#virgil; poking his friends whenever the opportunity presents itself: is this a clear form of affection?

[acanvasofabillionsuns]

got a fascination (with you)

chapter 1! @heavenly-roman

Summary: Roman has a Plan™ (its effectiveness is,, debatable) Warnings: self-deprecation, maybe some secondhand embarrassment, threatened fratricide (roman doesn’t really mean it), all caps in a few spots Wordcount: 3181

Step 1 - call him pet names ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“What do you think, darling?” Roman turns to Janus for his opinion.

“Ihavetogo,” Janus says in a rush, before hurrying out of the room, face bright red. 

Roman grins to glowself—he’s flustered! Glo has a chance!—and turns back to Remus.

“I guess he doesn’t want to share what he thinks.”

“…What was that.”

“What was what?”

“‘Darling?’ Since when do you call Janus ‘darling’?”

“That is step one of my master plan to woo Janus,” Roman informs him haughtily. “I was gauging his interest.”

“Or making him so uncomfortable he had to leave.”

“Wait, you think so?” Looking back with that perspective, that could definitely be the case. Oh no, what if glo’d ruined glows chance by calling Janus a pet name when he didn’t like people calling him those? What if Janus was so agitated by it he didn’t want to be friends anymore? “Shoot.”

Roman pulls out glows phone and opens glows messages with Janus. ‘dude i am so sorry, i didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. i just’

Roman looks up at Remus. “Quick, what do I tell him I did it for?”

“I don’t know, why are you asking me? You said I’d be terrible at wooing!”

“Remus!”

“I don’t know! Say you do it with your friends sometimes? Or tell him the truth.”

“Friend thing!” Roman crows, typing ‘use pet names on my friends sometimes? but i won’t for you, sorry again’ and sending it. “Thanks, you’re a lifesaver.”

“I think the truth was the better option,” Remus tells him snobbily.

“Everyone’s a critic.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What was that?  “Darling??” Since when is Janus Roman’s darling???

Janus buries his face in his hands, keeping enough visibility that he can actually see where he’s going. He makes his way to the nearest bathroom and plops to the floor. He’s too gay to worry about germs or whatever else because Roman just called him darling.

Did that mean glo likes him back? Maybe? But surely Roman knew what glo was saying when glo called him darling, and Janus doubts glo just calls crushes darling without confessing first. That sounds like it has the potential to be incredibly awkward. But maybe glo does?

Or maybe there’s some explanation Janus had just forgotten about? Or an obvious answer that he’s just completely missed?

Roman had said it so casually. “Darling.” Like it was normal. (One part of Janus’s brain whispers what if it was normal and Janus can feel the blood rushing to his face.)

Janus’s phone dings and he pulls it out, hoping he can distract himself from the massive gay crisis he is having. No such luck, unfortunately.

‘dude i am so sorry, i didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, i just use pet names on my friends sometimes? but i won’t for you, sorry again’

Oh. It was a friend thing. Roman didn’t mean anything by it.

Janus buries his face in his hands again, this time from embarrassment, and groans. Stupid, thinking Roman calling him darling meant anything. Although, who just calls their friends pet names randomly? That’s such a stupidly (endearingly) Roman thing to do.

Oh, he hasn’t answered Roman yet. He should do that.

Janus sits up and taps the screen so the little cursor and keyboard pop up. He thinks for a minute on how to spin his sudden departure as not very gay, then realizes Roman gave him an excuse. Wait, no, because then Roman’ll think he’s upset with glow or something because of it. Maybe he can pretend he had somewhere to be? Flimsy excuse, but he doesn’t want to leave Roman on read for longer to think of a better one and risk Roman thinking he’s mad at glow or something. The double “sorry” almost definitely means glo feels guilty for saying it.

‘it’s okay idm! I just remembered I had somewhere to be. sorry if I made you feel bad, you’re fine I promise ’

Janus rereads the message a few times, changing the exclamation point into a semicolon and rearranging the last bit so it reads ‘I promise you’re fine’ before sending it. There’s a pause of a few seconds where Janus stares at his screen, then a bouncing ellipsis appears for a moment before Roman replies ‘it’s okay!! gl with your thing!!’

Janus smiles at his screen, then puts a hand over his mouth to hide it. He’s so gone on Roman.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Step 2 - see how he reacts to the idea of them dating ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Hey, Janus!” Roman calls, running up and skidding to a stop in front of him. “Hey.”

“Hi, Roman,” Janus says, smiling at glow, which glo takes as a good sign.

“I wanted to ask you something.”

“Okay?”

Shoot, Roman realizes, I am not going to be able to just ask how he’d feel about going on a date with me. What do I do now?

“Roman?” Janus does a little wave at glow. “You good?”

“Yeah!” Roman flashes him a grin.

“What’d you wanna ask me?” Janus prompts after another few moments of Roman frantically trying to make up an excuse.

“I, uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh…” Screw it. “I wanted to ask if you’d want to hang out with me sometime?” Roman winces at how squeaky glows voice got by the end of it.

“I mean, sure? Why do you sound so nervous, though? We’ve done that plenty of times before.”

Roman’s shoulders climb up near glows ears. “No, I mean like? Hanging out? One on one?” There’s a pause where Janus opens his mouth to speak and Roman realizes that glo isn’t sure glo wants to know what he’s going to say, so glo rushes out, “Oh look at the time I’ve gotta go sorry bye see ya!” and sprints off.

Roman runs outside, to glows car, and slides into the driver’s seat, letting glows head thunk against the top of the steering wheel. That certainly could’ve gone better.

It’s only after Roman’s started driving home that glo realizes glo’s finished the first two steps, which means past-Roman was too optimistic about glo’s ideas-ability and current-Roman has no clue what glo’s going to do next. 

“Besides wait to see if he unfriends me because of how weird I was acting, I guess,” glo mutters to glowself. Janus doesn’t seem like the type to do that, but if he pieces together that Roman likes him, gets uncomfortable, and decides to distance himself from Roman because of that? …That sounds like an unfortunately realistic scenario.

Roman sighs. There’s nothing to do now but wait and see how (or if) Janus reacts.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Step 3 - ??? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Janus looks at the fake potted plant across the hall from where he’s standing.

“Did that seem really weird to you too or is it just me?” he asks it, in lieu of an actual human being anywhere nearby to ask.

The plant, predictably, doesn’t reply, and Janus sighs.

He considers messaging Roman to ask what all that was about, but judging from how dodgy glo was in person, Janus doesn’t think he’s going to get a better answer through text.

Was Roman asking you on a date? his traitorous brain asks, and Janus scrunches up his nose and tells it to stop seeing things that aren’t there. He’s not going to let himself assume and then make a fool of himself when he turns out to be wrong, weirding out Roman and potentially losing glow as a friend in the process. 

Even if Roman’s anxiety levels did seem disproportionately high, glo’d only asked if they could hang out. They’d only hung out in groups before! They were still in the process of being comfortable around each other! Being nervous about hanging out with a friend you aren’t very close with yet is perfectly normal! If Janus’s brain could shut up about what if glo likes you back and it seemed kind of like glo might’ve been asking you on a date that would be great, thank you! He isn’t going to read too deeply into things and find some meaning that doesn’t actually exist, thank you very much!

…If this line of thought could stop sounding like he’s trying to convince himself of it, that would be great too, thanks.

Janus shakes his head to clear it and pulls out his phone, turning on some music to distract himself as he walks out to his car. He just needs to stop thinking about this for a bit, and then he can do something—ask Remus? Maybe? That sounds like a decent plan—about it later.

By the time Janus has driven home, the plan to ask Remus about it has solidified in his brain, so he goes inside and grabs an apple to snack on while he texts Remus.

‘hey’

‘Yooooooooo’ comes a few minutes later. Janus squints, counts the o’s, considers asking how Remus remembers the exact number of o’s he’s done each time so he can add one more every new conversation, then decides he doesn’t want to get into that.

‘has Roman been acting,, off? at all with you today?’

‘No why’

‘glo asked me if I wanted to hang out one on one then ran away before I could answer?? I was hoping you could tell me about that?’

‘SLDKJFSLDF glo DID??’

‘yes’

‘Omg this is too good,,,,, glo’s never living this down,,,,, tried to ask you out on a date and ran away before you could say yes KASNFKENFNSKFNE’

Wait. 

Date? Roman had been trying to ask him out on a date??

Wait.

Before he could say yes???

‘remus wth’

‘I can’t,,,,,,,,, as soon as glo gets home i’m gonna look at glow and burst into laughter,,,,,,, this is amazing,,,,,,’

‘remus wdym “before i could say yes”?? who’s to say that i would’ve agreed to a date??’

‘Would u have?”

‘i mean, glo asked if we could hang out. not go on a date’

‘Okay but you totally would’ve said yes either way’

Janus doesn’t respond, trying to figure out how to deny it without sounding like a complete liar. 

‘( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Your silence is condemning you fool’

‘...maybe,’ Janus finally acquiesces. ‘i admit to nothing.’ Then, because Janus is still very confused about this, ‘roman was trying to ask me out??’ Remus has been annoyingly unhelpful about answering that so far.

‘Kakandfdfas yeah’

‘i see’

‘Jdgsfskdfsdsjsjjsdj what’s that supposed to mean’

Janus leaves him on read, already plotting how to use this information to his advantage (and a little bit to spite him. Just because he can).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Virgil,” Roman groans. “I’m an idiot.”

“Yeah.”

“And Remus won’t stop laughing at me about it, thus forcing me—what do you mean ‘yeah?’ You’re supposed to be supporting me! I—you don’t even know what I’m complaining about yet!”

Virgil rolls his eyes. “Don’t need to know what you did to know you’re an idiot.” 

Roman scoffs offendedly. The disrespect! And after glo is trusting him enough to open up about glows problems!

“I don’t have to take this!”

“But you will.”

Roman hums, conflicted. Usually, glo would take Virgil’s mocking, giving just as good as glo got, but glo doesn’t really feel good enough about glowself at the moment. After embarrassing glowself in front of Janus, Roman’s ego is at an all time low, and Virgil isn’t helping.

Virgil pokes glow. “If it’s bothering you I can stop.”

“Tone it back a bit?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Thanks.”

“‘Course.” Virgil pokes glow again and Roman bats at his hand, but glo’s smiling now. “What’d you do this time, princex?”

Roman sighs and puts a hand to glows forehead dramatically, slumping back in glows seat. “It’s tragic! I’ve been humiliated and can no longer show my face around school.”

“I’m heartbroken,” Virgil deadpans. “What happened?”

“I asked—” Roman falters. This sounds… stupid. Glo asked Janus a question and then ran away before he could answer? Virgil’s probably going to laugh at glow. Roman would probably laugh if the situation was reversed. “You know what, nevermind.”

“No, what is it?” Virgil presses, smirking, but he drops it when he notices Roman’s expression. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, I just... don’t really want to talk about this anymore,” Roman says, putting an elbow on the table so glo can cover glows mouth with glows hand as glo looks over at the wall.

“Okay,” Virgil agrees. “Is this ‘I’m scared of being vulnerable’ don’t want to talk or something else? Because if it’s the first thing then I promise not to laugh at you or judge you or anything.”

Roman wrinkles glows nose, considering. Still staring at the wall, glo says, “I was going to ask Janus out on a date, but I chickened out and asked him how he’d feel about ‘hanging out one on one’ or something stupid, and then chickened out again and ran away before he could answer. And now I think he’s probably figured out I like him and he’ll probably stop being friends with me because now it’s weird. So.” Glo gives a short, self-deprecating laugh. “Anyway, how’re you doing?”

“I’m fine,” Virgil says lightly after a moment. “My best friend was scared to tell me something, but glo opened up anyway, so I’m proud of glow and happy glo was comfortable enough to share that with me. And despite how anxious glo is about the situation, I think it’s gonna work out for glow.”

Roman looks over at him, asking softly, “I’m your best friend?” Glo’d figured, kind of, but it was the first time either of them had said it to each other.

“I mean, one of, but yeah. I don’t annoy just anyone; my anxiety’s way too high for that.”

“And your standards,” Roman jokes, pointing glows nose in the air.

“And my standards,” Virgil agrees, grinning.

“Well, I suppose, then, that I could concede that you’re my best friend too, and that I appreciate you saying all that,” Roman says primly, making eye contact with Virgil for a moment and smiling before glancing away nervously. “Do you really think it’ll work out?”

“Oh, yeah,” Virgil says, with much more confidence than Roman thinks he maybe should have. “Definitely.”

Roman squints. “I’m trusting you.”

“As you should.” Virgil sticks his nose up in the air in what Roman is certain is a mockery of glow earlier, and so of course glo reaches over and shoves him, laughing at the indignant squawk Virgil makes. From there it devolves into them hitting at each other, not hard enough to really hurt, and laughing so hard that for a while Roman forgets about Janus.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Step 4 - profit ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ “Hey, Roman,” Janus calls, walking the last few steps over to glow. He wonders briefly if the roses are too much, but Roman’s already turned to look at him so he guesses it’s too late to try to subtly get rid of them or something.

Roman’s face does a thing, where it sort of… spasms? Just for a second, but it’s almost like a flash of fear before Roman’s grinning at him and Janus wonders if he’d imagined it.

“Hi, Janus!” glo chirps. “Whatcha got there?” Glo leans over to the side, trying to look behind Janus’s back.

“A gift,” he tells glow, “to, uh, try to— actually, yeah. Just a gift. For you.” Janus mentally facepalms. Remus said Roman likes him; he shouldn’t be so nervous about this!

“For me?” Roman’s eyebrows raise. “What’re you trying to do?”

“Um.” Janus gathers all his courage, pulling the roses out from behind his back and shoving them towards Roman as he says, “Ask you on a date?” It comes out sounding more like a question than he’d intended, and he squeezes his eyes shut, bracing.

Nothing happens, and after a few moments he opens one eye to peer nervously at Roman, who’s sitting there slack-jawed.

“Roman?” Janus asks, straightening up and letting his arms relax.

There’s a squeak.

“Are you okay?”

There’s another squeak, a lot of sputtering, and then finally glo echoes, “Date?”

“If you want to go on one?” Janus offers.

“You want to go on a date… with me?” Roman’s gaze is flickering between staring at the roses and looking up at him in bewilderment.

“I—yes?” This isn’t how Janus envisioned this going. “I like you romantically, you like me romantically, we go on a date and maybe more if we both enjoy ourselves? Does that sound right?”

Roman’s face, which had been steadily growing pinker as the conversation continued, now flames bright red, and glo buries glows face in glows hands.

“Who told you I like you?”

“Remus.”

“I’m going to kill him.” Janus can see Roman take a deep breath, shoulders rising and falling, and then glo looks up at him, face still fairly pink. “And then I’m going to go on a date with you, provided this isn’t your version of a joke or something, and then if it goes well then maybe I’ll resurrect him.”

“Sounds lovely.” Janus grins. “Maybe leave the fratricide until after the date so you don’t have to go through all the work of bringing him back to life?”

“Sure.”

Lacking any response, Janus holds the flowers back out to Roman. Glo takes them gingerly, tracing the edge of a petal and rubbing another one between glows fingers, lifting it up to sniff it and admiring the bouquet. Janus watches glow, a small smile creeping on his face at how enraptured Roman is by the flowers.

After a minute or two, Roman looks back up at him.

“Thank you,” glo says, hiding the bottom half of glows face behind the roses. “No one’s ever bought me flowers before; they’re beautiful.”

“Just like you,” Janus says before his brain can do any silly little things like consider the consequences and Not say stupidly sappy stuff. Roman’s face ducks further under the flowers, and Janus thinks he hears a squeak.

“Thank you,” glo repeats.

“You’re quite welcome, dear.” Janus tacks the pet name on as revenge for how flustered he’d been when Roman called him darling on impulse, curious to see how Roman reacts. Which is, apparently, to squeak more loudly and actually pull glows face up from the bouquet enough to glare weakly at him.

“Stoooooop,” glo complains. “I retract my agreement to date you.”

“Well, in that case, let me retract my roses.”

“No, they’re mine.” Roman clutches them closer against glows chest.

“Alright, then pay for them.”

Roman squints at him. “What’s the payment?”

Janus reaches out, gesturing towards glows hand. Roman stretches it out towards him slowly, watching for what he’s going to do. Janus takes it carefully, bending over it and looking up through his eyelashes at Roman.

“Is this okay?”

Roman nods, blushing, and Janus kisses glows hand, straightening up and smirking at glow. (And if he doesn’t release Roman’s hand, it’s surely just an oversight on his part.)

“Payment.”

“This is unfair,” Roman complains. “I had this whole plan to try and woo you and now you’re being mean and you stole my idea.”

“Well,” Janus says, squeezing glows hand a little. “I’d say your plan worked pretty well.”

Roman looks at their joined hands and squeezes back, then smiles up at Janus. 

“Yeah, I’d say so too.”