Work Text:
The realization hit Terrell like a heavy swung baseball bat, winding him and almost knocking him down. He had feelings for Red. Romantic feelings. He had romantic feelings!
He had been up late as usual scribbling away in his journal about the day’s adventures. Him and Red has gone on a solo mission to scout an area for any cult activity before they planned to raid it. One thing led to another and they got found out. Maybe bringing a 6’3 hunk of muscle wasn’t the smartest in hindsight but as the two worked together to take down the two that found them Terrell found his eyes wandering over to Red a lot. They usually did, that wasn’t that new, he observed the man like he was under a microscope, taking mental notes of anything interesting for his notes later. It’s what he had always done since they were kids.
But as he wrote he felt his face get…hot, an embarrassed feeling washing over as he wrote about how Red took down one of the cultists. Noting the way certain muscles moved as he swung or slashed or blocked. Terrell felt his face get hotter as he read over it again. This has nothing to do with Red being a dragon or any other benefit to his research…Terrell flipped his pencil around to erase it but read over it again. A twisting feeling in his stomach, like something was in there excitedly waving its arms at what he wrote.
Oh no.
He had never felt this feeling before but he had read enough about it to get an idea of what it was. A crush.
Fuck fuck fuck.
Terrell abruptly stood from his desk and paced his room. He didn’t want this, not in the slightest. He knew how much pain this could bring and he had easily avoided this problem for years. YEARS. Not really intentionally, he just never felt that desire, he was always busy-
Terrell stopped dead in his tracks. He dashed over to a bottom drawer in his desk and started frantically pulling out old notebooks and sketchbooks. As he flipped through them, quickly and aggressively, but careful enough to not tear any pages or ruin the ink, an even bigger realization dawned on Terrell. The years he spent “researching” and “analyzing” Red. Drawing him in the midst of battle, mental images Terrell redrew time and time again…for research. That’s what he always told himself. The elf wanted to throw up. He wanted to crawl into a hole and never see anyone or the light ever again, the embarrassment of realizing after YEARS two whole DECADES that Terrell was just as susceptible to falling in love as everyone else, in fact more so as he had been obviously pinning close to the day they met.
Terrell’s face was beat red as he curled in on himself. What the fuck was he meant to do now? He didn’t know how to deal with these kinds of feelings! No one he knew knew how to deal with these kinds of feelings. It was so complicated and distressing that’s why he wanted to avoid it in the first place! “UGH! Are ye fuckin serious!” He shouts to himself, his accent thicker with his boiling emotions, as he shoves all his old books away he gets up and starts pacing again.
He had usually always been pretty good with handling his emotions, he was an eladrin, he had to be mindful. Everything felt so easy to handle, fix whatever the issue was if he was upset or he was happy. Simple as! Love was so unpredictable! No one could give straight answers because it was all always different and unpredictable. There were no finite truths to how love worked. When Terrell tried to study it that was all he could learn from it, that’s what scared him off from it to begin with. Quick to turn down advances from anyone and everyone and the idea hardly ever crossed his mind. He was content with his friends, family and research. Or he thought he was…
No! He was! This would change nothing! Why would it!? He was content for this long, why change anything!? He didn’t need anything more, he didn’t for over twenty years why would he now!? The thoughts always disgusted him anyway, holding hands, kissing…cuddling… with Red…Terrell kicked his desk chair in anger. Fuck…he was getting to worked up. He hated when this happened. He paused, taking a deep breath and calmly walking to the door to go for a walk. It was late, or technically early as it had passed into the early morning. Terrell tried to distract himself, deliberately noting how empty the streets were, counting the stones within kicking distance and kicking them. He tried to keep his mind busy, talking loudly in his head to keep the romantic thoughts at bay, ’Three stone’s, they’re all a type of granite, I haven’t done a geological survey in this area yet! I bet Red would be great at picking up the bigger-‘ the elf facepalmed, dragging it down his face dramatically, groaning. “Alright! This isn’t working! I need…” Terrell pondered out loud to himself in the dead of night, in the middle of the road.
“Books! I should read books about this! More research should help! Maybe I just wasn’t looking hard enough!” He concluded, making a beeline for the library. It was always unlocked in this small town so he entered the vacant building with ease, the only sound being the comforting creaking of old wood. As Terrell headed to his regular section it occurred to him that if he had been unsuccessful in his regular research maybe he had to expand and look elsewhere…
Reluctantly Terrell made his way to the romance section. People like this stuff right? They must since there was so much of it! This could have the answers he needed right? He grabbed a glossy covered one that caught his eye, a quick flip through showed it had pictures and Terrell looked hopeful, “Perfect! Diagrams! This should work nicely!” He grabbed a few more, noting the volume numbers and headed to a table. For the next few hours Terrell read. The writing was a bit different that what he was used to but he quickly got the hang of it. As he read all through the night finishing one volume after the next he felt his face getting hotter and hotter. These of course were not his regular textbook type books but an actual story. He’s read plenty of course. But this one…the imagery, quietly the idea of him and Red doing some of the act depicted wormed it’s way into his head and his blush grew even more.
He was definitely learning something he wasn’t entirely sure what though. It’s wasn’t until later in the day, the Sun now peaking out of the horizon, that Terrell heard the large front doors being opened. He jumped, slamming the book shut and looking up. He was quickly greeted by Abbeline, well, Abbeline dressed as Charince the librarian as he came to find out, “Terrell? What the hell are you doing here?”
Terrell looked like a deer in headlights, His mouth opening and closing as he fished for an answer, “I- uh- r-research!” He answered awkwardly. Internally cursing himself because he knew that was suspicious as fuck and would lead to more questions.
Abbeline raised an eyebrow, obviously suspicious of the usually overly confident elf’s demeanour. Their eyes flicked to the book in his hands and a wide smirk spread across their face, “And that’s important to your research?” They teased, nodding to the stack of books Terrell had already gone through.
The elf’s face morphed into a flustered scowl as he abrutpily shoved the books off the table, sparing a quick glance to them to make sure he didn’t damage any of them, “Thats! Nothing!” He remarked, the guilt on his face evident. Not like Abbeline didn’t know the truth already anyway.
They rolled their eyes and scoffed, “Riiiiiight, well those definitely aren’t gonna help you with confessing to Red,” they asserted with a teasing cockiness Terrell loathed.
The accuasion caught Terrell off guard. Did they read his mind or something? How did they know? Terrell knew tons of people! He could have been thinking of anyone! “Wha-!? I’m not- how did you- How did you know that?!”
Abbeline chuckled, “Well that was mostly an educated guess but you really don’t hide it well, basically eye fucking him eveytime we battle,” Terrell made a shocked noise at that but Abbeline ignored it. “Anyway, you sad sack, do you want proper help?” They offered with a mischievous grin. Terrell just glared at them, face bright red from the embarrassment of being called out, “Fine, I won’t help you then, since you clearly know what you’re doing,” they stated with a sarcastic smile, turning to walk away and finish checking everything was in order in the library. Besides the stack of books Terrell just threw onto to the floor.
As much as Terrell hated to admit it, he did need Abbeline’s help. They…dated, so they definitely knew a lot more than Terrell and could hopefully help him deal with these feelings, “Wait! I need your help, I’m way out of my depth with this,” he admitted as he stood up from his chair.
Abbeline smiled smugly as they turned back to him, “That’s what I thought, alright, here's the deal…” They started before explaining the deal to Terrell.
He listened closely until, “Confess!? I just barely started to accept that I like him!” Started to pace again, the mention of confessing mucking his brain up again. In the book he read it was such a sweet, magical moment.
Abbeline just rolled their eyes again and huffed, “Yea well, you do, so to make this easy on the whole group and not have you awkwardly flirt with him just confess, simple as that,” they said so matter of factly Terrell had to agree.
Terrell thought about it. It did kind of make sense, it seemd like that was how these things worked and if Abbeline was saying it it must be true, “I suppose…” he relented then a plan was set in motion.
“Alright, go!” Abbeline delacred as they pushed Terrell out from the safety of the bushes.
Terrell stumbled before turning back to Abbeline panicked, “How does this work again?” He glanced at the tall figure of Red who was standing to far away but was clearly to absorbed staring at the sun then finally blinking his eyes when they started to hurt. This immediately felt like a mistake, Terrell’s heart thumping loudly in his chest with anxiety.
Abbeline just rolled their eyes, “You ask him on a date and he says yes, simple as that, remember?” They started to nudge Terrell towards Red even as he tried to protest.
“Are you sure? That doesn’t seem-” But he was sushed as pushed closer and closer.
“It is! Now go!” Abbeline gave him one final shove, bumping him into Red before dashing back to hide to watch the drama unfold. Truthfully, Abbeline didn’t know if Red even knew what dating even was, and Terrell being a clueless fool. Oh this was going to be good.
Terrell stumbled to collect himself, smiling up nervously at Red who was now looking down at him after being bumped, “H-hey! Red!” Terrell cursed himself. ‘Fuck sake, sound like my father around any attractive person ever, get it together ya losey fool’
Red smiled back at him once he had regained his vision and saw it was Terrell, “Oh uh, hey Terrell! What’s up?”
Terrell fidgeted as he normally did, adjusting his bag strap over and over, “Ahhhh nothing really just- wanted to say heyyyy,” he shot an awkward finger gun but Red didn’t seem to mind.
“Alright well uh- heyyyyy,” Red shot one back, chucking with his deep usually booming voice. Terrell felt his face heat up again at realizing the sappy thoughts coming back. He had to get out of here, but when he glanced at back to Abbeline, about to make a mad dash he was meet with aggressive encouragement, waving him back to continue.
That must mean he was doing well right? Fuck, he wish he knew. This was so confusing and didn’t make any sense, his emotions going a bit haywire. He took a deep breathe and turned back to Red, “Actually! I guess there was something I wanted to ask…” He blurted out, everything in his body screaming at him to stop and get out of there, but he persisted.
“Yea?” Red tilted his head like a curious puppy.
Terrell didn’t know where to keep his eye’s glancing to and from Red’s face, “I was just wondering if you’d…be interested…in…” Terrell started forcing out the words. Why was this so scary? Why did he want to crawl into the ground and never see the light again. The Feywild even sounded better than this at this point.
Red leaned in a bit making Terrell feel like he was set on fire, “You alright Terrell, your face looks red, like my name,” he chuckled again,
“Ay- I- uh-” Terrell wanted to scream, so instead he just blurted it out and got it over with, “I was wondering if you’d like to go on a date with me!”
Terrell was looking directly at Red as an unreadable expression crossed his face, “Wait…seriously?” Red asked genuinely.
Shoot him now! Terrell couldn’t handle this! He was meant to say yes, what kind of response was that!? ‘Gods! Any gods listening, please smite me now! Bane? Malar? Yoba!?’ When no gods blasted him into smitherens Terrell pressed on, “Ay…?” He said a bit meekly.
Terrell quickly felt himself being pulled into a bone crushing hug, his feet being picked up off the ground as Red stood with him in his arms, “Wha-!?” Terrell looked up at the other the best he could while being crushed in his chest and Red had the brightest smile the elf had ever seen. That and the hug instantly melted away the fear and anxiety Terrell had been feeling gone and replaced with a warm fuzzy feeling.
Soon Red pulled back to face Terrell again, holding him out in front of him like a doll, “I’m so happy! I never knew you’d feel the same! We should totally be boyfriends!” He declared, smiling ear to ear like he just won a grandprize.
A distant, shocked “What!?” could be heard from behind Terrell but neither acknowledged it.
Terrell laughed, feeling like he had just won a grandprize. So this is why people fell in love, “Well- how about we start with a date yea?” he offered, though he assumed boyfriends was the next step after this and he was excited for what that entailed.
Red quickly placed Terrell down, “Oh yea right! Sure! I’ll date you at 5 tonight okay? When the sun is nearer to the statue! We can go to the creek you like and I’ll get some meat from Lalantos at the shop to eat!” Red essentially told Terrell as he was already running off to get whatever leftover meat he could get from his sister at the butcher shop.
“Right! See you then!” Terrell was giddy and beaming as he bounced back to his house, not noticing the stunned state of Abbeline in the bushes he passed. Maybe this love thing wasn’t so hard after all!