#so the isa drawings should get better soon

[daily-beau]

Day 1: Isaboop

[asirensrage]

3 or 12 for the yandere smut prompts. Murder husband or established couple, please. ❤️

Okay, so I need you to forgive me because I legit couldn't decide on who fit this best. It might be Billy and Grace though because I could see those two pulling something like this. Or! Billy and Isa. I listened to "Love is a Bitch" by Two Feet while writing the smut lol and I really like these two lines in this one shot.

Oh well, regardless, I hope you enjoy it. Thanks for participating!

Pairing: Billy Russo x Undescribed female character Rating: Explicit Warnings: suggested kidnapping. Unprotected sex. Unbeta'd ;)

To say she had better days was an understatement. 

Waking up in a room she doesn’t remember falling asleep in was the initial warning sign. Granted it was a big one, but it was the first clue that something was wrong. Thankfully, the door is unlocked and she isn’t about to stick around to find out. 

The hallway is empty and she creeps out slowly, listening carefully as she leaves. The hall is dark enough that she needs to keep a hand on a wall to help find her way. It’s then that she realizes her cell phone is gone. Whatever. That’s a problem for later. Right now, she needs to escape. 

Footsteps sound down the hall, making her freeze. She waits until she hears him open the door she just left and takes the chance to duck into the next door she touches. Thankfully it’s empty and she presses her ear to the door, holding her breath as she listens. 

“Sweetheart!” Billy’s voice echoes down the hall. “I didn’t think you’d wake up so soon.”

She doesn’t respond.

“Come on out. I promise it’s not what it seems.”

She doesn’t believe that for a second. She knows that voice. She slept with him last night, letting him buy her a drink before taking her home. It was clearly a mistake. One she wouldn’t make again. 

She waits until he heads down the hall, opening another door. She takes the chance to leave the room she’s in and makes her way further down the hall before hiding again in another room when she hears him come back into the hall. 

“I guess we’re playing then.” 

The game continues. 

He gets close a couple of times but the place is a maze and she’s not entirely sure she’s not lost. It doesn’t matter. As long as he stays behind, and she gets out, she’ll win. She just needs to make sure he doesn’t find her first. 

“How many fucking doors does this place have?” she mutters to herself.

“I hear you,” he calls out. 

She ignores the taunt. 

“Come on, sweetheart. Haven’t I promised I would take care of you?” 

She doesn’t remember that. 

“Haven’t I made you feel good? Let me continue. Let me show you everything I can offer you.” 

It’s tempting. She knows by his tone that he’s serious and she remembers the last night they were together. Still, it’s not enough to stop her. 

She thinks she’s getting close to the end. She has to be. 

One of the doors is locked and the doorknob rattles when she tries it. There’s no light shining underneath so she moves on, praying it’s not nighttime outside and she didn’t notice. There’s a door at the end of the hall. She hears him getting closer and she takes the chance. She runs.

Footsteps pound on the ground behind her. Her fingers wrap around the doorknob as she shoulders it open. Light spills into the hallway, silhouetting her. Before she can move further, a hand closes around her mouth as an arm loops around her waist, yanking her back. The door closes in front of her. 

Lips press to her ear as he whispers, “Found you.” 

She shivers at the feeling. “I almost made it.” 

“Almost,” he agrees before pressing his lips to her neck. He kisses the skin softly. “Ready to come back?”

“If I say no?”

“I guess I’ll have to convince you…” He turns her, pushing her back against the wall. His lips are on hers, kissing her deeply. Her arms move, wrapping around his neck and drawing him closer. She likes him like this, even if it’s a game neither of them should be playing.

His kisses are desperate, as though he suspects that given the chance she really will leave, that she’ll get tired of him. She doesn’t think that will ever happen. 

She scrapes her nails gently against the nape of his neck and he pulls away from her just enough so he can brush his lips against her cheek before kissing a path down hers. 

Her breath hitches as he presses closer, providing her with more warmth than she thought possible. She didn’t realize she had been so cold until now. His hands slide under her shirt and she closes her eyes, leaning back as she focuses on the feeling. He leaves goosebumps in his wake and her stomach flutters at the promises she knows he’ll keep. 

When he kneels before her, helping her out of her clothes, he looks up like he’s ready to worship. She can barely see him in the dark, but there’s just enough light from the crack of the door to illuminate his devotion. 

Her hands dig into his hair when he guides one of her legs to rest on his shoulder. He holds her weight, keeping her steady, even as he buries his face between her legs. She reaches a crescendo under his familiar touch with startling ease. He’s tasted her a thousand times and every one he feasts as though it’s his first. 

Billy keeps her standing when her legs threaten to give out on her as she breaks, murmuring praises against her skin. He moves slowly, standing back to his feet and kisses her again. And again. 

“Gonna let me treat you right?” he asks softly. 

“You already do.”

He laughs at that, a low chuckle that makes her stomach clench. “Let me feel you.” 

She doesn’t bother answering, not with words. She unbuttons his pants, pushing them down and freeing him before hooking a leg around his waist and pulling him close. She eases his way in with a guidance that burns both of them in its familiarity. No matter how many times she’s felt him, it never gets old. 

He holds her against the wall, keeping her pressed back on it with every thrust. She clings to him, nails digging into his back as she tries to hold herself up, to keep pace with him. He overwhelms her though. He always does. 

His hands press bruises into her skin as she draws blood from his. Their kisses are hungry and desperate as they turn relentless in their pursuit of their pleasure. 

She bites on his neck, trying to keep herself from crying out when she reaches the brink and is thrown into her orgasm. 

He swears as his grip tightens and his pace increases. The overstimulation turns nearly painful before his hips stutter and he presses her tighter against the wall, as though he’s trying to etch himself into her skin. They both struggle to catch their breaths.

“Are you okay?” he asks, his voice quiet in the dark.

“Yeah,” she answers, smiling softly. He pulls out before lowering her slowly to the ground. “Where did you find this place?”

“A friend of a friend. You weren’t too scared waking up alone, were you?”

“A little but once I heard your voice, I knew what it was.” 

His hand brush back her hair, one curling at the back of her neck as he kisses her again. “Have I told you how much I love your trust in me?”

“As often as I tell you I love our games.”

Billy laughs at that. “You really thought this was all just a game? Darling, my love for you goes far deeper than you could even imagine.” 

“Good.” 

[mimiplaysgames]

Terraqua Week Day 6 (Free Day)

Summary: Terra and Aqua are getting married—and Ven is the Bridezilla. || Word Count: 9,058

Read on AO3

A/N: @terraquaweek​ I could have never written this without my dear friend @localcryptideli​. We talked about this wedding years ago, and I promised to write it. It’s here, three years later, blending their headcanons with mine and I couldn’t be more proud of it. <3

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

the threads that tie hearts together

Terra never once considered in his entire life that his wedding preparations would include the perk of mice squeaking in his ear—but he here is, in the tailor’s studio, getting re-fitted for his tuxedo, with Princess Cinderella’s team of seamstress mice on his shoulders, measuring the length of his arms. His muscles were too big for the previous suit. 

Ven refuses to hire a proper tailor, and instead rents out the parlor so the mice could do their work in private.

Lea sits on a nearby bench by the shoe shelves, the top button of his shirt open, jabbing at his Gummiphone. He’s quite popular today, pinged every two minutes. Isa and Roxas share a mirror, trying to get the mechanics of their bow ties right. 

Terra is getting married. 

The thought. Married. Soon. Yes. Damn. He can’t cry right now.

Terra stands in front of a mirror and bends his elbows to see how the fabric moves. The mice are tiny, three of them in skirts. They’ve developed an efficient obstacle course of threads all down his entire body, a network so the mice on the floor can deliver them supplies—spools, sewing needles, thumbtacks, measuring tape—in a jiffy. 

Lea groans, squeezing his Gummiphone. “This twerp is going to turn me into a serial killer.” He yawns, possibly for the fortieth time.

“Not an ill-fitting job, all things considered,” Isa says from across the room.

“I do appreciate your sarcasm.”

“Who’s bothering you?” Terra asks, lifting his collar so the mouse on his left could thread through it with a sewing needle.

Lea snorts, slaps his knee and leans forward. “Did you not know your buddy is a monster?”

“Ven?”

“Oh, he’s a joy.” Lea holds his Gummiphone up as if he’s about to make a speech. “Come help me pick out Aqua’s flowers. Now. If you could.” He glances at Terra, then back at the phone. “He writes that in all-caps.”

“I’m sure he doesn’t mean to be so pushy.”

“The other day, he called me to model the bride’s dress because Miss Aqua couldn’t be bothered to come to the fitting herself.”

“Master Aqua was away on a mission,” Isa explains.

“Isa took photos of me in it—” Lea scrolls through his phone, but stops. “Oh, I can’t show you before...” He clicks his tongue. “It’s very nice. Very bridal.”

Terra is sure that’s true, but the image of Ven hanging his head so much on someone else’s wedding is worrisome. Last night, he fell asleep at dinner. “I think Ven is taking on too much stress.”

“Lea,” Roxas says, snorting a chuckle and giving up on his bow tie, “you should show him the texts.” 

“Gladly.” Lea stands to shove the Gummiphone into Terra’s face. Out of the history, a couple of messages stand out.

Ventus

I got 500 cake flavors come taste them with me

Ventus

Which cologne do you think terra should wear

COME SMELL 

i need a second opinion

Ventus

Do you have aqua’s flowers yet?

remember 

we want orange roses and bluestars

Ventus

Aqua isnt here im freaking out

Youre closest to her body type

HELP

After all that, Terra feels as though he’s being watched by several microscopic eyes. One of the mice squeaks with urgency, and he straightens one of his arms. “I don’t know what to say... Why doesn’t he talk to me directly?”

Lea purses his lips as though this is a secret not worth sharing. Roxas is the one to step forward, a knowing grimace plastered on his face.

“He told me that he doesn’t want to bother you with anything.”

That doesn’t sound entirely false but not true either.

“That’s ridiculous.” Terra tests the bend of the elbow to fiddle with his bow tie. It’s already done but something about it doesn’t sit right. “He could come to me for anything,” he says with a low voice, wondering if there’s something he’s missing. Terra has also been a mess. He’s getting married. Holy stars. 

Isa huffs out of frustration, turning away from the mirror, his bow tie undone. He studies Terra’s suit. “I don’t like it.”

His straightforwardness is well appreciated. Aqua would probably smirk at the sight of it and stare at his neck the entire ceremony. “I don’t either,” Terra says.

“Smart man.” Isa smirks, and tugs Terra’s bow tie to undo it. “Let’s change it.”

Lea snorts. “You might want to ask permission from he-who-shall-be-slapped.”

“It’s my wedding,” Terra says.

“So you think.”

He-who-may-be-slapped enters the tailor’s parlor through the front entrance, announced by the bell of the ring. He’s perfectly dressed in his ringbearer’s/best man’s/maid of honor’s suit, vest fitted, bow tie sublime, sleeves coiffed. He sees what Isa is doing. He gapes.

“Hey guys,” Ven asks with a frustratingly shaky voice. “What are we doing?”

“They are unbecoming,” Isa answers, wrapping a traditional tie around Terra’s neck.

“Oh.” 

Sometimes, speaking to Isa is like getting clocked in the stomach. By the looks of Lea’s expression, chewing on the edge of his Gummiphone, it’s well deserved.

“Okay,” Ven says, with a tight smile. He takes the tie from Isa’s hands. “Do they match?”

“A hello would be less rude,” Terra says. “Hi, Ven. Can we talk?”

Ven glances up. “Later. There’s lots to do.”

Lea inhales sharply. “Hey, Ven. Here’s an idea. Did you know you could tame cicadas to sing in harmony on command?”

Ven whips his head around. “You can?”

Isa brings a hand up to hide a smirk and Lea passes him a subtle wink.

“Picture it.” Lea opens his arms. “From nine until eleven at night, they gather in the bushes. They mutter, a light dusting of atmosphere on a peaceful summer night.”

Ven’s eyes grow wide with obsession. 

Roxas comes near. “You can also make them glow.”

“Like stars in the bushes,” Ven whispers to himself.

“Come on, guys,” Terra says, unimpressed. “Leave him alone. We’ve got better things to do.”

Ven snaps himself out of it, but not before pulling out a notepad and writing notes. He eyes Terra over, nudging him to open his arms and pinching the sides of the suit. Ven draws them in by the measure of a finger and pulls pins out of his pocket, like he’s been expecting to use them, and marks their places. “Jaq Jaq,” he calls, “where’s Suzy? We need to make sure these ties look right. Oh, and we need two extras—we have to ship some to Riku and Sora.”

Some mouse squeaks in reply.

“I can help her carry things.” Ven gives a flash of a smile and then hurries off.

Out of earshot, Lea gives Terra a look. “Anyone able to talk to mice is a crazy person in my book.”

Terra glares back and quotes, “‘You could tame cicadas to sing on command?’”

“He needs something to obsess over. How else am I going to get peace?”

“This is going to bite you in the ass,” Roxas says, wrapping his new tie over the neck and having a much easier time.

“Ventus may very well task you with hunting and gathering the cicadas,” Isa says, a tie already in place, immaculate. 

Lea groans and Terra feels it’s well deserved. 

Well deserved… the suit may be. The future wife, maybe not. The suit is a glove for every finger with no excess. It makes him a good-looking groom, a nice addition to the closet for any special occasion. The bride is beautiful, no matter what she wears. She is loyal, patient, strong, intelligent, loving, funny when she’s stern, too good for him, a divine gift he didn’t earn and he still can’t understand how she said yes.

“I hope you’re laughing at the face of my misery,” Lea says.

Terra knows that’s sarcasm. Weddings are headaches, emotions are terrifying and Terra needs Aqua like a sip of medicinal tea to calm down.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The others squeal when they walk into Le Grand Bistro. It’s sunset, the city lights already ignited and giving it the glow of evening fairies welcoming the moon. They’ve just discussed dresses—Xion requests a pantsuit instead, which looks stellar—and they can choose their own styles so long as they all wear the color of night. Simple, elegant. That’s the kind of effect Aqua prefers. Thank goodness they’re almost done. Aqua couldn’t handle more hands in her hair and she rejected the flower crown that would have come down on one side to compensate for the lack of length. 

She fiddles with the ring—a thin, intricate design weaved around a small, blue stone—as a waiter escorts them to the kitchen. On days when she doesn’t have missions, she wears it.

Aqua is getting married. Some part of her wonders about the surreality of it, like it’s a dream or a picture she created in her mind when she was a child, at the altar with a faceless person next to her. Sometimes, it feels like she is already married. Terra has always been with her. Every day in class. Every day strolling through the woods. Every day sparring, sharing meals, bickering and laughing. Her best friend, her confidant, her rock.

There is something about nearly dying that challenges perspective. When they both thought they’d never see each other again, it made them realize there’s more to it and there’s been more to it for years. The emotional intimacy that strengthened after the fact. The physicality of it, when he takes her to bed. They argue differently, they laugh the same. Terra has always been with her, so what is the difference between being with him and being married to him? A part of her is eager to find out. The other is already at peace, a kind of joy Aqua has always wanted.

Ven is in the kitchen, talking with Remy (responding to Remy, who is naturally unintelligible). Plates of cake pieces sprawl out on the table, eliciting oohs and aahs from the others, all patient like they’re waiting for Aqua’s permission to take a small bite.

Aqua reads through the description of flavors—strawberry, fudge, angel food cake with blueberries, red velvet, even coffee. “The one we requested isn’t here.”

“You mean…” Ven pulls out his notepad and looks through his notes. Remy climbs onto Ven’s head, squeaking and pointing to a bowl of flour and eggs, unmixed. “Dark chocolate and rum?”

“That would be correct.”

“A spicy cake? Are you insane?” At his shock and at Aqua’s denial, Kairi helps herself to a spoonful of vanilla. “This is a wedding, not a club!”

“My wedding, Ven.” Aqua isn’t annoyed, but amused. Ven has such strong opinions about for some reason. 

“Try this one.” He holds up a plate of a decorated piece that honestly looks delicious. “Triple chocolate, with the rarest berries found in the woods, matured at thirty-five degrees Celsius for a week.” 

“Burnt cake?” Kairi asks with a smirk.

“Not the cake, the berries.” 

“Oh,” Xion gasps, with need in her eyes. It takes a nod from Aqua to grab a fork and have at it. She approaches each piece with so much excitement— Aqua wonders if there are flavors here she’s never tried before in her short life. 

“What will the final cake look like?” Naminé asks, the only one not to dive forward. She’s so gentle, so serene. When they were trying out dresses, everyone was saying what a beautiful bride she’ll be one day if she chooses. 

“Perfect,” Ven says, like it’s the most obvious thing. “It has to be perfect so it will look beautiful. Painted like a night sky, with stars everywhere. You got that, Remy?”

Remy glares at Ven.

“I want,” Aqua starts, and when Ven frowns, she smirks. Sometimes, for the sake of maintaining control, she has to play dirty. “Rosewater and cardamom.” 

Ven sticks his tongue out in disgust.

“Terra needs something to enjoy,” Aqua insists. “These are all too sweet for him.”

“Terra is the bane of my existence.”

“By the way, I don’t know if I want King Mickey and Queen Minnie to officiate.”

“You are way more difficult to deal with.”

Aqua and Ven have a staring contest as the others talk about their favorite flavors. Ven, a glare, a challenge to outwit her. Aqua, a calm knowing that she’s going to win. Ven relents.

“Fine,” he stresses. “Remy, change of plans. We’ll need some damage control. Let’s add some”—he writes into his notepad—“fruit pastries, sweet cheese with chocolate—”

“Triple chocolate,” Kairi adds.

“Custard and kiwi,” Xion says.

“All good choices.” Ven writes them down.

“Sea salt ice cream?” Naminé says, lifting a shoulder. “Everyone else eats them, I hope to try some.”

“Ven.” Kairi slams a hand on the table. “You need to add marshmallows covered in hazelnut and chocolate.”

“We need all the chocolate,” Ven agrees. “Call it revenge on this nasty cake.”

Kairi cackles, but it’s nothing malicious. They’re young and excited about the wedding, their suggestions a way of helping. Aqua takes it all in stride. The small details don’t matter, only the intent, and letting friends have fun deciding makes the entire process easier. What’s bothering her is Ven. He’s exhausted from taking it all too seriously. Aqua assumes the best intentions, but she doesn’t get it.

“You know what would be really cute?” Xion says. “Little petit fours shaped in your symbols.”

Ven blinks. “What symbols?”

“Oh, the Keyblade Master symbols.” Naminé claps her hands. “That would be so lovely.”

“In different colors,” Xion says.

“Each a different flavor,” Naminé adds. “Maybe the same colors as your Wayfinders?”

“You two are geniuses.” Ven taps his notepad. “Remy, we gotta get to work.”

Remy stomps a paw and squeaks vigorously.

“No worries. You’ll get paid.” Though it seems that’s the last thing on Remy’s mind.

“Ven,” Aqua says softly, pulling him aside as the others brainstorm ideas. “I don’t think we can afford all this.”

“Sure you can,” he says too confidently, though she and Terra were the ones to save up their munny. “Don’t worry,” he stresses when she’s not convinced, giving her a squeeze on the arm. “You asked me to bookkeep your finances” 

“Reminder that I did not ask you to take full responsibility. Remy can’t do all of this alone, he’s going to need you.”

“I’ve got plenty of time, and we’ve got plenty of budget.”

Aqua does not know how that is possible. After the dresses, the refitting of Terra’s tux, the decorations… sure, since they’re using the ballroom in the Land of Departure, they saved on not having to rent out a venue, but the original plan was to have a small, intimate wedding in the woods, something private with just the three of them, minimal decorations necessary, all plucked from nature. 

All of this is out of their price range.

Ven goes back to the table, back to the stovetop and oven where he follows Remy’s instructions and mixes the flour in the bowl with some milk. He doesn’t assuage her at all, like he knows something she doesn’t.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Home should be a solace but not when it’s the wedding rehearsal. 

Ven has ushered in movers from different worlds to carry in artifacts, all decorations, all star-themed. Terra has yet to see the ballroom, but the amount of people rushing through the hallways makes him nervous. 

Ever since Terra called Riku in the dead of night (in a panic, needing someone to talk to, alone in the kitchen with a cracked mug of tea), blabbing about tripping on the way to the altar, or cutting the cake clean through the table, or stepping on linen and ripping the curtains, or dropping his plate of food, or looking like an idiot on the dance floor, or worse—forgetting his vows—he hasn’t lived a moment of peace. Sora won’t let him. 

Terra finds it hard to breathe. What if he chokes on his vows and accidentally offends everyone?

He stays far away from the workers—it’s for the best. No one needs a huge bull stampeding in a china shop, destroying everything.

Lea crosses the hallway on his sixth trip and enters one of two entrances to the ballroom, vases of flowers in his hands. Terra peeks. From the looks of it, Ven did a fantastic job. 

The ballroom, once gold, now looks like the set of night. The ceiling is covered in blue with twinkling lights. The table linens are also dark, with napkins and silverware sets a solid gold. Glass windows that take up one entire side to the ballroom are bare of curtains—the wedding is planned for after sunset so they’d be declaring their vows under the stars. Two navy blue carpets come in through both entrances of the ballroom, meeting in the middle and then straight to the altar at the far end. The point is for him and Aqua to enter together, like equals. With her in a bridal dress, she’ll look like a light in the darkness.

Through the doorway, Terra can see Riku and Sora, the latter making motions with his arms as if he’s flapping like a bird. Terra lets the door close so they don’t notice him. 

There are fears he’s never voiced.

What if she realizes she doesn’t want to get married to him after all? At the altar no less?

Oh stars, what if he makes a terrible husband? 

What if he neglects her?

What if, years down the road, she realizes after a slowly oncoming epiphany that she isn’t happy and regrets it?

Tonight is the party, tomorrow is the wedding, and Terra still has no vows. He pinches his nose hard enough to distract him from crying. He’s already cried five times in the arc of three hours.

Footsteps—light, brisque, confident, hers—approach him, and Terra embraces her in his arms, taking her in with a needy kiss. She smells like home, she lets him breathe again. 

“You look like you’re about to fall apart,” she says, stroking a thumb on his cheek.

“Not if you’re my glue.”

She snorts, smacking him on the bicep. “What did I say about the puns?”

“Shower you with them.”

He kisses her before she can roll her eyes—

—and gets interrupted the moment Ven peeks out of one door. 

“What’s with the hold-up?” he says.

Terra breaks from the kiss, casually noticing how Aqua is patting his shoulder, as if to warn him. “What’s with your attitude?”

Ven pouts like he’s about to choke and slaps the notepad to his forehead. “No one listens to me. I said baby blue and champagne on the napkins, all shaped to form the constellation of Juno… and they gave me yellow. I am gonna complain so much.”

“There are worse things?” Terra says and Aqua shakes his shoulder as another warning. 

Ven snaps his eyes open. “Get into position, we’re starting.”

Aqua stands behind one door and Terra goes to the other, waiting for the cue to enter. On the other side, Ven is speaking out loud, organizing people and where they should stand. Grooms and bridesmaids will enter the altar from behind and gather together, leaving the carpet only for the star couple (no pun intended). He interrupts himself, raising his voice about vases that match too much and Terra can imagine him pointing across the room.

“I have to tell you something,” Aqua loudly whispers from the other side of the hall. 

Terra runs to her and wraps an arm around her waist. Touching her is a panacea. Despite knowing there is still a possibility she’ll rethink this entire relationship, it seems unreal, like a nightmare.

“It’s about Ven,” she continues, keeping her voice low even though they’re the only ones in the hall.

“Lea threatened to slap him.”

She frowns.

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

“Don’t you think it’s too expensive?”

“I don’t know. Ven doesn’t tell me how much anything costs.”

“It’s way more than we have saved up.”

Terra gapes. “Then how—?”

Aqua stammers, fiddling with her fingers. “I looked into his books.”

Terra melts into a breath-heavy laugh, careful to keep his voice out of it. “Reading people’s diaries? Aqua, I thought I knew you better.”

She blushes. “I didn’t mean to, but I was worried.” Now Terra is worried. Her expression is too serious. “Ven has been doing side-missions and hustles for months just to earn enough to hire the best chefs and tailors, to buy linens and all these flowers and carpets—” 

“He wouldn’t.”

“He did.”

“Why?” 

“I think it’s because he wants us to be happy.”

“We are.” Terra doesn’t appreciate how he doesn’t sound confident, scared he’s assuming too much on her behalf. “How could he just…”

“We were stuck in darkness for so long and he couldn’t help us.”

“But that’s not his fault.”

“He feels he is the weakest and wants to compensate.” Aqua grimaces and she blinks back tears. 

“I feel so guilty.”

“I feel worse.”

“Why?”

Aqua bites her lip. “I’m still attached to the idea of a small, intimate ceremony in the woods. Just the three of us. Does that make me a horrible person?”

“No. Our wedding has become a spectacle. Maybe pointing that out makes me terrible, too.”

She groans. “I found a book. I left it in your room. It’s very last minute, but there are some ancient rituals in there that I found so beautiful… the exchanging of rings is beautiful, too, but modern and there are some lost traditions from our Keyblade history that I’d love to do instead... if you could take a look?” 

The way she smiles, stars. Ancient, modern, he’d do anything for her. “Sure. I’ll read it tonight.”

Aqua winces. “He’ll be so angry with us.”

Terra squeezes her hand. “He wants us to be happy. Think about that.”

One of the doors burst open, and Lea sticks his head out. “Kindly stop being an ass and don’t keep your guests waiting anymore?”

They start: Terra at one entrance, Aqua on the other, entering the ballroom at the same time, where guests will watch them approach one another, like the shadow of the moon to a star. They meet at the point where their lanes merge into one. 

Terra offers his arm—

“Nonono,” Ven warns, running up to them. “You can’t meet her like this. You must bow at a forty-degree angle.” Ven scans the room frantically. “Here, I have a ruler.”

After that hiccup, Aqua finally takes Terra’s arm, walking down the single aisle, where guests can ogle at them. Their groomsmen and bridesmaids take pictures with their Gummiphones for their arrival at a wall of flowers. 

Sora has his hands behind his head and snickers when they reach the end. “I made sure the carpet is ironed out so she doesn’t fall with you.”

“I’m going to kick you in the shins,” Terra says.

He snorts and wipes his nose. “I’ll kick you back.”

At the altar, Ven is too excited to stop rambling. “We have to make sure that you arrive here, at this spot, at exactly nine-thirty so we can finish the vows at ten because...” He frames the windows with his hands. “We’ve got a perfect spot for star sighting so we need to be on time.”

“Do you mean, right after the wedding ceremony?” Aqua asks. 

“Before the reception, yup. We’re walking out to the balcony, we’ll watch the meteor shower where a new world will be born, then we’ll come back in for supper and dancing.” When he notices their stupefied faces, he continues, “I spent three weeks finding the right angulations so you can witness a unique astronomical event, and we’ve got a miracle of a spot right here so we can’t be late.”

“It’s a wonderful thought, Ven,” Aqua says, her voice shaky.

“Okay, now you get into position and face each other.” He points and they follow. “Next, Mickey and Minnie will talk some stuff, you know, all official, and then you say your vows.”

Terra freezes up. “Our vows.”

“Yeah. That’s what I said. You ready?”

Terra hesitates and Aqua speaks for him. “We’re keeping those a secret until tomorrow.”

Ven pauses, then shrugs. “Fair enough.”

Aqua doesn’t let Terra have another thought, leaning forward to kiss him in front of everyone (aahs and awws elicited), and ending the rehearsal.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“How do you get your skin so clear?” Kairi asks, though the warm glow of the fire makes for spectacular lighting. 

They’re camping in the woods near the waterfall, equipped with warm blankets and pillows, a bowl of cookies, and toasted marshmallows on sticks; Aqua’s vision of a bachelorette party. No gifts necessary.

“Mountain spring water does wonders for you,” Aqua says.

“I’ve read in a magazine,” Xion says, crawling out of her sleeping bag, “that some people like to put mud on their faces to get clean skin.”

“Why?” Naminé asks, chewing on a marshmallow.

“Something about the properties. Lots of good minerals.” She walks over to the creek, digging her hands into the dirt and smashing it into her face against the shocks and cries of the other girls. “If mountain water is good for you, then that must mean this mud is magical.” 

“Is that true?” Kairi says, though she’s asking no one. She hurries over and joins in on the mud-mashing, running fingers over Xion’s face in places she’s missed.

With globs of mud in their hands, they bring over the excess to the camp. 

Xion offers it to Aqua. “For beautiful skin on your special day?”

“It’s our job to pamper,” Kairi says with her hands out so that Naminé can scoop up the mud on her own. 

Aqua tries not to chuckle too loudly. It’s adorable. “Okay,” she says, and Xion gets to work, massaging it into her skin. It smells unpleasant, earthy and mukky. She closes her eyes and tries to relax regardless.

“I think we’re supposed to keep it on our faces for at least a half hour,” Xion says, rubbing more on Aqua’s nose. 

“This will make us prettier?” Naminé asks.

“Cleaner,” Kairi says. 

Naminé blinks, already covered in the mud and hesitating to put on more. “But we look dirty,” she says quietly.

“Can I request something, Miss Aqua?” Xion says, patting her fingers onto Aqua’s forehead.

“Certainly.”

“Can you tell us the story of how Terra proposed?”

Kairi jumps and squeals, and Naminé claps her hands, both of them chattering please, please, we’re dying to know.

“We’re around a fire,” Kairi says, as if that’s a convincing argument. “We’re supposed to tell stories.” 

“I feel bad for asking,” Naminé says. “You’re very private, and I don’t want to intrude…”

Aqua reads her face. “But you’re curious.”

Naminé pouts. Xion’s eyes go wide, and Kairi nods excitedly. Everyone is guilty as charged.

“It’s a simple story, I guess,” Aqua says, crossing her legs and watching the fire. It’s not often that she talks so openly about the details of her relationship. The two of them together is something people know, but never knowing where they come from and why, except for Ven—even then, there’s so much he never pries to. Watching their reactions is a little overwhelming. She rubs the stone on her ring. “Terra made the engagement ring with his own hands, but he took months to propose.”

“I remember that,” Xion says, sitting on her chair and smiling. “It annoyed Lea so much that he offered to set you both up just to get it over with.”

Aqua laughs. “I’m grateful we had it to ourselves.”

“Was it romantic?” Kairi asks.

“Not at all. I… knew he was up to something. I know him.” She lifts a shoulder. “He was burning breakfast too often, he couldn’t look me directly in the eye, and he left on his own to do more missions than usual. I took that as though he had done something wrong. The last time he was that clumsy and avoidant, it was because he accidentally cast Firaga in the library and was trying to hide it. Or when he broke the oven. Or when he offered to do my laundry but didn’t know how to treat my fabric and ruined my clothes.”

“He sounds like a clumsy oaf,” Kairi says.

That makes Aqua smile. She loves that oaf. “He is. The general rule of thumb is that a clumsy, avoidant Terra is usually hiding something.”

“So how did the proposal happen?” Naminé asks.

“I cornered him—”

Kairi snorts.

“—and he blurted it out.”

They giggle, Kairi acting out how that may have looked and Naminé holding her hands over her heart in a show of genuine affection. 

Aqua smiles to herself, a finger to her lips. It might be her favorite memory, her standing her ground and demanding to know what was going on. 

Terra, looking all around the terrace except for her face, guilty, guilty, guilty, pulling a box out of his pocket and stammering for a cohesive sentence. Well, I don’t know what to say, he had said, like a child getting grounded. I-I’m sorry. I’m dumb, I’m a big lump of a human being. He paused, his cheeks rounding up like he was about to vomit. Will…will you marry me, anyway?

It felt like racing in a train and pulling all the stops, crashing. He got red in the face, tears welling in his eyes and she realized he took her silence as rejection. Aqua had to hold his forearms, and all she could utter was a soft, I genuinely thought you burned down a building.

Terra’s eyes went wide. Do you mean you’re not mad?

Of course not. Why would I be?

So… He licked his lips, reaching for her but not touching her, forgetting that he had the box with the ring inside. What do you say? I mean, you don’t have to give me an answer straight away. I mean, I just thought you would… you know… because… He sighed. Yeah.

Aqua finally laughed, and kissed him on the cheek. Of course I will marry you, you beautiful dork.

The laughter quiets around the fire. They’re waiting for Aqua to continue her story.

“Then he drops the ring.”

They howl, melting into a blissful exchange of cheers and gossip, a vibrant hearth brighter than the one keeping them warm. 

“I had hoped to propose first, actually,” Aqua continues. She shrugs. “The end.”

“That was beautiful,” Naminé says, wiping her eyes.

“If Sora hears about this, he’ll never leave Terra alone,” Kairi says, grinning something mischievous. 

“I don’t know what love is supposed to look like,” Xion says thoughtfully, gazing at the sky. “But it sounds sweet.”

In Aqua’s opinion, the proposal was perfect, him scattered on the ground frantically searching for the ring, her on her knees helping him. How he slipped it on her finger, how they kissed for an hour in the dirt, unaware that they were dusty, unaware that anyone else existed in the world. 

Aqua nods, mostly to herself. It aches to be away from Terra tonight but it burns her insides to see him tomorrow and finally do this. Aqua wants to sleep and get this night over with but she doesn’t want to sleep so she could see the sunrise, knowing he’d be up early watching the same thing.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Bachelor parties aren’t fun.

Sora is whooping about a cannonball, the water splashing when he makes contact. Ven and Roxas race to the lake, testing who will be the first to dive, the first to swim across and come back. Considering the expanse of the surface area, they’ll be gone for a while and the barbecue will get cold, but maybe it’s for the best. It’s not the right time to talk to Ven right now, not when all of them have a moment of fun (except for Terra, the only one here thinking about tomorrow). Lea and Isa prefer to relax, sipping drinks on their chairs by the lanterns erected onto the sand, speaking quietly about memories, about chores, about home and what ifs. 

Terra sits by himself, the thin booklet Aqua gave him on his lap, tucked under layers of parchment. It’s titled The Way, no author. She was right: old Keyblade rituals are interesting, almost possessive, their focus on the literal binding of hearts. They’re from the Age of Fairytales, and Terra realizes as he reads through it that ancient Keyblade wielders were for some reason obsessed with the loss of memory and the prevention of it. The rituals sound painful, too—maybe Aqua has developed a mild taste of macabre from her time in the Realm of Darkness. 

All Terra has left to do are his vows. His stupid, dorky-sounding vows. He should have accepted the simple, “I do.” He shouldn’t have waited until the last minute.

He’s tried dramatic.

You are my other half, my heart, my breath of life, my sky, my angel, can we keep our souls together? 

He’s tried poetic.

The mountain will thirst if not for the water— 

He’s tried being honest.

I don’t know why you love me, but I’ll do my best to make it up to you.

All dumb.

Terra groans into his hands, eyes wide in existential blunder. 

“Keep doing that,” Riku says, setting a chair next to him and sitting down, “and you won’t be able to blink again.”

“I’m not finished.”

“But if you don’t sleep, then you’re more likely to have accidents.”

Terra gapes and almost whacks Riku on the side of the head from the sight of his constricted smirk. “You’re so mean. I called you one time.”

“In a huge panic talking about causing mass destruction of a wedding the worlds have never seen.” Riku shrugs nonchalantly. That’s his state of being—too cool for anything, too sensitive for everything. It’s refreshing. “It was the funniest phone conversation I’ve ever had.”

“I’ll never call you again.”

“Not in the middle of the night, please no.” Riku bites a forkful of steak. “Is it cliché to tell you to speak from the heart?”

“This entire conversation is cliché, but here I am, living it out.” Terra stares at his messy pages, where he pressed the pen so hard that it left ink blots.

“You could do the very committal thing and tell her you love her fifty times.”

“All the guests would leave by the time I reach twenty-five.”

“More like fifteen.”

“Ten.”

“Disaster.”

Terra grimaces, not entirely comforted, but not entirely anxious anymore, either. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”

“It is a big deal, I’ll give you that,” Riku says, more serious. “I don’t have any advice.”

“None of it makes sense. Be honest, but not too honest. Be loving, but don’t make it cheesy. Express yourself, but hold back on certain things. Do make it personal. Don’t expose personal details. How am I supposed to know how to do it right?” 

It would be easier if there are no witnesses. If it’s just Ven, if Aqua is the only person he’s talking to, if he could simply say, You’ve been my best friend for as long as I can remember. I know I’ve fucked up. For as long as I live, I’ll never do that again. I will never take your forgiveness for granted.

And if she doesn’t want to be with him anymore, there’d be nothing he could say to make her stay.

“I think if Aqua was the kind of person who expected you to do it right,” Riku says, looking out to the lake where Ven and Roxas are swimming back to their shore, “you wouldn’t be marrying her.”

Terra bends the pages, exposing the cover of the thin, leather bound booklet. There are no vows he could use in there, except for the officiator declaring their hearts intertwined. “Thank you,” he mumbles.

“Sorry I can’t be of more help.” 

Riku pats him on the shoulder and leaves him alone to take a walk, Sora begging him to enter the water. Terra flips to a page where he’s repeated I love you, I love you all over, each in different calligraphy, like doodling, like losing his mind and procrastinating the night away, hoping that any moment, inspiration would drop bricks on him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It’s time.

The strangest part of the day is waiting it out in her bedroom until it’s her turn to show herself. Over the years, her bedroom has been a reflection of her personality. The cleanliness, the artifacts from her home world long ago, the size of the bed, the furniture—they all stayed the same. What’s come and gone were the paint colors, the bedsheets, the art on the wall, the smaller vanity mirror. Her bedroom is her old life, and she sits in front of the mirror in her bride’s dress, about to start a new one. For now, they both collide, as though her childhood doesn’t know her.

The cape dress is simple, plain white with the neck scooped across the collarbone. The sleeves slit at the shoulders, draping over to the floor with the rest of the train. Aqua couldn’t have asked for something better. She completes the look with the ring, a jeweled hair pin on one side, and an armored choker. Makeup is minimal. 

Aqua is surprisingly calm and the sun is going down. 

Her Gummiphone buzzes with a text message.

Terra

Let’s do it

Aqua sighs, not texting back immediately.

Aqua

I don’t want to break Ven’s heart

Terra

I’ll talk to him

We can both get what we want

I already stole some flowers from the wall

Don’t think he notices

She chuckles, moving a hair strand behind her ear. She hasn’t noticed that her stomach has been a knot, from excitement, from nerves, from anticipation. The sun takes so long to set. Terra is the warmth of a tight blanket.

Aqua

Will this label me as a runaway bride?

Terra takes a long time to answer, giving her the impression that he must have been distracted and forgot to reply. 

It buzzes.

Terra

The shame

Aqua

What will they think when they find out the groom seduced her to it

Terra

The scandal 

when they hear how she met him secretly at the creek 

an hour before the ceremony

It sounds like an action plan. Aqua picks up her bouquet of orange roses and bluestars from her vanity table, heading out the door.

Aqua

I want Ven there

Terra

Definitely

I love you

Aqua

I love you too

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Terra finds Ven in the dining room, taking inventory of an indulgement of sweets and a feast of meats, fritters, and rice. The wedding cake is as tall as his body, a dark blue with smacks of gold glitter in the shapes of galaxies, large stars framing each layer, and topped with two halos. Ven is mostly dressed in his vest and tie, the suit missing. By comparison, Terra is overdressed, a groom ready for his encore.

Ven sighs when he sneaks a cookie the shape of the Keyblade Master symbol into his mouth, as though Terra’s presence reminds him of disappointment. 

“I couldn’t tame the cicadas,” he says morosely, like he’s apologizing, and for a moment Terra second-guesses what he’s about to do. Ven eyes the white rope curled around Terra’s shoulder. “What’s that for?”

“This may either cheer you up or piss you off,” Terra says, dropping The Way on the counter.

“I don’t like how you said that.” As Ven flips through pages, he frowns, chewing on the side of his lip. “Are you... not happy with the wedding preparations?”

Terra inhales, caught off guard. “Of course I am. Happy, I mean. It’s… huge. It’s a giant ordeal.”

“And you don’t like that,” Ven says quietly, stroking one of the pages with his thumb.

“I think there are things we’ve always wanted to have privately.” Terra sits on a stool, but Ven won’t look him in the eye. “And we want you to be there. We can do it now. We’ll be back in time for our guests.”

The booklet shakes in his hands. “I messed up.”

“From my point of view, I’ll be eating very well tonight. There’s nothing to compensate for.”

Ven closes the book. “I just wanted to do a good job.”

“If you allow Lea to slap you, he’ll forgive you.” Terra smiles, but Ven doesn’t join him. “We’re still doing your grand ceremony—that, we could never pull off on our own. But we also want something tiny and ours, and we won’t do this without you.” Terra takes Ven’s hand and squeezes it, before glancing at the cake. “I hope it’s delicious.”

“It’s disgusting so you’ll definitely like it.”

“See, I can always count on you.” Terra stands up. “Now come on. You wouldn’t want us to be late for the bride.”

Terra takes him to the creek, not far from where Aqua hosted her bachelorette camp, where the sound of rushing water is gentle and the creek splits into two directions, one that would drip off the side of a cliff and one that would join a massive river downstream. The trees huddle close in the clearing, a soft shadow from the fierceness of the setting sun, like a pocket of protective magic in the middle of the forest. 

Ven gasps. “You stole my flowers.”

“Please, you didn’t even notice.” Terra had built an easy wooden arbor before the crack of dawn that morning, an arch weaved with orange and blue flowers, spotted every so often with green lilies. He showered right after so no one would suspect.

“Let’s take it over there.” Ven points to a short boulder against a tree nearby, a good photo op. They pluck the arbor up from both sides and plant it in front of the boulder. Ven takes stock of the sight. “Not bad.”

“Thanks!”

“I take credit for the choice of flowers.” Ven rolls the rope into a tight circle, layering it on the boulder with each loop in equal circumference. He splays the book open and studies. “It’s kinda creepy,” he says though he gets no response and he doesn’t ask for one.

Terra shoves his hands into the pockets of his tuxedo and waits. Aqua isn’t here yet. The vest constricts his breathing, the thicket suddenly feels humid, and Terra wipes his cheek, realizing that his heart is beating fast. Time sped up to this moment and dropped him here without warning. Now it’s slowing down out of pure, unjustifiable spite to torture him in the final hour. 

“You okay, dude?” Ven asks.

Terra lifts his face to the sky to keep the tears in his eyes. “If I cry now, I think I’ll cry for the rest of the night.”

Ven snorts. “No one would be surprised, trust me.”

But it’s not working. He’s two seconds from sobbing. “I don’t know. I…” He scoffs. “I can’t believe it’s happening. I’m expecting her to never show up or brush me off last minute when she realizes what we’re doing—”

“No.” Ven approaches Terra like he’s about to punch him in the stomach to make a point. “Don’t think like that, she’d never do that.” 

Ven has good faith and better timing. Aqua approaches the other side of the clearing, the fabric of her dress gracefully making waves with every step, the foliage fluttering light and shadow on her figure. She holds her bouquet in one hand and a framed photograph tucked under the other.

It shocks Terra.

He can’t stop the flow of tears. He covers his shivering lips and the drip of his nose, his face twisting from the sight of her—brilliant, like she’s made of stars, a gift walking the earth.

“Terra, are you okay?” Aqua asks, rushing to him now, the train of her dress bouncing behind her. 

In the flash of an instinct, Terra runs to meet her, tripping over a branch and landing right into her arms. 

“You’re—” Terra sucks air in, his heart shoving itself up his esophagus. “Y-you’re s-so beautiful.”

Aqua uses her pinky to wipe his tears. “So are you.”

“Let me help you.” He takes the frame—a portrait of the Master, bordered with a white ribbon—and walks her to the arbor. Ven takes the portrait and places it on the boulder, their little family tied together, fractured in glued pieces, now and always. Before they start, Terra asks Aqua to pose under the arbor so he can take a picture of the trees and the flowers surrounding her. Beautiful.

“How do we do this?” Terra asks when he finds his voice again, still trembling. Aqua stands to the side to take her place. She’s beautiful.

Ven takes the book in his hands. The description of this ritual covers at most two pages. “Well, it’s archaic. It’s from the Age of Fairytales but it sounds like we will intertwine your hearts—but in an intense way, like we’re sewing them together.”

Aqua holds her bouquet to her chest. “Shall we start?”

Terra chuckles too hard, gasping for breath. “Simple as that.”

They wait for Ven’s cue, who also has no idea how to do anything. Ven clears his throat, shrugs his shoulders, and reads:

“We witness today the soldering of two hearts. To intertwine like the roots of a tree, the severance painful, the nourishment plentiful. A physical bond, a magical one, the merging of two sprites under the guidance of one truth. Two hearts, but one.” Terra watches the way Aqua watches him. There’s no one else in the world, Ven’s voice disconnected, like it floats on air. “Now it says to summon your Keyblades. Dig the tips into the ground, and offer your hilts to each other.”

Ends of the Earth is massive, taller than Ven. Stormfall looks delicate but it’s menacing, sharp, direct. They offer their hilts, the shafts crossed over each other, Stormfall light and airy in his hand, Ends of the Earth weighty and thick in hers. 

Terra finds it interesting that they’re using the hilt to connect each other’s hearts—the Keyblade should never be used against a person’s heart in traditional Mastery, because it’s such a dangerous weapon and it’s so violating. The blunt hilt, on the other hand, the physical manifestation of their hearts, is like exposure, an offer of vulnerability. 

Aqua’s feels like it’s thrumming, singing. She’s happy.

Ven steps forward with the rope and ties it over the hilts in loops. “This is just an image, the ties that bind, two Keyblades, but one. To intertwine a heart is to forge a chain, a friend, a companion, a memory. If missing then a void, a dream, a wish until reunion.” He steps back into position. “Before we go on, I think this would be a nice place to say your vows. Terra, you first.”

Terra stammers, looking into her eyes. “I-I couldn’t write one. I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” Ven whispers, pulling a piece of paper out of his pocket. “I wrote some just in case.”

Terra doesn’t take it. He licks his lips. “It wouldn’t have been graceful. None of it—all of my thoughts—pale in comparison to you, Aqua.” He steadies himself with labored breathing, the squeeze on her Keyblade like a hold on her waist. “You’re so, so beautiful, and I’ve spent my days believing I don’t deserve you, because… because I couldn’t make things right like I should have.” 

Aqua quivers, gently touching his arm with her free hand and motioning for him to breathe. 

He continues, “I’m sorry. I wish the Master was here. I wish I was smart enough to prevent it from happening.” He inhales, choking up from the mention of Eraqus. “I never thought you would marry me of all people, so… I promise... I will be there every step of the way. I promise you, if you’re scared at night, I’ll be there to protect you. If you’re hurting in another world, I’ll come find you. If you’re confused, I’ll hold you close and help you make sense of it. I’ll brew you tea to help you sleep, I’ll step in the line of fire even if you wish to do the same for me, I’ll walk to the ends of the earth to make sure you are safe and healthy. I promise I’ll be with you.

“And I’ll mess up. I know me. I’ll fix it. If you want to clobber me, I’ll be patient. I’ll learn. I’ll do better. Every day you save me from myself. This is the least I can do. I’ve loved you since I was a kid. I’ll love you every day.”

Silence falls on all of them, Terra sniffing just to get some fresh air, Ven wiping his eyes, Aqua blinking too much. 

“Now you, Aqua,” Ven says. 

Despite being teared up, Aqua holds it together. She’s so good at that.

“Terra, I stand with you because I do want to be here. I do want to be by your side. I do want to laugh at your bad jokes.” She relieves a giggle. “I love you. I have for as long as I can remember, even if I didn’t know the words for it.” She studies his face. “I’m sure the Master is here with us, and he couldn’t be prouder of you. I’m proud of you.” Suddenly, she switches her tone, as if to lecture. “And if you even fathom taking a hit for me, remember that I’m faster than you. I’ll protect you first.” Then she softens. “I promise to be your shelter when the storm falls on us. I promise to sit on your bedside when you’re sick, to lift you up when you’re down about yourself, because you are sometimes. 

“You are my home, no matter how far your heart is from me. If you need a star to light your way back, I’ll give it to you.” She smiles widely, like she’s about to laugh. “If something between us breaks, I’ll mend it with you. I can’t imagine my life any other way.”

Their words are now spoken. Aqua suppresses a laugh and grins like a child. Terra holds his breath, just in case he screams from every emotion that he can’t name.  

“Well,” Ven says, rolling his sleeve up so he could wipe his nose on his forearm. “I guess it’s time. This bond is an oath you will remember each other until you close your eyes for the last time, for the tragedy to forget is to be alone forever. Do you accept this?”

“I do,” Terra says.

Aqua hums. “Yes, I do.”

Ven smiles. “You know what to do.”

With his free hand, Terra presses two fingers to his chest, over his heart, where he builds a golden glow. Twenty years living with her, ten years in darkness thinking about her, this vow is impossible to break—even if they can’t do this any longer, Terra could never forget her. Never. In his hand is now a piece of himself, a nugget of his heart, a memory of her in his bed that he never wants to lose.

He takes those fingers to her chest, two thick golden threads drawn out from his heart. She winces at the touch, quick to dissolve. Stormfall shifts in his hand, growing longer, its hilt thicker and darker, wrapping around like a weaved shield. A subtle change, a little piece of him.

Aqua does the same, fingers to her chest first to create the threads, bringing them to his chest. It does hurt, like a needle digging into his skin, sharp for the entire length until it’s suddenly gone. 

He feels full, as though his insides are creating space for something extra. Warm, frightening, whole, exciting. Her piece is a memory he can’t read but he doesn’t need to. Ends of the Earth opens way for an icy blade to cut through the middle as the hilt fans out like wings. A piece of her to take with him where he goes.

“Alright,” Ven chirps, snapping the booklet closed. “The book ends with the quote, Two hearts, only one, but I think this means I can call you husband and wife in secret. So kiss.”

Their Keyblades dissipate when they hold each other, tender but with appetite, unaware of their surroundings for several selfish moments. With sewn threads, it’s as though he breathes through her. Terra presses her onto him, feeling how her heart now beats in sync with his.

“I love you,” she whispers. They are married. 

He’ll never tire of hearing it. Stars, they are married. “I love you, too.”

Terra hears Ven sniff before a handkerchief is shoved into his face. “You need your face dry and clean before everyone sees you,” Ven says. 

The sunset now is deep, a fiery orange. Terra doesn’t want to let go.

“I’ll hold you again tonight,” Aqua says, patting his chest. “I want to see the meteor shower Ven promised.”

“It’ll be a good one,” Ven assures.

Terra kisses her. “Then we have to make a run for it.” He picks Ven up like a log, jogging through the thicket of the forest with Aqua close behind him, the Master in her arms. When they approach the castle, in the twilight, they hear chatter coming from the halls, as though ghosts are partying outside. 

Terra feels at peace despite that he now has to perform, balancing on a tightrope where he doesn’t care if he falls. He turns around and holds her neck to kiss her again, feeling her laughter in his mouth. “One more?” he asks when they break. 

Ven, still tucked in Terra’s arm, groans. “I never asked for a front seat to the kissing show. Is this my punishment?”

Aqua kisses him one more time, whispering to him I love you for what will be a string of I love you’s in the night to come. Friends will cheer, Terra will trip on the way to the altar, Sora will cry because Terra will cry, Xion will eat too much cake and get sick, Isa will laugh because he is drunk, Kairi will be the star of the dance, Aqua will be the star in his eyes. 

[writingformymentalhealth]

Chapter 5

The Black Brothers

Josephine Fawley or as her brother liked to call her the tomboy Princess had a striking romance with Hogwarts very own Pureblood rebel Sirius Black.

Sadly her parents deemed his Brother the so called Slytherin Prince as a better fit and arranged a marriage with the younger Black.

Tw: Arranged marriage, possible smut, swear words, lots of fluff, angst, mentions of abuse and depression,

Part 1

Wattpad link

Masterlist

The Newts went by in the blink of an eye and before any of them knew they were back at the platform 9 3/4.

“I will miss you so bad,” Isa said and Joey’s insides felt warm. Isa wasn’t one for sentimentalities usually and having her openly talk about missing her made her happier than she would ever admit.

“I’ll miss you too, Isa.” She said, pulling the girl in a quick hug.

“Hey Isa, don’t steal away my girl,” Sirius’ voice said from behind, earning him a playful shove from Joey.

Isa waved a last time before going to look for her parents, leaving the couple to bid their goodbyes.

“Farewell Princess.”

“We’ll see each other at the next boring pureblood ball.”

“I’ll still miss you like crazy.” His hand cupped her cheek, making a blush creep up on her. How could he make her feel this way, even after all these years?

And then kissed her. He kissed her like it was the last kiss they ever shared.

After pulling back, both teens were slightly panting.

“I’ll miss you too, Black”

“Write to me, love.”

“Every day.”

And with a last playful wink the boy disappeared between the people, going to find his parents - or hiding from them.

Just seconds later, Quentin appeared next to the girl.

“Let’s go, mum and dad will be waiting.” He said, nudging her.

It only took the twins minutes to find their parents chatting with the Malfoys, and even though Quentin’s expression remained rather neutral, Joey could practically feel her brother’s blood boil at the sight of Lucius.

Their Mother was the first one to see the twins hugging them both and mumbling something about having missed them. Their father just nodded at the scene, bidding his goodbyes to the Malfoys.

“We have something to tell you when we come home.” Cordelia whispered to her children before grabbing Joey’s hand.

Joey and Quentin exchanged a look.

With a plop the family landed back at the Fawley residence and Joey inhaled the familiar scent of Lavender and Moth balls that always seemed to linger in the old house and didn’t pay much attention to her mother asking for a teatime with the family to discuss ‘important matters’. At least until Quentin took her hand, and she felt just how clammy and sweaty his hand was.

“It will be alright Quen.”

He shook his head. And Joey prayed they weren’t going to tell her that his depression got worse.

With a weird feeling in her stomach, she made her way to the sitting corner in which the Fawley family always drunk their tea, carefully pulling Quentin behind, who seemed almost frozen into place.

Their parents sat opposite to them, both seeming suspiciously smiley.

“What’s up?” Joey asked, not able to take the tension anymore.

Her mother inhaled sharply before letting her catlike green eyes meet her daughters. “We arranged a marriage for you, Josephine.”

“You what?” The siblings asked simultaneously.

“We arranged for you to marry a respectable pure blood gentleman.” Her father explained, not looking his children in the eyes.

“Absolutely not.”

Her mother pursed her lips. “I fear you don’t have a choice, Darling.”

“You were always against that bullshit,” her brother spat, his voice being louder than ever.

“Things change, circumstances change.” Their father said, just earning a scoff from his son.

“It is the best for all of us.”

“Not for me.”

Her mother looked at her sadly, “You don’t have a choice.”

“Oh hell, yes I do.” Joey screamed, standing up, running into her room, still faintly hearing her brother argue with her parents.

In her room she pulled out her trunk, chaotically throwing clothes, pictures and other prized possessions in it. She didn’t know where she was going to go, but she knew she needed to go. Hot tears streamed down her face, she always thought her parents were different, sure most pure blood families had some weird beliefs about keeping their blood pure therefore arranged marriage looked like the best thing to do, but her parents always seemed to accept that their children would go their own way.

A faint knock on the door alerted the girl of her mother’s presence.

“Can I come in?”

“In your words, I don’t have a choice, do I?”

“We made a deal with the family years ago,” her mother sighed suddenly looking decades older, “we promised them you would marry their son in exchange for safety from the dark Lord.”

“What has Voldemort to do with all this?” her Mother flinched by the mention of his name.

“The family is very close to him. They inform him about blood traitors, eventual followers and all that.”

“So I don’t have a choice?”

“Not if you want your loved ones to live.” Her Mother said simply giving her daughter a reassuring squeeze before going out of the room leaving Joey at a complete loss.

After the initial shock, there was only one thing on her mind: Sirius.

She fidgeted with the silver ring on her left hand, knowing that she always wanted to marry him, spend her life with the boy she loved above everything else, and now she would have to face a relationship like Narcissa had with Lucius.

The lump in her throat grew bigger and bigger, and she barely noticed the tears streaming down her face mercilessly.

Perhaps the worst heartbreak isn’t getting broken up with, perhaps the worst heartbreak is knowing you have to break up with someone who you still love with every fiber of your body.

-

Two days had gone by, but Joey didn’t even seem to notice. Everything went on in a blur and no words from Isabella, who she wrote to immediately nor her brother, could pull her out of her misery.

“You know you need to break up with him, don’t you?” Her brother just asked, while soothingly drawing circles on her back.

“Isabella said I should break his heart really bad to make it easier for him,” Joey scoffed, tears still rolling down her cheeks.

“That’s a terrible idea, even for Isabella.”

“You just say that because you hate her. She said, I should just tell him I am in love with someone else.”

“Josephine, don’t do it, please. People will know about the arranged marriage just like they know about Lucius and Narcissa.”

“I could still love him though.”

“Sirius isn’t stupid - not that stupid at least.”

“If I tell him the truth he would try to fight the bloke in some deathly duel or something,” she laughed humorlessly, “he’d do anything for me.”

“You don’t need to tell him a reason to break up with him.”

“Don’t you think I owe him one?”

Her brother stayed silent, engulfing her in a hug, while her tears left a wet patch on his shirt. Quentin knew better than to argue with his sister. She already made up her mind.

-

Joey had asked Sirius to meet her at the park bench he once gave her the promise ring at. Her face was stoic, almost unreadable. She knew she couldn’t show weakness in front of him. She couldn’t make him question her decision. She needed to be confident and cold.

She already saw him from afar, his long hair hanging in his eyes while he comfortably sat in the grass even though a perfectly intact bench was right next to him.

As soon as the boy saw her his eyes lit up and he stood up to hug her, but she took a step back making his eyebrows snap together in confusion.

“We need to talk.” She said instead of a greeting slowly making her way to the bench.

“What’s wrong, love?”

She forced herself to look into his concerned eyes that were so full of love for her and she knew Isabella was right. She would have to break him so he could let her go.

“I am breaking up with you.”

Sirius’ eyes widened in disbelief, his hands fidgeting with each other like they always did when he got overwhelmed, and Joey had to resist the urge to hold them.

“Why? Joey we can fix this I-“

“I made my decision.”

He swallowed hard, and she saw tears starting to pool in his eyes.

“Why?” He asked again, his voice cracking.

“I found somebody else.” She said simply, not daring to look into the stormy grey eyes she was still very much in love with, “and I am in love with him.”

“I love you.” Sirius said, his voice barely above a whisper and it took everything in Joey not to say it back.

“I should go.” She said, not waiting for an answer before standing up and taking fast steps towards the point she knew she could Apparate away in safety. A small part of her hoped he would run after her, tell her he saw through her act, tell her he knew how to get out of it but he didn’t so she let the tears that she was holding in since the moment she saw him sitting next to the bench fall but to her surprise she didn’t feel the hurt anymore. Instead, her heart felt cold, as if it was made of ice or as if someone had just burst through her rib cage and taken it out, leaving only an empty space.

Sirius Black felt like he was having a heart attack, and for a short second he thought about admitting himself into St mangos hospital but he came to the conclusion that maybe having a heart attack right now wouldn’t be too bad because the one person he trusted and treasured over anyone else made his worst fears come true. He knew he was always jealous, but that was just because he knew deep inside that a guy like him could never keep a girl like her. That a girl like Josephine didn’t settle for family disappointments with lots of baggage, but he still tried and for a brief moment he thought he could be happy. Now he knew that some people just aren’t meant to be happy.

For the first time since the couple started dating, Sirius lit up a cigarette, inhaling the deathly smoke deeply, hoping that it would kill the sadness in him.

Sirius Black’s world became dull that day.

Unbeknownst to both they had the same essential question running through their head, ‘who is this other guy’ but while Sirius would have to wait some time till his question got answered, Joey had the option to confront her parents.

Of course she could have done this earlier, but she had to admit she was scared of the answer. She knew most pureblood families and couldn’t say she particularly liked them. Additionally a family that was close to the Dark Lord was bound to be involved in the dark arts and at least to some extent evil.

She shuddered at that thought; she heard all the stories about arranged marriages - the regular rape, the abuse and the fear and she wasn’t keen on joining that club. So when she saw her Mother that day ready to confront her - she couldn’t.

She couldn’t bring herself to ask.

Actually, she couldn’t bring herself to do anything besides lay in bed and sleep, she didn’t even have it in her to cry anymore. Even after her Mother informed her she was going to meet her future husband for dinner, she didn’t have it in herself to react.

In the end it was her brother who brought back the girl’s spirits on the day of the dinner.

“Oh no, you are not meeting your future husband looking like that.”

“Why? He has to marry me, anyway.” Joey said, rolling over.

“Go shower. Now. You smell, and if you don’t shower, I will conjure a bucket of ice water and shower you myself.” He said while rummaging through her closet.

Joey frowned, not being used to her brother being so authoritarian, but she did as he said, too tired to argue with him.

Even though she would never admit it, the shower did make her feel better, and the dress her brother chose made her feel like a real life princess.

“You have to do your clown paint on your own, I have no idea what that stuff is.” He said gesturing to her makeup and for the first time in eleven days Joey chuckled.

She was just doing her eye makeup as her mother came in, a sad smile decorating her face. “You never asked who.”

“Does it matter?” Joey asked, applying mascara.

“It’s Regulus Black.”

Joey almost poked her eye out as she heard that. Her heart hammered desperately against her chest.

“Why not Sirius?” Quentin asked the question Joey wanted to ask so desperately. “Isn’t he the oldest?”

Her mother made a sound with her mouth, “We discussed this matter but Sirius and his family have a complicated relationship, they want regulus to make the proud.”

And Joey felt like her heart broke all over again. She was so close to getting what she wanted, yet destiny had ripped it away from her again. If this was a story, the Author had to be downright cruel to put her through this.

-

At the Black Mansion Sirius - for the first time in his life felt completely and utterly broken. Hot tears ran down his face, and he couldn’t contain the sobs coming out of his mouth.

He almost didn’t notice his Mother coming in hitting him with the stupid Black family ring she was so proud of turning it outward so it would leave deep cuts on his cheeks.

“Crying is something for muggles and weaklings. Not for Blacks.” She screeched, but he didn’t care, he never cared for anything his parents wanted or said, he only cared for her and his friends and maybe Regulus even though his loyalty to their parents could be infuriating sometimes.

“We have guests this evening. If you aren’t on your best behavior, I will crucio you right in front of them.” His mother sneered, and Sirius knew from experience that she meant what she said.

“Yes.”

“Yes, what?” His Mother grabbed her wand and Sirius bit his lip till it started bleeding.

“Yes, ma’am.” he grumbled quietly, just hoping that she would disappear soon so he could be sad in peace.

Walburga strutted out of the room, locking the door behind her, making Sirius sigh.

He looked around his room trying to ground himself, the red gryffindor flags, the muggle band posters from bands he didn’t know just to spite his mother, the pictures of the Marauders and of course the pictures of Joey that he didn’t yet have the heart to take down, her smile illuminating the whole room even through a picture. Tears filled his eyes again, yet he didn’t dare to cry. Instead, he got out his wand, muttering some spells to heal the wounds.

A few hours later Sirius was well aware of how horrible he looked, skin pale, deep rings under the eyes and his usually shiny hair hanging matted over his eyes, this look being further enhanced while standing next to his brother who looked more and more like Sirius every day, sharing his aristocratic features. But other than Sirius;, Regulus looked amazing, his tie in place, his hair combed and his shoes cleaned.

Sirius saw the disgusted face his mother gave him before gushing about Regulus and he couldn’t help but feel accomplished at his disheveled appearance that hopefully would disgust any weird poor blood family her mother invited for today.

“Adrian, Cordelia! How nice to see you.” Walburga greeted, making Sirius’ blood run cold at the mention of Joey’s parents’ names; and really just behind the two middle-aged wizards and next to Quentin, the girl of his dreams, stood. Her usually wavy hair was curled and neatly pinned up, leaving just a few strands to frame her beautiful face.

Sirius stood there frozen as the other people greeted each other. Joey stiffly shook his hand. Her eyes looking cold and disinterested, just like the first time Sirius saw her at the pureblood ball.

Joey, on the other hand, felt immensely grateful for her brother standing beside her, as she didn’t know where she should look. She was scared to look in Regulus eyes seeing the familiar cold and steely gaze of her future husband and even though she wanted to, she knew looking in Sirius’ eyes would just open up a Pandora’s box of feelings.

The dinner went over like a blur, Walburga asking lots of questions that were being answered politely, mostly by Cordelia.

As dessert came - crème brûlée, finally the point of the entire dinner was made clear.

“Josephine, Regulus, as you both know we arranged a marriage between you two, binding two of the most pureblood families together by law.” Orion said, his voice cold and calculated just like Regulus’ voice was. Sirius started coughing uncontrollably, choking on the water he just tried to drink, earning himself dirty looks from the pureblood parents, Orion especially looking at Sirius like Walburga looked at discounter clothes. “Don’t mind my son, he doesn’t take news like a gentleman, another reason why we chose regulus over him.”

Joey looked up from her plate - the first time this evening and her mask broke for a short second and Sirius saw how deeply horrified she looked before she went back to smiling politely with the same cold disinterested eyes every pureblood kid learned to have at a young age.

“We expect you to be a pleasant couple till you marry, no drama or other nonsense.” Orion continued.

“Josephine, darling, I suspect your parents already informed you about the risks of acting out?” Walburga asked, and Joey’s stomach turned at her sickly sweet voice. Her eyes automatically found Sirius’ for comfort, but his eyes were clouded with shock and something Joey could only interpret as realization.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Very well, how about you two go up to Regulus’ room to get to know each other better, while we discuss the details of the engagement party?”

Regulus nodded wordlessly, taking his future fiancée’s hand leading her up the stairs so familiar of the noble house of black, into his room.

It was the first time that Joey saw a room except the ball room and Sirius’ room and she was impressed at how unimpressive the room looked. The walls were empty except a Slytherin flag over his bed; the room was almost hauntingly neat, and she didn’t see even one personal item.

“I apologize for all of this.” Regulus said, looking at the stoic girl in front of him.

“No need to apologize.” She whispered, her voice sounding hoarse as she took in the room, looking anywhere but into the boys’ eyes.

“I’m sure no girl wants to have that kind of proposal.”

She chuckled at the absurdity of his words, sitting down on his bed, surprised at the softness of the mattress, yet shuddering at the thought of her having to have sex with him on that mattress - or anywhere, for that matter.

“We are practically engaged and you don’t even know my favorite color.” She said, looking into his eyes for the first time this evening.

There was a deep breath, and then Regulus sat beside her.

“Josephine-“

“Why are you marrying me?”

He looked shocked at the question and Joey wished she could take the words back, knowing that she crossed a line and being basically the property of Regulus now, she should maybe at least try to keep the comments to herself.

“Josephine, it’s what our parents want from us.”

“Nobody calls me Josephine, except my parents.” Joey whispered, her voice restrained from the fear pulsing through her body.

“I know, but I didn’t know if you wanted me to call you that.”

Joey looked into his steely eyes, and they looked surprisingly soft and understanding. And a small glimmer of hope tugged at her heartstrings.

“Why do you care what I want? Am I now not your property?” The words came out harder than she intended, and Regulus flinched slightly.

“I���m not a monster.”

Joey stayed silent.

She was glad, as Walburga called them downstairs, looking at them as if she just won the lottery.

“Splendid news, we will hold the engagement party in one week.”, Joey forced a smile but by the falling face of Walburga she could already tell that it came out more like a grimace, “and the even better news is that you will spend all summer with us so you and Regulus can bond and have some appearances as a couple before you marry.”

Joey’s stomach turned. Spending all summer with the guy they forced her to marry, her ex boyfriend who still gave her butterflies and their psychopathic parents sounded like a nightmare.

“We will have a guest room ready.” Orion added coldly, and from the corner of her eye she saw Sirius exhaling in something that looked like relief.

“Oh no, we aren’t in the eighties anymore. She can sleep in Regulus room, they can practice for their wedding night.” Walburga grinned wolfishly, and Joey felt so sick she was sure she would throw up all over the carpet.

Masterlist

Part 6

Let me know if you want to be on the taglist for this story :)

[peaceoutofthepieces]

Sink Or Swim

tag list: @cleocc @feeling-kinda-so-so @hopelessromanticvirgo @dreamy-slytherin @adora8 @lockerfivethreefive @painfully-oblivious @poeticinemaa @jjustonemorething @sassy-sara @wedarkacademia @coolguyssyndrome @hischbabe @suckerforsobbe @tayspots @starmansander @theah0lt @zoenneforever @invisibleme @chibibanane @odi-et-amo85

~^~

Sunday, 14:07

Song: Sam Smith - How Do You Sleep

Lucas feels a little ridiculous, smiling dopily at his phone while he sits at the kitchen table, but it’s impossible not to. He always smiles at messages from Jens—has done since first meeting him—and now his joy is only doubled.

I think Jana is suspicious

suspicious how?

Lucas scrolls back up to the message Jens had sent him earlier while he waits for him to respond. Lucas had woken up to it—an image of Jens still in bed, pouting into his pillow. The accompanying message had simply read ‘not as comfy as yours’.

He scrolls back down when Jens replies.

she’s giving me that look. the suspicious one. all knowing and smug and shit

Lucas smiles, giving a tiny shake of his head.

maybe you should stop texting me and actually spend time with her then? don’t forget it’s your last chance

why thank you. now I’m sad :(

okay. I’m gonna ignore you now but know that I don’t want to </3

dumbass. you can text me later

Lucas hesitates a moment, and then sends one final message.

<3

“What are you smiling at?”

Lucas looks up at his dad and hastily places his phone on the table. He’d forgotten he wasn’t in the room alone, that his dad is only at the sink, washing the dishes. He’s looking over his shoulder at Lucas in amusement, and Lucas crosses his arms on the table and shrugs him off. “Nothing, just the guys.”

“The guys as in Kes and Jayden, or new guys?” Hugo asks.

It would be very simple. Lucas could just say Kes and let the conversation drop. He wouldn’t have to explain anything. He’d be asked the easy questions; how are they doing, does Lucas miss them. It might be the best segway into organising a trip home soon.

It’s also clear that his dad is trying, and Lucas decides it probably wouldn’t be the worst thing to put in the same effort.

“New.”

Hugo hums approvingly as he leaves the last plate aside and turns off the tap. He grabs a towel before turning around, leaning back against the counter as he dries his hands. “Anybody special?”

Lucas works very hard not to blush and give himself away, because the truthful answer is yes. Jens is incredibly special—the word doesn’t even seem sufficient to describe him.

But Lucas isn’t about to tell anyone else that, much less his father.

“No,” Lucas groans, rubbing a hand over his face for emphasis, hoping that’s enough to get past the subject.

“What? Smiling like that, what am I supposed to think? You know you didn’t even make a single snide comment during lunch?”

“Did you want me to?”

That earns him a withering look. “Lucas, come. Tell me about it. Your friends, at least. I let you out to that Halloween party and you haven’t even told me who you were with.”

“I didn’t know going outside came with terms and conditions,” Lucas mutters.

His father merely raises a brow. “When you were originally grounded, it does, yes.”

Lucas relents by letting his shoulders slump.

“Did you smoke?”

“I didn’t, actually.” Lucas resists the urge to roll his eyes, but he’s disappointed that this seems to have turned into an interrogation. For once, for some reason, he’d thought it would be better. They’ve been more amicable over the past week, casual with each other, with Hugo actually making it home in time to have dinner with him on occasion.

“That’s slightly impressive,” Hugo allows, moving to sit down with him at the table. “And did you have fun?”

Lucas shrugs. “Yeah, it was fine.” It was better than fine. It was the night he and Jens had almost kissed.

But, again, he isn’t about to tell his father that.

“You’re really not gonna give me anything, huh?” Hugo nudges his arm. “What about Saturday then? Where’d you disappear to that night?”

A smile flits on to Lucas’s lips. “Trick-or-treating.”

“Ah, well, now you’re just making fun of me.”

“No, I’m serious,” Lucas protests. “I went trick-or-treating with Jens and his little sister.”

He’s confused for a moment as to why his father brightens, but he quickly lets Lucas know what he’d latched onto. “Is that finally a name?” Lucas’s smile drops as his dad leans towards him, urging him on with a wave of his hand. “Jens, tell me about Jens.”

Lucas absolutely cannot do that. His pulse spikes, but he quickly tamps his fear down. His father has no reason to expect anything beyond friendship. He’s just asking Lucas to tell him about his friends. Lucas can tell him about Jens without giving him any of the...details.

“I don’t know. He’s Jens. I met him at—“ Lucas quickly cuts himself off, remembering that he’d snuck out to that party after his father had gone to his room. “I met him at school at the end of my first week. He kind of got me into his friend group.”

Hugo nods, pleased, but not entirely satisfied. “What’s he like?”

“He’s...cool. He skates, he’s chill. He kind of reminds me of Kes, I guess.”

“I’d like him, then?”

Lucas has to admit that he hasn’t thought about it much, but now that the man has put it out there, he likes the idea. It’s not really something he’d ever looked for, before—his father’s approval. He supposes it’s different, now that they’re on their own. He’s been worrying about what the boys will think, trying to figure out how to tell Isa, wondering what Jens’s friends will say. He has thought about telling his mother.

He hasn’t really considered his dad much, beyond how best to sneak Jens around him.

“Yeah,” he says quietly, “I think so. He’s a good guy.”

Hugo smiles. “I wouldn’t expect you to pick anything less.”

Lucas can’t help but find a deeper meaning in the words, for just a second, and feel his heart warm. Then he crushes the idea and comes back to the matter at hand, and decides he can’t give anything more away. “Should I tell Jayden you think he’s good, then?”

“You’ll do no such thing. I love the kid, but it’s a tough love.”

Lucas snorts, shaking his head slightly, surprised again at how at-ease he feels. Maybe he is misjudging, just slightly. Maybe he should try a little more.

He’s even more surprised when his dad gives his hair a fond ruffle as he rises, standing next to Lucas with a hand on his shoulder. “If you don’t have any plans today, you wanna watch a film with me?”

Lucas’s brows raise slowly. “What film?”

“Your choice.”

It’s a good offer that Lucas doesn’t really have a reason to refuse. Trying, he reminds himself. “Sure.”

Hugo grins and pats his shoulder. “Good. I’ll go set up the TV and you can get us the ice cream.”

“You got ice cream?” Lucas asks, disbelieving, as his dad makes his way out of the room.

“I know my son. Of course I got ice cream.”

Lucas finds himself grinning after him, shaking his head to himself in an attempt to snap out of it. He doesn’t have to, he realises. He should take this treacherous peace and allow himself to enjoy it. Maybe things are simply going right for once.

Maybe the universe is on his side, after all.

He picks his phone back up before getting the dessert, seeing another notification from Jens, but this time in the form of an Instagram post. Lucas clicks into it and finds an image of him and Jana. They’re both pouting, eyes closed, and Jana has her arms wrapped tightly around his neck, pressing their cheeks together. Jens has simply captioned it, ‘miss you already’.

There’s a low thrum of jealousy in Lucas’s stomach, at first, but the longer he looks at it, the easier he finds it. Eventually, it draws a smile onto his face. He remembers what Jens had told him, the night of the Halloween party, and what Jens had told him yesterday, and he merges it all together and reminds himself of how Jens had kissed him, over and over, going so far as to ask Lucas if he could stay forever.

He smiles to himself as he likes the post, then slips his phone back into his pocket before going in search of the ice cream.

[midnight0stars]

**Stay? ~ Modern AU Isa x Fem!Reader**

Words: 2092

The two of you sat together in darkness, eyes glued to the screen in front of you, though you were still hardly paying attention to it. You were suddenly regretting your suggestion to see a movie, unable to focus on what was going on over the feeling of his hand trailing lightly up and down your leg. You glanced over at Isa out of the corner of your eye, finding that he was seemingly paying rapt attention to the movie.

A touch of impatience ran through you as you tried to remember how long the runtime for this movie was. It felt like you had been sitting there for forever, suffering through the movie that you had been so excited for just an hour ago. Part of you wanted to lift his hand and tell him to stop, but the greater part of you was thrumming with anticipation of what direction this meant your night would take.

His hand dipped lower on your thigh, his thumb brushing over the seam of your jeans. You sucked in a breath at the sensation, almost a tickle but all pleasure as his hand slid further up your leg. Part of you was so wickedly tempted to jump him then and there, but a particularly loud crunch of popcorn from another movie goer snapped you out of it. You sighed, glancing over at Isa again, this time finding a small smirk upon his lips.

You blinked a bit in surprise before realizing what his smirk was for. He knew exactly what he was doing to you and was obviously doing it on purpose — though you really shouldn’t have expected anything different. In your irritation, you grabbed his hand, intending to shove it back into his own lap, but he captured his hand in yours, twining your fingers together. You let out a huff of annoyance but allowed him to keep hold of your hand. A shiver raced up your arm and you jerked to look at him fully, finding his lips still pressed to the back of your hand. The action turned you on more than you wanted to let him know, but the look he gave you as your eyes met broke your resolve.

You leaned forward, crushing your lips against his in a deep kiss, lips parting so your tongues could meet. He released your hand to grip the back of your head, tangling his hand in your hair. You stifled a moan, pursing your lips and pulling back from him.

“Screw the movie,” you said.

That was all the prompting he needed. He gave you a satisfied smile, grabbing your hand again and pulling you up out of your seat and then out of the theater. Your heart pounded in your chest as the two of you barely made it out of the theater before he pushed you into an alcove, hands gripping your waist. His lips found your neck, and you couldn’t help the soft groan that left your lips, ever aware of how quiet everything around you suddenly was.

“You’ve been driving me crazy all night.”

His murmured words hummed against your skin, making you laugh breathlessly.

“I’ve been driving you crazy? I’m the one who’s been getting felt up all night.”

“Is that complaining I hear?”

“H-hardly.”

The word was a gasp as his hand found the skin of the small of your back and his teeth nipped your neck. Suddenly, you reached up to push him away, trying to hide just how heavily you were breathing already. You could feel your wetness beginning to soak through your panties, and you wanted nothing more than for him to have his way with you right then and there, but you also didn’t want to get banned from your favorite movie theater.

“My place,” you whispered in explanation to his questioning look.

He nodded in understanding and then the two of you were on the move again, exiting the building and finding your way out to the car. Of the two of you, your place was closer, and Isa navigated there easily, while simultaneously continuing to run his hand up your thigh. Every time he drew close to your core you involuntarily drew in a sharp breath, but it was better than becoming a moaning mess in the car.

When Isa parked the car, you couldn’t hold yourself back. You fumbled with the buckle of your seatbelt before managing to get free and leaned your body over the center console. It dug into your stomach uncomfortably, but you ignored it as your lips crashed together. You reached up and laced your fingers through his hair, letting out a soft moan that grew in intensity as his tongue slipped into your mouth.

“Isa,” you breathed, trying to press yourself closer to him.

The feeling of his palm pressed against the small of your back, and the center console inhibiting you from reaching him, made you draw back in frustration.

“Inside.”

His soft command, reading your mind, sent a shiver of anticipating running through you. You hastily turned to obey, throwing open the door and walking quickly up the path to your door. The deadbolt had barely twisted to unlock when you felt Isa’s hands at your waist, his lips pressing against your neck. You let your head loll to the side, offering him more of your skin that he eagerly lavished.

“I thought… nngh…” You moaned at his teeth nipping your neck, his affections leaving you breathless. “You said inside?”

“You’re irresistible,” he said against your skin.

A shiver raced down your spine and your knees buckled as he reached forward and pushed open your door. Without thinking, you reached down to grab his hands so that he couldn’t pull away when you hurriedly stepped past the threshold. You turned your head, redirecting his lips from your neck to meet your own lips, your body obediently turning under his touch as he made you face him. In the back of your mind, you wondered whether you should try to make it all the way back to your bedroom.

Your question was answered when his hand slipped under your shirt, lifting it as he trailed his fingers up your stomach to lightly trace along the bottom of your bra. Screw trying to make it to the bedroom. No sooner had the decision been made than his hands tugged at your shirt. You lifted your arms up over your head to assist him and in the next moment, the fabric was being tossed to the side.

His lips crashed back down on yours, hands roaming up your torso to find the clasp of your bra. After the long build up of anticipation in the theater and the car ride back, all you wanted was for him to take you and quickly.

“Isa…”

Your bra hit the floor, and there was only a brief moment of time between when the cool air of the room hit your breasts, and when Isa’s hands found them. He cupped them gently, thumbs grazing over your nipples, eliciting another shiver and moan from you. You tangled your fingers through his hair as he swallowed your moans, taking advantage of your parted lips.

Unable to stand it anymore, you pulled back just enough to whisper, “Take me.”

You felt the back of the couch against your skin as Isa pushed you onto it before kneeling down between your legs. The way he looked up at you, gripping your knees and spreading them, only served to make you even wetter, and you were seconds away from whining out his name. His hands slid up your legs, caressing your hips before hooking his fingers through your belt loops. Your fingers found the button of your pants, swiftly undoing it before his expectant eyes could even meet yours.

A smirk lifted his lips as he gave a tug at those belt loops, prompting you to lift your hips so that he could slide your pants down your legs. Impatience mounting ever higher, you yanked down your own panties to go with your pants. You knew if he had his way, he’d be teasing you far longer, and that was the last thing you wanted. When his hands found your thighs again and you had an inkling of what he was planning you wrapped your fingers around his wrists to stop him.

He looked up at you questioningly and you used your grip on his wrists to tug him up towards you. You weren’t quite strong enough to pull him up without a little assistance from him, but he obliged, and as soon as he was close enough you captured his lips with your own.

“Stop toying with me,” you told him after pulling away. “I’m ready for you.”

Isa held your gaze for a long moment before responding by standing and taking off his own clothes. Your eyes roved up and down his body, greedily taking in the musculature of his abs and chest and landing on his erection. It was obvious he was as ready for you as you were for him. In your distraction, he caught you off guard when he suddenly leaned forward, gripping your wrist to pull you off the couch, other arm looping around your waist as he spun the two of you around and switched your positions.

Sitting on the couch now, with you straddling him, Isa pulled you in close, peppering kisses along your collarbone and breasts as his free hand ran up your thigh to your waist, and then up further to trace the curve of your breast. As blissful as those kisses felt, as much as you enjoyed his lips on your skin, you still wanted more. You wanted him inside of you, and you wanted it now.

As he continued lavishing your body, back arching under his touch, your hands found their way down between your bodies, and your fingers wrapped around his shaft. His moan was a soft breath against your skin as you lifted yourself just enough that you could lower yourself back down and onto him. You echoed his moan, letting the noise last for as long as it took to take him deeply inside of you. With how aroused you were, you were wet enough that it was so smooth as he entered you that you almost came then and there.

Both of Isa’s arms wrapped around you then, pushing you downward in an attempt to get himself even deeper. You groaned at the sensation, tangling your fingers through his hair. He kissed you again, and that was when you started moving, gripping the back of the couch instead when you realized that would help you move better.

Even pressed against each other, you couldn’t help but arch your back into his touch when his lips found your skin. He teased the area around and between your breasts, ever so slightly brushing past your nipples, but not nearly enough to satisfy you. A sharp gasp left your lips when he finally did take your nipple into his mouth, licking and sucking it in a way that caused you to pick up your pace as you felt your release coiling within you.

As a particular thrust hit in tandem with the way he sucked your nipple, you cried out as you came, hands leaving the back of the couch to dig into his shoulders. Your movements had paused as you came, but as your senses returned to you, you kept moving, taking Isa as deep as you could until you felt him tense up underneath you. He thrust shortly into you a few more times before the two of you finally went still and you draped yourself over him.

After a few moments, you started lightly tracing random patterns over his chest, your eyes still closed. This was the part usually, where he would gather his clothes, kiss you goodnight, and then leave, but… This time you didn’t want him to. Actually, you never really wanted him to, but you understood the need for a little bit of space, to maintain your own lives outside of each other, despite how much you cared for each other.

Tonight though, when you felt the “I should go” about to come from his lips, you interrupted.

“Stay?” You phrased it as a question, not entirely sure how he would react. “I don’t want you to go.”

His arms tightened around you as he kissed the top of your head and whispered, “Of course.”

[franboos]

I don’t want to be your friend i want to kiss you neck

a vds college roommate fic

written by @gucciboner and me <3

word count: 1617

chapter one, part 3/3

chapter one, part 2

find the entire first chapter on a03

“Get off.” Lucas murmured, roughly trying to scrub the yellow paint off of his hands. One of the downsides of wanting to be an artist, his hands were constantly covered in either paint or pencil smudges.

He enjoyed his first week of school a lot. He met a lot of new people and all his teachers are very relaxed. This place is really going to feel like his second home, just like Sander told him.

He quickly fixes his hair in the mirror, it always gets messed up when he’s painting, before walking out of the bathroom. Sander send him a text when he was in class, asking him if he wanted to hang out at his apartment after school. Lucas said yes, he liked Sander, and wouldn’t mind getting to know him better.

Sander was waiting for him outside, leaning against the building.

“You ready to go?” He asks a soon as he sees Lucas.

Sander’s apartment isn’t far from the school, a 15-minute walk at least. They talk about their day for a bit and Lucas tells a story about the girl from his class who knocked over a supplies cart, breaking several glass jars and spilling paint water all over the classroom floor.

“I felt really bad for her, she almost started crying.”

They’re walking through a part of Antwerp that Lucas hasn’t seen yet and he makes a mental note that he really needs to drag Isa with him to explore the city this weekend. Maybe Jens could show them some cool spots, since he has lived in Antwerp his whole life. So has Friso but Lucas doesn’t like him as much.

“Robbe just texted me,” Sander says, shaking Lucas from his thoughts.

The infamous Robbe. Sander had told Lucas all about his boyfriend on the first day they met.

“He says he invited some of our friends over as well, is that okay?”

Lucas shrugs. “The more the merrier.”

“They’re kind of idiots though, I’m warning you.” He says, making Lucas laugh.

“I have a lot of experience with idiotic friends, so I think I’m gonna be just fine.”

Sanders stops in front of a relatively small apartment complex. “here we are,” He takes his set of keys out of his pocket and unlocks the door. Once the door is closed again Sander leads them up the stairs. The apartment is on the third floor, which are more stairs than Lucas would have liked to climb, he’s embarrassed by the fact that he’s slightly out of breath when they reach the correct floor.

Sander unlocks the front door for them “After you,” he smiles. As soon as Lucas steps into the narrow hallway he can hear loud voices coming from somewhere inside the apartment.

“You’re home,” at the end of the hall a head pops out of the doorframe.

The guy, Robbe, Lucas assumes, because Sander beams at the sight of him, steps into the hallway and greets Sander by wrapping his arms around his neck and pulling him into a kiss. So definitely Robbe then.

Lucas stands there, awkwardly, looking anywhere but the two of them.

“And you must be Lucas?” Robbe asks, once he pulls away from Sander. “I’m Robbe.” He stretches his hand out to Lucas.

“Yeah, I figured,” He laughs and shakes Robbe’s hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Sander has told me a lot about you.”

Robbe’s cheeks turn slightly pink and Sander presses a kiss to his temple.

“Positive stuff I hope…” Robbe says, shyly looking down.

“Of course baby, always.”

Robbe looks back up and gives Sander another lingering kiss but he doesn’t get the change to deepen it since Sander starts talking again.

“Let’s go meet the rest shall we?” Sander claps his hands together and turns around, walking through the doorway that Robbe appeared out of earlier. Lucas and Robbe trail behind him.

The living room is slightly messy, In the left corner stands a small desk that is covered in what seems to be some of Sanders drawings. The windowsill is covered in plants, a few vaguely turning light brown. A big light blue rug covers almost the whole floor. And a big L shaped grey couch stands in the middle of the room, facing a tv, with a matching chair next to it. This definitely looks a lot more organised than his student residence.

“Everyone, meet Lucas,”  Sander excitedly announces to the three guys sitting on the couch playing video games, too focused on whatever game they’re playing, to lookup.

Lucas immediately recognizes one of them as Jens.

“Wait,” Jens says, rapidly pushing the buttons on the controller, “too busy killing Aaron.”

“What the fuck,” Lucas is taken aback by the fact that his super cute roommate is sitting on Sanders couch, so he mumbles it more to himself than anyone else but Jens hears him anyway and looks up, the surprise also clear on his face when he sees Lucas.

They look at each other for a few seconds, not saying anything, until Jens shakes his head slightly. “What are you doing here?” He pauses the video game, earning a groan from one of the other guys.

“Wait you two know each other?” Sander asks from where he’s standing next to Lucas.

“Yeah,” Lucas says, never breaking eye-contact with Jens. “We’re roommates.”

Sander laughs, “what a coincidence.” He plops down on the couch, tugging Robbe along with him.

After Lucas sits down as well, across from everyone in the chair,  the other two guys introduce themself as Aaron and Moyo. They talk for a while and Lucas finds out that Robbe and Jens have been friends the longest out of all of them. They tell Lucas all about their youtube channel, about the time Moyo and Aaron pranked Jens by faking that Aaron was under hypnosis and making him steal a handbag. Lucas laughed and Jens pouted adorably at him. According to Robbe, their best video was the one where he and Moyo tested their makeup skills on Jens. When Lucas asked to see it, Jens was quick to say no because “it was really really bad.”

Their whole friendship dynamic reminds Lucas a lot of his with Jayden and Kes.

“So Lucas,” Moyo shifts on the couch, turning all his attention to Lucas. “Is there a girl back in Utrecht?”

“If not, we can totally hook you up with some hot ones,” Aaron grins sheepishly. “Oh maybe Noor,” He hits Moyo on the arm excitedly.

Lucas lets out a snort, “That’s alright Aaron, girls aren’t really my thing.”

He watches the confusion take over Aaron’s face. It takes him a few seconds before he understands what Lucas means. “Oh,” he says with widened eyes, “we can totally help you find hot guys as well.” He looks around at his friends. “I’m sure Sander and Robbe know some.”

“Dude,” Moyo groans, shaking his head.

Robbe, who is basically sitting in Sanders lap at this point, just rolls his eyes at Aarons comment.

“Do you have a boyfriend then?” Jens, who has been quiet ever since Moyo’s question, asks while he clenches his jaw, his attention fully on Lucas.

“Nope, I’m very single,” Lucas says while looking Jens straight in the eye.

Jens tries to casually nod and he gives him a small “Ah okay”, but Lucas sees some of the tension from Jens face disappear. Did he just care if Lucas has a boyfriend or not?

No, he must be seeing things. Jens was just curious. That’s all.

“So, beside from Sander and Robbe, are any of you dating?”

“Surprisingly enough, only Aaron,” Moyo says, “but that is just because I haven’t found someone I really like. I could get any girl I want you know.”

Jens scoffs, “yeah sure dude, are you confusing real life with your dreams?”

Moyo looks annoyed but the other boys start laughing.

“Are you guys just living with the two of you or with more people?” Moyo asks pointing to Lucas and Jens.

“You want to know if we live with any girls, Moyo?” Lucas says, “you could just have asked politely.”  

Sander, who sits next to Lucas, gives him a fist bump while laughing.

“No, I’m genuinely interested.”  Although he doesn’t sound so convincing.

“We live with two other guys and two other girls, who one of them is my best friend. They are all pretty cool, so that’s chill.”

Moyo tries to casually nod without looking interested in getting to know any of those girls.

“Well moyo, if I were you I would do something with this information as soon as possible, because Jens already got hit on,” Lucas says while first looking at Moyo but then switching his gaze to Jens.

“Ugh, Luc. I don’t like her okay.” His eyes stare so deep in Lucas his eyes, like he is really trying to make clear that he would never do anything with her.

It is silent for a second. Lucas sees Robbe and Sander looking at each other while exchanging non existing words. He can’t figure out what their trying to tell each other, must be some weird boyfriend telepathie.

Moyo breaks the tension. “So, you guys should really show us your place one day!”

“Yeah, but we should first make the living room at least look a bit more presentable.”

“I agree with you on that,” Jens says with a laugh.

The boys kept talking for a while but then started gaming again. Lucas could get along quit good with the boys. He did not just meet Sander his friends, but also Jens’. And for some reason, it felt important that he liked jens friends, and that they liked him.

[moonlightmurder]

Robert Mark Steele : The Gentle Giant

Allan Chisholm was the boss of Goulburn Jail when numerous murders happened. When asked if it took a toll on him, he said only one death did and it wasn’t a murder, “Sure it does affect you — watching a man die is not pleasant — but with all of them…well… it was just part of the job. But there was a particular death during my time at Goulburn that stands out. One that really got and one that I am still saddened by now.“

“Hey you, retard,” the inmate yelled, throwing a handful of food slop.

“Yeah, you, dumb shit,” he continued to bully as the leftover meat and veggies slid down the target’s spine. “You giant piece of spastic shit. I’m going to hurt you. Hurt you real bad.“

Backed by a posse of tattooed arms and battle-scarred heads, the big-mouthed man stepped in. His leading left crashed into chin. His right, the enforcer’s trusted knock-out blow, slammed into temple.

The ‘giant piece of spastic shit’ shook his head. “Don’t make me hurt you,” he said. “I don’t want to have to hurt you. No trouble, please.“

The prison heavy went red with rage.

A body shot this time.

Wrong.

The giant wrapped his hands around the attacker’s neck, and with nothing more that a flick of his wrists and should twitch, he lifted the prisoner into the air.

“I told you!” the giant screamed.

The force of the blow that followed knocked the name-calling, food-throwing man out cold.

“He never hurt anyone unless he had to,” recalled Chislom of Robert Mark Steele, a man imprisoned for his role in five murders.

“Only one that I can recall. He was a bit like the guy from the movie The Green Mile — a gentle giant who looked like a killer. He was simple but kind, and could have destroyed anyone in the jail but didn’t. He was that sort of inmate. I really had a soft spot for him, and I don’t think he should have even been in jail.“

March 1993,

The rays of the rising summer sun, hot enough to wring steam from the damp grass, could not drive the evil away.

The light did not deter the devil.

“I ain’t going out without a fight,” said self-described sociopath Leonard Leabeater, surrounded by police in a Hanging Rock  Station farmhouse at Cangai, New South Wales. “I’m going to make sure they kill me.“

He hugged the shotgun like a teddy bear as he reflected on the two hostages he had just released : Trevor Lasserre, 11, and his sister, Tonia, 6.

“I don’t kill people under 12,” he boasted. “I’d rather be in South Australia killing cops.“

Leabeater had let the children go shortly after fellow fugitive Raymond Basset surrendered himself to police; the 25-year-old wasn’t ready to die. The third murderer, Robert Steele, 22, stayed with Leabeater even after the children had been released. Like Bassett, he didn’t want to be shot down in a hail of bullets, but he couldn’t leave the man who had taken him in, either. Steele believed Leabeater was the religious prophet of the spirit Astra. He had followed Leabeater, who foretold that his own death would come when he was killed by a warlock, without question. But with the death he predicted drawing near — it would later be revealed he told his sister he would die on an altar on the fourth month of 1993 — Leabeater instructed his loyal follower to leave. He told him to walk towards the light.

At 6am Steele strolled from the farmhouse, calmly smoking a Winfield Red, and handed himself over to police.

But Leabeater remained in the dark. The fresh sun, the threatening guns and the pleas driven through police-issue PAs not stopping him from claiming one last life — his own.

After a 26-hour siege, the nine-day rampage that saw Leabeater, Bassett and Steel kill five people was finally over. Leabeater’s body was found lying on a blood-soaked bed, a half-smoked cigarette still gripped between his fingers.

A shotgun was lying next to the remains of his head.

Bassett and Steele were charged with the murders of a pregnant 14-year old, whose charred remains were found on a Queensland farm; three miners, all shot in the head and two thrown from a cliff; and a helicopter mechanic murdered near Mount Isa.

Bassett was given two life sentences for the shocking crime. Steele received five life sentences plus 12 years without the possibility of parole.

The giant Steele, 130kg of bulk and brawn, was sent to Goulburn Jail. That’s where he pulled out a packet of Winfield Reds and offered it to the boss.

“I smoked Marlboros, and he looked at them and told me they were no good,” recalled Chisholm. “He offered me his whole pack. I remember that because no one in prison had ever offered me anything, and smokes were a very big deal to them. They are like gold in prison. That was the first time I saw his good heart.“

The next time Chisholm saw the giant’s kindness was when he reluctantly flipped the bully.

“A crook was picking on him,” Chisholm said. “He was a heavy and he was giving Steele heaps because he was simple. The guy was in high-security because he was a handful; someone who couldn’t be contained elsewhere. He was a tough bloke, but he picked out Steele. It was a huge mistake. Steele upended him and knocked him out with a single blow. He could have kept on going, but he walked away. He didn’t hurt him more that he had to, and I was there soon after the fight. He was apologizing. ‘It’s not my fault, chief. He was picking on me. I’m sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt him so bad,’ he said.”

Chisholm knew Steele was telling the truth. “He could have killed the bloke if he wanted to — and everyone else in the room — with his bare hands. But he was just protecting himself.“

Chisholm found Steele to be incredibly kind but easily led. “He was involved in that hostage thing,” Chisholm said.  “He was involved in the killings and the siege, but it was a cult-type thing and he was very young. I’ll go further than that — to be blunt, he was retarded. He wasn’t all there. He was the youngest, and he was taken advantage of. He was like a big kid who is extremely strong. He believed in what the other two were doing and he did as he was told.“

Chisholm became fascinated with the behemoth man-child.

“I was always in close contact with Steele,” Chisholm said. “And I built a rapport with him, mainly because we initially thought he was going to be such a threat to everyone else in jail and a major problem. But he didn’t hurt officers or anyone else. I would tell him to get back to his cell and he did. I honestly believe he should have not been in jail. He should have been in some psychiatric facility. He was a child trapped in a giant’s body. Yes, he deserved to be punished because of his horrendous crimes, and he couldn’t live in society, but Goulburn wasn’t the place for him, and it would kill him.“

Chisholm got the call on Christmas Eve, 1994.

“He’s dead, boss,” said an officer. “You better come down.”

Steele was on his knees, a twisted blanket the only thing stopping his head from falling onto the cell floor.

“About 12.05 am we got a call to say he had necked himself,” Chisholm said. “He was so big that he had to kneel down and fall forward to get enough tension on the sheet. He had tied it to the cell bars and pulled forward until he was dead. It took us ages to get him out of the cell because he was so big. It was really a horrible thing to see.“

Steele was to spend Christmas in solitary confinement after threatening to go out with a bang.

“I went and saw him on the Christmas Eve because of somme allegations he had made,” Chisholm recalled. “He always said that he was going to go out with something big and that he was going to make headlines. He said he would take officers with him, and that he would do it on Christmas Day. We didn’t think he would harm anyone, but we had to take the threat seriously. He could have cause absolute havoc in the prison. We would not have been able to handle him. It would have taken lots of men to contain him, and there would have been a lot hurt.

So we put him in segregation for the night. We told him no officer was going to go near him because of what he had said. We told him no officer would come, even if he knocked. They would have to call me first, and I would come and see him. He assured me there would be no problem. He seemed absolutely normal.“

The next time Chisholm would see Steele, the prisoner would be dead.

“It was a complete shock. We had no idea he would hurt himself. We were worried about others, not him. It’s the prison death that has affected me the most. It was such a sad tale, and I still think about it now. “

Sources: Australia’s Most Murderous Prison : Behind the Walls of Goulburn Jail and The Sydney Morning Herald.

[takkforaltijd]

"I really had no idea what to expect from this evening" 2/2

Okay here's part two. A few things beforehand, did you know that Lucas is actually attending a Waldorf school in skamnl! Namely the St-Gregorius College in Utrecht! So I put this into the story. I also have no idea what the translation of "borrelnootje" is. It is a peanut with a kind of crispy layer around it. Here a picture haha. So I just called it crispy nuts.

Jens is home alone the weekend and has asked Lucas if he would like to come. Friday has arrived and the two have not talked about it. Jens sends a message if Lucas still wants to come over.

Also an evening with cards, drinks, good conversations and a first kiss. ———————————————————————

Jens zipped up his jacket and went to the front door. He felt in the pocket of his jacket for his bicycle key, but he was not in it.

"Fuck where's my key," Jens thought. He ran to his bedroom and looked at his desk. The key was not there. He looked quickly through his room, but he was nowhere to be seen.

He hurried to the kitchen, almost falling down the stairs on the way. Had he thrown it there when he got home? The key was not on the kitchen table, nor on the counter.

"You've got to be kidding me" the boy thought. He even checked the pantry to see if he had left it there, but the key was nowhere to be seen.

Jens's last hope was that he hadn't locked his bike at all. Then it was praying that he was still there.

"My god I'm such a idiot" Jens thought when he saw his bike with the key in the lock. How long had this taken? Almost five minutes?! Jens jumped on the bike towards the harbor. Why was he so extremely chaotic? He just couldn’t come on time.

...

When he arrived at the harbor, Lucas was already there.

"Sorry I lost my key. I really went all over the house to find it, but apparently my bike was not locked at all…” Jens said a bit breathless from cycling.

Lucas could only laugh. "I think this can really only happen to you"

Lucas might be right about that, Jens thought. "I am the absolute master of chaotic people," Jens said back with raised eyebrows and a cheeky smile.

The boys got on their bikes and headed for his house.

...

“We'll put the bike in the back, that's easier” the boys cycled through a narrow alley and not much later they were behind Jens's house.

"Well, here I live." The boys parked their bikes and walked in. Jens took off his shoes and hung his coat on the overfull coat rack. He saw Lucas look with a look that said, "there is no possibility that my jacket will go with this too without it collapsing." "Uh just hang it over something."

The boys went to the kitchen. "Do you want something to drink?" Jens asked with his head already in the fridge. "Yes please" he answered. "Uh we have juice, coke ... I don't know what you like?"

Jens didn't get an answer, so he looked around and what he feared earlier today was reality. Lucas was looking extensively at the old pictures on the wall.

“Uh yes old pictures are hanging everywhere in the house. Nice and embarrassing.” Jens said with a flushed cheeks.

"No this is amazing!" Lucas said enthusiastically. "Isn't this you?" he pointed to an old school photo, about nine years old Jens was there. Jens nodded. "And this? Is that your sister?”

"Yes, that's Lotte, she's only eight, by the way, which also explains the drawings on the fridge," Jens said while he closed the fridge. "Is Coke good?" and Lucas nodded.

"You said eight years, this really isn’t bad," said Lucas with admiration. "I couldn't do this when I was eight!"

"Do you draw then?" Jens aked. “Yes, I have always attended a Waldorf school in the Netherlands. So, there was always a lot of room for creativity. My mother thought that was important for my development. That's why started painting and drawing I think.” Lucas said almost shyly.

"So not just the skater boy I've seen so far," Jens joked.

"No not just a skater boy"

The boys sat down at the kitchen table with their drinks. "And you? Are you also doing something creative or are you really just the skater boy I've seen so far?” Lucas asked with genuine interest and a slight grin on his face.

"I play the guitar, but I don't think I can get much further than that," Jens replied.

"I should hear that one time," said Lucas with a smile on his face. "Only if I get to see your drawings" Jens said back teasingly "at least if that's not too personal" he quickly added realizing how personal art could be. But Lucas agreed. "Next time, then," the blond boy said.

Next time, Jens thought. That sounds good.

The boys' small talk went on for a while until Jens asked if Lucas would like to have another drink.

"a beer?" Jens asked. And Lucas replied as if he had never heard anything better. Jens took two bottles of beer from the fridge and put them on the table. He also took a deck of cards.

"Can you play cards?" he asked. To which Lucas replied with a provocative tone "and if I can play cards" and the boys both laughed at it.

...

A few games of cards and two beers later Jens gave up “how is this possible, people never want to play cards with me because I always win, and you just finished me like it was nothing”

"Oh… has Lucas destroyed jens his little ego," said Lucas in a teasing voice and half a pout. Both boys couldn't stop laughing.

Lucas took some more crispy nuts and put them in his mouth. "Do you know what my party trick is?" he asked. Jens shook his head. "I can float crispy nuts in the air," he said through his laughter. Jens had no idea what to imagine. "I must see that!" Lucas tried to back out of it, but Jens was steadfast. He had to see this.

"Okay, but then I have to lie flat." And not much later, the boys had moved into the living room with the bag of crispy nuts.

Jens looked wide-eyed at Lucas. "Dude how?!" he said in surprise. "I have to be able to do this, it is brilliant." So not much later Jens himself was on the couch.

"Okay, you need a round nut that isn't too big." So Jens picked up a round crispy nut. "Then you put it on your lips" Jens followed the instructions of a slightly tipsy Lucas. "And then you have to blow gently." Jens tried but failed very hard. He tried a few more times but failed really hard.

"How do you do this, it is impossible," said Jens, almost irritated. "You should blow softer," said Lucas. Jens had to be able to do it "even softer, that really is impossible!". Both boys burst out laughing at Jens's frustration. “You know what, I give up. You already destroyed my ego while playing cards” and Jens sat up straight on the couch. Lucas dropped down next to him and said with a grin “sorry…” “ah stop it” Jens said back.

"should I put some music on?" Jens asked, already getting up. Lucas nodded. “What should I put on. I really have no idea what the Dutch are listening to.” Jens said teasingly. "you can decide I listen to almost everything thanks to my friends in the Netherlands." Lucas replied. "Everything?" Jens asked in a provocative tone. Lucas put his hands over his head "oh god what have I started."

Little boy You are in this world so you will have to fight just like me I can know Life is not easy There is adversity at any time (translated from dutch)

Jens looked at a Lucas who sang this song with one hand on his hard. "The Dutch really like their Hazes or not," said Jens, laughing. "Who doesn't love Hazes." Lucas supposedly said back offended. "You are a real Dutchman," Jens said, shaking his head. "But Hazes is okay…. I think," Jens admitted. "okay?" Lucas said, his hands on his hard. "It's always time for Hazes!" and Jens didn’t dare go against it.

"But what do you really listen to, as in everyday life." Jens asked. "Uh that differs a lot, but I think artists like The 1975 or Bon Iver are chill", said Lucas. "I don't know Bon Iver," Jens admitted.

Lucas got up and took the phone from Jens's hand. "I'm sure you know this number."

Come on skinny love just last the year Pour a little salt we were never here My, my, my, my, my, my, my, my Staring at the sink of blood and crushed veneer

"Isn't that Birdy her song?" Jens asked. Lucas looked at Jens and sarcastically said “ouch”. "No Birdy covered this. I think the original is better though.” And Jens joined Lucas's opinion.

Lucas returned the phone to Jens and plopped down on the sofa. Jens scrolled through the list Lucas had put on. "I'll keep this on," said Jens and sat down next to Lucas. Closer than he actually intended. The boys' shoulders touched.

If Lucas does not think this is chill then he will move to the side, Jens thought, but Lucas did not move.

A few songs passed and the conversation got back on track. "But why did you actually come to Antwerp?" Jens asked. Lucas took a deep breath which made boys touch each other even more. "Uh, it's quite complicated," said Lucas. Jens immediately felt guilty about the question. "You don't have to tell if you don't want to"

Lucas nodded, but opened his mouth searching for words. “No it's okay, I lived in Utrecht with my mother, but she is uh… bipolar. I don't know if you know what that is” Jens looked at Lucas and nodded “Yes I do. Sander, Robbe's boyfriend is bipolar ”Lucas nodded and looked for words to go on. “The three of us have decided that it is better for me not to live with her for a while, so now I am here with my father in Antwerp”

"Do you think you're going back to the Netherlands?" Jens secretly hoped not.

"Not any time soon. At least I want to finish my school here.” Lucas took a deep breath “it's just difficult, because my whole life is in the Netherlands. My friends, basically just everything.”

Jens understood Lucas exactly. The boy he has only known since this school year has just opened up here. Maybe it was good for him too.

"I think I understand you," Jens said cautiously. “When my father lost his job, we had to choose between living smaller here in Antwerp or leaving the city… I don't know how I would have managed leaving the city. Without Robbe. ”

"I really miss Kes and Isa very much" said Lucas "never thought I would even miss Jayden as much as I do" and the Boy laughed. "But I immediately felt accepted here." A smile appeared on Jens's face. "You, the boys and the girls were there for me from day one."

Silence fell between the boys. Not an awkward silence, it was a silence that said more than all the words spoken that night.

Jens knew that the feelings for Lucas were more than friendly. He had never felt this fot a boy before. He had never ruled it out, but it was still scary.

Jens felt Lucas's gaze on him, and his whole body heated. Kissing the boy, that's what he wanted all night. But Jens was afraid it would ruin their friendship.

Jens turned his head to Lucas's. Lucas's eyes fixed on his lips.

Without thinking, Jens closed the space between him and Lucas. His lips found Lucas's and Lucas kissed him back.

It was a small cautious kiss, and Jens pulled back gently.

"Uh ... sorry"

"You don't have to apologize," said Lucas with a smile. "If I hadn't wanted it, I wouldn't have kissed you back."

Jens's body simply stopped functioning, so all he could do was nod yes. He opened his mouth searching for words "it's just uh ... I’ve never done that before." He didn't even dare to look at Lucas.

"You are not my first boy." Lucas replied. That made Jens look up "as in ..." Jens started

Lucas finished "Gay".

A short pause followed, until Jens asked, "How did you know you're gay?"

"I am simply not attracted to girls, it just doesn’t work for me" Lucas replied.

"I never knew I could be attracted to boys," Jens said.

“That's okay, right? And that you kissed me doesn't make you gay” Lucas said “you don't have to put a label on yourself just because you kissed a boy.”

"No, I know, but at least I'm not straight." Jens Huffed. And both boys laughed.

"There is much more than gay and straight you know, you just have to discover it." Lucas said. And he was right.

...

"My god it's already half past two," said Lucas. "If I want to keep my father on my side, I really have to go home soon."

"I will cycle with you, because I don't think you really paid attention to how to get back to the harbor." Jens laughed. And Lucas admitted he had no idea how to go back home.

The boys put on their coats and shoes and walked over to the bikes.

"Do you have your key this time?" Lucas joked. And Jens nudged him.

...

Fifteen minutes later they stood in front of a modern apartment complex.

“Thanks for riding along!” Lucas said “next time at my place?”

That sounds good, Jens thought and agreed with the plan.

The boys hugged each other, and Lucas walked towards the door of the complex. Before he went in, he said "I really liked it tonight, would you send a message when you get home?"

Jens would do that. He took his earphones out of his pocket and put on Lucas's playlist.

Evergreens in a dream of an island town Draw a line in the sand and we'll smooth it down Will your side win, get to the middle Count them off one at a time And we'll try, to guess right

[atomic-taco-muffin]

I Love You Chapter 6

Warnings: More flashbacks/angst (this broke my heart)

Sora walked to your room after he had his breakdown. He remembered getting you some of the stuff that he found. You were his little cupcake. But now, you were gone. And there was probably nothing he could do. He started to clean up your room and had little flashbacks of you. 

~~~~

You were just starting to walk. Sora was proud of you for trying. He placed you in the living room and sat across from you. 

“Okay, Cupcake. Try walking towards me. You can do it.” Sora held out his arms. You looked at him, slightly confused. You soon understood what he was trying to say and started to get up on your feet. You wobbled a bit and fell on your butt. But you were determined to walk. You got up again and took a couple steps forward before you fell again. This time, you started to cry. 

“Aww, Cupcake. It’s okay. Don’t cry.” He picked you up and began to calm you down. Once you calmed down, you squirmed wanting to get down. Sora put you down and you were walking, not falling down this time. Sora was so proud! You walked towards the couch and grabbed your teddy bear. 

~~~~

Sora remembered the look on your face when you started to cry. It broke his heart whenever he saw you cry. He opened your closet and saw you old baby mobile (the one he had to replace) and had another flashback. 

~~~~

It was your first night home from the hospital. You woke up in the middle of the night, like any baby does, and started to cry. Sora heard you from the baby monitor and came in to help you go back to sleep. He checked your diaper. Nope! Still good. He went to the kitchen to make your bottle. He gave you your bottle and you drank it. After you drank it, Sora burped you but you were still crying. 

“I wish you can talk so I can understand why you’re crying.” Sora whined. He took you to his room and laid down. You soon fell asleep. You just wanted to be with Sora. 

“Oh. You just wanted to spend the night with me. Okay, Cupcake. I got you.” You and Sora soon fell asleep for the rest of the night.

~~~~

Sora went to turn off all the lights in your room, including your fairy lights. But before he could turn off the fairy lights he heard your voice. 

DADDY! DON’T TURN OFF THE LIGHTS! I’M SCARED OF THE DARK!

Sora turned around but you weren’t there. He looked around your room but heard your voice again.

Daddy. I’m scared. 

“Cupcake? Where are you?” He looked around but couldn’t see you. 

Right here. In your heart.

Sora placed his hand over his heart. He let out a breathless laugh. You were okay. The next couple of days, he would hear and sometimes see you laughing and talking to him. One day, Sora went to the store to get some food. He saw you in the cart wanting your favorite sugar cereal. Normally he would say no, but considering your vulnerable state, he put in the cart and continued shopping. Later that night, he went to put you to bed when he had a flashback to your toddler bed.

~~~~

You were 3. Which meant that you got to sleep in an actual bed. Sora bought you a cute little princess bed. When you entered the room, you ran to the bed and jumped on it. He giggled and picked you up. 

“No more (Y/n)’s jumping on the bed!” You laughed as Sora bounced you around. He laid you on the bed and told you a bedtime story. You fell asleep halfway through the story. Sora smiled and gave you a good night kiss. 

~~~~

He put you to sleep but after an hour, you ran to Sora’s room to spend the night there. Sora was deep in sleep so he didn’t notice you. You snuggled close to him and went back to sleep. 

~~~~

The next day, Riku and Kairi were in Radiant Garden, trying to find you. It was super hard considering they have no idea what you look like. They soon found Xemnas with you. Roxas was right. It was weird seeing an Organization member with a child. Also you weren’t crying or screaming for help. 

“What if she’s actually his daughter? Or something else?” Kairi asked. 

“Maybe. But we can’t be sure. We should ask her.” Riku said. They waited for Xemnas to leave and that’s when they approached you. They saw that you were drawing you and Xemnas with some chalk. And also how you wrote your name and your age afterwards. 

“Hi. Are you here by yourself?” Kairi asked. 

“Yeah. But my daddy’s coming right back.” Riku looked at the drawing and saw your name. 

“Kairi, look.” he whispered. Kairi looked at the drawing and also saw your name. 

“Is that Sora’s little one?” she asked. 

“I think so.” Before they could ask you some more questions, you ran off to the fountain court. 

“Wait, come back!” Kairi said. But you were gone. Kairi was about to go looking for you but Riku stopped her. 

“If we go looking for her, then Organization members might come after us.” 

“Right. We should head back to Master Yen Sid.” 

“Agreed.” They headed back to Master Yen Sid to let them know the situation. 

~~~~

Back at the tower, Kairi and Riku delivered the news. Sora was glad that you were okay. But he wanted to go find you. Master Yen Sid that he wasn’t allowed to go because he hasn’t been able to wield his keyblade in so long. Mickey agreed, and so did everyone else. Sora looked down and started to cry again. You wanted to help him, but you knew that if you did, the others will think that Sora is going crazy. 

“I shall assign Roxas, Xion, Lea, and Isa to find (Y/N).” the master said. (i read that in his voice). Sora still looked down. Roxas came up to him and put his hand on Sora’s shoulder. Sora looked up.

“We’ll get her back. Don’t worry.”  Sora smiled slightly. Later that night, Sora was making dinner. You sat in the living room, hugging your knees to you chest. Sora came in, saying that dinner was ready and saw your sad face. 

“Cupcake? What’s wrong?” he asked. 

“I’m lost... I don’t know where I am. Or who I belong to..I’m scared.” You cried looking confused. 

“Oh Cupcake. Come here.” Sora wrapped you in a hug. He knew you weren’t actually there. But he could feel your touch. It got him thinking, was the Organization hurting you? And were you loved? Probably not. This was the Organization after all. He didn’t know this, but the Organization planted a piece of Xemnas’ ‘heart’ inside of you. 

~~~~

Back at the Castle That Never Was, You were playing in a very special room you were given that had all of your games, toys, and more. You were playing with some of your new dolls, when Xemnas told you that it was time to get ready for bed. You did as you were told and climbed into bed. Xemnas came in to read you your bedtime story. After the story, he tucked you in, gave you your good night kiss, and put on the music box. 

~~~~

The next day, Sora took you to secluded part of the beach where people wouldn’t think that he’s going crazy.  You were building a sand castle in Sora’s imagination while he was watching the view, praying that the Organization wasn’t hurting you. He then saw Yuki walking along the beach towards the secret place. Sora ran up to him and grabbed him by the arm.

“Where is my daughter?!” Sora yelled. Yuki said nothing. 

“Where is she? Please tell me.” Sora begged. 

“Why does it matter? You lied to her! So she wanted to leave. Don’t worry we’re taking good care of her.” Yuki said. He then threw one of your old teddy bears in front of Sora’s feet. Sora had enough of this. He’s going to rescue you by himself whether his friends like it or not. He was able to create a somewhat realistic version of an Organization coat and went undercover to find you. Thankfully, the other members didn’t notice him. He walked through the halls of the castle and found you in your special room. You looked up. 

“Hi. I’m (Y/N). What’s your name?” you asked. It broke his heart that you didn’t know who he was. 

“Uh, My name is Saxor.” he said. 

“That’s a cool name. Wanna play with me?”

“Sure. I’d love to.” The two of you played around together. He reminded you of Yuki a little bit, but better. You didn’t know why you liked him better. You just did. Pretty soon, it was time for him to go. He needed to get out of there before he got caught. You were sad that your playdate had to end but you knew that the Organization works a lot. You said okay and he left. When Sora got home, he started crying again. It was nice to know that they didn’t hurt you and that you were having fun with the toys you had. But he wanted his cupcake back. And he was going to get you back. One way or the other. 

[emilianopavone]

Self Para 003.

Though he questioned the choice as soon as he walked in the door, there were several explanations Emiliano could give for why he was going to church on a Thursday afternoon. The first was his mother, a reminder that if he was meant to be a practicing Catholic it might help to actually practice. The second was mere happenstance, a trip into town for business that made the pitstop convenient if not incredibly ironic. But the third, and perhaps most important reason, was Montgomery. He wasn’t sure why and he wasn’t sure when, but after the second sleepless night wrapped in the man’s arms, it was clear that his magic bullet for quieting his restless thoughts wasn’t so magic anymore.

Emil wasn’t worried about the lost sleep, a problem that had become as familiar as its many remedies, but he was worried about his ability to keep hiding it. Montgomery’s habit for noticing things he didn’t want him to was matched only by his penchant for worrying, so in the interest of heading off a host of questions he couldn’t answer honestly, he decided to take him up on his offer. He decided to talk to someone.

Father Rosario greeted him with patient silence from the other side of the thin black screen, a comforting lie of anonymity when Emil was certain he would recognize his voice as soon as he spoke. The symbolism, however, was not lost on him, and he had faith that if there was anyone in the city he could talk to without fear of repercussions — social, legal or otherwise — it was him. So he went through the motions of a ritual that held more meaning in its familiarity than its sanctity, crossing himself as he finally broke the silence. 

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been two and a half years since my last confession.” It felt like a bad start, but at least it was an honest one, and whether he was out of practice or still searching for the right words, he paused long enough for the priest to prompt him gently along.

“What is it that you came to confess?” There was a neutrality to Father Rosario’s tone that Emil wished he could pin down so he could better emulate it, wondering how long he had practiced before he could ask his parishioners to bear their souls to him as if they were truly free of judgement. He wondered if he or Monty would ever figure out how to do the same.

“Well, I haven’t dedicated as much of my time to God as I should.” Or at least as much as his mother thought he should, and not enough to count time passed since his last confession in months instead of years. “I haven’t always kept the Sabbath or come to Mass. I’ve given into temptation. Temptations,” he corrected, trying to keep anything coy out of his tone when it seemed contrary to the point, “Drinking...a lot. A little less than before, but probably still more than I’m supposed to. Smoking — no drugs though — just the smoking. And sex. A lot of that, too. It’s just with one person now, so I’m not sure if that makes it better.” Emil was fairly certain it didn’t, and he opted to leave out exactly what kind of sex he was having when it was nothing he would apologize for.

“Honor your mother...I could do better with that one. Coveting your neighbor’s possessions, too,” he continued, ticking his way through the commandments and wondering if it was better to list the ones he was following rather than each one he wasn’t. “I’ve been trying not to lie, but I’m not sure that’s the same as telling the truth.” He paused after the words, sincerity surfacing in the midst of a shallow list that made him wonder if that’s what this was. A list of Catholic sins that were all true, but not honest. Stalling more than confessing, and it wasn’t surprising to know Father Rosario had practice with that as well.

“Telling the truth is hard,” he started, neutral tone replaced with warm empathy, “Confession is hard. We have to be at peace with ourselves and the world doesn’t make that easy, does it? It is filled with distractions. Temptations. Things that draw us away from God and make us feel shame. But God is never ashamed of us, that’s what we have to remember. He never stops loving us. Only we can chose to turn away from that love when we let shame block out His light.”

Emil listened quietly, gaze resting on his hands and staying there in the still silence that followed, a long moment that felt like a deep breath. There was a slowness in churches, a disregard for the passage of time that he needed right now. So far removed from the sharp, quick wit of his conversations, of questions that demanded answers, and quiet moments that spoke for him in ways he didn’t want when he couldn’t find the right words fast enough. He appreciated having time that didn’t tick, taking a moment to slip off the plain silver ring that hid his thoughts, playing with it between his fingers like he might have a chance to see them now, too.

“I don’t know if I’m a good person.” Another pause, another breath. “I think I am sometimes. I try to be. But I feel like it’s harder for me than everyone else and I’m not sure what that says about me.” It was a confession he’d already made, less painful the second time he said it out loud, but he wasn’t sure what that said about him either. An ebbing fear or a growing numbness to it.

“It says you’re human,” Father Rosario replied, “We are made in His image, but we are not divine. We see His image in us and we glimpse that divinity when we choose to do good. It is the choosing that matters, and choosing can be hard, even painful.”

“See I did that. I chose to do a good thing. I chose to save someone’s life, but I...” Emil paused, rushing in his explanation but hesitating in his confession, the scalpel feeling so much deadlier when it was in his own hand, “But I had to do horrible things to do it. I had to lie, I had to steal, I had to break laws.” It was another laundry list of sins, worse this time, crimes that felt foolish to disclose yet still didn’t feel like enough, so he cut deeper. “I hurt people,” he admitted after another moment, swallowing hard and pushing deeper, “A lot of people...mostly good ones. Mostly friends.” Messages he thought he’d see again every time he opened his phone, Isa’s number long since blocked when he only remembered a string of pleas. I miss you. Can we Facetime? Can you call? I just want to hear your voice. When are you coming back?

Emil stopped twirling the ring between his fingers, staring at it frozen for a long moment. “I think I hurt the person I was trying to save the most.” It was a cut deep enough that he could feel it, a truth both obvious and overwhelming, and whatever came next in his list was gone. Not sure if it was an argument or an apology that he’d lost track, but he did his best to reclaim the train of thought. “I chose the right thing — the good thing — that’s what matters. So when does it feel like it? When do I see that glimpse of divinity?”

He had looked for it. Some sign that blood could be repaid in gold. In honey-hued drinks and sun-painted skin. He looked for it beside him every morning and every evening, proof in his presence, in the warmth that wrapped around him. But there wasn’t enough comfort in the soft breath on the back of his neck, and he couldn’t find credit in a heartbeat that said Montgomery was alive. Too much blame stitched between still fading scars he was realizing might never go away. 

“God never asks us to turn to evil for the sake of good,” Father Rosario said after a moment of careful thought, “He will sometimes ask us to make great sacrifices, ones we may not think that we can survive, but we will.”

“But isn’t that what this is?” Emil interrupted, remembering he preferred an argument to an apology, “I gave up everything. I sacrificed my job, my relationships, my safety…” God he was going to die. He remembered it the way he always did, with a sudden terrifying intensity that he had to ignore before it paralyzed him. “I made the choice to do something good, the choice that screwed me over and ruined all of it. And I don’t get to complain. I don’t get pity or comfort or forgiveness because I gave that up too.” And you know why. He knew why he couldn’t be trusted, why he couldn’t be angry, why he’d lost every argument before it ever started, and why the only person he could talk to was sitting behind a partition. No sympathetic ear he could convince to see his pain as anything but self-induced, no friend who would pity him more than they hated him, and at least it hurt less to hear his justifications picked apart by a man who barely knew him.

“I gave up the chance to be the hero because being a hero wouldn’t have saved him. I made all the hard calls, I made all the sacrifices, and what do I get?” Emil tried to hold onto some shred of self-righteousness, but he felt it breaking apart as quickly as he built it up. Disgust replacing indignation as his anger turned back inward. A poison he couldn’t stop from spreading, and every time he tried it just got worse. I just want you to be okay too.

Father Rosario waited this time, letting the brief spark of resentment burn itself out before offering guidance both harsh and kind. “God does not pity sinners, and he does not comfort them,” he stated clearly, “But God does forgive them, and in that forgiveness you may find comfort.”

“How?” The blunt question was met by a pregnant pause, the priest cautiously picking through its ambiguity but as soon as he started to articulate an answer, Emil cut him off. “How is God’s forgiveness going to make this feel better? How is anything going to make this feel better?” His voice wavered, not from anger, but a desperate despair that was left in its wake, ring clenched in a fist that slowly tightened around it, searching for an anchor. “When I think about it for too long I can’t breathe. It is this...overwhelming weight and it is all-encompassing and suffocating and so I have to put it away. I have to ignore it or I can’t function. And sometimes it’s hours and sometimes it’s days but then I feel it again and it’s worse, it’s always worse. Because I put it away and I shouldn’t get to do that right?” The question broke on a single, sharp laugh, more hysterical than humorous. “I should have to feel it, I should have to feel this terrible, sickening guilt all the time, but I can’t. I can’t. So I put it away, and every time it comes back, it’s worse and worse and--” it feels like it’s going to kill me. 

Emil stopped short, words caught in his throat when it didn’t feel fair to say them out loud. Irrational, selfish fears that he pushed back down with everything else that came boiling over. Nails digging into his palm and holding his breath until he could let it out more slowly, waiting for something better than his heartbeat to fill the dead air between them.

“Do you know why God forgives us?” Father Rosario asked eventually, shifting on the other side of the screen to face him more directly, as if he might better impart his guidance if he could catch his gaze through cross-hatched holes, “God does not forgive us because he believes what we did is not wrong or that we have served our penance with a couple of prayers and a priest’s blessing. He forgives us because he believes we can do better. He knows we can. His forgiveness does not right our wrongs, and sometimes we can’t either. But his forgiveness gives us the grace to move forward without judgement. To do better.”

“What if I don’t want God’s forgiveness,” Emil replied, words heavy and numb when he felt too spent to offer anything but cynicism. A humanist boyfriend who might be proud of his skepticism if it wasn’t so self destructive.

“Then why have you come here today?” Father Rosario waited a long time for an answer, a practice of patience and of faith, but eventually even he was forced to offer a different kind of patience when Emil remained motionless and silent on the other side of the screen. “He offers forgiveness to all those who seek it. When you are ready, He will be, too.”

Emil cracked a crooked smile, not sure if he found the promise funny or just tragically ironic, but he could recognize a polite farewell when he heard one. Slipping the ring back on his finger, and standing up to leave, he was stopped by Father Rosario. One last question he asked as his professional persona dropped for something more personal. “Emiliano, why don’t you want God’s forgiveness? Is it because you’re not ready to ask for it, or because you’re not ready to receive it?” 

Somewhere between a lament and a plea, Emil thought it was the kind of question that would impress him in a game. Brilliant but brutal and cutting close to something important. But he missed by an inch, and so his answer came easily. “It’s because nothing worth anything was ever free.”

Before Father Rosario could refute the claim, the door shut, and the confessional booth was empty once again.

[dutten-does-the-fanfic]

I Want You Here With Me (Is It Too Much to Ask for Something Great) ch. 10

Title:  I Want You Here With Me (Is It Too Much to Ask for Something Great) ch. 10 of 14 (ch. 1) Pairing: Isak Valtersen/Even Bech Næsheim Word count: 23.713  Warnings: Language, internalized homophobia, mental illness, panic attacks & anxiety, the press, very vaguely referenced past suicide attempt

AO3

Summary:  The one where it’s been two years since Isak last saw or spoke with Even, and no one knows that Isak ever knew Even at all

Present

Isak spends the entire morning on the phone.

He makes the mistake of picking up the phone when Sonja had called – he doesn’t even know how she would’ve gotten his number, but it had been her, Isak recognized her voice. Ever since then, she’s been calling, or numbers Isak’s checked belong to the rest of Even’s team have called.

Maybe it’s shitty of him not to pick up, but once he’d assured Sonja that Even wasn’t injured – no comment if he was with him or well or anything – she’d started talking business, which, Isak can’t.

He tries to take care of his own business afterwards. He can skip lectures no problem, Sana will lend him her notes, he knows, but there’s lab work and group work that he can’t just stay away from. Study-buddy sessions with Sana can be rescheduled, but some of the other things are time sensitive, and working it out leaves him more exhausted than he’s felt since Even showed up at his front door, dreary and exhausted himself, and about to crash so hard he’s barely moved 16 hours later.

Isak had managed to doze off for a few hours in that time span, propped up in his desk chair because getting into bed with Even when everything was so messed up hadn’t seemed like a good idea. Hadn’t seemed like a fair thing to do – not to Even, but also not to Isak – lying next to him like that, as if their lives aren’t a fucking mess, like they’re still kids who don’t know any better, who life hasn’t fucked over.

He’s probably reading too much into it, knows he is. The first thing Even had done once Isak had said he could stay was, after all, to stumble against Isak and curl himself around him, a solid weight and like he’d never left.

Isak can’t remember the last time he’d hugged Even. That’s a… a something. A thought that actually scares him a bit, makes him feel like he’s taken a punch to the stomach.

It had been everything it had always been, though, even after all those years. Even was bigger, had somehow managed to grow even taller than he’d been back… back then, but so has Isak, so it evens out. Isak had still been able to comfortably fit his head underneath Even’s chin, had had to stand on his tippy toes to wrap his arms all the way around Even’s shoulders, to hold him so tightly they’d end up fusing together if they didn’t let go.

He’d gotten Even into his bed, Even falling asleep almost instantly, far more drained than he’d looked, which was a feat in itself. Isak had spent the next hours ignoring the boys’ increasingly worried looks and attempts of concerned comfort and had just stared at Even in his bed instead.

Whenever Isak has seen him on screen – the only access to Even he’s had for two years, barring the two accidental meet-ups – Even had been the same way as Isak had remembered him to be; larger than life, so charming and so magnetic and positively mesmerizing with his words and visions.

Even looks small now, covered up to his nose with Isak’s bed sheets, curled up and with dark purple bags underneath his eyes.

He’d left the room at the first buzz of his phone, then it hadn’t stopped buzzing since and Isak had stayed in the kitchen, finally slumping down on one of the chairs and given up looking at his phone.

“Hey,” Jonas says quietly, knocking against the doorframe to warn Isak of his presence. Isak still startles. “How are you?”

Isak snorts, goes back to staring at his phone placed on the kitchen table, wrong side up just so he wouldn’t have to see the numbers of people he can’t talk to right now.

Jonas doesn’t try to dig an answer out of him. Probably winces at his choice of words if Isak knows him well enough.

Isak doesn’t know how he is. He wants to cry, but not really. He mainly just feels numb.

“How long have you been up for?” Jonas moves towards the coffee machine, careful to keep his eyes on Isak.

Isak doesn’t know. He won’t be surprised if more time has managed to pass than he thinks has. He doesn’t want to check the time on his phone because he doesn’t want to check his phone, and he can’t work it out with the lack of exhaustion from the wired tension that refuses to leave him.

So he shrugs, keeps his gaze on the table. They should be more careful to clean it – there are several stains from spilled beer and sodas and condensation from bottles.

The stains are making him antsier than he already is, so Isak goes back to staring at the backside of his phone.

He doesn’t know how long he can get away with not going to school. He definitely needs to call some of his professors to ask for an extension, if he at this rate even gets close to getting started on his schoolwork.

It’s funny, Isak notes without any humor whatsoever. For so long, Even had been the most important thing to him, had been what he was most proud of, and then when Even had left and Isak had gotten his head out of his ass with Jonas’ help, he’d fixated on his studies, on getting his degree. Almost as a pseudo-replacement – he couldn’t get Even, but he could definitely get a degree.

Now Even’s back and Isak’s practically letting his degree fly out the window. Well, that’s probably an exaggeration, but if he continues at this rate, or if this temporary break has to turn into a longer term dropout, then he’s lucky if he’ll even get to re-sit his exams next summer.

“How is…” Jonas stirs a spoon in his cup of coffee despite not having poured the water in yet. “How is Even?”

The sound of Even’s name in Jonas’ mouth is… weird.

It’s not like Jonas hasn’t said Even’s name before, but it’s usually been Even Bech Næsheim and he’d been referring to him as this distant figure, famous for his movies and Magnus’ obsession, not as an actual person, definitely not as a physical being currently in his home, sleeping in his roommate’s bed.

Isak supposes that’s another thing he’ll have to get used to. He’ll have to get used to people talking about Even around him, and he’ll have to get used to people knowing he knows Even, and he’ll have to get used to people knowing.

“Asleep.”

Even hadn’t stirred in the couple hours Isak had managed to pass out. He should probably get him to drink something soon; maybe get some food in him if he can take it.

Jonas nods. “That’s good. He looked tired.”

“Yeah.”

Tired after the mania. Tired after running around naked at an internationally famous, televised award show. Tired in general.

Isak sure as hell is tired.

Jonas keeps stirring the spoon. The water finishes boiling, but he doesn’t add it. Isak doesn’t move either. Just sits there and stares like an actual idiot.

“Listen, man,” Jonas draws it out, enough that Isak tenses in his seat. “I’m sorry about last night, about just shouting like that. It wasn’t cool, and it wasn’t alright for me to do that to you.”

Last night feels like years have passed since, everything that happened before Even showing up at the door seems like eons ago, Isak can barely remember all the things Jonas had said through the haze and deliria of finding out Even was having an episode, and then Even being there, and then Even being there, and then having to help Even.

He doesn’t know how to tell Jonas that, though, so he just shrugs. “It’s fine. It doesn’t matter.”

Jonas scoffs, but he mostly just sounds tired, not angry. “It does, it really does. I just wanted you to know I shouldn’t have done it, and that I would change it if I could.”

I would change it if I could. How many times hasn’t Isak thought that exact sentence when he’d thought back on past choices and a life that seemed like it happened to someone else, another Isak in a different universe that this Isak got a glimpse into the life of.

“Don’t worry about it,” he says instead. Considers telling Jonas he can make up for it by buying him a beer next night out, but he really isn’t in the mood for a drink and he can’t imagine going out for the next very, very, very long while.

“Do you need to call the university?”

Another shrug. Isak thinks of his professors, of Sana, of the administration, the list of people growing longer and longer until he’s dizzy and a bit nauseous. “Probably.”

Jonas finally adds the water then goes back to stirring. The scent of coffee fills the room, Isak can’t tell if it’s helping to alleviate his growing headache, or if it’s just making it worse.

“You can tell us, you know, if you need help. Or just – anything.”

Isak stares harder at his phone. Don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry. If he starts crying now, he doesn’t know when or if he’ll stop.

“Yeah!” Magnus says, too loudly, startling Isak, from the doorway as he strides across the kitchen, getting a glass of water. “You need to personally hand in that essay today, don’t you? We can hang around until you get back. He’ll probably be asleep for a while longer, but we could make some breakfast for him.”

Isak blinks at Magnus. Then blinks again.

Jonas frowns as well. “He’s already been asleep for, like, more than 12 hours – how much –“

“Dude,” Magnus interrupts, scrunching up his nose at Jonas. “If you had spent the last, probably, week on a high like that, your body would be begging for some sleep, too.”

Isak blinks. How did he –

Jonas frowns even harder, his eyebrows fully curled in now. “High – what, are you telling me that was a drug-induced stunt?” Jonas switches between looking incredulously at Magnus and then over to Isak, like Isak’s in a position to confirm whether or not Hollywood’s worst reputation is true. Isak just blinks.

“The fuck, how did you know?”

Now Magnus is the one who blinks owlishly at Isak. “It’s… obvious?”

Isak nods towards Jonas. “It clearly isn’t.”

Magnus just keeps looking confused. “My mom is bipolar. Did you not know that?”

Isak did not know that, thank you very much, Magnus. He’s met the woman, sure, but not during an episode, and Magnus has never said a goddamn word about it, that’s for certain.

“Bipolar?” Jonas asks, not specifying to whom, but he’s ignored nonetheless.

“No,” Isak bites, huddling himself further down in his chair, “I didn’t.”

Magnus just blinks again. “Huh. I really thought I told you guys.”

Isak doesn’t bother shaking his head. It’s not like it matters now, anyway.

“Oh, then I’ve got to tell you about this one time she got pissed with the NSB, and so she found out who the regional director was and sent in a resignation letter in his name. It was fucking hilarious. All it said was, like: ‘I give up, I can’t work here anymore. Goodbye.’”

The dissonance between Magnus laughing and Isak just so out of it with how little control he has in his life is too great for Isak to wrap his head around.

Jonas is nodding along with Magnus’ story, but his eyes are wide and Isak can tell it’s all a little too much for him as well.

“Did Even ever do anything wild?” Magnus asks before he can help himself.

Isak flinches, doesn’t think of long, confused nights with Even switching between twenty scripts or hyper-focusing on one, where he’d have Isak lie in a pose for several hours because of the inspiration it gave Even, doesn’t think of Even painting an entire mural, doesn’t think of a lot of things.

He does think about Even running around naked at an award show, and what that could possibly do to his career. Like, end it, for one.

“No, nothing like that,” he says instead. During the admittedly short period of time where Even’s medication hadn’t been worked out, leaving him with only smaller episodes, he’d only ever really fixated on his work or on Isak. He hadn’t done something like Magnus’ mom with NSB, hadn’t really done anything that could be considered ‘funny’ in someone else’s eyes.

Magnus looks at him for a beat too long, Isak doesn’t like the way it feels like it goes through him, then opens his mouth to say something when Mahdi interrupts.

“Are the curtains still up?” Mahdi asks, stumbling over his joggers and looking sleep-rumbled. “The circus is back in town.”

“Shit, seriously?” Jonas moves towards the window to pull Mahdi’s sheet more securely over the corner. “What the fuck, man.”

There’s a small scratch near the bottom of his phone where he’d scratched it with the phone charger. Don’t fucking cry.

“Are the curtains drawn in your room?” Mahdi asks. Isak doesn’t even realize he’s talking to him before he asks, “Isak? Are the curtains drawn in your room?”

They are, Isak remembers they are, because he’d barely been able to see Even when he’d left to answer the phone, but also because he knows he hasn’t opened them since the certificate was exposed in the article.

He doesn’t know how to answer, though. Don’t cry.

“Hey.”

He feels a hand squeezing his shoulder. Magnus, Isak sees, when he looks up and sees Magnus’ blue eyes and a smile plastered on his face even as it looks like it takes a lot of effort.

Magnus squeezes his shoulder again. “Let’s make some breakfast, yeah?”

Isak doubts Even will actually eat it, but if he stares at his phone for one more second he’ll go insane, so he gets up and lets Magnus guide him through the kitchen, mindlessly going through the motions of making a cup of tea, some toast, and a glass of water.

Isak remembers the way Even used to take his tea – just like his coffee, with lots of sugar, enough to cause a heart attack as Isak would constantly remind him whilst Even laughed and made him taste some as well – which is something that leaves him frozen mid-motion before Magnus gets him going again. It’s such a small, insignificant detail to remember, and Isak can’t tell if he only remembers because seeing Even is triggering a lot of repressed memories or if he would’ve been able to recall that piece of information anyway.

Even is still asleep when he walks into his bedroom, still looking as small and exhausted from what Isak can see, which isn’t a lot in the darkness.

He still hasn’t moved since when Isak left, but he does when Isak takes a deep breath to brace himself and carefully makes sure to step on the floorboard that creaks piercingly.

“Morning,” Isak says cheerfully. He hopes it doesn’t come across as fake as it feels, as it sounds to his own ears.

Then again, he doubts Even particularly cares right now. He isn’t up to answering, either way, and the quiet feels stifling.

“I made toast,” Isak continues instead. He wants to walk over to his window and draw the curtains, let some light and air into the room, but he doesn’t know what it’s like out there right now, so he doesn’t. “Magnus made you a cup of tea. There’s also cereal if you’d rather. I would’ve made you eggs, but –“

He lets it hang in the air how Even was always the one who cooked the eggs because his turn out perfect and Isak’s turn out either overcooked or runny, no in-between. He doesn’t feel ready to bring up something so mundane about their past, not yet, anyway. It’s too early, still feels too much like ripping off a band-aid too quickly, so you know you rip off the scar tissue as well.

“I want to sleep,” Even mumbles, mostly muffled by the pillow and duvet.

Isak stills, has to take in a controlled breath in order to not let his emotions get the best of him.

It was never like it was only the good moments, the fond memories he had of Even that hurt to think about, it was all of them. Seeing Even like this again, it’s – It’s a little too much a lot too soon, if Isak’s honest with himself.

“Alright.” He’s proud of himself the way he sounds – not calm, necessarily, but not angry or put off with Even’s lack of want to participate in conversation. “Have a sip of water, then, before you do that.”

It would be best if he could get him to eat, just a few bites of the toast or something. There’s still time, though, before he has to leave, and if Even doesn’t wake up before then Mahdi doesn’t have class until this afternoon and no other obligations before that.

If he even ends up going, that is. It’ll probably be just as bad as when the article first got published – Isak doesn’t think he’ll be able to handle that, all those journalists yelling at him and photographers snapping pictures at his tired face.

Even’s hair flops down over his forehead, a few strands still clinging on to the meticulous style Even’s notorious for at this point. He looks soft and tired and so fucking exhausted in general. Isak doubts he looks better himself.

He really wants another hug from Even right now.

“Get some more sleep,” he whispers, daring to brush his fingers through Even’s hair, just once. It’s a little tacky from stale product, but it’s still soft and it’s still Even.

Even doesn’t say anything about it, doesn’t do anything about it either. Just burrows down under the duvet again and closes his eyes.

Isak can’t tell if he’s already fallen asleep or not, so he gets off the bed carefully and tries to gather his laptop, his charger, and a few books to finish the essay he needs to hand in today.

Considering the circumstances, he probably wouldn’t have bothered. Would’ve spent the day watching Netflix and attempting to fall asleep before trying to get some more food in Even, but this assignment is worth twenty percent of his final grade, and his professor is infamous for not handing out extensions, and getting the administration involved would take too long and be too difficult a process when Isak isn’t the one who’s ill. Doing the damn assignment is easier than not handing it in and trying to rectify it afterwards.

He still is actively trying not to flunk out of university, Isak reminds himself when he sits down on the couch, as doing homework is actually one of the last things he wants to be doing right now. The words dance around on the page for a few minutes, which is a sign Isak probably needs sleeps more badly than he’d thought he did, but he can feel he won’t be able to fall asleep were he to try now.

So he opens his document instead – only about 60% of the required amount of words done – and hopes determination will overpower sheer exhaustion.

Sleep is the cousin of death, he remembers Even saying sometimes when his mind wouldn’t let him sleep.

Isak definitely feels more dead than alive right now, that’s for damn certain.

OOOOO

“Hey,” Isak whispers, shaking Even gently by his shoulder until he opens his eyes.

He looks even more exhausted than he had when Isak woke him up for breakfast.

“I need to hand in an essay, and then I’ve got a tutorial.” Even just blinks. Isak tries not to feel too discouraged by it. “Mahdi and Magnus are both staying, if you remember them. They’ll make you some food when you wake up if I’m not back by then.”

Another blink. Isak feels it settling deeply in his bones, hates it but unable to help it.

“I’ll come hom- I’ll be back as soon as I can, okay?” he tries to hide his wince at the slip-up by squeezing Even’s shoulder. He sort of hopes for a nod, or a verbal confirmation, or another blink, but Even just closes his eyes and goes back to sleep.

Isak tries to take a deep breath in, but his lungs hurt too much, it’s still too hard to breathe.

Isak really needs for it to stop being so difficult to breathe soon.

“Thanks again,” he tells Magnus who has taken up Isak’s vacated spot on the couch.

Magnus waves him off like it’s nothing. Isak doesn’t know how to tell him any differently, so he meets up with Jonas by the front door, throws on his shoes and his jacket and goes to face the vultures.

OOOOO

Sana texts him when he’s on the tram, about three minutes away from UiO.

One time offer, Isabel, do you need me to swing by to pick up your essay?

Isak nearly facepalms, doesn’t because he has enough decorum not to and because enough people stared at him when he got on the tram with photographers flashing pictures of him. He can see a few younger people trying to discreetly take a few pictures of him as well.

If he had known he wouldn’t need to subject himself to all of this, just by asking Sana to come by he would’ve.

‘s cool, Sanasol he writes back, feeling like kicking himself. Jonas gives him a worried look, but thankfully keeps quiet, like he has ever since the press stopped hounding them. Omw already.

How Jonas can read him so well to know Isak will snap if someone talks to him, Isak doesn’t know – especially considering how rotten he’s been at it for so long by now, absolutely nothing coming naturally, but Jonas has always been like that. His cool, chill nature the complete antithesis to Isak’s high-strung grumpy self.

The quiet a few weeks ago would’ve scared Isak to death. He would’ve thought Jonas had managed to work it out, that he knew, and now everything was ending, but now Jonas does know, all of the boys know – or they know something, they don’t know enough, and they’ve been left with as much guesswork as the rest of the world, really – but they haven’t stopped being his friends and they haven’t kicked him out.

And now Jonas is being an absolute god-tier best friend, trying to block Isak from everyone’s sight, which is a comical feat considering Isak is taller, and he’s keeping quiet because Isak doesn’t have room for anyone else in his already overflowing head.

Isak fucking loves his friends, and he’s been too scared of losing them to tell them that. He should fix that – put it on the list of the million other things he also needs to fix in his life.

The only thing Jonas had said was when they’d gotten on the tram and he’d asked Isak if he was okay. Isak hadn’t known how to tell him that his ears were still ringing, that he felt like he was going to be sick, that he simultaneously felt a thousand tons heavy yet floating outside of his body. That all he really hears over the ringing is hungry journalists shouting at him, asking if Even is still staying with him, if he’s fucking psychotic, if he needs to stay in the closed ward. How long he’s been insane for, or if it’s a new development, if it’s a drug addiction, if it’s something else entirely.

Saved you a seat is all Sana texts back.

Jonas follows him to his classroom, despite Political Science being all the way across campus from the science department. Isak wants to hug him, really fucking wants a hug himself, but he isn’t willing to chance loitering around the halls or getting anyone’s attention. He has enough attention on him already to last a lifetime, so he goes inside the classroom instead, spotting Sana all the way in the back in the corner of the room.

“Everyone take a seat,” the professor orders. He sounds tired as well. “When I call out your name, come hand in your assignment. If you don’t hand anything in, I can’t check you off on my list, and it’s an automatic F – remember, it affects your final ECTS points. It is not possible to ask for an extension. Please have your essays ready, we all have things we need to do today. Everyone ready? Anna Norland.”

Sana sits perfectly poised next to him. Isak feels like an even bigger mess than he had before; he keeps fiddling, shifting in his seat, and taking his phone out of his pocket, back into his pocket, out of his pocket, back into his pocket –

“Alright, stop,” Sana snaps, grabbing his phone and placing it on the table. Isak flips it around so its front side is up, but otherwise he lets go of it at Sana’s pointed glare.

Isak manages two taps on the table before he reaches out for his phone. Maybe he didn’t hear it, maybe Magnus or Mahdi texted to let him know something about Even, maybe Even texted him, he just needs to check –

Sana snatches his wrist out of the air, grabbing a hold of him. Isak stares up at her, wide-eyed.

“I will break it,” she tells him in a tone that very clearly adds on the left out just try me.

Isak isn’t sure whether she’s talking about his wrist or his phone. He’s not all that curious to find out.

He also isn’t in a mood to let someone else step all over him, either, so before he can stop himself he snaps, “It could’ve been an emergency.”

Sana raises one perfect eyebrow and doesn’t even deign him worthy of a reply. “Essay ready. You’re up next,” she says instead.

“Isak Valtersen.”

“Shit,” he curses, scrambling to get the folded up papers hastily printed out of his bag. He trips over said bag when he tries to get to the front of the classroom.

“Today, Mr. Valtersen.”

“Sorry, I – sorry,” he hands over the papers, his spine crumbling a bit at the look fixed upon him, and then he hurries back to his seat.

He feels like he can’t breathe before he sits down, then it all comes whooshing out of him in one big breath. The relief of it only lasts a few seconds, right until he sees the look on Sana’s face.

That just got caught look, that I’m so pissed off right now look, that I can’t believe this or the variation I can believe this, I just really hoped it wouldn’t happen look.

Because then Isak sees where her attention is at. His phone. Which is lit up, the number 12:12 stark white against his dark background, and showing a message-notification from Vilde.

Are you and Even married?!?? And shortly after another one So are you gay?

It feels… it feels like a stab to the heart and like someone has tied an elastic around his lungs and like he has weights attached to his feet and someone has thrown him into a pool, and he’s just sinking, sinking, sinking.

Sana looks at him out of the corner of her eye. She’s biting her lip and clearly debating whether or not it would be more helpful if she said something or remained quiet.

There’s no way she didn’t see the messages. Isak doesn’t even know if there had been more than just the two that had lit up his phone for her to see while he was up at the desk. There could’ve been a million for all he knows, and he only saw the two from Vilde.

He’s out of his chair, out of the room, before Sana has a chance to say a word.

Isak speedwalks down the hallway to get to the exit. He bumps into a group of people, barely remembering to apologize in his haste to worm around them, to get out, get out, get out.

“Shit, isn’t that him –“ he hears before he rounds the corner, throws himself against the automatic door opener and stumbles outside.

He takes in a big gulp of fresh air, feels how it gets stuck somewhere in his throat, none of it reaching his lungs.

Fuck.

He’s got his module coming up now, and going outside means taking the long way around, unless he wants to go back inside and face that group of people, risk facing Sana.

His legs are moving before Isak is aware of it, taking him the long way around the building.

It’s probably a bigger risk, walking around outside like this, but Isak doubts people can’t whisper and sneak photos of him inside as well. Not that that is a particularly comforting thought, either.

His phone feels like it’s burning a hole through his pocket. It hasn’t vibrated once since Vilde’s messages, but Isak’s still wavering on the edge of wanting to check just in case and letting it remain in his pocket.

He can’t even explain the way he feels about it – if he’s just pissed because Sana saw, Sana whom he has to work together with for the rest of the semester, or because Vilde, whom he knows, was the one to ask him like that. Isak doesn’t doubt that he probably has a few similar messages in his inbox, but he doesn’t have any close friends besides the boys, Eva’s girls, and Eskild and Linn, and none of them – besides Vilde – have been forward enough to ask him to his face, even as he had to practically scare the boys into not asking questions, and Eskild was told before everyone else were really made aware.

Isak pushes a door open to one of the side-buildings, hoping he can cut through it to get to the classroom from the back. There shouldn’t be a lot of people loitering around here, which is mainly why Isak does it, risking three locked doors if he’s really unlucky, just to get some peace and quiet for two minutes, please.

“Isak!” someone yells from behind, and Isak can’t deal with anyone else wanting to talk to him, he can’t.

He quickens his pace, turns a corner and half walks, half jogs down the hall, hoping to lose whoever was calling for him.

“Isak!”

He hasn’t. Whoever it is sounds closer and a lot more winded than at the first shout, and Isak realizes he’s going to have to give up unless he wants to start actually running for it.

“Hey!” a hand curls around his shoulder.

It’s not harsh, there’s not even a squeeze, but all the alarm bells in Isak’s head start ringing at the contact and he jerks himself out of the grip. His back ends up pressed against the wall, his shoulder blades pressing harshly into it and he nearly knocks the back of his head out as well as he stares wide-eyed and angrily up at the person.

He’s reached the end of his fuse and all his pent-up anger is about to be unleashed over –

Mikael is standing in front of him, holding both hands up with his palms flat as he stumbles a few steps backwards to put more space in-between the two of them.

“Woah!” he tries to grin, but he’s too worried for it to come out properly. “Sorry. Probably shouldn’t have grabbed you like that.”

Isak’s heart is pounding. He is standing in front of Mikael. Best bud Mikael. He is talking to Mikael.

Or, Mikael is talking to him, because Isak’s mouth has stopped working sometime between leaving the flat and being stopped in the hall by Mikael.

“I, uh –“ Mikael gestures to Isak vaguely, looking a bit uncomfortable, and all Isak can focus on is why, because, is it Isak? Is it that Even had a secret relationship? Is it that it was with a guy? “I thought it was you. I’ve kind of been looking for you. I – I recognized you from the back.”

Isak arches an eyebrow. “Excuse me?”

Mikael flushes and looks a cross between mildly horrified and scolded. “Shit, no, I didn’t –“ his hands flail wildly at the back of his own head. “The hair! Like, you from the back, it’s the only side of you I’ve ever seen. Not that I –“

He cuts himself off before he can make it any worse with whatever was about to be thrown out of his mouth.

“I meant,” Mikael closes his eyes and purses his lips as he tries to figure out what he’d wanted to say, “that, when I recently thought back over the years, I’ve seen you sometimes, but only from the back. Whenever we ran into Even in public, he’d always be staring in one direction for a little too long, and when I turned to look there was always some curly-haired blond kid walking away.”

Isak can feel the heat rising up in his cheeks. He remembers all those times, remembers the first time he’d run into Even accidentally in public and his friends had been with him. Thank god they live in such a heteronormative society that Mikael hadn’t even questioned why Even apparently was staring at a guy.

“I saw the picture – I mean,” Mikael winces, tries again, “I saw – there was – Even’s staying with you, right?” finally settling on something. “I’ve tried his phone, but he hasn’t picked up.”

“It’s probably run out of battery,” Isak’s face feels numb, it feels a bit like someone else is talking. Seeing Mikael up close, talking to him when a few years ago seeing Mikael would’ve meant run, hide, deflect is such an odd experience, it’s really throwing Isak for a loop. “Or maybe he’s turned it off.”

Definitely the former, if Even hasn’t changed since Isak knew him. He’s always been particularly destructive with his phone-usage during an episode, even the minor ones Isak had been there to experience, so Isak’s at least glad to know Even hasn’t managed to do something he’ll regret when he doesn’t feel as horrible as he does right now.

Mikael nods, scuffs his shoes a bit. Isak can see the tension in his shoulders. What a weird experience this must be for him as well – talking to his best friend’s secret former beau, when he’d only been told about it at the same time as the rest of the world.

“I just, I wanted to check, see how he’s doing.”

“He was sleeping when I left,” Isak tells him, tries not to feel weird about actually talking to someone about Even when he’s like this for the first time ever. He hadn’t been able to before, because asking someone for help would mean having to tell them about Even, or Even having to tell them about Isak, but seeing as that had never happened, Isak had relied on intuition and Google. “He’ll probably have some lunch by the time I get back. It’s still early on, so he’ll sleep for a while.”

Mikael scuffs his shoes again. “Yeah, yeah, I know, I just – I got spooked,” he shrugs, doesn’t meet Isak’s eyes, “what, with what happened last time it was a big one.”

Isak frowns, his heartbeat picking up a notch. He thinks this time is plenty bad enough, he can’t really imagine something worse – at least sit would’ve made the news, and if Isak hadn’t discovered it in his weakest moments Magnus would’ve talked their ears off about it.

Whatever face he’s pulling, Mikael looks like he’s said too much.

“Anyway, I –“

“What – what hap-“ Isak fumbles with the words, his throat tight. Mikael flinches.

“Have you talked to Sonja?” he asks instead. “She’ll want to know where he is –“

“I – yes, I’ve talked to her.”

Sonja. A thousand needles prickles inside of Isak’s body at the mention of her name. It’s not like he was the one who’d been married to Even or anything. Isak doesn’t mention she barely spared a second to ask how Even was doing before she was moving on with business, doesn’t know what it means concerning Sonja and Even.

Mikael takes a step back, but Isak reacts quicker than his brain can follow and grabs a hold of his jacket.

“What – Mikael, what happened?”

Mikael winces, doesn’t look Isak in the eye. Isak doesn’t let go of his jacket.

“It –“ Mikael shrugs helplessly, accidentally getting out of Isak’s grip. Isak’s hand falls uselessly against his side. “He just – he got too low, if you…” he trails off, shakes his head. “Anyway, I know things must’ve gotten really messed up, back then,” Mikael frowns, “but I’m glad he’s got you to take care of him. That’s all.”

Isak can’t swallow, his throat has closed up. “Okay.”

Mikael attempts a smile, but it doesn’t quite fit right. “Tell him to call when he’s feeling better, alright?”

“Okay,” Isak repeats, stumbling over his own feet when he tries to take a step backwards. He’s supposed to head the other way, past Mikael, but Isak can’t get his feet to work, can’t do anything but round the corner, holding up a hand towards Mikael in an awkward wave.

He can’t breathe properly. He hears Mikael walk away, and he still can’t breathe properly.

He has his tutorial next, but he can’t go there, not right now, he can’t. He switches route and heads for the labs instead.

It’s all too much. It’s all too much, all of it, and Isak feels like he’s suffocating under the stares and the whispers. He can’t breathe.

He can’t breathe.

He rushes down the hall until he gets to the more secluded student laboratories. They’re old and haven’t been updated for ages, and no one really uses them in favor of the cooler, bigger ones closer to the lecture hall, even as they’re designed for multiple people to use at the same time.

He runs his student ID through the slot, his hands nearly shaking too badly that he misses several times, types in the code and pushes the door open when it buzzes.

Isak stumbles over the entrance and bangs his shoulder into one of the high tables. It hurts and he tries to clutch his hand around it to alleviate the pain as he crumbles onto the floor.

It’s like with the added physical pain it all just falls down around him. All the walls he’s spent his entire life building up fall, his will to get up and finish the day disappears and his resolve to not cry is gone and the tears are streaming out of his eyes.

An ugly sob is torn out of his throat. Isak has to let go of his shoulder so he can stuff the cuff of his hoodie into his mouth to muffle any other noises that might escape.

A lot of noises end up escaping anyway.

He wants to call Magnus, wants to know for sure that Even’s still there, that he’s lying in his bed, that he’s sleeping, that he’s had something to eat, that he’s –

Isak’s hands are shaking. It makes it more difficult to muffle the noises with each slip of his hand. He thumps his head back against the cupboard behind him to mask it, but it just makes him sore.

It’s not – it’s not like this is only about what Mikael had implied, a breakdown like this is never about just one thing. Even having apparently – that he – that – that is only the last drop falling on top of an already completely full glass, causing everything to spill over.

Isak’s exhausted. He’s so, so tired, his body feels heavy with it. His head is pounding, his nose is stuffed, and he can’t stop crying.

He can’t stop crying and he can’t breathe – not like the panic attack, not can’t breathe as in he’s about to die any second now, but can’t breathe as in everything inside of him is clogged up and everything hurts and he keeps crying, keeps sobbing.

His breath comes out in small hitches, little gasps trying to suck in more air than he’s letting out. It makes the sobbing sound awful, completely ratchet, and for some reason the thought pops into Isak’s head that he has his tutorial he needs to get to, but everyone will know he’s been crying, will talk about why he’s crying because everyone wants to talk about Even Bech Næsheim like he isn’t an actual person.

Like the world can tell Isak’s thinking about it, wishing to never be a part of it again, the electronic lock buzzes, the door opening. Isak bites down on his lip hard to keep quiet, despite knowing it won’t work.

His vision is blurry, too blurry to see who it is. All he sees is some misshapen, black blob – a blob Isak knows, he realizes.

Sana doesn’t say anything when she shuts the door behind her. Her steps echo slightly in the otherwise empty room, small taps of the soles of her shoes against the linoleum floor. Tap, tap, tap until she reaches him.

She lowers herself down next to him, first just crouching down with her back against the cupboard next to Isak’s, then she plops down fully on the ground.

She still doesn’t say anything. Isak can’t fight the sob that breaks out. Sana just stays there, right next to him, her bag left by the door in a sad attempt of a blockade.

It’s not until Isak feels like he’s momentarily run out of tears, cheeks sticky and neck clammy, sweatshirt ruined with dark blotches all over that Sana says something. His lungs still aren’t great, but he doesn’t feel like he’s about to suffocate – it’s not like breathing has been easy for so long by now, anyway, Isak reasons with himself.

“Noora’s told me that ‘people need people’, but… I don’t know what to do with crying people,” Sana confesses. She’s staring into the air, doesn’t dare look over at Isak.

It startles a laugh out of Isak, and not a pretty one at that. There’s snot and tears all over and he’s pretty sure he looks hideous, but it feels like his lungs work a little better than before.

“I don’t think you’re supposed to do anything with them.”

Sana rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”

“Yeah,” because he does, but that doesn’t mean he knows what to do with crying people either.

They’re quiet for a couple of minutes. The silence doesn’t feel as suffocating as it had before – maybe because Isak’s sharing the silence now. Everything’s supposed to be easier when you share. Share the load, share the burden.

“Maybe,” he has to stop and wet his lower lip before he can continue. “Maybe just don’t tell anyone. About this. You don’t have to do anything more for me.”

Sana doesn’t turn to look at Isak and Isak doesn’t turn to look at Sana. He does give in to the urge to see what she looks like, but only out of the corner of his eye.

She’s smiling, but it doesn’t look real. It looks sad and absolutely fake and a bit pained at that, and Isak almost wants to ask if there’s something wrong, except he can kind of gather what it is that made her look like that.

Maybe she thinks enough people are talking about Isak as is. She doesn’t have to add any more fuel to the fire.

Isak wipes his face on his sleeve. He’ll have to just wear a t-shirt and his jacket for the rest of the day if he wants to get away with keeping this mini-breakdown a secret. His hoodie is wet from tears and saliva from when he’d stuffed it in his mouth to keep quiet, and there really isn’t a doubt what he’s just been doing, even if people somehow don’t notice the red puffiness of his eyes.

Sana doesn’t comment on it even though it must be disgusting. Isak would be disgusted by it, but it’s his own body’s fluids, and it’s a bit of a special circumstance so he’s willing to forgive himself.

Sana helps him get his things in order. Isak pulls off his hoodie and stuffs it in the bottom of his backpack, and then Sana rearranges everything to lie on top so it’s covered.

“You’re a good friend, you know that?” he tells her when they’re nearly ready to leave. He just has to pull on his jacket and they’re good to go.

She snorts, rolls her eyes and huffs at him, but her cheeks are a bit flushed and she refuses to meet his eyes. “Piss off, would you?”

Isak grins widely. His cheeks still feel sticky and the stretch makes it scratch at his skin. “My best bud,” he teases in English.

“We are not best buds,” she tells him as she opens the door, not waiting to make sure Isak has a hold of it before she’s stepped through, ready to let it slam shut. Isak nearly drops his bag in his hurry to catch the door so he doesn’t get smacked in the face by an inanimate object.

“We are a little bit best buds.”

Isak’s taller than her so it’s easy to catch up, even as she’s practically power walking down the hall. She slows down when he’s next to her. She glares up at him, but Isak just grins wider, because it’s obvious she’s fighting a smile.

“Little bit best buds,” she concedes and leads him up the stairs so she can sit in with him in a module she doesn’t have.

That in itself qualifies as more than just ‘a little bit’ best buds. They both know it does.

OOOOO

The apartment is quiet when Isak finally gets home. He’s freezing, the wind too cold just for a t-shirt and his jacket as he hadn’t dared pulling out his hoodie once Sana led him away from campus and waited for the tram with him.

Magnus hasn’t been gone for more than six minutes, Isak knows, because he texted him when he left to hear if Isak was nearly back. Woke up, like, an hour ago. Had something to eat, but didn’t say a lot. Went back to sleep afterwards. Don’t worry too much, ‘s all good! Quote Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson

Isak resisted the urge to text back that Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson had in no way ever said that, but he knew he was only going to get another fake quote back, so he’d just texted back his thanks and braced himself for the circus by the entrance of his building.

Even’s still in bed when Isak checks in on him. At least he’s moved, reassuring Isak that Magnus hadn’t been lying. His back is to the door, so Isak can’t see if he’s awake or not, and it suddenly feels too awkward and invasive to walk all the way around his bed just to see if Even’s eyes are open or not.

“Hei,” he whispers instead, peeking past the door frame. He doesn’t dare breathe, doesn’t dare move, just in case Even actually has fallen asleep again and Isak will end up waking him accidentally.

The sheets start shuffling before Isak can see Even actually moving. His heart is stuck in his throat for a moment, then Even’s turning onto his back.

He’s staring at the ceiling, not moving to look at Isak, but that’s okay. Isak can see that his eyes are open and that he’s awake.

Even blinks slowly, the drag of his eyelashes clearly feeling like a struggle, and now Isak’s heart is stuck in his throat for another reason. Mikael’s insinuation still a little too close to not meticulously pay attention to each small detail.

“Did you sleep okay?”

Even doesn’t reply. He can’t muster up the strength to say anything, and Isak feels like sobbing despite being sure he’s cried himself out of tears already, but he pulls himself back together.

Instead, he just starts talking, up and down about everything; he knows Even’s listening. He moves from the doorway to the foot of the bed, Even’s eyes following his movement, but stubbornly refusing to meet his eyes.

Isak’s still talking, slowly and quietly so Even can go back to sleep if he wants to. It’s nothing particularly interesting, the topics falling out of his mouth so seamlessly Isak almost wonders if he and Even had ever stopped talking, that the past few years haven’t just been a fever-nightmare.

He considers mentioning Mikael, but he isn’t sure Even wants to know about anyone outside of their little bubble right now, and he also isn’t sure if Even’s okay with Isak having talked to Mikael, so he lets it lie for now.

It’s nothing personal he talks about, either, because as much as he wishes the past couple of years had just been a nightmare, as dissociating is it to see Even in his bed, in his apartment that he shares with his best friends that Even wasn’t around long enough to ever hear about, in Isak’s life that hasn’t had Even in it for two years. Talking about something close to heart, the way they’d somehow always been able to back then, it’s – it doesn’t fit in with the Isak of the now. He’s not the same, and he doubts Even is either.

Even’s been asleep for a little over an hour when Isak gets up off the bed and slips out the door quietly. He crashes on the couch, no more energy left in his body after the day he’s had.

He wakes up the next morning when Even does – way too early, unable to sleep any longer – wandering out of Isak’s room with a slow gait, gaze slightly vacant. His hair is greasy, and the bags underneath his eyes are still too deep, too purple, looking too much like two sets of bruises.

It’s nearing four am. They’re sitting on Isak’s bedroom floor with a bowl of cereal each, facing the window with the side of the bed against their backs. They don’t watch the sun rise because the curtains are still drawn. Neither of them make a move to open them up, neither of them dare to.

Isak can feel the heat of Even against his right arm. It would probably feel so much like old times if they weren’t disturbingly quiet.

Well, Even was always quiet during the lows, even when they hadn’t been as extreme as this one seems to be, but any other morning where they’d do this – most mornings in general – he wouldn’t be able to stop talking about anything and everything.

Isak stirs the cocoa puffs around, watches as the milky brown turns darker and darker with each press of the spoon. It’s easier to look at the food than it is to look at Even. He doesn’t have to wonder when that happened, he already knows.

The spoon clatters against the ceramic rim of the bowl when Isak accidentally lets go. Even looks at him for a beat too long, Isak can feel it even as he doesn’t look up to check, but he doesn’t say anything. Before long he’s gone back to eating his own cereal.

Isak doesn’t go out the following days.

He stays off of the internet as much as possible, doesn’t want to know what people are saying about Even, about him, about him and Even, about anything at all, in fact. Sana keeps sending him her notes unprompted, and Isak constantly wonders why the hell she would ever decide to bless him with her friendship when he doubts he’s earned it.

Same goes for the boys.

None of them complain about the media circus they have to walk through, about having to field questions they’re asked about their gay roommate and his secret marriage, about having Even around. Instead they’re constantly around; working in shifts that Isak hasn’t figured out the system of yet, figures they probably have a secret group chat where they work it out impromptu, asking if Isak needs help, ready to step in and make sure Even’s alright.

It’s at times like that that Isak feels particularly overwhelmed with the feeling of how not alone he is.

He’s been alone for so long he doesn’t remember what to do to reach out to other people, to ask for help, and he can’t even remember what he did to make Jonas, Mahdi, and Magnus think, you know, he’s alright that one, because he’d been drunk or pissed their entire first semester, and stressed and pissed for the second term, but somehow they did, and they still do, and they don’t bother waiting for Isak to ask – probably because they know the wait would be futile, Isak would never think to ask – they just offer and do it.

Sometimes during the quietest moments of the nights, when Isak has the most trouble falling asleep, he feels a bit like crying at the thought of his three friends.

Days pass like this – with Isak switching between hovering over Even and trying to salvage whatever is left of his degree, sleeping on the couch, resulting in an increasing amount of back pain each night.

He does his assignments to force himself into thinking about something else. Half the time it doesn’t work, but he isn’t falling horribly behind anymore. Then he spends a lot of time not looking any of the boys in the eye.

That makes him feel like shit as well, because they’ve been nothing but nice and really great friends during this entire ordeal, but Isak –

Isak doesn’t know what he’ll see when he looks. He’s not sure he wants to know – or, he does, but he won’t be able to handle it if it’s bad. Not on top of everything else.

He checks in on Even again, sees he’s still sleeping, but it’s been less and less over the past couple of days, so Isak suspects he’ll wake up soon.

It feels odd standing around in his own room when Even’s there, almost creepy in a sense, but that’s probably because Even is asleep. It leaves Isak feeling a bit beside himself, because first of all he’s never felt like this when he’d been with Even before, not when they’d shared everything and been so desperate to have a space for themselves, but that was years ago and second of all because this is Isak’s room. It’s where he’s hidden himself away from the world when everything was just too much, when he’d been sure he was one step away from fucking up and everyone knowing.

Isak’s careful about shutting the door behind him, it clicking in place seemingly louder than normal because of his intention to be quiet.

He’d heard the boys get in a while ago. He can smell the lingering scent of food, doesn’t know if he hopes for leftovers or not, probably not with how simultaneously jittery and exhausted he feels.

They’re still in the kitchen; Isak can hear them as he tiptoes closer. Not that they’re loud, they’re clearly consciously trying to keep quiet so as to not wake Even up.

Mahdi’s sitting on the window sill, back against his own sheets that they still haven’t taken down. They color the room an odd, muted golden because of the sunlight trying to break through unsuccessfully. Magnus is finishing up the last of the dishes, snapping the dishtowel at Jonas when he tries to grab a clean glass to get some water.

“Yo,” Mahdi startles him, nodding in a greeting like he usually would, but there’s a look to him that makes it obvious there’s nothing normal about this.

Jonas gives up stealing a glass from Magnus’ clutches in favor of focusing on Isak.

“Hey,” Jonas’ voice is gentle, but there’s a worry in his eyes that makes Isak squirm. Jonas frowns. “Have you slept?”

“When?” Isak evades, but not well enough.

Jonas snorts. “At all.”

Isak looks down at the floor to avoid any of their gazes. He hates this – probably why he’s practically been avoiding the boys the past couple of days unless he desperately needs help. He doesn’t know what possessed him to not continue like that right now.

And then he remembers Even sleeping in his room and how not right it had felt to be there, how wrong it feels to be in any room of the house when he never expected to ever be in the same place as Even again. That’s why.

Doesn’t make it any easier to just stand here like this with them watching him. Isak’s sick of feeling like his skin is crawling from all the sets of eyes that are on him. When he strides forward to grab the same glass Jonas had been trying to get, Magnus doesn’t try to swat at him with the dishtowel.

“Even’s asleep, right?” Jonas asks.

Isak turns the tap on, lets the water run colder and colder. It numbs the tips of his fingers when he tests the temperature. “Yeah.”

“You were up pretty early, weren’t you?” Magnus asks, putting away the last of the plates. “I thought I heard you moving around.”

Isak nods, doesn’t really know what to say. He’s so tired, and he’s tired of feeling like – like this, like he’s constantly trying to stand on his feet, but he doesn’t have any balance to stay up. It’s disorientating and confusing and absolutely exhausting, and Isak’s tired of feeling like he’s an extra piece that just doesn’t fit in with the rest of the puzzle.

The water shuts off. Isak registers the lack of sound before he feels it on his fingers. Jonas’ hand is still on the tap. Isak’s hand is still wavering mid-air, his other holding the empty glass like an idiot.

It’s quiet in the kitchen. Isak feels it like a weight upon his shoulders, holding him down.

Mahdi’s the one who breaks it.

“You look like you’re going to fall over,” he says, not needing to specify who he’s speaking to. He nods towards the space next to him. “Just, come on.”

Isak doesn’t move. He still just stands there by the sink, holding an empty glass until Jonas gently grabs onto his elbow and makes him put it down.

“Is,” he mutters, “you can’t keep going like this.”

And the worst part is that it’s the truth, Isak can’t keep going like this. Not only because he’s hiding away in his apartment which is an option that won’t keep being viable, but because Isak isn’t okay, hasn’t been okay for so, so long and he doesn’t know how to get himself to a place where he can get better.

So he lets Jonas maneuver him over to the window, sits down next to Mahdi, Jonas pressed against his left side and Magnus takes a seat on Mahdi’s right side.

People need people, he thinks of Sana telling him. He can feel the sun warming up his back through the window.

He doesn’t know where to start – he’s never done this before, never said the words. Where is he supposed to start? Meeting Even? When Even left? An apology?

“You’re, like, properly fucked up over him, aren’t you?” Jonas states quietly, lightly puffing at him with his shoulder.

Isak snorts. He would’ve figured that was a given by now, but apparently Jonas still felt the need to ask him directly.

“What happened?” Jonas whispers, voice soft but desperate.

Isak thinks he should feel sad. He does, sort of, but almost in a detached kind of way. He doesn’t even register that his bum is starting to go numb from sitting in the same position on a hard surface for so long, barely notices the warmth of Jonas and Mahdi on either side of him. He’s so tired, so, so tired and he can barely pull himself together enough to open up his mouth and answer.

“I met him when I was fifteen.”

He remembers Even back then; all floppy hair and bomber jacket and so, so beautiful, full of ideas and dreams – so different from the meek, quiet boy who had showed up outside their door.

“There’s never been anyone but him,” Isak admits. He feels like he should be crying, but his eyes feel almost too dry instead. He can’t blink, doesn’t know how to stop looking out into the hallway, really. “For so long, I couldn’t imagine spending my life without him, and then one day I had to imagine it with everyone but.”

The confession hurts, like someone is forcing a knife into his heart because Isak fucking remembers those months, as hard as he’d tried not to by drowning himself in booze and whatever weed or pills he could come across.

“I still haven’t figured out how to do that,” he whispers, like if he doesn’t say it too loudly, it won’t be true, he could still pull off being suave, being so in control of his life that of course he knows how to live without Even, he’s figured it all out already.

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Magnus asks. Isak thinks he sounds so incredibly sad, sad enough for the both of them because Isak feels the indifference coloring his voice like a self-defense mechanism so engrained he doesn’t know how to turn it off.

Isak shrugs. “Didn’t know how to.”

“Did we,” Jonas gulps, like he’s afraid of asking the question because he isn’t certain he wants to know the answer. “Did we make you think you… couldn’t tell us?”

To be honest, there had been many times; bad jokes and wrongly phrased comebacks that left a bigger impact than Isak was willing to admit, but he knows none of the boys are homophobic. Still, there’s always a difference in saying you’re not homophobic and then actually having a friend, a friend you live with, be gay and Isak just wasn’t ready or willing to take that chance.

“Didn’t tell anyone.”

A secret like that, so big and personal, had felt like a massive weight on Isak’s shoulders, constantly weighing him down. Sometimes, really late at night, he’d imagine what it would be like if everyone knew and no one left him because of it, how much lighter he would feel.

Well, they all know now, but Isak doesn’t feel any better about it. He feels worse.

“No one?” Jonas frowns. “Not even Eskild?”

Eskild would’ve been the obvious choice if Isak were to tell someone, probably would’ve been the first person he told if he’d been in a different universe. But in this universe Isak had kept his mouth shut until someone else opened it for him.

Isak shakes his head. “No. Just spent ages sneaking around behind everyone’s back and lying to their faces.”

Mahdi clears his throat. “So you meet him at fifteen – he was what, seventeen? And you fall in love –“ Isak’s insides tighten at how easily it’s said, as if keeping it a secret had never been as big of a deal as it had felt, “– and then what? Like, how did it get so bad? ‘Cause, like, you got the certificate, you would’ve had to have been together for three years for you to be eighteen, so what –“ he trails off, shaking his head.

The thing is, things hadn’t gone bad, not like they do in a normal situation. It hadn’t been like that, and to this day Isak still can’t wrap his head around it properly for how sudden it had come.

Even to the tee, he thinks, folding one leg up to he can rest his head on his knee, hiding away a bit. There one second, gone the next.

Isak doesn’t know how to tell them about that, though, so he gives the briefest overview he possibly could; talks about moving in together – doesn’t tell them about proposing or about getting married because he doesn’t think he can actually say the words out loud. He definitely doesn’t talk about the cabin, because that memory is too good, reminds him too much of a time he’d never been happier, and it’s just too sore of a moment to think about, let alone share out loud. He tells them about Even’s job instead, about how he’d worked longer and longer hours, about him getting into film school and meeting more of the right people, about the one in a million lifetimes opportunity.

Talking about Even isn’t cathartic, not in the way Isak had always hoped it would feel. Instead it leaves him feeling hollow inside and like a vice is squeezing tighter and tighter around his heart, because talking about Even like this just serves to remind Isak that Even had been the center of his world, and Isak just hadn’t realized it wasn’t mutual.

He got the message loud and clear, though, when Even fucked off to the other side of the world and never came back. When he left Isak behind to go over it over and over again, about how stupid he’d ever been for thinking he could’ve been the center of Even’s world as well.

Isak forcefully blinks to clear his eyes of tears. He isn’t going to cry, he won’t.

So he forces his thoughts away from that topic, tells them about starting at university only because he’d applied before everything went horribly, horribly bad, and how he’d been desperate to get out of their shared apartment so he’d jumped at the chance of student housing. About how it had been his opportunity to get away from everything Even, even if it just meant that he got drunk in a different setting.

“You must’ve hated me,” Magnus mutters. He’s trying to make it sound like it’s funny, like a ‘ha, ha, I was constantly bringing up the person who hurt you, what a laugh’, but he sounds too guilty about it.

“At first,” Isak admits. He can sense Magnus is coiled, tensed up. “But I liked everything else about you, so I figured I could let Jonas and Mahdi deal with the fangirling.”

Magnus breathes out from his nose a bit harsher than usual, but other than that doesn’t outwardly react.

“Besides,” Isak adds when he can’t handle the silence anymore, “technically, we had something in common from the get-go, which is more than I can say for Mr. capitalism-is-the-root-of-all-evil over there.”

“Hey,” Jonas protests, but it’s halfhearted at best.

Isak’s distraction had been as well, though. He draws in a shaky breath, too loud for how still all of them are.

“I still haven’t said it, you know?” Isak stares blankly ahead of him even as he can feel Jonas’, Mahdi’s and Magnus’ eyes on him. “Out loud. I never said it.”

“Jesus,” Jonas whispers. “Jesus.”

“Do you want to?” Mahdi asks, hesitantly, like he isn’t sure it’s the proper time to ask.

Isak snorts. “Doesn’t really matter now, does it? Everyone already knows.”

Mahdi rolls his eyes. “Not like that. You, actually saying the words out loud. Doesn’t matter who hears them or that we all know already. Maybe it’ll be good for you.”

Isak can’t imagine anything being good for him – nothing has been good for so long that he doesn’t really know how to get to the opposite end.

“I should,” he concedes. The glass is slowly warming up against his back, but it’s from their combined body warmth and not from the sun outside. “I should say it. When all of this,” meaning Even being down and getting the press off of their, his, backs, of getting back to his daily rhythm going to uni and coming home to his boys, “is over, I need to be able to say it.”

Isak gulps. He can’t believe he’s actually about to say the words. It’s been so, so long, and he still doesn’t feel like he’s at a point where he wants the words to be out there, no matter how much they already are.

“Maybe it’ll be good,” Jonas suggest. “Getting to, like, ‘come out’ yourself.”

Isak can’t help but flinch. “I’m not – I mean, I –“ it’s so engrained in him to deny, deny, deny, that he almost doesn’t stop to think that that isn’t even the part he’s denying. “I wasn’t talking about saying I’m, about – about the guys part, I was talking about –“ Isak gulps and curls his hands into fists to get them to stop shaking, “I was talking about how I have to be able to say ‘I’m married’ to be able to say ‘I’m divorced’.”

“Fuck,” Magnus swears. Isak feels it in his bones.

“Is that what you are?” Jonas asks.

Isak shrugs. “No fucking clue.” It probably is. He’d never been contacted by a lawyer after signing the papers, but he doesn’t know anything about the entire process of being divorced – does it involve the court and lawyers, or is that just American movies being dramatic?

It makes him feel unsettled – more so than he already is, which is impressive by itself. The boys certainly get the message to stay off of that topic for a little while yet, at least, despite how much Isak can tell they’re itching to know, to help.

“I just –“ something gets stuck in his throat. There are lights dancing in front of his eyes from how teary they are. “I just really thought –“ he squeezes his eyes shut, swallows, and shakes his head and lets out a self-deprecating laugh. “I’m such an idiot.”

“Hey,” Jonas protests immediately, grabbing a hold of Isak’s arm. “Come on, don’t say that, that’s not fair.”

Isn’t it? Isak wants to ask but doesn’t. He’s pretty certain that it is a fair question to ask, because he’s never felt so stupid in his entire goddamn life as he does when he thinks about Even and lawyers and so many papers and signatures.

“I love him,” he whispers, digs his nails into his knee. “He broke my heart, and I’m in fucking love with him. And I know he loved me back, that it wasn’t fake, but I just – I don’t know when he stopped, what I did to make him stop loving me.”

“Isak…” Jonas sounds horribly sad, and Isak’s so tired of making his friends sad. He’s tired of being sad, because he is. He’s not fine. He hasn’t been fine for so long – for a while he’d thought he’d figured it out, that moving into this flatshare with his boys had been the answer, had been the push he needed to finally be a better version of himself, but he hadn’t even had the chance to test it out before everything went a hundred times worse than they’d been at the beginning.

“Fy faen, this is so fucking depressing,” Magnus sniffles, wiping at his eyes before he slaps both of his knees and jumps up. “Alright, that’s it, come on, group hug, we’re doing it.”

“Huh?”

“What?”

But no amount of protesting stops Magnus from grabbing on to Jonas and Mahdi, and then Isak gets pulled along unwillingly as well.

“I’m way too tall for this,” Isak complains immediately, trying to bow out, but the boys won’t let him, Magnus already folding them all around Isak to keep him in place.

“Bend down, then, bitch,” Mahdi orders, which is how Isak ends up with a mouthful of Jonas’ curls and his forehead pressed against Mahdi’s ear.

“The girls do it all the time!” Magnus attempts to convince them even as they’re already in the middle of it. “Vilde told me so.”

“Oh? How long have you been speaking to Vilde?” Jonas shoves his hip against Magnus’, nearly unsettling all of them in the process.

Magnus flushes a bright red. “I – there was the party, you know, and, I just –“ then makes a lot of indistinguishable noises much to Jonas’ amusement.

“Christ, please tell me it wasn’t your dried up come I found in my bed the day after,” Mahdi begs over Magnus’ continued blundering.

“No, that was Eskild’s,” Isak tells him, smothering his laugh in Mahdi’s shoulder at the following swearing at Isak for not having warned him.

He presses his face harder against Mahdi, wills himself to take deep breaths and not fucking cry. Mahdi smells like he always does – of cologne and himself and a hint of weed despite not having smoked any today. A hand grabs the back of Isak’s head, tugging his hair gently. Isak can’t tell who it is, knows he’ll probably cry if he looks up, so he just keeps his head down.

He squeezes his boys harder. They squeeze back.

OOOOO

“Takk,” Even says when Isak comes back from bringing his plate out.

It’s late, the room dark apart from the bright white light of the lamp on Isak’s desk, casting weird shadows on the wall and making both their faces look more gaunt and tired than Isak hopes they look normally.

It’s probably too much to hope for, though, Isak knows, considering the past couple of weeks. Isak definitely knows the purplish bags underneath his eyes are probably permanent by now. Even looks a little better after having spent the first couple of days mainly asleep, but there’s wariness and a tired look to him that doesn’t come from the need to sleep.

Even’s hair flops down awkwardly, half sticking up and the other half falling down in his eyes. He’s got more color in his cheeks than he did yesterday, and apart from the afternoon nap he’s been up for pretty much the entire day – and then some, seeing as Isak’s fairly certain it’s nearing 2 am and they should’ve both gone to sleep hours ago, but eating hadn’t been the easiest today and the clock had run away from them by the time Isak had gotten Even to have a bite of toast and a cup of tea to settle down for the night.

“It’s nothing,” Isak tells him, means it too. He still thinks he should be angry, maybe – not at Even for having shown up like he had, just in general angry about everything that had gone so wrong, but he doesn’t feel angry. He’s honestly relieved that Even came here when he needed help, when he needed someone. Isak doesn’t really want to think about how awful it would’ve been had he just seen the award show and then had the complete radio silence the rest of the world has had to deal with.

He’s not in a hurry to spend another night on the couch, even if talking to the boys left him physically and mentally exhausted, and despite how much it sometimes hurts to look at Even, so deeply like someone is twisting around a knife that had been left inside of him, Isak doesn’t want to leave.

Even’s huddled up against the headboard, legs curled up on top of the duvet and in the softest hoodie Isak owns.

Isak turns around to fiddle with the stuff littered around on his desk so he doesn’t have to see how soft Even looks.

“Are you tired?” he asks instead without turning around. He stacks a couple of books on top of each other, then restacks them according to color, then restacks them again according to size, the smallest on top.

When Even still hasn’t said anything, he rearranges them after the due dates of his assignment. That just makes him slightly depressed, so he puts them together randomly and covers them with a wad of notebooks.

There’s nothing left for him to fiddle with, but he can’t turn around to look at Even, he can’t. He wants to, but he doesn’t know what it will do to him if he does.

“Yeah,” Even sounds resigned when he realizes Isak won’t face him. Isak can hear rustling, the bed creaking when Even’s weight leaves it, the sound of steps as Even walks towards the door. “I’ll go brush my teeth.”

Isak lets out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding once the bathroom door has shut.

He chances a look over at the bed, feeling like an intruder in his own bedroom and like someone is going to fault him for not leaving as well now that Even has, which is stupid because this is Isak’s room.

The sheets are rumpled, a dip in the mattress left behind from where Even had been sitting. When Isak sits down at the foot of the bed, the duvet is still warm.

He doesn’t know what possesses him to do it, knows he’ll regret it, but his body moves without his permission, and the next thing Isak knows is he’s lying down on his bed, shoulder bent uncomfortably underneath his own weight, but his nose is pressed against the sheets and Isak doesn’t want to move.

He can smell Even on them, the same scent as he’s always had, and a feeling of what Isak can only describe as homesickness surges through him, leaving him so off kilter he nearly doesn’t hear when Even gets out of the bathroom.

He throws himself off of the bed just in time for Even to enter the room.

Even pauses at the door, looks Isak in the eyes. Isak’s breathing too heavily to appear as casual as he tries to, a too wild look in his eyes and a flush to his cheeks.

“I’ll just –“ Isak starts, clears his throat when barely any sound comes out. “I’ll let you go to bed.”

He shuffles around, heading towards the door before realizing he’ll have to walk past Even, brush up against him to get out, so he stalls by the desk so Even has a safe distance to crawl onto the bed and let Isak leave without any close proximity to each other.

This is stupid. Isak feels stupid. Even if it’s been literal years since he last kissed Even, since he slept with him, it’s not as if they’ve only been five feet apart since Even showed up on his doorstep. Isak’s brushed his fingers through his hair, has folded his fingers around Even’s wrist, has squeezed his shoulder encouragingly to prompt Even into eating, moving, whatever.

Even doesn’t move. Or, he does, but he takes a step towards Isak, not towards the bed. Isak stands as if he’s rooted in place, not daring to blink in case he misses something.

“You could,” Even hesitates, looking like he’s so carefully thinking about his next words. “You could stay, if you want.”

It’s a bad idea. It’s a very bad idea. It’s such a bad idea, because Isak and Even have simultaneously got unfinished history and very much definitely finished history.

It’s not as if anything is going to happen if Isak were to stay – they’re both exhausted. Isak can see it on Even and he can feel it in his own bones, but just the idea of being near Even, of sleeping next to him for the entire duration of the night, or what’s left of it, it – it’s so much. Too much and not enough all at once and such a bad idea, and none of it changes the fact that Isak wants.

He nods carefully, slowly, barely enough movement for Even to recognize the assent for what it is.

Even breathes out deeply when he does realize Isak is agreeing, that he’s staying, fuck. Fucking fuck.

Isak panics about it when he brushes his teeth – locking the door and spending a worryingly long amount of time staring into the mirror at his reflection. Then he panics some more about it as he walks back into his room.

Even’s sitting on the edge of the bed, trying to pretend he hadn’t kept his eyes on the door to be sure Isak was coming back. Something tugs inside of Isak.

As Isak pulls off his sweatshirt, Even shoves himself backwards towards the side of the bed he’d always slept on when they’d shared a bed before. Something keeps tugging inside of Isak, something he desperately tries to ignore as he panics about what to wear for bed.

He keeps his t-shirt on, just like Even, but doesn’t strip to his boxers like Even has, sticks with his joggers instead. He’ll be uncomfortably hot and probably wake up in the middle of the night because of it, but he can barely handle the thought that in a few seconds he’ll lie next to Even, will spend hours just lying next to Even and have to worry about their bare legs brushing during the night when they’re both under the covers.

He turns off the light, then trails back and shuts the door before he shuffles onto the bed himself, lifting the covers and settling stiffly onto his back.

The duvet is still warm from Even sitting on it earlier, but the pillows and sheets underneath him are cool and fresh. Isak can feel Even next to him, can hear his breathing in the darkness. He stares resolutely at the ceiling, not able to see anything before his eyes adjust to the lack of light.

“Thank you,” Even whispers. He’s lying on his back as well, just as stiffly as Isak is, careful not to touch despite how they’re sharing a bed and a duvet and space in each other’s lives.

Isak doesn’t know what he’s thanking him for, isn’t sure he wants to know either. Doesn’t know if it’s for agreeing to sleep here for tonight, or if it’s for everything in general, or if it’s so much deeper. He doesn’t know what he’d respond even if he did know.

You’re welcome isn’t personal enough for the two of them, but any time and always is too much considering. Maybe Isak should just keep it impersonal, maybe it’ll help him in the long run.

He nearly snorts. As if he’s ever thought about long-term consequences of his actions. If he had they wouldn’t be here right now.

“Selvfølgelig,” he tells him instead, hopes Even doesn’t read too much into just how big a matter of course it is, that there wouldn’t be an Isak in any of the universes, including this one even back when he’d been completely fucked up and so furious with Even, where Isak wouldn’t have let Even in.

He keeps hearing Even breathing – tunes into it really as it’s the only audible sound in the room apart from Isak’s heart pounding in his chest – hears how Even consciously tries to keep his breaths deep and even.

“I’m sorry for showing up like this,” Even finally whispers. “I’m sorry for being a burden.”

“Don’t say things like that.” There’s more venom in Isak’s voice than he’d usually put there, but he’d been sick and tired of Even saying those things back when they were together, and that hate hasn’t lessened with the time.

“It’s true, though, isn’t it?” Even’s exhausted, but there’s still bite in his tone. It makes red hot fury curl up in Isak’s stomach.

“No, it isn’t, actually.” It isn’t true at all, he wants to add, softer, but he can feel that all that will come out of his mouth will be snide remarks and harshly spoken words, so he keeps it shut.

It’s like saying Isak had been a burden back when Even’s career had been ‘make it or break it’ –

Isak freezes even as he didn’t say the words out loud. Because that’s what had happened. Isak had been the burden and Even had cut off the deadweight.

God, he’s tired and he’s hurting and he’s tired of always hurting.

He doesn’t have a way to fix this, fix any of it. Doesn’t know how to feel okay, doesn’t know how to rid Even of any backlash because of his episode, doesn’t have a wand he can wave around and make everything okay. Doesn’t even have any words of comfort, words of encouragement, he’s too worn out, stripped to the bones and left exposed to have any more left to give.

But neither of them will get any sleep tonight if they end it like this.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Even snorts irritated at him.

“No, really, I mean it,” Isak insists. “Give it a week and all people will be talking about is the ‘integrity’ of your ‘art’, you proper artiste,” Isak puts on a snooty voice that makes Even try to muffle a laugh into the duvet.

“Do a lot of running around naked at award shows, then?”

Isak tries desperately hard to keep the smile on his face, even though it’s too dark and Even won’t be able to tell one way or another. “Nah. I wouldn’t get away with it either – I’m no artist, people can sense that shit.”

“Are you seriously telling me that there has never been a scientist showing up for work buck-ass naked?”

Isak wracks his brain, because, yeah, when Even puts it like that, it sounds unlikely that it hasn’t happened.

“Some of us are just eccentric.”

Even barks out a laugh too loud for the hour, and Isak is giggling too much to shush him properly. It feels like they’re sixteen and eighteen again and they’re lying under the covers in Isak’s bed in the Kollektiv, and they have to be quiet so Eskild doesn’t come to investigate what Isak could possibly be laughing about at this hour.

“Eccentric!” Even laughs too loudly, but Isak doesn’t want to quiet him. “That’s certainly a word for it! ‘Oh, just ignore the naked man in the room, that’s just my eccentric husba-“ both of them freeze.

Suddenly they aren’t sixteen and eighteen and they aren’t in the Kollektiv. They are twenty and twenty-two and they’re in Isak’s apartment that he shares with his three friends, because he and Even aren’t even together anymore.

A car passes by on the street outside, loud music spilling out of it as whoever’s driving around whoops excitedly. Isak can’t tell if it adds to the tension or helps dissolve some of it.

“You know,” Even whispers once it’s quiet again, “the only way to have something for infinite time is by losing it.”

Burning hot white fear rushes through Isak. He thinks of Mikael’s words, of how bad it had apparently gotten ‘last time’, thinks of Even’s movies where the lovers never get what Isak would call a happy ending, the ‘epic love stories’ as Even had always argued.

“Don’t say things like that.”

He doesn’t dare to breathe, too focused to pay attention to each inhale and exhale of Even’s, just to be sure he’s still there, he’s still breathing, he’s okay.

In the end he has to breathe in. It sounds too shaky and too obvious in the otherwise silent room, so Isak hurries to turn onto his side, facing away from Even.

It doesn’t help, doesn’t make his heart feel any less like it’s too big for his chest and falling apart because of it, but it means he can smother his face into the pillow, that he can curl up into a ball, that he can hide away from Even as the two of them hide away from the world.

It’s quiet for ages. Isak doesn’t feel any closer to sleep than he had when he’d first gotten in bed. Despite how much his body begs for the rest, his brain won’t comply.

“I didn’t know it meant having to choose,” Even whispers, sounding like he can’t bear it if the words aren’t out there, but also like he doesn’t want to wake Isak up on the off-chance he’s already fallen asleep.

Isak’s breath hitches and he squeezes his eyes shut harshly to stop the tears from welling up in them. It doesn’t work.

What is he even meant to say to that? ‘Well, it did’ or ‘Now you know’? Especially because the only thing Isak wants to say is, ‘I didn’t either.’

“Let’s not do this now,” he settles for instead.

Even’s presence on the other side of the bed feels tense and stifling, and Isak almost wants to make an excuse just so he can go sleep on the couch instead – Even hadn’t asked for him to stay this night after all.

“If you’re saying that because, because of – because I’m being mental, you can cut it out.”

Anger wells up in Isak so quickly his blood rushes through his body with too much heat. “I’m saying it,” he grits out through his teeth, “because it’s late and we’re both tired and these past couple of weeks haven’t been easy for either of us. Let’s not do this now.”

“Okay,” Even sounds more resigned than mollified, but neither of them is going to be getting things the way they’d like for them to be, not with how everything is right now.

Not ever, Isak doubts, folding his arms underneath his pillow so he can hide away easier, because anything they could want at this point would only be achievable in a fantasy world, not in this universe.

 Past

It’s… odd, coming back to an empty apartment.

Isak’s never really lived alone, so to speak. His dad had been in and out of the house for longer than Isak can remember, but his mom had always been a stable presence wherever she’d choose to loiter – the only part Isak had experienced that had been stable in that godforsaken house.

He’d been isolated, definitely, but he hadn’t been completely on his own.

Moving in to the Kollektiv had meant living with both Eskild and Linn, and whilst Linn wasn’t exactly the most social roommate in the world, Eskild had done more than his fair share of inserting himself into Isak’s life.

And finally, living with Even. Isak had never felt alone the entire time he’d shared a physical home with Even, hadn’t felt alone when his home had been Even.

He still is, Isak forcefully reminds himself in the particularly tough moments, as if he’d ever forget it. Forgetting wouldn’t be the hard part; it’s living with his home thousands upon thousands of kilometers away from where Isak is that’s the hard part.

It feels like the apartment feels the loss of Even as much as Isak does. The air is stuffy from Isak not throwing a window open for the entire day. He can’t bear it if the wind were to blow away the last remnant of Even’s scent on the sheets, on his clothes, in the apartment.

Even doesn’t text him when he gets to the airport, but he does text when he lands on his layover somewhere on the eastern coast of America. It’s in the very early hours of the morning, but Isak hasn’t fallen asleep yet.

He spends an embarrassingly long amount of time tracing over the shape of the letters of the I love you Even had finished the text with.

Once Even gets a bit more settled, they spend several hours on facetime, any time either of them – Even – has a free moment to spare. It not even an exaggeration to say that Isak lives for those times, even if they’re short and Even’s just on his way out the door to get to set, Isak loves seeing Even happy and excited and full of life as he tells him all about what’s going on over in America as Isak teases him with, over-pronouncing the syllables to make Even laugh.

Even explains everything so well it almost feels like Isak is there with him, all the way in America and not stuck in Oslo, Norway with the same daily routine day in and day out. It almost makes him miss Even a little less, but then they hang up and the pain inside him is tenfold.

It makes it nearly unbearable to spend his time in the empty apartment. When the first month and a half has passed and nothing smells of Even anymore apart from the pieces of clothes Isak had shoved all the way in the back of the dresser to ensure he wouldn’t lose Even’s scent completely, Isak caves and spends the night rooming with Eskild, then spends the next night on the couch because Eskild brought a guy home with him.

Eskild doesn’t ask questions, as much as Isak can tell that he wants to and it physically pains him to hold back. He just lets Isak in and talks up and down about how Noora has apparently for the past couple of days been staying with this guy she’s been seeing – complete with a nose wrinkle, which tells Isak’s he’s about to be updated on just about every reason why Eskild doesn’t like this guy.

He forces himself not to make it a habit to stay with Linn and Eskild because it feels too much like giving up, like he’s weak. He misses Even terribly and he hates being alone in their apartment and he misses Even, but he’s also so fucking proud of Even that it sort of makes it worth it. He just wants to shout to the world, “that’s my husband!” except he doesn’t, because he still hasn’t quite figured out how to do that.

They celebrate Halloween together on Skype, Even answering the call completely dressed up as God much to Isak’s amusement, and then he spends nearly an hour chewing Isak out for having done nothing to prepare and guiding him through their closet until Isak’s found a golden wreath and a red blanket he slings across his shoulders, proclaiming himself as Julius Caesar.

Even claims it suits him because Isak is fit to rule and will go down in history. Isak claims it’s because were he to go to a party, he too would get stabbed 23 times, which doesn’t deserve as much eye-rolling as Even gives him.

Isak doesn’t mention that it already feels like he’s gotten stabbed 23 times with the way Even’s taking care of him halfway across the globe. It wouldn’t help. It wouldn’t make things better, any easier.

They time when they start the movies so they’re technically watching them together. Isak falls asleep around three am Norwegian time, which would only be in the evening for Even. He wakes up to the call having been ended, but Even’s written him a message telling him he’s cute when he sleeps and that he loves him. Isak takes a screenshot and saves it for when the nights are particularly long and lonely.

The next couple of months Isak spends halfway delirious from lack of sleep. They’ve gotten in the habit of talking when Even’s cooking up some dinner for himself, which with the increasingly later and later hours Even’s working means Isak’s up to about four am before Even’s finished eating, and then he has to get up three hours later to get to class.

His grades don’t slip, but that’s also just about the only part of Isak’s life that doesn’t feel like it’s falling apart. It’s the one thing he’s stubbornly clung on to, almost seeing the row of 6’s as a validation, a confirmation that Even isn’t the only one who’s doing well, who’s working hard to live out his dream. Isak’s going to get into university, get into the bio-science program, and he’s going to make Even be proud of him that he managed to do it.

But getting top-grades with basically no sleep is wearing him down. He falls asleep on Even all the time. One time when he’d been going on two days with practically no sleep and Even had run late, he’d missed the call entirely, absolutely kicking himself for it the next day as frustrated tears had prickled in the corner of his eyes as he typed out an apology to Even.

Even replies with a blue heart and doesn’t mention it the next time the talk. He also doesn’t mention the dark circles underneath Isak’s eyes three days later when Isak feels himself slipping again, but this time he’s prepared and has set up alarms every fifteen minutes so if he does fall asleep, he won’t stay asleep.

He just needs to survive until Christmas, Isak constantly reminds himself when everything feels particularly horrible. Christmas, and then Even’s coming home for a short break. He’ll see Even for Christmas. He’ll come home for Christmas.

Isak spends Christmas alone in their apartment.

Maybe it’s because of the season, but everything in it looks particularly grey and dreary.

Even had booked the plane tickets, everything had been ready, and then for some reason the tickets had been cancelled. And then Even had booked again, and they’d not gone through. And again, despite third time’s the charm. No tickets. The price increases every time Even tries again and again until Isak’s cursing out about holiday extortion and considers buying a ticket himself to go see Even.

He’s just about to make the purchase when Even texts him that his parents showed up, apparently having bought tickets of their own and wanting to come surprise him, having apparently arranged all of it with Even’s assistant.

Isak does not cry. He doesn’t.

He spends a very sad evening eating way too much food and drinking way too many beers and steers far away from every soppy Christmas movie shown on TV, only watching the gory ones that he actually hates, but his options are rather lacking right now.

They talk for an hour in the middle of the night for Even, early morning for Isak; Even apologetic and Isak trying not to take his hurt out on him. Even loves his parents and it’s no one’s fault but Isak and Even’s own that they can’t say screw it and have Isak meet Even’s parents. They don’t even entertain the idea, that’s how bad it is.

Once the holidays are over and the stores open again, Isak heads into town and buys a calendar - a calendar – and a red sharpie, and then he starts to count down the days until Even is done and home for good. One red X at the start of each day. He can do this.

Except then school begins again, and suddenly it seems as if his teachers have remembered that they’re in their third year, that they’re graduating in a couple of months, and so the workload increases exponentially until Isak could cry from the mix of exhaustion and fucking missing his husband.

He misses another call. Even cancels a call because he’s going out to dinner with a group of people. Isak misses another call and doesn’t wake up to a sweet message from Even, reminding him that he loves him.

He phones Even four times on Even’s birthday before he picks up, the background so noisy Isak can barely pick out anything Even says. The crew is throwing me a party, I’ll call you back later!

No I love you, which makes sense if Even is surrounded by the people he now spends every day with. But there’s also no call later. Come morning, Isak shakily crosses out another day on the calendar and wills himself not to cry.

It’s a good thing, he tries to remind himself. It gets harder and harder to do every single day, but at the bottom of Isak’s heart nothing has changed. He’s proud of Even, he wants this for Even, he just doesn’t want this. He doesn’t want to be left behind.

He doesn’t go to see Eskild.

He probably should – he’s isolating himself and it’s not healthy. He’s hours away from spiraling, from falling too deeply down the black hole. Going to see Eskild would definitely help, but Eskild would know something is wrong – he’d take one look at Isak, if that, and the cards would be spilt on the table. Isak can’t take that chance, so he stays at home, spirals and tries to fucking breathe.

At the end of March, Isak applies to university. He forgets to tell Even about it.

Or, he doesn’t forget, it’s just –

They’ve gone from talking every single day to every once in a while, and Isak’s working hard not to be resentful, to keep being so proud of Even at the front of his heart and his mind over everything else. So the next time they talk, Isak vows to tell Even all about how he finally settled on bio-science, all about the first term courses that he’s looking forward to, everything.

When Even picks up, there are worry lines etched into his face and a frown on his lips that seems foreign to Isak but perfectly fitting with the image of the worried man that Isak is faced with.

Shooting finished two days ago, Even should not be looking this stressed, Isak notes.

He keeps his eyes on the screen, doesn’t let them stray to the calendar and the five days left to cross out.

Or, twenty-five days left, as Isak finds out, because a problem has come up. Something about the editing and the framing that the studio isn’t happy with, which – who cares what they think? It’s Even’s movie, and Isak knows how meticulous Even is about every single detail which is what makes his movies so goddamn perfect.

Turns out a lot more people care about what the studio thinks than they care about what Even thinks.

Twenty-five days. Isak wants to tear the stupid calendar apart with his bare hands. Wants to shout. Wants to cry.

He does not cry. He doesn’t.

Fifteen days pass. The fifteenth of April passes without Isak noticing it until it’s the seventeenth and he realizes he still hasn’t told Even about his application.

It’s whatever, he figures. It’s not like he’s scared he won’t get in – he’s got the grades and he’s got the right course combination and he’s got the brains. He doesn’t need to put any more on Even’s plate than there already is. He’ll just tell him in eight days when Even comes home.

Eight days. Then fourteen days. Then another fourteen days. The problems going from the editing to framing choices to choices in general. More and more problems with each day that passes. Another week added on top of those extra fourteen days.

Promo starts despite there not being an actual movie that the stupid studio wants to show. It’s not a lot – not exactly the big conferences and rows upon rows of interviews – most of it is on various social media platforms, but it’s gaining a following, slowly but surely.

More weeks. Promo finishes.

Isak is russ by now, but he doesn’t get to show off the red pants with his name on them to Even, doesn’t go out partying because he isn’t on a bus, doesn’t really have any friends. He crashes house parties every once in a while, but they’re not particularly fun.

Still beats spending every night alone in his and Even’s empty apartment. It’s still better than going days upon days not speaking to Even.

There’s a due date, a premier date. Isak steadily makes little red x’s and thinks after that day Even will come home.

The premier date is pushed back.

Even is panicking, and Isak understands why, but he doesn’t understand the actual technicalities of the problem, and Even is, as said, panicking too much to explain it to him properly.

Isak had always thought that movies just got made and then shown in the cinema, but apparently that isn’t the case, or at least it isn’t with non-full length feature films, which is what Even has made.

He doesn’t understand the severity of the problem until he hears five rapid knocks on his front door.

The thing is, Even’s movie was supposed to be in theaters nearly a month ago by now, but it isn’t. There’s absolutely nothing, and Even doesn’t know what’s going on so Isak doesn’t know what’s going on.

And that’s when he gets the knock on his door.

They come in a series of raps. Later, Isak thinks they should’ve been heavier, more of a pounding – that would’ve fitted better.

Isak’s wearing an old hoodie of Even’s – the one he’d painted the drawstrings of a few years back by now. He’s worn it so much he can’t scent Even on it anymore, the colors starting to fade from repeated washes and general wear and tear.

He considers taking it off, shoving it under the bed, but then he forces himself not to. There’s no reason to think that anyone showing up on his doorstep would suspect him of wearing another guy’s, of wearing Even’s hoodie.

He quells down the anxiety, takes a deep breath, and opens the door.

Three well-dressed men in suits and ties and identically slicked-back hair are standing on Isak’s doorstep. They’re each holding their own briefcase. All three look very much like they do not want to be here right now, like they clearly have way more important things to do than apparently seek out Isak.

Isak blinks.

“Isak Valtersen?” the guy in the front asks in English. He says it wrong, though – pronounces it Isaac Walltersen, and then he just stands still until Isak replies to him.

“Yes?” He didn’t mean for it to come out as a question. He also didn’t mean to sound as hoarse and quiet as he does.

The man grins brightly at him, but it doesn’t reach his eyes and he doesn’t reach out his hand to shake Isak’s.

“My name’s Harley Walliams, these are my associates, David O’Leary and Pete Simonson. Do you know who we are?”

Isak knows who they are. Harley Walliams was the one who’d overlooked every single signature Even had had to give the studio’s management team. They’re lawyers. Even had raved about them when he’d found out the studio had assigned them to him, had told Isak all about how the clients they took care of were always the one to get the furthest in their careers.

Isak feels very cold all of a sudden, not entirely sure why.

“Yeah,” he repeats, voice still hoarse and small and really not like Isak at all. “I – what –“

“Do you mind if we come in?” Harley interrupts, the hand not holding the briefcase on the door before Isak’s had the time to even register the words. He’s not sure if it looks like Harley Walliams expects to be let in and figuratively put a foot inside the door, or if he expects to be asked to leave and is ensuring Isak can’t shut the door on him.

Isak lets go of the iron grip he has on the door handle, takes a couple steps backwards. His back hits the wall before long. He flushes a bit at the thought of having three hot-shot lawyers inside his very, very tiny shoebox of a home he shared with Even.

It’s his home and it’s his home with Even – he isn’t ashamed of it, he fucking loves it, even if it’s grown to be a hellhole constantly reminding Isak that Even isn’t here rather than the oasis they’d built for themselves. But he’s not embarrassed. He isn’t.

“Charming,” David comments once they’re inside the only actual room in the apartment. Isak’s cheeks burn hotter despite David’s perfectly passive expression and tone, Isak can tell he’s the furthest thing from sincere.

Isak lets his eyes skim over the room to check the state of it – he hadn’t expected any company, not ever, but it’s not too bad. No dirty underwear and no dirty dishes lying around. Just general disarray.

“Oh,” his eyes land on the improvised dining table and the two chairs from the flea market. The only chairs that he and Even own. “The chairs, I can – I –“

God, he can’t run down to the basement and get some fold-out chairs, can he? He doesn’t really want to leave them alone in his home, but he can’t exactly expect them to stand.

“Don’t worry about it!” Harley laughs, clapping Isak on the shoulder, making it feel as if Isak’s knees are about to buckle. “One for you and one for me, we don’t need anything else.”

“Oh.” Isak stumbles when Harley tries to get him closer to the table. The bed’s fairly close, there being so limited an amount of space, maybe he could…

Harley grabs a hold of the chair, pulling it out and maneuvers Isak to sit down, then takes his own seat opposite of Isak.

“There we go!” He grins again, doesn’t meet Isak’s eyes, too busy fiddling with the briefcase and then fiddling with a wad of papers that he turns so they’re wrong side up. “We’re all set up, then.”

Isak blinks. Set up for… what, exactly?

“Mr. Valtersen,” Walltersen, Harley begins, still smiling brightly, “ – may I call you Isak?” Isaac.

Isak doesn’t correct him. “Sure.”

“Isak,” Harley blinks at Isak like they’re in an amicable agreement with each other. “First of all, I’d like to apologize for intruding – this must seem very sudden for you, but we’re afraid it’s necessary.”

Isak’s heartbeat picks up. It’s necessary, what does that mean?

“What is this about?”

Harley doesn’t meet his eyes, instead he starts fiddling with the papers again, restacking them until all the edges are aligned perfectly. Isak can’t sit still, his foot taps against the floor.

“We have some…” he chews over his words for a few very long seconds, “concerns for our client.”

For Even, Isak wants to tell him. They’re talking about a human being, about Even. ‘Client’ is dehumanizing.

He doesn’t correct him. Doesn’t do much of anything as his tongue suddenly feels too big for his mouth and his heart is pounding, because concerns for Even does not sound good. It sounds very, very bad.

It had been a few days since Isak last talked to Even, but it’s been like that for a while and Even had seemed fine the last time Isak had talked to him. Surely – surely someone would’ve called him if something had happened. A few select people of Even’s team know about him, one of them would’ve called Even’s husband if something had happened, if something was wrong, right?

A million thoughts and scenarios fly through Isak’s head as he tries to figure out just what could’ve gone wrong, but none of it seems likely.

It had been part of the contract that Even had to keep up with his medication, had to present proof that he was doing so, Isak knows that, but that doesn’t stop him from nearly leaping up to find Even’s prescriptions, to call Even and tell him to tell them, to call Even’s psychiatrist and have her tell them – he knows Even’s doing alright, there haven’t been any signs whatsoever that he’s slipping! Isak hasn’t spoken to him for more than a couple of days by now, but there hadn’t been any reason to suspect Even of being on the cusp of an episode when he had last spoken to him.

Isak knows Even’s transferred everything when he moved to America – temporarily, Isak angrily reminds himself to add – to ensure he had access to any help he’d need and so he could get the medication he needed. Isak also knows Even’s team must have access to all of that information, so why –

“Has something happened?” flies out of Isak’s mouth, making Harley give him a rather unimpressed look that Isak can’t even feel embarrassed over, not over the thought of something having happened.

“Even’s fine, Isak,” Harley replies smoothly, mispronouncing Even’s name as well. Evan’s fine, Isaac.

Isak can’t even feel annoyed about it. His breath comes out long and shakily, so fucking relieved. Even’s fine. It’s not said in a right way, not in a humane way, but Isak doubts Harley personally interacts with Even, that he’s gotten a chance to get attached the way everyone around Even does. Plus, this is a professional meeting, even if Isak hadn’t been aware that it was happening. He doubts Harley would lie to him about this.

David shuffles his weight around, Isak sees the movement out of the corner of his eye. Back and forth, back and forth, Isak almost wants to offer his chair up just to get him to stop, but he wants answers and explanations more.

He shakes his head, tries to focus on Harley instead of everything else. “Then, what –“

Pete’s moved over to the dresser, looking at one of Even’s old cameras that cost a fortune and only good for taking vintage, pompous pictures. Isak wants him to stop looking at it, but the words don’t come out of his mouth, he doesn’t know how to make them. It’s obvious the camera isn’t Isak’s, but Isak’s never figured out how to talk about Even with anyone, it doesn’t matter that these three men already know about him and Even, Isak literally doesn’t have the words.

“We’re here to talk about your… affiliation with our client.”

Isak’s focus hones in on Harley. His hands are clammy, but his foot finally stills underneath the table. It’s nearly impossible to swallow past the lump that has formed in his throat in no time.

“I thought any issues about that was taken care of,” Isak bites, thinking about the thousands of signatures both of them had had to sign for the management team and then the PR team and then the team of lawyers and probably more teams that Isak’s just forgotten about. “That I am just a part of Even’s private life. He’s allowed to have a private life.”

The English words don’t feel foreign on his tongue, but compared to the three Americans in his home it sounds broken and like his tongue is too big for his mouth.

Harley frowns. He’s stopped fiddling with the papers by now, but the stillness to him just seems unnatural.

“Naturally,” he acquiesces albeit reluctantly. Isak’s foot starts tapping again. “Which is why we haven’t interfered until it became necessary.”

Isak stills.

Cold sweat runs down his back. He doesn’t know what facial expression he’s making, but Harley keeps his perfectly neutral in response.

“He hasn’t told you?” No, Even hasn’t spoken to him in days. “That’s – we’d honestly hoped he would’ve told you himself by now.”

By now. How long – what is going on? Why can’t Harley Walliams just tell him instead of stringing Isak along on a merry-go-round?

Harley does not reply. Instead, he picks up the papers, separates them into two stacks and lays out one in front of Isak, right side up this time so he can read what it says.

What it says makes Isak’s heart stop.

“We’ve had our legal-division here in Norway translate it, if it’s easier for you,” Harley hands over the second stack of papers. Isak doesn’t reach out to hold it so Harley just places it on the table in front of Isak instead.

It doesn’t matter if he sees divorce or skilsmisse, the language isn’t the fucking problem.

“What the fuck is this?” Isak’s hands are shaking, his breathing is too quick. “What the fuck is this?”

“Now, Isak,” Isaac, Harley says calmly. What right does he have to sound so calm when Isak is looking at divorce papers sent to him by Even. “Just take a moment to calm down –“

“I don’t need a moment to calm down,” Isak snaps harshly. Fuck, it hurts to breathe. “I need a goddamn explanation. This – this doesn’t make sense, this –“

He struggles to get air down to his lungs, to push it back out again. All he can see is either divorce or skilsmisse or Harley Walliams.

Harley clears his throat, slowly and pointedly. Isak wants to flip the table.

“It’s become clear that your… relation to our client has become a hindrance to any attempt to further Mr. Næsheim’s career.”

Our marriage, Isak wants to shout. His marriage to Even, Harley Walliams is a coward who can’t even say the words.

At the same time it feels like he’s just been slapped across the face, the sting of it bright and embarrassing and Isak’s cheeks feel unnaturally hot from misplaced shame, because now he knows why these men are here.

They’re here, not because Even is married, they don’t care about that. They’re here because Even is married to him, is married to a guy.

“That’s illegal,” is the first thing that flies out of his mouth. He doesn’t know where his head is at – he feels like a hypocrite, lecturing these men about pride and rights when Isak and Even have been a secret for literal years.

Pete quirks an eyebrow. “Getting divorced?”

Isak scowls at him. “Refusing Even work because of… that. That’s discrimination.”

Fuck, he can’t even say the word out loud. He’s being presented with divorce papers and he still can’t say the actual fucking words.

Harley looks exasperated. “I don’t know what it’s like over here in Norway,” he sighs, saying it like he’s out in the middle of nowhere, on a field where there’s no other company than cows instead of in central Oslo, “but over in America you don’t want to make any enemies over such an inconsequential detail as being gay is –“

Isak feels sick. “He isn’t gay,” he argues under his breath. “He’s pan.”

He doesn’t even know why he says it, lawyer-guy looks like that holds absolutely zero meaning to him, plus he looks more annoyed at having been interrupted.

“Point is,” he snaps, “no one’s going to show a gay director’s movie.”

He isn’t gay, Isak repeats in his head, but that isn’t the part that matters. It doesn’t matter if Even only likes guys or likes both guys and girls or likes anyone or no one. What matters is that he’s married to a guy, married to Isak, and that’s what’s going to stop him.

“The studio can’t sell him. They can’t get a licensing agreement with any of the distribution companies. No one wants his movie.”

It sounds miles away from Isak, like he’s only hearing an echo, like there isn’t a lawyer or a manager or whatever it is he’s supposed to be right in front of him, staring at him in disinterest as he tells him that Even has a choice, and he hasn’t picked Isak.

“I need –“ Isak chokes, slides his chair back despite how dizzy he feels. “I should – I’m gonna call him. I just –“

“Isak,” Harley reaches out and grabs onto Isak’s wrist before he can stand up fully. He keeps mispronouncing his name, pronounces it like he’s American. Isaac. It throws Isak off balance more than he already is. “He’s already made his choice.”

It sounds so final. It is final, but none of it is making sense in Isak’s head.

Why would Even just send three guys to tell him? Why couldn’t he just pick up the phone, explain what’s going on? Why couldn’t he just fucking tell him that he is filing for a divorce?

Oh god. Isak’s about to be divorced. Divorced. He isn’t going to be married, isn’t going to be married to Even, and Isak doesn’t know how to live a life like that, never thought he’d have to.

He really, really wants to pick up his phone and just call Even, just to talk to him, like he always wants to when something’s wrong, when something is right, even if that isn’t the case right now, but –

But now he’s being told he’s the only one who feels like that, who feels the comfort and the want and the need for his, for his –

Even isn’t going to be his husband anymore. Even is going to be his ex. Isak is being divorced. Separated, whatever.

Suddenly, it doesn’t seem as imperative that they hadn’t told anyone when they were friends, when they were something more, when they were actual boyfriends, when they were engaged, when they got married. All that seems to matter now is that Even wants to write all of those moments off, and Isak is being left behind in the dust.

“There’s something else,” Harley says.

Isak’s eyes snap up to look at him. More? What more could there possibly be?

Pete brings out a smaller wad of papers from his briefcase. These papers aren’t from Even. Even wouldn’t even have thought of giving Isak a fucking non-disclosure agreement.

Harley holds out an ink pen that had probably cost more than Isak’s monthly rent does. “We’re going to need you to keep quiet about everything.”

OOOOO

Isak can’t sit still once they’ve left.

He’d spent close to half an hour in despondent silence, completely unresponsive. Harley had kept talking, then Pete and David had tried, but all Isak had been able to do was stare at the papers.

Divorce, divorce, divorce.

He’s not married anymore. Isak isn’t married anymore. He isn’t married to Even, because Even had found out that you couldn’t be a successful director in America and have a husband waiting for you at home, so he had cut off the husband.

For how long had Even known? How many conversations have they had where Even had already made up his mind, where Isak had wasted time crossing out dates to count down for when Even was coming home, when Even was in fact never coming home again.

Isak paces back and forth again. He feels trapped, like he’s stuck in a cage that’s been decorated to appear as a home.

He picks up his phone. He should call Even, he should demand to hear Even explain himself, not three lawyers explain it for him.

Isak throws the phone onto the bed instead.

He cards his fingers through his hair, then does it again, and again, harder and harder until his scalp is hurting and his eyes are watering and, fuck, divorce. He crumbles onto the floor, pressing his eyes against his knees and holding onto his hair tighter and tighter.

Isak feels – he feels young. And he feels stupid. And he feels utterly heartbroken.

It hasn’t been more than a quarter of a day when Isak’s phone buzzes.

Isak blinks slowly, his eyelashes scratching weirdly against the floor. He’ll probably have a mark on his face from how long he’s been lying there.

It takes ages to pick himself up off the floor, to sit up, and then it takes just as long to just stare at his phone, lying innocently wrong side up on top of the duvet. Isak’s hand shakes when he reaches out and grabs it, his fingers twitching as he unlocks it.

They’re showing my movie! the text says and Isak feels sick.

Alright, he already got the hint; Even wants the divorce so he can be a big movie director, fine, but he doesn’t have to shove it in Isak’s face. God, Isak feels sick, he thinks he might actually throw up over a text message.

It takes another day for the phone calls to start ringing in.

Constantly, constantly, his ring tone sounds, the stupid jingle Even had set up – some theme song from some movie Isak doesn’t want to think about, because he doesn’t want to be thinking about Even. Isak doesn’t get out of bed to answer the calls or turn the phone off.

His phone runs out of battery at the end of the day.

When he finally can’t stand lying in his own filth anymore and he isn’t currently crying, he gets up and plugs it in.

86 missed calls. 236 new messages. All his storage has been filled up. One of those texts are from Eskild, just sending him a picture of himself pouting at the camera, text written on the picture saying miss you xxx, and it’s stupid that that’s what makes Isak tear up again. Not the 235 messages from Even, but one dumb picture from Eskild.

He hates crying and he’s been doing nothing but for the past couple of days. He reeks and he has no energy and he hates being here in his goddamn home – his home with Even.

Even’s things are everywhere. There’s his stupid hoodie still slung over the back of the chair, and there are his movies, various knickknacks, all his drawings pinned up on the wall, a couple of old notebooks, his clothes, his favorite mug, and Isak wants to scream and tear it all apart. He wants to hurt Even as much as he’s hurting.

He storms into the kitchen to smash that stupid cup to bits and pieces. Flings the cupboard door open to tear it out of its place and into millions of unfixable pieces.

He crumbles onto the floor before he can do any of that. He’s clutching on to the mug desperately, the sobs wrack through his body, the sounds coming out of his mouth ugly and so loud he doesn’t hear the phone start ringing again.

OOOOO

The mature thing would be to call Even up, demand an explanation, actually talk things through.

It’s the mature thing to do. It’s the rational thing to do.

But Isak both feels so incredibly young and small right now and he’s the furthest thing from rational.

He just – he doesn’t want to actually hear the words coming out of Even’s mouth. Doesn’t want to hear him admit directing and writing just being more important to him than Isak has ever been, could ever be.

And, like, it’s – it’s not okay, none of this is okay, but that’s the exact reason why Isak let him go to begin with. Why he was okay and why he encouraged Even to go to America, to just go for it, try it out. He’d wanted it for Even, still does, somewhere deep, deep, deep inside where the hurt and pain hasn’t fully torn him apart just yet.

It’s not far off, though. Isak feels how the bitterness threatens to swallow him up.

He didn’t know Even going off to follow his dream meant leaving Isak behind. That had never been what it was about – at least, it hadn’t been what it was about to Isak. Right now, Isak has no idea what Even ever thought the plan or the point was. He doesn’t know which version is better, easier to believe in for his rapidly crumbling mental health; that Even had been aware already before he left Norway that leaving Isak could very quickly turn from a temporary to a permanent situation, or if it’s nicer to think that Even had always planned to come back to him at one point, and only when directly faced with the choice he hadn’t chosen Isak.

It’s both stupidly easy and stupidly hard to pack up all of Even’s things.

He does it mindlessly, which is the easy part. The hard part is to actually bear the thought that he’s getting rid of Even’s things.

He should be angry. He is – he is so fucking angry he’s furious and he’s hurt, but if he stops to think about all of that again he’ll end up crying and Isak is so fucking sick of crying.

His body doesn’t allow him to go on, though, so that’s where he is now; sitting on their – his bed, looking helplessly around in their – his flat that looks like a tornado has swept through it.

Everything is in disarray and there are boxes on every available flat surface area, most only packed halfway. Isak’s sitting with Even’s hoodie in his hands, twisting the drawstrings around his fingers, around and around and around until he feels dizzy and hollow with it.

God, this wasn’t what he’d thought his life would be.

He’s already sent in his applications for university weeks before everything went to shit. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to go there when everything is so shit, doesn’t know how to focus enough to take his exams, to pass his exams, to show up at school, to show up to a university where he doesn’t know anyone and no one knows him and –

The hoodie is soft in his hands and he can’t bring himself to get rid of Even’s things, he can’t, but he can’t stand to look at them either and he can’t stand not being able to look at them.

Fuck.

Fuck, he doesn’t know what to do.

OOOOO

Confusion comes first.

It’s there when Isak’s being told Even has sent a team of lawyers and managers to tell him they’re getting a divorce. When he apparently couldn’t bring himself to tell Isak himself.

Isak knows it was there when he kept repeating to said lawyers that Even isn’t gay, because he isn’t, but he kept saying it like that was the important part – not the divorce part.

And it’s there when Isak wonders what the fuck went wrong, what did he do, why does Even want this? He can’t figure it out – absolutely none of it, because none of it makes sense, and Isak’s just so fucking confused.

He thought they were alright, he thought they were making it, he thought they were strong enough to wait for Isak to finish up school, graduate, and then he come travel around with Even wherever he wanted to go to film and it would be brilliant.

He thought they were in love. And he’s so confused, because he really thought he knew Even, and he’s so certain he would’ve picked up on it along the way the moment it turned from Isak and Even loving each other to only Isak being in love.

Confusion is awful, and it leaves Isak dizzy and with a headache and feeling vaguely ill. He wants to call someone, wants to call Eskild, because Eskild always helps, but Eskild doesn’t know about Even, about Isak, no one knows and now –

It takes a while for the confusion to turn into denial.

It’s easy to tell it’s denial, because all Isak does is stare at the papers with big, bold, black letters at the top spelling out d-i-v-o-r-c-e, and all he can think is that doesn’t make sense. Those papers aren’t for him, they’re for someone else, their neighbors, the one’s next door who are always fighting. They’re meant for people whose love turned so ugly and violent there was absolutely no way back – the antithesis to him and Even.

It’s all centered around we’re in love, like that’ll fix everything, like it’s both the problem and the solution, because they’re in fucking love.

Isak paces back and forth, going along the small stretch by the foot of their bed before he hits the chairs at the table and the dresser at the other end, back and forth, back and forth. Stops and stares at the papers for a few beats too long, and then starts pacing again until he gets so dizzy he has to lay down.

He should just call Even. It’s what makes sense – the only thing out of all of this that makes fucking sense. Isak doesn’t know why he doesn’t just pick up the goddamn phone and call Even. If he wants this divorce so fucking badly, he can damn well tell him himself.

It doesn’t take long for denial to turn to anger.

Confusion made Isak feel off-kilter and sick. Denial made him feel like he was going out of his mind, like he was living in a parallel universe where the curtains are non-existent because there are shutters put up instead, like this isn’t his life.

Anger is ugly. Probably one of the ugliest feelings Isak has ever felt.

It curls up in his stomach and chest like a beast, grumbling to be let out. Isak feels it looming, feels it growing until it finally bursts out.

Denial had made him want to call Even and demand an explanation, demand being told that this entire thing is just a prank, that it’s for a film, that he’s still in love with him, whatever, Isak will accept whatever reason Even gives him.

Anger is different. Anger makes him want to hurt Even, makes him want to never see him again, makes him want for Even to suffer.

It makes him wish that he never met Even to begin with, that he never moved out of the kollektiv, that they never got married, that they never fell in love in the first place, that Even never showed him all he could have, all he ever wanted and dreamt of, and then ripped it away again within the same breath.

It’s there when he stares at his phone, stares at the text message that so clearly shows Even’s enthusiasm at his film being shown just because Isak signed a couple papers and effectively ended their marriage. Isak stares at the exclamation marks, feels his heartbeat pick up and sees how his hands start to shake, how he squeezes around the phone too hard, how he can barely breathe, how he’s seeing red.

And all the anger, the hurt, everything, that had been bubbling away inside of him boils over.

They’ve still got some moving boxes left over from when they moved in; tucked nicely away in the closet, unfolded and flat and serving as a barrier between the floor and their shoes. The top box is a little muddy from Isak’s trainers, but it’s long since dried up so it just flakes off when Isak accidentally touches it.

It just makes him feel even more angry to see the dirt lying on the floor. Stupid, fuck, shit, fucking shit.

It shouldn’t be this easy to pack another person’s life into three boxes, shouldn’t be so easy to pick apart Even’s belongings from Isak’s, but it is. Isak tears through their flat like a tornado, a goddamn whirlwind that doesn’t care about the destruction it leaves behind.

He packs away some of the camera equipment Even left behind first, isn’t one bit careful with it because he doesn’t care if it cracks, to hell with that. Even’s off to be a big movie director, he can goddamn well afford to replace whatever shitty second-hand shit he’d gotten his hands on back when movies had shared a first place in his priorities. Isak can probably just blame it on however that ends up shipping it across the globe to him, say he forgot the fragile sticker and leave it at that.

Then he grabs whatever else of knick-knacks Even had left behind. Movies, drawing utensils, books. They all make satisfying thumps and crashes when Isak throws them together; metal scraping against metal and possibly one or two pencils and brushes snapping in half. Isak feels vindictive and vindicated all in one.

They don’t have any photographs of the two of them around, didn’t dare to, just in case, so Isak makes a mental note to delete them off of his phone instead, every single last one of them. Or maybe print some of them out first so he can burn them.

He ends with the clothes, because throwing clothes around is never satisfying, and Isak had hoped he would’ve burned through at least some of the anger by now, but he hasn’t, he really, really hasn’t.

Seeing Even’s clothes probably makes it worse.

It’s difficult to tell what’s Even’s and what’s Isak’s; all of it so intertwined and interchangeable Isak wants to tear it all apart instead of sorting through it. He keeps the Jesus-shirt, because it’s originally Eskild’s, and Eskild is Isak’s so Even sure as hell isn’t getting it.

But the clothes are also the worst thing to get rid of, because they’ve been sealed up in the closet or the dresser for months by now. They’ve mixed with Isak’s scent, with the scent of their laundry detergent, sure, but they still smell so much like Even it actually brings Isak to his knees and makes him struggle to breathe.

That feeling doesn’t go away. Even when he manages to get up onto his knees, then his feet, then onto the bed, Isak still feels it.

It’s like there’s something in his chest, weighing him down; his heart, his lungs, everything – nothing is left alone, and Isak feels heavy with it.

It’s – god, everything is so fucked up, and now that Isak’s paused in his frenzy it’s so fucking obvious Isak kind of wants to laugh.

He ends up crying instead. Crying and unable to breathe and looking utterly pathetic, buried between mountains of clothes strewn all over the place, like the closet actually exploded all over him, clutching what had always been his favorite of Even’s hoodies.

It’s soft and worn through and it smells so much like Even that Isak physically can’t let go of it. He can’t. His fingers won’t cooperate, and when he tries to throw it his arms refuse to work.

OOOOO

Isak picks up the phone when the unanswered calls list is closer to quadruple digits than triple.

“Just pick up – Isak!” Even breathes when he realizes Isak actually picked up. “Isak, thank god, don’t hang up, please – “

He hadn’t expected hearing Even’s voice to hurt as much as it does. It hurts.

He wants to demand an explanation, demand an apology, wants to be assertive and confident and not let Even know just how fucked up he is right now. He wants to shout and be mean and make Even feel bad, and at the same time he desperately wants for Even to say it’s been a bad prank, that he’s awful and he’s sorry and of course he’s not leaving Isak.

Suddenly, Isak does not want an explanation. He doesn’t want to hear a single word from Even.

“Have your team send out your stuff to you,” he says instead of all that. He’s proud that his voice doesn’t shake.

“Isak, I – what?”

Isak squeezes his eyes shut. “And figure out what you want to do with –“ our home “– the apartment. It’s your name on the lease, so you need to be the one to put it up for sale, if that’s what you want to do.”

“If that’s what I – Isak, for god’s sake, just stop!”

‘Just stop’? ‘Just stop’? Isak is the one who wants it to stop, what the hell is Even telling him to stop for?

He just wants everything to be over.

He doesn’t look over at the two boxes filled with Even’s things that Isak couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing again. The stupid, stupid hoodie is lying at the bottom of one of them.

“I’ll leave my key underneath the doormat for them. If some of your shit is missing it’s because I’ve gotten rid of it.”

“Isak –“

Isak hangs up, shuts off his phone and throws it onto the bed. Then he spends the next day, curled up, unmoving and unresponsive.

OOOOO

He doesn’t know what to do.

He can’t just show up at the kollektiv with all of his shit, there isn’t any room for him and he doesn’t know how to explain any of it. He can’t stay in their basement either, not with how close Eskild had been to getting in a lot of trouble with the landlord.

For the first time in so long, Isak doesn’t have a home to come back to. He’s on his own and he doesn’t know what to do, where to go.

He figures it out by accident.

It’s a complete coincidence that he gets the email when he goes to charge his phone, the notification popping up at the same time as the screen lights up to tell Isak it’s charging.

The answer to some – one – of Isak’s problems comes in the form of student housing, because Isak’s been accepted to UiO. He got in.

He doesn’t stick around long enough to find out who Even sends to take care of the apartment or how he even plans on doing it. He just leaves his key underneath the doormat like he’d told Even he would, walks down all four flights of stairs and doesn’t turn around or look back.

He’s got enough stuff to warrant two trips back and forth his and Even’s – the old apartment and the new flat he’ll share with eight other people, but Isak knows that if he has to go back, he’ll never actually leave, he’ll just be stuck there until Even’s people throw him out. He can’t let that happen, can’t let anyone see him like that, can’t have them reporting back to Even, you broke your husband.

Ex-husband, Isak reminds himself. Ex. He broke his ex-husband, because that part is true enough. Isak can’t remember ever feeling this torn apart ever before.

So he fits everything he owns into a suitcase, two backpacks and two boxes of Even’s stuff that he can’t bring himself to let go off, and he wrangles all of it onto the tram halfway across Oslo. The further the better, he thinks bitterly.

He stops on the way there to buy a bottle of something, anything – whiskey, he thinks it is he ends up with. He doesn’t check, just goes for the cheapest there is with the highest alcohol percentage, grabs it, hands over the money and leaves.

He just wants to forget. He wants to not feel broken.

Somewhere underneath all of the hurt and the anger, there’s a small part of Isak that’s happy for Even. Despite how much he tries to crush it down, suppress it, tear it apart, it doesn’t go away. He can’t stand thinking the thought already, not already it’s too close, but he knows it’s because he’s still so terribly, horribly in love with Even.

Next part

[mimiplaysgames]

Terra Week Day 6 (Free Day)

Summary: Sometimes, a ghost is a wish. | Word Count: 3,218

Read on AO3

A/N: For Terra Week 2021! You can find that account on Twitter!

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The Tenets of a Master, Ch. 6

The Master’s bedroom is exactly as he left it many years ago. Bed made, dresser (now) dusty, curtains parted to let the sunlight in, walk-in closet neatly organized with not a single article of clothing in his hamper, as the Master was a fan of washing clothes every single day. Terra never found out why. 

Terra has rummaged through this drawer three times already and still he can’t find them. He’s looking for a stack of sepia-toned pictures, cradled in a small envelope, the ones on the top dated many years ago when the Master was a student, while the ones at the bottom chronicle some of his adult life when Terra and Aqua were children. He’s tried searching every drawer, every box, every cupboard, and has even looked under the mattress and in the pillow cases. He couldn’t have misremembered them, could he?

One of the things he’s surprised to find instead is a small, delicately furnished wooden box with a latch. Full of cigars. The Master never smoked, but maybe he liked to smell like them. Though Terra would never personally choose to keep a set in his dresser, smudging all his clothes. 

Sighing, Terra stands by the bed, taking another gander around the room to see if there’s a spot he could have missed. Maybe behind the mirror? No, not there. He slips his hands into his pockets, and finds something else. Folded over in four, the paper is crumpled, living in his pocket for the better part of a week. Naminé’s drawing of Xemnas is messier, the strokes of crayon meshed into each other that he’s less of a childish, crude figure and more of a smear. That ring of fire surrounding him stays closed. 

Terra grunts.

Here comes another headache, a tense pulse above his brow. Massaging it never helps. Suddenly, Terra is not in his Master’s old bedroom anymore. Suddenly, he’s standing high on a cliff overlooking a wasteland, talking to someone in a black cloak with the hood up. 

Now he’s back in the bedroom, the sun cutting shapes through the lace curtains with the breeze passing by. In a few minutes, the headache will go away. This is how it goes every single time.

Yes, it’s been a week since they left Radiant Garden. Only Ienzo uses the Gummiphone for contact, leaving long messages that take Terra too much time to reply back to. The rest of the team would prefer correspondence through letters, which is something Terra would rather do as well. He just hasn’t done so yet, focusing his attention on cleaning the castle as they start a new life without their old Master. Once that’s done, he promises himself to do so. 

It’s a shame, he knows he should make more of an effort (and promises that he would once he takes care of the Master). Xion sometimes texts him with pictures, some of them with Roxas, who still hasn’t made an effort to talk to him even though they played a good race at the beach (Terra didn’t even need to let him win—that kid is fast). That’s okay. Xion has offered to set Terra up with what she calls a Kingstagram account, and Terra supposes that’s okay, too. He just doesn’t know what that is or if it’s worth his time. 

In the end, he is still really bad at connecting with others, and he’s still out of pictures, and he still doesn’t know what to do with the Xemnas drawing. Any moment now, Aqua will come looking for him. They’re finally preparing for his memorial, to say goodbye to his Keyblade—

—And Terra has to say goodbye forever without ever seeing him again. What’s the point of staying linked to these memories if they do nothing for him? 

Why does looking at this drawing of Xemnas the only thing that gives him reminders?

Grunting, Terra rubs his face. Maybe it’s as good a time as any to text somebody now, distract himself so he calms down and do some good so he’s not completely isolated. He waits for his Gummiphone to turn on to the initial screen, the whirring of the machine the only noise accompanying him. How did Ven do this again? He clicks on his address book. Now he has to remember how to open a text and take a picture, particularly of the Xemnas drawing.

terra

did he ever call you an also-ran

Send.

Terra doesn’t expect Lea to answer right away. He probably will read the text, probably take the time he needs to register how he feels before painting his usual bright smile that he uses to play everyone. Maybe Terra has him all wrong. Maybe this is really offensive, and Lea would actually be upset. It’s not his intention.

The Gummiphone buzzes several times.

lea

see

i told isa the other day

the first time i saw you i thought you looked like an asshole

Terra snorts to himself quietly.

terra

is that your favorite word

lea

;3

So it’s all good. Terra breathes a sigh of relief, a smirk that’s warm on his cheeks. He doesn’t know if texting people randomly is the right way to go about doing this whole make-new-friends thing. It’s not as easy as walking up to somebody and saying hello anymore, but starting a new life doesn’t have a manual. 

As though the chains he linked through Xemnas harbor resentment, he’s hit with another spasm of pain, drilling onto the side of his skull. Stars, they get intense sometimes, some of them downright gorey. He will not think about it. He will push it away. The pain subsides but only a bit, throbbing instead. 

It can’t end like this. He’s avoided going back to Naminé ever since just to keep trying and see Eraqus, one more time. One more. It’s not much to ask for, so why can’t the stars be more forgiving? He swears to them he’ll never ask for something again. 

Terra groans, pain hammering over his brow. What’s coming this time is going to knock him around, so he lowers himself to his knees. Several people dressed in extravagant embroidery, from some other world, being swallowed up by darkness, their hearts floating up to the sky and a small cry of Mister, is my mommy coming back? 

When it’s over, Terra sobs, keeping a heave from rupturing his chest and wiping dry tears. If Aqua comes in and sees him like this, she’ll freak—she’s already brewed so many potions and teas for him whenever he has an episode. 

He tries for the closet again. The Master kept his most expensive robes wrapped in plastic, preserving a faded scent of cedar. Terra takes the fabric, smooth as silk, and breathes into it. It’s weaker than last time. He could always spray it with the Master’s leftover cologne (his favorite), but it still wouldn’t smell exactly like him, and as Terra waits seconds for another memory to come, he realizes as soon as it hurts that it wouldn’t bother with giving him what he’s looking for. All he asks for is the sound of the Master’s voice, to see that smile move one more time so he makes sure he sears it into his mind for the rest of his life. 

Instead, a strong voice (Xehanort’s) talks about the Darkness making way for the Light, just like the expansive sky that is home to the stars. It was necessary to pursue it, he had said to someone. 

A single tear treads all the way to Terra’s jawline. He’s tried his best. No photos, no special memory. It’s like the Master doesn’t linger here anymore.

Defeated, Terra pulls his Gummiphone out, searching for Naminé’s entry. He won’t commit to an appointment. He’s only asking questions, wondering if there are better ways to maneuver through the memories so he gets what he wants. She doesn’t answer right away. 

He pulls himself up at the foot of the bed, aching like an older man even though he looks twenty in the mirrors. What lies.

Where else to find mementos? Terra has already looked through the Master’s study and his favorite spots in the library. The only place left is the attic. 

The attic sits atop the northeast tower. Terra is in the residential wing, in the southeast tower, so he has to travel several paces downstairs to make it over, just to climb all the way back up. Entirely built of wood, the attic has one stained-glass window that slices pastels through the floorboards. A lot of junk gets dumped up here—old knight statues from a Master that lived eight-hundred years ago or so, faded paintings that have names but aren’t recognizable anymore, couches that are stained and out of style, chests of outdated books and maps, and trinkets and gifts that litter everywhere else. Even Aqua can’t bear to let any of this go despite that none of it truly belongs to anybody. To her, it’s like rejecting their history. The Master probably had felt the same.

Before what happened, Master Eraqus was moving items up here, mostly stacks of papers. They were shoved in a leather binder, tied together with string. It’s a long shot the photos will be with them, but regardless, Terra begins the hunt. 

It’s not in the chest of crystals. Not by the old (creepy) dollhouse. Not with any of the broken phonograms, nor with the folded rugs that stack from floor to ceiling. 

But it’s right there, sitting neatly by a basket full of gold artifacts from worlds Terra has never been to and engraved in languages he doesn’t know, tied with a red string and stitched in handmade leather. When Terra pulls it open, he’s greeted by a handful of letters written to Eraqus about trouble in other worlds, asking for his help, and a stack of essays about the philosophy of the Keyblade, both in the common-tongue and the ancient. 

It’s nothing like reliving memories or watching them like footage, but Terra imagines the Master working late into the night on his desk with a quill, writing these essays slowly so he keeps his impeccable script. He’d read books with a glass of wine every night, and keep at it in the morning with a mug of coffee, hair unbrushed as usual but that’s fine when he keeps it in a short ponytail every day. He’d disappear every week to some other world, leaving Terra and Aqua with a nanny until they were old enough to take care of themselves. Considering what these people are writing about—missing circus animals, their neighborhood mountain being possessed, and even an early report of Unversed showing up in the woods—the Master used to be a busy man. 

Why did he have to die that day? Why can’t Terra keep the things that are supposed to come with home?

Terra sniffs. The smell of cedar comes up, as though the cologne was sprayed up here recently. Kicked up with a cloud of dust, as though the Master is here.

I am… well, for a short time at least.

Terra whips over his shoulder to find the Master behind him, a glow beaming through him as he checks the rust spreading on one of the oldest sets of armor. Picking up dust, Master Eraqus rubs it between his fingers.

This sorely needs urgent attention. I recommend some solvent and a spot of oil, he says, smiling at Terra as if it’s any other morning and breakfast will be announced soon. So many histories live here.

“Master?” Terra drops the papers.

Eraqus tsks his disapproval and like muscle memory, Terra immediately gathers the papers together, working on automatic mode, tucking them under his arm as if this is class and he has to be on his best behavior. When the Master approaches, he makes no noise: no thuds to his steps, no wind whooshed by his robe, gliding gracefully across the floor. Terra bows... though he cannot fight the urge to stare up. Terra has forgotten about the scar; it was on the Master’s face,  every single day, but he’s never heard the story behind it. An elephant accident. A run-in with pirates. Those were the contradicting explanations he’s heard every time he asks.

The Master looks down, motioning with his hand to stand up. Look at you. Almost as tall as I am.

“You’re here.”

The Master smiles. This is the happiest Terra remembers him being; he must not feel his chronic back pains anymore. You have spent your whole week following me. He gives Terra a mischievous knowing in his eyes. I suppose it would be rude of me not to return the gesture.

“I’m sorry,” Terra gasps, mouth gaped open for all the words he prepared, but now that the moment is passing by, he doesn’t know what to say anymore. He reaches out with a hand but stops himself, scared of what it would feel like to to pass right through the image. “I missed you.”

And I have missed you all so much, Eraqus says with contentment.

“I wish it never happened,” Terra chokes. “Sometimes, I wish I could find some way—”

Shhh. The Master shakes his head lovingly. Don’t. No longer shall you venture down the path of grief. You have already experienced first-hand what such curiosities could lead to. And you already know you don’t need to. 

“I know,” Terra whispers. “I know.”

When the Master smiles this time, he sighs and closes his eyes like he’s feeling the sun. I have reunited with so many of my old friends since. Such a peaceful existence. He opens them. Your friendships are something to cherish for as long as they can physically walk by your side, Terra. But who am I to lecture? You have always. Friends to love, who want to care for you. I am so proud.

So proud…

Tears, quiet and happy, fall like drops of spring, Terra hearing what he always yearned to hear since he was six years old, a comforting embrace that wants to tell him he can breathe again without feeling guilty. 

But he still does. Every living breath is guilty by association.

“She’s so happy now,” Terra whispers as if to justify his actions, remembering Aqua sparring for the first time with Rainfell in years, hesitant at first, unsure of how it’s going to react with spells, but it comes fast. It comes like drinking water, natural and needed. “I don’t regret anything.”

Which was why you were the perfect candidate when I had asked you to look after them. He smirks. I couldn’t have trusted anyone better for the responsibility. 

Terra swallows, searching for the courage not to ask, believing he shouldn’t. He’s weak. “I am?”

The smile falls. You are not weak. 

You are willing to bare it all for your friends. Your bonds with Aqua and Ven are unbreakable, a magical, special, living Light to behold. A forge stronger than chains, weightless and free. I am sorry for seeding so much doubt within you, when you have so much to offer. If only I wasn’t—it was my duty to do better. That is my shame. He shakes his head at himself. But you’ve been so dedicated to the past, Terra, he says, concerned but not disappointed. Too much so. I worry. 

Terra grimaces. “Ha, I never have any explanations for the dumb mistakes I make when I need to.”

You’ll find little answers in what lies behind you. The Master leans forward, pulling a small smile as he studies Terra’s eyes. But you are more than capable. Please do me the favor. Trace the past no longer. You have your bonds to nourish, and more to flower. Then he smiles more, an epiphany in his eyes like he wants to share a secret. Only in death did I realize what true Mastery really is. The living can be so foolish. 

“You weren’t a fool, Master.”

Master… A Master is a forever student. To deny this is to be blind to your faults. Eraqus laughs, his eyes rolling. What would I have said to my younger self. You don’t see that one in the books. 

“I don’t know, I… I think what I did for Aqua trumps any dream I had in becoming Master.”

Eraqus’s eyes glisten. Do you not see one when you look at yourself in the mirror? 

Terra bows his head, squeezing his eyes shut.

He feels a hand on his shoulder, warm and real. Terra could hug him. But he doesn’t, not when Eraqus slips something flat in his hand. 

Do take care of them. He holds Terra’s jaw. Chin up, son.

Footsteps climb up the stairs leading into the attic, and Terra is alone with a smooth piece of paper in one hand, the other wiping tears from his cheeks.

“Terra? You okay? I’ve been looking everywhere for you.” Aqua is carrying a finished wreath with purple flowers. She stops when she gasps, looking around the attic. “That smells like the Master’s cologne,” she whispers.

When Terra smiles, he cries more. “Look at this.”

A sepia-toned picture of Eraqus as a young boy, sitting on a window seat with a chess board laid out in front of him, all teeth from ear to ear, sincere and hopeful. He looks at the camera like it’s his best friend. 

Aqua’s eyes light up as she takes it, a tear for each eye. “Look at him. It’s so strange, but he was adorable.”

“Have you ever seen that one?”

“Never. It wasn’t with the others.”

“The others?”

She strokes the photo with her thumb. “Hm. I moved them into my room. I wanted to frame them.” She holds it to her chest. “Can I take this one?”

“For your room?”

“I’ve got one ready for yours. It’s that nice portrait that used to embarrass him.”

The one where he looked serious enough to judge someone to death. The Master had called it unsightly when it was presented to him.

“That one’s perfect.”

Aqua exhales deeply, shivering as tries to keep herself tall. “I’m so sad he’s gone, and... I don’t know. Sometimes I wish I had given him a Wayfinder. He feels so far away.”

He holds her chin softly, keeping it up as her heavy tears fall. “We could give him ours.”

She stops sobbing and stares through Terra when the realization hits her. She nods. “That’s a wonderful idea,” she says, nuzzling the wreath closer to her, her own little hug for the Master. 

Terra’s Gummiphone buzzes in his pocket. That has to be Naminé. 

“The wreath is beautiful,” he tells Aqua, and that grounds her back to reality. “You’ve done a marvelous job.”

“Thank you.” She strokes some of the leaves to keep them in place. “I’ll see you back at the front door?”

“Definitely.”

He’ll let her go downstairs first, pulling out the Gummiphone to read his new text. He’s going to tell Naminé that he’s changed his mind. He’s ready for an appointment.

[chikoriita]

The Search for Sora Ch.6

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Interlude II: Naminé

Enough was enough. The last 24 hours passed without progress. If this morning did not result in any changes, Naminé swore she would chuck her pencil at them.

“Them” referred to the castle inhabitants: Ansem the Wise and his apprentices. She was not sure who counted in that group anymore.

She arrived this morning, escorted by Cid and Leon upon the King’s orders. Naminé expected a welcome akin to the one she received at her awakening. Tacit acceptance and professional respect. She assumed these grown men were mature enough to face her.

Not at all. Aeleus, the silent stalwart, was kind enough to take her bags to her room and meet her with a small smile. The most Dilan did was allow her into the castle and direct her to the library. Inside sat only Ienzo, nervously shaking his leg. His long hair, messy as always, hung over his eyes.

Naminé barely got one word out when he stood up and quickly blurted, “Welcome to the castle. Here’s your information. Goodbye!”

Before she even blinked, he dropped a file at her feet and shot out of the room. The only sign that he was there was the cup of tea on the table.

If she hadn’t been so shocked by his rudeness, Naminé would have been angry. If anyone should be wary, it was her! She came into this assignment with reservations, considering their shared past. She wanted to work with the Restoration Committee instead, but the King insisted that she take point. The Castle had better connections with the Gummi Network, and Ienzo already worked extensively with Chip and Dale. Ansem the Wise assured the King that she was welcome at the Castle.

After spending the evening alone in her room with only the information in the file and dinner, she felt truly welcome that night. At least Ienzo left her room key in the file. Little favors, she supposed.

Ansem the Wise, DiZ as she knew him, still held a grudge it seemed. Naminé was the loose end he never tied up. That fact alone is why it mystified her that he was the main reason she and Roxas came back. Without him and the other apprentices, it might not have been possible.

Naminé knew when to be grateful. The window for gratitude was quickly closing. Her mission was to help Kairi and Riku find a way to bring Sora back, not deal with these childish antics.

Well, if no one wanted to show her around, she might as well get used to her new headquarters in the lab. Naminé pulled the map out of the file Ienzo gave her and grabbed her bag. The route to the lab was legible and clearly marked. ‘This should be simple enough.’

She tiptoed down the hallway and followed the dim lights to the lift stop at the end. The darkness frightened her just a bit. On one hand, the others would be asleep and not in her way. On the other, she hated being alone. From birth to rebirth, Naminé was alone. She was tired of it. When Riku came to escort her to Destiny Islands, she vowed that she would not allow anymore solitude in her life.

Naminé thought on her promise as she entered the lift stop chamber. The moonlight filtered through the stained glass on the ceiling, reflecting light everywhere. If not for the dead silence in the castle, Naminé may have appreciated the view more. Right then, however, all she wanted was to get to the basement level. She stifled a small giggle; she doubted anyone ever hurried down to the laboratories.

The computers’ soft buzzing welcomed her to the lab. She found multiple stations in various states of disarray. All except one. That one had only one piece of paper.

Welcome Naminé

If the handwriting on her file was any indication, this was Ienzo’s doing. Out of all of the apprentices, he was the mystery. His contradictory actions confused her. First, he meticulously organized a welcome packet for her, then soon after, dropped it and ran away.

She waved away those thoughts. As long as she was here, she add a few personal touches to her workstation. She had already papered the walls at Isa and Lea’s house with her observational drawings. Naminé was determined to leave her mark everywhere now. Never again would she fade into oblivion with nothing to remember her by. Here, she started at her computer.

As she considered which of her drawings to pin first, she heard the soft hiss of the sliding door to the manufactory. Someone else was down here. Gasp. Correction: someone else knew she was down here. She glanced out the door window and saw the glimpse of lavender hair.

She shook her head. “I don’t bite, Ienzo,” Naminé called out to the man hiding behind the door. “You can come in.”

The door slid open once again, and Ienzo poked his head around the corner. She waved him inside, and he slowly shuffled into the lab.

“I did not want to - that is - You are settling? I mean, are you okay?” Ienzo stumbled over his words.

She continued arranging the sketches on her desk and shrugged. “Well enough. Although,” she swiveled toward him on the chair, “I prefer my coworkers not avoiding me.”

He winced. “We deserve that. I deserve that.” He walked slowly toward her and avoided eye contact.

Even now, Naminé could not believe the treatment. He was talking to and still avoiding her. Enough was enough. She laughed harshly. “I expected at least professional courtesy despite our history.”

Ienzo raised a brow, barely visible under his hair. “Despite?”

“I am not just a Replica. I remember everything.” Remembered more than she cared to. Marluxia’s taunts and Larxene’s blows. Her time at Castle Oblivion and the Organization… the less she reminisced, the less it continued to hurt her.

“Don’t you see! That’s why we decided to leave you be.”

His words stalled Namine’s thoughts. “Pardon?” She asked, trying to meet his eyes.

He refused to look at her, instead choosing to pace around the lab. “Ansem the Wise is terrified to see you,” Ienzo started.

She did not predict that sentiment, and knowing it hurt more than she thought possible. It must be due to the new heart. If only data-hearts didn’t hurt as much as the real ones.

“He’s scared? But I don’t even have my powers anymore!” Naminé insisted. “I can’t hurt anyone. I promise.” Tears burned her, trying to escape no matter how hard she held them back.

Ienzo stopped his pacing and mouthed the words she just said.

“Hurt anyone?” He whispered in confusion. He turned to her and saw her crumpled face. “Naminé,” he said softly. Ienzo knelt in front of her. “You don’t believe that, do you?”

She felt the traitorous drops on her hands clenched in her skirt. She nodded.

“The five of us harmed more lives than you can imagine. Even I, who was barely older than Kairi when everything occurred, share the blame. The only way to live the rest of our lives is to repay those we hurt. The Organization’s reach was great, but the greatest sin was their cruelty to you.”

Naminé wiped her eyes and glanced at Ienzo. Standing, he towered over her, same as the rest of the apprentices. Now, he looked like he wanted to shrink into the ground at her feet.

She spoke quietly, just loud enough to rival the hum of the machines.“Aren’t we all here to get over our pasts? How do we move beyond the horrible history we all share?”

He looked up but didn’t answer her. Maybe there wasn’t a clear cut answer. Maybe, just maybe, she and Ienzo and all the other former Nobodies would find meaning in their lives past their darkest phase. Together.

The next morning was a stark difference from the night prior. Instead of a cold dinner and solitude, she found a spread of piping hot breakfast items with a serving of company.

Naminé cleared her throat. “Thank you for the invitation,” she directed to the five men sitting alongside her at the table. Ienzo chose the seat across from her. The others looked down at their meals in silent contemplation. He must have spoken to them after their late night chat. When he found the time, she had no idea.

“Naminé.” Ansem moved from his position at the head of the table toward her. He placed a gift box in her hands with his head bowed. “We wanted to take this moment to officially welcome you to our group. Forgive our misguided actions.”

Even scoffed. “Specify which ones, Master,” he murmured. Ansem turned a sharp eye to his apprentice. He, in return, shrugged it off and continued buttering his toast.

Naminé opened the top to reveal a matching lab coat to the ones Ienzo and Even wore.

“It is our small token of appreciation. We hope you will wear it to welcome Kairi and Riku when they arrive tomorrow.”

“We all owe you thanks.” Naminé raised a brow. Surely Aeleus did not waste his precious words on her? How thoughtful.

Dilan grunted. “Be thankful by allowing her and all of us to eat breakfast, you sap.” He pushed the eggs toward Aeleus with a sharp look.

She chose to return to her food, lest she start crying, and the others followed suit. She doubted any of these men wished to see her bawl over their breakfast at their touching gesture. She glanced around the room and thought of a proper response to their kindness. Her eyes met Ienzo’s across the table. She thought of his words last night, thought of how he mentioned that there was still a debt to be paid.

Naminé cleared her throat to gain their attention and raised her teacup. “You can thank me by helping us find Sora.”

“Aye.” Ienzo responded by raising his as well.

The others raised their various drinks in a toast. “To finding Sora,” Namine whispered with a smile.

[peaceoutofthepieces]

Title: Love Me Still

Square Filled: Fear

Ship: Lucas x Jens

Trigger Warnings (if applicable): None 

Created for @skamevents

This is just a really short thing inspired by an ask I got which I tried to meld to this prompt.

~^~

Jens is a little confused—and a tiny bit scared—when he gets a text from Kes. It isn’t entirely unusual for them to talk, he supposes, but it’s slightly unusual. He thinks it’s worse because he’s already a little bit on edge. Because he hasn’t heard much from Lucas today. 

kes_senova hey, are you busy? like, not just right now, but this weekend? 

jensrolt no? why?

kes_senova Luc’s mom isn’t doing well

jensrolt is typing…

kes_senova he’s okay  but he doesn’t let me help him when it’s like this  I’m worried about him dealing with it on his own he spirals. worries himself too much I hate having to ask you but...could you come down?

jensrolt yeah, of course  you think it’s that bad? I haven’t heard much from him today

kes_senova I’m guessing it’s bad, then

Kes doesn’t have to say anymore. Jens is already getting ready to go. 

~^~

It takes him no time to pack up, and his parents don’t put up any protest about him suddenly going for the weekend. He only has to say ‘Lucas isn’t doing great’, and they let him go. 

The train ride seems to last forever, but he’s soon at Lucas’s door. He hasn’t bothered texting him; he knew Lucas would only tell him not to come. That he’s fine, there’s no need, he doesn’t need Jens. Lucas will probably be even more mad at him, for showing up without warning, but it’s worth it. It won’t take him long to give in. 

It takes him ringing the bell twice, though, before he comes to the door. It swings open to reveal Lucas in a red hoodie and sweats, looking tense and exhausted. His expression is frustrated, pissed off even, before his eyes land on Jens. Then his shoulders drop instantly and his face slackens in surprise. He looks small, and young, and fragile. Jens’s heart throbs. 

Lucas asks, “What are you doing here?”

Instead of answering, Jens steps forward and wraps him up in a hug. Lucas is still for a few seconds, then he sags against him, arms winding around his waist. Jens walks them further inside and shuts the door, sliding his bag off his shoulder before tucking Lucas’s head into the vacated space. Lucas clutches at the back of his coat and lets out a shaky breath. 

“Why didn’t you talk to me?” Jens asks, soft but reprimanding. 

Lucas sniffs. “I didn’t think there was anything you could do. I didn’t think it would make any difference. You’d just be worried then too, and I didn’t want that.”

“You’re an idiot, you know that?” Jens pulls away and cradles his face in his hands, thumbs stroking over his cheekbones as he presses a kiss to his forehead. Lucas’s lips tilt up in a smile. This close Jens can see how tired he really is, the dimness of his usually bright eyes, the dark circles around them. His lips are dry, his shoulders hunched up around his neck. His hoodie—Jens’s hoodie—swallows him. 

“How’d you know to come?” Lucas asks, quiet. Embarrassed. 

“Kes texted me,” Jens admits. Lucas sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. “And I’m glad, because you being the tiniest bit silent worries me. You’re always double texting.”

“Ha ha,” Lucas says dryly. “I’m sorry. I’ve just been…”

“Having a bit of a breakdown?”

“Busy,” Lucas corrects. 

Jens kisses his cheek. “How is she?”

Lucas shrugs, blowing out a breath. “I don’t know. She hasn’t come out of her room much today. I’ve been trying to get her to eat, and I tried to tidy up a little bit, but I have this assignment due for Monday that I haven’t even started and I’m so tired—“ 

He draws in a sharp breath, cutting himself off, and Jens pulls him back into his arms, holding him close to his chest. He rubs a hand over his back and waits until his breaths are calm again. “Okay. How about this. I make you a coffee and you try to get a start on that assignment. While you’re doing that, I’ll clean up a bit. Then we can make dinner and check in on your mom, and then I’m taking you to bed early and making sure you sleep. Okay?”

Lucas smiles against his collarbone and then kisses it, nodding. “Okay.” He kisses his way up Jens’s neck to his ear, down his jaw, just butterfly presses of his lips. Then he gives him a soft smile. “I don’t deserve you.”

“No,” Jens agrees. “Better.” Instead of arguing, Lucas just shakes his head, leaning up for a kiss. Jens meets him halfway, lips finding each other and melding together easily, familiar. Jens indulges him, lets him melt into the kiss and deepen it until most of the tension seeps out of him. Then he takes him gently by the shoulders and pushes him back an inch, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Okay, distraction comes after your work. Go. I’ll take care of stuff out here. Okay?”

Lucas closes his eyes, laying his head on Jens’s shoulder. Jens wraps him up and gives him another squeeze and he says, “Okay.”

He sneaks one more kiss before disappearing to his room, taking Jens’s duffel with him. Jens sighs and hangs up his coat before heading to the kitchen.

~^~ 

He spends an hour and a half tidying minor things, putting on a load of washing and filling the dishwasher. He doesn’t want to turn on the vacuum and disturb the actual members of the house, so he gives the floors a quick brush and leaves it at that. 

Lucas seems a little less stressed when he emerges from his room. He and Jens make dinner together, and Lucas takes some to his mother, who comes out of her room briefly to say hello to Jens. Jens sits at the table with her, making idle chit chat and teasing Lucas in an attempt to bring a smile to her face. It turns from tired to genuine as she looks at her son while he laughs, and Jens is relieved, his heart warming. 

She doesn’t stay with them long, but she plants a kiss on both their heads before she goes. Soon after, Jens pulls Lucas up and drags him to bed. 

He lies with his back to Jens’s chest, Jens’s hand clasped in his over his heart, but he doesn’t sleep. Jens can feel the knots of tension throughout his body, his fast heartbeat under his hand. His breath hitches every so often, coming out harshly. Jens pulls him tighter against him and kisses the back of his neck. “Luc,” he says, “you can talk to me if you want to.” Lucas takes another shaky breath, turning his face into the pillow. “Lucas.”

After a moment of silence, Lucas turns around in Jens’s hold, lying flat on his back and staring up at the ceiling. Jens leaves him arm across his torso but shifts his head back a bit. “I hate seeing her like this.” Jens nods, rubbing his arm, but Lucas catches his hand and stops the movement. “No, but not the way I should. I mean of course that way too, it kills me to see her upset, but it’s not just that.”

Jens’s brow furrows. “What else?” Lucas closes his eyes. “Luc. It’s not going to go away if you don’t talk about it, and I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s wrong.”

Lucas licks his lips, and there’s a tremble in his voice Jens doesn’t quite understand when he says, “It can be genetic.”

Jens considers this. “So...what? You’re afraid you’re gonna...become bipolar? I’m pretty sure it’s not that simple. Wouldn’t you have already, I don’t know, showed symptoms or something?”

Lucas shrugs. “Mom wasn’t diagnosed until she was in her thirties. I know, I know it sounds stupid. It’s just...I see myself in her sometimes. When she’s like this. When she’s not doing well.” His voice drops to a whisper. “And it’s stupid, but it freaks me out. The days I feel like I can’t get out of bed, or I feel like I’m going to snap at the smallest thing, or…” He trails off, shaking his head with a rough swallow. Jens finally realizes what the odd tremble had been, what’s causing Lucas’s hitched breaths and tense shoulders. 

Fear. 

Jens moves his hand up to the side of his face, using the touch to gently turn Lucas towards him, to brush their noses together. “Hey. I have those days, too. That’s normal. And even if it is something...more, there’s no reason we can’t deal with that. The people who love you wouldn’t disappear because of that,” Jens reminds him, knowing this is the root of the problem. “You don’t love your mom any less when she’s like this. You know she’d always be there for you, too. Kes and Jayden would never go anywhere. You have Isa and Liv, and Ralph. And that’s just here. The boys love you, too. Robbe and Sander especially. And you know they wouldn’t even bat an eye.”

Lucas swallows again, but his eyes meet Jens’s. “And you?”

“And you know me. You’re my boyfriend, and I love you. Nothing would ever change that. I get the fear, Luc. I do. But you can’t let it eat away at you. If there’s ever anything, then we’ll deal with it. We’ll manage. No one’s going anywhere. You’re the strongest person I know, and you’d have all the support in the world. It’s okay to be scared. But you don’t have to be,” Jens shrugs. 

Lucas gives a tiny huff, but smiles. “That simple, huh?”

Jens shakes his head, smiling when it just makes their noses rub again. “I know it’s not. But it might be easier, at least, if you talk to me.”

Lucas turns onto his side and rests an arm over Jens’s waist, shifting closer. “Sorry. I don’t know why I didn’t. It just felt dumb.”

“Nothing’s dumb. Not if it’s bothering you. You can always tell me these things. Before you get stressed enough to have eyebags.”

Lucas pinches his side, but he snuggles into Jens’s chest, arms wrapping tightly around his waist. He’s soft and mellow now, a comforting weight, and Jens holds him close and kisses his head. “Thank you,” Lucas mumbles, finally sounding sleepy. “You’re a pretty good boyfriend.”

Jens grins. “I try. Besides, you’re not too bad yourself.”

Lucas hums, and the sound ends on a tiny laugh. It fills the last crevice in Jens’s chest with relief. He thinks of Lucas lying here on his own, spending the night struggling to sleep, the same worries spinning around and around in his head. He makes a mental note to thank Kes, as he places another kiss in Lucas’s hair. He whispers a quiet, “I love you,” as Lucas’s breathing begins to even out. 

“I love you, too,” Lucas murmurs in return, seconds before he falls asleep, unbothered and unafraid. 

[andessence]

@intoxicatiing // continued.

“I’m just saying, if you’re gonna find some cute girl, you have to know what you’re doing to impress her!” Isa herself had plenty of experience, whether or not it was appropriate for someone her age. “Look – it’s fine. Max doesn’t even care if I kiss other girls. He thinks it’s hot.” Her significant other – and not someone most people should want to date. But he gave her attention and told her she was pretty, and she was going to help Moritz find someone just as good – if not better as well. “I promise. Let me just give you a few pointers? It’s not like it’s your first kiss or anything, no?”

She was soft, more so than one might think for someone like her, and she leaned in, brushing her hands against Moritz’s jaw. There was a bit of stubble on her chin – something she liked on girls. Or maybe just this girl. Moritz was adorable, and this just added to it. “Close your eyes. Trust me.” Slowly, gently, Ruby pressed her lips to Moritz’s, a chaste kiss, mouth closed, and pulled away after just a moment, grinning as she watched for Moritz’s reaction. “You are a natural. You know that, right? It’s like you’re a master already.”

Not like it’s your first kiss! It was, though. These lips were the first to ever meet hers and to linger, setting her heart thudding. Incredibly, she did not completely freeze in Ruby’s touch. There was the anxious STILLNESS that came with the initial contact of fingertips over her jaw, but this same touch, coupled with those words, was what in turn soothed her in the seconds before the kiss came. She did trust Ruby, even if her skin prickled with gooseflesh and her pulse still pounded. Her eyes were closed obediently, and so when the sensation of the kiss came she felt it more freely, less concerned with the potentially awkward look of it all. It was so terribly SOFT and WARM, and it was over so soon, but it stirred something in Moritz that did not need the consent of her mind to act, and when Ruby drew away, it led Moritz to chase her lips just for an instant before the warmth of Ruby’s nearness was gone from her face and her delinquent brain sputtered back to thoughtfulness, drawing her back.

The praise washed over her, just as warm as Ruby’s touch had been, and she exhaled (only a little shakily) as her lips drew into a sheepish grin. “A natural. You’re making fun of me, aren’t you? But I’ll get better. I’lll get better with, uh,” — and her eyes flickered impulsively to Ruby’s lips and then, as if to make up for the indiscretion, away from her face entirely, to the bedspread they sat on — “with practice. ... He really doesn’t get mad? He ... thinks it’s hot?”