

“So no one managed to get either of the brothers?” She whispered in his ear.

Thomas smiled back at her, eyes softened as he moved a strand of hair behind her ear.

“Not yet. Did you manage to get the video?”

Noelle pulled her phone out of her bag and showed it to Thomas.

“It’s hilarious, T. Me and Nat were in stitches.” Thomas smiled slyly, placed a kiss on Noelle’s forehead, and walked up the the little make shift entertainment stage.

“Can I please have everyone’s attention!” He called out, arms wide. Mutters of ‘speech!’ were called out across the bar, paired with smattering’s of applause.

“Now with the close of another successful year of April Fools, we have this years standings. At the bottom, with the most unoriginal prank I think any of us have ever seen, we have Cole and Layla, who took it upon themselves to TP Knutty and Blizz’s goals.”

A round of ‘boo’s’ swept across the bar.

“Yes, yes, thank you. Do better next year” Cole and Layla had their heads in their hands looking mortified.

“Before I reveal the winner, I have one last thing I would like to do. Who here has been personally victimised by a certain pair of red-headed brothers this year?” Hands went up, Logan the Zebra’s face like thunder as people turned around to chuckle at him.

“Yes, now. I set Christmas on a task a week ago. Big love, Noelle,” he held a glass up to her and winked. “A little birdy once told us that our very own Alexander and Finnigan have their own pregame ritual they started when they were kids. Their mom and dad were more than happy to share this video with us-“

“No no no- please Walker I’m begging you,” Finn called out, laughter clinging onto his every word. Alex’s jaw was on the floor.

“If you’d please turn your attention to the screen.”

An old video played. A young Alex was instructing their parent to sit on the couch whilst Finn was in the background rewinding the tv to the perfect moment. The pair did an almost perfect rendition of the handshake from the parent trap.

Thomas looked back at Finn and Alex who were doubled over in laughter.

[fruitcoops]

Clean Slate

Ah, the passage of time. If anyone has been here since the first phone call, you may be entitled to financial compensation (or an AARP membership). Character credit goes to @lumosinlove <3

“Reg?”

On the first ring, as always. “Hey.”

“…hi?”

“I was thinking about going back to Gryff for Christmas.”

“Oh.” Surprise, but pleasant surprise. Regulus shook his pan of sausage. “Yeah, sounds good. You always have a room here. Or were you staying with the cubs?”

“With you.” He stretched his neck from side-to-side. Tension bled out of his forehead and shoulders at the familiar roll of French on his tongue. “If that’s okay.”

“Always,” Sirius answered immediately, almost hasty. Regulus wasn’t sure they’d ever get past that. Ah, well. The damage was done.

The line remained quiet for a moment. Sausage sizzled, and he turned to the pile of green beans on the cutting board. Leo had taught him how to snap the ends off with his fingernails, and though he was better now about not chewing them to the quick, he still didn’t like the feeling of stuff stuck beneath them. Regulus had really only called to clarify plans.

“How—how are your friends?”

“Good.” Sirius liked to talk, even if he wasn’t very good at it. “Jax and Kris set up the living room last night.”

“Do they still have that stupid poster?”

Regulus snorted under his breath and carefully sliced the tip off another bean. “They tried to hang it in the window.”

Sirius groaned.

Regulus grinned. He supposed he could have a little mercy. “Don’t worry, it’s under my bed.”

“Somehow, that’s worse.”

“I can’t get rid of it. It’s their favorite possession. They have a thing for your long hair and the murder face. Jax is still waiting for the day you spontaneously get divorced and need a hot young college student to rebound.”

He wasn’t sure whether the gagging sound Sirius made was real or exaggerated. As long as he was in mild torment, Regulus was happy. A simple, ever-amusing perk of long-distance communication.

“I hope your classmates are less in tune with pop culture.”

“Hockey, yes. Pop culture, no.” Regulus eyed the pan, then added another knob of butter to be safe. There was nothing worse than a burnt vegetable. “And my classes are going well, thank you for asking.”

“You’re welcome.”

He rolled his eyes. It didn’t matter that Sirius couldn’t see it; the message would certainly get through.

“Don’t make that face at me.”

“I’m not making a face.”

“You always make faces.”

Regulus stuck his tongue out at the microwave above the stove.

“I can feel you doing it again.”

“That was a different one. I’m taking physics 3 this year and it’s making me want to eat a doorknob already.”

“You’re anemic enough that it would probably help.”

“I take my supplements!” Regulus argued, shaking his pan. “Not my fault we were force-fed protein in fucking sun-less Canada.”

“We had sun, you just never went outside,” Sirius countered, like it was some sort of argument. “I don’t have to take supplements.”

“Well, you’re perfect and bulletproof, as everyone knows.”

“Exactly.”

Regulus angled his face at the dark phone screen when he pulled a face this time. It was a good one. Pity that Sirius couldn’t see it. He should’ve gone for FaceTime.

“Are you starting a fire?”

“I’m making dinner.”

“So…yes?”

“Not all of us have a home cook.”

“I can cook now.”

“Oh, you’ve been housebroken.” Regulus blew out a mouthful of steam as he tested a piece of sausage. “How thrilling for Lupin.”

“You’re such an asshole.”

“Takes one to know one. I learned that last week.”

He could feel Sirius shaking his head. “Knutty is formally banned from teaching you new slang.”

“You’ve never said ‘no’ to him in his entire career.” Regulus let the line hang silent for another half-minute as he turned the burner off and began scraping his dinner into a bowl. It still bore a faint orange tinge from last year’s finals-week spaghetti run. He fished a piece of pasta out of the water and popped it in his mouth, grimacing at the heat on his tongue. It was cooked well enough—at least, he was hungry enough to forgive a more al dente texture.

“By the way,” he started, as if his stomach wasn’t stuttering. “I think I’ll be back in time for family skate.”

The shuffling sounds on Sirius’ end came to an abrupt halt. “That’s nice,” came the faux-casual answer.

Anxiety made a valiant effort to claw up and silence his tongue. “I was thinking about going.”

“Well,” Sirius began, then paused. Regulus swallowed a few times to clear the block in his throat while Sirius pondered. “I—yeah, sounds good.”

“I want to.”

“Good.” Sirius’ relief was audible. “Okay, good. You can change your mind.”

“Don’t be weird about it,” Regulus ordered as he toed his slippers on and made his way to the apartment’s tiny coffee table. They’d get chairs at some point, but for now three pillows sat on the floor beside it.

“I’m never weird.”

“Boo, liar.”

“Freak.”

“I’m telling Lupin.”

“Do it. He likes me better. I can cook.”

“I’m—” Regulus caught himself at the last second and felt Sirius’ breath hitch on the other end of the line in anticipation. “—not joking, I actually want to go and play stupid ice fetch with your irritating friends, and nobody is making me feel pressured.”

“Okay.”

“Don’t sound so…” He wrinkled his nose and stuffed a mouthful of pasta into his mouth. “Smiley.”

“It’ll be good to have you home.”

“If you’re weird, I’m staying with Leo,” Regulus threatened. “For real, this time.”

“Right, because you love being around people who are engaged and anywhere near a holiday, or mistletoe, or the magic of Christmas—”

His loud groan silenced Sirius’ words, but not his laughter. “Get your laughs in now, before I whoop your ass on the ice.”

“Would love to see you try.”

“Don’t sound so thrilled.”

“Everyone else is going to underestimate you. I won’t be nice like that.”

“You’re never nice,” Regulus lied.

Sirius let him eat in peace until he was scraping the last bits of cheese from the bottom of the bowl. He heard the faint beeping of the dishwasher buttons in the background and glanced at his own sink, nearly overflowing with haphazard dishes from the first chaotic weeks of their senior year. The apartment was a pleasant change from living on campus, such as it was. Jax and Kris had offered to pay rent—tried to strongarm him, really—but a few withering looks had finally made them relent. It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was his. Theirs.

The string lights lining the ceiling weren’t strictly allowed, but Regulus liked their gentle blue cast. The blanket Remus and Sirius had sent as a housewarming gift sat cozily on the back of their couch. Curtains from Jax’s mother let in just the right amount of light in the mornings.

“Call me if you need anything, okay?”

The sound of Sirius’ voice in his earbuds startled him. “Yeah,” Regulus said. “Yeah, sure.”

“Even for laundry.” Sirius tried for wry, and it made Regulus crack a small smile, but it was gentler than either of them intended. “Don’t shrink your clothes. Check the tags.”

Always do, he thought, but kept it down. “Good advice. No centipedes here, yet.”

Sirius’ laugh was a little weak. “You’re just not looking hard enough.”

“Eugh, don’t say that.” Regulus blinked fast, tipping his head toward the ceiling. “Hey, this washer even has a ‘normal’ setting, if you can believe it.”

“Oh, wow. Lucky you.”

Picking up the phone on the first ring, always. For four years straight. “I’ll see you at Christmas.”

“We can come up in October, if you want.”

Of course Sirius had the academic calendar on-hand. “I’ll be gone that weekend with the guys. We didn’t want to be around all the new parents. They’re very damp.”

“And you melt when water touches you, of course.”

“Of course.”

Sirius let out a quiet breath. “See you at Christmas, Reg. Call me when you have flights.”

“Mhm.”

“Stay safe.”

“Always do.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I do here,” he corrected.

“Fine.”

“Miss you.” The streetlights down the road were just starting to come on. “Say hi to Lupin for me.”

“He’s in the other room,” Sirius offered. “You can say it yourself.”

“I’ll talk to you both enough at Christmas.”

“Call any time. And let us know when you hear back about graduation tickets.”

What a terrifying thought to leave for the end of the call. “I’ll forward it to you.”

“I’ll keep an eye out.”

“Okay. Bye.” And before he could second-guess himself—“I’ll be home soon.”

“Don’t talk to strangers,” Sirius answered. Regulus heard the truth under it. “And do your laundry.”

[greyeyedmonster-18]

Do you have any fic recs for maybe the best Sirius portrayals you've come across? Thanks!

ahhhhhhh

okay well, im obviously biased, and i love my own fics, the end.

but, if you don't want to read my nonsense, here are some of my favs:

-the son and heir of nothing in particular by @steelycunt (aeridi0nis on AO3) as well as on the issue of fever and delight and in lieu of beaujolais.

as you can see, i'm particularly fond of their writing and despite loving to be mean to Sirius (in the best sort of way, he is our barbie doll that gets chewed on sometimes, shaken like a rag doll), always do a phenomenal job of capturing his demons and the vibe. there's a particular line in OTIOFAD where sirius is there trying to apologize, and he, like, can't figure out how to slouch enough to do so, and it just hits right where it should. yes.

-the shape and sound of god by @dykefever (dykesiriusblack on AO3).

this is a fleabag AU, and Sirius is the star of the show. I am in love with this sad, sad, depiction of him. What I love a lot about sirius is how raw he is, like literally an open wound walking around and he pulls people into it, but he's always honest about that too. and is just like trying trying trying to be better, but the wound is just festering and. this. also, if you're in the mood for more dykefever, i highly recommend (in my room) i want you here

sweater weather by lumosinlove; look, i am a cult member too. i am nothing but a cult member. (i'm not tagging because I'm sure they get tagged 80x every day, yall know where to go)

Beneath a Big Blue Sky by @eyra; also a cult member for this one, i can't help it. There's something so delightful about sirius in this. and understanding. our sweet silly boy. everyone's comfort fic is also my comfort fic.

Boys Don't Cry by @blitheringmcgonagall (YouBlitheringIdiot on AO3);

i don't tend to read about the Prank because it makes me feel too much and drives me insane but THIS ONE. THIS ONE. yes. will read. and Sirius's characterization in this is top tier.

Drifters by twentysevensummers; the insane times i have read this single chapter.

At the Healing Edge of Broken by @heartofspells

OKAY LOOK I HAD TO COME BACK AND EDIT THIS POST. so fair warning (and i told tumblr user heartofspells this when i was reading as well), i had to do some skimming with some of the subject matter in this fic. BUT that does not erase the fact i LOVED this sirius. i loved how sweet he was with harry. i loved his humor. i loved his arrogance and forced vulnerability. I binged this and then went straight to the authors DM's to scream so. yeah. whoops.

(please let the record show i dont generally make rec lists because I'm always afraid someones going to be sad they weren't on it. but here are some of my favs that i find myself returning to.)

[itsaash]

O'Knutzy Week! Prompt: gardening, smile

I'll be posting parts of the same story each day this week! It's a cubs au where Finn's spending the summer at his parent's house in the Hamptons and Leo is their private chef. Established LeLo. Characters by @lumosinlove, for @oknutzyweek2023

Part 1

Part 2

and now, Part 3

Finn looked up from his laptop, he had been sitting under the big umbrella at the side of the yard going over his latest edits. He noticed the sun had well crested through the sky since he last looked up. But it felt good to finish up those edits and send them back to the author. He took a breath and leaned back in his chair, stretching his back and arms overhead, looking around at the house in the distance and the green of the property all around him.

His eye caught movement straight across the lawn from him, a sunshine yellow hat at the raised garden beds. The soft yellow, wide brimmed hat sat on top Leo’s head, giving him the illusion of even more inches of height. He was wearing overalls, it looked like cotton ones. And thank god for that, a person was liable to melt in denim today. He had a big basket beside him, filling up with produce from the garden. But also a spade? Was he digging something? Finn watched as Leo stood up and used the spade to turn the earth in the garden bed, his arms flexing strongly even from this distance. He bent over to reach for something and Finn jumped up. He couldn’t admire Leo from over here like some sort of creep. Just go talk to him. And get out of the line of sight that makes staring far too easy.

He had found himself doing that, staring. Just gazing at Leo as he moved around the kitchen with such a graceful confidence that it could almost be a dance. Across the dinner table, Leo’s hand around a cup, damp with condensation, how he closed his eyes to fully enjoy the perfect bite of food. And, okaaay, that was enough of that train of thought, he reprimanded himself. He crossed the lawn in easy strides, hands in his pockets.

“Hey, Leo. Whatcha doin?”

Leo looked up from patting down the dirt with his gloved hands. He ran the back of one of his wrists over his cheek, smudging a bit of dirt there. Why did Finn want to reach out and brush it away? He clenched his hands tighter in his pockets.

“Oh hey, Finn. Just getting some stuff for dinner, doing some planting. How’s your work going?”

“Oh, great! Thanks! Ya, I've done what I need to for today.”

“That’s good to hear. You were sitting out here a long time.”

Finn laughed self consciously. He knew he tended to lose track of time.

“Yeah, it was an interesting project and I wanted to get the edits to them for Monday, you know? So I just kept going.”

“Well I’m sure glad you’re done. I was going to bring you a drink, but now you can come in and get one.”

Finn stared as Leo turned back to the garden, seemingly digging shallow rows in nice straight lines. Leo had noticed him? Was thinking about if he was drinking enough? How could he be so sweet? He coughed slightly.

“Whatcha planting there? Isn’t it kind of late in the season for planting?”

Leo kept working as he answered, shaking tiny seeds from a packet and placing them carefully. “For a lot of things it is, but there’s some things that you want to have consecutive crops of, every few weeks. So I’m doing a few more rows of beets and other greens, like arugula, spinach. This is probably the last row of carrots for the season too.”

Finn had never thought about gardening for two minutes straight in his life before, but there was a first time for everything.

“Beets and other greens?” Finn questioned, “how are beets green?”

Leo laughed, covering up the latest tiny seeds with a layer of dirt and patting them lovingly.

“You’re right, I said that in a confusing way. I just meant how you can eat beet greens - the leaves of beets - just like they’re lettuce. There were some in the mixed salad last night.”

“Those were beet greens in the salad last night? Who knew!” Finn reached out a hand to pluck a long, leafy stem from the neat row of beets in front of him. He could see the round curve of the beet starting to appear up through the dirt. Leo looked up from his planting, almost in time, “No! Not that –”

But, Finn had already brushed the leaf off and popped it in his mouth, chewing slowly. His relaxed face rapidly morphed into horror.

“–one,” Leo finished lamely. A smile quirked at the corner of his mouth and he scrunched his eyes shut, whether in laughter or distress … Finn couldn’t tell, given the rather large distraction of one of the worst tasting things he had ever put in his mouth and that was saying something ohmygod.

Finn coughed, spluttered, and looked around frantically, searching for salvation. He dashed to the tree line and spat out the bite as fully as he could.

“Leo, what in the fuck…” Finn said as he walked back, wiping his mouth, eyes wide.

Leo couldn’t help the burst of laughter that escaped his chest at the horrified look on Finn’s face. “It’s only the little ones we eat, Finn. Oh my God, your face.”

“That was so gross!”

“Yes, I imagine it was,” Leo chuckled, reaching for a plant at least a quarter of the size of the one Finn had chosen. “Try this one, maybe it will get rid of the taste.”

Finn reached out his hand, taking the small leaf. He paused, “Promise?”

Leo’s blue eyes locked onto Finn’s soft brown ones and the moment stretched.

“Promise.”

Finn popped the leaf into his mouth, a little relief softening his features.

“How the fuck can the same plant have two so different tastes?”

“Well I don’t know the chemistry of it, but yes, you only eat very new beet greens. Like I said, that’s why I’m planting more. The big ones are left to grow to eat the actual beet, but it’s nice to have another crop of fresh greens too.”

Finn nodded sagely, he wouldn’t forget that lesson any time soon. Rather effective learning technique.

“Do I even like beets?” Finn asked, and cringed, as if Leo would know.

“Well I know a lot of folks don’t, but I’ll try to make something good for you. I like them roasted and served cold with balsamic vinegar and feta cheese. Maybe we’ll do that as a side dish tomorrow. They make such a goddamn mess though, you won’t believe it.”

Finn laughed, “You must hate that.”

Leo looked up at him, and rose from his planting, clapping his hands together to brush off the dirt. “Yeah, I do. You caught onto that, did you? I’ll peel them outside with about a roll of paper towel handy.”

Finn shrugged, “I’ll help you. I don’t mind a mess.”

Leo paused in his gathering of gardening tools and looked at Finn, saw him full to the brim of sincerity.

“You don’t have to, Finn. You’re so sweet to offer, but it is my job. You’re supposed to be able to work, and relax … and not worry about cooking on the weekend.”

Finn cocked his head to the side, not loving the reminder of their power imbalance. He needed to fix that. Somehow. “I appreciate the amazing food you make so much, Leo. It’s more than a job, or like … a service. It’s been a gift. I’ll help you. If you want.”

Leo smiled his sunshine smile and the bitter taste still coating his mouth was worth that smile, that laugh. Being in Leo’s orbit only brought him joy. Finn helped gather up the last of the gardening tools and they walked back to the house across the soft grass.

Leo turned to FInn, “You need a good glass of water to get rid of that taste, and then a strong tasting drink. Maybe sweet tea to cut the bitter? Or maybe cover it up with a strong taste, like a mojito?”

“Afternoon mojitos?!” Finn practically bounced when he was excited, and was even bouncier to see that it made Leo smile.

“Mojitos it is.”

Finn tried to tamp down the silly grin he knew was all over his face, but he couldn’t stop the feeling of bubbles in his chest at the idea of spending the rest of the late afternoon with Leo. And, honestly, he was also quite looking forwards to getting this goddamn horrible taste out of his mouth. Beet greens, indeed. The things he’s do to see that sunshine smile.