This Is Not About Love
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Summary
Human AU. In which Marshall Lee meets a prissy, stuck-up boy at a support group, and the prissy, stuck-up boy won't leave him alone.
"So do they go together, or can it be one or the other?"
"It's one word on my birth certificate," Marshall Lee replies.
"Then I won't call you Marshall, and you won't call me candy names. It's G.B."
Series
- Part 1 of This Is Not About Love
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Pepper says she's excited when G.B. texts her to say he's got a guest for dinner, and maybe she is.
Or she will be, until she sees Marshall Lee: the ripped jeans, the hair, the eyes that only seem to be sullen or sexual.
What are you doing? she will ask G.B.
It's been a long time since G.B. couldn't answer that question.
Series
- Part 2 of This Is Not About Love
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It is not like they were on a schedule or anything. Marshall Lee calls when he feels like calling. On average, it comes once a week—but on average belies two-week stretches of nothing and weeks where Marshall Lee drags him out of bed every night.
But two weeks become three, and three weeks become four, and G.B. finds himself checking his call history more and more, looking at the anonymous number and the time and date stamp beside it.
He starts watching the local news again; he isn’t sure why. But there certainly is a lot of violence in the city. He’s never thought about it before. And he starts reading the paper, going through the police reports with a thoroughness he reserves for reading recipes.
At night, he goes up to the roof and stares at the stars, but it isn’t the same.
Series
- Part 3 of This Is Not About Love
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His eyes narrow again, and he adjusts his glasses, and he walks over to the window, every movement stiff as an ill-oiled toy robot. “What are you doing here?” His voice is calm, natural, but he knows his expression is not, since Marshall Lee draws back.
Again, that cognizance flashes across Marshall Lee’s face—he knows exactly what’s going on, but he wants to ignore it. G.B.’s hands tighten at his side. Marshall Lee puts his hand on the window and leans inside. “Well, there’s this great Ramones-slash-Black-Flag cover band playing in the park tonight. I know that sounds like kind of a weird combination, but—”
“What are you doing here.” The words drop from his lips like stones.
Series
- Part 4 of This Is Not About Love
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Marshall Lee swallows. “Listen, just—”
“Why?” The word comes out all broken and twisted-up, like something you’d find lying on the side of the road. G.B. clears his throat. It doesn’t help. “Why should I listen, Marshall Lee? I keep… reaching. I keep trying. And I have no idea what the hell I’m getting back.”
Marshall Lee lets his head fall back. His hair is shaggy, nearly shoulder-length, but he has shaved a section on one side of his head. It makes him look like he walked out of a concentration camp. “I know. I know. It’s just…” He swallows. “I don’t have anything to give you. I don’t know why you keep looking at me like I’m—worth something. And I—” He moves, almost like a convulsion, and covers his head with his arms.
G.B. looks out to the far wall so he won’t watch the storms of feeling moving over Marshall Lee’s face.
Series
- Part 5 of This Is Not About Love
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Marshall Lee had been gone for nearly a month—no word, no warning, not even a goodbye. Just like always. G.B. had a thousand things he wanted to say on the subject, and none of them were nice. Most would get him labeled a nag, but G.B. reveled in the idea because Marshall Lee would squirm and fidget and try to worm his way out of responsibility, and G.B. would finally have some way to use the restless energy that always filled him whenever Marshall Lee disappeared.
But… he’d never heard Marshall Lee this way. Before this moment, he’d have bet every penny of his inheritance that Marshall Lee would never let himself sound so… vulnerable. Not in front of another person, anyway.
Marshall Lee cleared his throat. “Yeah, I… I don’t really want to be alone.”
G.B. bit the inside of his cheek. A litany of refusals scrolled behind his eyes, each more sensible than the last. And yet—that voice—
It wasn’t rational, but, then, their relationship never had been.
“Yeah, you can come over.”
Marshall Lee hung up. He never said goodbye.
Series
- Part 6 of This Is Not About Love
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The phone call woke G.B. from sleep.
“Are you awake?”
G.B. frowned at the phone. He wanted to be angry and found he could not be, but at least he could sound peevish. It was petty, wanting Marshall Lee to think G.B. didn’t care, but G.B. would be the first to admit he was petty. At least where Marshall Lee was involved. “I am now.”
Series
- Part 7 of This Is Not About Love
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Marshall Lee sighed. “Well, I guess I should let you go to sleep. Since you actually sleep and stuff.”
“I appreciate that, too,” said G.B.
Marshall Lee slid backwards but paused in the doorway. “Open or closed?”
“Closed, please.”
The last thing G.B. saw before getting into bed was Marshall Lee glancing at him before shutting the door. The dirty smirk had faded; in its place was a rarely glimpsed softness. G.B. always had a hard time falling asleep in strange beds, but for once the noise of the house wasn’t the cause.
Series
- Part 8 of This Is Not About Love
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“I keep telling myself it’ll be just like losing my real mom.” Marshall Lee’s voice was flat. “I mean, it can’t be any worse than that.”
G.B. wanted to say something to stop Marshall Lee, but the conversation was horrifying, and he found he couldn’t speak against the lump in his throat.
“Simone tells me she loves me every day. Sometimes more than once. It’s nice.” His voice was emotionless. “And my real mom told me I never should have been born, that she didn’t want anything to do with me, that she had never loved me. That nobody would ever love me.”
“You can’t believe that,” G.B. managed, his voice hoarse.
“My mom told me that,” said Marshall Lee, with a touch of irritation. “Your mom is like the only person who’s required to love you. If she doesn’t love you, then who will?”
G.B. couldn’t get the words out, and Marshall Lee hung up.
Series
- Part 9 of This Is Not About Love
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The man kept his head down as he unbuttoned the cape and let it drop. Then he lifted his head, and G.B. felt like he’d been gutted from top to tail.
Marshall Lee hadn’t changed all that much. He’d lost weight, and it showed in his face—painted with garish makeup that highlighted his stark cheekbones, the hollows beneath his eyes. He was looking the other way, but a smirk spread across his face as he looked over the crowd. He’d grown back his dreads, at least; he’d never looked right without them.
G.B. dropped his head and turned his face away, covering it from Marshall Lee’s view with his hand. His heart was pounding; he felt it in his temples and wrists more than his chest because he was pressing them to each other, trying to erase the image in his head.
No, no. Not after so long. Not like this.
Series
- Part 10 of This Is Not About Love
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Cake leaned on the steering wheel and let out a slow breath, meeting Fionna’s eyes. “Baby, I know what you’re thinking. You wanna save them, just like you wanna save the whole damn world. But some things are better left broken.
Fionna wrinkled her nose, but she didn’t bother trying to deny it. Cake knew her too well. “What’re you telling me that for? What do you know about it?”
Cake bit her lip. “When I told MoChro where we were going, he—told me some things. Don’t go thinking all this could be fixed just by you making ‘em sit down and talk to each other. They never got along. It’s good that you’re friends with ‘em. God knows I wish they were girls, but even that ingrate respects you. They treat you all right. But they don’t need to be friends with each other to be friends with you. Just… let it alone, okay?”
Series
- Part 11 of This Is Not About Love
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To Fionna’s disappointment, Marshall Lee played quiet songs. “I wanted to mossssh,” she said, shoving her hands in her pockets.
“Didn’t Abraham Lincoln prove you’ve had enough of that?” said G.B. Fionna stuck out her tongue at him.
But she was mostly silent. Even G.B. could admit it was hard to think of anything else when Marshall Lee was singing.
Though G.B. wasn’t all that interested, he kept looking at Marshall Lee’s face and frowning. Pale. Paler. Palest. His voice was quieter, too. G.B. suspected he wasn’t playing any loud songs because he couldn’t scream like usual.
G.B. did not care, any more than he cared that most of the songs sounded like they were about Marshall Lee’s mother. Marshall Lee’s problems were his own stupid problems. It wasn’t like he would ever ask for help in the first place.
Series
- Part 12 of This Is Not About Love
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"Listen, all right," Marshall Lee said, pushing off G.B.'s desk. "It's about my mom."
"How many times have I told you to use antecedents to your pronouns," said G.B., but boredly. He was drained at the idea of going through all this again. And yet he'd still opened his window. God. How stupid was he?
"I still don't know what that means." Marshall Lee gestured as though to brush the words away. "It doesn't matter. My mom has some of my stuff, and I need it back."
G.B. almost said, "So go talk to your mother," but even now, he couldn't make himself be that cruel. Marshall Lee had never told him the whole story—Marshall Lee never told anyone the whole story—but even so.
Instead, G.B. shrugged. "What has that got to do with me?"
Marshall Lee bit his lip, hard, then pushed his hands up into his hair, tugging at his thick dreads. "I need that stuff back," he repeated. "And I can't... I need help. I can't face her alone."
Series
- Part 13 of This Is Not About Love
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"She told me I have to tell Fionna it's not happening," he said at last and let out a long breath.
Marshall Lee laughed softly, and G.B. pulled away, frowning. Marshall Lee just shrugged, pushing his way further onto the desk and shoving away G.B.'s textbooks in the process. G.B. rolled his eyes, but it was perfunctory.
"Nah, it's just funny. I felt bad for her the second minute I saw her with you."
"I don't treat her that badly, do I?" G.B. was aiming for angry, but it came out nervous. He worried about Fionna. Sometimes he wondered if he should have walked away the minute he got out of the hospital, instead of being friends with her even though he knew she wanted more.
Marshall Lee shook his head. He dropped his eyes, then lifted them back to G.B.'s face with a hint of defiance. "Nah. I just know how much it sucks to be in love with you."
G.B. took in a breath, then shook his head. "No," he said, closing his eyes. "If you want to talk like that, you can leave."
Series
- Part 14 of This Is Not About Love
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G.B. isn't used to caring about sex. But now that he finally has Marshall Lee back, it's all he can think about.
Series
- Part 15 of This Is Not About Love
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Marshall Lee groaned and pushed himself up on his elbows. "Look, everything's, like, where it should be right now, yeah? Finally. You've got your bakery and I've got a contract that doesn't murder me."
G.B. frowned. "Are you just trying to confuse me now?"
But Marshall Lee shook his head, and G.B. could tell by the frustration in his eyes that he wasn't just trying to keep G.B. from getting a good night's sleep. "I'm right, right?"
"I suppose...?" G.B. spread his hands. "Since when have you ever cared about checking off milestones?"
Series
- Part 16 of This Is Not About Love