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He was a king. Went from nothing to everything. Even though this wasn’t how he’d envisioned ‘everything’. In his dreams it had been like this: perfect grades, perfect smile, perfect suit, proud parents, perfect girlfriend, more money than he could ever spend. What he had was this: a day with Ronan at the Barns. Sleepless nights were like shadows on his face. His smile had an edge to it, and he sure wasn’t wearing a suit. He was wearing a T-Shirt, and it was muddy from spending all day in the garden playing with a girl with hooves for feet and planting that weird tree a rich boy who hated school and had zero respect for pretty much anyone had dreamed up. There didn’t seem to be anything special about that tree, in fact, it looked quite normal, but when Adam had asked Ronan about it, he had smiled and told Adam to wait and see.
This was so much better than his dreams.
Ronan had to stop Opal from trying to eat a butterfly. His tone of voice said disgusting, but his care smile said amused. His smile. It only looked like that when the others weren’t there. And with the other he didn’t mean everyone - just those people out there that weren’t in the exclusive club of people Ronan trusted. So, still most people. Adam wondered how he came to be one of those people. He remembered how different it was in the beginning. He had since found out that Ronan had acted that way because he had been jealous. It still seemed slightly impossible to Adam that someone like Ronan could be jealous of someone like him. Not to long ago he would have hated feeling like this. It didn’t matter now, though.
He was still at the Aglionby. It was a miracle that his grades only slipped as much as they did. He wasn’t a perfect A-Grade student anymore. It would change again, though. He’d make sure of it. He was Adam Parrish, goddamnit.
He was a magician. It seemed weird that he had ever not been like this. He was fulfilling his destiny now. This was who he was meant to be. He was weird and everybody knew it. All the weirdness didn’t matter though, because he could still be known, despite the weirdness and everything he had been though. In fact, especially because of that.
He had been so sceptical of all that magical shit that Gansey kept going on about. Because it was Gansey, he put up with it. But actually believe in magic? He respectfully declined having an opinion on wether magic was rea. Now he was a magician, and his opinion had barely changed. Magic was mystical, sure. But that was because nobody understood it. Magic followed rules, just like everything else. And he intended to find out exactly how it worked. Because he was Adam fucking Parrish and that’s what he did.
*
The shadows grew longer and the air became colder. They went inside. Opal had to go to sleep (Ronan had to convince her to sleep in the bed and not on the floor, and no, just taking a pillow from the bed didn’t count).
Ronan and Adam though went to the kitchen. The warm yellow light lit the room up in a way that made him think of long past summer evenings in the trailer. But it was a passing thought. One second it was there and the next it was gone and replaced.
“What are you thinking about?” Ronan asked, taking him out of his thoughts.
“The latin exam next week. I should have started studying earlier.”
“All day? Because you’ve been absent minded all day.”
“I’m just generally thinking much.”
“Not about your father though, right?”
Adam studied Ronan. His eyebrows were drawn together, his expression hard.
“No. Why do you think that’s what I’ve been thinking about?”
Ronan shrugged like it didn’t matter. Adam knew better than to fall for it.
“Were you thinking about him? Or where you thinking about your father?” he guessed. By the way Ronan looked away for a second before catching himself he seemed to have been right. Adam was getting good at this. Ronan didn’t follow up though, so Adam took it on himself.
“Something you want to say?”
“No,” Ronan snapped, suddently defensive, “why do you always have to interpret so much into everything?”
“You’re a bad liar.”
“Yeah, sure.”
Adam sighed and stood up to get his notes he took in his latin class. Maybe he could look over some them before going to bed. He was nearly out of the room when Ronan spoke.
“Do you think we are doomed to end up like them? We have their DNA, after all.”
“Why are you asking me that?”
“You know I didn’t mean it like that.” Ronan back tracked. Adam thought for a while before finally answering.
“I don’t think that we’re doomed to repeat their mistakes. Tempted, maybe. But we’re not them. You’re not your father, Ronan.”
“I know. I just don’t want to …”
He didn’t finish the sentence immediatly. Adam let him take his time.
“I just want thing to get better. I don’t want something to happen again.”
Not that he had started, it seemed that he couldn’t stop talking. This clearly had been weighting on his mind.
“I keep thinking about it. In the beginning it was the worst. I always thought about the things that could happen. Especially if I fell sleep. Like … I’d wake up and Gansey was dead. I dreamed about it all the damn time. And I dreamed that someone killed Matthew. I dreamed that Declan disappeared. I dreamed of that day Dad died, only it was Mom lying there dead. And it … I … she’s dead. She’s dead, and it’s because of me. It’s my fault.”
Adam went over to Ronan. Near enough that he knew he wasn’t alone. But he didn’t touch him. When Ronan got like this, it was best to keep a little distance. Adam knew this from experience.
“It had nothing to do with you.”
“I know. That’s the worst part of it. But I also can’t help but think about to all the things I could have done. Should have done. I’m a horrible son. Was, actually.”
Ronan laughed without humor like he was about to cry, or throw something, or maybe both.
*
Later Adam held Ronans hand while they fell asleep. A sense of peace washed over him like a wave and he knew that things would be okay. Because they had this. Even if the past couldn’t be changed and would stay with them. Even if things still sucked right now. It didn’t matter that there were still so many bad things in the world. Their lives would never be perfect. But it didn’t matter. Not right now, when they were falling asleep next to each other. Not here, in the barns, where the possibilities for the future seemed a little less dark and a lot more magical than they did everywhere else.