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Alhaitham comes home with a bouquet of flowers.
A recurring experience in the past few months, but the sight still never fails to make Kaveh’s heart beat double time in his chest. Kaveh’s been lucky enough to be home all the times Alhaitham’s bought flowers for him, because it’s a sight to see every time; Alhaitham will walk in, a small bouquet clutched gently in his hands, and shoulder the door closed. When he sees Kaveh, he’ll smile, just the smallest bit, and make a gesture with his fingers that Kaveh takes to mean you want them so bad? Get up from the couch and come greet me.
Kaveh always finds himself obliging, because at this point he can admit to himself that he is just maybe the tiniest bit weak to Alhaitham, but that’s a secret he’ll take to his grave and surely no one else has figured it out.
Until Alhaitham opens his mouth.
“Please wash the dishes,” is the first thing he says, as he pushes the flowers into Kaveh’s hands. “I got you flowers.”
Stunned silent by the mental whiplash, Kaveh takes a moment longer than normal to get annoyed—“wha—I washed the dishes last night!”
“After letting them pile up for three days.”
“You—” Kaveh starts, and then sighs. He’s aware he hasn’t been the best roommate for a few days, because he’d been so fixated on this one job that was actually interesting. “Okay. Okay. Sorry. Won’t happen again.”
Alhaitham hums in acceptance, and leans forward to cup a hand around Kaveh’s neck so he can press a kiss to his forehead, and despite himself, Kaveh feels his mouth curling up in what has to be the most embarrassing dopiest grin ever.
He can’t resist—he pulls Alhaitham down for a proper kiss once he pulls back.
“Hey,” he says when they part, just enough that their lips are still barely brushing against each other’s. “How was work?”
Alhaitham pulls a face. (Tighnari has told him that it is not a face that Alhaitham pulls, but more of a slight twitch of his eyebrows that no one but Kaveh can ever seem to pick up.) “Busy. I can’t wait to be demoted.”
“I think you’re the only person in the history of Sumeru to desperately beg a boss to demote you,” Kaveh teases, taking Alhaitham’s hand and leading him towards the kitchen, “In other places, they’d just fire you for the insubordination.”
“I wish I was fired,” Alhaitham says, moving to wash his hands first, eyes tracking Kaveh as he moves around the kitchen, checking on the soup to reheat it just a little bit. Alhaitham doesn’t like his food too hot while Kaveh prefers it piping, so he makes sure to spoon a bowl out early to make sure it’s only just warm. “Imagine, I could just live here for the rest of my days.”
“And how are you going to support yourself?” Kaveh asks, “I know you have a ton of money saved up, but that’s going to run out at some point. Not to mention all the frivolous purchases you end up making.”
“They’re not frivolous,” Alhaitham frowns, “They amuse me.”
“More like I amuse you,” Kaveh huffs, and that gets him a small laugh.
“You’re not wrong.”
Rolling his eyes, Kaveh gestures rudely at him and points him towards where the rice is sitting in the pot, still warm from when he’d cooked it a few hours earlier. Alhaitham spoons out two dishes for the both of them, and tonight’s dinner is a mutton curry that Kaveh had gotten a great deal for in the wet market.
“Looks good,” Alhaitham hums, “Did you put spice in it?”
“Yes, I did. And before you ask, no, I put a humane amount of spice in it, not the hellish amount that you like.”
Alhaitham frowns. Brings a spoon up to his mouth and chews on a piece of meat thoughtfully. “No taste.”
Kaveh groans. “I know you’re just taking the piss out of me, this tastes perfectly fine. If I get you a bottle of chili to dump over your rice will that make you feel better?”
“It might.”
With a clack of his spoon, Kaveh stomps to the counter to retrieve their bottle of dry chili, and shoves it across the table at Alhaitham. “There. Put in the entire bottle, dickhead.”
Grinning, Alhaitham twists off the top and puts a sprinkle of it on his curry. There’s absolutely no fucking way that it tastes good, but Alhaitham acts like it’s the greatest thing on Teyvat, humming appreciatively after eating in a way that makes Kaveh shudder in revulsion.
Kaveh hasn’t had to meet any clients today, so he’s been taking a slow day for him—but it’s not the case for Alhaitham, it seems, because Kaveh has to listen to Alhaitham’s twenty minute rant about people and their incompetence and how did they even get hired in the first place, and by the end he’s patting Alhaitham’s shoulder in sympathy.
He hasn’t had to work in the same capacity as Alhaitham did, but fresh out of graduation had found him in an office as a temporary job while he set up his portfolio and both as a way to actually understand the intricacies of the business he was going into.
It was a very good job for him, Kaveh admits, one with great benefits and definitely where a lot of things could be learned.
But he is absolutely of the opinion that he couldn’t ever do it again, even if he was offered a hundred million mora for it.
People tend to assume that he’s an extrovert. And sure, he does like meeting his friends and being in social settings, but they don’t know how much he needs to recharge after those meetings. Doing work is worse because he’d had to be both polite and gentle while all his ideas were being shot down left and right and it’d made him want to put his fist through the wall because Archons, what was with the utter nonsense?
But he’s survived, on the bright side.
Alhaitham, however…
“Think about it,” he says, “what would you do if you didn’t have a job? Just lay about all day at home reading books?”
“Yes,” Alhaitham answers immediately, and okay, Kaveh should’ve expected that. It’s then that Alhaitham looks him in the eye and says, completely uncalled for and without any prompting whatsoever, “I’d be a good trophy husband, I think.”
Kaveh chokes.
It takes him a moment to recover, coupled with Alhaitham’s alarmed looks and furious patting on the back, but he finally gets his food down the right pipe and swipes at his nose with a tissue. “What brought that on,” he asks, voice raspy from coughing.
Alhaitham shrugs. Kaveh wants to strangle him. Just a little. “Nothing,” he says, “I’m quiet and I don’t intrude on your space. And… do you think I’m pretty, Kaveh?”
Kaveh stares, gobsmacked. That string of words coming out of Alhaitham’s mouth was not what he’d expected and honestly he thinks he might have died and went… somewhere. Not Celestia, for sure.
“The prettiest,” he manages to find his voice eventually, and says it with the most sarcastic and scathing tone he can muster up. Unfortunately, Alhaitham does seem to understand that Kaveh meant every word of what he said, and Kaveh’s willing to go crawl into their garden at this point.
Alhaitham only hums. And then he looks up at Kaveh through his eyelashes and says. “Thank you. I think you’re the prettiest too.”
Kaveh’s face goes up in flames. He’s only glad his friends aren’t with them because this would be prime blackmail material; the way his face goes red and unevenly splotchy is such an unattractive look that Kaveh hides his face in his hands—he can feel the heat radiating off his own skin, that’s how bad the situation is.
Cool fingertips land on his wrist, and then a tug. Kaveh peeks out from behind his fingers to see Alhaitham looking at him softly, and he looks so endeared that Kaveh can’t help but knock his head into Alhaitham’s hands as a show of reciprocating his affection.
They fall silent, after that. Kaveh eats faster—eats the fastest in their group of friends, in fact—and Alhaitham is the slowest. He takes the time to savour his food while Kaveh slurps everything down and manages to horrifically burn his own throat in the process. Now, this means he waits for Alhaitham to finish his dinner before collecting both their dishes and putting them in the sink.
“Is that something you want?” he blurts out, when the water’s running, and slightly wants to slap himself for the question.
“Hm?”
“Marriage. Being a husband.”
There’s a pause, and even with his back turned, Kaveh can imagine Alhaitham peering at him with those stupidly green eyes of his. It’s a few seconds before he replies.
“I have talked about this before, I think.” In his mind’s eye, Kaveh can imagine Alhaitham tapping the wood of the table. “Back in the Akademiya.”
“I remember you saying you didn’t care much for it,” Kaveh recalls, and then, wondering why the hell he’s pursuing the topic, continues, “Is it still the same?”
“Mostly,” Alhaitham allows. “I still do not see the appeal in it. But I would not be opposed, if…”
“If?”
There’s no reply. Kaveh pauses scrubbing a dish to look back over his shoulder at Alhaitham, who looks uncharacteristically quiet.
“Come here,” he says softly, and watches the way Alhaitham seems to perk up at that, and then relaxes back into his hold when Alhaitham wraps his arms around Kaveh’s waist from behind.
“If?” he prompts gently.
When Alhaitham speaks, it’s into Kaveh’s neck. “If my partner wanted it. I would not be opposed.”
Kaveh hums, deep in thought. They’ve only been together for a few months, but what does it mean that they’ve been living together for years at this point, and known each other for most of their lives? Surely that has to count for something?
“It’s too early,” Alhaitham suddenly declares, snapping Kaveh out of his thoughts, “Not now. But, sometime in the future—that would be nice.”
“Yeah,” Kaveh agrees, and can’t help turning his head to the side to press a kiss to Alhaitham’s hair, “Yeah, I agree.”
Alhaitham doesn’t say anything as he finishes washing the dishes and leaves them out to dry, and then he separates, excusing himself for a shower, and Kaveh settles on the couch to do some light reading of his own. He’s in the middle of a particularly engrossing chapter when Alhaitham returns, so he simply moves to the side to make space for Alhaitham and pats it in a gesture for Alhaitham to sit down.
He feels Alhaitham sink into the couch next to him. Like this, it’s easy for Kaveh to be reminded of the times back in the Akademiya where they spent their time in equal amounts talking and in silence. Remembers their first date that had gone so badly that they just ended up back at the house with takeout from Lambad, chortling at each other about the—admittedly, really fucking bad—place they’d gone to for dinner and ending up cuddled on the couch. Even when it was all too new to them, they’d been comfortable with each other.
“Kaveh,” Alhaitham murmurs.
He blinks and turns. “Mhm?”
“Meant to ask earlier. Can you take a look at my earphones for me? Not right now, but there’s a staticky kind of sound from the right ear.”
“Of course,” Kaveh says, “Just one more chapter, and I’ll have it ready for you right as rain.”
“It’s never just one chapter with you.”
“H-hey,” Kaveh says, feeling very wronged by the sudden and unprovoked attack on his person, “I offer to fix your headphones and this is the thanks I get?”
Alhaitham only laughs, drawing him closer by the waist to press a kiss against his lips.
And, yeah, Kaveh finds himself thinking, as he sets the book on the table and slides a hand into Alhaitham’s hair to press their lips closer together, he wouldn’t mind having this forever.
He’s definitely looking forward to it.