Chapter Text
Viktor opens the door to his dorm as quietly as possible. He had stayed in the lab far too late, and it is nearly three in the morning. The apartment is dark, all the lights off, but he can see that his roommate’s bedroom door is open by the sight of the moonlight shining through their bedroom window. He closes the door slowly behind him, trying to be as quiet as possible. Viktor winces at the creak of the hinges, the sharp snap of the latch. When he turns back toward the common area he jumps, startled.
A person sits completely still on the couch in the dark sitting room, obscured by shadow and half-silhouetted by the moon. Viktor brandishes his crutch like a weapon, unsteady on his feet but suddenly wide awake. At the same time, the figure on the couch shifts. There is the soft scraping thunk of ceramic on wood, the sound of a striking match. The person leans over and carefully re-lights the oil lamp that sits on the coffee table. A scrape, a rustle, the strengthening of a flame, and suddenly - there sits Viktor’s roommate.
“You scared me!” Viktor hisses, and something in him is ashamed of how weak he thinks he sounds, how frightened.
“I’m sorry,” Rowan says. His voice is thick with weariness, carrying that heavy tiredness Viktor has grown to learn is characteristic of him.
Viktor returns his crutch to its proper position, re-settling his weight on it. “What are you doing?” he asks.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Rowan starts, his voice quiet, as if he’d wake someone. “Realized I’d never drank the tea I’d made.” In the lamplight, Viktor can see the mug cradled in Rowan’s hands which, in turn, rest in his lap, forearms on thighs. His legs are pulled entirely up onto the sofa, crossed over each other. His back is pressed against the back of the sofa.
“So, you drank it… in the dark?” he asks and walks slowly toward the door of his room.
“Yeah,” Rowan answers. His head is tipped back, over the back of the couch, his breathing slow and measured, deliberate.
Viktor leans on his doorframe. “In the dark?” he repeats.
“Yes, Viktor,” Rowan sighs, lifting his head to look at Viktor.
Viktor is caught somewhere between a fond smile and a sharp ache. Instead, he asks, “Are you doing this often?”
Rowan hesitates. His voice sounds resigned. “Yeah, I have been.”
He is often up late, unable to sleep, drinking tea in the dark, Viktor thinks. There’s the ache. Maybe if I was home more, not so often staying in the lab.
He shakes his head once, to knock out the thought. Viktor straightens himself, then turns toward his room again. “Go to bed,” he says, gently, sadly. And still, he stalls - until he hears the puff of Rowan’s breath extinguishing the lamp, the slight swish of fabric on fabric, of his bare feet on the wooden floor – before Viktor walks into his room and closes the door.
He sits on the edge of his bed, carefully toes off his shoes. He undoes the buttons down the front of his vest, and then his shirt. Slowly, carefully, he unfastens his braces, removes them, and sets them on the wooden chair next to the bed. He lays down on his back and pulls his blankets over himself.
The ache still sits there, in his chest, strange and not-quite-foreign. He grabs the pillow from the other side of his double bed, wraps his arms around it, holds it to his chest.
In his room, Rowan slides back under his duvet. He lays on his stomach, snuggling into a pillow. Sleep takes him quickly now that he’s had his tea, the medicine in the leaves potent. And he dreams of love, of romance, of friendship.
Viktor is exhausted, but he is such a light sleeper that he has never been sure if he’s actually asleep or just lying there. But still, time dilates, his breathing slows, and isn’t it a good rest? Isn’t there someone else in his bed, long dark hair cascading around his fingers, an arm draped over his chest? Isn’t he loved and held, and dear to someone? Isn’t his first crush, his dear friend, finally reciprocating his feelings? Aren’t they perfect together, and both so, so loved? He turns his head to the side, looks down, gently raises his lover’s chin. He looks at his gentle, sleeping face, looks at –
Viktor wakes to muffled screaming. He pushes himself out of bed, which is once again home only to him and the pillows. He grabs his crutch from where it is propped against the wall between the bed and nightstand and walks out of his room and straight to Rowan’s door.
He knocks once, sharp. He calls Rowan’s name and, when he is met with another strangled cry, he lets himself in.
Rowan’s sheets are bunching and tangling around his legs, which are kicking erratically. His shoulders squirm, his torso twists, his arms are pulled tight to his chest. His long, black hair is wild, falling in his sweat-covered face. He whimpers, cries, screams, but any words are undiscernible, save for the occasional weak ‘no’.
Viktor sits on the opposite side of the bed, makes sure he’s secure, then grabs Rowan’s shoulder and shakes it. “Lyubimyy,” he calls, softly, darling rolling off his tired lips before he can think about it.
He watches Rowan’s eyes scrunch closed, his face screwing up, looking like he is in pain.
“Viktor,” Rowan cries, and he feels his heart skip for a moment. “Don’t,” he continues, the word falling weakly from his tongue, but anything else is lost.
What are you dreaming? Why am I there? “You need to wake up,” Viktor says, shaking his shoulder again, more aggressively.
Suddenly, and without any warning, Rowan’s eye’s snap open and he wakes with a jolt so hard it shakes the bedframe, knocking Viktor’s crutch to the floor.
Viktor isn’t sure what to do, still reeling from hearing Rowan call his name in his sleep, so Rowan is the one to break the silence.
He reorients himself, then squints, trying to make out the moonlit face beside him. “Viktor?” he mumbles, staring at the honey-colored eyes, the moonlit face.
“Hello you,” Viktor says, his voice nervous and too loud. He quickly corrects his volume and whispers, “Sorry.”
Rowan pushes himself up to sit, unravelling himself from the blankets. “What’s going on?”
“You, eh… you were screaming. I wanted to make sure you were okay,” Viktor adds. His brow furrows.
Rowan nods just a little bit, pushing his hair out of his face. His breathing is finally slowing. “Yeah, I just-” he starts.
Viktor cuts him off. “Bad dream?”
“You could say that.”
“I am,” he says, and it draws the smallest laugh, which makes Viktor smile in turn.
They both sit there in silence. Rowan stares at his hands, lying palm-up in his lap. Viktor stares at the top of his head.
“You are having a lot of trouble sleeping lately?” he asks, keeping his voice soft, trying to tread carefully. He watches as Rowan nods.
He had noticed that his roommate was tired lately, but Rowan had always been tired – for as long as he had known him – and Viktor had clearly not been home enough to notice how bad it was getting. That, or Rowan was very good at hiding it.
Likely both.
Before he can catch himself – before he can even realize that he is thinking it – Viktor asks, “Would you like to maybe try sleeping in my room?”
Rowan looks up at him, exhausted, and maybe that is why he doesn’t hesitate before saying, “Yeah,” and getting up shuffling toward Viktor’s room.
Surprised, Viktor abandons his crutch and follows.
- TWO YEARS BEFORE –
It is late, but not as late as it normally is when Viktor is making his way back to his dorm. It is a year before he would begin working with Jayce Talis, the summer break is just ending at the academy, and right now his days consist of doing whatever work Heimerdinger needs him to do or reading in the library. Being from the Undercity, and without a home there to return to, Viktor always finds himself one of the few students that are permanent residents of the Academy, and therefore one of the few there during the summer months. He doesn’t mind it too much; he enjoys the four months of near silence, just him and his work. It had been three years of quiet summers, just him, Heimerdinger, and the library. He enjoys it. He enjoys living alone.
Maybe that is why it is such an unpleasant surprise that there is noise coming from behind the door of his dorm when he gets home that day.
Viktor turns the knob and finds it locked. From behind the door, he can hear mumbling, punctuated by the sound of something heavy slamming into a hard surface – a table? The floor? “Can’t even bother to be here,” the voice says.
“House is a mess.” SLAM.
“There’s nothing here.” SLAM.
The voice has escalated to frustrated shouting. “Do I even have the right room?” SLAM.
Viktor carefully balances a small stack of books on the hand of the arm that his crutch sits under. He slides the other hand into his pocket and pulls out his keys, concentrating to get them into the lock and get it open as smoothly as possible. The door swings open, and now he can see what is happening – one after another, several small stacks of books have been growing on the coffee table, each book added with an aggressive thud. Viktor slides is keys back into his pocket, juggles the book stack back to his free hand, and grabs the handle of his crutch again. He steps into the dorm and kicks the door closed behind him.
Viktor clears his throat and the person in his dorm spins around suddenly, glaring at him. “You sound unpleased,” Viktor says. The glare gets harsher.
The man in his apartment is not much shorter than Viktor, but he is broad, and the energy emanating from him makes him seem far larger than he physically is. He commands the room, suddenly bustling around the small siting area and kitchen that make up the common area of each of the Piltover Academy dorms. He has a mass of dark brown hair tied and secured precariously on top of his head; it is streaked with grey in a way that Viktor knows is natural but seems premature. His body seems young, but his face looks weary. He is wearing a black undershirt and long olive cargo pants, utilitarian clothing in muted colors that Viktor finds unfamiliar in Piltover.
“Are you Viktor?” the man asks.
“Yes,” he responds. “What is your name?”
“You know, it really was a mess in here,” the man says, and he starts sweeping the common area.
Viktor sighs. “Yes, I am sorry. I have been busy,” he adds, then repeats, “Your name?”
“What have you been doing? It’s the summer, and they’ve only just let me move in here, so you can’t have been here for long.” He is speaking rapidly, so fast that another man might not have been able to keep up.
“I live here permanently.” Viktor was developing a headache. “Your name?”
Viktor didn’t know it was possible, but his new roommate starts sweeping more aggressively, focused on his work.
He sighs and heads to his room, closing the door behind him.
The next day, Viktor wakes up early and immediately heads to Heimerdinger’s professorial office. He lets himself in, sits at his small desk to the side of the room, and begins grading a stack of papers that are sitting there. He waits for his mentor to appear, which takes another two hours – it must have been earlier than he thought – and he almost feels bad for startling the Yordle when he cannot help but bypass a greeting.
“I have been assigned a roommate, who has moved in early, and is very out of touch with their manners.”
Heimerdinger drops the book he was carrying. “Good morning, Viktor,” he says, then picks the book up. “If I am not mistaken, you are also out of touch with your manners at times."
Viktor sighs. “Yes, I know, but-”
“Stop grading. Your task today is to go home and introduce yourself to your roommate.”
“I have tried,” he says, exasperated.
“Well, try again,” Heimerdinger says, then sits in his desk chair and begins his work in the way that lets Viktor know he will not be entertaining a response.
- NOW –
It has been two years since meeting Rowan, and for most of that time, Viktor has been pining.
And now, Viktor finds his roommate climbing into his bed. Yes, they are using different blankets, and yes, they are keeping themselves awkwardly constrained to entirely opposite sides of the bed. But they are still in the same bed.
He cannot get attached.
This is not romantic.
He is just being a good friend, helping his friend who he has very platonic feelings for sleep when he is having nightmares.
That does not mean he can calm down enough to fall asleep himself.
He lays on his back in a straight line, his arms pinned to his sides. He lays on the right side of the bed, so that if anything happened Rowan would not accidentally roll over and push or move or pin Viktor’s bad leg. He stares up at the ceiling and listens as Rowan begins to doze off, falling asleep again.
He waits until Rowan’s breath comes slowly, evenly, softly, before he closes his own eyes. He folds his hands on his stomach, over his blankets. He is careful not to touch the other man, trying not to cross any boundaries – boundaries that are entirely undefined right now.
He feels himself starting to doze off, finally, but is woken quickly by the feeling of the mattress shifting. He sighs soft – he won’t be getting much sleep at all tonight if Rowan moves so much in his sleep. Suddenly, his breath hitches and his eyes fly open. He looks to his side. Rowan has rolled over, onto his stomach. He is laying on his side, and his arm has draped over Viktor’s chest, his face tucked against the outside of Viktor’s shoulder.
Viktor’s heart races. He stares, looking at the top of Rowan’s head, at his pale face and dark, greying hair strewn about around his head. His breathing is soft, coming out if quiet, even sighs. Viktor desperately tries to match his breathing to Rowan’s and is finally able to doze off again.
Rowan wakes up the next morning and finds himself curled into Viktor’s side, separated by the blankets. More importantly, Viktor’s cool hand is carefully, gently laced into his hair, the heel of his hand resting on Rowan’s temple. He does not want to move, would love nothing more than to stay right there, but he doesn’t want to cross any boundaries. Viktor was gracious enough to invite him into his bed, an effort to help him sleep after his nightmares. He did not want to cross the line between their friendship.
Slowly, carefully, he slips out of Viktor’s bed and heads back to his own bedroom. He picks up his sketchbook, curls up on his bed, and sketches.