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Ivan isn’t unfamiliar with birthdays.
He remembers the first time it was explained to them in class. Their alien teacher explained it to them as a tradition of the humans from the past, to celebrate the day of one’s birth, the day you were brought to life. He knows the other children in the garden enjoy celebrating it, with gift giving and little treats. He sees how they smile widely as everyone wishes them, eyes twinkling and cheeks pinkened in joy. Of course, he knows. After all, stealing all of Till’s own gifts when it's his birthday was one of his favourite things to do. His reactions never fail to disappoint.
That doesn’t mean he particularly cares for the tradition. Some of the other children that he doesn't bother learning the names of ask him about it— why he never celebrates, or why they never hear about it. He simply smiles back and shrugs in response, saying that he doesn’t have one, and it’s not a lie. He doesn’t.
Well, perhaps he does— but he doesn't know when, and the only thing he does have is an adoption date, on the fourteenth of February, but celebrating the day he was forced into the role of a pet, a disposable product, in this industry that will inevitably lead to his death sooner or later isn’t exactly the most appealing thing to him.
That’s all he thinks of the concept, and it’s another day in the garden when he looks around for Till, searching around the perfectly round trees under the artificial sun’s light. He eventually spots a silver head of hair sitting hunched over under a big tree in the corner, approaches him and sits down close as he leans his head on his shoulder in lieu of a greeting. This is routine for them, at this point, and Till momentarily tenses from the contact, but doesn’t try pushing him away, instead slightly relaxing and even leaning into his touch. Ivan stills imperceptibly– he usually curses him out even just a bit, yelling at him to move over and that he’s too close, even if it doesn’t ultimately accomplish anything. Huh.
Ivan doesn't comment on it, instead opting to simply watch as he sketches a landscape filled with real trees and shrubs that they’ve been shown in books and pictures, unlike the artificial ones that are scattered around in the garden. It’s pretty just like you, Ivan doesn’t say. Till would just get flustered and mad, and while Ivan delights in making him turn pretty colors, this is one of the rare occasions where he doesn’t immediately try pushing him off, so he’s not going to ruin it. For now.
Till must be in a good mood. Maybe Mizi talked to him today?
They sit in silence for a while. “You lied to me.” Till eventually says, and Ivan tilts his head up to stare at him, momentarily surprised. It’s not often that Till is the one who breaks their silences first.
Ivan hums, contemplative. “You’re not drawing Mizi today?” He asks instead.
Till’s face turns rosy at that, flushing all the way down to his neck. Ivan stares at his nape, wondering how much further it can go. “Shut up. Don’t ignore me, idiot.”
Ivan almost laughs. There’s some type of humor in his words— the kind that comes when you hear something so absurdly impossible it makes it funny. Him, ignoring Till? He doesn’t think he could even if he wanted to. Not that he ever would. “You’ll have to be more specific than that. I like lying to you a lot.”
Till shoots him a look, nose scrunched up. Cute. “The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Then, “…You said you didn’t have a birthday.” He mumbles, almost shy. Interesting. Ivan wants nothing more than to study him under a microscope.
“Hm?” He inquires, even though he very clearly heard Till. He always does. Something in him just wants Till to say it again.
Till turns even more red, and Ivan marvels. Definitely worth it. No matter how many times he’s seen it, it’s always fascinating to him how deeply Till feels, how easily he turns pink and displays his emotions, and how he wears his heart on his sleeve, considering how emotions had always been something Ivan himself struggled with. “You said you didn’t have a birthday, you lying bastard.” He scoffs, gripping his pen with a force that makes the tips of his fingers turn slightly white. Is he… nervous?
“You’re going to break it.” Ivan says instead, nodding towards the pencil in his grip.
“Stop trying to change the subject!” He glares back.
“I’m not,” Ivan sighs, moving to wrap his hands around Till. When he’s not met with any resistance or hostility, it would be a lie to say that he’s not surprised. Not that he’s complaining, of course. “I don’t have one. Why? You want to give me a gift?” He grins lazily, and Till stills for a second, before turning to smack him on the head with his sketchbook.
“S-Shut up! And dont lie to me, you do have one! I saw it in your files! You know, the ones they use to track our progress or whatever.” He replies, slightly proud.
“Why are you looking through my files, Till?” He gasps, feigning shock. It’s all a ploy to see him get even more flustered and angry, so of course it works.
Whatever smugness he was feeling instantly melts off his face with that. “I didn’t—! They were on my desk, and I-I thought they were mine so I— just… s-stop making it sound weird, you weirdo!” He squawks, defensive, and Ivan has to use all his self restraint to refrain gobbling him up on the spot. If he were ever given the opportunity, he would want to climb into and live in Till’s ribcage forever, memorising the rhythm of his heartbeat, until the end of eternity. He wants to keep him in a jar and study his every move, record his every expression. Alas.
In a way to vent his desires, he bites down on Till’s shoulder instead. Till shrieks, and he finally tries pushing Ivan away. “Stop that!” He yells, pulling on his hair to try and get him to budge. Honestly, in Ivan’s very unbiased opinion, Till should be glad that he didn’t do anything else. The cannibalistic urges were very strong. Though, its true that Ivan is nothing if not a man of self control.
“That’s not my real birthday. It’s just my adoption date.” He says, begrudgingly peeling his arms off of Till. he doesn’t move away, though.
Till is quiet for a few beats, considering it. “So what?” He eventually huffs, “If you don’t have one, then that’s the closest thing you have. That’s your birthday, then.”
Ivan hums. “I guess,” He replies, shrugging. “I don’t really care.”
Till blinks, as if he hadn’t thought of that possibility. “…Today is the fourteenth, though.” He mutters, voice small. Is he pouting? Ivan might be having a heart attack. He’s going to explode and spill his guts all over Till, and then he’ll have to clean it all up. He smiles at the thought.
He then registers what Till had said. Oh. “Is it?” He muses. Right, today is the fourteenth, meaning it’s his adoption day, then. He hadn’t remembered. “Huh. I guess it is.”
Till glances over at him for a second, opening his mouth to say something and then closing it, lips pressed into a line, pensive. He eventually puts his sketchbook down, not before taking a page out of it. “…Here.” He murmurs quietly, and he almost doesn’t catch it. He holds out the paper, and though Ivan can’t see his face because his head is tilted to the side away from him, he sees the deep red blush on his nape.
Ivan blinks. He gingerly takes the paper, and his eyes widen when he sees what exactly it is. It’s a drawing of him wearing a flower crown, smiling, and there's a small scrawl of ‘Happy birthday’ written on the side in his messy handwriting. It’s beautiful— of course. Everything Till creates always is, from his compositions to his art to the red flower crowns he makes with delicate movements, with a gentleness Ivan could never hope to have— and it looks exactly like him, from the glint in his eyes he has when he’s around Till to the sharp dip of his snaggletooth. Ivan is stunned silent, unblinking as he studies the picture.
“I-If you don’t like it, just say that. You don't have to keep it.” Till grumbles irritatedly after a few moments in silence, but there’s a slight undertone of something like insecurity in his voice, as if he’s anxious. As if Ivan would ever reject anything from him. Till asks him to jump and he says how high.
“What,” He eventually says, when he remembers that responding accordingly when someone gives you a gift is what normal humans do, “—what is this?”
Somehow, Till’s blush deepens even further. “Are you blind? What does it look like, idiot!? I-It’s a drawing of you, obviously!” He yells, voice cracking.
Ivan considers it. “What do you want me to do with this? Do you want me to give it to Mizi?” He asks, though the writing on the paper confuses him. It’s not Mizi’s birthday, is it? Surely he would've known if it was.
“What!? No! W-Why would I want you to do that?” He gasps, incredulous. “If I was going to give it to Mizi, I would draw something else! Why would she want a picture of your dumb face, stupid? This is… for you,” He glares, meekly trailing off at the end.
It’s funny Till says that because he would definitely not give Mizi anything by himself, considering he turns completely red and unable to form sentences whenever she’s around, but Ivan doesn’t tease him for it. He’s a bit busy trying to comprehend what exactly is happening right now.
“This… is for me?” He mutters. Till just gave him something. A gift. A drawing. Till drew him. “Am I dreaming?”
“Who else is it for? Do you see anyone else here?” He glares, but the effect is offset by the furious blush on his cheeks. “Y-You’re always nagging me about how I never draw you, so I thought…” He bites his lip, “…that you’d like this, since it’s your birthday or whatever.” He stammers, refusing to meet his gaze.
“Ah.” Ivan looks down at the paper again, fingers tracing the edge of the paper. “Thank you. I’ll frame it and hang it up on my walls. I’ll stick it on the ceiling above my bed so it’ll be the first thing I see when I wake up everyday. I’ll cherish it forever,” He grins, slightly manic.
Till’s head snaps to him, and he arches a brow. “W-What the hell are you saying? Be normal for once.” He glares, but the slight tension in his posture relaxes, as if relieved.
“You just gave me a gift. How am I supposed to act normal?” He asks.
“It’s just a drawing,” He stammers.
“You could give me a half dead worm and I’d nurse it back to life and care for it forever,” Ivan explains, tone serious. There’s another gift that he’d love to ask for, but he knows better than to push. He’s ecstatic nonetheless, ecstatic that Till thought about giving him something, that Till thought about him, even if it was brief. Even if the space he occupies in Till's mind is ever so small, miniscule, even, he's happy.
“Weirdo.” He mumbles, before averting his eyes to the side. He bites his lip, seemingly thinking over something, before turning back to Ivan.
“C-Close your eyes,” He says, his previous blush that had somewhat calmed down coming back full force.
Ivan blinks once, twice. “What?”
“Just… close your eyes, idiot! Are you deaf?” He snaps, shifting to sit up on his knees.
Ivan obliges, and he shuts his eyes. His confusion only grows when he feels Till shift closer to him, and then there’s a slight brush of something soft— a slight pressure— on his lips, and Ivan freezes. He’s pretty sure his brain is malfunctioning. The featherlight touch lingers for a second before he feels Till pulling away.
Did Till just—
He immediately jerks his eyes open, wide in surprise. Till’s face is burning, eyes looking to the side as he tries to moves back. Ivan’s own face feels slightly warm. He lunges to grab him, keeping him in his position where he’s straddling Ivan’s legs, almost sitting on them.
“Till,” He breathes, reverent and slightly crazed, “Till,”
“L-Let go of me!” He shrieks, digging his nails into Ivan’s arms which are gripping both of his shoulders, keeping him rooted there.
“Till,” He repeats, ignoring his protests, “Did. Did you just—”
“Shut the fuck up! Y-You were the one who said you wanted to try this for your birthday!” He gasps, increasingly frantic in his attempts at escaping. Ivan grins, slightly unhinged. How had the segyein taught him to smile again? He can't be bothered to remember that right now. He doesn’t care.
“You remembered that?”
“What, you think I'm some idiot who can't remember things? O-Of course I did!” He snaps, finally giving up and glaring daggers at him. Of course, this only means that he looks like an angry, hissy kitten to Ivan.
“I didn't say that,” Ivan then pauses for a second, before flipping them over, Till splayed over the grass as Ivan holds himself up above him.
“What the fu–”
“Can we do it again?” He pleads, relishing in the way Till flushes an even deeper red under him. God, he could watch him for centuries and never get bored. He doesn’t think he’ll ever find someone who fascinates and makes him feel as much as Till does.
“F-Fuck no! Get off me!” He yelps, trying to kick Ivan away.
“C’mon, Till… We already did it once…” He whines, leaning down to nuzzle his nose into his chest.
“I-I said no! Go away! You’re too heavy! Ivan, I swear—!” He sputters, hitting him on the head. Ivan lets out a muffled laugh into his chest, endeared to no end. Till, beautiful, unpredictable, sweet Till. He remembered. He remembered what I said, Ivan thinks, giddy.
“S-Stop laughing!” He yells, and that just makes him smile and laugh even harder.
Maybe birthdays weren't so bad after all.