Chapter Text
Watching Logan clips and "you just don't understand love" "I understand that it's making you act pathetic" is a banger line but also very aro coded lol Anyways this is partially I wanted to share the quote and also partially aro Logan please and thank you? – anon
Roman answers his door and doesn't even hesitate before he's pulling Logan inside and into a hug. "Hey, Erudite, what's going on?"
"I'm very stressed for no reason and it's troubling me."
He blinks. "Yeah, that sounds like it's not a good thing to be. Can I help?"
"I don't know."
"Okay, do you want me to keep asking questions about it or do you just need to…exist for a few minutes?"
Logan sighs, shaking his hands as his arms start to cramp from being crossed for so long. "I think I—forgive me, but I don't think I know what I need."
"…well, you're doing the thing of being a little extra formal because you're freaking out—"
"I'm aware."
"Okay, okay. Uh—" Roman glances around and picks up one of the stuffed whales from his bed— "here. Hold onto that for a little while."
Logan gratefully accepts the plush and plants his chin right about where the blowhole would be, closing his eyes and breathing in the soft scent of fresh breeze lingering on the plush. Roman must've had his windows open this morning; he recognizes the smell of some of the Imagination's flower fields and the slight chill means it must've been recently. Reconstructing the timeline in his head does wonders to undo the worst of the tangled knot of stress and his shoulders sag. Roman comes up beside him and plants his chin on his shoulder, another grounding point of contact.
"Hi," he says, head bobbing awkwardly as his chin moves up and down, "you feel any better?"
"I think so. Thank you."
"Sure. You wanna come cuddle for a second while you figure stuff out?"
"…if you're busy, then—"
"Shush, Erudite," Roman says fondly, pushing him over to the bed and making him sit, "come cuddle. You look like you need it."
Logan doesn't protest as Roman slides his glasses from his face, letting him lie him on his side and scooting behind him, the whale still nestled in his arms. He closes his eyes and breathes in the scent again. Soft bird calls and wind chimes come from Roman's closet—that's right, he was supposed to work in the Imagination this morning, perhaps he just got back. The memory of Roman's joke about the door being in his closet makes his mouth turn up just slightly and he huffs a laugh. Roman snuggles into his side and nudges him.
"What's funny?"
"I was remembering your jokes about the closet door."
"That's a good thing to remember, I'm hilarious."
"You are."
"You want a blanket or something?"
"No, I'm okay." He lets out a long breath. "I think it's just…hard today."
"What's hard today?" Logan makes a vague gesture toward Roman's door and Roman makes an ah sound. "The others?"
"It's not their fault and there's nothing I would have them do about it—they can't do anything about it, it's not something for them to be worried about—"
"And it's not your fault for being affected by it either," Roman breaks in gently, "don't beat yourself up for having a reaction to something, Erudite."
"But shouldn't I be happy for them? That they're happy and everything? I know, I know," he says before Roman can say anything, "we've been over that too. It's a complicated situation and there will be periods where it's more challenging due to the nature of human emotions and the nuances therein."
"Took the words right out of my mouth."
He laughs again. "I know, Roman, I do, it's just…hard."
"Well, as we've also discussed, you can't think your way out of being in pain, so…"
The next sigh is tinged with frustration. "I know that. I'm just…frustrated with myself. I know it's not like I have a right to be—no, no, that's a poor choice of words. I'm frustrated that I'm frustrated, and at how there is not a way to resolve the frustration and instead I have to…ride it out, as Virgil would put it."
Roman's quiet for a second, just resting his head on Logan's shoulder when he rolls onto his back, still holding the whale. Then he too lets out a sigh. "Yeah, I get that. It's a very annoying sort of being annoyed because the fact that you're annoyed is making you more annoyed."
"Exactly."
"And I'm guessing that pointing out the ridiculousness of it or the justifications for it doesn't help? Because then it just makes you more annoyed that you got into the situation in the first place?"
"You're as insightful as ever and the others don't give you enough credit for it."
He lets out a surprised bark of laughter. "Well, I wouldn't say that, but the sentiment is appreciated."
Logan lets his eyes fall closed, taking comfort in the solid heft and weight of the whale plushie against his chest. If he doesn't think about it too much—which is enough of a challenge for him at the best of times—he can almost imagine the whale wriggling around slightly to make itself more comfortable in his hold, its tail brushing the undersides of his arms as it rolls over to—
He lets out a yelp and scrambles upright, staring at the definitely moving whale plush on his chest.
"Oh, shit," Roman mutters, quickly scooping it up and petting it until it stills again, "I'm sorry, Erudite, I didn't know that would happen. I was working on a type of stuffed animal that would come alive in the Imagination as like, an animal companion sort of thing? But it was only supposed to come alive once we were in there or if…"
He glances up at Logan. Logan's still recovering from the shock of having a stuffed animal move, thank you very much, but manages to hold eye contact. "If what?"
"…it's dumb and more of an unintended side effect than a feature of the thing, okay?"
"Alright, so what is it?"
Roman sighs, ducking his head as a small blush spreads over his cheeks. "If it senses that you're someone I care about and worry about, okay? You were holding it and you were upset and it could tell that I was upset for you and…yeah, okay? It's not like I meant for it to happen or anything."
The whale moves a little and Roman presses a kiss to the top of its head.
"Yeah, I know, buddy, everything's okay. You just go on back to sleep, okay?"
"I didn't mind."
"You what?"
"I didn't mind," Logan admits, holding his arms out again, "it just startled me. Besides, that's sweet."
"Sweet? What's sweet? The fact that it just randomly comes alive when it's not supposed to?" The whale bumps its snout against his chin and he kisses it in apology. "I didn't mean it like that, buddy."
"I think it's sweet that it can sense when you're worried and tries to help. Though that does seem to be a feature of most of the Imagination's creations."
"Yeah, yeah, just call me a sap out loud, why don't you," Roman grumbles, but Logan can see the pleased tilt to his smile as he passes the plush back over. "If you're sure it won't bother you?"
"I'm sure. Hello," Logan mumbles as the plush squirms happily in his grip and he holds onto it again. It shifts so its tail is nestled against the crook of his arms, its snout against the crook of his neck. "It almost feels as though it's breathing, did you design that too?"
"Huh? No, I think it's…well, it's probably trying to calm you down and so it's mimicking a breathing cycle as like, a comfort thing?"
"Fascinating." He runs his hand up and down the whale's back, feeling the pulses every so often. The more he thinks about it, the more it feels like a pulse than a strict inhale-exhale, which is, as Roman says, actually doing wonders to help calm him down. "Is this what you've been working on?"
"Yeah, one of them."
"It's lovely. Who is the whale for?"
"Well, that one wasn't gonna be for anyone specifically, but I think it'd be quite upset if I didn't let it see you anymore." Roman reaches out and tweaks its fin gently. It brushes its tail against his hand before curling up with Logan again. "So it might be yours. Yeah? That sound good? Oh, god, look at it, it's really snuggling with you now, isn't it?"
Indeed, the whale plush seems to have taken on the affection of a sleepy cat, lazing across Logan's chest with a contented sort of air that comes from something right on the verge of sleep. The drowsiness is contagious; as the plush lounges in his arms, he feels himself slipping closer and closer to the edge of sleep as Roman scoots close enough to rest their heads together. The smell of the Imagination's flower fields helps tremendously. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.
"I think it's just difficult when I hear them talk in absolutes about it," he admits into the gentle quiet of the room, "when they say thinks like 'of course I love you, who wouldn't,' or things about the inevitability of falling in love with each other."
"Like it's not a choice to commit to that sort of relationship and just kinda something everyone's expected to do?"
"I believe so, yes. Not everyone will end up in a romantic relationship, not everyone will choose to stay in or maintain a romantic relationship, and it's not—it's not as though the romantic attraction itself sustains a healthy relationship."
" God no. Not in the slightest."
"And then to just…make a statement like that, where it's an assumption that this is just something that everyone does, like it's a facet of being alive, it…grates on me."
Roman doesn't bother with empty platitudes. Instead, he shifts closer and lets Logan cuddle into his side, the plush still nestled in his arms. Here in this moment, he doesn't have to worry about being judged or ostracized, he can just feel the emotions that he needs to in the time and space he needs to process them properly. And just that small action, in and of itself, makes everything a little more bearable.
"For what it's worth," Roman says after a while of them lying together in the quiet, "if at any point you just need to come in here and be away from all of that, you have permission to."
"You'd—you'd just let me come into your room whenever? What if you're not here?"
"If it's me specifically you're after, then either I'm gonna be in here or in there." He indicates the closet. "Off in Narnia or some other fantastical realm."
"Are you inviting me to get back in the closet?"
"Hey, we all know there's nothing wrong with being in the closet," Roman jokes, "but yeah, it'll be open to signify that's where I am. If you need to find me, just come in and it should take you right to me. I just mean that I get it, Erudite, I have to get away from it every so often too."
"Is that why you're up here instead of downstairs while they're making cookies?"
"No comment."
"That's a 'yes.'"
Roman lightly kicks his ankle and chuckles. "The answer is yes, you can come in here if you need to. Whenever you need to. I care for the others, really, I do, but I…just because I'm Romance doesn't mean that I'm immune to the aro need to get away from all of it every once in a while."
"I appreciate that, Roman."
"Of course. I—" he lets out a slightly self-deprecating laugh—"believe me, I've learned the importance of giving myself time to like, recover from stuff before I get to the point where I feel like I'm gonna explode about it."
Logan frowns, looking over at him. Roman's still staring up at the ceiling, his expression calm, but there's something slightly frantic about the way he's looking at the edge of the canopy. He shuffles a little closer and waits. Sure enough, after a few moment, Roman sighs.
"I'm sure you remember how difficult it was for us when Thomas was coming to terms with the fact that he wasn't straight."
"Yes."
"It was extra difficult for me because it made sense that Thomas didn't like girls, but when Patton and Janus were asking me why he liked boys, why he couldn't like girls and had to like boys, I…didn't have an answer. Like, I could explain to them the ways in which it made sense in Thomas's brain, not that they would've really understood it, but when it came down to like, me understanding it?" He shakes his head and his hair rustles against the pillows. "It was like someone asking me why the light was pink instead of purple and I didn't get why it was on in the first place, I just knew that it was. That it…had to be."
Logan makes a quiet noise of reassurance. The whale moves its tail over to brush Roman's hands. He huffs a laugh and starts stroking its soft plush back again.
"It was a lot of coming to terms with the fact that I just…didn't have the same lights that everyone else did. Ironically enough, that was actually really helpful in getting everyone to be okay with the fact that Thomas was gay. To me, it wasn't really very different from if he liked girls versus boys. It's what made him happy, and who were we to say he couldn't be happy?"
"And if it was possible to be happy with the lights in one color versus another…"
"Then it was also possible to be happy with no light. Or a different set of lights." Roman cracks a smile. "Besides, it's my head, it's my party, I can have whatever lights I want."
Logan chuckles. "Thank you, Roman, that…that helps."
"That's me, happy to help you out."
"You…you know I'm here for you too, right?"
"Aww, of course I do, Erudite," Roman murmurs, turning on his side properly so he can ruffle Logan's hair, "but this is about you right now."
"Yes, well, reassuring you that you know I'm part of your support network is helping me."
"This sounds suspiciously like your 'it makes me less stressed if I help you do something right' translating into you doing it for them."
"Look, there's a difference between telling you I'm here for you and actually making sure Virgil doesn't use salt instead of sugar, so—"
Roman bursts out laughing. "I forgot about that!"
"I envy you. My tastebuds still haven't forgiven it."
"I grew up with Remus, you remember. I think I got burnt out of reacting to weird-tasting stuff fairly young."
"Ah, yes, how could I forget?"
"Trust me," Roman says, making a face, "I wish he would've just messed up the salt and the sugar."
"I'm torn between wanting to know and desperately wanting to preserve some of my appetite for dinner."
"Take your time to decide, Erudite, we've got all afternoon."
"Thank you, Roman," Logan murmurs as the three of them drift slowly towards a pleasant mid-afternoon nap, "really."
"Of course, Erudite. In your own time, that's how everything's gotta go."
In his own time.