Chapter Text
Jere should be the happiest he has ever been. He knows that he should be jumping with joy at just what he has achieved over these last few months. But any time he feels even an inkling of pride - of joy at the memory of the crowd chanting his name - that voice in the back of his mind reminds him that he failed. He lost Eurovision, and no matter how many points the viewers gave - no matter the success of Cha Cha Cha or just how much people seem to have connected with the song and Käärijä, he failed. He was supposed to bring the contest to Finland. He was supposed to win and make people proud. But he failed.
The thought keeps running through his mind, and this negative mindset, mixed with the total emotional exhaustion, has led to a negative spiral again. He has been here before. Just a few years ago he felt like he had lost everything. His tour was canceled, his girlfriend left him, and on top of things, he had lost his job. He had failed at life - at being the man he had tried so hard to be. He had been so close to taking his career to the next level, and to having the family he had always dreamt of having. He had had his dreams, and for just a moment they all seemed to be coming true, and then within weeks, it came crashing down around him.
All this had led to a negative and downwards spiral, and it had taken him becoming someone he no longer recognised, to ask for help. He had started talking about his fears, about his traumas and the pain he had always kept to himself, and although it had been hard at first, in the end he had found himself coming out of the darkness and back into the light.
The craziness of the last months, and the constant eyes on him in Liverpool - mixed with a pressure he’d put on himself to do well - had sent him back to that dark place, though. The people around him had noticed, and after some calls here and there, they’d managed to arrange for Jere to have a vacation in return for some Instagram promotion. Jere had been grateful, because the thought of being in Finland right now - where the Käärijä mania was still at its height, despite Loreen’s win at Eurovision - filled him with anxiety.
For months now Jere had felt like he had to be ‘Käärijä’ all the time. For months he had felt like he had to be on top of his game, and ‘on’ all the time. It left him tired and even a little lost as to where Käärijä ended and where Jere began. Of course Käärijä was just an extension of himself, yet he felt like people weren’t interested in Jere. They weren’t interested in him, he decided, so he constantly had to be on and be the character people wanted to see - the character people fell in love with.
This week away was supposed to give him time away from work - from Käärijä. It was supposed to give him time to relax and process all that had happened. He was supposed to spend the week, lying on the beach and getting back to his own, happy self. At the end of the trip, surely he’d have processed his ‘failing’, and he’d come to realize just how loved he is and how not a single person is disappointed in him - as he had convinced himself was the case. A week away, all by himself was going to be good for him, and it would get him in the right headspace for the upcoming tour.
Being alone had never been good for Jere, though. It gave him too much time alone with his own thoughts, and those thoughts were far more negative than he ever let on. Hell, it had taken him years to open up about just how his health issues had affected him, and of the trauma it had left him with. The people around him had given up so much to support him in this Eurovision journey, so who was he to complain about the anxiety it had led to, and just how emotionally draining it had been? His loved ones could see that he wasn’t doing well, but Jere doubted they could see just how negative the thoughts he had about himself had gotten. After all, they believed a week away by himself would solve everything.
There had been one person who could see the pain behind Jere’s smile, though. Jere had only met Bojan a matter of weeks before, yet from the moment they met, there was a bond between them that he had never had with anyone. Not even with his brothers, nor with the people he had been in a relationship with. There was an immediate trust, and where Jere was trying to be the Käärijä he thought people wanted him to be around others, around Bojan he was able to let his guard down and be himself. Even if he had a bad day, he could text him about it and share his honest thoughts - dark and negative as they sometimes were - and Bojan would be nothing but supportive. He didn’t tell him to stop talking himself down, or to be grateful for the Eurovision opportunity. He was just there for him, and in turn he opened up to Jere about his insecurities and the doubts he had about this whole thing and the way it would affect the band and the rest of their career.
The two of them had gotten close to each other the moment they met, and from that moment until they were reunited in Liverpool, there were hundreds, if not thousands of texts. They would spend day and night talking - sometimes about meaningless things like the weather or what they’d done that day, other times about their lives and about things they couldn’t talk about to anyone else. Jere knew that this bond was special, and that he had met someone who would be a big part of his life. Yet he was still not prepared for the love he had felt when he had seen Bojan again in Liverpool.
The two men had fallen into each other’s arms, and they had shared a hug that seemed to last for hours. The way Bojan had looked at him had reassured Jere that this bond wasn’t just something he had created in his own mind - that this wasn’t something lost in translation and a case of him getting the wrong end of the stick.
Liverpool had been crazy, but having someone like Bojan had kept Jere from losing his mind at times. They would sneak off and spend time together, away from the Eurovision bubble. They would go to Jere’s hotel room and lie in bed, talking about everything and nothing, until sure enough one of them would be dragged off back to work. Jere enjoyed the hectic of Eurovision - exhausting as it was - and for some time he thought that this was the most exciting thing he would ever do. However, something changed when it hit him just how many eyes were on him, and how popular not only Cha Cha Cha, but he himself had become.
After spending months drinking too much during his darkest times, he had vowed to stay sober in Liverpool. It would be for the best, and once he’d won - as he told himself he had to - he could let go and celebrate. But once Käärijä mania hit, and he started to feel like he couldn’t be Jere - once he felt like he was starting to lose control of this thing he had worked on so hard to built these last ten years or so - he started to slip.
The Joker Out boys had invited him to a party, and even though it was supposed to be a small get together, more and more contestants heard about it, and as everyone was starting to feel the pressure, they all needed a break and one night to just let go. The party had grown, and there had been alcohol and other things everywhere. Jere wanted so badly to be good - to stay sober and focused on his performance and the win - but seeing everyone else let go made him decide to indulge in just a drink or two. Perhaps it would make him able to relax, and by the end of the night this dark cloud hanging over him would fade. One drink had led to another, and by the end of the night - when most contestants had left, either to go to their own hotel room or someone else’s - the world was spinning.
Bojan had spent most of the night with him, and they’d danced to song after song. It didn’t take long before Jere had taken his shirt off, and although the sight of him without a top wasn’t new to anyone, it seemed to have lit a fire in Bojan that night. He had flirted with him, and told him just how hot he looked, before pulling him close. Their hands had been all over each other, and although there had been some playful flirting before, this had felt different. Before, the flirting seemed to be part of the game they played with each other. They were always messing around and trying to make each other laugh. That night’s flirting didn’t seem playful, though. Jere felt a heat inside himself which he hadn’t felt for years - yet he knew what it meant. He wanted Bojan, in any and all ways, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that they were surrounded by people, surely he’d have gone for it. But they were friends, and this wanting - this longing to take it to the next level, would surely only lead to awkwardness and things between them changing for the worst.
Bojan had told Jere about the boys he had made out with before, and the fact that when he was drunk he had no inhibitions. So even though Jere was starting to realize that perhaps he was starting to feel different about Bojan - even though he tried his best to push the thought down to save their friendship - he was not shocked when Bojan kissed him. This was what Bojan did, and this was just him having a bit of fun. Surely, Jere told himself, it was part of the game.
The kiss hadn’t been talked about again, and it only confirmed to Jere that it hadn’t meant anything to Bojan. Part of him had been disappointed and even a little hurt, but it also made it easier for him to push down his ever-growing feelings for the other man. Now he knew for sure that Bojan did not feel the same way, so keeping quiet and hoping that these feelings would fade with time was the absolute best thing he could do for their friendship.
Now that Jere is on a beach, far away from everyone he knows and loves - with just the locals to help him film the promo videos he has to film every other day - it’s not so easy to ignore what he has been trying to ignore for weeks now, though. He has fallen for Bojan, and although he has never felt this way about another man before, it’s not his attraction or his feelings that are upsetting him. He doesn’t care that he has fallen for a man, and that he every so often catches himself daydreaming about building a life with him. It’s the fact that he has fallen for his best friend - the one person who can make him feel okay with just a few words, or even just a smile. It terrifies him that if he were to slip and say the wrong thing - if he were to take this playful flirting between them just a step too far, he could ruin everything. He could lose Bojan, and the thought of that fills him with such a raw pain and anxiety that he has had multiple crying fits per day since they’d said goodbye to each other the morning after the final.
Part of him still thinks he can make these feelings go away with time, though. But when he grabs his phone, and he sees even more texts from Bojan - joining the dozen texts he didn’t even open because he was too busy crying and feeling miserable - his heart makes a jolt that makes it all too obvious that this isn’t just going to go away. Because as much as he is still trying to deny it to himself, this is not just a silly crush. He has fallen in love with Bojan.