Chapter Text
Ultimately, the most romantic thing is the heart, and every sensitive person carries in himself old cities enclosed by ancient walls.
— Robert Walser, The Walk and Other Stories
“I want you to top me,” James whispers into Jason’s ear on a Friday, in the cafeteria, after two hours of writing a supposed short story.
Jason chokes on his coke, sending James into an amused panic named “My boyfriend looks so funny, but wait, he’s dying!”
Today is Jason’s birthday, and though James has other gifts for him, he has to do something about that. They had a conversation about it last week, and Jason suggested it, and James’ interest was casually piqued. That was then. Now, he’s almost shaking with excitement.
“What did you say to him?” Cliff asks across the table, eyeing them with a questioning frown.
Jason coughs, shaking his head. “I’m—I’m fine, jeez.”
The plan is simple: a nice meal with Cliff, Dave, Kirk and Lars in a nearby Italian restaurant, and then Lars will first drive Dave to his dorm, then to his flat with Kirk and Cliff; and Jason is going to have his last gift from James.
But before that, James bought him two things: KISS’ Creatures of the Night vinyl—another collector’s item, but James is not going to tell Jason that and listen to a lecture—and a copy of Carson McCullers’ The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter. Cliff got him a new pair of jeans—he lost a pair in the laundromat—Lars and Kirk got him a Walkman, and Dave made him a map of their dorm so Jason can sneak in.
The dinner goes uneventfully, laughter heightened by beer and pizza. Jason seems pretty happy, surrounded by his—well, technically now James and his—friends. He doesn’t look nervous.
James would be a liar to say he isn’t nervous, but this one isn’t the bad type but is that waiting for the fireworks to deafen you but feast your eyes and feel their flame burn into your skin. Is Jason nervous too?
Is it weird to be nervous?
Jason went to his class after lunch, and James joined Dave in the shop after reading a book called Hear the Wind Sing by Haruki Murakami and got something close to a thousand words into his story.
Now, he sits next to Jason, thighs pressed together and knees knocking against each other every time one of them moves a muscle.
Jason reaches for James’ beer and takes a sip, then grimaces. “What’s wrong with this?”
“Nothing. You just have bad taste in beer.”
“Fuck you.”
A smirk creeps into James’ lips. “Well.” He snatches the can from Jason. “You will.”
James almost screams in delight when Cliff suggests they go.
The car ride is silent.
James feels his heart beat behind his teeth and watches Jason fiddling with the cassette player. Zeppelin is playing. It’s the new mixtape Jason made, probably, because a few days ago, he asked for Dave’s Led Zeppelin II and Houses of the Holy tapes.
Little drops of rain, whisper of the pain
Tears of loves lost in the days gone by
My love is strong, with you there is no wrong
Can his heart burst through his ribcage, tearing his skin and lungs apart, and lie on the dashboard, aflutter with a vehement ardour?
James kisses Jason after he kicks his shoes off and yelps when Jason pulls him by his belt.
“I didn’t think you’d be into this,” Jason murmurs, teething James’ lower lip.
“Oh, I’m so into this, ‘cause I’m into you.”
Jason grins against his lips, and, God, he is so—James doesn’t have a word for this, but he doesn’t need one, because he’s busy trying to get his hands beneath Jason’s shirt.
“Says the guy who gave me his favourite book after a five-minute interaction and called me Pink Floyd guy for weeks.”
James laughs, tugging at Jason’s collar, and moans quietly when Jason pulls his hair a bit.
“Who knew you were this smooth?”
Oh, well, James thinks, hours later, as he lies half-conscious on Jason’s bed, you did bring out the man in me.
In the afternoon, he walks into the class and sees Dave next to the window, in their usual place.
“I’m surprised you can walk,” he whispers after James settles to the desk next to him, a smirk in his voice. “Does it hurt?”
James pushes his shoulder away. “Fuck off, man.”
And yes, his ass and legs hurt so much. Thank you for asking.
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“So I’m getting the crisps and the cookie dough.”
“And I’m getting the ice cream and the drinks.”
“Not cookies and cream, please.”
James laughs in response, turning on his heels and hurrying down the cooler aisle.
“James!”
“I’ll get mint chocolate too!”
It may not be the wisest choice to eat all those at 2 a.m., but one does not simply have relations with wisdom when one is in love.
“I told you to not get that,” Jason whispers as the cashier scans the items. They’re standing close, too close, and James wants to get his hands under—isn’t that James’ leather jacket? “We already have cookie dough itself—”
James pecks Jason’s lips, chuckling at Jason’s reddening cheeks as he pulls away. “I know, but—”
A loud, hostile cough echoes in the store, and the grin adorning Jason’s face dulls into a tight-lipped smile. James never liked the insipid gaze in his eyes, which are now flitting away to look at—
The cashier.
It’s a young woman, wearing an ugly scowl and a repulsive t-shirt to match it. She glares at James as if he’s a spider she found in a shoddy loo and trapped in a glass.
A cool thumb caresses the back of his hand, but even that doesn’t fill the hollowness in his gut.
A silence follows the beep of each scanned item. James twists his wrist to bring his and Jason’s palms together. A shiver runs down his spine, like electricity; he feels his muscles and brain grow paralysed with Jason’s each breath near his neck.
The feeling leaves as slowly as it comes. He doesn’t realise Jason paying, but when his hand slips away from James’ hold, that snaps him back. The rustle of a plastic bag, and then James takes it from Jason.
They walk to Jason’s flat in a scaffold-like silence. James clings to Jason’s fingers and cherishes the burn in the back of his throat.
That’s the thing, isn’t it? Heaven doesn’t exist, and they have to leave the greenwood at times and come back running to the trees once their eyes bleed to black.
He doesn’t know who moves first, but the first thing they do after Jason closes the front door is to wrap their arms around each other.
The bag’s contents might be digging into Jason’s back, but he doesn’t complain, so James tightens his grip around his shoulders and buries his face deeper in Jason’s hair.
The most fatal thing a man can do is try to stand alone.
They don’t talk much that night.
They have three bottles of Carlsberg, but Jason doesn’t touch his; instead smokes. Jason is curled up on his side, and his breath hitches every now and then. Some soap opera’s faded colours burn in James’ eyelids. The smoke made him contact high when he was halfway through the second bottle.
Cliff comes back smelling of that stupid weed Dave likes and raises his brows at them. Jason flips him off, so he shrugs and staggers into his room.
“You know,” Jason begins when the hour clock is nearing four a.m. They haven’t moved, and it’s warm, with Jason’s weight on his side. His eyes are glued to the black-haired girl now lying on her bed and giggling about the gift her boyfriend gave. “I kind of knew this was going to happen. At some point, at least.”
Does Wilde have something to say? James can’t recall.
“Maybe—”
“Don’t say stupid shit.” James says, frowning. No, he doesn’t want to hear, no, think of what Jason might be suggesting. Jason cranes his neck to look at him, eyes red and questioning. “I won’t—you don’t—fuck, no. It’s not your fault, not mine—”
“James, oh my God. I was gonna say maybe we should go to bed.”
Oh. James feels his face burn under Jason’s amused gaze. “Shit. Sorry.”
“Nope, it’s cool. Plus, it’s nice to hear that.”
So it’s not a happier year.
James rests his head on Jason’s chest. His heartbeat is calm, loud, and steady. He probably is asleep, because his breaths are even now and silent. It’s better this way, that James doesn’t keep him awake because his brain can’t fucking stop replaying that—that witch’s glares and the way Jason wilted, like a delicate daisy beneath the scorching glares of the August sun.
The heart is a lonely hunter with only one desire! To find some lasting comfort in the arms of another’s fire.
How can he be sure if the arms around shoulders will stay where they are next month? Next week? Tomorrow? Is there any guarantee that the lips he has grown used to will keep telling him “I love you” and won’t be a stranger’s an hour later?
“Hey.”
“Why aren’t you asleep?”
Jason chuckles into his hair. James feels them rumble through the chest beneath his ear. “I can ask you the same thing.”
“It’s just,” James begins, tightening his arms around Jason’s body, “I don’t know. I—”
His throat lets him down, but no, he’s not going to cry. He, for once in his life, has to speak.
“Take your time,” Jason mutters, his fingers slow and light in his locks.
“I love you,” James whispers. He can feel words flood each curve and nerve of his brain, and the dam behind his throat cracks. “And I’m so grateful that I get to—to have you hold me like this. It’s—you’re, just, so lovely, Jase. And I want to make you laugh and have you—in any way, really. I just think that, well, I—I have no regrets loving you.”
James hears Jason sigh, then he’s silent for a while. His heart beats faster, but his nails scrape James’ scalp just the same. Until he hears a sob, or rather, feels it.
James snaps his neck up to look at him, at his boyfriend, at his dear and beautiful and careworn Jason, and sees his red eyes and ruddy nose and that single tear running down his flushed cheeks and thinks, “I need to bury that bitch six feet underground.”
Without a word, James moves up on the couch and pulls Jason into an odd-positioned hug. Jason buries his face into James’ neck and fists the front of his t-shirt, shoulders shaking feebly and quietly—so quiet that James hears his own heart crack open and let the tears seep into each crack.
James doesn’t know how long they stay like this, Jason’s breath on James’ nape and their legs tangled, James holding him close, but Jason stops trembling in his arms and lets out a long exhale some time later.
“James?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
The hands on his chest snake around his waist. “I also don’t regret anything. And—”
“Don’t say it—”
“—I love you.”
James swallows the lump in his throat. “I love you too.”
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Love is a dolorous little thing one can’t help but yearn for.
Or maybe James is a bit too spellbound by the gentle palm on the small of his back when they are in the queue in the cafeteria, or the soft gasp leaving Jason’s mouth when James presses his lips to his neck, or the grin they share when they pull at their clothes to hide all the red and purple marks on their skin.
He feels the sadness creep under the covers, sees it wave at him in the mirror and hears it in the silence when they kiss or hold hands in public.
It’s normal, he guesses, because Jason loses his grin when James goes quiet, but James doesn’t drop his hand.
And the years passed, like scenes of a show
The Professor said to write what you know
[…]
And the slow dance was alight with the sparks
And the tears fell in synchronicity with the score
And at last, they knew what the agony had been for
— Taylor Swift, The Manuscript