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To anyone watching their relationship from the sidelines, it would look like Baz wasn’t affectionate or particularly loving. To Simon, Baz was the sappiest git he’d ever met.
It’s not like Baz went around declaring his love for Simon at all times of the day, but he did certain things that left Simon feeling warm and buzzed. It was the little things that caused him to fall deeper in love with Baz. He didn’t think that was even possible. Until Baz, Simon didn’t even know what love felt like.
When Simon was with Agatha, he thought he knew what love was. They had said they loved each other only six days into their relationship (when Penny found out, she had thrown a book at the two of them). Hearing Agatha say she loved Simon gave him a sense of belonging that he had never felt before. He felt like he was finally apart of something that he actually wanted. It was nice. Really nice.
Penny always said that they weren’t really in love. That they were just together because it was expected and cliché and “honestly quite sexist in my opinion”, but Simon chose to ignore her. Deep down he knew she was right, but Simon couldn’t bear to let go of how grounded he felt whenever he reminded himself that the prettiest and most sought after girl was in love with him; an orphan thrown from foster home to foster home.
So Simon let Agatha’s soft I love you’s soothe him after a rough day of classes and he would bask in her gentle touches. He would ignore an ache he felt somewhere in his chest that longed for something, although Simon could never figure out what exactly he wanted (he didn’t dare tell Penny about it or ask her what it could mean).
When their relationship started to dwindle and Simon could feel Agatha pulling away, he was surprised to realize that he didn’t particularly mind. He missed Agatha’s hair hitting his face whenever they ate outside, he missed Agatha’s soft fingers grazing his arms, he missed Agatha’s lips on his and her cherry flavored lip balm that she always insisted on wearing. But he didn’t miss Agatha.
“I told you.” Penny said when Simon brought it up a few days after he came to realization. That was all he got out of her before she asked if he had started his Greek assignment.
It took Simon some time to come to terms with the fact that he wasn’t in love with Agatha, he was in love with the way she made him feel. He figured it made sense. After all, he was an orphan who grew up in different foster homes run by unloving people. Of course Simon would jump the first person who gave him attention. It’s how he made Penny his best friend and Baz his enemy.
When Simon found Agatha with Baz in the woods, it felt like someone had kicked him in the stomach. It felt like all the air had been knocked out of him after a bad fall. It hurt to see Baz in Simon’s place, standing in front of Agatha the way Simon did and holding her hands the way he used to do. It was unbearable to see his mortal enemy break the first thing Simon had ever been apart of.
That night in the woods had lead to the biggest shit show Simon had ever seen. The months Baz was missing were the worst months of Simon’s life. He would look for him in the halls, during classes, at the field, in the woods. Everywhere. The ache that Simon felt when he was with Agatha had increased tenfold during the time Baz was gone. The longing Simon felt had become unbearable. When Baz returned, it was like a huge weight being lifted from his chest, but the ache stayed.
Finding Baz and kissing him in the woods as smoke filled his lungs and everything burned around them had set off a flurry of emotions for Simon. All at once he felt complete yet incomplete, hot all over yet ice cold, filled to the brim yet empty. Above everything Simon was thinking and feeling, the main thought had been ‘finally’.
The ache that had settled and burrowed in Simon’s chest disappeared the day he kissed Baz. He no longer felt like he was just floating along. A touch from Baz kept his feet firmly rooted to the ground. That night when Simon watched Baz eat his food and hide his fangs, all he could think about was how perfect and adorable the boy in front of him was. After years of fighting, venomous words, physical altercations, and curses being thrown, being in Baz’s room on Christmas Eve sitting across from him and asking if he could touch his fangs, it all just made sense to Simon.
Somewhere between saving the World of Mages and seeing his therapist, Simon fell in love with Baz. In love in love. Madly, fully, truly in love. What Simon felt for Agatha’s touches could never compare to how he felt for Baz and mere glances from the boy.
Baz had completely flipped Simon’s life upside down. Simon finally knew what love was. When he laid in Baz’s arms at night and heard the boy softly snore, Simon knew where he belonged. When Simon watched Baz and Penny jokingly bicker and tease each other as they made dinner and fight over whose turn it was to set the table, he knew what he was apart of. When Baz grabbed Simon by the waist and pulled him flush against him as they danced without music on a random Wednesday evening, Simon finally knew what love was. It’s all he could feel when he was with Baz.
To others, Simon and Baz were an odd couple. Baz was reserved about kissing in public, he never called Simon any pet names, and only held Simon’s hand. Simon loved kissing in public, found new and creative names to call Baz every day, and would play with Baz’s fingers whenever he grew bored.
To Simon, him and Baz were perfect together. Whenever Baz kissed Simon in a crowded street, mall, shop, or area he would smile wide and feel like the luckiest idiot in the world. Away from nosy ears Baz would call Simon “love” because he knew it made Simon giddy and feel special. Searching for Baz’s hand when he felt anxious or heard a loud noise that set off his PTSD, Baz’s long fingers enclosing around Simon’s cleared his head and made him feel invincible. With Baz, Simon knew he could conquer the world.
Baz wasn’t an expressive person unless he trusted who he was with, but it never made Simon feel any less loved. Waking up to Baz’s nose nuzzled in his neck, kissing the mole there was like winning the lottery. Every. Single. Day. Lazy Sunday afternoons spent with his head in Baz’s lap and his curls around Baz’s fingers were Simon’s favorite days.
And when Baz kissed Simon silly because he said something incredibly dumb, well. Simon couldn’t lie and say he didn’t like this better than fighting. He loved it almost as much as he loved Baz.