Chapter Text
"Well, that was only a mild disaster." Fabian sprawls across his offensively large bed, a wrist draped over his forehead in feigned exhaustion. Riz rolls his eyes.
Fabian's always had people to pick up after him, so his room has never gotten very messy, even when it was being inhabited full-time by a teenage boy. Someone has cleaned it again in his absence– made the bed, carefully arranged each of his old possessions– so that it doesn't look lived in anymore. But there are still small trinkets that make it feel like his. A lot of them bring up memories for Riz, too. On a wall shelf is a framed picture of the party, one of the few staged photographs that exist of all of them, where they're all smiling, and none of them are covered in blood, dirt, or ash. His old sword sits in its wall mount. On a hook just above the bed, Riz spots the glint of a thin chain, carrying Fabian's half of their friendship pendant.
Riz climbs up and lies down at the very edge of his bed, refusing to make use of the luxurious expanse of mattress. "It was pretty brutal," he agrees.
"Your mother seems well, at least."
"Oh, yeah, I think she is. She seems, like, happy, lately."
"She's living with Gortholax now?"
"No... But, practically. I think they might have been planning to move in together when I moved out, but..." But he had dropped out, and come back home. He could get his own apartment in town, but he liked living with his mom, and his office was so close that it would feel weird to not be there with her. It's not like he would mind Gortholax being around, so he doesn't even see why they're waiting.
"Hm." Fabian nods in sympathy. "My mother still hasn't let Gilear sleep in my father's bed, thankfully, as I'll kill him if he ever does. But I swear to Gods I tripped over him in the hallway last time I visited because he was sleeping against her door, like some sort of barnacle. It's disgusting... He said his own mattress was 'wet' and 'infested with earwigs', which is all the more reason for him to sleep nowhere near my mother."
Riz nods, not wanting to participate in shit-talking Fig's dad, but also not willing to further set Fabian off by defending him. So he changes the subject.
"Yeah… Hey, do you want these?" Riz pulls the condoms out of his jacket and splays them on the mattress. Fabian looks at him like he's just pulled a live animal out of his pocket, or threatened him with a knife. "My mom thinks we're having sex," Riz explains. Fabian groans.
"Oh, Gods. My mother thinks so too. She didn't bother with condoms though." It's reassuring to Riz that Fabian seems as exasperated as he does. "I can't tell if she really thinks you and I are together, or if she just can't keep any of my friends and partners straight... Anyhow, weird timing, but yes, I will use these." He reaches over to stow them in his nightstand. "Not to brag," he glances back, sly.
"It didn't sound like you were bragging until you said that."
Fabian keeps on grinning, as he settles back against the pillow, looking at Riz like a stereotypical gossiping teenage girl. "Joy wants to see me tomorrow."
Riz refrains from groaning. In highschool, he had learned to care less about Fabian's choice in partners, even though it was and is so predictable and bad. Aelwyn, for example, is a lot cooler now than she used to be, but at the time that Fabian decided he was into her, she wasn't great. Joy is this underclassman demonic-warlock cheerleader kid, also an Elf, who dropped out of Augefort to adventure with Fabian for a year before going back to graduate, so, he's still a highschooler, which makes it weirder, even if he's only a year or two younger than Riz. And he's violent, emotionally unstable, and worships a demon. It really isn't jealousy. He just wishes Fabian would stop dating people that are Chaotic Evil. Either Fabian is bringing this up to provoke him, or he's oblivious to how annoyed it makes him. Riz feels like an asshole either way. He should just support whoever Fabian is into. So, he replies, "Cool."
"I'm guessing you're not seeing anyone, are you?"
"Ha. No." What would make him guess that, he wonders.
"Right. I figured, but, it still seemed like you weren't totally sure in senior year. About dating, I mean."
Riz stares across at him from his outpost on the edge of the bed. Fabian has always been exceptionally supportive of him when it comes to the whole "aro ace" thing. It's especially exceptional considering that Fabian doesn't talk about sexuality with anyone else, as far as Riz can tell; he wouldn't even call himself "bi" around his closest (and very queer) friends until recently, despite hooking up with and dating guys for years, and even now only mentions it quietly and infrequently. It's unclear where his reticence comes from; Riz is pretty sure both of Fabian's parents are or were bisexual too, and perfectly supportive of his preferences. Fabian can be surprisingly self-conscious about unexpected things. Yet, he seems to have made an exception about his neurotic privacy for Riz. Riz doesn't know why it's still so hard to talk to him about this.
"Well, yeah. I..." He shifts, like he's trying to wriggle out of the conversation. "I guess it's because... When I talked to my dad about it, he said that things might change in college. Which felt like it probably wasn't true, but I guess I was still subconsciously waiting. And then I tried it out in college and I still hated it, and now I'm not in college anymore, so, I'm done waiting for things to change."
Fabian looks across at him, soft, rapt, caring. "Who did you try it with?"
Riz feels his face burn with shame. He's still slightly buzzed from the drinks Fabian spiked for him, and now wishes that either he was sober and would shut up or was drunk enough to make this conversation less painful. He told himself he wasn't going to talk to anyone about this. "Someone at a party. This jock-ish guy."
"Seriously? Is that really your type?"
"I don't have a type... But, yes, obviously that would be my type."
Fabian, mercifully, doesn't probe any deeper into that. "So, wait... you had sex with him?"
"I mean, sort of. I had to stop pretty quickly."
Fabian looks away, sighs through his teeth, pitying."I thought you meant you had tried dating someone. I was under the impression that you were already clear about your opinion on sex."
Suddenly Riz notices how agitated he is. He regrets his tone as it comes out of his mouth. "Well, I was lying to myself. And there were drugs involved, too. And I'd never tried it, and I felt like I couldn't really know unless I did. So now I know."
Fabian doesn't get angry back, just pauses for a solemn moment and then carefully says, "It might be a good thing that you're not in college anymore."
Riz isn't sure how to take that. He's been feeling like his life is falling apart.
He doesn't know what he wants, out of his education, his career, his relationships, anything. He's always been so fixated on whatever is right in front of him, tuning out everything else, and then finding something new to latch onto once he's done. Lately he's been painfully aware that there's a big picture, and it's massive and unknowable and merciless, and could probably drive him insane to think too hard about. But he has to make decisions about his life, or else life will make them for him. And he doesn't have a particularly long life to live.
His elbows stick up in the air when he presses his palms into his eyes. Riz cries in a way that makes it hard to tell that he's crying, because he gets so still and breathes so controlled when he does it, like he's trying to convince his body that it doesn't need to, but Fabian knows him, and he knows right away.
"Sorry, sorry," he bridges the expanse of silken sheets, squeezes Riz by the arm, brings him in. Riz lets him, even lets him scoop him up into a Ball and lay him on his chest, in the middle of the ridiculous mattress, in a way that's awkward and embarrassing, but also really comforting. "Was it the sex talk, or the talk about school?"
"I don't know. Both. Sorry."
"Don't apologize."
Riz drags his hands down his face. "I don't know what I'm doing."
"No one does all the time. Do you want to talk through it?"
"Not really... Maybe I should. I haven't even really talked to my mom about it."
"Not Kristen? Adaine?" Fabian seems frustrated with him.
"No... Because it's stupid. And I didn't think they'd..." That they'd what? Understand? Be supportive? Kristen, who is enthusiastically supportive of any and all ways to love, who is the Patron Saint of Doubt and knows exactly what it feels like? Adaine, also asexual, who has gone to hell and back when it comes to educational trauma related to mental health and neurodiversity? Riz realizes that it's ridiculous before he even finishes the sentence. But then again, their problems make sense, are valid, whereas Riz doesn't understand why he can't just push through his. And besides, both of them are so successful now. Riz is in Elmville. "I just... I hated school, man. It wasn't anything like what I thought it would be."
"Well of course. I'm sure you'd still be there if you liked it."
"Well, I didn't like it, but I wanted it. Or I thought I did... And it's not like I wasn't excited about what I was learning. It was extremely exciting, but lots of things are, and I just couldn't focus on one thing. Like, I couldn't make myself do what I was supposed to do when I needed to. And anyway, the expectations weren't realistic, because figuring things out doesn't happen on a fixed schedule, and sometimes you start working on one thing and it turns into something else, and that should be fine, that's how problems get solved, but that just wasn't how it worked there. Honestly, it felt like being self-motivated was a bad thing."
Fabian is aggravatingly unsurprised. "Yeah. College is a scam."
"God... How is it so easy for you to say that?"
"My father never went to college and he was very successful."
"My parents did go to college. It was a big deal for them."
"And so it has to be for you as well? What about your mother, is she upset with you?"
"No, no. She's really supportive. Just, disappointed, maybe. I don't know." Riz hides his face in his elbow.
Fabian strokes his back.
"I guess I'm fine . I like the work I'm doing, even if it's really simple right now and... I know there's nothing wrong with still being in this town, but it's hard not to compare myself to Fig, or Adaine, or you, or..."
"Me? Riz." Fabian scoffs. "I'm living with my mother's family and learning to dance. I'm not even really adventuring. Your life is probably more eventful than mine is right now."
"Well. Right. Okay, but. You just seem really... cool."
"I am really cool."
Riz manages to laugh.
"Honestly, we had a pretty crazy highschool experience, and I'm not upset about taking a respite from all that... Besides, we've already saved the world a couple of times, so I figure no matter what we do now we'll always have that to be proud of."
Riz nods, and feels his eyes prickle. The only thing he can do to stop them from spilling over is to roll over and grip Fabian hard enough around the chest to break a rib.
"Ow, gentle with me."
"You're my favorite." He growls into his chest. "You are my favorite person. Except for my mom."
"Of course," he's touched. "Likewise."
Suddenly Riz feels like an overflowing bucket of emotions and he starts breathing in and out through his teeth.
"Oh god, you're not going to vomit, are you?" Fabian glances around for a trash can.
"No, it's cool."
"Because that's happened before. It was not cool."
"I know, I know, I'm fine."
Fabian, only slightly warily, wraps his arms back around Riz. One of his hands tangles softly in his hair. Riz doesn't have plans of letting go, so they just lie there, cuddling. They're friends. It's normal.
"You know, if you really aren't doing anything important here, you could come with me to Fallinell." His gaze is out of the corner of his eye, like he's waiting to see how Riz reacts, before deciding whether or not he's joking. The fact that Fabian would offer is genuinely touching, but it's also laughable, to think of Riz trying to make a life for himself in the High Elven state. He would be completely out of place.
"Maybe... if it weren't Fallinell."
"Right. Yes. That figures."
"But I'd love to visit. To visit you, specifically."
"Yes. Anytime. Really."
There's a pause, until Fabian finally says what he had been thinking about.
"There was something you wanted to tell me earlier?"
Right. Riz was hoping Fabian wouldn't remember. Lying here with him, talking like this, like it's easy to know each other and be connected, without any anxiety or pain... It's perfect. He wants things with Fabian to stay like this, stay easy, and it would be so easy to never talk about it, to just deal with his chaotic mess of feelings quietly and alone forever. But he shouldn't. He can't.
"Yeah, there was." Riz stares at the ceiling, enjoying the feeling of this moment, before he potentially fucks it all up irrevocably. "Fabian… What are we doing?"
"Um… You mean, right now?" He looks at him like it was a dumb question. But maybe it's an act.
"Yeah, kind of. This… The cuddling. And the touching, the falling asleep together… I'm not saying I don't like it, but. It isn't normal, is it?"
Fabian looks mildly upset. "What does that matter?"
"I don't know. Clearly it matters to other people."
"And?"
"And maybe to me. I just, I don't know how to think of you sometimes. I'm worried I'm going to do something wrong, because I don't know what we are or what you want and I don't know what the rules are."
"We can make up our own rules. And tell each other what we want."
"But," Riz is starting to get frustrated, "What am I supposed to call you?"
"What do you want to call me?" Fabian matches his tone.
"I don't know. My adventuring partner? Friend? Best friend? I almost feel like we're family, except there are things I'd do with you that I wouldn't do with my mom." Fabian raises an eyebrow. "I mean, not sex. I don't know what I mean. But, anyway... You don't..."
Fabian waits. "...Yes?"
"You don't want to... have sex, either. With me." He wonders if Fabian can feel his heart pounding, or his gut wrench, through the place where the chests are touching.
Fabian looks up at the ceiling for a worryingly long time, before looking right at Riz. "I would have sex with you if you wanted to."
"Okay." Fuck. "Okay. I'm... going to have to process that."
Fabian glances away and there's a moment of fear that makes Riz clutch onto his shirt, so he can't leave.
"You're so important to me."
"Yes, yes. You are too." He puts his hand over Riz', letting him know he doesn't need to pull on him, he's still there. "I have other partners I can have sex with. That's not why I like you."
Other partners. Riz can't tell if Fabian is implying that Riz is one of his partners, or if it was just an inconvenience of language. His stomach twists.
"Okay, but. Just to be clear…I'm also pretty sure that I don't want to date anyone. That I can't feel that way, even if I wanted to." It sucks, because either Riz is rejecting Fabian, or he's assuming that Fabian needs to be rejected, when Fabian might not feel that way about him at all. Both options are humiliating. He tries to keep his voice and expression neutral, but he kind of wants to start bawling. "Not that I'm saying that you'd want to–"
"Just. Hush. It's fine." There's a long stillness. "I had a terrible crush on you in highschool, but I don't feel that way very strongly anymore. And our friendship is much more important to me than that."
"What?" The blood rushes to Riz's head, and it burns.
"What do you mean, 'What'? Was it not obvious? All of our friends knew."
"No, Fabian. It was not obvious." Not to him, at least. What is he supposed to do with that information, anyway? His heart is pounding in his ears. He wonders if this is what Barbarian rage is like. "I really did not know that."
Fabian creases his brow. "Don't get angry, please. That's why I didn't tell you."
"I'm not…" he stops. Maybe he is angry. He doesn't know how to feel. He hasn't had any time to think about it. Fabian makes a motion to sit up and Riz grabs him again, growls, "Don't you dare," and Fabian relaxes back to the bed. He's clearly dealing with his own feelings and Riz feels immensely guilty. He puts his forehead heavy against Fabian's ribs, holds him with his claws. "I don't want to hurt you, and I really, really don't want to lose you."
"You haven't." Fabian holds him. "I love spending time with you, The Ball. Getting to know all the weird things you do and think about. Seeing you do the most… brave, brilliant, ill-advised, chaotic shit I've ever seen. Getting to, what… kiss you? Call you pet names? That's really nothing compared to how I feel about you. You make me really happy, Riz."
Riz feels himself tearing up, for like, the fourth fucking time tonight. His words come out too fast. "Sometimes when I think about you, and how cool you are, and how I get to be friends with you, I get so excited I don't know what to do. I just have to pace around or lie on the floor or go out into the woods and shoot into the trees."
He knows what that's going to do to Fabian's ego, how it's going to make him grin like a smug idiot, and he says it anyway, because it's true.
"You're so goddamn cute, The Ball."
It isn't sappy, or yearning, or even teasing, just a plain statement of truth. Riz feels possessed. It's that burning, inexpressible feeling, this time combined with a small fury. Fabian knows Riz doesn't like being called cute, and Riz knows that Fabian said it because he completely and totally meant it.
It takes all his willpower to make his claws retract back into his fingertips before he lunges for Fabian's collar. Fabian anticipates him and catches one of his wrists, rolls over on top, but Riz manages to slip out from under him, come back at him from the side, and hook an elbow around his neck, in an ineffectual rear choke.
"Is this cute, Fabian??"
"Honestly, it is extremely cute. Hrk–"
It's not too hard for him to get an arm around Riz' side and sweep him back down under him. Riz manages to fend off his submissions for a while, but after being tossed around for a few minutes, and the two of nearly toppling completely off the bed, Fabian finally gets him face-down on the mattress, pressing his arm into his back. His breath is warm when he whispers to him, "I'm the wrestling champion The Ball. Don't even step to me."
"Hah… Fine. Tap."
Fabian pulls off of him with smug satisfaction. Riz rolls over to face him. He's tall, athletic, extraordinarily handsome– but in an objective way, as objective as one can be about that sort of thing. But really, all that comes to mind right now is how he looked falling flat on his face onto the cafeteria table after making a showy, unnecessary leap, and that story about how he cried after pretending to be Riz and eating a piece of glass. It makes him laugh.
Fabian might be a little offended if he knew what he was laughing about, or maybe not. But he matches Riz's easy smile. "Is this what you meant by things you wouldn't do with your mother?"
"Yeah, I think it is, actually."
They watch each other catch their breath. Riz breaks the silence.
"So… We're friends."
" Best friends."
"Yeah."
"And we can do whatever the hell we want together."
"And nothing else."
"Yes."
"What if… I don't know what I want, yet?"
"Then we'll figure it out."
Fabian holds out his hand to pull Riz up, and Riz takes it. Instead of letting go when he's pulled up onto his knees, he squeezes, holding him there. "I want to be a part of your life. Even when you go back to Fallinell... Maybe forever."
"I was planning on that." Fabian smiles, like he really means it. "I want to fall asleep next to you tonight."
"Yeah. I want that too."
It's dangerous– a different type of danger than Riz knows how to deal with, the one where you're high on adrenaline and putting your body on the line to achieve some necessary, world-altering goal. This is smaller, slower, but almost as scary. They could fuck this up so badly. Riz could lose him, and it wouldn't be in service of any greater good, any higher purpose, it would just be petty, and stupid, and animal. They're in uncharted waters here. Riz does not know how to sail.
In the bottom of Fabian's dresser, there's still the pair of pajamas Riz used to wear when he'd stay here after too-late nights in highschool. There's still an extra toothbrush for him in his bathroom.
"Will you actually sleep tonight? You'll stay in bed the whole time?" Fabian is laying across from him, the crisp sheets tucked under his arm and covering his bare chest, his room dark except for the dim pale-blue moonlight.
"Yeah. I'll do my best."
"You'd better. You need it… I love you, Riz."
Riz reaches out to him, finds his hand, under the pillow. "Yeah. I love you too, Fabian."
"Goodnight."
"Goodnight."