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“So you want me to pretend to be your boyfriend?” Theo closed the book he was reading and left it on the desk to pay attention to Liam.
“Yeah, I guess,” Liam awkwardly said as he looked anywhere else but Theo’s eyes.
“...Why?” Theo blurted out after a few minutes of silence. The simple thought of Liam picking him , when a few months ago they were both threatening to kill one another, seemed unreal.
Theo didn’t have any experience when it comes to dating at all, and yet Liam wanted him to successfully pretend to be his boyfriend in less than two days? Like that was going to turn out alright.
“I panicked, okay! You were the first person that came to my mind when I got asked if I was dating anyone and I didn’t wanna get caught in a lie,” Liam explained, putting his hands on his face to cover his embarrassment.
“Well at least they couldn’t hear your heartbeat, otherwise you’d be busted,” Theo rolled his eyes because he knew Liam was the worst liar he had ever known. “Do you have a plan at least?”
“I just… figured you could just tag along on the trip for the weekend and we could… hold hands?” Liam winced at hearing his plan out loud because it sucked.
“That’s it? You just expect me to drop everything for you to join you on a school trip- a school I’m not even part of anymore, so you can get rid of a girl that is obsessed with you?” Theo deadpanned and Liam simply shrugged.
Theo sighed. Despite his complaining, of course he was going to end up helping Liam one way or another. He would be lying to himself if he said he hadn’t thought of the idea of what would be like to date someone. To date Liam. Of course that would never happen for real, but yet he found himself most times staring down at the beta’s lips when in an argument and he had to catch himself and snap out of it before he did something he regretted later.
Sure, it’s going to be all pretend. But don’t they say that it’s better to take what you can get than nothing at all?
“Let’s say I agree with your plan and go with you, now what?” Theo asked, but Liam just stared at him in confusion. “What’s the story, what’s our cover? I mean, if what you’re saying about how annoying and obsessed with you this girl is turns out to be true, she’s going to be asking a lot of questions.”
“She probably won’t, what we need is to put on a decent act and lie to their faces. Can you do that?” Liam stressed the last sentence enough that it got a smirk out of Theo.
“It’s a good thing then that at least one of us can lie,” Theo turned back to pick up his book and resume reading where he had left off, but he couldn’t quite concentrate because there was a nervous feeling in the pit of his stomach that wouldn’t leave him alone.
---
Weekend came around and he ended up joining Liam in his school trip. Some people did take some friends that weren’t in the school, so Theo didn’t feel that much out of place. Not that he cared, the only thing present in the back of his mind was how Liam was sitting dangerously close next to him on the bus.
“That’s her,” Liam whispered to Theo low enough so only he could hear. He looked at some girls that were sitting two rows in front of them. One of the girls had blonde hair and blue eyes, and kept taking not-so-subtle glances at Liam while he wasn’t looking, or at least Liam pretended not to be looking, to avoid any chances of getting to talk to her.
“I still don’t get why you couldn’t just say that you’re not interested in her instead of making this… plan ,” Theo looked out the window now, not wanting to stare at Liam.
“Because she doesn’t get it!” Liam said through gritted teeth. “Now, when should we start pretending?”
That made Theo look back at him. He stared at him for a few seconds before he found himself staring down at Liam’s lips, again.
“I thought we were already,” Theo replied back, looking away. “Oh, and just a suggestion but you might want to drop the ‘I want to punch you in the face’ look, it gives off the wrong vibe.”
“Fine,” Liam rolled his eyes but tried to relax. For the sake of the lie. “And just so you know I can be dating you and still want to punch you in the face.”
“Whatever you say, boyfriend,” Theo said knowing it’d get a rise out of Liam, and smirked once he heard the deep sigh coming from next of him.
---
“Liam, who’s your friend?” the blonde girl who had a deep crush on Liam, apparently her name was Chloe, caught up to him and Theo once they got off the bus. She was with her two friends, and one of them was eyeing Theo like she liked what she was seeing.
“No Chloe, this is my boyfriend , Theo. I told you about him two days ago,” Liam impatiently said, standing next to Theo. He was standing so stiffly, and he reeked of anxiety. The girls stared at them both like they could see right through the lie.
Theo didn’t even know these people and had no reason to care for this working out, and yet he had to be the one to put the effort in making their lie work. Because Liam wouldn’t do shit apparently. So he put a hand around Liam’s shoulders, pulling him closer to his body in some kind of awkward hug.
Yup, they were excellent at this, sarcasm fully intended.
“Right,” Chloe narrowed her eyes like she didn’t believe them anyway. “So how long have you been together?”
“Uh-” Liam started mumbling but was cut off by Theo, who was faster at replying.
“Four months,” Theo firmly said, still not taking off his arm from Liam’s shoulder.
“How did you two meet?” Chloe asked once again. Liam was mentally scolding himself because Theo had been right, she was asking too many questions. He knew Theo was going to say ‘I told you so’ first chance he gets.
“Well, we met at school…” Liam didn’t bother to elaborate, all three girls were waiting for him to continue his answer.
“We met when he was in his sophomore year, I was in my senior, but we didn’t become friends until recently,” Theo saved their cover yet again. Damn, was he good at lying or what (although not really, because Liam realized he had been saying nothing else but the truth).
“Recently? You said you’d been dating for four months,” Chloe crossed her arms in a challenge.
“Six months ago we became friends, that’s still recent enough,” Theo bit back.
“So how come we haven’t heard anything about this tall and mysterious boyfriend of yours if you’ve been dating for months?” the friend that had been eyeing Theo all this time, Patty was her name, asked.
Theo was seriously tempted to reply with a ‘yeah Liam, why hadn’t you said anything about me?’ just for the sake of annoying him but he held back. He still disliked the three girls, even more with each minute passing.
“Because it hadn’t been brought up, and it’s not like the entire school needs to know who I’m dating and who I’m not,” Liam said, definitely it wasn’t his best answer.
“So why did you bring him here?” Chloe asked.
“So we, ” Liam said, putting a hand around Theo’s back and pulled him closer to his side, maybe with a little more force than intended. “-could enjoy a nice weekend to ourselves.”
Liam’s hand felt like fire burning in his skin, even if his shirt was in between them, and Theo couldn’t decide if it was a good feeling or not. Even if it burned somehow, he didn’t want Liam to let go. Maybe he was just too touch-starved and this is his body’s reaction to it. Thankfully he was still in control of his heartbeat so he could fake like it was nothing.
“Fine then, see you at lunch,” Chloe winked at Liam as she and her two friends walked away to follow the rest of the class. Seconds later, Liam dropped his arm, and Theo followed.
“Unbelievable, did you see how annoying they are? What I have to deal with everyday?” Liam groaned in frustration as he started walking towards where the class was headed, Theo just smirked and followed behind.
---
“Look Liam, we can hold hands all you want, but let’s be real, it’s not going to get you anywhere,” Theo said as they were walking through a certain part of the forest they were brought to. It was daylight and the forest was enormous, nothing like the one in Beacon Hills.
They were trying to find some kind of plant that Liam’s biology teacher had asked them to. She had started to divide them into groups, but Liam had quickly grabbed Theo’s hand and started moving before Chloe could tag along.
“We’re doing fine, we just need her to see us together at all times so she can leave me alone,” Liam said as he kept walking.
“She’s seeing right through this bullshit,” Theo motioned between them, then grabbed Liam’s hand so he would stop looking for the damn plants and listen to him.
“So what do you suggest?” Liam turned around to face Theo. They were both standing too closely to one another, personal space be damned when it comes to these two.
Theo looked up, knowing damn well if he didn’t focus he’d end up looking down at Liam’s lips, and that was too dangerous right now. He shook his head in disagreement because he had nothing to say and kept walking.
---
Sun was starting to set and the teenagers were left to eat and talk among themselves, the teachers had left to fill the gas tank of the bus so they could drive them all back to the cabins where they’d be staying the night.
Liam was sitting with Theo silently munching on a sandwich he had packed for lunch, the chimera doing the same thing. He felt somebody looking right at him and it was none other than Chloe.
“She’s looking,” Liam whispered to Theo while taking another bite of his sandwich.
“What do you want me to do about it? Do you want me to hold your hand some more in hopes she’ll notice our undying love for one another?” Theo mocked him but Liam didn’t say anything.
Liam’s mood had switched. Sure, he was still annoyed at the fact that Chloe wouldn’t take her demon eyes off of him, but he was starting to relax because he had understood what Theo had been saying to him in the woods. He needed to make things more realistic in order for his plan to work.
“What would you do if I kissed you?” Liam just said out of nowhere and Theo choked on his sandwich. It made Liam grin.
“You what now? ” Theo managed to compose himself after Liam’s abrupt question.
“Kissing. You were right, maybe we need to make it a bit more realistic and they would go away,” Liam said, still smiling because he knew his idea could work and afterwards everything could go back to normal.
“You want to kiss me, in front of all your classmates, right now,” Theo was still trying to get it through his head, just to make sure he wasn’t hearing things.
“Why not? For the sake of the lie, right?” Liam shrugged.
Right. Pretend.
There was a moment where they just kept staring at one another, and goddamn his eyes were betraying him because his immediate reaction was to look down at Liam’s lips and-
He didn’t know in what moment but Theo decided to take the initiative and leaned in to kiss Liam. It had happened so fast it didn’t give Liam enough time to react as soon as he should have, but after a few seconds he was returning the kiss.
Okay, so maybe Theo didn’t know how to kiss, sue him, but he was trying his best considering there were about 30 more people probably watching them both, at least three of them guaranteed. But he didn’t know any of them, except for Liam, and in that moment it was all that mattered.
It mattered how Liam had put one of his hands in the back of Theo’s neck to pull him in closer. It mattered how in that moment Theo felt like his entire body was lit on fire, the good kind, the kind he could get used to. It mattered how real it had felt despite the fact that it was all pretend, and how there was some part in his brain that wished he wouldn’t have to let go because it wouldn’t be the same after.
I mean, how do you come back from a kiss? Fake or not, there was just no going back. No way to forget it unless you get amnesia, but that was impossible. It would be constant suffering from now on because Theo might have played with fire and gotten himself burnt, but he was the only one at fault for catching goddamn feelings in the most unfortunate moment. He was going to go to his own personal hell afterwards, but for now, right that moment, he let himself enjoy it. He let himself pretend like it was real.
They broke the kiss after a while, needing to breathe despite their werewolf enhanced abilities. But Theo didn’t quite let go of Liam’s face, and the younger boy didn’t complain or asked.
“We have to sell the act,” Theo whispered, the lie coming out bittersweet because that’s his only excuse right now that would allow him to be this near to Liam, possibly in forever. He had his hand on Liam’s cheek, softly letting his fingers fall from it after a few seconds, Liam nodding to agree to his previous words.
Minutes later after they got back to their food, Liam subtly looked to where Chloe and her group of friends had been, the blonde clearly seemed jealous of witnessing the kiss. So it was working.
Liam then turned to subtly look at Theo, and a soft smile appeared on his lips for no particular reason.
---
“Was it your first time kissing somebody?” Liam curiously asked Theo once they were settling in their room in the cabin.
“Was it that bad?” Theo said trying to not get offended by the comment.
“Not really, but I was just curious,” Liam said.
“If you must know, no, it wasn’t Liam,” was it the first kiss he had actually enjoyed? Yes. But that wasn’t the question.
Both boys were about to get in their own separate beds and sleep when Liam froze in his place.
“Shit,” he muttered and Theo looked at him, worried. “They’re coming.”
“Who’s coming?” Theo asked, confused.
“Chloe and her witch friends, god can’t they leave us alone? It’s the guys’ section of the cabin,” Liam freaked out as he walked over to Theo’s side. “Take off your shirt.”
“What?” Theo snapped.
“Take it off now! I have an idea.”
Reluctantly at first (because Liam wasn’t known for having the best plans all the time) he obeyed and took it off, and watched as Liam did the same.
“What are you doing?” Theo whispered, somewhat a bit alarmed.
“What does it look like?” Liam replied between whispers, hearing how the footsteps sounded closer and closer to the room. He put his hands in Theo’s hair, messing it up, then doing the same to his own.
Just knock on their door, they probably won’t be doing anything, Liam heard as one of Chloe’s annoying friends encouraged the blonde to do it. Anticipating the knock on the door, Liam grabbed Theo by the arms and pushed him against the door, then kissed him, hard .
Was there any need really for Liam to kiss him? Not really, since it wasn’t like the other three human girls could hear they were making out, they didn’t have enhanced hearing. But maybe Liam had freaked out too much in the same moment that it seemed the most logical thing to do.
For a moment, both boys lost themselves in the kiss, Theo trying to keep up with the sudden actions, because yes, he had been used to being pinned against walls, but usually to get punched in the face, not kissed.
Theo put his hands on Liam’s back to keep him close, and Liam had both hands in the back of Theo’s neck, trying to push him down to his height. Goddamn height difference.
This kiss had seemed more heated and somewhat intimate, because they weren’t really putting on a show for anybody, it was just the two of them, letting themselves get consumed in the messy, rough, hungry kiss. Liam bit Theo’s lip on accident and the older boy groaned. They were taken back to the cold reality of their situation when three loud knocks on the door were heard.
Theo, still pinned to the door, found the doorknob with his right hand and turned it until the door was open.
“What?” Theo said dryly, looking like he wanted to murder the girls right there and then for interrupting.
The three girls were stunned, too shocked to even talk, they only managed to look back and forth between them. Liam used that opportunity to smirk as he put an arm around Theo’s waist, who still had a firm grasp on the doorknob as if that was the only thing keeping him from kicking the girls out of the cabin.
“Woah, um,” one of them, the sort of reasonable one, looked away and was trying to pull her other two friends away from the door.
“We just wanted to know if you wanted to hang out downstairs, but I see you guys are busy,” Chloe said bitterly, still shocked. “We’ll leave you guys to it.”
Liam barely managed to mockingly say goodnight to the group of girls when Theo slammed it closed, resting his back against the door and closing his eyes for a moment before he had to look at Liam again.
“Okay, I get what you were trying to do,” Theo started, putting a hand to his once bloody lip to see if it was still bleeding. It wasn’t. “-but did you really had to kiss me?”
Liam just shrugged and looked like he was hesitating between punching or kissing him again, Theo couldn’t tell.
He swore Liam would be the death of him one day. He might’ve been the one who brought him back from hell, but he was going to be the one to put him back in the ground sooner or later if he kept this up.
That night Theo didn’t sleep well at all, being too overly aware of the boy who was sleeping in the bed next to his, who had just kissed him in that way. It was hard to sleep when the same moment kept replaying over and over in his head. Yup, he was truly in a new brand type of hell.
---
To top it all off they still had one more day to go. One more day to keep pretending to be in this relationship that had started as a mess and escalated to a bittersweet mess.
The girls seemed to not be paying that much attention to Liam now, except for the occasional glances, but they didn’t seem as interested as they had been yesterday.
On the bus ride from the cabins to yet another forest, Liam had decided for whatever reason that it was a good idea to let his head rest on Theo’s shoulder. The chimera tensed for a bit, before he relaxed into it, looking at Liam and wow, he looked so peaceful when he was sleeping.
He couldn’t help but hate himself because something inside of him warmed up at the sight, and he needed to stop before he would create irreversible damage to their friendship. But for the time being, he allowed himself to relax into the touch, resting his own head against the bus window, trying to get some of the sleep that had been long forgotten last night.
---
Theo had been staying behind the group, mostly tired from the lack of sleep, but also he couldn’t bring himself to care much about what the teacher was telling her class. He was invited to the trip, not taking the actual class. However, even then Liam had stayed behind with him at all times.
At one point Theo had almost fallen asleep while standing because they had stopped while the teacher explained something to the class. He was brought back to reality by the warm feeling of a hand wrapping around his own, looking next to the person responsible for it. Liam was looking back with a small smile, then cocking his head to the side to let Theo know of the presence of the other three girls. Right.
They returned to the cabins earlier than yesterday, the teachers giving them the rest of the day to enjoy before they had to head back tomorrow. There was a campfire and some of the teenagers were gathered around it. Others had decided to go rest inside the cabins, and Liam and Theo were by themselves outside, Liam stubbornly wanting to light up his own small campfire.
At first it was entertaining watching Liam try and rub two sticks together to create fire but failing at it. Then after a while Theo grabbed a stick and went to light it up in the nearby campfire, bringing it back and dropping it with the other sticks so it would make the fire.
“I was almost there,” Liam muttered as he dropped the two sticks into the fire.
“Sure you were,” Theo replied, grabbing his hands and putting them nearby the fire to get warmer. Theo wasn’t scared of fire, the warm feeling of the heat felt rather nice, especially in a cold night. What he was scared of though was the equal feeling he felt whenever Liam did something in the name of “pretending.”
It was uncertain what else he’ll do to keep up this fake relationship. If Theo was being honest, they had already succeeded in keeping Chloe and her friends away. There was no need for them to keep going.
And yet, here Liam was, resting his head against Theo’s shoulder once again, looking at the fire in front of him. He checked the perimeter to see where the three girls were located, but didn’t see them anywhere at all.
“They’re not here you know, you can drop the act,” Theo said.
“I know,” Liam replied softly but sure of what he was doing, which left Theo even more confused.
“Then what are you doing?” it was a genuine question, no snark, no fight behind it. Just pure curiosity.
“It felt right, you know,” Liam shrugged, lifting his head up. “Do you want me to stop?”
No, Theo thought. He didn’t mind actually, but it just wasn’t something that they would willingly do. He remained silent for a while trying to think of a more appropriate reply. “It’s whatever. Although next time if you want to use me as your personal pillow, at least warn me before I agree to come to future trips with you.”
“Shut up,” Liam let out a laugh, shaking his head as he grabbed a stick to poke at the fire. It was silent afterwards, but it wasn’t awkward. No, it was the most friendly they have been with one another all these past months they’ve been living together.
For Liam, it felt weird but in a good way. They were always at each other’s throats that now when they were trying to be, well, like this , it felt like something was different. Liam had began to see Theo differently now, but he couldn’t quite put a name on what he was feeling. He was still a pain in the ass, no denying, but there was something else to it that had changed that weekend.
“Blue,” Liam said without any explanation whatsoever. Theo turned to look at Liam with his eyebrows raised in confusion.
“Your favorite color is blue, just like your truck,” Liam finished after a while. “And your favorite pastime is reading apparently, judging by the amount of books you make me check out of the library.”
Theo just stared at Liam wondering what was he getting at with all this.
“I should’ve listened to you earlier on, when you said we should plan this out. We didn’t think it through- I didn’t think it through, but we got through it. And we can go back to normal tomorrow,” Liam said, and there it was, the reminder once again that brought them back to sobering reality.
Theo nodded and after a yawn he excused himself to their room, not really saying anything else. He was tired and not in the mood to deal with his unrequited feelings that had escalated big time during this weekend. He guessed he’d sleep it off and deal with them another day.
Liam was left there on his own and he wondered if he had said something wrong to break the calm that they had going on. If he had said anything wrong that would had made Theo leave. He wondered when he had started caring so much about all this.
And maybe Liam had impulsively kissed Theo back then in their room because it had felt right. Maybe he had leaned in to rest his head against the taller boy’s shoulder because it had felt right. But if he said that a part of him was tempted to go back to their room and kiss him again because it felt right in some part inside of his brain, where would that leave them?
Liam put out the fire as quick as he could and made his way clumsily to the inside of the cabin, running upstairs to get to their room. He knocked on the door and prayed Theo wouldn’t really be asleep because he didn’t want to wake him up, and also because he didn’t want to sleep anywhere else.
When Theo opened the door, Liam’s impulsiveness was still in the back of his mind. He stood still outside the room and Theo stared at him, waiting for Liam to walk into the room.
“Are you coming in or what?” Theo said.
Once again Theo didn’t have any warning or time to respond but he was being pushed forward into the room, Liam’s lips smashing against his. Liam was kissing him desperately, similarly to yesterday night, but different. This time it felt like he was in a hurry, like if he didn’t get to kiss him soon he might lose him.
Theo pushed Liam backwards softly, giving time to compose himself.
“Are they coming back?” Theo asked in a hurry, preparing to tell the girls to piss off once and for all.
“No one’s coming this time,” Liam said in a hurry and tried to get back at kissing Theo but the chimera stopped him again.
Believe him, no one wanted this more than Theo himself. But he also wasn’t stupid enough to risk his sometimes-stable friendship with Liam. He lived at his house for crying out loud, and Theo didn’t want to be homeless again. Or lose his only friend for that matter.
“Liam, you do understand that once we cross that line, there’s no going back, right? We can’t take it back, we can’t blame it on a pretend relationship,” Theo didn’t know if he was trying to reassure Liam or himself.
“Look, I don’t know what changed, I couldn’t even begin to explain it myself, but-” Liam bit his lower lip trying to find the words to express what he felt right in that moment. Instead, he got distracted by seeing how Theo’s eyes stared directly into his lips.
“Are you- did you just stare at my lips?” he changed the topic of the conversation and Theo looked like he had been caught in the act.
Have been for the past few months, but thanks for noticing, he bitterly thought but didn’t say it out loud. Both their heartbeats were agitated, and they hadn’t calmed down since the kiss. They kept staring at each other, hoping one of them would make a move or do something.
It was Liam who said fuck it in the end and decided to kiss Theo once again. After all he was always the most impatient between the both of them. This time though, Theo let him, he didn’t push him away. They would surely deal with the consequences later, hopefully it’ll all work out - this , whatever it is between them.
But for now he let himself enjoy the kisses, and the way Liam’s lips were making his way along his jaw down to his neck, leaving kisses behind. He loved the feeling of how the younger boy managed to set him on fire, how he made him feel alive.
It started out as a pretend relationship, but by the end of the weekend it felt like the only thing they had been pretending was that none of this affected them both, affected their feelings. Because it very damn well did, but Theo was thankful that one of Liam’s stupid plans had worked out better than expected for once.