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Charlie’s head was pillowed on Nick’s chest, his fingers skimming over Nick’s soft stomach, and he was trying to figure out how to tell him he’d been asked on a date. Nick was running his fingers through Charlie’s hair, occasionally placing a soft kiss to his temple, and Charlie was struggling with how to explain that he was being pursued by someone else. They’d just finished a particularly sweet bout of intimacy, Charlie felt utterless boneless, and he needed to somehow tell Nick he couldn’t keep doing this.
When Charlie had first met Nick — at a house party thrown by his new friends, Tara and Darcy — he’d immediately been drawn to him. How could he not be; Nick was tall and broad and soft, so handsome in a way that still somehow felt comfortable and approachable. And Nick had apparently been drawn to Charlie as well, at least that was the impression he got when they ended up making out in the corner of the living room a mere half an hour later.
After that first time, they just kept… hooking up. Initially, it was only at parties, both gravitating towards each other and ending the night entangled in some way. Soon, after Nick had insisted they exchange numbers, it morphed into scheduled hook-ups, no pretense of a party required. And then they started hanging out afterwards, studying or watching a movie or just talking. They’d catch meals together and meet at the campus coffee shop every morning before class, sharing a muffin and grumbling about the day ahead.
Charlie wasn’t sure when they’d transitioned from random strangers hooking up to hook-ups who occasionally hang out to inseparable friends who also happen to hook up with each other, but he didn’t want to question it. Nick was maybe the best thing to ever happen to him, and he wasn’t about to complicate that with logistics.
A finger ran over Charlie’s face, smoothing out the wrinkle that had appeared between his eyes, snapping him out of his thoughts and into the present. “What’s got you so stressed?”
I thought I was okay with us just being friends with benefits but someone else asked me out and I’ve realised that I don’t want to go out with someone who isn’t you but that’s not what this is and I don’t know what to do about it because this isn’t enough but I don’t want anyone else.
“Mm, nothing.” Charlie nuzzled into Nick’s chest.
“Char, I know you. You don’t get that little crinkle between your eyes unprompted.” Nick kissed the area in question, featherlight and soft.
“You know that guy, Evan?” Charlie focused on the small hairs of Nick’s stomach, smoothing over them lightly, marveling at the goosebumps he left in his wake.
“Um, I think? That one guy that’s stalking you?” Nick chuckled, and the vibrations in his chest shook Charlie just a bit. Just enough to remind him how physically close they were in that moment, as if neither boy existed without the other. Something panged near Charlie’s heart.
“He’s not… He’s not stalking me.”
“Oh, so he just happens to appear everywhere you are? I don’t think we’ve gone anywhere in the last month without him ‘randomly’ showing up. He’s obsessed with you.” Nick pushed back Charlie's hair from his forehead and kissed him there. “Can’t say I blame him, though.”
Charlie’s chest ached. He wasn’t sure when he’d fallen in love with Nick, but he was now firmly in the throes of it and every delicate gesture from Nick, every word of affection, every tiny touch, twisted something deep in his stomach. When Nick held him like this, naked and sated and warm, and looked at him with those adoring amber eyes, touched him like he mattered, Charlie found it almost impossible to hold back all that he was feeling.
“You obsessed with me, Nelson?” He hoped the joke would defuse some of the tension, maybe make Nick believe he too could be cool and casual about all of this.
“Yeah,” Nick whispered before cupping Charlie’s face like he was something precious and pulling him into a kiss, small and slow and perfect.
Charlie wanted to cry.
He needed a moment to come back to himself after Nick pulled back, eyes closed and lips still puckered.
“What did Evan do?” Nick’s fingers returned to Charlie’s hair.
“He, uh, he…” Charlie thought it may be less painful to pluck out his own eyelashes than continue. “He asked me out.”
Charlie hadn’t known how he thought Nick would react, but laughter had not been top of his list. But Nick did just that, laughing breathily, shaking them both. “Oh, wow. Poor Evan.”
Poor Evan. What did that mean?!
Charlie frowned and sat up, needing to somehow find a way to put space between himself and Nick. He turned to face the wall and crossed his arms, fighting back tears.
“You don’t have to be cruel, Nick.”
“What?” Nick sat up too, placing a tentative hand on Charlie’s shoulder, which he shrugged off. “I just meant—”
“I know what you meant!” Charlie looked down, concentrating on Nick’s patterned sheets. “Just because you don’t want to date me doesn’t mean no one else does.”
“What?! What are you talking about?!” Nick almost sounded angry, as if Charlie were the one mocking him.
“People can like me, Nick! People can find me attractive and compelling and worthwhile.” Tears formed in the corners of his eyes.
“Char, I know that—”
“So why did you laugh? Why did you pity Evan for deigning to like me?”
“Charlie, what are you talking about?!” Nick sounded on the verge of tears as well, which finally made Charlie turn to look at him.
His face was flushed red, his eyes glassy and wet, and he almost looked scared, as though Charlie’s words were wounding him somehow.
“I’m worth someone liking me like that. I deserve that.” Some of Charlie’s resolve was slipping at Nick’s expression, but he still managed to choke out a self-defense.
“I know that. You think I don’t know that?!” A tear slid down Nick’s cheek.
“You don’t get to cry, Nick. You’re the one insulting me.”
Another tear fell down Nick’s perfect face, splotchy and red, but still perfect. “I don’t get to cry when my boyfriend seems to be trying to break up with me by accusing me of not liking him and talking about another guy asking him out?”
“Wh–what?”
“I’m gonna cry over that, Charlie.” Nick’s voice was thick, his face now covered in a steady stream of tears. “I’m gonna cry over you breaking my heart.”
“Boyfriend?”
“Don’t make fun of me.”
“You have a boyfriend?” Since when did Nick have a boyfriend?
“Apparently I don’t anymore.” Nick’s voice caught at the end, a sob escaping his mouth.
“I— I’m your boyfriend?” Was Charlie an idiot? Had he been dating Nick this whole time? He reached out to grab Nick’s face, wiping tears with the pads of his thumbs. “Nick. I am genuinely asking you: am I your boyfriend?”
Nick gaped at him. “I— yes? I thought so.”
Charlie floundered for a moment, surveying Nick’s face for any sign of insincerity; instead, all he found was wide-eyed hope. In lieu of any verbal response, Charlie pulled Nick’s face to his own, kissing him with all he had, all the twisted aches in his stomach, all the blind hopes in his heart. He guided Nick back down, settling on top of him as their kiss deepened. The only thing Charlie could think was NickNickNick.
“Mm.” Nick lightly pushed Charlie back, separating their lips so he could talk. “Charlie, you really didn’t know?”
“I didn’t think you liked me like that. I thought we were just… hooking up.”
Nick stroked a thumb over Charlie’s bottom lip, blowing a soft breath of laughter out of his nose. “Charlie, I’m almost embarrassingly in love with you.”
“I didn’t know. You never… I didn’t know.”
“I guess I could have been clearer. But I thought when we started actually going on dates…” Nick trailed off, cheeks flushing.
Charlie groaned and dropped his forehead to Nick’s chest. “I’ve never been on a date! How was I supposed to know we were going on dates? I thought we were friends who hung out all the time and then had sex.”
“Yeah, Charlie, that’s what dating is.” A beautiful laugh bubbled out of Nick, a bit watery from his crying, but still so lovely and bright.
“Okay, well, that makes it a lot easier to turn Evan down.”
“I may not like that he went after my boyfriend, but without Evan, you may have just assumed we were platonic BFFs who kiss for the rest of our lives. Our grandchildren gather round to hear our love story and you’re like ‘he’s just my friend, he doesn’t like me like that.’”
Charlie raised his head and grinned wickedly. “Grandchildren?”
Nick smiled back, soft and glowing. “Oh yeah, we’re ride or die besties, Char. May as well go in on one headstone, purely for financial purposes. And one last name too. Again, for financial purposes.”
“You proposing?” Even joking about it made Charlie's stomach do several backflips.
“Nah, not yet. We have to at least finish uni first.”
“Hey.”
“Hm?”
“I’m embarrassingly in love with you too.”
Charlie settled back onto Nick’s chest, resuming his skimming of Nick’s stomach, listening intently to Nick’s heart race. Despite having been in this exact position ten minutes prior, he felt lighter now, none of the trepidation and insecurity remaining.
Nick wanted him — loved him — as so much more than a friend with benefits, and Charlie had never been happier.