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Dimitri noticed Claude on the very first day of their International Relations class. It wasn’t anything, then. He just noticed Claude like he was sure a lot of people noticed him - his arresting eyes, his easy smile, his handsome face. But Dimitri wasn’t really the sort of person who let a pretty face affect him. He’d always been more interested in substance than style.
To Dimitri’s surprise, it quickly became clear that Claude had that, too.
His observations and questions in class were remarkable. He came at things from angles Dimitri hadn’t considered before - and given that his father was a senator, he’d thought himself quite well-schooled in international relations. Really, he’d only taken the class because it was required for his major, and he’d expected it to be easy.
The work itself was easy. Straightforward, covering the topics Dimitri had expected, the sorts of things he had no trouble writing decent essays about. Claude, however, added a dimension of difficulty that Dimitri had not expected at all. It made sense once Dimitri discovered that he was originally from Almyra - though how an Almyran ended up studying at Fódlan’s most prestigious college, when their countries were still technically at war (even if there had been no hostilities for years, a peace treaty still hadn’t been signed), Dimitri didn’t know.
He wanted to know. The more he saw Claude’s bright smile, the more he heard his clever comments, the more Dimitri wanted to know.
Unfortunately, they weren’t actually friends.
Claude ran with an eclectic crowd - art majors and veterinary students, business majors and even some folks who Dimitri didn’t think actually attended their school. People he’d met and befriended after arriving. Dimitri, on the other hand, had come to university with a handful of his closest friends, all of whom had parents in politics who had graduated from Garreg Mach years ago. Legacies.
Their social circles did not overlap at all. Everything Dimitri knew about Claude he’d learned second- or third-hand, while he pretended not to be interested. But he was, incredibly so, and it was hard to deny it.
It became even more difficult when Claude showed up in his class the next semester, too, just as full of unique viewpoints and entertaining anecdotes. Dimitri spent the entire first class barely listening, going around in circles, convincing himself he ought to talk to Claude and then talking himself out of it.
He might never have done so - if Claude had not approached him. It was right after that first class, and he walked straight up to Dimitri with a dazzling smile and a casual, “Nice to see you again.”
Dimitri’s tongue felt fat and awkward in his mouth, but Claude didn’t immediately walk away, which gave him a moment to get his bearings. “Ah - yes. You as well. I admit I’m surprised, I thought you were a history major.”
He managed to control his wince as he realized what he’d said. There was no reason Dimitri ought to know Claude’s major, as they’d never spoken one-on-one before. He couldn’t exactly admit that he’d asked Ingrid, who had some kind of flirting-or-maybe-just-friendship with Dorothea, who in turn had a weird competitive besties thing going on with Hilda, who Dimitri knew was Claude’s best friend. That would be weird.
Claude didn’t seem to notice, though, or if he did he didn’t show it. “Yeah, but I love this stuff. And there’s a lot of history in it, you know? All these political grudges based on stuff from hundreds of years ago, it’s great.” He grinned. “I was even thinking about a double major.”
“I see,” Dimitri said, and found that he was smiling as well, a foolish reflection of Claude’s easy grin. “Then perhaps we’ll see more of each other.”
“Maybe so,” Claude said, and that was it. He waved a casual farewell to Dimitri and wandered off to his next class, or maybe to meet up with friends, or - well, who knew. Dimitri imagined Claude’s life outside their classes together to be full of exciting happenings and spontaneous parties, unlike his rather serious and studying-based existence. There was no reason for them to be friends.
But the next week in Geopolitics of Modern Fódlan, there Claude was, smiling across the room at him.
Dimitri started to get ideas.
He really wasn’t smooth, he knew. He saw how Sylvain was with - well, anyone - and Dimitri had no illusions that he could match that. But he and Claude talked in class now, a little, and Dimitri thought that was promising. He told himself he wouldn’t miss a chance if he saw one, even if he wasn’t entirely sure what he would use that chance for.
It happened a few weeks later. They were deep into the quarter, proposing research topics for the final essay the instructor expected for them, and after class Claude lingered, scratching out a few more lines in his battered notebook. He looked up when Dimitri stopped by his desk, smiling.
“About time to get to work, huh? What’d you pick?”
“I was thinking about focusing on the current border between Duscur and Fhirdiad. It’s been in contention for years,” Dimitri said.
“Oh yeah,” Claude said. “Your friend Dedue’s from Duscur, huh? I bet he’d have some good insight on that.”
Dimitri didn’t know how Claude knew about Dedue, but it made him flush to think that Claude might have been asking about him. Thinking about him outside of their classes together. It probably didn’t mean anything, but Dimitri wanted it to. “Have you chosen your topic?”
“I’m doing the last Almyra-Alliance peace talks,” Claude said. “Should be interesting!”
Dimitri had told himself he wouldn’t miss his chance if he got one. He cleared his throat, gathered his courage. “Why don’t we study together?”
It wasn’t what he really wanted to say. Despite that courage, he still felt like he was being a coward - after all, what he really wanted was to ask Claude on a date. But this could be a stepping stone to that, right? It was something. Time spent with just the two of them. He tried to convince himself of that, even while regretting that he hadn’t had more courage.
Claude brightened. “Sure! I know the library like the back of my hand. You wanna meet there?”
“I’d love to,” Dimitri said. They picked a time later that week, then Claude was off again, rushing to his next class. Dimitri thought he might be taking more credits than was usual - he always seemed to have somewhere to be, and he had mentioned a double major, after all.
It was commendable. Dimitri could not help but admire that desire for knowledge, though he did not share it. No - that wasn’t quite true. There were classes he took, things he learned, that truly interested him. It was only that political science itself was not so terribly interesting. But he was expected to follow in his father’s footsteps, and he hadn’t really known what else to do, so here he was. Following the path laid out for him.
Claude, a boy with foreign roots and irrepressible curiosity, was assuredly not part of that path. But Dimitri could not bring himself to care.
Besides, they were only studying. Nothing more.
Claude really did know the library like the back of his hand. Dimitri had spent a good amount of time in there as well, and would have said that he knew it well, but Claude appeared to live there. He knew all the nooks and crannies, all intricacies of the cataloging system. He knew the librarians, too, greeting them by name as he and Dimitri entered the building.
It was charming, really. Dimitri enjoyed seeing Claude in a different setting - he was vibrant in a classroom, but here he seemed more relaxed, more friendly. Dimitri could not deny that he felt a bit more relaxed himself, too.
They found a table to share, tucked away in the back of the second floor where it seemed like few people went. Dimitri spread out his things and tried to shove away the knowledge that he’d much rather be doing something else with Claude. Studying was all well and good, but if he’d had the courage to ask him on a real date…
Well. Perhaps he would find that courage by the end of their time together. Dimitri tried to keep his thoughts on that, and not the inappropriate thoughts that sometimes crept in when he was looking at Claude.
Could anyone really blame him? Claude was entirely lovely, with a smile that could light up a room, a quick wit, and an intelligence that would impress anyone. But it wasn’t just that, at least not for Dimitri. He tried not to think about it - considered it a bit disrespectful, to have such thoughts about someone who was hardly even a friend yet - but the truth was that Dimitri had never been so attracted to anyone as he was to Claude.
He’d had teenage hormones, just like anyone, and he’d thought he’d aged out of that sort of thing long ago. But Claude’s clever fingers, the glimpses of collarbone Dimitri sometimes got when he wore loose shirts, the scent of whatever product he used in his hair that completely failed to tame it - that and so much more made Dimitri’s head spin everytime he got close.
He wanted to take Claude out on a real date, so they could talk, exchange stories, learn more about each other. So he could unfold the story of Claude, find all that had been hidden from him. But he wanted to take Claude out on a real date for completely disrespectful reasons as well. To hold his hand. To kiss him. To touch that untouchable skin, to give into the thought he’d once (perhaps more than once) had of licking that collarbone he’d caught glimpses of.
He tried not to think about it, but Claude was closer to him than he ever had been before. Sometimes they sat near each other in class, but not always, and now Claude was right next to him. Now Dimitri could breathe him in, could reach out and touch him so easily. And he wanted to. He couldn’t pretend otherwise.
But they were studying. He was not such a beast that he could not keep his hands to himself.
Except that Claude didn’t seem to have any problem touching him.
Dimitri had never gotten the impression that Claude was particularly physical with people, but then, he’d never really seen Claude with his friends. With him, though, Claude did not seem reserved at all. He rested a hand - nails a little bitten, calloused here and there - on Dimitri’s arm without a thought, to get his attention and point out something in a book. He bumped his shoulder against Dimitri’s while telling an awfully interesting (and shockingly funny) anecdote about some obscure bit of Almyran history. He grinned up at Dimitri with abandon, and though Dimitri never much cared either way about his height most of the time, in those moments he was thankful of it - for it gave him an excellent view of Claude’s eyelashes, sinfully long.
Dimitri tried not to react too obviously. He certainly tried not to do anything that would make Claude stop, even if they really weren’t getting much studying done. Claude had managed to dig up some excellent books on both of their subjects, though, so the time wasn’t entirely wasted.
No - that wasn’t fair. Dimitri did not feel that the time was even a little bit wasted, because it was all spent with Claude. He was able to enjoy Claude’s smiles, his curiosity, his clever comments and his sharp intelligence. And Claude’s curiosity extended to him, as well - he didn’t hesitate to ask Dimitri about his own interests, his own life.
Dimitri even found himself somewhat hesitantly confessing that he did not particularly love political science, but that he didn’t know what he would study if not that.
“Anything,” Claude said with a wink. “There’s so much out there! Just pick some random class and see how you like it. A smart guy like you could do just about anything, if he tried.”
Dimitri tried not to flush at the praise. He did not think he was unintelligent, but that wasn’t the sort of thing people usually complimented him on - but then, had it not become clear that Claude had listened to Dimitri in class just as keenly as Dimitri had listened to him?
Even if they got less studying done than might have been expected, the afternoon proved something to Dimitri: he wanted to spend more time with Claude.
“I’ll walk you to your dorm,” Dimitri said as they were leaving the library. Claude grinned up at him.
“A gentleman, huh? I mean, I’m not gonna turn down a little more Dimitri time.”
His ears felt warm again, hearing that. He did not think it was entirely his imagination that made him think Claude might be flirting a little. Might have been flirting this whole time.
They paused outside the building Claude’s room was in, and Dimitri told himself he would not back down this time. He would not pass up his chance.
“Claude,” he said, and cleared his throat, gathering up his courage. “Perhaps next time we could…” What? Get coffee? Have dinner? No, best to be very clear. The details didn’t matter nearly as much. “Go on a date.”
Claude blinked at him. “Huh?”
Dimitri tried to swallow down his instant urge towards something like panic. “A date. Wherever you’d like - however, if you aren’t interested, I will not take it poorly.”
“No,” Claude said, “I mean, I thought this was a date?”
For a moment they stared at each other, Dimitri replaying every moment of the evening, Claude almost certainly doing the same. Recontextualizing each word, every moment Claude had so casually touched him.
So maybe he had been flirting.
“I, ah,” Dimitri started carefully, “I didn’t think people normally studied on dates.”
“They don’t?” Claude seemed more shocked by that idea than anything else that had just happened. “Huh! Well, for what it’s worth, I thought it was a great date.” He’d recovered his composure and was smiling up at Dimitri. Dimitri didn’t want to look away. “And I’d be happy to go on another.”
Dimitri found himself smiling, too, the confusion of the previous moment fading away in the face of Claude’s ease. “A… second first date, perhaps.”
Claude laughed. “Sure, something like that.” He paused, looking up at Dimitri, something like a sly look crossing his face. It was cute. “I was planning to ask for a good night kiss, but I guess that would be kinda inappropriate now.”
“Not at all,” Dimitri said, quickly. Quickly enough that he was sure he sounded ridiculous, overeager and excited, but he didn’t care. Claude didn’t seem to either, because he stepped closer.
“Well, just one, then,” he said, and then he was stretching up to meet Dimitri’s lips with his own.
Perhaps objectively it wasn’t the most perfect kiss in existence, meant to go down in history, but if anyone had asked in that moment Dimitri would not have been able to call it anything else.
When they parted, he knew his face was flushed, but he didn’t care one bit. Claude, too, seemed a touch pink, though it was harder to see on him.
“Good night,” Dimitri said. He could not stop a smile from rising to his lips, irrepressible as the lightness of his heart.
“Good night, Dimitri,” Claude said, and he waited there at the door to his dorm, watching Dimitri walk away.
Just before he turned the corner that would lead to his own dorm, Dimitri looked back. Even from that far away he could see Claude’s smile, bringing the memory of his warm lips flooding back.
They’d get another chance soon. Dimitri couldn’t wait.