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Lasko liked to think that libraries were the place where all the worlds (well, maybe not all of them) ever to be created collided, in what he was grateful to call, an organized fashion. He liked to think he was like a gatekeeper to that organized fashion.
After his years of college experience, he was able to help people get whatever they needed in order to move their minds, whether it be to a place of peace to study, a place where they could escape reality and drift into a headspace of fantasy and action, or a place where they could finally find themselves represented to the world.
He was proud of himself.
And with that job, came a very sweet and attractive Freelancer that had grown on him for the last year and a half.
“Som-something like Lord of the Rings or Game of Th-Thrones is always a first recommendation, but I’d say that you should maybe start off with something a little short-shorter so that it can actually get your attention and get you in the mood to like- umm- read more f-fantasy if that makes sense, and it would eventually lead you up to get into the mood to read something like Fellowship-which, I’ve gotta say, I think is my favorite- actually- umm- maybe, that’s yet to be determined actually, but basically you should start off with something simpler- well- not simpler, just something that would get you into the general genre of fantasy, because if one of those b-book series isn’t your thing then it could possibly lead you to not want to read other fantasy stuff which wouldn’t really be a bad thing, I’m not saying that it has to be your taste, f-fantasy isn’t e-everyone’s taste but it-”
“Lasko, honey, please breathe.” The Freelancer rubbed his shoulder. Lasko immediately took a breath, feeling very winded. He felt his shame crawl over his skin at the prospect of them being annoyed with his incessant rambling for the sixth time that day.
“I love hearing you talk but you really should start taking breaths in between sentences,” They said gently, their finger twirling a curled strand on the back of his neck, making him blush.
He looked down at his shoes, the foot of a bookshelf in his view. “S-sorry.”
The Freelancer leaned their head down so they could be in his field of view, their hair hanging down as they bent at a weird angle.
“You have nothing to apologize for, I just want you to start looking out for yourself a little more, that’s all.” They smiled at him, and Lasko tried his best to will his blush away, but it wasn’t really going anywhere.
They went out of his field of view for a second, and his eyes followed them, seeing them stifle a yawn and cough to cover it up.
“I-I’m sorry,” He said, feeling bad about keeping them in the library for so long.
The Freelancer just gave him a soft look and cupped his cheek gently, only making the blush darken as they looked at him with soft, caring eyes paired with a gentle and bright smile.
“Lasko, you have nothing to apologize for. I chose to stay here, because I love spending time with you. You make me happy,” They rubbed their thumb across his cheek gently, making him lean into their touch subtly. “You have nothing to apologize for, hun.”
He knew they called people affectionate names a lot, but that didn’t stop Lasko from blushing intensely and leaning forward to hide his face with their shoulder.
They huffed through their nose in amusement and wrapped their arms around his shoulders, one hand going into his hair. Lasko felt like he was going to explode if he kept blushing. There could never be a day where they visited when he didn’t end up as a blushing mess that was a puddle of love in their arms.
He sighed. He had absolutely no chance with them.
“Thank you.”
“For what?” They mumbled against his neck, sending shivers down his spine.
“You’re always so nice to me, even when I’m being annoying,” They pulled back, eyebrows furrowed and a frown ready for his eyes. He felt guilt bubble up in his chest, feeling bad about making that gorgeous smile disappear.
“I-it’s just that I-I alwa-always stutter and rant about th-things that don-don’t even m-matter,” Lasko felt like beating himself up, he was doing the annoying stuttering thing again. They were gonna get upset. “I talk w-way too much an-and it probably an-annoys you, a-and I’m sorry.” Lasko could feel his tear ducts sing as he started to get emotional.
Fuck, Lasko you’re gonna annoy them even more and make them run away. You’re gonna lose the best thing in your life.
He couldn’t read the expression on the Freelancer’s face, and it just made his tears come faster. His heart ached in confusion, unknowing as to why he was starting to get teary eyed over talking about himself.
“Lasko,” The Freelancer said firmly, their expression not wavering a bit. “As I’ve said many times before, and will continue to say for the rest of my life—I love talking to you. I love hearing about the things you love talking about. I love spending my time with you. I love when you talk fast and try to fit everything into one breath. I love…”
The Freelancer hesitated, turning their head down so they could look at the floor. After taking a deep breath, they looked back up at him.
“I love when you’re you,” Lasko didn’t know why his heart hurt at that, maybe he had hoped for something else to have been said, “so don’t apologize for being someone that I care about. You wouldn’t like it if I talked bad about myself, and I don’t like it when you talk bad about yourself.”
He looked down in shame, “I’m sorry.”
The Freelancer huffed in amusement and gently lifted his chin back up so he would look at them.
“We’ll work on that apologizing stuff as well.”
__________
“So…it would be…E?” The Freelancer asked hesitantly, not wanting to seem as stupid as they felt next to Lasko.
He smiled at them and nodded. He enjoyed seeing their intelligence, even if it was sometimes from afar as they continuously managed to impress their project partner, Damien. Though they did tend to check and double check and triple check their work (before attempting to quadruple check it before Damien took the paper from their hands).
The tension in their shoulders eased away as they sighed.
“Thank fuck that’s the last one,” They mumbled, rubbing their hands up and down their face. Thankfully they didn’t see the overthinking expression on Lasko’s face. “Don’t even start thinking that it’s because I wanna get away from you; I’m not going anywhere yet.” They leaned over and rested their head on his shoulder, making his face flush brightly. “I just feel like my brain is mush.”
Lasko had never related to someone in a non-exact way. His mind was blank, filled with thoughts of how gentle and soft they were. Head leaning against his shoulder, hands grabbing his, and eyes closing as they tried to expel any leftover thoughts of academics from their brain.
“You did a great job today,” He said quietly, making them smile. Lasko tried to keep his awkwardness off of his face, so instead he just put an arm around their shoulders and used his other hand to put their stuff on the floor next to them.
“I definitely wouldn’t be able to do half of these things without Damien and you.” They mumbled tiredly.
Lasko felt his face heat up even more, “I-I’m sure that isn’t true, you’re very smart, I’m sure you would have been much faster if you hadn’t been so distracted.”
They just sighed and leaned against him even more, making his heart rate speed up.
The familiar feeling of being in their arms was a pleasant one, especially when they were tired and trusted him enough to be vulnerable with him. It never failed to pull his breath straight from his lungs.
“Does it count if you were the distraction?” They mumbled into the crook of his neck.
Lasko felt himself blush, but he knew there could have been a negative reason for him being a distraction. Maybe he shouldn’t have tried to tutor them, maybe he should’ve just left them alone so they could work faster and in peace.
“A wonderful distraction, Lasko.” They said reassuringly, making all of his doubts (and thoughts) disappear at the feeling of their lips brushing against the bare skin of his shoulder under the collar of his button-up.
“Th-thank you.” He stuttered breathlessly.
He felt them sigh against his skin before they pulled back, sitting themself down on their own bean bag chair. Lasko wanted to speak up about how they didn’t have to move (and keep the fact that he liked it to himself), but he stayed quiet so he wouldn’t be annoying.
“No,” They said gently, looking at him with a gentle care in their eyes that always turned his heart into a puddle of nothing, “thank you.”
Lasko could tell by their tone that a heartwarming monologue was gonna come out of their mouth, and he did his best to prepare himself for the waterworks. They were always good at making him cry, in the best way possible.
“You’ve been such a great help, with everything that I’ve come to you for,” They looked away from him to trace the patterns of their shoelaces. “Walking into this library was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Ever.” Lasko could already feel the sting in his eyes. “Meeting you…was the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
The Freelancer looked back to him, eyes flicking from his to somewhere else on his face he was too distracted to think about.
“Thank you, for everything. I-” They cut themself off. Lasko could see the panic in their eyes, and he could feel the sting in his eyes start to ebb away, his thoughts coming back so he could comfort them intelligibly.
“Is everything okay Freelancer?” He asked slowly.
They just bit their lip and nodded. “Yeah, everything’s good. I should probably go though, it’s getting late.”
The Freelancer started putting their stuff into their bag, and Lasko panicked.
“U-umm, you- you umm, you don’t have to leave i-if you don’t want to.” He whispered. As much as he wanted them to stay with him, hold him (he tried not to let his thoughts drift too far into a more romantic territory), sleep with him as they normally did, they always had a choice. If they wanted to leave, as much as he didn’t want them to, he had no right to stop them.
“Thanks Lasko, but I can’t stay tonight. I just…I just can’t.” Lasko could feel his self-hatred start to stir, and he obviously wasn’t good at hiding it. They always seemed to know. “I-it’s nothing you did, I swear. My feelings just aren’t behaving the way they’re supposed to.”
They zipped up their bag and slung their bag over their shoulder.
“You’re always a wonderful person to hang out with, no matter what we may be doing. Even just being next to you makes me happy. Thank you for always letting me bug you.” They sent him a faint smile, and he could feel his heart twist in confliction.
“You- I- you aren’t ‘bugging’ me, Freelancer. I want you to hang out with me be-because you’re a wonderful person that I- umm…that I care about.”
The Freelancer took a deep breath and startled him with a tight hug.
“Thank you, Lasko.”
They pressed their lips to his cheek, and they probably felt the heat that erupted at that spot as Lasko blushed.
“I’ll see you tomorrow,” He tried to focus on the feeling of them in his arms before they slipped away. “Love you.”
Lasko felt his grip go limp as his brain paused.
The Freelancer smiled sadly at him and hurriedly walked away, leaving Lasko alone to try to get the ability to think back, and to get his pounding heart to slow before he had a heart attack.
__________
“Please return it on the 19th, or call ahe-ahead of time to renew it.”
He said it in the same nervous yet blank way he had been for a while.
Lasko’s eyes scanned as much ground as he could cover, hoping he just missed them coming in while he scanned someone’s book to go. As hard as he looked though, he hadn’t managed to find even a sliver of them.
He sighed and closed his eyes, waiting for someone to show up so he could take his mind off the wonderful Freelancer that had confessed their love for him and ran away before he could even process what they had said, not returning so he could tell them he loved them as well.
“Hey buddy, rough day?” Lasko’s eyes opened when he heard Huxley’s voice, feeling thoughts of the Freelancer drift to the back of his mind.
Lasko smiled at him, “Umm, it’s been…i-interesting.”
Huxley put his elbows on the counter, that same wide grin on his face that Lasko hardly ever saw gone. He held out his fist, and Lasko gave Huxley a gentle fistbump, making Huxley chuckle.
“Interesting bad? Or interesting good?” He asked, and Lasko just took a deep breath and put his head in his hands. Huxley reached out and gave Lasko a pat on the head, making some of his distraught feelings ease away. Huxley was pretty good at getting people to feel better, if even a little bit.
“Interesting. I see.” Huxley said. “Is it that Freelancer again?”
Lasko could feel his heart start up quickly at the mention of them, his face burning a little. Huxley huffed in amusement, reading people was a thing he was also very good at. Lasko figured he was especially easy, seeing as he was one to scold his body for betraying him.
“Have you told them about your feelings yet?” Huxley asked Lasko, twirling a curly strand of Lasko’s hair as he tried to piece together what happened. Lasko tried not to think about how different it felt from when the Freelancer did it. It was just different.
Both the Freelancer and Huxley were very gentle. More gentle than anyone had ever been with Lasko, which was something that made his eyes sting. But the Freelancer’s touch was unlike anything Lasko had seemed to feel before.
“No,” Lasko mumbled, the sound muffled by his hands over his face. “But they did tell me that they love me.”
Huxley stopped twirling the hair, and Lasko could practically feel the grin coming from the excited ball of sunshine in front of him.
“Really dude? That’s awesome! What did you tell them?” Lasko could feel the flush of shame creep its way up his neck, the hot, prickly feeling more unpleasant than it had been in a while. Telling an AVID supporter of his relationship with the Freelancer that they hadn’t seen each other in a week would not bode well.
“I- um- I didn’t…I didn’t say any- I- I didn’t say anything,” He said in shame, feeling Huxley’s grin turned into a confused smile. Lasko picked his head up from his hands and saw his prediction confirmed.
“You didn’t say anything?”
It wasn’t judgmental. It wasn’t rude. It wasn’t disappointing. It was just Huxley being confused and not understanding why Lasko would not tell the person he loved that he loved them back.
Lasko appreciated Huxley for just being his same old self.
“We-well I couldn’t. Th-they j-just ran off bef-before I could say anything. And they haven’t come back to talk- talk about it in a week.”
Huxley furrowed his eyebrows and gave Lasko a sympathetic look. He reached out to give Lasko another pat on the head, ruffling his hair and making Lasko smile.
“I’m sure they’ll be back to talk about it soon dude. That’s kind of a shitty thing to do to someone but I’m sure they have their reasons for doing it.” He said reassuringly, making Lasko’s heart soften. Huxley always sounded like someone you could believe, like something that was true dripped like water into your ears, even when you didn’t believe it originally.
Huxley would never lie about what he was thinking. Lasko believed that Huxley genuinely thought he would have a chance to tell the Freelancer how he felt. The truth didn’t pour out like honey. It ran down easily and quickly like water.
Some people may not have liked drinking water, but Huxley was always the one in a group to remind everyone to hydrate.
“Thanks Hux, that really helps,” Lasko said truthfully, resting his elbows on the counter. He kept his eyes on the bookshelves, not looking around for them for the first time in a week. “It really does.”
Lasko took one more deep breath, actually feeling the air enter his lungs, and pushed himself off the counter so he could put on his friendly professional voice.
“Alright, anything you wanted some help with Hux? You want some help with your Elemental class or help finding a book?”
Huxley almost answered, but his head turned and his mouth just stayed open, no words coming out. Lasko leaned over in concern so he would be in Huxley’s field of view before he turned around and his breath was pulled from his lungs in a way he couldn’t feel.
He missed that.
“He’s hot.” Huxley said, and Lasko almost laughed.
“He is a Fire Elemental.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
He made eye contact with the Freelancer, and they immediately looked away from him, making his heart ache a little. His subconscious came up with an idea that would give both him and Huxley golden opportunities.
“I-I’m gonna go ta-talk to them, c-can you keep Damien company?”
Huxley mouthed Damien’s name twice, and Lasko could tell that Huxley was trying to tear his gaze away from Damien. Lasko smiled and assumed that Huxley would be happy to do it.
__________
“I’m so sorry I-I just didn’t want to hear what you had to say because I was fucking terrified because I haven’t felt like this in like, ever, and you always made it easy to love you but I don’t think I ever really made it easy to love me because I’m just not as good as you and i-it hurts, but I also didn’t want to make things awkward between the two of us because we’re great friends and I didn’t- don’t, want to ruin things between us-”
“Freelancer?” Lasko said quietly, “Please breathe.”
They stopped talking and sucked in a deep breath, making him smile at how similar the two of them could be. He shuffled a little closer to them and reached a hesitant hand out to pull them in gently by the shoulder.
The Freelancer practically jumped into his arms, making Lasko smile and stare at the floor in contentment over their shoulder.
“I-I’m not better than you, and yo-you could never make it awkward between us, especially not with something like that.”
He felt their hand reach up to run it through his hair, and he sighed happily. He wasn’t gonna say it just yet, he wanted to stay in their arms in quiet after being Freelancer Deprived for a week. Now that they had come back, he would get to do that as much as he wanted without being rushed to tell them how much they meant to him.
“I missed you,” Lasko admitted, feeling the gentle flush of shame crawl back up to his cheeks. It was still uncomfortably hot and prickly on his skin, but it was much more pleasant when it came to them. At least the words poured like water rather than honey.
They pressed a kiss on his shoulder, their lips unfortunately blocked from his skin because of his sweater vest. “I missed you too Lasko. I’m sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize, I get why you did it.” The water dripped faster than he would have liked, but it was still better than honey. “I probably wou-would’ve done the same th-thing if I was you.” He knew the Freelancer was more of a water person anyway.
“H-honestly…if you had given me the chance to tell you how I felt first, I definitely would’ve done the same- umm- the same th-thing.”
Lasko knew hearts were weird in the way they were connected to a person’s emotional state. He knew the Freelancer felt the same way that he did (at least, he was pretty sure it was romantic on both ends), but that didn’t stop his heart from hammering in his chest, making Lasko feel like he would explode on the spot.
“B-because I-I’m scared of loving people. A-and I know I don’t ha-have to be, but I’m afraid of lo-lov-loving you,” He mumbled into their (Damien’s) hoodie. “Yo-you’re just…amazing. And I’m afraid you’ll realize I’m not that great.”
The Freelancer pulled back and put a hand over his mouth, surprising him. “You are. And I won’t hear anything other than you’re wonderful, and you are worthy of more love than how much this world has to offer and give. And I have no trouble telling you that every single day that you let me stay in your life.”
They pulled their hand away and rested their forehead against his. Lasko’s eyes flicked from their eyes, down to their lips, and back to their closed eyes. He could easily kiss them. All he had to do was tell them how he felt and ask permission.
“I love you.” Lasko said.
They let out a breath and opened their eyes.
“Can I kiss you?” The Freelancer asked.
“Please do.” Lasko said.
The Freelancer put a hand in his hair and gently held his head in place (gently enough that he could have pulled away any second he wanted, he felt his eyes sting a little) and kissed him. Lasko made sure he savored every second, the butterflies in his stomach flying around as rapidly as book pages in front of a fan.
“Love you.” They mumbled in between kisses, and Lasko pulled them as close to him as he could.
Lasko felt like he was reading a romance novel. A nerdy guy who was constantly at the library finally getting together with the kind, sweet, flawed yet perfect person, their lips coming together as easily as water to the ocean.