#can’t even imagine what he’d say to me if i mentioned half manic episodes and suicidal ideation and violent tendencies

[uhode]

i have to somehow stop being so paranoid this amount of fear can’t be good for my stomach

[if-you-built-yourself-a-myth]

Check Ignition: Part X

That Sobbe fake-dating Hogwarts au that one person asked for and I dove into headfirst.... ALL DONE! (besides any editing)

First part // Previous part

Thank you all for sticking with me here. I'm going to make some sweeping edits to this fic on AO3 sometime in the next months, so if you have suggestions, feel free to shoot me an ask. You can also request oneshots if you like :)

Robbe had whiplash. The phone call, the blurry note, the revelation, and now Sander. Sander at his front door. Sander looking into his apartment, at the world he’d done nothing but complain about and avoid while at school. Sander, who suffered like Robbe’s mother without Robbe ever knowing, and who listened to Robbe lament things that were not her fault.

He choked on his breath.

Sander had no problem continuing the conversation. “It wasn’t fake for me, okay? It never was. I need you to get that.”

“Do you want to come in?” said Robbe.

“Who’s at the door?” called his mother from the living room. Robbe bit back the part of him that wanted to hide her away.

Sander shook his head, and water flung from the ends of his hair. “I don’t need to come in. You just had to know that. So when you come back to school, we’ll talk.”

“We could talk, um, now.”

“I don’t want to ruin your Christmas,” said Sander. “Jens said you were free though, so I had to—”

The proximity was too much for Robbe, and maybe for Sander too, because Sander grabbed Robbe by both cheeks and pulled him in for a kiss. They should muddle through everything that just went down. They should clear a space in the living room to discuss everything that happened between them during the past few weeks, most of which was still a blur, even to Robbe. They should—

Robbe leaned deeper into the kiss. All that could wait. Kissing Sander felt like breathing air after being trapped underwater.

“Robbe, who’s at the door?” his mother called again.

They broke apart for a second, Robbe’s lips stinging. Sander looked at Robbe, blinked as if surprised, and went right back in for round two. Robbe barely mustered a breath to shout, “A friend,” before Sander’s mouth on his neck sent a shiver down his spine.

“This isn’t talking,” Robbe hissed into Sander’s shoulder.

“Shut up,” said Sander. The physical aspect of their relationship had always superseded communication.

Britt’s note poked out of Robbe’s pocket as they spun into Robbe’s mess of a room. Sander backed him up onto the bed, where Robbe fell back against a pile of clothing. Layers peeled off. They only separated for harmonious milliseconds, just enough time to get a breath or whisper a sentence that meant nothing outside of their bodies pressed together. If Robbe could do wordless magic, he imagined the whole apartment might have been vaporized in one firm wave of euphoria.

He was not unaware of his mother’s presence in their living room, and thus cast the muffiliato charm while Sander’s tongue danced over his teeth. The non-magical lock should hold. Any other noise would become nothing more than static in her ears.

His mother. Whom Sander thought he hated. They needed to talk about it.

Sander slid his hand across the bare skin of Robbe’s stomach.

Maybe they didn’t need to talk about it right now.

In no time, the early-morning sun cast golden rays through the binds on Robbe’s bedroom window. He woke with a start, sitting bolt upright in the sheets, and jumped again when he saw Sander’s body wrapped up beside him. Still here. Real. The sunlight made Sander’s face resemble an oil painting, glowing cheeks and serene eyes half-closed against the world. A line of drool cut a pathway down to Robbe’s pillow. Robbe disentangled himself from the bedclothes, pulled on a sweater, and tiptoed out of the room for breakfast. He knew he had some explaining to do.

Sure enough, his mother awaited him. She propped herself up against their kitchen counter, a mug of coffee clasped in her hands.

“Morning,” she said, blasé.

“Morning,” said Robbe.

“I hope you used protection.”

Robbe blushed. “Mom.”

“Robbe,” she imitated. “You bring someone into my house, I don’t see her, and next thing I know she’s in your room. I’m not stupid.”

She. Her. Robbe swallowed. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to spring him on you. He was supposed to stay on campus.” He drummed his fingers on the countertop, waited for her to notice his pronoun use. Was it a casual way to come out to someone huge? Yes. Did he want to have a larger conversation about his sexuality when he only just understood it himself? Absolutely not.

His mother’s eyes widened. “If you mean to tell me you smuggled Jens in here—oh, his parents already hate me. I’ll have to make a call—”

“It’s not Jens,” said Robbe.

“I should hope not.” Her voice softened. “From the phone last night?”

This was a moment for honesty. Robbe started the coffeemaker and placed a mug of his own under the dispenser. He tried to recall anything awful he’d said about her during his time with Sander, anything that would make Sander think that their relationship couldn’t be real beyond the arrangement. He said, “Yes. I didn’t know he was coming.”

Four weeks. Four weeks had passed since he kissed Sander for the first time in the astronomy tower. So much had happened in that time. What if the whole thing was one long manic episode? No, that was stupid. There were symptoms to mania, and it would be wrong to assume Sander wasn’t completely stable. Lots of people were.

“What’s his name?” It seemed by now his mother had caught on. “You used protection, right?”

“His name is Sander,” said Robbe, “and nothing happened. Honestly.”

His mother waggled her eyebrows at him. He stared down at his bare feet, wondering when Sander would wake up.

The conversation lulled, so Robbe pretended to take a sip of his coffee, even though it was still too hot for his tongue. He supposed he should be thankful that the coming-out experience had not been as hard or as unpleasant as it could have been, but the lack of reaction felt incomplete, far too casual for the scenario in which it was presented.

“So,” said his mother. She looked behind Robbe into the hallway from whence he came, as if scared that Sander would be out of the bedroom at any minute. “That phone call…”

“He was in crisis,” Robbe offered.

“I might have heard my title mentioned once or twice.”

“It’s—” Robbe didn’t know what to tell her it was. He didn’t quite know himself.

Something in his mother’s eyes, though, told him that she did. “Listen,” she said, leaning toward him from her place on the counter. “I feel like there are a few things you and I haven’t really addressed. It’s my fault, in a way, for keeping them unsaid.”

Robbe nodded along.

“You and I, we’re—” Her breath caught. “Lines must’ve been crossed at some point, y’know?”

“I don’t know what that means,” said Robbe.

“It means I love you so much. Even if I wasn’t there for you. I know there are moments that you can’t forgive me for, but—”

“Do we have to have this conversation now?” Robbe was still lightheaded from the previous night, and from waking up next to Sander, and from gathering the courage to casually come out only moments ago.

“Yes, now.” His mother took him by the hand, her fingertips brushing his knuckles, and for a moment, he was with her on the side of the road as a child, watching for passing cars. “I love you, and it’s okay if you hate me. If that’s what you have to do.” Before Robbe could protest once more, she cut him off. “I heard you on the phone last night, and you said you didn’t, I know. But we don’t talk much, do we?”

Robbe burned his tongue on his coffee rather than answer.

“I know that my illness isn’t easy for you to deal with. It isn’t easy for me either. And I know sometimes it feels like we’re not… I don’t know. Sometimes it might feel like I ruined everything.”

He could deny it, but she’d know he was lying.

“Your Sander… in the phone call, well, it seemed like…”

“He has it too,” said Robbe. “Bipolar.”

“Do you love him?”

Robbe dropped his head into her shoulder and inhaled. There were so many moments they missed because of her sickness. There was so much of her that he never wanted to talk about with anyone outside of his father, who knew everything anyway. In the action, though, he hoped she understood everything that he couldn’t say right now: Yes I love him, I’m trying to forgive you, I love you too. I understand you. I’m sorry for the way I talked about you, even if I’m not sure I regret it yet. Sometimes, all you need is time. He knew he’d have to wait for the betrayal to dissipate. Step one was admitting he loved her anyway.

The timer on her phone beeped for medication. She dropped his hand to go for the foyer, where her pills waited on display in the hallway.

Robbe stopped her with a whisper. “I don’t want him to go through what you did.”

“You remember that blood sausage recipe?” she asked. It seemed off-topic, enough to derail Robbe’s train of thought.

“Of course,” he said.

“You and your father had such a great time making it for Christmas every year. I thought maybe—” Robbe’s mother pulled something from her pants pocket, an index card with loopy cursive handwriting.

Robbe looked down at the card, back up at his mother, back down at the card again. He didn’t know what to say, so he said the first thing that popped into his head. “You don’t ruin things. I don’t know why I—”

“Youruin plenty,” Robbe’s mother said. “We don’t need to start coddling each other now.” She motioned him back to his bedroom with a wink. In some bizarre way, they’d reached a tentative understanding.

***

Robbe expected for Sander to be asleep when he returned to bed. In the grand scheme of things, it was still quite early. But Sander was awake, combing the room, searching for his shirt and pants among the chaos of Robbe’s floor. His hair stuck out in all different directions, and Robbe let himself wonder at the warmth it spread through his chest. He’d never felt this way about anyone before. Of course it would be Sander that did it.

“Going somewhere?” he asked, more to be conversational.

“Hogwarts,” said Sander.

Okay, not what Robbe wanted to hear. “What?”

“I’m going back to Hogwarts. Supposed to be there for the holidays.”

It hit Robbe again: the possibility that everything was as fake as their original relationship. Mania, or something. Mania didn’t normally work like that, but— “I thought we had to talk,” Robbe said.

Sander shrugged. “You made it clear you didn’t want to.”

“How?”

“Well, we didn’t.”

“You kissed me,” said Robbe.

Sander abandoned the search for his own shirt and pulled one of Robbe’s threadbare sweatshirts over his head. The bottom skimmed up at his hips, and the sleeves were a little short at the wrists. A moment later, he recovered his jeans. Robbe couldn’t stop him from getting dressed without feeling dirty, so he blocked the doorway as much as someone with his stature could.

“You talked to Jens?” he asked.

“Said you’d be here,” Sander said. “It was a stupid idea. I don’t know why I came. Nothing changed.”

Everything changed. Robbe bit his lip. He wasn’t sure how to articulate the things he was feeling anymore, not in the chaos of all this new information at once.

“I don’t want you to go.” He reached out to hold Sander’s wrist.

Sander shook his hand away. “No, I’m going to ruin everything. That’s why they want me there, that’s why you want me there.”

“I don’t want you there. I want you here.”

They stood at a faceoff, and Robbe dropped Sander’s wrist to make a barrier across the doorframe. Such a motion felt childish. If Sander pushed at his arm, Robbe decided, he’d let Sander through, because he wasn’t here to keep Sander in places Sander didn’t want to be.

No movement. Sander took a deep breath and sat back on the bed. “Even this,” he said. “I feel fine, but it was crazy to come here. Sometimes I do things and they’re crazy and I don’t realize. I don’t want you to hate me.”

Robbe thought about his own mother. She wasn’t crazy. She was sick. He couldn’t promise to feel like he loved her one hundred percent of the time, but he loved her just the same. Never had he hated her.

“I won’t,” he said. “I can’t.”

“You can’t promise that.”

“Then I’ll do my very best.”

The paper that Britt gave Robbe in the astronomy tower shot up from its dejected place on the ground, its requirements fulfilled. The writing shifted from overlapping words, to cursive, to a legible, block print. Robbe would read it to completion later:

Robbe:

I’m not an expert. These are things that have worked in the past. He should tell you more than this.

1. Be there. That’s the big one. Sometimes he’ll ask you to be close to him, other times he’ll want you to leave him alone, and that’s fine. Just be there.

2. Talk to him. It’s his illness and he knows more about his experience than anyone else.

3. He’s not stupid so don’t treat him like he is. I know I do sometimes. Don’t be me for him.

4. Not everything is an episode. It’s going to feel like a lot of stuff is. I don’t know how to get around it.

5. Ask for help when you need it. It doesn’t do anyone any good if you pretend you can take care of everything by yourself.

Britt

But for now, Robbe let it flutter downward once more. He thought back across their time together thus far. Kissing Sander in the Quidditch stands, making out in the upper corner of a classroom, sharing breakfast in the Great Hall. This started as a way to keep Noor off his back, of course, but somehow, it blossomed into a long joyride of self-discovery and love. Love. The word hit him just as hard as it had on their first date by the Great Lake. Sander looked at Robbe like that, and Robbe knew he needed more than a fake relationship. Here it was. All he had to do was show Sander the same.

Robbe couldn’t go anywhere if he tried.

“It was easier when you thought we were pretending,” he said, pushing aside all doubts. No more disclaimers. No more stepping back and letting Sander walk in the other direction. He knew what he wanted. “When it was fake, you didn’t have to worry about me leaving.”

Sander shrugged. “Low stakes. Like a game.”

“Alright then, let’s play a game.” Robbe’s confidence built as he found his stride. He took a step away from the doorway and grabbed Sander’s hands in his own, the smooth skin he’d imagined against his every night this week. Sander let him. “It’s called Robbe and Sander, minute by minute. How you play it is you only worry about the next minute. You and I together. If you could pretend it was real, how is it different when it’s real?”

The gap between them closed in an aching kiss, teeth tugging on the edge of lips, fingers dancing over goosebumped shoulders. Robbe hoped Sander could taste the sincerity on his tongue. Each kiss bled into the next, peaceful, a request for more. Robbe was asking, again and again, and Sander was replying in the same vein. Yes, I want this with you. If you’ll take me, I want this with you.

“I’m going to mess up,” Sander whimpered, pulling away an inch.

“Okay,” said Robbe.

“What if you regret this in the future?”

“Okay.”

“Robbe, what if it was better off fake, what if—” He cut off as Robbe leaned in for yet another kiss. Melted into the sensation. The muffliato charm might be a nice investment.

“What you and I have,” Robbe whispered into Sander’s lips, “has always been real.”

Tomorrow, Jens and Moyo would call to see how the night went. They gave Sander directions to the house in accordance with article XII, section VIII of Operation Sobbe. Robbe, Sander, and his mother would make blood sausage and cry laughing when Sander took the first bite. Robbe would return to Hogwarts after break with Sander’s hand clasped in his own. But tonight, if Robbe could do wordless magic, the world would freeze in this moment forever.

And afterward, the view from his bedroom window beat that of the astronomy tower, because it reflected their faces back.

[vexedtonightmares]

last dance (elu ballet au) chapter dix-sept - epilogue

Lucas is in his final year at the Paris Opera Ballet School and he’ll be damned if he lets his former friend-turned-rival Eliott steal the lead role in their production of Swan Lake.

aka- lucas and eliott are rivals who are forced to room together for their final year of ballet school before they try to enter the company. we can all see where this is going.  

i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x. xi. xii. xiii. xiv. xv. xvi. xvii.

ao3

it’s so strange to be at the end of this fic, but thanks so everyone who’s read, commented, given me kudos, or supported this fic in any way. this version of lucas and eliott really mean a lot to me, and i’m glad they mean a lot to some of you too. 

also sorry not sorry this is nearly 20k words but i’m a sucker for an epilogue.

l’amour gagne toujours. alt er love.

**tw: eating disorder, ed relapse, bipolar disorder, mentions of manic/ depressive episodes**

6 MONTHS LATER

Lucas sat frozen in his chair and set his phone down with shaking hands. He couldn’t decide if it was a good kind of shaking or a bad kind of shaking yet. He was fucked, he was so utterly fucked. He wished he had more time, but it had been six months, so he should have known this day would come eventually. 

Eliott called out as he entered their suite, nearly singing his voice was so full of love for Lucas. It made him soften, just a bit, until he remembered why his hands had been shaking and his heart dropped to his stomach. 

He couldn’t believe they only had a few days left at school, it seemed like just yesterday he was standing on stage performing as Prince Siegfried in their production of Swan Lake. It seemed like just yesterday he was auditioning for the show. It was crazy how long and how short six months could feel. 

For example, for the last four months Lucas had been able to overcome his eating disorder. Not completely, he didn’t think he’d ever overcome it completely, but he was in a much healthier mindset now, thanks to Angelique and his friends and Eliott, and he really thought he might be able to make this last. There were still some daily struggles, mostly with his OCD and anxiety, but his medication did help, and so did therapy. 

His clothes fit him better too, he didn’t feel ashamed every time he looked in the mirror. Instead of seeing skin and bones he saw muscle, color in his cheeks, and less darkness under his eyes. He didn’t hate catching glimpses of himself anymore, and Eliott made jokes about his ass way too often, but he still appreciated the normalization of it all. 

He’d tried to do the same for Eliott, never be overbearing but provide support when Eliott had days that were too bad or too good, or maybe even a mix of the two. They’d fallen into a nice rhythm, the two of them, and their friends teased them endlessly for acting like a married couple. Lucas secretly warmed inside every time they said so, not that he’d ever admit it aloud. 

Eliott poked his head into the room, grinning ear to ear. “G’day mate,” he said in an exaggerated Australian accent, and Lucas’ stomach roiled over itself again. That was the newest development in the great story of Lucas and Eliott, their decision for their futures. It hadn’t been a precise thing, they’d just taken a map and spun around a few times with their eyes closed, pointing and seeing where their fingers might land. Australia, it seemed, was what the fates had decreed for them, and they were both more excited than they could put into words. 

They’d both used a weekend earlier in the spring to audition for the company, and they both made it, celebrating all night when they’d found out. Most of their friends were staying in Europe, it seemed, but Sofiane had also auditioned for the Australian Ballet and gotten in unbeknownst to any of them. It would be fun to be there with him though, Lucas and Eliott had rationalized, especially given the fact that Lucas was much closer with him now than he had been six months or a year ago.

Eliott frowned and entered the room, and Lucas realized he hadn’t responded. The truth was, he didn’t know how to. He’d gone with Manon and Daphné when they’d auditioned for the Royal Ballet for moral support, but they’d convinced him to audition last minute, and the call he’d just received had offered him a place in the Royal Ballet, should he want it. The bad thing, the thing that was making his heart beat rapidly and his stomach ache with unease, was that he did want it. More than Australia, despite all the plans he’d already made. 

Eliott tapped Lucas’ wrist with one finger, grounding him and drawing him back into the present moment. “Are you ok?” Eliott asked, voice coated in sweetness. 

Lucas nodded, then shook his head, then froze again, searching Eliott’s face for the right way to tell him that he wanted to go to London. Maybe it wasn’t too late for Eliott to audition, too.

“What’s wrong?” Eliott asked, sitting down on Lucas’ bed, probably still trying to gauge what Lucas was feeling. 

Lucas didn’t want to say anything, because if he said it, then that made it real. And he didn’t want it to be real. But he did. But he didn’t. He just really didn’t want to part ways with Eliott, but the more he thought about it, the more he knew London was where he belonged. 

“I was offered a contract for the Royal Ballet.” He wasn’t consciously aware of opening his mouth to speak, and judging by Eliott’s expression, maybe he hadn’t even spoken at all. He swallowed and opened his mouth, prepared to repeat, just in case, when Eliott sat back abruptly.

“I heard you.”

The softness in his voice wasn’t there anymore, and Lucas panicked internally. He never should have said anything, he never should have answered the call. If he didn’t know that he had a place in the Royal Ballet if he wanted it, he probably wouldn’t have wanted it, and he and Eliott could live out their Australian dreams together. They’d only chosen Australia because Lucas’ finger had landed on it on the map, Eliott probably hadn’t even wanted to go there in the first place. He shouldn’t have said anything, he shouldn’t have—

“Do you… want to accept?” Eliott’s words were slow, and Lucas still couldn’t get a read on him. 

Tears pricked the corners of Lucas’ eyes as he admitted, “I do.”

In an instant, any defenses Eliott had built up dropped completely. He pulled Lucas closer by his hands, desk chair rolling over to where Eliott was still seated on the bed. His eyes were open and understanding and Lucas was struck with the feeling that he didn’t deserve someone like Eliott. Eliott laced their fingers together.

“Why didn’t you say anything?” was his only question, which seemed justified but also way too mild a reaction. 

“I didn’t think I’d make it,” he answered honestly. His audition had been a mess, at least in terms of preparation. He’d probably danced fairly well, but he’d mostly done it because Manon and Daphné were excellent with peer pressure and he’d been too happy as of late to worry too much about it. He never really thought it was an option until it was one.

Eliott’s expression changed only in small amounts, the slight furrowing of his eyebrows or downturn of his mouth. “I didn’t even know you auditioned.”

Lucas shrugged helplessly. “Manon and Daphné convinced me, you know how they are. I really didn’t think that it would matter, because I was almost entirely certain I wouldn’t get offered a contract.”

“But what about Australia?” 

What about Australia. That was the question, wasn’t it. “I wasn’t feigning enthusiasm, just so you know. Until like fifteen minutes ago I was all in,” Lucas said, knowing how bad it sounded regardless. 

Eliott dropped his head but didn’t drop Lucas’ hands. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

“I don’t know,” Lucas scrambled for an explanation, realizing that there wasn’t one. He should have just been honest from the start, then maybe Eliott would be going to the Royal Ballet with him. His voice took on a strained tone. “I really don’t have an answer.”

“I don’t want to go without you, but I would never forgive myself if I made you come with me,” Eliott admitted. 

“I want to be with you,” Lucas promised, “I just… I can’t explain it. When I was in London, I felt something inside my chest, a feeling that wouldn’t go away. I haven’t felt it in a long time, at least not in relation to ballet, and I think I’d be stupid not to chase it.”

“So, you’re sure, then, that you don’t… that you want to go to London?” Eliott confirmed. His head was still down, so Lucas couldn’t see his eyes and how they might be reacting. It didn’t seem right that he should be able to decide something so monumental so quickly, but maybe it was a sign that he was making the right choice. 

“We’ll still talk every day, right? And come home for the holidays, or visit each other here and there. And who knows, this probably won’t be forever, maybe I’ll realize I made the wrong decision and come running to Australia in a few months,” Lucas tried to joke, but part of him was serious. 

Eliott finally looked up at him, through his eyelashes. “Lucas, if you’re going to do this, you need to stop worrying about me, ok? Of course I’d rather be with you, but I’ll be fine, and so will you. Better than fine, because we’ll be living our dreams! Distance makes the heart grow fonder, right? Don’t go into this thinking about plans to fall back on, go into it as if this is it. I don’t want you to live half a life on my account.”

“I can’t imagine sleeping without you,” Lucas said, taking in all of Eliott’s words and processing them to the best of his current ability. 

Eliott just shrugged, squeezing his hands. “Well then we’ll just have to make the most of the time we have left. Or I could print a pillowcase with my face on it for you to use in London.”

Lucas laughed, vocal chords still thick with unshed tears. “That’s not a terrible idea…”

“Wait, you have somewhere to live, right?” Eliott asked, just as the thought came into Lucas’ own mind. He did not, because he hadn’t been planning to be in London. 

“Well, the thing about that is…” Lucas trailed off, but Eliott simply rolled his eyes fondly. 

“We’re going to figure that out before anything else.”

“Eliott, you don’t have to—”

“I want to,” Eliott reassured him, pulling him closer again until he was practically in Eliott’s lap and not on his chair anymore. Lucas leaned in, waiting to see if Eliott would respond, and he did, meeting Lucas for a short but emotion filled kiss. It told Lucas everything that he needed to know and let the anxiety ease its way out of his mind and out of his body. 

When they pulled away Lucas looked at Eliott with heavily hooded eyes. “I still love you as much as ever.”

“I know,” Eliott said, “I never thought you didn’t. Sometimes we have to do things for ourselves, though, even if we think they might hurt the people we love. Never choose me over yourself, Lucas, not when it comes to your happiness.” 

“But what about you? Did you even want to go to Australia? It’s so far away, and you don’t know anyone there, and—”

“Lucas, Australia still sounds fucking amazing to me, I promise. Plus, Sofiane will be there too. I need something completely new, I think, and what’s more new than Australia?” The usual light had returned to Eliott’s eyes, and Lucas finally allowed himself to exhale. Eliott went on about Australia and all the things he was excited for, and Lucas indulged him, even chiming in with a few things he was excited for in London. A nine hour time difference wasn’t ideal, but they’d both have completely different perspectives on the world at the same time, and that was kind of cool. In a sense, it was almost like they’d be living in different universes, bringing the multiverse theory to life. 

“Just don’t go falling in love with another Lucas,” Lucas said, wrapping his arms around Eliott’s neck. 

Eliott scoffed, like the statement had offended him. “I could never. Not in a million years or universes.”

So they kissed again, and Lucas breathed a little easier, excited for all the possibilities ahead of him and still overwhelmingly in love with the boy who’d urged him to chase new dreams even when the old ones would have made him happier. 

1 YEAR LATER

The winter wind nipped at Lucas’ cheeks, but he could hardly feel it, too hopped up on adrenaline. This was the first time he’d be seeing Eliott in person since he’d left for Australia, and he was so excited he could hardly sit still. They’d debated meeting back in Paris, but Eliott had wanted to experience Christmas in London and see Lucas’ new home of sorts, so that was what they had planned for. 

Eliott’s parents obviously wanted to see him as well, so he and Lucas would go back to Paris at the end of their holiday break from their respective companies and meet up with them as well as some of their other friends from school before Eliott left again for Australia and Lucas left again for London. They only had two weeks total, one in London, one in Paris, and Lucas planned on taking advantage of every single minute.

He’d been living with Manon and Daphné since they’d all moved to London and joined the Royal Ballet, which wasn’t as horrible as it sounded. They were still the cutest couple he knew (other than himself and Eliott, obviously) and living with two girls was much more organized than with Yann or Eliott over the years. They were spending the holidays back in Paris with Mika and Lisa, Manon and Lucas’ old flatmates, probably so they could visit with Emma, Imane, and Alexia as well. As far as he knew, Emma and Imane had stayed in Paris at the Paris Opera Ballet, and Alexia was attending university in the city as well. Imane and Emma had both been shocked to have been offered contracts in the company, but they deserved it. He was pretty sure Chloé and Sarah in their year had stayed in Paris as well, but everyone else had dispersed across the world. 

Yann had gone to Berlin, and he’d been loving it based on what he’d told Lucas. Lucas was also dying to see him, he’d gone far too long without best friend idiocy hours. Arthur, too, Lucas longed to see, but he wouldn’t have to wait as long. Arthur was supposed to meet him and Eliott in London for dinner later that night, choosing to spend the holidays in a city that didn’t remind him of things he’d rather forget. Lucas knew the feeling. He’d offered to have Arthur stay in the flat he shared with Manon and Daphné, since the two of them were gone, but Arthur had insisted on staying elsewhere with no explanation. He’d gone to the Dutch Ballet and was enjoying it quite well considering the fact he’d wanted to quit a year ago. Lucas felt like Arthur might have been keeping something from him, but he never pried, knowing Arthur would tell him when he was ready. Hopefully he wasn’t in love with Lucas again, but he didn’t think that was the case. 

Lucas had made some new friends too, while in London, though none of them compared to the ones he’d grown up dancing with. Noora, from Norway, was really close with Manon, and they were eerily similar in Lucas’ opinion. She’d originally gone to London to be with her boyfriend, and she’d considered quitting ballet for him, but in the end she realized that she was worth more than her relationship with him and if he didn’t support her dreams then she didn’t need him around. It seemed to have paid off, because Noora was only two years older than them but she was already a principal dancer in the company.

Daphné had been jealous of Manon and Noora for a while, but Noora had apparently been seeing a lot more of one of her old high school friends recently, Eva, and she’d enlisted Manon and Daphné’s help in winning her heart.

There was also Sander, who reminded Lucas a lot of Eliott, but with bleached blond hair. Sander was the most chaotic of their new friends, but Lucas appreciated that energy because the girls were overall too sensible for him. Well, other than Isa. She and Lucas had hit it off right off the bat and she kept claiming he reminded her of one of her friends back in the Netherlands and would have to introduce the two of them when he came to visit, which he was supposedly doing over the holidays. Lucas wouldn’t mind hanging out with them and Eliott, he thought Eliott would like Isa a lot, because there was no way not to like Isa.

“Excuse me, do you know where I might find my boyfriend?” someone said to Lucas’ left and immediately his heart started to flutter. He’d been so distracted he’d forgotten where he was and why he was there. 

He decided to play along. “What does he look like? A handsome French sort with dazzling eyes and a great ass?”

Looking Eliott in the eyes for the first time in six months was intoxicating, and Lucas could tell that Eliott felt the same way. They both stood there frozen, just looking at each other like they were the only two people in the world. Then Eliott snapped out of it. “I was going to say he kind of looks like a hedgehog, actually. Short… fluffy hair…”

He didn’t have the opportunity to finish, Lucas threw himself into Eliott’s arms and Eliott accepted him readily, pressing their lips together in what felt like the first kiss they’d ever shared. Maybe they looked a little dramatic, and maybe people were judging them, but Lucas didn’t care one bit. His soul had ached in Eliott’s absence, and now he felt whole again. 

“… but he does have a great ass,” Eliott finished once they separated, goofy smile on his face.

“I love you so much,” Lucas said, not even embarrassed by the fact that he was on the verge of tears. 

Eliott’s hands brushed both sides of his face as he pulled Lucas closer to him, resting their foreheads together. “I love you too. I missed you so much— god, I don’t even know where to start.” 

“Let’s start with a nap,” Lucas suggested, leaning away and holding his hand out for Eliott to take. Eliott took it, and they started to walk away, Eliott dragging a suitcase behind him.

“I’m not that tired—” Eliott tried, but Lucas shook his head. 

“Three things. One, yes you are, jet lag is a bitch, two, I’m not about to have you fall asleep during dinner with Arthur later, and three, you have no idea how much I missed sleeping with you.” Lucas ticked off each one on his free hand, and Eliott raised his eyebrows suggestively. He blushed bright red. “I meant— you know what I meant.” He paused, growing redder still. “But that too.”

Needless to say, they made their way to Lucas’ flat much more quickly after that. 

——

Eliott looked much more well rested by the time they started walking to dinner, even though they really hadn’t slept that much. First he’d had to give Eliott the grand tour of the two bedroom flat he’d come to call home (well, not first, first, they’d had some other business to attend to before that), and then they’d talked for quite a while, not even about ballet, just about life. 

It wasn’t like they hadn’t spoken nearly every day they’d been apart, but being there in person was entirely new and entirely the same all at once. They fell quickly back into old patterns and Lucas didn’t think his smile had left his face once, even while he slept tucked into Eliott’s side.

It was snowing while they walked, and Lucas had offered to pay for a cab, but Eliott insisted on walking, taking advantage of all the city had to offer. In such a short amount of time Lucas had really come to adore London. It didn’t compare to Paris, of course it didn’t, but he could see himself being happy there for a very long time. He didn’t want to say anything, but he’d secretly been harboring the fantasy of Eliott joining him there next year.

Eliott was wearing a beanie and his cheeks were pink from the cold, but his hand was laced through Lucas’ and his eyes were full of wonder like the cold was the last thing on his mind. He kept rambling about all the things he wanted to do while they were together and Lucas had barely responded, watching and listening with such adoration usually only reserved for puppies on Instagram. 

Two hands appeared over Lucas’ eyes and he laughed shortly until he realized it couldn’t have been Eliott, whose hand was still in his. His brows furrowed, but then he realized that if Eliott wasn’t freaking out there was only one person it could be. 

“Arthur?” he asked, and the hands fell from his eyes, the boy in question jumping around to stand right in front of him. 

“Lulu!” They both broke into wide grins meeting halfway for a tight hug. Arthur and Eliott hugged afterwards, with only a little bit less enthusiasm. Lucas wondered briefly how many people from school Eliott had kept in touch with. 

“How have you two been?” Arthur asked, falling into step beside them.

Eliott and Lucas shared a glance, deciding how to answer and who was going to answer first. Eliott raised his eyebrows, and Lucas spoke. “Better now that we’re together.”

“Ugh, did not miss you two being all sappy and gross, that’s for sure,” Arthur said, pretending to gag. They entered the restaurant, Lucas catching a curly brown haired boy’s eye as they did. 

Lucas looked away from the boy who was still looking at them, rolling his eyes at Arthur. Eliott teased, nudging Arthur’s side, “Aww, we’ll find you a Lucas someday, then we’ll complain about how gross and sappy you are.”

To Lucas’ surprise, Arthur flushed bright red, blinking rapidly. His eyes caught on something over Lucas’ shoulder. “About that—”

He was cut off by the same boy Lucas had just locked eyes with clearing his throat and blushing either from the cold or from something else entirely. Lucas looked at him, then at Eliott, then back at him, but he was no longer paying attention to Lucas or Eliott. 

“I was wondering when you’d get here,” the boy said in a soft voice, to Arthur. Arthur was still bright red but his eyes held a gleam of joy. 

“Here I am,” he said, and both boys grinned stupidly. Eliott and Lucas exchanged another glance, this one with wide eyes. 

The boy took a small step closer to Arthur. “There you are.”

Lucas felt like he was encroaching on something and briefly wondered if this was how other people felt about being around him and Eliott. Of course, he could have been reading into things… but nope, the boy with the curly hair just kissed Arthur and Arthur looked like he’d made it to heaven and was never coming back down. 

Eliott cleared his throat softly, more to remind Arthur and the boy of their presence than to intrude on something intimate. Both boys turned to them with wide eyes, the curly haired boy looking happy and open and Arthur’s expression shifting to something more nervous. 

“This is my boyfriend, Lucas,” Arthur said, eyes looking everywhere but Lucas and Eliott. 

Lucas broke into a wide grin that he tried to downplay for the other boy’s sake. “Nice to meet you, what’s your name?” Lucas asked. 

Arthur looked at him with exasperation. “Lucas.”

“What?” Lucas demanded defensively. Was it so weird to ask someone’s name? 

Arthur’s boyfriend laughed, shaking his head. “No, my name, it’s Lucas, Lucas Van der Heijden. I assume you’re the famous other Lucas I’ve heard so much about?”

Lucas shut his eyes in embarrassment, trying to figure out how to not look like an idiot from here on out. “Fuck, sorry. Yeah, I’m other Lucas, and this is my boyfriend, Eliott.”

Other Lucas, who Lucas decided he was going to refer to in his head as VDH so he wouldn’t confuse himself, had an accent that sounded vaguely familiar, though Lucas couldn’t quite place it. Just as Lucas was about to inquire into VDH a bit more, the host gestured for them to follow to a table. Lucas met Arthur’s eyes with a look that said, You are not off the hook for not telling me, and Arthur levelled him with one that said, Sure, Mr. I dated Eliott in secret for months while we all lived and danced together. Which, fair enough. 

They sat in a booth, Eliott and Lucas across from VDH and Arthur, and Eliott asked the question that was on Lucas’ mind. “So how and when did you guys meet?”

“We dance together, Luc is in the Dutch Ballet as well,” Arthur answered, and Lucas smiled slightly at the nickname use. It was like when Eliott called him Lu, so intoxicating and so intimate all at once. 

VDH nodded, grinning at Arthur. “I’m from the Netherlands, so I graciously introduced him to all the best things our country has to offer.”

Ah, so that’s where the accent was from, and he recognized it because of Isa. “One of my friends at the Royal Ballet is from the Netherlands,” Lucas said, trying to relate in any way he could. He liked VDH so far, but he was always scared of new conversations with new people. 

VDH perked up. “Oh, really? That’s awesome, I have a friend here too. That’s why we’re here, actually, I wanted to visit her here for the holidays and Arthur wanted to visit you, so voila.” That answered the question of where Arthur was staying. 

“How’d she end up in London?” Eliott asked, thanking the server who supplied them with menus and glasses of water.

“Same as Lucas, she’s in the Royal Ballet,” Arthur answered.

“Isa Keijser?” Lucas asked at the same time VDH said, “Isa Keijser? I don’t know if you know her.”

They stared at each other for a minute, then burst out laughing. “You must be the French dumbass she’s always talking about, then,” VDH said with half a grin, and Lucas scoffed. 

“She could very well be talking about Manon or Daphné,” he argued, and Eliott levelled him with a stare. He rolled his eyes, cracking a small smile. “But, yeah, she was probably talking about me. She’s told me about you too, actually, she just never referred to you by name.”

“It would be so her style to intentionally not tell you my name to confuse us when and if we met for the first time,” VDH sighed fondly. Lucas laughed, nodding in agreement. The waiter returned and Lucas realized he hadn’t looked at the menu. Truthfully, he wasn’t very hungry, but he wasn’t about to say anything when Eliott and Arthur were there and that was the entire reason they’d met up. 

He wasn’t slipping into old habits, he was fine. Things had just been so busy leading up to the holidays and he’d been missing Eliott extra and food was never something he’d paid enough attention to. Ok, maybe he was slipping back into old habits, but he had it under control. Now that Eliott was there, he already felt better. 

Regardless, he ordered something random off the menu, knowing that Eliott would probably like it if he didn’t, and tuned back into the conversations being had. Eliott was telling Arthur and VDH about Australia, about the places he’d been and the people he’d met. Apparently Sofiane had hit it off immediately with two dancers from Germany, Mohammed and Amira. He said Amira reminded him of a slightly softer but no less badass version of Imane, something Sofiane likely noticed too. Eliott had hit it off with an Italian boy named Niccolo, who he’d told Lucas about already. He wasn’t a dancer, but he was a piano accompanist and he composed music in his free time. Lucas had joked that Niccolo would replace him as the composer for Polaris and Eliott had assured him that could never happen, not in a million years. Even though Lucas had been mostly joking, it warmed his heart to know that Polaris was still their thing. Shay was another one of Eliott’s friends in Australia, from America, and Lucas had met her over Facetime a few times. She reminded him of himself in some ways, kind of like Manon and Noora, and he really wanted to meet her when he visited Eliott. 

Lucas was surprised but glad to see a new light in Arthur’s eyes as he talked about dancing in the Dutch Ballet, and Lucas could tell that Arthur was a little surprised by it himself. Arthur had found a completely random flat when he’d moved to the Netherlands, and his roommates, Liv and Ralph, were already friends with VDH, so they’d been forced to hang out quite often. Apparently VDH was practically the star of their company, but Arthur had given him a run for his money. Instead of turning it into a rivalry, they’d slowly become friends, then more, and the rest was history. Lucas knew who Liv was, vaguely, because Isa talked about her friend Liv a lot and he assumed this had to be the same person. It was crazy, how small of a world it was that they lived in.                   

Their conversations flowed nicely the rest of the time they sat at the restaurant, and Lucas pretended not to notice the small looks Eliott was giving him all night. He didn’t know what it was all about, but he figured Eliott would tell him later when they were alone. 

He was glad that Arthur had found someone— his own Lucas if you will— that made him feel like the best version of himself all the time. Sure, he didn’t necessarily need it, but he deserved it. He supposed he’d never have to wonder again if another universe Lucas and another universe Arthur had ended up together, because somehow they had in this one. Maybe VDH was a parallel version of Lucas, wouldn’t that be something. 

After what might have been anywhere between two and four hours, Lucas noticed Eliott’s eyes starting to droop and they decided to call it a night, promising to hang out together again before Eliott and Lucas left for Paris. Once they parted ways, Lucas tucked himself close into Eliott’s side and started going on about VDH, Arthur, and VDH and Arthur. He paused when he realized Eliott wasn’t responding. 

“Is everything ok?” he asked. Maybe Eliott was just tired, he rationalized. 

Eliott looked at him, face serious, voice casual. “You barely ate anything.”

Lucas’ heart dropped to his stomach. He should have known Eliott would notice those things. It hadn’t been intentional, it really hadn’t, he just didn’t have an appetite. 

“I know what you’re thinking,” Lucas said, “But I’m not— I’m still doing good, I promise.”

“Lucas…” Eliott started, but Lucas cut him off.

“I promise, Eliott. Ok? I just get distracted by conversation when we eat, you know that.” He was vaguely aware that he sounded a bit like he was pleading, which didn’t bode well for him. 

Eliott sighed, stopping to turn and face him head on. “I just want to make sure that you’re ok. You’re the most important person to me, and I worry about you even when I know I shouldn’t.”

Lucas stepped closer so they were toe to toe. “I worry about you too. It’s the nature of caring, to worry, but I believe in you, and I know that you can handle whatever life throws your way, you’re too strong not to. I need you to think the same of me.”

“I do, Lucas, but—” Eliott cut himself off, entwining his pointer fingers with Lucas’. He continued, “I trust you. And I believe in you. You’re one of the strongest people I’ve ever met, I know you can handle whatever life throws at you, but that doesn’t mean I don’t wish you didn’t have to, you know?”

Lucas did know. He’d known it since he’d come to Eliott’s house and found him curled into a ball on his bed looking like he never wanted to leave. If he could make it so Eliott only ever experience the good in life, he would do it in a heartbeat. He nodded. “I know.”

“I just love you too much to ever want to see you anything less than one hundred percent happy, which I know is a stupid dream, and I do love when you’re a grumpy little shit too, but you deserve the world even though you have a habit of forgetting that,” Eliott said. 

Lucas closed his eyes, letting the winter wind settle across his face and letting Eliott’s words be imprinted in his mind. “I love you,” he said.

“I love you too.”

“Now why don’t we go home, and I’ll make us both a big blueberry-bacon muffin filled breakfast tableau tomorrow morning,” Lucas suggested, ghosting his lips close to Eliott’s. Eliott smiled leaning in ever so slightly.

“That sounds amazing, love,” he agreed, leaning in further, and Lucas pulled back. 

He squinted. “Love?”

“When in London,” Eliott said with a dopey grin and a shrug, and Lucas kissed him senseless right there in the middle of the street. Everything was how it should be. 

18 MONTHS LATER

Lucas was panicking. None of it had been intentional, but he’d skipped over a month of therapy sessions and he couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten an actual meal, and it was starting to show. He wasn’t quite where he’d been in his last year of school, but he was pretty close. He’d ridden the high of seeing Eliott for a week or two after the holidays, but then they’d started casting and rehearsal for a new show and even though he was just in the corps rehearsals were a million times more taxing than they had been at school and he felt himself slipping ever so slightly day by day without Eliott there to ground him. It didn’t help that Eliott had seemingly forgotten about him, Facetime conversations going from daily to weekly to whenever they could find time. He knew Eliott was busy with his show as well, but it still stung to not hear from him for days on end.

He’d wanted to tell Eliott about everything that was going on inside his mind to try to find some clarity, but he didn’t want their first real conversation in almost a month to be about something so negative. So, he got better at hiding things again, feeling ashamed for doing so but having no intention of stopping. He wouldn’t see Eliott in person for a little while anyway, so all he had to do was get himself back on track by then and he’d never have to own up to the fact that he’d been faking happiness for a few months.

Manon had noticed, and she’d tried to talk to him, but when he didn’t want to talk there was nothing she, or anyone (besides Eliott) could do to make him. Still, she was watching him closely, and he knew that she’d intervene if things got too bad again. 

It was Saturday, so he had a day off and had planned on spending it in bed watching tv and trying to forget that Eliott had cancelled their Facetime date for that day, even though he didn’t have rehearsals on weekends either.

The buzzer to the flat rang and Lucas rolled his eyes, wondering if Daphné had forgotten her keys again. “Manon, the door,” he yelled, receiving no response. Groaning, he got out of bed as the buzzer rang again, peeking his head into Manon and Daphné’s room and finding it empty. He didn’t know when Manon had left, but cursed her for making him get out of bed, especially if it was because she and Daphné had both forgotten their keys. 

He pressed the button to let them in, unlocking the door to their unit and hoping they would just walk right in instead of waiting for him to open that one too. Just as he reached his bedroom door, there was a knock, and he groaned again, yelling, “It’s open!”

A muffled voice came from the other side of the door. “Special delivery for Lucas Lallemant!” 

Lucas froze, because he recognized that voice. Even though he might have been hallucinating, he ran to the door as fast as his feet would carry him, throwing it open and finding Eliott on the other side, a bouquet of flowers in hand. His smile was so bright that it nearly brought Lucas to tears and Lucas launched himself into Eliott’s arms, pulling him into the flat. 

Eliott threw the flowers onto the table before fully hugging Lucas back, stiffening once he did. Lucas pulled away, confused. “Everything ok?”

Eliott looked down at him, face pale, then blinked a few times and forced a smile. “Yeah, of course.”

Lucas smiled, lacing his arms around Eliott’s neck. “What are you doing here?”

“I missed you,” Eliott said with a shrug, “Wanted to surprise you.”

Lucas’ heart melted as he buried his face in Eliott’s chest. Eliott continued, “I know I haven’t been the best boyfriend recently. I’m really sorry about it, and I wanted to make it up to you. I can’t stay long because of rehearsals, but I wanted to make sure you know that you’re still the most important person in my life.”

“I missed you so much,” Lucas said, holding Eliott tighter than ever. “Want to…” He trailed off suggestively, nodding to his bedroom. Eliott’s face turned red but his eyes were bright with longing and desire. 

“Of course,” Eliott responded, and that was all Lucas needed to crash their lips together, stumbling across the flat until they made it into his room, slamming the door shut behind them in case Manon or Daphné arrived while they were occupied. 

Lucas pulled off Eliott’s shirt, peppering kisses down his neck and his torso, making Eliott’s breaths ragged. Eliott’s fingers fiddled with the bottom of Lucas’s shirt and Lucas grinned into another kiss, allowing them to separate only long enough to remove his own shirt. He moved to pull Eliott back in for a kiss when Eliott stopped him, same wide eyed anxious look he’d had on his face moments earlier. 

Lucas frowned folding their hands together, and Eliott wrenched them apart, leaving Lucas to go sit on the edge of the bed with his face in his hands. Lucas didn’t know what was wrong, what had changed. When Eliott finally looked at him, his eyes were red, like he was on the verge of tears.

“You told me everything was fine,” Eliott said, “You told me not to worry, and that you’d tell me if there ever was a problem.”

Lucas froze where he stood, understanding more clearly the cause of Eliott’s current distance. He picked his shirt up off the floor and put it back on, wrapping his arms around his body as if that would do anything to cover it. “There isn’t a problem,” he tried, but Eliott shook his head, devastation turning to anger. 

“Lucas there’s barely anything left of you.”

Lucas shook his head, sitting down next to Eliott and reaching for one of his hands. Eliott pulled away, looking betrayed. 

“How long has this been going on again? It’s been this way since Christmastime, right? Maybe even before?” Eliott broke off, putting his head in his hands again. “You don’t trust me, is that it? Lucas don’t you see what you’re doing to yourself?”

“Maybe it isn’t about you!” Lucas said angrily, and Eliott blinked up at him in shock. That was a lie, a little bit of it was about Eliott, but he wouldn’t give Eliott that satisfaction of thinking he was the only thing in Lucas’ world.

Eliott’s voice turned pleading. “Lu, don’t you see that I’m just upset because I care about you?”

“I know that you do.” Lucas ran a hand through his hair, sobs bubbling up in his chest and begging to break free. Eliott looked at him, really looked at him, and the dam broke wide open. “I just feel so alone. I have so many people here that I really like, but none of them are you, none of them are Yann or Arthur or Basile or Imane. I have Manon, but she has Daphné, and every time I see them, I think of you. But I don’t even have you, not really, because you have a beautiful amazing life without me, and I’m just the fucking mess of a boy you stupidly fell in love with. I’m good, but I’m not good enough. I was only ever good enough for you and that’s not even true anymore. The only thing you do is worry about me, I can see it in your eyes, and that’s not a relationship. Maybe you do have reason to worry, but I don’t feel like a real person when that’s all I see when I look at you. Worry, worry, worry. I’m not a child, I’m an adult, and yeah, I’m fucked up on so many levels that you probably should worry, but I also fear I’m never going to get better until people stop fucking worrying. You care about me, you care about me, you all fucking care about me, but I’m always the problem.”

Eliott’s arms wrapped around Lucas as he sobbed, spilling tears onto Eliott’s shirt. It was a new shirt, Lucas noticed, and for some reason that made him cry harder. “I’m tired, Eliott, I’m so tired, because I never sleep anymore, and I feel like I’m dying all the time. I don’t want to die, but I think I might and I don’t know how to stop it from happening.”

“Lucas, Lucas, look at me.” Eliott’s eyes were wide and wild as he held Lucas’ face in his hands. “You’re not dying. I won’t let that happen, ok? I could never let that happen. I’m not— ok, maybe I am a little bit worried about you, but I promise it comes from a place of love. I try to live minute by minute, like you told me when I was diagnosed, and I want you to keep trying to do that too. In this minute, how about we breathe, ok?”

Lucas nodded, infinitesimally, tears still streaking down his face. Eliott breathed in deeply, and Lucas followed, feeling his eyes water and his mouth wobble even as he did so. Eliott kept his hands on Lucas’ face, breathing out and waiting for Lucas to follow. They did that a couple more times, until Lucas’ heart rate was back to normal even if slow tears were still falling.  

“Lucas,” Eliott said, dropping his hands to Lucas’ hands. “I don’t love you because I have to, I love you because I want to, and I choose to every day.”

Lucas shook his head. “You say that but—”

“Lucas. I love you. There are no buts.”

Lucas sniffed, clenching Eliott’s hands in his. “I was so happy. I was doing so good.”

“We all have setbacks. Healing takes time, and in that time we’re allowed moments of weakness, because they only make us stronger going forward.” He paused, looking like he had more to say but didn’t want to say it. “I, um, had a depressive episode, a little while back. When I stopped responding like I usually did. I remembered you talking about not wanting to worry, and I figured it would pass because I was taking my medication and going to therapy, but it didn’t pass for a long time. I still feel like I might not be back to one hundred percent, but I knew the only way to get there was to see you again, so here I am.”

Lucas blinked in surprise He’d never even considered… he felt like an idiot. “You have no right to be mad at me for not telling you things, then.” He’d forgotten that he got a bit too defensive when confronted with his own faults.

Instead of rising to Lucas’ defensiveness, Eliott crumbled. “I know. It wasn’t because I didn’t trust you, its just I— I’m a bad person, a bad boyfriend, I know that, but I never wanted you to.”

“Eliott you’re neither of those things.”

“Neither are you.”

“Eliott.”

“Lucas.”

They looked at each other earnestly, honestly, seeing more than what was on the surface for the first time in far too long. It was easy to get swept away by love and longing when they were only together for a short amount of time, easy to put aside the hurt and the pain and let themselves feel loved, but in reality they were two lost boys still trying to find a way to live in a world that was determined to break them down to nothing. 

“I know things have to change,” Lucas said, because now that Eliott was there, he did. He couldn’t stand the broken look in Eliott’s eyes when he’d realized Lucas was back to who he’d been a year and a half ago. He continued, “But I can’t count on you, on us, to make that change.”

Eliott furrowed his brows. “What do you mean?”

“I need to learn how to come back from this on my own.”

Eliott’s face hardened. “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know.” He truly didn’t know. The last thing he ever wanted to do not be with Eliott, but it wasn’t like they were really together at the present time anyway, and clearly he couldn’t cope properly with that. “I think maybe I have to stop being so dependent on you to make everything better.”

“Lucas—” Eliot sounded confused, and Lucas couldn’t blame him. “You’re anything but dependent on me. Sometimes I wish you needed me a bit more, because being there for you is one of my favorite things.”

“I am too dependent, though, because I can’t function properly without you around. Maybe it has nothing to do with you at all, but I need to figure that all out on my own. I learned to love myself a little more with you, but I need to learn to love myself without you, do you understand? I hate myself so much, all the time, but you put those rose colored glasses on my eyes that make me not see it for a little while. It’s not a bad thing, it’s a great thing, actually, but you’re in Australia, and I’m in London, for who knows how long, and I don’t want to always have to count on other people to bring me back to a healthy state of mind, I want to be able to do it myself, or at least realize when things are getting bad and feel comfortable reaching out.” He was spewing words without thinking about them, but he realized they were all true. 

Eliott bit his lip. “So where do I— where do we fit into all of this, then?”

It hurt Lucas more than anything, and he regretted the words before they even left his mouth, but he knew it was the right thing to say. “I don’t think we do, at least not right now.”

“But Lucas…” Eliott’s face crumbled and Lucas felt pain twist in his chest like never before. “You’re my forever.”

“You’re mine too,” Lucas said, urgency in his voice. He meant it, he really did. He’d never love anyone like Eliott, and he didn’t want to. “We might just have to put a pause on forever until I figure out who I am on my own.”

Eliott dropped Lucas’ hands, and the loss was felt by both of them instantly. Lucas stammered over his words, feeling sobs bubble in his chest again. “I- I don’t expect you to wait for me. You have so much love to give, and I don’t want you wasting it on me. You’re free to find a new forever, if you want.”

“I could never,” Eliott said, shaking his head. His voice was thick, but he looked more certain than ever. “You’re my forever, Lucas, I can wait as long as you need me to. I want to.”

It went against every bit of his better judgement, but he couldn’t help himself, he pulled Eliott into him and their lips met in a searing, sorrowful kiss. It tasted like tears on both ends but neither of them cared much. Lucas knew he was making the right decision, but it hurt so badly and he just wanted to ease the pain, if only for a moment. He could tell Eliott felt the same, so when Eliott lifted Lucas’ shirt, he gave in willingly, undoing Eliott’s jeans and finishing what they’d put on hold. He hoped dearly it wasn’t the last time, that it was just a goodbye for now, but if it was the end, at least they went out with a bang. 

2 YEARS LATER

Paris looked as beautiful as it always did, but Lucas was seeing it with new eyes. The last six months had been a lot, mentally and emotionally, but as he looked out at the city he knew so well, he knew that it had all been worth it. Sure, presently he was only seeing it through a few windows, but after a few more papers, a few more signatures, and he’d be back to the hustle and bustle of everyday life, and he finally felt ready to tackle it. 

He’d been more of a mess than usual after Eliott’s impromptu visit from Australia, even though their decision to pause things between them had been Lucas’ idea. Fortunately for him, Manon had enough and forced him to make changes for real. He started going back to therapy, but it wasn’t enough, and he made the painful decision to put his career on hold to get his life back on track and checked himself into a facility in Paris that specialized in eating disorder recovery. Paris had been the only option for him, really, because no matter how much he loved London, his heart was in the city he’d called home for eighteen years. 

It had been hell at first, and he’d regretted every choice he’d made since Eliott’s visit, maybe even before then, but as the days turned into weeks and then into months, he knew that he’d made the right decision. He kept up with his ballet, giving himself private lessons in his room during free time because fucked up or not, he was still planning on dancing as long as humanly possible. He’d kept in touch with all of his friends, but particularly Manon, Yann, and Arthur, and that had really pulled him through a lot of hard times. He hadn’t spoken to Eliott since he’d left Lucas’ flat in London for the last time, and though he ached to, a part of him was fearful that Eliott had forgotten him, left him like people in his life always tended to do.

He wasn’t allowed his own phone while in treatment, so he couldn’t even check Eliott’s social media to see what he was up to in Australia, if he was doing ok or not, so he tried his best not to think about it. Of course, Eliott had been one of the many things he’d talked about in therapy sessions, but all of it had only made him realize that Eliott truly was who he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

It hadn’t ever been a doubt, not really, but Lucas felt comfortable enough in where he was and who he was that he knew he wouldn’t place all his value into solely his relationship or ballet ever again. He was a pretty great person, it turned out, it had just taken him nineteen years to realize it. 

He was handed his phone back, and he turned it on for the first time in months, bombarded by a barrage of notifications. He deleted most of them, knowing they’d been sent before the senders had known where he was and that he didn’t have use of his phone. Thankfully, he had no messages from his father. He hadn’t been expecting it, he hadn’t heard from him since before his last year at school, when he’d caused him to have a breakdown in front of Manon, leading to Lucas’ summer in the colloc, but there was still that fear that one day he might try to reenter Lucas’ life and make it hell. 

There were messages from Eliott, a lot of them, as well as some missed calls and voicemails, but Lucas couldn’t bring himself to look at any of them. He knew that he should have told Eliott where he was going, but he hadn’t been able to bring himself to. He knew Eliott would support him in something drastic as this, but he also hadn’t wanted that pity, that worry that had prompted all this in the first place. 

“Lucas?” the receptionist said, and he realized she’d been trying to get his attention. 

He blinked and smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry, um, yes?”

“You’re free to go,” she said with a warm smile that he couldn’t help but return. He hadn’t felt this kind of happiness since the show, his final year of school, and this happiness had nothing to do with anyone other than himself, which made it better than anything he’d ever experienced. He was sure there would be more moments throughout his life to top this one, and that this one might pale in comparison to other memories over time, but this feeling, this moment, was all his own.

It was all his own, but in realizing that he realized that it didn’t have to be all his own, that he wanted to share it, because he knew that it wouldn’t diminish the joy he felt on his own. He wanted to share it with Eliott, but he couldn’t because Eliott was in Australia, and Eliott probably thought Lucas didn’t love him anymore. 

Well, he’d share it with Imane, then. Since she was still in Paris, he’d called her the week before to see if he could stay with her until he found his footing wherever he was off to next, and she’d readily agreed, only hesitation being that she was living with Idriss currently, and Idriss still spoke to Eliott frequently. It wouldn’t be a problem, he’d assured her, because he did plan on reaching out to Eliott again, hopefully pressing play and picking up where they left off. That was, if he wasn’t too much of a coward to do so. 

He pushed open the doors and breathed in the fresh, winter air. It was nearly Christmas, and there was a very thin layer of snow dusting the pavement, something that didn’t happen very often, and Lucas felt like it was there just for him. He closed his eyes and tipped his head back to the sky, smiling despite everything that he still needed to do to get himself fully back on track. In this one minute, he didn’t have a care in the world. 

He opened his eyes, gazing up at the sky for a minute and all the stars dotting it, seeing his breath in the air as he exhaled before he dropped his eyes back to what was in front of him and stepping back into the real world. 

Just as he took the first step, his eyes caught on someone at the end of the sidewalk, leaning against a streetlight like they were exactly where they were meant to be. It couldn’t be— he had no way of knowing where Lucas was and when he was getting out… Lucas took a few hesitant steps, breath catching in his throat as he took in the sight of Eliott Demaury, grinning ear to ear like his Christmas wishes had just come true in front of his eyes. 

Seeing Eliott there, smiling like he was, Lucas couldn’t stop his own smile from overtaking his face, walking quicker and quicker to the man of his dreams. “Eliott, how did you— what are you—”

He didn’t have a chance to finish, because Eliott met him in a few long strides, cupping his face with both hands and kissing him so hard he saw stars. He kissed Eliott back, wondering briefly if he was dreaming. 

“Lucas, I love you so much,” was the first thing Eliott said when they broke apart, foreheads resting together like they did so often. They swayed there together for a minute, neither one of them speaking, dancing to the music of their souls finding their way back to one another. 

“I love you too, Eliott, I love you too.” Lucas was crying, but these were tears of pure joy, pure love, and they both could see it. “You look great,” he said, because Eliott did, there wasn’t a day that he didn’t.

“You look better,” Eliott countered, and Lucas laughed, a loud joyous sound. 

“I am,” he agreed, “Better, that is. I’m sorry for everything, for not telling you where I was going, for not calling, for suggesting we pause in the first place—”

“Hey,” Eliott cut him off, running his thumbs up and down Lucas’ cheekbones. “You have nothing to apologize for. Look at me, look how happy I am. It’s all because of you, because I get to see you, hold you, love you, and wait for you, even if I wasn’t entirely sure you wanted me to.” 

He was happy, Lucas could see it, there wasn’t a hint of worry in his face, even though there was plenty of reason for there to be. It made Lucas feel a little lighter, smile a little brighter. Fuck him, even his thoughts were coming out in stupid rhymes now. 

“Thank you for waiting,” Lucas said genuinely, because if he couldn’t apologize he could at least show his gratitude. 

“It was my pleasure,” Eliott said, “Now come on, let’s go home.”

He stuck a hand out for Lucas to take, and Lucas obliged with a beaming smile. “Home?” he asked, but Eliott just raised an eyebrow, planting a kiss on his forehead. 

—— 

Home, it seemed, was the house of Harold and Caroline Demaury, a place Lucas hadn’t visited since Eliott was diagnosed two years ago. The year before when they’d visited Paris, he and Eliott had stayed with Imane and Idriss, visiting with his parents for dinner but nothing beyond that. He texted Imane about his change of plans and she told him that she already knew, but her flat was open to him anytime in case he had a change of heart. This partially answered some of Lucas’ questions about how Eliott had known where he was and why he was there, but there were still more answers he’d need before the night was up.

Harold and Caroline welcomed him like their own son, and Lucas wondered what Eliott had told them about why Lucas was in Paris, or if he’d told them anything at all. It wasn’t very late, but Lucas was a bit exhausted so he didn’t engage much in conversation. Eliott picked up on this, eyes softening with understanding as he placed his hand on Lucas’ leg. 

“Mom, Dad, is it ok if we call it quits for the night?” he asked, smiling earnestly.

“Oh, of course. You two must be tired. Let me know if you need anything at all,” she said, warmth evident in her voice. Lucas and Eliott stood to leave the room, and she spoke up again. “And Lucas? I’m glad to have you back here, and know that you’re welcome anytime.”

He smiled, feeling Eliott’s hand slip into his. “Thank you, Caroline. It means a lot.”

They walked the short distance to Eliott’s bedroom in silence, hand in hand. Lucas didn’t know what he should be feeling at the moment, but he mostly just felt happy. Maybe that was wrong, maybe he should have waited before jumping back into the life he’d put on pause, but it felt right being there with Eliott and his parents.

Lucas tried to speak, but Eliott cut him off by throwing a hoodie his way, raising his eyebrows as he changed out of his own clothes into more comfortable ones. Most of Lucas’ things were still in London, actually, he hoped Manon and Daphné hadn’t gotten rid of them or gotten a roommate to take his place just yet. They’d assured him he needn’t worry about the rent while he was away, but he was a bit worried regardless. 

Eliott was wearing a simple pair of sweatpants and a red t shirt Lucas recognized as one of his, but he didn’t say anything because he wasn’t even sure if that fact had registered with Eliott. They both crawled into bed, Lucas in Eliott’s hoodie and his underwear, but they had no intention of sleeping just yet. They needed to talk, and most of their best talks happened in hushed whispers, faces nearly pressed together sharing the same pillow. 

“How did you know where I was? And when I was leaving?” Lucas asked before Eliott had a chance to say anything. 

“I still talk to people from school too, you know,” Eliott said, then, “Imane told me, she thought I’d want to know, please don’t be mad at her.”

Lucas shook his head. “I’m not mad at her.” He didn’t say anything else, trying to figure out what to say. That question had been answered, but did he even have any more? Should he apologize for leaving Eliott in the dark for so long? 

“Was this presumptuous of me?” Eliott asked, voice strained. 

Lucas furrowed his brows. “What do you mean?”

“Was it presumptuous of me to be there, to think you wanted me to be there?” Eliott’s voice was small, like he was scared of the answer. 

Lucas looked at him a little more closely mapping out the face of the only person he’d ever loved, at least in such an eternal way. Before he could answer, Eliott continued, “I just wanted you to know that of all the people that have left in your life, I’ll never be one of them. I know that ‘for better or for worse’ is a marriage vow, but I’m in it with you one hundred percent, for better or for worse. Even if the worse requires a little time apart to figure things out, know that I’ll always be rooting for you, and that I’ll wait for you no matter how long we’re apart.”

Lucas placed his hand on the side of Eliott’s face, and Eliott melted into the touch, closing his eyes instinctively. “It wasn’t presumptuous of you.”

Eliott’s hand rested on top of his on Eliott’s cheek and all Lucas felt was warmth. “I thought about it a lot, what I would do and say when I saw you again, because I’ve fucked up so many times by now that I figured I’d owe you a million apologies if you even wanted to see me at all. But then, when I saw you there, I realized that all I wanted was you and that I wasn’t going to stand in my own way anymore. I know who I am without you now, and I’m comfortable with that person, but I don’t think that it’s a bad thing to love myself a little bit more when I’m with you, because it only shows how much love I’m capable of giving. I’m in a better place than I’ve ever been, and I can’t thank you enough for allowing me the time to figure out a lot of the shit that’s been circulating in my head longer than I can remember. I’ve had time to heal on my own, but I’m ready for the beginning of the rest of my life, a life with you by my side. If you still want to be there, that is.”

Eliott opened his eyes. “Of course I do. Of course I want to be there. I love you exponentially, remember?”

“I love you exponentially,” Lucas repeated in a whisper, allowing himself a smile at the memories of laying exactly like this but under entirely different circumstances. He looked at their hands, then into Eliott’s eyes. “I do too, I love you exponentially. Even when I was figuring things out, that stayed the same, me loving you more and more every day.”

“Can I kiss you?” Eliott asked, and Lucas nodded.

“Yes.” 

A soft, gentle press of the lips was all it was, nothing like the whirlwind kiss they’d swept each other up in earlier, but it was the perfect kiss in the perfect moment. Maybe the universe was on their side, after all, if it had all led to where they were in that specific instance. 

“What are you going to do about ballet?” Eliott asked, and Lucas was glad he hadn’t avoided the topic. It was Lucas’ second love, after all. 

“I can’t go back to the Royal Ballet, even though I really did enjoy it there,” Lucas confessed with a sigh. Truthfully, he didn’t want to. He felt he’d worn out his time in London, but was grateful for it nonetheless.

Eliott trailed one hand up and down his spine idly, an action that Lucas found to be quite comforting. “There’s a new director at the Paris Opera Ballet, you know.”

Lucas didn’t know. “What?”

Eliott nodded. “There have been a lot of changes, actually, according to Imane. Most of them for the better.”

“Oh?” Lucas really didn’t want to get any of his hopes up, but he wanted to return home more than anything. It was a bit ironic, that he loved this city so much considering all he’d been through in it, but it also contained most of his happiest memories and greatest moments of healing.

“I think I’m going to audition,” Eliott said, “That’s part of why I came back here, other than for you.”

Lucas blinked at him. “Really? What about Australia?”

“Australia’s fine. But it’s not Paris, and you’re not there.” 

“Don’t make your decisions around me—”

Eliott huffed out a small laugh. “All due respect, Lucas, but don’t even start with me. It’s been a year and a half since we left, and all I’ve thought about is how much I want to come home, yes, to you, but also to Paris, my friends, my family. I had Sofiane but it wasn’t enough. This is where I’m meant to be, I know it now.”

“I think this is where I’m meant to be too,” Lucas admitted, “I think I’ve always known, in my heart.”

Eliott swallowed, and Lucas watched his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. “I was also thinking… I don’t really want to live with my parents if I come back here.”

“Understandable,” Lucas agreed with a small laugh, and Eliott’s traced the lines it left on his face. 

“I was wondering if you’d want to get a flat with me, if you’re sure you’d like to be here in Paris?” Eliott asked, and Lucas’ smile faltered. 

“Are you serious?” 

Eliott nodded, then backtracked, “Unless you think it’s too soon, or you need more time, or—”

“Hey,” Lucas cut Eliott off, lacing his fingers through his hair. He pulled Eliott’s face closer to his, kissing him gently. “I’d love to get a flat with you.”

Eliott’s eyebrows shot up. “Really?”

“Really,” Lucas promised with a smile. “We make quite the roommate duo, if I remember correctly.”

Eliott laughed, a sound that Lucas wanted to capture in a jar and keep with him forever. “That we do.”

Somewhere in the distance, church bells rang, and winter wind whistled by, and Lucas and Eliott found home in one another again, not for the first time, but for the last, because this time would lead to forever. 

3 YEARS LATER

It was so strange, being in the same place he’d grown up, performing the same pieces he’d practiced a million times, but in a completely different way. Eliott had waited until his two year contract with the Australian Ballet was up, auditioning for the Paris Opera Ballet with Lucas in the meantime, and now the both of them were exactly where they were meant to be. Imane was still at the company, but she was the only one of their good friends still there. Emma had quit ballet while Lucas was in treatment, something he hadn’t found out about until he’d auditioned, but she seemed happy, so that was all that mattered. Lucas was still trying to convince Yann and Arthur to come back from Berlin and Amsterdam, respectively, but Yann loved Berlin and Arthur had his Lucas, so his pleas fell on deaf ears. 

Sofiane stayed in Australia for another year, but Imane had told them that she suspected he’d be coming back to Paris soon as well. Lucas suspected it had something to do with her, but she refused to entertain any of his questions on the subject.

Eliott and Lucas’ flat was tiny, there was barely enough room for the both of them, but Lucas loved it with all his heart. Eliott had gotten him a piano for his twentieth birthday, and Lucas had gotten Eliott a record player, complete with a set of dubstep tracks on vinyl that Eliott loved for god knew what reason. He’d regretted that purchase a little bit, but the look on Eliott’s face when he’d given them to him sat in his memories and made his bleeding eardrums worth it. 

Lucas and Eliott had also attended a few cooking classes in their free time, partially as a way to normalize healthy eating habits, and partially because if Lucas had to eat one more blueberry-bacon muffin he was going to throw Eliott’s dubstep records out the window. It was easier with Eliott, of course, but Lucas still worked on himself often, even going back to Angelique for weekly therapy sessions. She’d been pleasantly surprised to hear that he was back in town, and he’d been pleasantly surprised that she was willing to work with him again. 

Eliott was still going to therapy too, but Lucas sensed something a little different about his behavior recently, and he wondered if there was anything he should have been doing to make sure everything was going ok for him mentally. 

It was four in the morning and the two of them had to be up early for rehearsals in the morning, but when Lucas blinked his eyes open blearily and saw that Eliott wasn’t in bed beside him, he realized Eliott must never have gone to bed. 

He got out of bed, trying to adjust his eyes to the dim light as he made his way into the living room to see why Eliott was still up. The brightness hit his eyes harder than he’d expected and he braced himself against the wall, squinting. 

“Eliott?” His voice was groggy with sleep but Eliott looked up at him from where he was seated in the middle of the floor, surrounded by papers. Some were drawings, some looked like sheet music, and some looked like notes written by an unsteady hand. It gave Lucas flashbacks to three years ago. 

“Eliott, come to bed,” he tried, knowing it was useless when he saw the light in Eliott’s eyes. 

“Sleep?” Eliott laughed, “Come on, Lucas, I’m on a roll!”

Lucas nodded in agreement, knowing that the best he could do was offer quiet support until the euphoria gave way to the darkness lurking beneath. “I can see that. Do you want to tell me about it?”

Eliott’s eyes lit up again, and Lucas sat down beside him, hanging onto his every word. Well, at least until tiredness overtook him again. He wasn’t even aware of falling asleep, and felt kind of bad about it, but when he woke up a few hours later, Eliott was holding him from behind, likely having carried him to bed. He could tell Eliott wasn’t asleep by the pattern of his breathing, but at least his body was resting. 

Lucas didn’t mention their middle of the night conversation but he did remind Eliott to take his medication, taking his own at the same time. Eliott peppered him with kisses all throughout the morning, something Lucas would never complain about, and when they went to practice, Lucas was just grateful that he would be able to help Eliott through whatever this was, if it was a manic episode, a hypomanic one, a mixed one, whichever. Eliott hadn’t had a manic episode since the one that had led to his diagnosis, so this was still new territory for both of them, but Lucas knew they could both handle it, for better or for worse. 

——

The depression hit a few days later, so fast that Lucas hadn’t been expecting it, even if he was. It wasn’t the deepest hole Eliott had ever fallen into, but it wasn’t the shallowest, so Lucas did everything he could to help ease even the smallest fraction of pain Eliott was going through. 

A few days into the depressive episode, Lucas made Eliott breakfast in bed, even though he wasn’t sure if Eliott would eat it, because he knew that it was always something that Eliott did to cheer him up and make him feel special. They didn’t have rehearsals for a few days because the new director was out of town, so there were no obligations for either one of them.

Even after being away for two years, they still had quite the reputation at the Paris Opera Ballet, mostly amongst the dancers. Their friends, old and new, knew what was going on and offered support in any way they could, but there were still whispers around the company of them being lazy or crazy or undeserving of what they had. Lucas knew how to handle it, he’d been dealing with similar shit practically his whole life, but it hit Eliott harder than Lucas had expected it to. Eliott had always been the star, even when the director was being an asshole, everyone had been on his side, because the director was so clearly in the wrong. But now, facing a group mostly made up of people they didn’t know very well, every negative or ignorant comment hit Eliott with twice the impact, and Lucas could only do his best to try to pick up the pieces. 

It didn’t help anything that Lucille, Eliott’s ex-girlfriend was a soloist in the company and everyone fawned over her like she was the next Svetlana Zakharova. Eliott had told him plenty about Lucille, and all of it left a bad taste in his mouth. Clearly, Lucille wasn’t very fond of Lucas either, but he wasn’t in the mood to try to change her mind. She probably felt that she was still owed Eliott’s love, even after years apart, simply because she felt entitled to the best of everything.

Lucas was about to be on his way into the bedroom with his tray of breakfast for Eliott when two arms wrapped around his middle, head resting on his shoulder. He set the tray down and turned around, smiling softly as he looked Eliott in the eyes. They weren’t as bright as they usually were, but the dull haze that had coated them for the past few days wasn’t there anymore, and Lucas was happy to see the colors he loved a bit more vibrantly. Eliott’s eyes were still his favorite color, that would probably never change. 

“I was just about to bring you breakfast,” Lucas said, nodding his head to the tray. He watched Eliott look down at it, surprise evident on his face.

“You made me breakfast in bed?” he asked softly.

Lucas nodded, wrapping his arms around Eliott’s neck. “Of course. It always makes me feel better when I’m down, so…” he trailed off, seeing an unreadable emotion in Eliott’s expression. “Was it stupid, to do that?”

Eliott’s brows furrowed instantly, head snapping back to meet Lucas’ gaze. “What? No, of course not. It’s just… I’ve been so awful to you these past few days, you don’t need to do anything like this for me.”

“Eliott,” Lucas sighed, “You have not been awful to me at all. Need I remind you that I was intentionally awful to you for like five years back in school?”

“That was different—”

“It was and it wasn’t. You’re allowed bad days, Eliott, and I’m not going to try to fix them for you, because I know that’s not what you want or need. Maybe you’ll yell at me or ignore me, but I’ll always be there to make you breakfast in bed or cuddle with you at night, ok?”

Eliott ran his hands up and down Lucas’ back. “Ok.”

“Good,” Lucas beamed, wiggling out of Eliott’s grip. “Now go back to the bedroom, I have a surprise for you that may or may not be breakfast in bed.”

Eliott smiled, the first one Lucas had seen in days, lifting his hand up to salute Lucas. “Aye, aye captain.”

In hindsight, breakfast in bed probably would have worked much better if Lucas had remembered to grab silverware, but Eliott had tucked Lucas close once he entered the room and set the tray on the bed and hadn’t let him go. It didn’t matter, though, not really, because Eliott was smiling, and Lucas was eating, and they were going to be ok.

No, they were going to be more than ok, they were going to be great. Greatness wasn’t measured by the number of good days versus the bad, it wasn’t measured by anything, really, it was just a simple fact. They were going to be great again, no matter what the present had in store. At least, that was what Angelique had been trying to help him understand. She was also helping him to understand that the days that weren’t great were vital to his existence, because when everything was good, nothing was. 

It was all a bit confusing at times, if Lucas was honest with himself, so he focused on the simple things when it all got to be too much. The sun beams twisting their way through Eliott’s hair in the morning, curtains parted just so. The curtains themselves, a bright, golden yellow, Lucas had picked out because they reminded him of Eliott. The way Eliott buttered Lucas’ toast for him, knowing exactly how he liked it, and the way he did it without thinking twice. Falling in love more and more every single minute wasn’t scary, not anymore, because it was Eliott, and scary wasn’t even a word in Lucas’ vocabulary around him. 

“Thank you,” Eliott said, leaning his head on Lucas’ shoulder. “For the breakfast, and for everything.”

“You’re welcome,” Lucas said, because they both knew Eliott didn’t need to thank him, but Lucas was starting to allow people to thank him for things when they wanted to. “Thank you for being you.”

Because, flaws and all, Lucas was still the person Eliott loved more than anything, and Eliott was still the person Lucas loved more than anything. Maybe it was partially because of their brief stint as rivals, one sided as it might have been. Not caring how the other person saw you broke down every wall before they even got close enough to fall in love. They’d learned to love every ugly part of each other because those parts hadn’t really ever been hidden, because they hadn’t cared to hide them. 

Lucas kissed Eliott’s forehead, loving when Eliott made himself small and tucked himself into Lucas like he could shield him from the world. He probably couldn’t, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try.     

5 YEARS LATER

Eliott was leading Lucas by the hand, blindfolded, and Lucas couldn’t have been happier. They’d been on a date to celebrate their five year anniversary, going out to dinner at a fancy restaurant because they were technically adults now, that was what adults did, but Eliott had blindfolded Lucas immediately after and told Lucas to trust him, as if there was any other option. 

They were both wearing suits, partly because they were celebrating an anniversary, and partly because they both had suits they never wore and didn’t want them or the money they’d spent to go to waste. Lucas had tried to keep his cool all night, but he’d been dying to take Eliott’s clothes off since the minute he’d seen him all dressed up. He didn’t honestly look that different than he did at seventeen, but he looked more Eliott, and in a suit he rendered Lucas completely incapable of coherent thought.

“Eliiii,” he whined, Eliott’s hands still on his shoulders, guiding him. 

Eliott’s laugh was music to his ears, despite the fact he was still blindfolded and had no idea where they were going. “I always forget how whiny you are,” Eliott teased.

“I am not whiny!” Lucas gasped indignantly, dissolving into giggles when he heard Eliott laugh again behind him. After a few more minutes of walking, they came to a stop, so Lucas raised his hands to remove his blindfold, but Eliott swatted them away before he could do so. 

“Dude!” Lucas laughed, and Eliott groaned. 

“This is not the time for you to call me dude,” Eliott complained, and Lucas scoffed.

“I’ll call you dude whenever I want to, dude.”

He heard Eliott sigh, and he smiled triumphantly until he felt Eliott’s hands push him gently. “What the—”

He ripped off the blindfold as he stumbled backwards, landing in something wet. Once he cleared the water from his eyes he saw Eliott standing on the street in front of him, shit eating grin on his face. Lucas surveyed his surroundings, fully intending to be mad, but then he realized where they were. 

“The fucking fountain,” he said, no mirth in his voice at all. 

Eliott nodded. “The fucking fountain.”

“I can’t believe you’ve waited five years to push me into a fucking fountain,” Lucas said, shaking his head. 

Eliott raised his eyebrows. “Not just any fountain!”

“Not just any fountain,” Lucas agreed, “Although, if memory serves, you should be in here with me.”

He vaguely wondered if the water was ruining his only good suit, but decided he didn’t really care. Maybe it was time to get a new one anyway. He held out a hand, and Eliott laughed. “You really think I’m going to fall for that?”

“I don’t think you have a choice, Demaury,” Lucas said, wiggling his fingers, and something shifted in Eliott’s expression. He grasped Lucas’ hand and Lucas pulled him into the fountain, Eliott sputtering indignantly even though he’d known it was coming. 

Eliott stumbled into the fountain clumsily, falling on his ass, and Lucas burst into hysterics. It took him a minute to regain control over himself, and when he did Eliott was still sitting in the fountain, looking up at Lucas with a glimmer in his eyes. 

“I’m not helping you up,” Lucas said, raising one eyebrow and crossing his arms. The corner of his mouth twitched, threatening to collapse him into another bout of laughter, but he remained steady as Eliott shifted from sitting to kneeling, one foot braced on the ground. Lucas sighed overdramatically, holding out a hand. “Ok, fine, I’ll help you up. But only because I love you.”

Eliott’s fingers ghosted over his briefly, not long enough for Lucas to grip them to pull him up, before they disappeared inside his suit jacket, like he was looking for something. He smiled as he found whatever it was, and Lucas became acutely aware of how they were positioned. 

Eliott, on one knee before him, Lucas reaching out a hand, both of them in the fountain that had started it all. 

His heart stopped beating. If he was wrong… but if he was right… 

“Lucas, I’ve loved you since we were children, even if I didn’t know it back then,” Eliott said, and Lucas’ heart started beating again, threatening to burst out of his chest. It was loud inside the fountain, but Lucas almost didn’t hear it, the only thing on his mind the man in front of him. The man, the boy, the love of his life. 

Eliott continued, “You’re the only one I want to see first thing in the morning, even on the bad days, and you’re the only person I can’t picture my life without. I know we’re still young and we’ve got our whole lives ahead of us, but I made you a promise five years ago, and I still mean every word. I promised that no matter where we were, you were it for me. You’re the one I love. We’ve been through more ups and downs than most people probably have to go through in their whole lives, but I wouldn’t trade a single second of it, not if it led us here. You have the most beautiful soul I’ve ever seen, and some days I still pinch myself to make sure that this is all real, that you actually chose me. But you did, and I chose you, continue to choose you, and that’s never going to change. And sure, marriage is kind of an arbitrary institution that our generation is moving past as a whole, and our love and commitment to one another speaks loud enough on its own, but Lucas Lallemant, will you marry me?”

Lucas froze with tears in his eyes, watching as the water from the fountain pelted down on Eliott’s head, soaking him more and more with each passing second. He didn’t notice the small crowd of people that had started to surround them in the fountain, whispering and videotaping them. 

A million years passed in a single second when their eyes met, each of them staring into the depths of their favorite color. The world restarted, and Lucas smiled, letting tears mingle with the water on his face. 

“Yes.”

The grin that broke out on Eliott’s face was unlike anything Lucas had ever seen, so blinding he feared he shouldn’t look right at it. In the blink of an eye, he was on his feet, surging forward and capturing Lucas in a time bending kiss that made him feel like he was floating amongst the stars, happiest version of himself in any universe. 

They broke apart laughing as the people that had become voyeurs to one of their greatest moments of personal joy applauded and cheered. Eliott slipped a simple ring onto Lucas finger, and Lucas made a note to himself to get one for Eliott as well. 

“We should probably get out of the fountain now,” Lucas suggested, and Eliott shrugged. 

“Probably,” he agreed. 

The people that had gathered congratulated them as they clumsily hopped out of the stupid fountain that would probably be the site of their wedding if they weren’t careful. They were only twenty-two, but five years together felt like a lifetime, and Lucas had honestly been thinking a lot about marriage and what that might bring for them. They already acted like they were married anyway, why should they wait on making it official?

Lucas couldn’t stop looking at the simple band on his finger, surprised at how well it fit. He was soaked from head to toe, and the season was teetering on winter, but he wasn’t cold, not with all the warmth that had filled in his chest.

Eliott clasped his hand, smiling down at him like he’d done five years ago, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. Lucas didn’t know if Eliott even remembered that was exactly what he’d done after their first kiss, but Lucas remembered, he’d always remember every second of that night, even the fight that had preceded it all, such a trivial thing that had led to something so monumental. 

Everyone surrounding them had more or less dispersed, realizing Lucas and Eliott were done putting on a show, so they walked back to their flat peacefully, content with each other’s presence.

“You know, I’ve been thinking about something,” Eliott said as they walked, thumb rubbing Lucas’ ring. 

Lucas laughed minutely, wondering what else there was to be thinking about. The only other major thing they’d done recently was renew their contracts with the Paris Opera Ballet, if that could even be considered major. “Thinking about what?” he asked. 

Eliott swallowed, looking up at the moon. “Well, I—”

He broke off as Lucas’ phone started to ring. Lucas swore under his breath, he’d been certain he’d put his phone on silent. He glanced up apologetically at Eliott, who simply shook his head to indicate that there were no worries. Grabbing his phone from his pocket, he released Eliott’s hand when he saw the caller ID. Why was the director calling him? He hoped he hadn’t done anything wrong that he’d forgotten about.

The new director was great, though, so he wouldn’t have been worried about her calls if it hadn’t been the first time she’d ever called him. She liked to stay involved professionally, not personally, and most of the time he really appreciated that. Of course, there were some personal things he and Eliott had to share with her, but she never looked at either of them any different knowing what she knew.

“Hello?” he answered, not meaning to phrase it as a question but still completely in the dark as to the reason for the call. When she started to speak, it wasn’t that Lucas wasn’t listening, he heard every word she said, but his head filled with a buzz, blocking out everything in the outside world. He was registering the words he was hearing, but he wasn’t sure he was responding, at least not coherently. It couldn’t be true, this couldn’t be happening.

His mind left his body, only coming back down when Eliott placed a hand on his cheek. He didn’t know how long he’d been standing there, phone frozen in front of him, wide eyed blank expression on his face. 

“Lucas?” Eliott asked, concern written all over his face. “Is everything all right?”

Was everything all right? Was what the director had just said real? 

“I…” he began, trying to find the words he was looking for. “She…”

“She?” Eliott prompted, still looking nervous. 

“I’m a principal dancer in the company,” Lucas said, or maybe didn’t say. He wasn’t sure. 

Judging by the way Eliott’s eyes got so wide they nearly took up his entire face, he had, in fact, spoken aloud. “You what?”

“The director,” Lucas said dazedly, “She called to tell me they’re making me a principal dancer in the company.”

If Lucas had thought Eliott’s smile before was blinding, that had nothing on this one. “Are you serious? Lu! What the fuck that’s incredible! At twenty-two years old! And you’ve only been a soloist, what, for a year?”

Lucas nodded, brain still fuzzy and uncomprehending. He and Eliott were both soloists, Eliott had entered the company as one. It didn’t seem possible… maybe they mixed up Eliott’s number with his? All the other principal dancers were older than him, not by much, admittedly, because ballet didn’t have many dancers aged into their late thirties and forties, but still.

“Is tonight real?” Lucas asked, because he’d also just gotten engaged. Somehow that seemed a million times easier to stomach than the other news he’d received.

“It is,” Eliott said softly, toning down his blinding smile as he realized that the pure disbelief that Lucas was feeling was too present for him to feel any form of happiness. 

Lucas blinked up at Eliott, shaking his head. “Why wasn’t it you?”

Eliott furrowed his eyebrows. “Why wasn’t what me?”

“You should be the principal dancer… are you sure they didn’t call you? This is my phone right?” Lucas was spiraling a tiny bit, thank god for Eliott, being steady and grounded when his head started spinning. 

“Lucas, they meant to call you, not me, because you deserve this. You’re the best dancer in the company by a mile.”

“But you’re better, you’ve always been better.”

Eliott shrugged. “Maybe I’m not what they’re looking for. Besides, I wouldn’t want to be a principal dancer anyway.”

Lucas gawked at him. Was the whole world flipped upside down, was this an episode of Stranger Things? “That’s always been your dream.”

“Maybe, like, top three dreams,” Eliott agreed. 

“Eliott what are you talking about?” Lucas asked, feeling his brain enter his body again, bit by bit.

“That was what I was about to talk to you about, actually,” Eliott said sheepishly, “Though I’m not sure if now is the right time anymore.”

“Eliott. Tell me.”

Eliott sighed, running a hand through his hair. “Principal dancer has been my dream, but there are two others that outweigh it, and I already have one, and I think it’s time for me to start reaching for the other one seriously.”

Lucas blinked. “Ok?”

“The dream I have, it’s you,” Eliott said, and Lucas levelled him with a look, causing Eliott to laugh. “I’m serious! I can’t help it if you’re the Rapunzel to my Flynn Ryder—”

“I’m Flynn Ryder and you know it,” Lucas interrupted, earning a short laugh.

“—But my other dream, well, you know this one too, actually, is Polaris. I want to commit to Polaris full time, quit the company in the meantime.”

Now Lucas’ eyes turned into saucers. “You what?”

“I know I should have said something before now, but I wasn’t totally sure until now,” Eliott said quickly, words running together, “I’ll still be here, though, with you. It won’t be like Australia, in fact, I still want you to compose the music, but I understand if you don’t want to or don’t have the time…” 

“Eliott,” Lucas laughed, “I’m not mad, how could I be mad?”

“You… aren’t?” Eliott clarified hopefully.

“No! Just surprised.” He paused, taking both of Eliott’s hands in his. “I’ll support you in whatever you want to do, you know that, right?”

Eliott nodded, gripping his hands tighter. “I do. I just didn’t want you to think it was because you’re a principal dancer now, or anything.”

“The thought never even crossed my mind,” Lucas answered truthfully. They were long past the jealousy and rivalry. If Eliott had made principal dancer, Lucas would have been equally happy for him. 

Principal dancer. Now that he was back on earth, it was sinking in more and more. He wasn’t the first of their friends to be a principal dancer, but did Manon really count? She hadn’t ever even been in the corps, soloist straight out of school. Her and Daphné were still thriving at the Royal Ballet, and Noora and her girlfriend had ended up moving in with them to take Lucas’ place. He was pretty sure they were getting their own place soon, but was glad that they’d kept the gay alive in his absence. He missed Manon a lot, and he couldn’t wait to rub it in her face that she may have been principal dancer before him, but he was engaged before her. 

“I’m a principal dancer in the Paris Opera Ballet,” Lucas said aloud, finally believing it. 

Eliott smiled. “You are.”

“I’m engaged to the man of my dreams,” he said. What a day it had been. 

Eliott pulled him close. He realized they were both still soaking wet, and laughed. “You are,” Eliott said again, bringing them closer still. 

“I love you, Eliott,” Lucas said, observing the stars reflecting in Eliott’s luminescent eyes. “I didn’t say it before, but I should have. Even though you know it, I love you, I love you, I love you.”

“And I love you.”

If he wasn’t mistaken, Lucas might have seen a shooting star soaring behind Eliott’s head. He didn’t make a wish though, because he realized he didn’t need to. He had everything that he’d ever wanted. 

And this was only the beginning.            

10 YEARS LATER

Lucas was standing backstage, like he had so many times before, but this was the first time he’d been truly nervous. It was the opening night of Polaris, a ballet Eliott had choreographed and staged, and he had composed music for. Five years ago he never would have expected this to come to fruition so quickly, but there they were. Five years ago, he wouldn’t have expected a lot of things, but life had many surprises. 

It was absolutely insane to think that in such a short time he’d become one of the most sought after dancers in the world, and he still didn’t believe it to be true, but there had been some definite successes since he’d become one of the youngest principal dancers in the company. He had no intention of leaving Paris anytime soon, but he had done a few performances at different places around the world in the meantime, stunned that people would travel any distance to see him dance.

Professionally, he was still Lucas Lallemant, a decision he’d struggled with a bit since marrying Eliott, but he’d decided to stop allowing his father’s influence to control his life and what he did with it, showing the world that Lallemant wasn’t a dirty name, even if they’d never known that it was. Everywhere else, though, he was Lucas Lallemant-Demaury. Ten years ago he’d told Eliott he wanted to be a Demaury, and he hadn’t changed his mind, but it was important for him to take ownership of who he was because at the end of the day, a name was just a name. He wouldn’t let a name scare him anymore.

Eliott had risen to great prominence as a choreographer, staging pieces around the world that brought audiences to tears and filled them with joy. Polaris was his first full ballet, and everyone close to him knew that this was the only one that had ever really mattered, no matter the time and care he put into others. If his other pieces had been so impactful, the world clearly wasn’t ready for Polaris. It was the first ballet in history to star two male leads in a romantic story, which was groundbreaking enough as it was, especially to be put on for the first time in such a company of prestige.

They were more successful than either of them had ever expected to be, especially at the young age of twenty-seven, and for the most part they still didn’t know what to do with that success. They’d both been very outspoken about mental health and LGBTQ+ rights, which seemed like a good place to start, and they’d gotten a dog, a little Pomeranian named Ouba, who they loved only second to each other. They’d discussed kids, but Lucas knew that he had no intentions of leaving the stage anytime soon, and Eliott hadn’t too many dreams and plans he wanted to pursue to consider raising a child. They reserved the right to change their minds in the future, but in the present moment they were happy with it just being the two of them and Ouba taking on the world one minute at a time.

The world rejoiced when Eliott had announced he was coming back to the stage to perform opposite Lucas in the lead roles, though Lucas had known that was his plan from the beginning. Working so closely with Eliott was something he’d missed, and Eliott had missed too. He’d composed all the music with a little help from people in the industry trained for this sort of thing, including Eliott’s friend from Australia, Niccolo, and practicing to the music he’d heard in his head for ten years was a visceral experience. He couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to perform on stage in a little under an hour. Then again and again for as long as the show would run. 

All of their old friends from school were in the audience for the performance, which filled Lucas’ heart with joy. Well, they were supposed to be in the audience, but Eliott had invited them all backstage for a little pre-show reunion, despite the fact that the cast should have been focused. 

Imane and Sofiane were in the show as well, as they were both dancing with the Paris Opera Ballet, and they both had prominent roles because Eliott would accept nothing less for them. Plus, they were still two of the best dancer Lucas knew, and they deserved every bit accolade they had or would receive in their lives. They’d gotten married a year after Lucas and Eliott had, and Lucas knew that they’d been discussing some of the things Eliott and Lucas discussed recently. Imane loved ballet, and Sofiane loved Imane, so Lucas didn’t expect any Alaoui kids in the near future, but he did think there would be some eventually, and expected to be referred to as Uncle Lucas when they did come into the world.

Yann wasn’t dancing anymore, which had come as a bit of a shock to Lucas when Yann had visited and told them he was going to ‘retire’ from the dance world two or so years back. He’d met a girl in Berlin, Emmeline, but they’d moved back to Paris fairly recently and things seemed to be going quite well with them. He tried not to tease Yann too much about the fact that he’d dated an Emma, and now an Emmeline. Lucas knew that Yann was planning to propose to her any day now, but if he knew anything about Emmeline, it was that she’d probably get around to popping the question before Yann could even get down on one knee. He liked her a lot. 

Arthur wasn’t dancing anymore either, at least not in a company. He’d taken his abuser to court while dancing in Amsterdam and the settlement payout had been much more money than Arthur had ever been expecting, so he’d put it towards starting his own ballet school in Amsterdam. Lucas had been a bit sad to hear he wouldn’t be coming back to Paris, that his life was elsewhere now, but he and VDH were still together, and he seemed happier than he ever had been, so Lucas was happy as a result. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t still tease Arthur for having a crush on him ten years ago, especially not when Arthur asked him to come teach master classes for his students. Definitely not. 

Basile was living large, doing whatever it was that Basile did best. Last Lucas had spoken to him he’d been applying to schools to go back and get his doctorate in French, because he wanted to be a professor. Lucas had been surprised at first, but then he’d realized that he’d never actually known what it was that Basile wanted to do with his life, so he accepted it with no more than a shrug. He wasn’t dating anyone presently, but Yann and Lucas had secretly been planning to set him up with a girl named Leia, who’d danced with them at school and they’d recently gotten back in touch with because she was friends with Emmeline.

Alexia had become quite the fixture in their lives, surprisingly, because she’d helped Eliott a lot with blocking and planning Polaris. She may have quit ballet a long time ago, but Lucas could tell she was still very passionate about dance, and he thought she might have a future in choreography if she wanted it. She was also their designated dogsitter, which had somehow led to her reconnecting with Chloé, who Yann had briefly dated— and Lucas had too, but that didn’t really count— and apparently now they were planning on moving in together. Oh, how small the world was.

Emma, surprising all of them, had married Alex briefly, then got divorced, then married him again. Lucas was pretty sure it would last this time, knew that it only hadn’t lasted the first time because both of them wanted to experience a little bit more of the world before settling down, soon realizing that their hearts kept finding their way back to each other and would keep doing so. They had a kid together, a little spitfire named Amelie, and she and Lucas got along a little bit too well for their own good. Emma and Lucas had always had a friendship teetering on chaos, so it was inevitable that the same would be said for her daughter. 

Manon and Daphné, of course, were still together. Lucas still held it over their head that he and Eliott got married three months before they did, but everyone knew that it was in good humor. In fact, they were expecting their first child together, something Lucas definitely hadn’t seen coming. He’d also assumed they would adopt, but Daphné had wanted to have a biological child and Manon had agreed. They’d had an anonymous donor, and Lucas had feigned offense that they hadn’t wanted his dna. Manon was terrified of having children, at least physically, but apparently Daphné had really wanted to be the one to carry their baby, so it had all worked out for them. Lucas didn’t know whether or not she planned on returning to ballet after the baby was born, but he supposed Daphné and Manon would figure that out amongst themselves. Manon was probably more famous in the ballet world than he or Eliott could even dream of, which was unsurprising to everyone but Manon.

They were all there, looking the same and yet so completely different than they had ten years ago. It was terrifying to think ten years had passed, because in some respects Lucas had no idea where the time had gone, but in some ways it also felt like three whole lifetimes had been lived in the last ten years. He was still doing well, had only had a minor relapse of his eating disorder during his first year as a principal dancer, but Eliott had been there through it all and he’d made his way out of it stronger than ever. Eliott had a few episodes, having to change his medication after the most recent one, but he’d been good for a long while too, and the depression hadn’t hit as hard in both of his most recent episodes. He attributed it to Lucas, though Lucas would never agree, knowing that it was just brain chemicals doing whatever the hell they wanted to at any given time, but it made him happy to make Eliott happy in whatever way he could. 

Manon looked regal and sharp, every bit the prima ballerina she’d shaped up to be, red lipstick perfectly applied like it always had been as she ran over to Lucas to hug him. Daphné was right behind her, albeit a bit slower given her current condition, but she looked just as beautiful as Manon but in a softer way. 

“When are you due?” Eliott asked her excitedly as the two of them hugged, and Daphné beamed, lacing her hand with Manon’s. 

“Eight weeks,” she said, catching Manon’s eye. The way the two of them looked at each other… if Lucas didn’t have Eliott to look at like that, he probably would have pretended to barf all over the both of them. 

Arthur and VDH approached next, who Lucas refused to refer to as anything other than VDH, which Arthur rolled his eyes at every time but VDH himself had said he didn’t mind at all. Isa and some of her friends had joined, standing a bit on the outskirts of the group because Isa was the only one who knew Lucas well. He recognized Liv and her girlfriend Engel, because Arthur had lived with Liv and Isa had talked about the two of them all the time, so he assumed the other three girls must have been Janna, who danced in Sweden, Imaan, who wasn’t a dancer, and Esra, who was a well known name in the dance community for being the first hijabi muslim principal dancer in the American Ballet Theatre. Lucas was a bit intimidated to be in her presence, actually, because he’d followed her career and admired her so much, but she seemed very down to earth from what he’d heard through Isa. 

“You’re going to kill it,” Arthur said pulling him into a hug. He was wearing the same glasses he’d worn back during school, but they still suited him. “And if you don’t, I’ll let you join my tiny tots ballet class, see if you can learn something from them.”

“Ha ha,” Lucas deadpanned, smirking despite himself. “Tiny tots, huh?”

Arthur widened his eyes in a don’t ask sort of way. “Past me was an ambitious man,” he lamented. 

VDH nudged his shoulder. “Shut up, the kids love you. And you love them, no matter what you say on the contrary.”

“I just picture them all as baby Yoda,” Arthur admitted, earning him another nudge. 

“Dude, the baby Yoda meme died, like, ten years ago,” Lucas laughed. 

Arthur scoffed in offense, putting a hand up to his chest. “Baby Yoda is eternal.”

Yann entered their conversation at that moment, raising his eyebrows when he noticed all of them bursting into uncontrollable laughter. “Three Musketeers back and better than ever, huh?”

“It’s been way too fucking long, man,” Arthur said once he caught his breath, wiping his eyes for errant tears. Lucas nodded in agreement, just as Baz joined the circle. 

“I sure hope you didn’t forget about me,” he pouted, and the three of them pulled him into a bearhug, Eliott engaged in conversation with Idriss, Imane, and Sofiane, and VDH moving back to talk with his friends. 

“As if we ever could,” Lucas said to Basile, ruffling his curly hair. 

“I sure hope not! Just because I don’t have a hot boyfriend, doesn’t mean I’m not still a part of the group, right?” Basile scoffed indignantly. 

Yann cocked his head to the side. “Pretty sure I don’t have a hot boyfriend, Baz.”

“But you totally could, if you wanted to,” he said, as if that explained everything, and the three of them burst into even more laughter. Lucas had to get control over himself, otherwise he’d have to redo his makeup, a task he really did not want to complete for a second time that night. 

A hand tapped his leg and Lucas looked down with a grin to see three year old Amelie Delano, looking mischievous as ever. “Uncle Arthur said to call you Uncle Lulu,” she said breathlessly, in that way all three year olds did. 

Lucas glared at Arthur, who became suddenly interested in the set on stage. Lucas bent down to be eye level with Amelie. “You can call me whatever you want,” he said, because if he was being honest it was adorable to hear a toddler call him Uncle Lulu. 

Emma appeared at Amelie’s side, sighing deeply. “There you are, I should have known you’d be with Uncle Lucas.”

“Lulu,” Amelie said indignantly, and Emma raised one eyebrow in Lucas’ direction, holding back a laugh. 

“Lulu,” Lucas agreed with defeat, giving her tiny hand a high five. 

“Break a leg out there,” Emma said as he straightened up, giving him a high five of her own. 

“Yours, maybe,” he said with a half a smirk, wondering if she remembered one of their old inside jokes. At first she looked confused, but he saw the exact moment she remembered, laughing in a nostalgic sort of way. 

She pointed at him. “Still the same, I see.”

“Why mess with perfection?” he joked, knowing full well that he would never have been standing where he was if he’d actually stayed the same person he was back then.

A hand wrapped around his waist and he turned to see Eliott, softness in his eyes that was reserved only for Lucas and Ouba. “We should get ready,” Eliott said, and the nerves kicked in again. 

“We should,” Lucas agreed, and he saw Eliott read the anxiety in his eyes. The two of them moved a little bit out of the way of everyone, finding their own bubble of peace amidst the chaos like they always did. 

Eliott put his hands on either side of Lucas’ face. “Don’t be afraid.”

“I’m not,” Lucas lied, and Eliott saw right through him again. 

“This show, it’s everything to me,” Eliott began, and Lucas frowned. 

“How is that supposed to make me less nervous?” 

Eliott laughed, shaking his head. “Let me finish, Lu. It’s everything to me, because of you. Because I had a dream, and you helped me turn it into a reality, and now I’m living out a dream I never knew I had, the dream of us dancing side by side in a story I’ve held close to my heart for almost twelve years. I don’t care what it looks like to the audience, maybe I should, but I really don't. All I care about is you and I giving the performance I know we’re capable of, because it’s fueled by all the love we share. I’m not afraid, because you’re the best dancer I’ve ever known, and because of all the shit life’s thrown our way, we’ve made it out stronger each time. We can handle anything on our own, but when we’re together all the struggles and pain turn to pure magic, consuming every atom of my being.”

“In another universe you’re a poet, I think. Or maybe a songwriter,” Lucas said dumbly, struck by the power and intention in Eliott’s voice, the love and care in his words. 

Eliott smiled and leaned in close, brushing their noses together, like he was waiting. Lucas closed the gap, kissing Eliott deeply. He pulled away, Eliott chasing his lips, and placed his hands on Eliott’s face, each of them holding the world in their hands. 

“I’m not afraid,” he said again, and this time it wasn’t a lie.

“Not afraid?”

“Not afraid.”

“Well then, let’s go give the audience the show of a lifetime,” Eliott said, dropping his hands from Lucas’ face and holding one out to him. Lucas accepted it following him back into the hustle and bustle of being backstage the opening night of a ballet. It was Lucas’ favorite place to be, other than wrapped in Eliott’s arms. They took their places in the wings, breaths in synch and hearts on fire.

Eliott had been so many of Lucas’ firsts. First friend, first enemy, first love, first heartbreak, first (and only, if he had anything to say about it) husband, first person Lucas had shown himself to completely, every crack and bruise and flaw most people would flinch away from. Eliott never flinched, which was what made him the last of everything too. 

He would be Lucas’ last love, his last husband, his last kiss. There were so many firsts left in his life, and even more lasts, but Eliott would be a part of all of them. And he would be a part of all of Eliott’s. 

Lucas looked out at the stage, a mix of melancholy and longing filling his body. There would be a last dance too, of course there would, but that was another thing Lucas wasn’t scared of anymore. He wasn’t scared, because he knew that Eliott would be right there for all of the firsts and all of the lasts, even his last dance.

He looked at Eliott, finding his hand and squeezing it once.

Especially his last dance. 

The curtain went up and the music began to swell, and Lucas stepped onto the stage, leaving Eliott’s hand behind him. 

Even after years of training, the Paris Opera Ballet was still everything Lucas dreamed it would be. And, he realized, gazing out at the audience, each person waiting for him to blow them away, it was all his. It always had been.

He smiled, and began to dance.

[hencethebravery]

Title: “The Spooky Truth with Dr. Jones,” (1/2)

Summary: Emma Swan is a podcaster looking for a semi-interesting story. Dr. Killian Jones is a paranormal investigator who doesn’t believe in the paranormal. Emma Swan absolutely does not want to write this story—but it seems to be writing itself. A CS Black Tapes AU.

Notes: This delightful little AU was 100% inspired by The Black Tapes, a seriously awesome fictional horror podcast that you can listen to for free. Which you should. Right now. I’d like to thank and/or notify a # of awesome people who helped with this: @seastarved @zengoalie @ofshipsandswans @abbadons-little-witch @the-reason-to-sail-home @businesscasualprincess @swanandapirate (who also wrote a podcast AU, so if you like this, you should probably check it out). Also on Ao3.

+ Honestly, the worst thing about this job is the constant threat of, “You have a face too pretty for radio,” every time she has to conduct an interview with some bland fuck-boy that the country has suddenly decided is worth her time. If not for the occasionally tedious subject matter and overeager interviewees, it would be damn near perfect.

It’s certainly odd, considering how long she’d spent trying to make herself invisible; avoiding friends and relationships in exchange for the blissful quiet of self-imposed isolation, all while maintaining her carefully constructed state of emotional constipation.

“They’re not my friends,” trying to explain to her producer, David, “they’re my subjects.”

Snorting, with an affectionate rolling of his eyes, “That’s awfully sentimental of you, Emma.”

“Except you,” her words starting to run sloppily together, resting a warm, heavy arm around his neck, “you’re a regular ‘prince charming.’”

“Yeah, yeah,” brushing off the compliment but she can see it in his eyes, how much he cares, and while it still makes her vaguely uncomfortable, it’s nice knowing there’s somebody in her corner. “Let’s get you to bed, ‘princess.’”

It was supposed to be a one-off episode, part of a larger story about people and professions and why we do what we do to get by—defining ourselves through our work, that kind of thing. She had done a few episodes already; one on geo-caching, another one focusing on a lady who actually got paid to paint the claws of people’s cats. And that was when David had gently knocked on her office door and told her about a conference about the paranormal going on at the local college, and would she, maybe, like to attend?

 She had been in the midst of sorting through a rather demoralizing gallery of neon-colored cat toenails when he’d made the suggestion, so it wasn’t hard to imagine the gusto with which she flew out of her chair; oversized bag of gum, phone chargers, and pencils swung over one shoulder, her knee-length boots half-zipped up her calves, “Yeah,” she answered excitedly, “I’m on it!”

“Dr. Killian Jones is handsome,” she speaks into her dictaphone later that night, an unfamiliar vibrato of excitement painting her words, “there’s no point in denying it. I won’t have my young, impressionable female listeners hanging on his every lovely, accented word thinking this guy isn’t as good looking as he sounds.”

 She considers the, frankly, unreal color of his stupidly blue eyes and continues, “But I don’t want there to be any kind of confusion. Dr. Killian Jones is a real dick.”

The lecture hall is louder, busier, and fuller than she’s ever seen it before. She’s taken a few classes here, attended a few events, and she can say with absolute confidence that this campus has never seen such a to-do in all its many, stuffy years.

The hall is a diverse mix, but there's an unusually large amount of tittering freshmen, and she can't help but feel as if she might be missing something.

She puts that exact question to a rather excitable group of young women (and men), all of them clutching copies of the same book. It's large, hardcover, she can barely make out the thick, dramatic eyebrows of the author on the back.

“So, uh, what's with the crowd?”

A young man wearing bold, square frames and a bowtie covered in tiny ghosts answers incredulously, “How can you not know?”

 “Don't be rude, Jefferson,” interrupts a small, dark-haired brunette, her lipstick a bright, fire engine red. “Dr. Killian Jones,” she answers happily, handing Emma a copy of her book, “expert in all things fucked up and certifiably creepy.”

 Emma skims the almost revelatory reviews on the back as the girl continues, “The accent and the eyes don't hurt either.”

 “Not a damn bit,” the kid with the bowtie, Jefferson, mumbles under his breath.

 Emma releases a sigh. There's no point in being coy, she'd actually been excited about this. Turns out it's nothing more than an academic peep show.

 “You should stick around,” the girl comments carefully, her grin shrewd, “I don't think you'll regret it.

“Here’s the thing about me,” she reflects carefully, a half-empty bottle of beer dangling from her fingertips, “I’m skeptical, but I don’t begrudge people their beliefs.”

It probably has something to do with the absolutely devastating, trope-tastic childhood that she carries around with her like a brand. All those years yearning for some kind of “happily ever after,” when really it was just one bleak foster home after another, disappointment upon disappointment upon disappointment. But for a while? It was all that had kept her going.

“I would have given up otherwise,” a dry sniff, a cough that attempts to hide an unwelcome truth, “no matter how idealistic—stories… even the crazy ones, were everything.”

She pauses the recording, takes another swig of the warm beer in her hand, and pictures Killian Jones’ smug face, stiff blazer, and distinctly non-professorial jewelry. Recording.

“Asshole.”

“But what’s wrong with letting people believe what they believe…? If it brings them comfort?”

Emma’s sure this kid couldn’t look anymore nervous if she tried, the flushed cheeks and shaky hands an obvious betrayal of her adoration and fear of this guy. Sure, the deep, dulcet tones of his voice were what radio jockeys dreamed of, and yes, maybe the black stud in his ear managed to convey so authentic a quality that it had to be seen to be believed, but still—the all-knowing grin and perfect teeth were undoubtedly punch-worthy.

“I would never want to deny someone their comfort,” he begins gently, a charming twinkle in his eye, “but there’s quite a bit more at stake, love—”

Impossibly, the girl blushes even deeper as he continues, “Your intentions, while quite admirable, they undermine the integrity of scientific fact, and in this day and age, well…”

He laughs and the entire room joins in, even the girl who had asked the question, and Emma can’t help but feel that if she were to pull her aside at the end of the night, she would have insisted that he had done her some kind of favor.

Unsurprisingly, the rest of the night seems as if it will continue in much the same way. The guy has an answer to absolutely everything, and nothing has gotten under her skin more. He’s unshakeable in his rightness, in the certainty of his argument and his devotion to the truth with a capital “T.”

 It would be almost admirable if it wasn’t so obviously a lie.

She decides to conduct street interviews the next day, nothing too formal, just the usual method of stopping folks on the street, inquiring after their views about the supernatural; make sure they feel comfortable and get honest, usable content.

“And you don’t think this tone of yours will influence their ‘honesty?’” David asks slyly, his smile familiar and deliberate and she’s had just about enough of how well he knows her sometimes.

“What tone? I just wanna prove to the guy that maybe he’s a little bit wrong about things.”

“No,” he laughs, shuffling around a pile of folders on top of his desk, “you want to humiliate him.”

“That would be unprofessional.”

“And no one would ever accuse you of that.”

She very professionally admits that she manages to speak with a handful of people who would agree with Dr. Killian Jones. They find belief in the supernatural, the magical, the unbelievable, to be a failing of the human mind, not a strength. A few of them even mentioned him by name, “That doctor, you know,” and she had to physically stop herself from recoiling, “the one with the accent. He’s got the right idea.”

But there’s also the vast majority of people who harbor some kind of belief in the unknown, even if it’s the teeniest, vaguest inkling—they want to believe, “And it warms the cockles of my cold, dead heart.”

It’s his answer to the last question that really seals the deal—acting as confirmation of the steadily growing theory that there’s a lot more to Jones’ “mission” than he’d like his enamored audiences to believe. It’s when the story that Emma Swan has started to write in her head goes from “so-so” to “award-winning.” It’s also when she gets the small blotch of ink on her face.

She’s just about ready to throw in the towel, hasn’t been able to stop anxiously chewing on the cap of the pen she had shoved into her mouth to keep from groaning at all of his well-crafted answers, when a stern-faced, well-dressed woman stands to speak.

Her voice seems to ring unusually loud in the suddenly hushed auditorium, and Emma’s eyes immediately swivel to the doctor’s face, which has, almost indiscernibly, shifted from charming to mildly concerned. Interesting.

“Yes, I have a question, Dr. Jones.”

He adjusts slightly in his seat, straightening the lapel of his blazer and clearing his throat, “Of course, darling, have at it.”

“You seem to have so many answers, and you’re so knowledgeable about all of these incomprehensible matters, I just have to know—”

“At this point, I’m so freaking enraptured by this ladies’ pantsuit, it’s all I can do to keep my butt in the seat,” there’s now a few empties strewn about the floor as she paces excitedly back and forth, her finger manically tapping against the side of the recorder, “In fact, I was so interested in this question that I happened to get pen ink all over my face,” she pauses, “but that’s neither here nor there. Point is, this lady stands up and says—”

“What happened to Milah Gold?”

A new, almost threatening kind of silence falls over the room. It had been “hushed” when Miss Pantsuit had stood up initially, but truthfully, there was still a smattering of noise you might usually attribute to normal human movement; the rustling of a candy wrapper, a small cough or shared whisper between friends, but the silence in the wake of this particular question, is, well, it’s almost spooky, isn’t it?

It’s like a vacuum has sucked all the air from the room, especially when you consider the fact that Jones’ face is so red it’s almost purple. His lips tighten and move together as if he’s about speak… and that’s when the goddamn lights go out.

“No shit?” David asks, distracted over the phone, his voice tinny and distant. She can hear Mary Margaret and the baby in the distance, the sound of a live studio audience clapping in time with his wife’s sickeningly sweet singing voice.

Emma’s own voice is high and fast as she walks quickly back to her car, a near-frigid October breeze whipping her hair into a frenzy against flushed cheeks, her boots still charmingly unzipped around her legs. “David, it was fucking wild. The lights went out.”

“So you said,” he laughs and says something to the baby in a squeaky, high-pitched voice she can’t help but roll her eyes at, “So, uh, you think there’s a story here?”

“Fucking hell, David, yes, yes, I think there’s a story here.”

“Well, you know I trust you,” Emma holds her breath as she stares at the strange, excited expression on the face of the woman reflected in the semi-frosted glass of her car window, “Go for it.”

It takes her a moment to realize that in the time spent walking from the lecture hall to her car, she’s somehow depleted all of her oxygen, and she has to quickly inhale before responding. Not to mention the fact of that damnable spot of ink still barely noticeable on the high apple of her stupid cheeks and she knows David’s waiting for an answer but it’s the freaking principle of the thing. She’s already about to lose a few cool points, with her back now resting heavily against the door of the VW, summoning the courage to be emotive for once in her pathetic life.

“Thank you, David. Seriously, I mean it.”

“No need to thank me,” he answers gently, “Emma Swan always gets her man.”

It will pain her to admit it, but there’s little room to exaggerate when she later tries to describe the undeniable smoothness of Dr. Killian Jones after the absurdly dramatic disruption of his, so far, grossly successful night of win, after win, after win. There’s some light shrieking and girlish giggling in the darkness of the auditorium, and Emma’s almost positive there’s a hand lost up a skirt somewhere, but as soon as the lights come up a few minutes later, it’s as if the whole thing never happened.

Pantsuit hasn’t plopped her proper butt back into her seat, but there’s a grin on Jones’ face that almost makes her believe he had planned the whole thing to catch her out. He makes some crack about the auditorium being haunted, “But don’t quote me on that,” winks, and turns those insane eyes back on the witch (Because she’s gotta be, right?) in the third row.

“The matter of Milah Gold’s disappearance is still up for a debate,” he answers firmly, succinctly, “and in all fairness I’m not quite certain why you would bring it up here.”

The witch in business attire takes a seat after that perfunctory response, and then, finally, after an almost masturbatory few hours in which Dr. Killian Jones manages to elevate himself to a pedestal so high she’s certain his body would explode on impact were he to do the whole world a favor and fling himself off, Emma Swan remains carefully still in her seat, waiting for the adoring fans to file out. Her recorder waits impatiently in the pocket of David’s denim jacket, at least three sizes too big, and she’s secretly yearning for the red leather number lost under her bed somewhere.

The pencil she’d tugged out of the rat’s nest on top of her head is tapping restlessly against her knee and goddamn, does she just want to get this guy alone. And she’s preparing herself because she just knows at this point, that when she gets within a hair’s breadth of his stupid face, he’s going to smell amazing—like warm, decadent cologne and expensive coffee. And she’s going to stare at his lips and her knees will undoubtedly quiver at the way he says… words.

“Come on, Emma,” she whispers furiously, wiping the unattractive, crusty remnants of old, useless sleep gathering at the corners of her eyes, “let’s give this guy something he’ll actually be afraid of.”

Whichever marketing firm designed August Booth’s website is a freaking genius.

“Well,” he laughs, blushing slightly, “thank you, Miss Swan.”

She meets him at his office in a town called Storybrooke, about an hour south of Portland, and calling it quaint would be an understatement. The people in this town would appear to be so close they’ve got a running schedule for everyone else’s daily fiber intake, and she wants to leave almost as soon as she arrives.

“So, it’s gotta be the pie or something, right?”

The guy’s charming, she’ll give him that, if not a bit… empty. Which is vague, she knows, and she’ll have to revise the language at a later date, but when she considers his laughter in her room later that night it’s the first word that’ll come to mind. Empty ideas, empty gestures, just… he’s there, but no one’s really home. Dr. Jones is a dramatic, performative jackass, there’s absolutely no doubt—but what’s not up for debate is his passion. The man obviously cares. Now, exactly what he cares about and why? That’s up for discussion.

“I don’t think I know what you mean,” smiling, but again, it’s all a bit off.

“Small towns like this,” she explains, “a lot of the time the reason people give for sticking around. It’s a signature dish or an old, anthropomorphic tree or something.”

“Ah,” he answers, turning around to face a large, imposing bookcase, “it does have... something.”

When she says “large,” she means floor to freaking ceiling. Emma’s got bookcases that David has called “large,” and she snaps a picture on her phone because this? This is large. Not only does it extend from the persian rug-covered floor to the water-stained ceiling, the thing is the width of the entire wall, one end to the other. Every shelf, every inch of available space is occupied, either with books, VHS cases, manuscripts, or various occult objects you couldn’t pay her to actually touch (she’s not so much with the tempting of fate).

“Jesus, does it spin around, too?”

She might pretend he doesn’t flinch at the Jesus-bomb, but regardless, he smiles again, of course, and makes some kind of Scooby-Doo reference she chooses to ignore.

He’s kinder up close and she wants to die. Basically. The anger is harder to use when she can see how fucking sweet he’s being to the gaggle of students hanging around, how he’s actually listening to their questions and comments instead of continuing the performance she had watched him perfectly execute on stage.

“I understand where you’re coming from, truly,” his hand pressed firmly, earnestly against his own chest, “but I’ve seen the damage it can do, and I have to take my own comfort in what I can actually see.”

He offers yet another winning, gentle grin, signs a few more books, confirms or denies a few more rumors, and she watches, entranced, as he collapses into his seat with a sigh. She almost feels bad for the guy. Almost.

“I know you’re there,” he starts kindly, his arm flung tiredly over his eyes, “no worries, love, I won’t bite.”

“What’s with the pet names?” she asks sweetly, dropping heavily into the seat across from him, “Does the tenure let you get away with that?”

He seems to lose his balance even though he’s seated, surprised at the vaguely mean, pointed quality of an older voice, “You’re not a student.”

“And you are very smart,” she responds kindly, her own smile adopting the least genuine feeling of kindness she can hope to convey, dragging her press pass out from beneath her flannel, “Emma Swan, ACRS.”

“Radio?”

The inviting, gentle nature she had witnessed earlier seems to have evaporated and there’s a part of her, a small, small part, that kind of hates what she’s about to do. As if it would kill her to make another friend.

“It’s a podcast.”

“I’m sorry, a what?”

“It’s radio. Look, don’t you think it’s just a little bit strange that—”

“Let me stop you right there, Miss Swan—”

Thus beginning the era of “interview interruptus,” as she would so gleefully begin later, trying and failing to conceal her pride at using a term she had coined a few months earlier. There was lots of fake politeness and huffs of frustrated breath and eye-rolling and honestly she barely got to ask a question let alone receive any answers, and he must have been getting just as irate as she was because the guy actually had the nerve to—

“What the hell are you doing?”

Realizing that she was standing dangerously close to this man, stepping out of his wickedly tempting sphere of handsome, academic influence (and she was right about the expensive coffee thing).

“You had some ink on your cheek,” he answered quietly, as if he were surprised at his own movement, his hand slowly returning to his side. “My apologies.”

“It’s fine,” she said sharply, swiping her hand over her face, “don’t worry about it.”

“Miss Swan,” he paused, “Emma.”

His brief silence was heavy, and while in reality it was probably only a few seconds, it felt as if hours of contemplation went by. It seemed like he was devoting so much energy, so much careful attention to his next words to her, and honestly, it was kind of refreshing.

“I understand you’re skeptical, alright? I’ve been known to doubt on occasion as well.”

She rolls her eyes and he smiles, his pronounced cheeks adorably flushed, “But I’m bloody exhausted, I could use some rest. Here’s my card.”

It’s just a normal business card, which is pretty disappointing. Could’ve at least used some holo-graphics or something.

“E-mail me, give me a call. We can talk then.”

Emma Swan is well-versed in the complex, many-layered looks of suspicion and distaste. She’s not quite sure which one she’s decided to unleash on the good doctor here, but from the look on his face it’s not too far off from the one she’d given Neal when he had tried to “bury the hatchet,” as it were. His face softens and he releases a quiet breath, a new, patient smile on his face.

“Try something new, darling. It’s called trust.”

And that’s when she runs for her car.

You can tell that August Booth wants to be able to pull off that genuine, trustworthy thing that Dr. Jones is able to convey so well, which is what makes it that much more distasteful to observe.

“I didn’t even think they made VHS tapes anymore.”

August glances back at her over his shoulder with a mischievous look on his face, or at the very least, trying to be. It’s a little bit like a teenager who thinks they’ve managed to pull one over on the teacher, when really they’re about to be sent to summer school.

“They do, actually,” he starts, pulling a black tape off the shelf, “something about the way it records. Catches it better.”

“Never thought I would hear that,” she answers, following his path across the room to an old television with a large player stacked beneath it. “Catches what better?”

A few hours later she’s calling, e-mailing, and texting Dr. Killian Jones, trying to temper the excitable tone of her voice, “Hey, Dr. Handsome? Yeah, I hope you’re well-rested. I’ve got something you need to see.”

Dropping her phone almost directly into the good doctor’s hot coffee probably isn’t the best idea she’s ever had, but it’s certainly one of the more dramatic.

“I hope you know that I won’t be paying for that,” he starts calmly, his eyebrow predictably, adorably quirked.

“Don’t quirk that thing at me,” she answers hotly, pulling the phone away at the corner, wiping the liquid off on her jeans, “she’s endured a whole lot worse than your shitty coffee.”

He takes an actual, delicate sip of his hot, expensive, garbage coffee and she thinks, gleefully, of all the articles she’s read about problematic coffee bean importation and the fact that this self-righteous jerkface actually thinks he’s taking the moral high ground right now before she tries to hand the phone over yet again. Slower this time.

“Watch it,” insistently pushing the phone into his hand, “I think you’ll find it... enlightening.”

“I can assure you, Swan,” slowly returning his mug to the table, his eyes never leaving hers as he tugs it from her fingers, “it’s nothing I haven’t seen before.”

“Yeah, well, we’ll see about that.”

She probably should’ve warned him, the screaming is pretty loud.

Exorcism footage is undeniably fucked, and she’s starting to regret the re-watch rabbit hole she tumbled down the night before. She hadn’t slept much, and between the violent, erratic spasming and otherworldly shrieking she’s not sure she’ll be sleeping ever again, thank you very much. It is worth it, however, for the shocked, offended look on his face when Alex Reagan, aged 10 or 11, lets out an ungodly shriek so loud that the barista behind the counter drops a bucket full of dirty mugs and dishes. (And, okay, she does feel slightly bad about that.)

“Good God, Swan,” he hisses angrily, desperately trying to mute her phone before it gives the older lady in the corner booth a heart attack, “you could see fit to warn a man.”

“Oops.”

His sigh of frustration is almost erotically gratifying, and she unleashes a smug, self-satisfied grin of her own before he resumes the video, at a much lower volume this time, and a serene sense of concentration seems to envelop him as he watches the entire 10 minute clip.

It had seemed pretty legitimate, in her admittedly amateur opinion. Maybe she hadn’t spent her whole life debunking the paranormal, but she liked to think she had a pretty good instinct for these things. August Booth was a shady character, there was no doubt in her mind of that, but this tape—and the others? They had to be real.

Her voice is clear, steady, and entirely unimpeded by snacks as she records. Her foot fails to nervously fidget beneath her desk as it normally would. Her motives are pure and ethically sound.

Take that, David Nolan.

Let me describe it for you, so you can really get a clear sense of what we’re seeing.

There’s a young girl tied to a chair. She’s unusually small for her age, Booth says she can’t be any older than 10, but it takes at least 3 large, beefy guys to keep her in that chair. There’s a sound coming from the video, and, ya know, her mouth is open, so it has to be the girl, but… it sounds more like the cries of a wounded animal. A cat, maybe. And it echoes, loudly, throughout the room—you can tell that it’s distracting the priest, which… I dunno, maybe that’s the point.

 He’s chanting something in Latin, and it’s having some kind of effect on the girl, Alex, her jaw seems to be clenched so tightly I’m surprised it doesn’t break. This goes on for a while, I won’t bore you with the rest, but it’s the end that’s really… it’s really something else. The priest seems to finish his chant or sermon, whatever it is, and Alex goes real still, like maybe she’s heard something in another room?

And then…

“Bloody hell.”

“Told ya.”

...Her mouth just… drops open, but it’s more than that, it’s not like she’s surprised or excited or shouting, it just drops, like the physical reality of her bones aren’t even a thing, because this poor girl’s jaw, it’s down to her sternum, at least, and it’s only a second, it’s a literal fraction of a second but when you see it. Man, do you see it. 

“Debunk that, Mr. Bean.”

Dr. Jones looks thoroughly unimpressed for a whopping 30 seconds before he speaks.

“Where did you find this, Emma?”

“I may have taken a trip to Storybrooke after our chat the other day.”

The man couldn’t look less amused by that confession even if he tried. His manner seems to shift from inquisitive scientist to scolding parent, and she tries not to feel disappointed.

“You shouldn’t have done that, Swan.”

“Oh, it’s ‘Swan,’ now, is it?”

He slips the phone back into her hand and returns to his seat, his sad, neglected coffee having significantly cooled since she walked in the door. She had been hoping for another explosive debate, if she were being truthful. Not that they’d made much progress the other night at the college, but she enjoyed riling him up—he blushed a lot.

“What is it you want from me?”

She sighs and considers her position. The least she could do is be truthful with her subject. The chair slides harshly across the floor as she moves to take a seat, and the coffee shop seems to fall almost eerily quiet in the absence of the video, the sound of their voices filtering in between the generic noises of a public space.

“I just want the truth, Jones. Like you.”

“Somehow, Miss Swan, I’m not quite sure that’s true.”

There’s something unsettling about the way he studies her, like he knows all of her deepest, darkest secrets, can read her insecurities as if they were second-rate horoscopes in some local paper and she wants to take it all back—she’ll write about the cat toenails. After a few long, uncomfortable minutes in which she feels strangely psychoanalyzed, he manages to expose at least one of her secrets.

“I know you got that tape from August Booth,” taking a sip of his cold coffee and wrinkling his nose, “and I can’t say I approve.”

“Good thing I don’t live or die at the whims of your approval, Dr. Jones.”

“Yes, I would have to agree. Quite a good thing.”

He seems to disappear into himself for another moment, not dissimilar to his reaction when the almost comically serious, dark-haired woman had asked him about Milah Gold that night at the lecture.

“I have a proposition,” he starts again, straightening his jacket, “if you’re going to be as… shall we say, ‘committed,’ to hounding me about this as you appear to be—”

A bearded waiter wearing suspenders (because this coffee shop isn’t trendy enough) stops by their table to retrieve empty mugs and take any other orders, and she would very much like to get some herbal tea (David “pop-pop” Nolan seems to think that caffeine “makes her worse”), except this dude won’t stop flirting with her paranormal professor. Her time is precious, after all.

“Excuse me, yes, hello?”

Killian Jones stops flashing his obnoxious eyeballs at their stunned waiter long enough for her to order her tea and then he’s gone, both of them making eyes at the other until he’s back behind the counter.

“You are a mystery unto yourself, Dr. Jones.”

He clears his throat and tries to hold back another one of those smug grins she still can’t stand, and he gestures towards her phone sitting innocuously on the table, like a bomb waiting to go off.

“I know this all seems like just another story to you, but there’s a lot more to this world than you know.”

“I do know, that’s why—”

He chuckles and gently interrupts, “Just, hold on one moment and let me finish. I’ve listened to a few of your ‘podcasts,’ as you call them. You are clearly very smart, intuitive, I have no doubt you could tell a compelling story.”

Flirty, in-over-his-head waiter returns with her tea, and luckily, doesn’t stick around for another game of mental footsie.

“If you’re going to tell this story, as I have no doubt you will, I want to make sure that it’s the truth.”

She raises an eyebrow, as if listening to a few of her episodes means he knows her. Nothing is more important than the integrity of her work. Nothing. Cat toenails or no, she’s not a liar.

“I’m not great at a whole lot, Dr. Jones. But I’m a brilliant reporter. I’m thorough and careful and creative and I do my job. I don’t need you or anybody else reminding me of what the truth is.”

Stand up, she thinks to herself, leave. You don’t know need him to tell this story, it’s practically writing itself at this point. In her recollections of this moment, lost in the digital confines of her recorder, looking out over the bay in her VW, the sun setting magnificently in the distance, she will lie. Just a little bit.

“So he tells me he thinks we’d make a good team, basically, only the language was a bit more formal.”

As if she were some kinda middle-class British lady in a Jane Austen novel and he’s gonna be her Mr. Darcy or a Knightley or whomever the hell decides to play the gentleman in the story of her life. Makes her realize that he wasn’t who she thought he was or some bullshit, and “No,” aloud, recording, “he’s exactly who I think he is.”

“Anyway,” taking a breath, re-focusing, onto the next step, “he’s taking me out of state tomorrow.” Some kind of haunting in Canada and dammit, she’s gonna need to dig her passport out of her closet.

“This is Emma Swan, ACRS, signing off.”