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douse me in gasoline

"Oh," Lauren says, "Alright."

It's a sort of soft sound, like he understands but doesn't really need to add to it. So he simply shrugs, contented, and says, "I learned because he was almost always in the mood to actually murder me once we met in person."

He listens with rapt attention, eyes always amiable but a little bit sharp. They were nothing like Adrastos or Thorne's. A different breed of creature lived here.

"I think you were on the radar from night one," Lauren says, amused. "I never knew your name, but the group chat had a lot to say about that guy Thorne wouldn't shut up about for two weeks straight." He shakes his head and snorts a little bit. "I think you owe it to yourself and him to stop looking at yourself like a shadow to this big bright sun you make him out to be. It gets lonely being that kind of person, you know?"

Lauren starts to reel in the house and replace its coils where they belong.

"If it makes you feel better, the people in this house think pretty highly of you, or Wren would have strung you up by your toes," Lauren says, kicking the coils into the shadows and turning back to Chris. "The first time I met Adrastos in person, I thought, there's no way he'd ever look at me like I wanted him too. So I know where you come from. There are different brands of loneliness. But there also different brands of greatness. Thorne can be whatever you want him to be, but at the end of the night, he still chooses to be yours, and I think you should consider what he sees in you too, because if you ask him, he'll say that he's only an artist, and why would someone like you ever want to end up with him?"

douse me in gasoline

"Good, remember it," Lauren says, jovially and gives the hose one final kick before stepping up onto the deck and checking on a strawberry plant growing there. He looks over at Chris with a curious expression.

"I know," he says, "Our group chat's name was but what if he thought they were mediocre cupcakes for like, two weeks. He was honestly terrified you were only eating them because you were half-asleep and he'd done something terribly offensive in making you suffer them." Lauren rolls his eyes skyward. "I thought Adrastos was dating my sister," he points out helpfully, "And then I thought he was dating Wren, which he was, for two seconds before Wren realized he was actually just hiding from his problems by hiding from me. And then when he wasn't dating anyone, I thought, he'll have to settle down eventually with some gorgeous girl, and then we kissed me, I thought, oh, this must be his last resort. Do you understand where I'm going with this?"

Lauren smiles at Chris. "Took me ten years, and I'm still working on it. Take your time, but don't be afraid to talk to one another about it. Just don't put him on some unobtainable pedestal. He'll get insufferable and whiny, it's no good for anyone's mental health."

He fiddles with a tiny budding strawberry.

"Well, I met him in middle school," Lauren says, "The awful embarrassing stories come in droves, like that one time he broke his leg in the shower."

douse me in gasoline

"And that's what you get to live with for the rest of time," Lauren drawls back at him, "he thinks all of his baking is mediocre, and spent most of his breaks in uni watching those stupid baking channel tutorials to try and get better." He fiddles with one of the other plants happily.

"Also," he adds, "The great banana bread discourse has been noted because he told us all about it in so many words." He smiles crookedly at Chris. "Good job with those bony legs of yours, by the way."

He stretches his arms above his head as Necalli calls out to them for a dessert reprieve. "Burden him," he says, pointing a finger back at Chris, "That's what being in a relationship is about. You're happy together, you're sad together, and you burden each other, because if you're worth it them, they're gonna shoulder the world for you. And you're going to do the same."

He laughs and opens the glass door heading back inside.

"Well," he said deviously, "He got very into his rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody, and then Wren set off one of those screaming halloween decorations and threw it through the window at him." He pauses, adds, "It was the most amazing ******** I'd ever seen. There was even a shitty amount of fake cobweb involved."

santa tell me

It's not Christmas, not even Thanksgiving, and only barely reaching Halloween, but Thorne takes Chris to the ice rink anyways. The Seattle Center somehow forgets that it's only October with all the lights and festive glow, setting up for the winter with merry, merry joy.

Thorne sits on the edge of the rink, watching the tiny crowd mill around on it with a grin stuck to his face. It was late evening, the lights glowing to keep away the dark, and the small crowd a mix of happy children and fumbling parents, young couples and old couples and everything in between.

Thorne pulls the laces of his own skates tight and stands up, stretching his hands above his head before grinning down at Chris.

"Ready?" he asks.

santa tell me

Thorne laughs and pulls Chris up to him, smirking a little bit at the idea that they might fall. After having had to relive an entire night of his friends telling the most embarrassing stories about him, he was tempted by the thought of a little bit of payback.

"Well, I can certainly try," he says, stepping onto the ice and waiting for Chris to join him. He's by no means professional and wobbles a bit before straightening out. But he remembers a little bit of it from the times when Wren would make him skate with her at midnight after classes were out, or some absurd time of the morning to kick away stress.

"Have you ever been ice skating before?"

santa tell me

Thorne snorts at Chris for clinging to the wall so soon.

"Baby," he says, but affectionately, as he skates little circles around in front of him, remembering the use of his legs and the bend of his knees and Wren windmilling her arms the one time they'd fallen over a ten year old and went sprawling onto the ice. He thinks he's gotten a little bit better since then, and the rustiness wears away to the point that he can simply drift in the circle without doing much.

Finally he slows to a halt and offers out a hand, smirking at Chris.

"Come on and trust me, if you fall I'll go down with you and make it look like my fault," he promises, amused. "Just think about it like rollerskating... except on ice, and with blades attached to your feet."

santa tell me

Thorne snorts at the death grip and smirks a little wider.

"You're impossible, you heathen. Whatever am I going to do with you?" he asks, and gives Chris's hand a firm tug that send the other man sliding towards him. He catches one hand around the other so he doesn't just keep going until he falls.

"Just bend your knees," Thorne says, "Think of gliding instead of walking. I'll pull you along until you get the hang of it, you big baby."

He turns so that he's skating backwards, wrapping both hands around Chris's wrists and tugging him along.

"This is how Wren taught me," Thorne said, grinning. "I fell a lot before I learned to stay up. I'm actually pretty bad at it, this is the extent of my abilities. If you run into me without warning, I'll fall over - I'm really not that good."

santa tell me

"I will if you let me," Thorne retorts, just as fast, his eyes flaring to Chris warmly, amused. He continues to tug them along, humming, one foot behind the other.

"Not here in particular," Thorne responds, "But I iceskated with Wren a lot when I was in uni, and when I moved to New York City, Adrastos, Lauren and I picked up the habit before they moved to Seattle and I moved to Ashdown." He bends them around a curve, slow and easy, the lights glimmering over both of their heads with a golden shine.

"You'll surpass me quickly, I'm awfully good at looking like an uprooted tree when I want to be," Thorne snorts back. "What did you do all those years for fun?"