Chapter Text
Being back in school after everything that had happened felt strange, but Nicholas tried very hard to be normal about it. Very hard. Very normal.
He was doing great, all things considered. He caught at least ten percent of his classes and was distracted by Seiji for a very minimal amount of them. Later, he thought to himself every time his mind wandered there. Which was often. More often than should be considered “minimal,” really.
At lunch he grabbed his tray and went to sit across from Bobby, who squealed at him without preamble. “Tell me everything that happened. Leave out no details.”
Nicholas knew Bobby only had a passing understanding of the weekend–that they’d won the competition, that Aiden had gotten sick, and that there had been some sort of altercation with Jesse. Nicholas decided it would be more fun to come out of left field with, “It all began when Seiji kissed me in a closet.”
Bobby’s eyes went wide. His mouth dropped as he screamed in that soundless, airy way. “Nicholas!”
“Yeah,” He rubbed the back of his neck. “I know.”
“Okay, I also need to tell you something. It’s related, sort of, and I don’t want you to think I’m overshadowing this very important milestone of yours with my thing.”
“What? No, I would never. Tell me!”
Bobby’s eyes turned pink. “I sort of asked Dante out this weekend.”
Nicholas experienced a very similar reaction. “Bobby!”
“Yeah, I know!”
“That’s awesome! Tell me everything.”
“No, we need to talk about Seiji first.”
“Dante, I assure you, is going to be a better starting point. The Seiji story is long.”
Bobby slammed his hands onto the table. “I will not be able to breathe until I hear the Seiji story.”
Nicholas laughed. “Fine, fine. But you’re not off the hook. I want to hear everything about you and Dante after.”
“Deal.”
“So before the concert, I was really panicking, and it only got worse when Harvard said Aiden wasn’t going to perform. So Seiji dragged me away from it all into a closet, where he talked me through the performance and then kissed me.” Nicholas shrunk down in his seat, feeling embarrassed just retelling the story. “I guess it isn’t that long. It felt a lot bigger.”
“Are you kidding? It’s huge! I bet there’s a lot of details you’re leaving out.”
He felt the ghost of Seiji’s hand at his neck, heard the echoes of think about me, and sternly averted his gaze from Bobby. “Maybe. But let’s get into those after we talk about you and Dante.”
Bobby pulled his sleeves over his hands and rested his cheeks on them. “It’s not that much. We were hanging out and watching the livestream of your performance, and I just—well, I said that I wished I could be up there, and he said that I would be amazing, and I just blurted it out. So now we have a date on Friday.”
Nicholas pounded his fist on the table. “That’s amazing! I’m so happy for you. We’ll have to do a double date sometime. Or triple, if you want to invite Aiden and Harvard. I love Eugene but I am not inviting Jesse.”
“Right, I forgot they were together.” Bobby cocked his head. “Why not? Because of Seiji?”
“No, it’s more complicated than that.” Nicholas wasn’t originally going to tell Bobby about this, but now that the opportunity had presented itself, he realized that he wanted to. Bobby had grown to be one of his best friends over the past few months. He wanted to share this bit of his life with him.
So Nicholas sat and told Bobby about Robert over cafeteria pizza. He told him everything, beginning with how he’d learned to play to mimic his Dad, passing vaguely over the event at the alumni night and the weeks after, and finally concluding at his fight with Jesse.
It felt good to tell Bobby on his own terms. It was the first time he had told the story and been in full control of it, and he found that it hurt a little bit less than before. He doubted the pain would ever fully fade, but he could keep telling it, keep trusting the friends he had and slowly, someday, all that love would overpower the pain.
Bobby was an excellent listener. He was sympathetic in the right moments and pissed in others. At the end of it all, he huffed haughtily and said, “I can’t believe this is real. What an asshole.”
Nicholas laughed. It eased the knot in his chest. “Totally.”
“Last time I listen to any of his music,” Bobby softened. “Seriously, thank you for telling me. I know it couldn’t have been easy.”
“Yeah, well,” Nicholas shrugged, “It is what it is. But let me tell you, it was awesome to see his face when we won.”
“I’ll bet!”
“No greater satisfaction. Well, except for what happened after.”
“And what was that?” Bobby asked with a knowing grin.
“Seiji.” Nicholas found his blush returning as he thought about Seiji covering his skin with kisses, pulling him over to the bed, and dragging Nicholas down on top of him. “We don’t need to go into detail about that.”
Bobby pouted. “Aw, come on.”
The memory of Seiji singing into his neck replayed and it suddenly felt just as intense as it had in that dim hotel room. He could still hear the low rumbling of the AC and smell Seiji’s vanilla. Despite it all, he smiled to himself. While he had loved sharing his life with Bobby, this felt more intimately private. He didn’t favor the thought of letting anyone else know the details of that night. “I think that belongs between Seiji and I.”
He was on his way to rehearsal–they may have won the competition, but now they had an album to record and more performances–when his phone buzzed. He ignored it, but then it buzzed again. And then a third time. Sighing, Nicholas withdrew it from his back pocket.
I asked him.
Can we start over?
It’s Jesse btw.
Nicholas stared down at his phone. This couldn’t be real. This had to be a joke. He was halfway to typing that before he caught himself. Backspace, backspace, backspace. Okay, Nicholas, think.
He didn’t like Jesse. Why didn’t he like him? Because of what he represented. He had everything Nicholas had grown up wanting right down to the financially stable father. But that wasn’t Jesse’s fault, was it? If Jesse wanted to bridge that gap, surely that meant he was trying to learn. So he’d asked Robert. Robert had been honest. Now Jesse knew the truth, but that didn’t mean he had to reach out.
He’d also hurt Seiji. That was more pressing to Nicholas. Sure, Jesse had grown up perfectly wealthy and spoiled, but he’d been born into that. No say in it, only luck. Yet he had distinctly chosen to hurt Seiji.
Nicholas turned his phone over in his hands and briefly thought of asking Seiji, but he knew what Seiji would do. He would get huffy, but he would ultimately say that it wasn’t his decision and Nicholas could do whatever he wanted. But it would hurt him, wouldn’t it? Or would it not, since he had moved on? No, what had happened between them hasn’t just been a breakup; it was a betrayal of trust. Dating Nicholas instead of Jesse would never erase that pain, even if Nicholas desperately wanted to.
There was no easy answer here. Maybe he could test the waters? A conversation wasn’t a commitment in any way. He typed out, How’d you get my number?
Eugene, his phone buzzed, and then again, You can’t blame me for not believing you.
Nicholas grimaced. He wanted to, but he couldn’t. Ugh, he hated being the bigger person, but what had he been saying about love? It wasn’t conditional. It had to go both ways. If Jesse was trying, Nicholas could try, too. At least a little. Until Jesse got too annoying. So he simply typed, No.
I’ve always wanted a brother.
Oh. Nicholas frowned, You always had one.
How long have you known?
Years, He answered. Maybe forever?
There was a lull in the messages, so Nicholas dropped his phone back in his pocket and pushed the weird feeling down on his way to practice. He set down his case just as his phone buzzed again.
Do you want to hang out this weekend?
Seiji walked over, but he didn’t look over Nicholas’s shoulder. “What are you reading?”
Nicholas made a distinct effort to relax his face since clearly Seiji could tell something was wrong. “Jesse texted me.”
Seiji’s eyes went wide. “What did he say?”
“He asked to hang out.”
“Clearly you can’t be trusted to do that. You will need a third person there.” So they didn’t get into another fight and kill each other. Yeah. That made sense.
“Are you volunteering?”
“I am not.”
“But you totally are, right? We can ask Eugene, too.” Maybe he would end up on a double date with them after all.
Seiji bristled. “Fine, if you insist then I will come.”
Well that didn’t take much convincing at all. “Awesome,” Nicholas said, and pecked his boyfriend’s cheek. Having him there would help. Maybe. Actually it might make things worse. That’s why Eugene was also a necessity. Shit, should they invite Aiden?
He redirected his attention to the text thread. Can Seiji and Eugene come?
The reply was instantaneous, That’s probably a good idea.
Nicholas grinned.
Before they left for the evening, Nicholas tried to have a serious conversation about Jesse.
“I don’t care anymore,” Seiji said, but his shoulders were tense so Nicholas knew he was lying.
“Come on. I don’t want to overstep. It’s just that I may be interested in trying to build a relationship with my brother. And I say may because there is a high probability that this will crash and burn, but you matter to me more right now. Jesse has been a jerk and I have lived my whole life without him. We can ditch this entire night if you want. Honest, I just need to know where the lines are—“
Seiji wrapped his hands around Nicholas’s neck and kissed him. It shut him up quick. Seiji did not hesitate to use that trick often. “Jesse has no hold on me anymore.”
“Yeah, but he hurt you—“
“He also hurt you.”
“Well that’s just not the same.”
“No. I actually would like an apology from him, but seeing his face as I kiss you will be just as satisfying. He can’t hurt me anymore.”
A grin slowly crept its way into Nicholas’s lips. “There’s the manipulative little shit I know and care for. Is it weird that hearing that explanation reassured me better than any other one you could have given?”
“No.”
“Great. And you wanna make out in front of Jesse?”
“Obviously not,” Seiji said.
“And if I started making out with you in front of him, you would…”
“Pull away and tell you to stop embarrassing me.”
“Lovely. Thank you.”
They met for dinner on Saturday night. It was, coincidentally, the same place Harvard had taken them to so many months ago. That first night after the auditions, after his and Seiji’s fight and when they’d danced for the first time. They danced often enough now. Nicholas had even managed to convince Seiji to start keeping his record player on his desk so that it could be used more.
Jesse frowned at the jukebox. “I have never seen one of those in real life.”
It was awkward. Everything. It was like everyone was waiting for the first insults to be thrown. Jesse not immediately being fond of the jukebox was not an insult, but it sort of felt like it was.
Nicholas’s legs were bouncing beneath the table, which of course just summoned Seiji to lay his hands upon them. He cleared his throat, “How’s your food?”
“It’s fine,” Jesse said simply. He wasn’t very talkative, was he? How has he and Seiji ever gotten along? Nicholas suddenly imagined many silent meals where they both made eyes at each other while soft, classical guitar floated between them.
Eugene jumped in, “I love it here, I used to come all the time last year but now I keep forgetting about it. I need to come more often.”
“Aren’t you going to ask?” Jesse blurted.
Nicholas frowned at the sudden change in conversation. “Ask what?”
“How the conversation went.” Oh. With Robert.
“Do you want to tell me?”
“No. Yes. I don’t know. It didn’t go well.”
Nicholas snorted as he recounted his own conversation he’d had with Robert. “I bet.”
“He told me I should just forget about you.” Jesse shifted in his seat.
“And why aren’t you?”
“Like I said, I’ve always wanted a brother, um, and it bothered me that you had always been out there, and everyone knew but me.”
“Oh.” He leaned back in his seat and into Seiji’s arm, which had been resting on the back of the chair.
“I can’t fix that. But maybe we could… Start over?”
Eugene nodded at this. “You two already fight like my siblings.”
“We’re not fighting right now,” Nicholas felt the need to point out.
Jesse playfully hit Eugene’s arm. “You don’t help,” but he said it with a flirtatious smile and flutter of the eyelids.
Oh. Oh. Nicholas and Seiji shared a knowing glance. A part of Nicholas and assumed that Jesse’s past obsession with Seiji would irrevocably bleed into their relationship, but Eugene hadn’t been lying when he’d said they were working on it. Something was working, because they seemed utterly obsessed with each other. Nicholas made an effort to zone back into their conversation.
“—Obviously I always win,” Eugene teased. “You know that.”
“I wasn’t sure how well those skills translated.”
“How do you think I got so good at pinning you down?”
Nicholas blanched. “Hey, how about we order dessert?”
They somehow made it through the entire dinner and dessert without any fights. It was awkward, and they repeatedly hit conversational walls where at least one of them did not feel comfortable continuing, but they always backtracked and managed to move on.
It would take work, but Nicholas thought he could do it, maybe. He could have someone else in his family. Despite how awkward it was, they were all trying, and that was what mattered.
At the end of it all, they danced. It was too good of a chance not to. When they finished dessert, Nicholas took Seiji’s hands and hauled him to his feet. He pulled him close and moved with him, just like he had that first night. And this time, Seiji let him. He even seemed to enjoy it. A small smile slid onto his lips and Nicholas kissed it tenderly. He’d grown to love those small smiles.
On the way out, Nicholas extended an invitation to Jesse. “You should come to our concert next weekend. You’ve never actually seen us play.”
Eugene’s eyes lit up. Jesse feigned nonchalance, “I’ve seen recordings.”
“Come on. Eugene obviously wants you there.”
“And you don’t?”
“You should go to support your boyfriend,” Nicholas teased, “And your brother. And your… ex?”
Seiji rolled his eyes, but Jesse actually laughed. “Sure, whatever, I guess I can come. Text me the details?”
“You got it.”
“That went well,” Nicholas said once they were back in their room.
Seiji nodded. “Better than expected.”
“Thank you for not, like, getting angry and Jesse or anything.”
“I think you are forgetting that what happened between Jesse and I was years ago.”
He rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, but at the competition you were super harsh with him. Which I support and admire. I’m just saying.”
Seiji eyed him strangely then, as if there was a reason for his actions. It seemed he expected Nicholas to have already grasped it before tonight and was only just discovering that he hadn’t. Seiji strode forward and took his cheeks in his hands, as he often did when wanting Nicholas to stop thinking about everything else and just focus on him. “How many times have I told you that I don’t care about Jesse anymore?”
Nicholas bit his lip. “Not enough, clearly.”
“Will I have to keep reminding you how much you matter to me?”
“Yeah, I think you will.”
Seiji hummed. “Well then, let me remind you,” and then his lips were on his, moving slowly and kindly but with purpose, like he really was trying to remind Nicholas of all they meant to each other.
Nicholas was quickly falling onto his bed with Seiji above him, already shedding layers to have closer access to skin. They rose and fell together. It was familiar by now, but familiar didn’t mean boring. Nicholas never stopped feeling the fire and lightning. Their mouths sang together, and he still found himself begging to have pity as Seiji swallowed the notes.
Nicholas remembered thinking that Seiji was inevitable. He’d never been more right about anything in his entire life.
Jesse met the five of them backstage before their performance. He didn’t wish them luck, he didn’t even greet anyone, he just walked in like he owned the place. The only hello he gave was a gentle brush aside of his magnificently blond bangs.
“Glad to see your singer showed up today,” Jesse said.
Aiden flipped his own hair in return. “Sorry, what was your name again?”
That launched Jesse into an undignified tirade. Despite their bickering, Nicholas found himself thinking that he was happy to have all of his family together., even if that wasn’t true at all. No one here was actually related to him besides Jesse, but maybe that didn’t matter. Maybe they were a different type of family. One that bickered and fought, but would always be there for each other where it mattered. And maybe, in some cases, they were still working on it, but they could get there someday. They were only just beginning.
The lights dimmed. It was their cue to go on.
Nicholas grabbed Seiji’s hand and led them to the stage. Aiden took front and center, but Nicholas took front-left. They’d decided to switch leads and duet a lot of songs. It had taken a lot of work, and it wasn’t over yet, but they would get there.
Seiji plugged in behind him. It was reassuring to have his familiar presence at his back. If anything happened, Seiji would catch him.
The lights were blinding, the noise was overwhelming, and as he processed it all, he couldn’t help but remember Seiji’s description of it all back in that closet. It had been spot on in every sense. Seiji had known what it would be like and he’d reassured him in his kisses. Nicholas felt them still. He thought he would always associate Seiji’s lips with performing.
He plugged his guitar into the stage amp and adjusted the settings. He watched everyone else get settled and then glanced to the left wing where Jesse Coste was standing, looking utterly disinterested in everything.
Nicholas saw him steal a glance at Eugene’s tank top. Maybe Jesse wasn’t here for him, but he found that he was rather okay with that. They had time to work on their relationship.
Nicholas chuckled to himself as he kicked a wire out of the way. This was their first performance since the competition. It was scary, but also refreshing. This was lower stakes. The competition had been an ending. This was the next step. It wasn’t an epilogue, it was the start of something–not a beginning, they’d been through too much for that–but maybe the start of Act II.
He flipped the effect switch and waited for Seiji to kick them off. Seiji took his sweet time, finding his way into that perfectly elegant position he held his guitar, his hands already poised at the second fret, his hair neatly combed back despite how deeply Nicholas’s hands had been in it just moments before.
He hit the reverb, dropped the chord, and whispered into the mic, “You have to promise, Nicholas, not to tell anyone.”