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In another universe, that would be him next to Genshin, Klimt thinks, glaring at the newlywed pair smiling at each other beneath the dais. Barok looks oh so happy next to Genshin. It’s sickening.
He should be celebrating with the rest of the party, like the good big brother he is. Not selfishly stewing on the side, wanting nothing more than to pull Genshin away and kiss him in front of his guests. A possessive declaration that he’s his, has always been, even though he’s gone and replaced him with his little brother. He’ll always have a hold on Genshin’s heart, just like Genshin will always hold his.
But Klimt is married. Has a little girl. She’s four years old and absolutely darling. That’s why Genshin eventually stops their trysts after Lady Baskerville announces that she’s pregnant, saying that he can’t damn Klimt like this. Out of love and respect. It’s not long after that when Barok confesses that he loves Genshin with teary eyes, and Klimt is okay with that. He can live with knowing the sparkling look in Barok’s eyes towards Genshin is more than just awe.
He can’t live with the way Genshin returns it with the same affectionate look that he used to give Klimt. Does he actually love Barok? He couldn’t believe it. The Van Zieks brothers have always had a chronic case of being treated near interchangeable, with Barok being only slightly inferior to Klimt. It’s the same thing. It has to be.
The thought that Genshin is using Barok, however terrible it means for his brother, is the only thing keeping Klimt sane.
He’s happy for Barok, truly. But goddamn, he would kill for Genshin.
.
They go to the bar after all the wedding ceremonies. Barok changes out of his white suit because there’s absolutely no way he’s risking it getting stained. Surely, his sentimental little brother will want to hook it up and hang it where he can always remember it with fondness years from now when they’re both old and grey.
Genshin looks good in his dark suit. That’s the only reason they went with a western wedding according to Kazuma, who is complaining his ears off about it. He wants to tell Genshin’s biggest mistake to shove it, but it’s an awful relief to hear someone who doesn’t talk about the couple with absolute felicitations for once, so he listens a bit longer before turning to the bartender and calling for two drinks for the both of them.
“You’re eighteen, aren’t you?”
“Just turned.”
“Please don’t get my son drunk,” Genshin says from the other end of the bar.
Barok scoffs. “No, please do. Maybe it’d make him tolerable for a change.” (Said intolerable one sticks his tongue in response.)
“I make no promises,” Klimt airly says at the same time.
He pulls his wallet out—an expensive gift from his wife’s family—to pay. Genshin sighs.
.
It is about ten p.m. when people begin to take off. Ten-forty-five, when Barok says it’s time for them to go. He looks exhausted—Klimt was always the social one. These sorts of functions always wrung out every single last mote of energy from Barok. He is frankly impressed that Barok has managed to last the entire night.
“I can drive you home,” Genshin offers Klimt. He only drank the toasting wine several hours prior, so he’s the only one eligible to, but the thought of being stuck in a car with him sounds downright torturous.
He looks over at Barok. “Where are you going after this?”
“I… was thinking of staying at Genshin’s place tonight,” Barok says.
Klimt tries not to think about the implications, which just means he’s left with his thoughts wandering to the large Van Zieks house and its long, dreary hallways that they haven’t yet fixed with electric lighting. His wife was visiting her parents with Iris at the moment. She would return home tomorrow, but until then, the house would be completely empty save for Klimt.
He dreads another night spent in solitude. When they were younger and casual intimacy was more acceptable between the siblings, he used to cradle Barok in his arms until he fell asleep. After Barok outgrew it, he found Genshin as a suitable replacement.
He doesn’t want to go back to a cold bed.
“Thanks for the offer, but I’ll be fine. I’ll get an Uber. Don’t worry about me, Genshin,” he says. The way his tongue curls around his former lover’s name feels like poison in his mouth.
“Alright.” Genshin nods. “Kazuma?”
He’s still perched on his stool, staring at his glass like it’s done something to offend him. “No thanks.”
Genshin frowns. “You can’t stay here unsupervised.”
Kazuma glances up. “I don’t want to be locked up in my room while you and… Van Zieks have your honeymoon.”
“Not technically ‘Van Zieks,’” Barok mutters.
Now is not the time, Klimt thinks, giving his little brother a sour look. Barok notices and lifts his leg threateningly. Before he can kick him, Klimt knocks his leg away with his foot.
“I’m hyphenating your father’s name to mine.”
“I hope you have an accident,” is Kazuma’s immediate response. Then follows up with, “You don’t get to have my name on top of my dad.”
“I thought you said you could live with it.”
“I said I could live with you marrying my dad, not that you could also take my name.”
“I would never in a million years want to take your name, but it’s your father’s as well.”
“I can watch him,” Klimt interrupts before they can turn it into one of their famous spats again. It’s comical how little they get along, but they don’t need to start a brawl in public.
“I’m an adult,” Kazuma reminds his father.
“You can trust me,” Klimt adds.
Genshin stares at him like he can’t trust Klimt. What he did to deserve that, Klimt doesn’t know, and it’s going to bother him if he thinks about it at all, so he turns his attention towards Kazuma, who is eyeing him curiously. What is he thinking, he wonders.
“It should be fine, right? Besides…” Barok says. He leans closer to Genshin and whispers something into his ear. Whatever his brother says leaves Genshin with a contemplative frown.
“…We’ll be going then. Don’t stay out too late, brother. Asōgi.”
Barok leads Genshin out, and then it’s just Klimt and Kazuma.
.
“What do you think he promised my dad,” Kazuma asks.
Klimt squints. “Nothing I haven’t done with him.”
Kazuma turns his head away in disgust. “Forget I said anything.”
.
The bar closes at eleven-thirty and they have to leave the bar together, but it’s no more awkward than the rest of the night has been. He calls an Uber to pick him up. It arrives fifteen minutes later. But Kazuma hasn’t made a move to call an Uber or a cab.
He hesitates and asks, “Do you need money to call a cab?”
“Nah.”
With that, Kazuma opens the car door and pushes Klimt into it. He scrambles purchase onto the seating, before being shoved forward as Kazuma crawls after him and buckles himself in.
“Old Queen Street, Westminster?” The driver asks.
“For the both of us,” Kazuma says. He stares Klimt down, daring him to say anything.
“...Sure, why not.” What the hell?
“I’m not going back,” Kazuma mutters so that the driver can’t hear him. “Not going to risk walking in on them.”
.
“Wine?” Klimt offers as they walk through the foyer.
Kazuma sneers. “Your house wouldn’t be my first choice if you didn’t have any.”
.
Kazuma seems to deflate the moment Klimt hands him the wine chalice. It’s one of his brother’s because he went and cleared their entire wine glass cabinet to replace with his precious chalices. Kazuma looks morose as he turns the glass around.
“You look like a man who had his heart broken,” Klimt comments.
His narrows his eyes when Kazuma responds by downing his wine glass. The gears in his head lag by a few seconds, impeded by the alcohol in his bloodstream, but he pieces it together.
“I knew you had a crush on my brother!” He says, slamming his hand down and nearly spilling his wine in the process.
Kazuma lets out an angry, caracal of a screech.
“I do not! Ugh, I was fourteen, okay?” In a small voice that Klimt barely even hears, Kazuma grumbles, “I had a crush on both of you.”
“Oh, that’s.” He’s not sure how he’s supposed to process the both of you of that particular confession. Flattered? A little concerned? Those seem like they use more emotional capacity than he has at the moment so instead, he says, “That’s surprising actually. I thought you hated us.”
“I do, you’re both obnoxious, haughty, and constantly shoving your wealth around in people’s faces. It was just a stupid, childish crush anyway.” Kazuma wrinkles his nose and looks away.
He says that, but Klimt raised Barok and saw him through every “childish” crush he had that ended in a broken heart. Kazuma isn’t so different, though he is loath to compare Genshin’s hell-spawn to his sweet, baby brother, there are some similarities between them. He offers more wine, even though that’s probably the opposite of what he should be doing. But misery loves to commiserate.
Kazuma snatches the bottle from his hands and fills his glass to it, barely cutting off the flow before it ends up on the counter.
.
“I want to die,” he says. Pushes Klimt away as he tries to get him to drink water.
“Your father would kill me.”
Kazuma sighs and rolls his eyes back toward Klimt.
“That’s the point,” he drawls.
.
“What does my father even see in him?” Kazuma bemoans.
“Whatever you saw, I assume.”
Klimt grimaces at the taste of the new wine he had fetched after giving up on the water. One of Barok’s. His brother’s tastes were always more… refined, but he’s pretty sure he poisoned his taste buds in the process.
“Blegh, I don’t know. What‘d you see?”
“How so?”
“In Barok. Or my dad, I guess,” Kazuma says.
Klimt frowns. It was impossible to hide his relationship with Genshin from his son when they often met and joined together underneath the same roof. He never tried to be quiet, exactly. Which is why he’s never bothered to hide the fact. It’s the mention of his brother that has him reeling.
“I think I’m drunk. Say that again?”
“Oh, I guess it’s just rumours,” Kazuma mutters underneath his breath. Something Klimt isn’t supposed to hear. He says a little louder, “You are drunk. Don’t worry about it. How are you holding up, Van Zieks? It was my father that broke off your arrangement with him after all. And then he gets married to your brother. Frankly, my personal drama over Barok isn’t anything compared to yours with my dad.”
Klimt buries his head in his hands.
“M’fine.”
Kazuma’s laugh is harsh, and it matches exactly how Klimt feels.
.
They stumble into Klimt’s room at some point, looking for an old gramophone that was his father’s. Kazuma wanted to see it, even though it hasn’t worked since the nineteen-hundreds. They don’t find it because Kazuma immediately gets distracted by his comfy-looking bed. He throws himself onto it and rolls around for a while until Klimt gets bored standing around and joins him.
“Soft,” Kazuma says.
“Of course it is.”
“Expensive.”
“Exorbitant. Your dad wouldn’t be able to afford this on his detective salary.”
“D’you think that’s why he’s getting married?”
“...I never considered it,” he admits.
“Probably not though. My dad’s not like that,” Kazuma says.
Klimt sighs. “No, he’s not.”
.
“We should get married.”
Kazuma’s eyes are the same as his dad’s. He doesn’t even register the ridiculousness of the statement. It is, isn’t it? Like—amber, maybe? He’s not sure. He leans in closer to Kazuma and reaches out to touch it.
Kazuma looks at him for a fraction of a second before he slaps his hand away.
It stings. He finds he doesn’t mind it.
He pulls Kazuma’s hand back and presses his lips against the fingertips. Gensh—Kazuma’s—it’s Kazuma in front of him—eyes widen.
“Okay,” he says.
Kazuma pulls his hand away quickly.
“So I don’t have to share the same name as Barok.”
Klimt tilts his head. He doesn’t know if Kazuma is serious or not, but Klimt doesn’t have the processes to think it through.
“The drawer,” he says, pointing to the nightstand.
Kazuma eagerly shuffles back until he’s at the edge of the bed, then fiddles with the handle of the nightstand. He gets it open after a couple of tries.
“What about it?” he asks.
“Underneath it.”
Kazuma hesitates and glances incredulously at him. Not seeing a trace of jest on Klimt’s face, he presses his against the bottom and starts feeling around. There’s a tell-tale click followed by the distinct sound of the single paper contained in the secret compartment being rustled.
“What’s this?”
Kazuma pulls out some papers from a secret compartment.
“This is legal documents for a marriage license? Wait, the name here is—”
“It’s fine, just cross it out and write your own.”
.
“Ah, but wait, Barok’s only hyphenating, so you’d still share the same name.”
“Oh. Then I guess I could marry… Ryūnosuke?”
“Who?”
“My best friend. Anyway, I’m pretty sure there are laws against bigamy.”
Klimt stares at Kazuma’s forehead. Aren’t there? Otherwise, he would have proposed to Genshin when he had the chance. Sometimes he wonders if he shouldn’t just divorce his wife, but he actually quite likes her. Even if—well, isn’t there a reason she absconded to her parent's estate? He’s a terrible husband.
“Some prosecutor you are,” Kazuma says.
“Barok is better than me,” he agrees.
.
He doesn’t know when he falls asleep, except that he eventually does to the warmth of alcohol in his blood and the knowledge that he’s not alone anymore. That’s why he isn’t immediately alarmed when he wakes up the next morning to the feeling of someone else in his arms.
Whoever they are, they feel nice, he fuzzily thinks. He opens his eyes to a head full of dark hair. He sees the screen of a phone beyond it.
“Are you awake?” A familiar voice asks as the screen clicks off.
Oh, dear God, as the realisation hits him like a brick that he’s holding Kazuma Asōgi in his arms. Eighteen-year-old son of his ex. He wants to release him, but that’s when his body decides that the appropriate response is to freeze. He’s forced to take in everything else, including the fact that Kazuma is shirtless. So is he. He doesn’t even remember taking his shirt off.
That’s enough of a shock for him to finally let go. Kazuma immediately wriggles away. He leans down and picks his shirt off the floor. A quick glance tells Klimt that there are no obvious markings on his torso at least.
He remembers—Kazuma inviting himself over because he didn’t want to go home to his father and Barok doing whatever they were doing, the bottles of wine they went through, including his brother’s piss shit wine, and then they’d gone looking for something in his bedroom and never left. There were those marriage papers he had put together a while ago and hidden in his nightstand as well.
He watches as Kazuma suddenly takes those out.
“What are you doing with that,” Klimt rasps.
“Insurance,” Kazuma simply says.
Kazuma doesn’t look inclined to explain further, so he changes his question.
“What happened last night?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?” Kazuma shakes his head, rolls the papers up, and tucks them into his pocket. He stares directly at him with an intense gaze and asks, “What do you think happened?”
Klimt swallows.
.
“Is your dad coming to pick you up?” he asks when Kazuma is still in his house, picking at the breakfast that Klimt made for him.
“No. I can’t disturb them like that.”
“You’re an exemplary, filial son, aren’t you?”
“I do my best.”
.
Kazuma’s phone pings to let him know that his Uber drive has arrived. Klimt trails after him to the front door.
“Wait,” he says before Kazuma opens the door.
He has to do something about this. Can’t just let Kazuma go without acknowledging what he’s done, even if he can’t remember anything.
“What happened last night, I’ll take responsibility for it.”
“...Heh, don’t worry about it.”
Kazuma slips out the front door. Klimt pursues him, wanting to protest that he should absolutely be worried but stops at the sight of Kazuma holding a rose-coloured wallet with an ornate “B.” He recalls then that he had his wallet in his pocket last night.
Kazuma pulls out a twenty pound banknote and hands it to the driver out in front. He turns toward Klimt, standing on the steps of the Van Zieks’ upscale home in Westminster and smiles.
“See you around, Van Zieks. Don’t forget that I have your papers!”
Papers?
Those fucking documents. With—one name scratched out and Kazuma’s written over it. Painting a very damning picture. Insurance, Kazuma said.
As the car drives away, Klimt realises that he’s been thoroughly tricked and possibly just threatened by Genshin’s hellion child.