Archive of Our Own

The news that Dimitri Blaiddyd was coming back had passed through the student body but garnered little reaction. Few knew the name anymore, and those that did could recall only a few pertinent facts about his departure.

A car accident. His parents, dead. Packed off to live with distant relatives. He wasn’t the first child to have his future snatched away and reshaped, and he wouldn’t be the last.

Felix had been like that.

He and Dimitri had been so close, but that had been years ago. They were children then, and so much had changed. Felix experienced his own loss, a Glenn-shaped hole carved in his own future, callused over by teenage years spent lashing out and fighting back against a world that he believed had wronged him.

But that too, was in the past. The Garreg Mach campus of the University of Fodlan had provided him with more than just an education and friends. It had been a distraction as well, offering distractions for Felix to pour his aggression and sorrow into. The first time he had run, truly run, not a single one of his nightmares could keep pace.

Only the news of Dimitri’s imminent return had managed to stop Felix in his tracks.

“Has he spoken to you yet?”

Felix shielded his eyes against the sun, ever-resentful of having to look up when Sylvain was speaking to him.

“No,” he replied. His mood was heavy, leaden, and had been since the first glance of shaggy blonde hair and a familiar face in the hallways. Familiar save for the ragged scar over Dimitri’s right eye.

“Is that because you duck behind me whenever you see him?”

Felix responded with one of the more venomous glares in his arsenal and Sylvain laughed.

“Come on. Childhood friend, taken away from you by tragedy, coming back into your life...these are the plots of all of the trashiest, cheesiest romance novels! Why do you keep avoiding him?”

“Sylvain,” Felix hissed, propping his ankle up against the edge of a bleacher. His muscles burned as they stretched, his hamstrings resisting exercise on this cold morning. “He probably doesn’t remember me. Or doesn’t want to. It was a long time ago, and we’ve both changed. I have no interest in revisiting the past.”

Sylvain responded with a grin and a *hmm*, returning to his own warm-up routine. The two continued in silence, Felix staring sullenly at the ground, feeling the familiar creep of a dark mood clouding his mind on an otherwise sunny day. Those clouds, at least, he could outrun.

The training track took Felix right past the rugby fields, and there he was.

Broad. So much broader than he had been, than he had ever shown any hint of becoming. Dimitri looked like a wall on the field, standing amongst his team-mates. The only player taller than him was the boy from Duscur who had transferred with Dimitri, although calling him a boy seemed silly at best, and utterly ridiculous at worst.

Felix had seen the two of them together in the halls, in the backs of classrooms, heads together and talking quietly. He assumed that the two had perhaps gone to the same middle school, or had met through a regional team. He assumed that the painful flare in his chest when he watched them was grief, and not something else, something more foolish.

Dimitri stood with his back to Felix, but it was undeniably him. Even with his shoulders hunched, his hair ragged and uncut, there was an air about him. A crackle of unpredictability that had existed even before the accident which had so suddenly changed the trajectory of his life. Despite himself, Felix slowed to a stop and stood, chest heaving, watching.

When Dimitri ran, he did so with grace and a surprising speed. He twisted and wove through a line of white jerseys, his own blue uniform stained with grass and sweat. When he hit, he hit hard, and stood above his opponent with his hair hanging shroud-like over his eyes.

Felix stared.

The boy he knew had been slight. Tall, but thin. When they had woven their way through tall grass fields or picked a path across rocky streams, Felix could always look back and see Dimitri smiling broadly at him. He had been full of light, born to a wealthy and powerful family, though his privilege had never made him cruel or thoughtless.

Even at the funeral, mourning his only family, Dimitri had smiled. Straightened his shoulders and comforted others, although his clear blue eyes were, for the first time, starting to cloud. Felix hadn’t seen him after that. Letters went unanswered. And then Felix had ghosts of his own to deal with, and he had stopped trying to reach out.

A shout from the field shook him from his thoughts, and he narrowed his eyes. Dedue was holding Dimitri back from another player, a broad hand planted in the middle of his chest. He was talking quietly, far too quiet for Felix to make out what he was saying. Felix strained to hear, took a step forward, and promptly kicked over a gear bin.

It crashed to the ground, loudly spilling its contents, and Dimitri’s head snapped up. He stared at Felix like a startled animal, pushing the hair from his face.

Felix ran.

“So you ran,” Sylvain said, rim of his plastic cup tucked beneath his bottom lip. His eyebrows were raised, drawn together, and Felix felt a desperate urge to punch him in the face.

“No. Sort of. I was already running.”

“Were you actively running when he looked at you? Or did you stop, watch him, and then run away when he noticed you?”

“Shut up.”

Mercedes wrapped an arm around Felix’s waist, laying her head on his shoulder. Her soft warmth was a comfort, had been since she had Felix had met on their first day, paired up during student orientation. Their friendship had really been cemented when she had introduced Felix to her girlfriend Annette, and the three of them had been inseparable from that moment. There was a gentleness and assurance in their company that Felix had never experienced before, even with Sylvain.

“Play nice, you two,” she chided, refilling her own cup. “Felix is going through a trying time. His childhood crush came back all big and hot and traumatized.”

Felix sputtered into his drink, staring at Mercedes with wide eyes. She shrugged, feigning innocence.

“He’s not-”

“Did you ever kiss him?” Sylvain interrupted, already throwing his immensely lanky body backwards, anticipating Felix’s swinging fist. “Come on! It’s so damn obvious!”

Felix pressed his shoulders into the corner of the room, screwing his eyes shut. “It’s not like that. He was just a friend. We were kids! Just kids. Just friends.”

Sylvain hmm’d over the edge of his drink, and Felix opened his eyes in time to see him exchange a sidelong glance with Mercedes. He groaned in frustration, heels of his hands pressed against his cheekbones.

“It’s true!” It was mostly true. Once, Felix might have felt the spark of something else buried within the friendship he had with Dimitri. It had grown with self-realization and exploration, but by the time Felix had mustered the courage to tangle his fingers with those of another boy, Dimitri was long out of his life.

Annette arrived then, her voice bright and cheery, enough of a distraction for Felix to turn inward and slink away. He would have to have A Talk with his friends soon, about boundaries and leaving his past behind him where it belonged. They teased, and he knew it was in good humor, but talking about Dimitri was like scraping away layers of dirt that Felix had spent years piling up over his own painful memories.

He picked his way through the party, pushing past bright blue, red, and gold letterman jackets. Why had he come? This was time that could be spent training, or studying. Better still, time that he could be flat on his back in his dorm, head pressed into the pillows, staring at the ceiling, bass thrumming through his headphones.

School spirit was Sylvain’s domain, and this was the last time Felix would be talked into it.

His head was down as he pushed through to the stairs, hoping to find a quiet room upstairs, maybe a window to look out of and brood. However his desperate need to avoid eye contact soon betrayed him in the most obvious way possible, and Felix would later bitterly reflect that if he hadn’t been looking at the ground, he might have seen it coming.

He slammed into another student’s back, and whoever it was was tall. Broad. And angry. Felix was sure for a moment, was positive, that the world wouldn’t do him dirty this way. Not after everything else. Not tonight.

Dimitri turned, and Felix sighed. Of course.

“Hey-” Dimitri began, lip curled, hair hanging in his face. Felix could see a hint of the scar underneath his right eye, angry and red. According to the rumors, he had almost lost that eye. “Watch where you’re…”

He trailed off. Felix swallowed. He had been hoping, praying, that Dimitri wouldn’t recognise him. Would find him as unremarkable and forgettable as anyone else on the campus. But of course, realization dawned on Dimitri’s darkly lined face at the exact same moment that Felix felt his heart drop straight down into his stomach.

Dimitri inhaled sharply. “...Felix?”

Felix could only stare. His eyes were wide, and his heartbeat roared until it sounded like the ocean rushing in his ears. All at once he could see Dimitri as he had known him, young and bright, full of sunlight and unlimited potential. Not this looming, shadowed beast that stood before him. Not this...this boar.

And for the second time in less than a day, Felix ran from Dimitri.

Felix made it almost all the way back to his dorm before he realised someone was following him, and he turned, expecting Sylvain, already prepared to send him packing. Instead, Dimitri loomed over him, and Felix felt anger and grief twist in his chest as he realized that this time, there was nowhere to go.

“Why did you run?” Dimitri asked softly, his voice rough and raspy. His right eye was obscured by hair once more, and Felix felt a disturbing urge to brush it to the side.

“I didn’t run.” he hissed.

Dimitri tilted his head to the side, and where Felix expected a mocking grin, there was nothing.

“You did. Twice, now.”

Felix refused to answer, casting his eyes to the ground and folding his arms over his narrow chest. They were as good a shield as any.

Silence stretched between them, until eventually Dimitri sighed and turned to leave. Only then did Felix speak.

“Why did you come back?”

Dimitri didn’t turn for the longest time, and when he did Felix suddenly appreciated just how tall he had gotten. How he pulled back from people. How sad he was.

“Dedue,” he replied. “He’s my closest friend. We transferred together, here. He gave me the confidence.”

His words were flat, matter of fact, each sentence an inarguable statement. It made Felix nauseous, and he very suddenly wanted to hear Dimitri scream, yell, laugh. Anything that could confirm that yes, his Dimitri was still there.

His Dimitri?

“Oh,” was all Felix could muster. That at least made Dimitri smile, even if it was just the ghost of one.

“Did you think I came back because of you?”

Felix felt the blood rush to his cheeks, like roaring waves crashing on the shore. He lashed out, catching Dimitri in the shoulder with his closed fist, and snarled through his clenched teeth.

“Why wouldn’t I think that?” he hissed, eyes wide, pupils dark. “You were my best friend! I can’t imagine what you went through, I knew how much you were hurting, but it was so easy for you to forget about me!”

Dimitri took a step back, more visibly hurt by Felix’s words than where his fist had connected with his shoulder.

“It…” he swallowed, and Felix stared, wishing that his gaze would burn the shocked expression from Dimitri’s face. “It wasn’t easy.”

Felix balled his fingers into tight fists, short nails digging into his palms.

“Then why didn’t you call? Why didn’t you write? After…”

The breath left Dimitri’s lungs in a soft woosh, but Felix had already looked away, already taken a step back.

“I’m sorry about Glenn.”

Felix turned away. There was nothing left, he had mourned Dimitri alongside his own brother. He didn’t run, not this time, but as he walked he was surprised that he felt no urge to turn and look behind him.

The first letter arrived the next day.

Although, calling it a letter was generous. It was hastily scribbled on the back of a napkin, in - Felix squinted at the hazy writing - pencil?

I’ll do better,

D

Felix used it to wipe the mud from the heels of his track shoes.

The second letter was stuffed underneath his dorm room door, crumpled and bent from being stuffed against the carpet edge. This one was on actual paper.

I’m sorry I never wrote back.

D

Felix held it between his hands for a moment, maybe a moment too long, before twisting it into a ball and throwing it against the side of the trash can.

He didn’t see Dimitri in the halls that day.

“He’s been sending you letters?”

Dorothea leaned across the table, almost toppling from where she sat in Sylvain’s lap. It was a habit that would have driven Felix mad, if not for the fact that it had started when Sylvain, claiming he was joking, once patted his lap and told Dorothea he had saved a seat for her. Since then, even after the pair had officially started dating, Dorothea had thrown herself into his lap at any chance she had. No bowl of soup, essay, phone, or laptop had stood in her way.

Felix admired that.

“Yes.” He speared a piece of pineapple from his plate, gesturing to the two of them. “But it’s not a thing. It’s not anything. Don’t try and make it something.”

Dorothea laughed her musical laugh and leaned back against Sylvain.

“What did today’s say?”

Felix pressed his hand over the folded paper in his pants pocket. This one had arrived in an envelope.

“That’s none of your business.”

Sylvain leaned in, eyes narrowed behind his black-framed glasses. Whether he actually needed them or just thought they made him look smart had been a topic of much debate.

“He’s into you.”

Felix slammed his fork down, scraping the ceramic of the plate.

“What?”

“He’s into you!” Sylvain persisted. “You told him how much it broke your heart that he never wrote back, and now he’s sending you letters.”

“I...broke…?...no…” Felix began to turn slightly purple.

Sylvain laughed, and folded his arms around Dorothea.

“Boom. Into you.”

On the fourth day, Felix wrote Dimitri a letter.

Stop this or I will beat the shit out of you.

He slammed it into Dimitri’s chest as he left a biology lecture, silently furious as he stalked away down the hall.

Dedue had followed Dimitri out, eyebrow raised.

“That one, huh?”

Dimiti smiled, just a little, and crumpled the paper in his hand.

“Yeah. That’s the one.”

There was no letter on the fifth day.

It sat poorly with Felix through his classes, and although he tried to tease apart why it made him feel so complicated, little reason could be found.

“I shouldn’t be surprised,” he told Mercedes at dinner. “It’s what I wanted.”

Mercedes had hmm’d and nodded and not said anything, which Felix knew to be a clear sign that she knew exactly what he wanted.

The sixth letter was two pages. Double sided. Cramped in the margins.

Felix,

I want to say sorry. Properly. But I want to do it in person. I have excuses, not reasons, and you know them already. Most of them.

I was so angry. I wanted to stop existing, I wanted to stick my head in the dirt and forget everything. So I did. I didn’t do it because I thought it would make me happy, I did it because I didn’t want to be happy. I didn’t want to feel that way, only to lose it again.

Thinking about you made me happy.

It was scary. I almost wrote you a few times...and then I heard about Glenn. I won’t ever forgive myself for refusing to call you. I knew how you must have felt, but I just...couldn’t.

Please let me fix this. Just talk to me. I’m here so I can start over, and I’d like to start over with you.

Dimitri.

P.s. If you want to give me a second chance, meet me at 6pm behind the gear shed.

“Hey. Hey!”

Dimitri turned sharply, started by the sudden voice. He had been standing behind the gear shed for an hour now, and he had been almost ready to throw in the towel.

Felix wasn’t coming. Why would he?

But the voice snapped him from his dark, heavy thoughts. It belonged, he realised, to the tall red-head that he had seen Felix hanging around with. A pang of angry jealousy flared in his chest, but Dimitri pushed it down. He didn’t do that anymore. He was better than that.

“Hey?”

The man...Sylvain? Sylvain. He ran closer, something clutched in his hand. He grinned as he approached and held it out to Dimitri at arm’s length.

“It’s a letter!”

Dimitri took it, and frowned. Sylvain mirrored his expression for a moment, before his eyes widened and he laughed.

“From Felix! That’s the thing you two are doing right? A weird letter thing?” He shrugged. “Whatever! This is for you. If you break my best friend’s heart, I’ll break your legs!”

And then he was gone, running back across the field, the most puzzling man that Dimitri had ever met.

Dimitri looked down at the paper in his hand, unfolded it, and smiled.

Really smiled.

Dimitri glanced at the paper again, and then up at the door in front of him. The writing on the door matched the note in his hand.

Room 6, Building C

He knocked. Before he could stop himself, before he could hesitate, he knocked.

Time stretched out like a road before him, and just as Dimitri felt his heart began to hammer in his chest, the door opened.

“Okay,” Felix said, and he didn’t smile, but Dimitri knew softness on his face when he saw it.

“Okay,” he replied. Felix moved to the side and waved him in.

He tucked his hands into his pockets as he stepped inside, fingers brushing the letter that Sylvain had delivered. It was just a scrap of paper, one that looked like it had been roughly torn from the corner of a notebook. Scrawled on it in thick, black letters, just beneath Felix’s room number, were three simple words.

I forgive you.