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“You. Fucker.” Kaveh gritted out from the floor, arms crossed over his body, rubbing his shoulders in an attempt to create some frictional warmth, “I understand we don’t have the best of relationships, but it’s common courtesy not to lock someone out of their own house!”
Al-Haitham looked down at the shivering man who was -in return- staring at him with vitriol. The former scribe casted a blank gaze of his own, immediately giving his retort, “Seems you have failed to notice that it is my house, and that you should have checked your person before leaving.”
Kaveh remained on the floor, but looked like he had half a mind to jump up and strangle Al-Haitham then and there, “Well I’m afraid that I had the very reasonable thought process of trusting your roommate to come home before you, as per the ushe!”
Al-Haitham scoffed, and stepped over the architect’s feet to unlock the door, feeling the warmth of thei- his house mix with the cool Sumeru night air. He could make sense of where Kaveh was coming from. Most of the time, Al-Haitham would return home prior to the other, regardless of the late nights he worked at the Akademiya. And if Kaveh wasn’t out? The man was inside feverishly working on new designs or improving old ones. Still, Al-Haitham couldn’t believe an Akademiya graduate didn’t think to check they had their keys on them. What flippant behavior. Once again stepping over Kaveh’s feet, Al-Haitham situated himself to where he was before, bending down to wrap his hands underneath the backs of Kaveh’s knees.
“Woah! What in Teyvat do you think you’re doing!?” Kaveh exclaimed, shuffling across the stone porch to get away from Al-Haitham’s outstretched arms.
“Carrying you inside, since you insist on being such a child.” Al-Haitham responded flatly, making another grab for Kaveh, to which he succeeded, hauling the other man up into his arms. It was petty, but Al-Haitham was in the mood for messing with his roommate.
Al-Haitham stepped into the house, shoes meeting wood instead of stone. As this transition was being made, Kaveh haughtily voiced his reservations, “The joke is on you, Scribe or… whatever you are now: children don’t have to pay bills.”
Al-Haitham knew better than to respond. If he did, they would be at it all night. Besides, even though Kaveh sounded discontented, his voice held the same shiver his body did. It was hard to take Kaveh seriously in the state he was in. Not like Al-Haitham ever did. At his silence, Kaveh irritatedly crossed his arms and furtively settled into Al-Haitham’s chest, trying to find more heat. Al-Haitham took note of this, amusedly huffing to himself. To anyone else, the noise would sound like an exasperated sigh instead.
Closing the door behind him with his heel, Al-Haitham strolled over to the couch and unceremoniously dropped Kaveh onto it, letting the man practically roll off his arms. If Kaveh was holding onto Al-Haitham’s neck instead of crossing his arms, then maybe the former scribe would have lowered him down slower. A simple fault of Kaveh's own. Weaving between a small table and the sofa’s armrest, Al-Haitham moved to lock the door, stopping when a noise rose up from the couch. A soft sneeze. Then another. And another.
“ Mehar kare. ” Al-Haitham muttered under his breath as he continued his trek.
“Thanks.” Kaveh replied, forgoing any inflection.
He dutifully locked the door- placing both house keys in a platter near said door, taking care to assure that Kaveh heard two keys clinking against ceramic. Kaveh scoffed offendedly, but any further protest died in his throat when Al-Haitham spun around and started off to his room. Kaveh desperately called after him, “Where are you going? Are you not going to check on me?”
Al-Haitham cocked his eyebrow.
“And why -pray tell- would I do that?”
“Because it's the nice thing to do to a potentially sick person. Not like you know how to be gracious.”
“You took the words out of my mouth, I’m going to bed.”
Continuing to try to retire for the night, Al-Haitham heard Kaveh struggling to get up, “Wait! You’ve been loitering around with your friends while I’ve been out- painstakingly trying to make sense of what happened while I was gone! I’m cold and hungry and probably sick. At least have enough decency to make me cha , let alone dinner.”
Al-Haitham had something to say in return, but he bit it back. Perhaps being around such empathetic people had changed Al-Haitham’s worldview, he was seriously considering making the two of them some cha . There was a strict lack of hot beverages at the celebration, and Al-Haitham wouldn’t mind something hot either. He reached an agreement with himself, “Fine. Stop being a freeloader and get yourself a blanket, and I’ll make you your cha . If I see you haven’t fufflied my request, I will drink every last drop in front of you.”
Still holding onto the couch’s backrest for support, Kaveh groaned and pushed off the sofa. While retreating to his room to grab a blanket, he deliberately bumped Al-Haitham’s shoulder. Al-Haitham might as well just sell him off to Zubayr Theatre with his abundance of vexing theatrics.
It wouldn’t take long to simply grab a blanket, so Al-Haitham figured he should get the ingredients out in the meantime. Conveniently enough, all that Al-Haitham had to do was take a couple of diagonal steps left to reach his destination. Mentally checking off the list of what he would need, Al-Haitham took the various components he needed out of the cupboards he’d rummaged through. Soon, all the ingredients were neatly arranged in a row on the kitchen island, meticulously placed in the order in which Al-Haitham would use them. It was habitual, reflective of the way Al-Haitham went about doing everything.
Squatting down to open the cupboard containing their cookware, Al-Haitham arbitrarily pulled out a pot and moved to the sink to fill the container with water. He stopped when the water filled a quarter of the pot’s volume, placing it on the stove and leaving it to boil. Finally did Al-Haitham address the question gnawing at his mind, how long did it take to grab a blanket? Al-Haitham was everything but lazy, but he couldn’t be bothered to check on Kaveh at the moment. Being out in the cold alone wasn’t enough to make Kaveh devastatingly ill.
Nipping his running thoughts in the bud, the slightly muted sound of a door opening reached his ears and out of the hallway emerged Kaveh. He was clad in white nightwear and a vibrant red blanket loosely wrapped around his person like a shawl, only one hand preventing it from falling. Both of Kaveh’s hands would be focused on keeping the blanket on his shoulders if not for the notebook and pencil the architect was clutching at his chest. Kaveh looked just about ready to make the floor beneath him his bed with how mused his hair was and how his citrine eyes were threatening to close. Groggy, would be the word for it. Not paying any mind to Al-Haitham, Kaveh trudged to the couch and tiredly plopped down, resting his feet on the armrest.
“I didn’t know you could follow orders.” Al-Haitham teased apathetically, turning back to peer into the steadily heating water while leaning against the counter.
Kaveh clicked his tongue before delivering his riposte, his words in a sleepy kind of slur, “You say that as if I followed your orders to a tee. Not only did I change my clothes, but I brought a sketchbook and pencil with me. I’m perpetuating the quality of expressing myself amidst authority.”
“You’re being unreasonable again. There isn’t much pomp and circumstance to simply changing your clothes and bringing additional items, curb your ego.”
“Hmph. Curb your conflict-hungry mind.”
“Same to you. It's much too late for this.”
Al-Haitham heard the soft and muffled thud of Kaveh falling back onto the sofa after their exchange. Barely a minute had passed, and the water was nowhere near boiled. Al-Haitham estimated it would take a whole three minutes until the water was up to speed. He might as well crush the cardamom pods while he waited, pushing off the counter towards the island to grab the container filled with the pods he needed. Al-Haitham unscrewed the lid and decided that they wouldn’t have to replenish their supply anytime soon, his mind soon recalling the reason why. Both Kaveh and Al-Haitham agreed that two pods were enough when it came to cha , the flavor being a bit too bitter for even his own tastes. In quick succession, he grabbed two pods, screwed the lid back on, and tossed the items into the mortar waiting on the counter. By now, the house had three noises in it: the popping and sizzling of water, the scratches of a pencil against paper, and the light taps of a pestle against the hard exterior of cardamom pods.
“Al-Haitham?”
“What.”
The shells had cracked.
“Blue or purple?”
“Blue.”
The grainy contents of the pods spill out.
“Hm. Purple looks better.”
“Suit yourself.”
The pestle grinds the black substance to near dust.
The water was definitely boiling now. Loose leaf black tea, fennel seeds, and cardamom, then more of the 30 second waiting game. Never had making cha felt so long. Painfully long process or not, the drink desperately needed milk.
Kaveh was the one who had the bright idea to purchase a newfangled device from Fontaine that he saw being used at the Bimarstan. It truly was a marvel of technology, a huge container using harnessed electro energy to keep an area at a cold enough temperature to make sure it wouldn’t soil. It had a longer name to it, but Kaveh had always called it “the fridge” to the point that Al-Haitham disregarded the device’s real name. Moving past the kitchen’s island to pull the cold steel handle with a little less energy than he expected, Al-Haitham dug through the fridge in hopes of finding what he was looking for to no avail.
“Check behind the sabji .” Kaveh hinted, his finger appearing from behind the backrest.
Sure enough, the milk was behind the sabji . Al-Haitham had to accede to the fact that this was one of the benefits of living with Kaveh. Something about how architects recall the layouts of things. Something about how Kaveh was his other-
“Haitham! Hurry up!” Kaveh lamented, kicking his feet on the armrest like a toddler.
Pouring the milk into the pot, Al-Haitham rolled his eyes and placed the milk back into the fridge with a slam. Maybe his compliments earlier were misguided.
“I never intended to become a father, but here I am raising a kid.” Al-Haitham quipped, staring intently at the pot filled with a now light brown liquid and various other solid ingredients set to be decanted later. Cha tended to boil over after milk was added, so watching it every step of the way was crucial.
“I hope the cha boils over and combusts in your face, leaving you bald .” Kaveh snarked, the drop of a notebook on a table punctuating his words.
Al-Haitham would have shot something back if not for a white foam threatening to spill out of the pot. Al-Haitham abruptly cut off the heat and watched as the cha simmered down.
“Add sugar!”
“I will. Where are our sieves?”
“Second drawer island drawer to the left. Might have to look underneath the black ladle.”
Unsurprisingly, the sieves were in the second island drawer to the left underneath the handle of a black ladle. Kshahrewar scholars , Al-Haitham commented, while looking through their overhead cupboards. Another -less bright- idea of Kaveh’s was to get them matching cups as a joke, it had become an unspoken tradition to use them together no matter what. They’d been doing it for so long that Al-Haitham couldn’t recall when they started. The warm brown liquid steadily poured into the cups, stray seeds and leaves being left behind in the sieve.
“How many cubes?” Al-Haitham questioned over his shoulder, working on filling the other cup.
“Hmm. Two. Wait no, three!” Kaveh decided, twisting around to sit upright and rest his head in his arms over the backrest.
“You’re getting two.” Al-Haitham stated matter-of-factly, getting an irritated huff in return. Taking two cubes from the sugar bowl in the middle of the island, Al-Haitham began to carefully drop them in, taking care not to let the scalding liquid splash on his fingers. Al-Haitham wasn’t one to add sugar to his drinks so it seemed he was done. He felt a huge sense of completion that was wholly unexpected. Archons, he was tired.
Lifting both cups off the counter, Al-Haitham strode over to Kaveh who was expectantly holding out his hand. Al-Haitham gingerly handed the man the beverage, fingers brushing as he transferred ownership. For some reason, Al-Haitham couldn’t help but linger in that position for a while. The contact was reluctantly broken by Kaveh, spinning back around to settle into the couch. Going around the right of the sofa, Al-Haitham weaved through the same small table as before to take his place on the couch next to Kaveh. The man looked quite snug, almost melting into the couch with his legs bent to the side, the blanket furthering his comfort. That comfort wouldn’t last for long as Al-Haitham maliciously tugged some of the cover away for himself, also settling into the couch with one of his legs drawn up. Kaveh snorted and rolled his eyes before taking a sample of his drink, those same eyes suddenly widening.
“Ah! Hot!” Kaveh yelped, keeping the cup away from his body like the plague and fanning his tongue as if the meager air would fix his problems.
“ Cha , straight from the stove, being hot? How curious. We should research this.” Al-Haitham deadpanned, taking a tentative sip of his own through his teeth. All that Al-Haitham tasted was heat and his scorched taste buds at the tip of his tongue.
“Ha. Ha. We should get you a gig at Zubayr Theatre.” Kaveh impassively stated, nudging Al-Haitham’s shoulder with his elbow. Kaveh was completely unaware that Al-Haitham only hummed mirthfully because of the callback he’d unknowingly made. The two sat in silence making occasional attempts to drink their cha before Kaveh piped up once more, “Y’know, I half expected you to thank me for waiting up. It would add to your comedic streak.”
“I’m not that grateful towards you, joke or not.”
“Are you ever going to tell me what happened at your little celebration?”
Al-Haitham reminisced on the surprise divine visit.
“It’s no secret, but I don’t see why you need to know.”
Kaveh yawned, squinting his eyes open and shut before resting himself against Al-Haitham’s side, “Figures.”
Initially, Al-Haitham tensed up but soon he also relaxed, even going as far to slightly tilt his head in Kaveh’s direction. It was natural. Just comforting a friend. It was just comforting a friend, but when Al-Haitham tried to support his point by putting other people in Kaveh’s place…it didn’t feel the same. When he thought of other people, the warmth that was in his body would leave him, as if he would die if it wasn’t Kaveh at his side. Al-Haitham had an idea what this was about, but he was so tired he didn’t dare open that can of worms.
Glancing down at Kaveh, he realized that the man was barely conscious, evident by light snores coming from Al-Haitham’s left and the sight of Kaveh’s grip on the handle of his cha slowly loosening. If Al-Haitham moved, he dared waking up the man next to him. It wasn’t common courtesy that made him think that however, it was the selfish reason of wanting the man to stay by his side. He reassured himself that he will address this newfound issue in the future. Al-Haitham’s vision glowed lightly at his hip as a sentient branch took Kaveh’s cup from him and cautiously placed it on the coffee table.
“If I get sick by tomorrow, you’re paying for my hospital bills.” Al-Haitham muttered as the branch dissipated. Another branch -not of his own making- reached up from the floor to evenly distribute the blanket amongst the two men before also disappearing.
“The Bimarstan has free healthcare.” Kaveh murmured, further nuzzling himself into Al-Haitham’s side. He felt a weird feeling of wanting to tear off all the skin that Kaveh touched. Directly or indirectly.
“Then I’d find a place that charges.” Al-Haitham mumbled, getting a grumpy noise of dissent as a response.
Al-Haitham’s hands were awkwardly laying on his lap. He really didn’t know what to do with them besides that. Would Kaveh mind if he reciprocated the man’s soothing contact? At that moment, Kaveh suddenly shifted forward a bit, leaving a gap between his back and the couch. As per the usual, Al-Haitham connected the dots. How the architect knew what Al-Haitham was thinking, he didn’t know.
Wrapping his arm around Kaveh’s waist, he pulled the man closer hands feeling a soft cotton that had warmth emanating from beneath it. Like a moth drawn to a flame, Al-Haitham was stuck with a desperate need to shed the layer that kept him from reveling in the heat’s entirety. It was becoming increasingly obvious this wasn’t what normal roommates did. What did it matter though? Under no circumstance were the two of them, “normal roommates.” Surprisingly, Al-Haitham was at peace internally and externally, listening to Kaveh’s soft snores and zoning in on the architect’s slightly closed hand resting on his thigh. The more he looked back, the more he digested how domestic their night was. Carrying the man into the house, making him tea, and now almost sleeping on the couch with him.Al-Haitham further realized that they were like this most of the time. The most shocking part of his revelations was: Al-Haitham liked the feeling of domesticity with Kaveh.
As much as Kaveh annoyed him, there was no one else in Teyvat who helped keep his mind sharp as Kaveh did. Sure, Al-Haitham argued with plenty of other people, but none of them lived with him. None of them had seen him at 3 in the morning tirelessly trying to decipher desert runes. None of them had seen him pass out after a great many sleepless nights. None of them had ever seen Al-Haitham vulnerable. But Kaveh had. He always did. Even if they didn’t live together, there was always something about Kaveh that made Al-Haitham want to cut open his stomach and lay every part of himself bare in front of the scholar, even against his better judgment. He’d said earlier he wouldn’t open this can of worms, but now the worms were free and eating at his brain.
All the evidence was pointing in one direction, he loved Kaveh. His eyes, his intellect, his lips, his hands, his creations, his-
Al-Haitham didn’t know what was happening to himself. The urge to kiss Kaveh stupid and breathless, to keep him on this couch and never let him go, and the urge to forever keep destroying the man in arguments made him feel too big for his skin. If his skeleton ripped out of his body to run to Kaveh, then he would be content with the knowledge that at least some part of him was with the man he…loved. This came as a slight shock to Al-Haitham, as just a couple months back he thought the opposite. Somehow, it pained him to know that Kaveh would leave. He would get his own money and move out. Al-Haitham was basically wishing upon a star when he hoped the man would want to stay with him.
His roommate was fast asleep at this point, it was made obvious by how still a usually sporadic Kaveh was. He looked down at the man and was met by a mass of blonde hair. Kaveh’s head was set at Al-Haitham's shoulder, little wisps of hair tickling Al-Haitham’s face. Lightly tugging the man rightward by the waist, Al-Haitham placed a hesitant kiss on the man’s head. The way he felt could only be cornily described as something like, “his heart fluttered.” Was this how love really felt like? Al-Haitham would punch the architect's face in a heartbeat, but he would also strive to protect it like a precious artifact. Was love really just a series of juxtapositions? Kill for or die for? Forgive like an idiot or to forget like an idiot? Love seemed to be too turbulent for the common person’s liking, especially with someone like Kaveh. But this kind of turbulence was what Al-Haitham lived for. With the return of their god, the leave of the Akasha, and the various other developments underway, perhaps Al-Haitham should also grow and give this love thing a try. He had a feeling Kaveh would receive him just fine.
During his internal ramblings, he was idly sipping at his cha, the mug now colder and half-empty (Kaveh would say it was half full). Setting his own cup down in the same fashion he did Kaveh’s, Al-Haitham soon managed to tear his eyes away from the spot where he’d kissed Kaveh before. He angled his body just so, delicately rested his head against Kaveh’s, and slowly closed his eyes. Al-Haitham willingly let sleep take him. A dream was waiting for him after all, and Al-Haitham knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Kaveh would be there with him. With the aftermath of a celebration came another thing to be celebrated.
—
When Al-Haitham got up the next morning, he was greeted by the living room being covered in tinted sunlight that flooded in through the windows and curtains, two long cold and unfinished cups of cha on the coffee table, and a comforting warm weight against his side. He would’ve called it nice, if not for the agonizing neck and back pain he felt from sleeping upright all night, and the reminder that he would have to deal with Kaveh’s complaints about his own pain. Even now, the man was preemptively groaning while waking. Forget love, he should have just left Kaveh out on the porch.