Chapter Text
“Aug, can you turn off the bloody kettle please?” bellowed Joseph, glancing away from the mirror.
“I’m trying, you hag, but the button isn’t pressing properly,” he replied, glaring at the stove like it had bad-mouthed his mother.
Life had been an adjustment since acquiring mortality.
Oh, not for Augustus. For Joseph.
Alongside his usual dry comments and sarcasm, he now had to deal with his beloved making numerous unnecessary trips to the first aid kit, placing plasters on every minor scratch and taking cough syrup “just in case”.
Lately, he had developed a small obsession with the wonders of modern technology. The former god would make himself upwards of ten cups of tea a day, just to watch the kettle come to a boil and let out a piercing scream when ready.
Joseph, of course, loved the irony of this. Sure, his boyfriend was born before time itself, but only one of them knows how a toilet works.
He walked over to the stove, where Augustus stood, eyes fixated on the kettle, as if waiting for it to start shrieking.
“You push it in, and turn it,” Joseph said smugly.
“I knew that.”
The flame lit in a haze of electric blue.
“Fascinating.” Augustus mumbled.
-
See, Joseph is lazy by nature.
He’ll be the first to admit that taking the quick way out has always been his specialty. Sometimes he even catches himself calculating the longest acceptable amount of time to have a bathroom break.
Augustus is very much not.
Perhaps it stems from having aeons with no projects or responsibilities to fulfill, but this man does not stop working for a second.
He had decided on a whim to acquire a teaching degree, and completed it within six months. He is a machine.
Which is why Joseph was standing outside Tesco’s, carrying four tins of instant coffee into the car upon Augustus’ request.
“You know,” he announced as he climbed into the driver’s seat and looked at his partner. “A human can’t handle this much caffeine without at least having heart palpitations.”
“Your point is?”
Joseph stared at him. “My point is obvious? You’re usually psychopathically health-conscious, why do you want this much coffee?”
“I have seventeen assignments to mark by tomorrow, you prick, have you tried reading year 4 handwriting?” Augustus said, closing the car window.
“Yeah, it’s not even that bad. Try reading Lindsey’s - now i just make her read the orders out loud to me so i actually know what to cook.”
“You’re undermining my suffering.”
“You’re undermining your physical health.”
They glared at each other. Eventually, Augustus just sighed in defeat, and Joseph started the car with a grin.
-
“Okay, this is it, I’m fed up.” Joseph declared one evening to Augustus, who gazed up at him from the essay he was squinting at on the coffee table.
Since acquiring impromptu mortality, Joseph has noticed a shift in his partner, particularly in the way he read things. With newfound limitations on his intelligence - namingly exhaustion, time, and most importantly a mortgage and a requirement to buy groceries - Joseph had worried that his reading comprehension would see a dramatic fall. But what he didn’t predict was his boyfriend’s very obvious struggle with nearsightedness (in both a literal and figurative sense) and absolute refusal to get his eyes tested.
“If you squint one more time I’m shoving you into the car and driving you to Spec Savers.” Joseph warned him.
The other man merely sighed. “I’ve told you before and I’ll tell you again, I don’t need glasses. I can see perfectly fine.”
“No, you can’t. Stop trying to argue with me on this.”
“Make me.”
He stared at him, somewhat appalled. “I’m not kissing you while you’re being an insolent prick.”
There was silence for a moment. Joseph attempted to argue: “C’mon, get your thi-“
“No.”
“Augustus.”
“Joseph.” He glared at him.
“I’m getting my phone.”
Half an hour later, an appointment was booked with Dr Jen Ferry - a local optometrist with a fairy cheap consulting price. It was scheduled for the day after the next. Augustus protested of course, but was eventually silenced for the sake of not scaring the receptionist on the phone.
A week later, and Joseph arrives at the flat with a box of prescription glasses. Thick, black frames, with small rhinestone detailing because his dearest is a ponce.
He finds Augustus in the kitchen, doing fuck-knows-what with a bread knife, ice cubes, and a punnet of blueberries. Nearly cutting his finger off from the sheer inconsistency of his aim.
Joseph has no idea how he’s still alive.
“I’m not even going to question what you’re doing. Try these on,” he tells him, holding out the spectacles.
“Many happy returns to you too, dear Jo.” In spite of himself, Augustus accepts it, and inspects the frames as of investigating for fraudulent glasses design.
Joseph smirks, and puts the pair on for him.
As expected, Augustus looks rather like a deer in headlights for a moment - a look of slight bewilderment falls over him. He blinks rapidly as if a cloud of dust had just blown his way - holding his hands out in front of him and looking at them with an intense and bizarre focus. Joseph couldn’t help himself - he burst into laughter.
“Just what are you laughing at?” Augustus sounds appalled.
“You!” Joseph wraps his arms around him, still chuckling to himself. “Love, you look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
“I feel like I have! Since when has there been such an extraordinary amount of wool on our carpet?”
“Since you’ve been too blind to see it!”
Augustus lets out a tssk sound. “There’s absolutely no chance my eyesight is this abysmal.”
Joseph pulls away and raises an eyebrow at him.
“I’m not admitting it.” his partner says instantly.
“Oh yes you are - three words ‘Gustus, c’mon!”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Augustus lets out the most dramatic huff, before finally grumbling: “You were right.”
“Of course I was.”
-
There was something odd about Augustus the moment he stepped into the apartment.
For one thing - he almost walked into the table absentmindedly, and had left his coat on despite the heating being sufficient enough inside the building.
It was only when he wordlessly found himself a set at the dining room table, when Joseph noticed a pale green envelope in his left hand and a letter.
From what Joseph could see - the handwriting was big and loopy - a clumsy mix of cursive and print with a few smudges near the dotted i’s, as if the author had pressed as hard as they could into the paper. Probably one of the former god’s young students, he supposed.
Augustus pulled out his spectacles, and sat down to read it with determined concentration. It was a truly bizarre sight.
It was the end of his second year of teaching history at the neighbiuring school. Joseph knew how passionate his partner was about his job - despite how much he loved to complain about the noisy teenagers and their decidedly simple use of language. He would never admit it - but Augustus loved his students very much.
Joseph leaned over him and attempted to decipher what was clearly a twelve year old’s writing.
Dear Mr Trinh, it began. (Augustus didn’t have a surname, so he generally used Joseph’s when applying for jobs, despite being unmarried. It made Joseph smile.)
Thank you for teaching me this year and for helping me out whenever i got stuck on the hard questions. Ursula also told me to tell you that she looks up to you. I said she should write her own letter, but she didn’t have any nice paper at her house.
You’ve made history fun and I hope I have you next year. Don’t tell Miss White but I think she’s boring
-Cecil
Joseph looked at the teacher in question, and kissed his temple.
“I told you, you make a damn fine teacher.” He told him.
Augustus just kept looking at the letter, a secret smile adorning his face