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Bedtime is always the same in what their friends have affectionately dubbed “The Threeway House”. Bossuet is thankful for that, knowing how different it will be when Joly finishes his medicine degree. The routine steadies them both.
As they sprawl out on the sofa, Musichetta yawns and stretches out her limbs like a cat, before rising and heading to the shower, stopping only to ruffle Joly’s hair and squeeze Bossuet’s shoulder. The two men readjust to fill the spaces now abandoned by Musichetta. When Bossuet rolls his final joint of the day, Joly complains about the dangers of smoking. He doesn’t move away though, even if he does occasionally sniff and pout pointedly.
They head upstairs only after the water stops, and Musichetta comes downstairs in a fluffy pink dressing gown. Joly makes tea for the three of them – green for him and Musichetta, white with one sugar for Bossuet – because Bossuet has not been allowed to make tea since the great exploding kettle incident of last summer.
Bossuet loves this. Though Bahorel will tease him for it, he adores the gentle domesticity of life with his partners. And if each night comes with a subtle reminder that Joly and Musichetta have been together for longer than he’s known either of them, well, the sorrow has all but dissipated by morning.
But when Joly bursts through the door, precariously carrying three mugs (because however much he fusses over his friends, he never listens to his own advice), and Musichetta jumps up from her spot, curled against Bossuet, he can’t help but think that they don’t need him, that they might even function better without him. And inevitably, when Joly places the mugs on the kitchen table beside him, he knocks one of them off.
Joly doesn’t frown, but he comes close to it, even as Musichetta ensures him that they can share.
It’s a running joke among their friends. Clumsy Bossuet, always dropping things, tripping over, starting fires in swimming pools. For the most part, it’s fine. It’s okay. He’s hilarious, always has been, always will be. Bossuet has carved out a place for himself in the hearts of those around him as the eternal class clown. It’s enough, for the most part. But sometimes – only sometimes, and always at night – he can’t help but wonder if the smiles his friends wear mask a certain exhaustion. Musichetta has said more than once that loving Bossuet is a task in itself. Joly has said nothing at all.
But then Joly doesn’t love Bossuet, not in the way he wishes he could.
Bossuet has spent a long time wondering if Joly is simply as straight as an arrow. He could easily forgive him if he were, and not-so-easily find happiness elsewhere. But the other man had been as insistent as Musichetta that Bossuet would make a welcome addition to their relationship. It’s only this thought that keep Bossuet from running from this strange, half-love that lies between them.
As they settle into bed, Musichetta looks down at her boyfriends.
“I love you,” she says.
“I love you too,” Joly replies.
“I love you three,” Bossuet adds, and knowing it, even as he says it (as he says it every night), ruins it all.
Joly tenses, Musichetta’s hand stilling in his hair. It would be unnoticeable if it weren’t for the hundred or so ways in which their bodies are connected. Bossuet plasters a false smile on his face and turns to face the wall. Perhaps now his boyfriend might breathe easy again.
It’s a small comfort that he’s absolutely, a hundred percent certain that Musichetta is (almost) as in love with him as he is with her. He takes a certain amount of pride in his ability to make her laugh when no one else can. Musichetta holds his hand and tells her she loves him as easy as breathing, before taking him and kissing him hard enough to prove it. And in return, he brings her into the world as he knows it, the world of breathless adventures in twenty-four hour supermarkets and abandoned buildings.
Joly usually stays at home.
Musichetta cups her palm around Bossuet’s neck, a small, sweet touch that says, I understand what you’re feeling and I love you. I know you and I love you. I love you...and I love you.
He nuzzles into Musichetta’s warm embrace, and she traces circles into his skin until she falls asleep. Joly starts to snore. Bossuet’s heart may break, but the world will go on, as it always does.
In the morning, he wakes up later than Joly, but earlier than Musichetta. When he heads downstairs, a strong cup of coffee is already waiting for him on the table. Joly is by the oven, cooking crumpets with a near-impossible level of concentration. He puts them on a single plate, and brings them over to the table.
“Good morning,” he says. He smiles warmly, and it lights a fire in Bossuet’s heart.
If anyone were to ask Bossuet, he’d swear it’s enough.