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“You’ve been reading my mind?!” Jaskier shrieked.
“No,” groaned Geralt, “it’s not like that.” He squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed the bridge of his nose, regretting every choice he had made in his life that led him to that moment.
“How could you?! You never said!!”
Geralt had actually thought that Jaskier already knew about his enhanced senses. The bard’s ballads were so exaggerated, you’d think Geralt was some kind of all powerful mage.
So when he had said,
“Back already?”
And Jaskier had said,
“Granted, it was a quick fuck, but I got off twice.”
And Geralt had said,
“You did not. You haven’t been whoring around since last spring at the Belleteyn festival in Gors Velen. I thought going without cock for this long would be a life threatening condition for you. Should I call for a physician?”
Well. The look on Jaskier’s face. The sound that came out of his mouth. It had started loud and screeching and had spiraled into this.
Geralt shouldn’t have said anything. He knew that. But the urge to provoke Jaskier was growing steadier by the day. Every time Jaskier left him, Geralt’s stomach felt like it was contracting and twisting into calcified knots. And when his friend came back, smelling of nothing but vodka and his own sweat, his relief was overwhelming. And that pissed him off.
So he poked at him.
Geralt’s shoulder blades rested against the door of their shared room. He crossed his arms and glowered with all his might. He hoped beyond hope that this would shut down the conversation. Granted, he could have been less of a smug asshole, but that didn’t mean he wanted to talk about it. He really did not want to talk about it.
“Ohhhh ho ho, I don’t think so, Geralt.” Jaskier raised an indignant finger. “Don’t even try your constipated little angry face. I do not give a single shit about your theatrics. Do you think I don’t know melodrama when I see it?”
Why? Why had he opened his big mouth? What had he even been trying to prove? Oh he knew. He knew it, he just hated to admit it. In some deep, dark, shameful corner of his heart, he had been hoping to hear Jaskier say oh Geralt, I don’t fuck people as often anymore because I want you, dear witcher. Big strong witcher. Sexy witcher.
He was an idiot. An absolute idiot for wanting such a thing from his friend. But he knew that already. He didn’t need enhanced senses for that.
Geralt heaved an exhausted sigh. “Stop it.” He gently but firmly removed Jaskier’s finger from where it shook in front of his face.
Jaskier sucked in a breath, ready to launch into a tirade. But when Geralt grasped his hand, he stuttered to a stop and fell silent. He glanced down at where Geralt was touching him and a flush crept across his cheeks.
Geralt sensed the window of opportunity and leaned in. “Jaskier” —he tilted his head forward and employed his best I’m trying to be reasonable here face— “to be fair, a drunken rat could tell when you’re lying.”
Jaskier wheezed shakily. “Rude!” He had on his outraged face. But Geralt hadn’t released his hand yet, which seemed to be scattering his nerves. “You leave Gordon out of this. He’s not a rat, he’s a mouse, and he’s got nothing to do with it.”
“Gordon?” Geralt blinked, momentarily stumped.
“As if you don’t know. You can read my mind. You know everything.”
Geralt finally let go of Jaskier’s hand. Its warmth slipped from him and he clenched his fist on nothing. Jaskier exhaled.
“Look,” Geralt continued, “it’s not mind reading. It’s feelings. And normal, non-mutated people can tell what others are feeling too. Can’t they? You can tell how people feel. Can’t you?”
“That’s different.” Jaskier crossed his arms and hunched forward. He had performed for several hours before he slipped out to supposedly fuck a blacksmith, so he still had his post-performance glow, despite his sour mood.
Not that Geralt noticed his post-performance glow on purpose. It was his damned senses. He couldn’t help it.
“Is it? Is it different?” Geralt looked at him with raised, dubious eyebrows.
“Yes!”
“It isn’t though. Think about it. How can you tell when someone is angry?”
“Well, Geralt, you can tell I’m angry because I am telling you that you are an asshole.”
Geralt pretended he didn’t notice the sarcasm. “Exactly. Or because your arms are crossed.” He gestured at Jaskier’s arms where he held them tight against his chest. Under Geralt’s scrutiny, he released them and laid them back at his side.
“Or, because your lips kind of—” Geralt gestured at his own lips, wiggling his fingers “—puff up.”
Jaskier blinked in surprise. He brought his fingers to his lips. “Puff—?”
Geralt swallowed hard. “You know. They… pout. Stick out. Look kind of…” His voice trailed off.
“Kind of what, Geralt?” Jaskier deadpanned. “My lips look kind of what?”
“The point is,” Geralt said strenuously, suddenly feeling the need to mop his brow with a sleeve, “my heightened senses are the same. It’s just putting together physical clues. I can just…add a few clues to the list.”
Jaskier narrowed his eyes dubiously. “Like what, exactly.”
“Ahhhh.” Geralt looked around as he gathered his thoughts. “Heartbeat. Pupil dilation. It’s not mystical. I just don’t have to stand close to see your eyes or press my ear to your chest to hear--” Geralt’s eyes dropped to where the generous thatch of chest hair peeked out from Jaskier’s open shirt. He tended to unlace everything after a performance to “air himself out,” and he traipsed around like that, driving Geralt to madness. “--your heartbeat.”
Geralt cleared his throat with an awkward hack and refocused on Jaskier’s face.
“Ok, and what else?” demanded Jaskier. He was growing more confident in the conversation, which was never a good sign. Not for Geralt, anyway.
Geralt shrugged. “I can smell more.” He mopped his brow again.
“Like sweat? If someone is nervous?”
“Yes. And pheromones.”
Jaskier yelped and stood up stock straight, startling Geralt. “Pheromones?? You know when I’m horny?!?!”
Geralt frowned. “Sure.”
He said it casually, though Jaskier reacted as though it was the single most humiliating thing that anyone had ever said.
His friend began to flail again and the register of his voice crept up to one better suited for dogs. “You absolute rat fucking bastard! I am never speaking to you again!”
Really. Did they have to do this? Geralt rolled his eyes and groaned dismissively.
“Yes, Jaskier, like everyone else on the continent, I know that you’re horny literally all the time. Who cares?”
Jaskier jammed his hands on his hips. “I care. Because that means you know that whenever you are close enough to scent me, I am horny.”
It was like a warning bell. There was something going on in this conversation that Geralt was missing. Also, Jaskier was standing right in front of him talking about lust and desire and him and...
“Right,” he said slowly. “You’re always horny.”
He was sure he had said the wrong thing. But he didn’t know how or why. And he was beginning to hope that Jaskier was saying that he wanted Geralt, but there was no way that was true.
“Do you really not see how those two things are different?” Jaskier’s eyes lit up maniacally.
He was standing close. So close. Geralt couldn’t think. And if he were being honest, he was extremely grateful that Jaskier could not scent lust. Maybe it was a tad unnerving when you couldn’t hide it. He tried to focus, replaying his words, and comparing them to what Jaskier had said.
Jaskier was claiming that he wasn’t horny literally all the time. He was claiming that Geralt just thought he was, because whenever he was around him---
“Wait for it…” said Jaskier with a voice so dry it could rival Geralt’s legendary sarcasm.
Geralt’s eyes widened in shocked realization. His jaw fell open, and his lips parted with a soft pop. “You feel. For me? No. That’s not true.”
Jaskier sang about sex and love. He wrote about sex and love. And people threw themselves at him at every performance. Geralt had always assumed that the warm, percolating, barely restrained desire that clung to the bard was just a permanent condition. And if it had been in response to any individual, it would have been for the fetching young farmboys and pretty infatuated barmaids. Not for him.
Though. That was a nice thought, wasn’t it?
It was.
Too late, Geralt realized that his frozen expression of shock could also be taken as one of horror.
Jaskier slapped his arms against his side. “See what I mean? A pox on it. This is fucking humiliating. I’m leaving.”
“Where are you going?” Geralt blurted out.
“Anywhere but here.”
“When are you coming back?” he demanded. Shit. He sounded plaintive.
“Never.”
Before he could stop himself, Geralt slapped a hand on the door. “Stop. This isn’t fair.”
And now he was whining. Fuck.
Jaskier let go of the handle and turned the full fire of his furious blue eyes on him. Geralt almost took a step back.
“It isn’t fair, Geralt?!”
Geralt cringed at his defiant anger. But the witcher stood his ground. “No. I can’t help that I have these powers.”
It was true. It wasn’t fair. It’s not like he’d chosen to have enhanced senses. And it’s not like there was a guidebook for when to notify your best friend that you knew far more about him than he realized. Also. He didn’t want Jaskier to leave. He just didn’t.
Not over this.
“Let’s talk fair, Geralt,” Jaskier shot back. He was so furious his voice trembled. “You know everything I feel, and I know fuck all about how you feel, because you never tell me anything. It’s an unequal friendship Geralt. And I hate it. I feel so…exposed.”
Jaskier spun again and yanked at the door handle. He actually got the door open a crack.
“Wait!” Geralt almost shouted. The desperation in his voice shocked the both of them.
“What? What, Geralt?”
Geralt stammered and scratched the back of his head. His eyes slid away. Jaskier huffed and turned again to leave.
Geralt’s hand shot out, seemingly of its own accord. Jaskier looked down at Geralt’s hand curled gently around his bicep. This was the second time tonight he had touched Jaskier for no good reason. He couldn’t think too hard about that right now. He began speaking fast, pushing the words out before he could take them back.
“Youcouldlistentomyheartbeat.”
Jaskier pushed the door closed with a click, and thankfully he was still on the inside of the room. Geralt heaved a sigh of relief. Jaskier was staying. This would be fine. It would be fine.
“What was that, Geralt?”
“Alright.” Geralt looked at the floor. “Say you…listened to my heartbeat. And you stood close enough to me to see my pupils. You would have the same information I have.”
Jaskier sucked in his cheeks and considered for a moment. Then he shrugged. “Alright.”
He took a step into Geralt’s space.
Geralt hadn’t thought this one through.
Fuck.
He could feel the warmth of Jaskier’s breath against his neck.
“You can see my pupils?” he breathed.
Jaskier hummed in the affirmative. That fetching flush was back on his cheeks, the one that made his eyes stand out, making them an even more powerful a force on Geralt, if that was possible.
Geralt inhaled and found the courage to reach for Jaskier’s hand again. He dragged it to his chest and with both hands, pressed Jaskier’s palm to his chest. It was so warm. And real. And touching him.
“And that is my heart,” he said stupidly. He tried to cover it with a joke. “You see, I have one after all.”
Jaskier’s lips curled into a devious smile. He tilted his head. “We still aren’t even, Geralt.”
“No?”
They were almost pressed against each other now, chest rising and falling together.
“No.” He flicked his eyelashes up and caught Geralt’s gaze. “I still can’t scent your lust. So how,” he brought his second hand up to press against Geralt’s chest, “am I supposed to know when you’re feeling desire?”
Well, thought Geralt. It is now or never. He had to act before he was shocked by his own audacity. He hooked his fingers in Jaskier’s waistband and with a firm yank plastered him against his chest. Jaskier’s eyes widened. His lips were right… there.
“Can I just. Show you?”
Jaskier whimpered and nodded. Geralt could feel Jaskier’s knees going weak. So he wrapped his arms tight around his waist, and he kissed him.
Geralt could hear his blood, feel the thud of his pulse. He could scent his own fear dissipate, leaving only affection and joy and desire.
They kissed soft and tentative at first. Then they grew desperate and searching. Geralt cradled Jaskier’s face like it was precious. He gripped him tighter, and pressed his tongue between his lips. It was a long time coming, so neither had any intention of leaving it at one polite kiss.
He would have thought that a kiss between friends would have a wobbly air of doubt and awkwardness at first. But somehow, it didn’t. It just didn’t. It was simply right. Natural. They already knew each other so intimately, that Geralt responded to the familiar, delicious noises, squeezing tighter, shifting position, responding to Jaskier’s passion with his own.
Jaskier was here. With him. They would be like this now, he knew it. He could feel it. Instead of leaving him each night to pantomime affairs that never existed, he could stay in his arms where he belonged.
They kissed until they were both out of breath, and they staggered closer to the bed. When they finally pulled apart, Geralt looked carefully into his eyes and asked with a smirk, “Are we even now?”
Jaskier smiled primly. “I’ll let you know.”
And he dragged Geralt into bed.