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“I like blowing things up,” Ominis announced, leaning back on the sofa.
“Garreth Weasley!” Sebastian guessed at once. Ominis rolled his eyes.
“All right, I set you up for that one. Next.”
Sebastian reached for the next slip of paper in the bowl on the table, grabbing a crisp at the same time. He unfolded it. Professor Sharp. He thought for a moment while he chewed, then declared:
“Someone with an incredibly sexy beard.”
“Professor Sharp,” Ominis replied immediately. Sebastian stared at him, another crisp halfway raised to his mouth.
“How did you get that so fast?”
Ominis raised an eyebrow. “You said ‘sexy beard’.”
Sebastian flung his hands out, nearly knocking over his wine glass. “Yes, but you don’t even know what a sexy beard looks like!”
“Rude,” Ominis sniffed, reaching for his own glass. “Besides, that implies you’re being ableist. Playing Heads Up with your blind boyfriend and still going for visual descriptions.”
Sebastian sighed. “Trust you to pull the blind card. Your turn.”
Ominis kept his “cards” on his phone instead, and Sebastian had to fight the urge to kiss him when he saw the little frown Ominis made while slotting in an AirPod and letting the screen reader read the word aloud. While Ominis listened, he looked around their cosy living room, at the few Christmas decorations they’d put up so far (Sebastian liked to pre-start Christmas in late October. He might have taken advantage of Ominis’ blindness and put up a few decorative elves and a wreath in the window. Ominis had threatened to throw them straight into the garbage when he’d noticed them a few days later).
Sebastian realised he’d truly grown old when he thought about the fact that he’d much rather spend his Saturdays like this: cooking and drinking wine with his boyfriend, then playing board games while soft music clinked from the stereo, rather than sweat on a crowded dance floor at some night club or pub.
“All right,” Ominis said, removing the AirPod. “Amit.”
Sebastian frowned. “Is that the clue I get?”
Ominis only gave him a mysterious smile and took a sip of wine. His lips were already a little red from the bottle they’d opened with dinner, and Sebastian was dangerously close to ditching the game entirely and climbing into his lap.
“I made it too easy last time.”
“Fine, all right. Amit, Amit… stars?” Sebastian guessed. Ominis shook his head.
“Bookish?”
Ominis tilted his head. “Good guess, but no.”
“Short?”
Ominis huffed. “Rude.”
Sebastian groaned, lightly nudging Ominis’ thigh with his feet. “Give me another clue.”
“All right. Hmm… Amit and arguments.”
“Unbearable?” Sebastian suggested immediately. Ominis laughed. “Good guess, but still wrong. This is more… a personality trait.”
“Unbearable is a personality trait,” Sebastian pointed out. “I mean, I love Amit, but he can be unbearable sometimes.”
Ominis rolled his eyes. “Fine, fair enough. But no. Compare Garreth in an argument with Amit in an argument. What does that make Amit?”
Sebastian hesitated, thinking hard. Finally he said:
“Conflict-averse?”
“Yes!” Ominis laughed. “Well done.”
“That one was difficult,” Sebastian complained, swatting Ominis on the leg. “You’re mean.”
Ominis only smiled. “Your turn.”
Sebastian unfolded the next slip of paper and broke into a grin when he read it: Boyfriend.
“Right!” he said eagerly, crossing his legs. “This one’s easy. What am I?”
“Irresponsible,” Ominis replied immediately. Sebastian frowned.
“No, I mean… what am I to you?”
“A nuisance!”
“What? No, more like… who, what, am I to you?!”
“Really fucking annoying!” Ominis guessed.
Sebastian slowly lowered the paper slip.
“Are you joking?”
Ominis blinked innocently. “What?”
“I mean,” Sebastian said, “what do I bring to our relationship? What does our relation to each other make me into, for you?”
Ominis tapped a finger against his glass. “A constant source of stress?”
“What is our connection to each other? What is our relationship?”
“Strained?”
“No! I mean … something I’ve become since meeting you. Not a trait exactly, more like… a sort of title I get, thanks to our dynamics and relationship?”
Ominis frowned, thinking hard.
“A lazy couch potato?” he suggested at last.
Sebastian threw the paper slip onto the table.
“I’m leaving,” he announced, and stood up.
Ominis burst out laughing and reached for his wrist, only to grab his thigh instead.
“All right, all right, I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll guess properly.”
Sebastian slowly sank back onto the sofa while Ominis thought.
“Something you are to me… the love of my life?” Ominis suggested at last.
Sebastian’s stomach, already warm with laughter, good food and wine, somehow got even warmer.
“All right, I forgive you,” he sighed, reaching for Ominis’ hand and threading their fingers together. “But that’s not it.”
“Isn’t it?” Ominis smirked. “No, you’re right, I forgot; Isaac Cooper is probably the love of my life…”
Sebastian’s grip on his hand tightened.
“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
Ominis rolled his eyes, but squeezed his hand back.
“Boyfriend?” he guessed, and Sebastian let out a dramatic, theatrical sigh.
“Finally!”
Ominis laughed.
“I’m done with this game,” he declared, holding out a hand. “Pass me the crisps?”
Sebastian placed the bowl in his hand and pushed aside his own stack of paper slips.
“Shall we watch a film?” he suggested.
“Yes please,” Ominis said, reaching for the fluffy throw draped along the back of the sofa and shifting closer.
Outside, night had settled in and the snow had started up again. While Ominis carefully arranged the blanket across both their knees, Sebastian grabbed the remote and started searching for Christmas films with audio description. They curled up together beneath the blanket, Sebastian with his arm around Ominis, while the opening of The Grinch began to play (Sebastian hated it, but Ominis loved it).
Sebastian glanced at the last slip of paper he’d drawn, now crumpled but unfolded on the coffee table. Boyfriend.
He thought of the little box tucked away at the very back of his dresser drawer, hidden among old high school jumpers where he knew Ominis never rummaged, and hoped that title would soon be upgraded.