Work Text:
Grey clouds were gathering around the Welton building, making everything darker than it should be, considering it was barely 1 pm. There was a hint of coldness in the air, the poets headed to their usual lunch spot, under a tree near the lake. Charlie and Cameron argued about something, occasionally interrupted by Meeks and Todd, who followed close behind them while having their own conversation. Pitts couldn't really hear what the deal was, as he was stuck in between Neil and Knox’s wingman attempts.
“Come on, Pitts, it's Valentine's!” Neil whispered-yelled at his side, shaking Pitts’ shoulder lightly in excitement.
“And his birthday” Knox added, walking around them to get on his other side.“Think about it! That's like, the most romantic opportunity you can get and you're still wasting it”, Pitts opened his mouth but couldn't come up with any answer. It was a coincidence that Meeks’ birthday was three days before Valentine's day — and another coincidence that they happened to be dating —, but he'd never put much thought into it. Steven's birthday always came first in his mind, and it wasn't like they didn't acknowledge the following date, they just didn't fuzz over it. Unlike some people. In his opinion, the rest of the poets were overly excited about the 14th, especially these two.
“So what?” he argued, “We're not what you would call ‘romantic’ anyway, so why does this matter?”
“Exactlyyy” Neil said, like it was obvious. “Don't you think it would be a nice surprise?”
Pitts was about to reply before Knox stepped in front of him “And what do you mean ‘not romantic’? You're a couple, aren't you?”
He had no choice but to stop in his tracks as his friends kept him from walking away, both looking at him, expectant. It was new, he and Steven had never been questioned in their relationship before. All of the poets knew they weren't exactly platonic, but no one asked questions about what they were to each other.
“Well… yes, it's just… “
“Just what?”
Was this an intervention? It definitely felt like an intervention. He doesn't remember ever hiring his friends as relationship advicers.
“We don't do all that stuff” Valentine's, that is. It'd never felt natural to them, celebrating love with gifts and cards, if they didn't do it the rest of the year, why do it then? “We're not like you and Todd”
The mentioned seemed out of answer for that one. From the beginning of the week, Neil had taken it as his personal mission to let Todd know what time of the year it was. The two had been exchanging little gifts and typical lovers-gestures for three days now, the main attraction being, of course, flowers.
“No one's like Neil and Todd” Knox chuckled loudly as they started walking again. “That's literally impossible, I think”
“Shut up, Knox” Neil replied while laughing along.
The conversation dissolved and soon they were trying to catch up with the rest of their friends, since they'd fallen far behind them. Neil leaned over Pitts once more, “Think about it. I'm going into town after dinner, before the club's meeting. You can come by” he said, and with that he disappeared with the others.
He did think about it. In fact, he couldn't stop thinking about it for one second. When he sat with Meeks at study group, he almost considered asking him about it. But like, what the hell would he say? Hey so what if I gave you some flowers haha, wouldn't that be so funny and weird? No? Damn.
Pitts wasn't exactly freaking out. He wasn't. It was not a big deal, nothing was ever that important, maybe he'd do it, maybe he wouldn't, it wouldn't change much really, just some stupid flowers, not like it was a marriage proposal or anything…
But. But Neil had given him so little time to make a judgement out of that thought. When the last class of the day was over, he started panicking. Just slightly. On one side, he and Meeks had never done anything for Valentine's, and they'd certainly never done any gestures like this one. It had never felt necessary, they were both okay with that. What if this broke that unspoken agreement? What if it was just awkward and weird and Meeks hated him forever—?
He was freaking out a little.
On the other hand… he had thought about it before. That is, months ago, when they went on one of those rare recreational trips to town that the school did. They saw an autumn themed flower arrangement in a storefront window, Meeks had pointed at it while passing by, and Pitts remembers thinking that if Steven was a flower, he would look exactly like that.
He also visited the thought on Christmas, briefly. And New year's, for some reason. And two weeks ago. And right now.
Someone nudged his shoulder. “You okay?” Steven looked a little worried, he didn't notice how much time he’d spent quietly on his head.
“Yeah” he replied, though he couldn't quite cover the nervousness in his voice. Before his friend could comment on it, he added, “I need to get more resistors for the radio, by the way, the ones we had are, uh, wrong”. Smooth.
Meeks seemed confused for half a second, then he just shrugged. “Sure, we can get them on the weekend”.
“Oh, no, we need them now.”
“...why?” he raised an incredulous eyebrow, Pitts knew he was not buying any of it.
“The inflation. You know how much the prices go up over a weekend? Next thing you know they’re gonna be a whole dollar each.” Not smooth, not smooth at all. Meeks stared, not sure if amused or annoyed or confused or all of the above. He didn’t say anything, it was implied that he was waiting for Pitts to explain what he was on, hopefully nothing illegal. Pitts was not going to cave. “Anyway, I’m going to the store tonight. I’ll be back before curfew”.
Apparently, he was now.
“Do you want me to go with you?”
“Nope”
He proceeded to take a spoonful of mashed potatoes and throw his friend his most innocent smile, to which he was met with a grimace of revulsion, then the topic was forgotten. He could've handled that better. Anyway.
Buying gifts was stressful. More than making them. Pitts was more of an arts and crafts kinda guy, in fact, two days ago he'd given Steven a handmade owl ornament for his desk, along with a book by Stephen Hawking, which is funny because. Well.
Those were the only things he was confident in buying for Steven; books. He had almost memorized his reading list by now and there was always one that he was sure he would like. But it's not like people went around saying hey happy valentine's here are some fucking encyclopedias.
“Do you need help with anything?” Can you make my brain shut up please?
The lady at the shop must've noticed his frustration. Didn't take a genius for it; he was standing in front of the seasonal arrangements next to the register doing nothing but squinting and mumbling. They were all too colorful, too big, too seasonal.
At the cashier's question, Neil stopped his rambling about… something. Pitts was now realizing he'd been being spoken to this whole time and he didn't listen to any of it. The lady at the counter was still expecting an answer, but just as he went to open his mouth to say ‘no thank you we’re fine’, Neil responded for him.
“Nicole! How are you doing?”
Who. Huh.
“Hi, Neil” she smiled, “Looking for another something for your lover?”
Neil walked to lean on the counter. It seemed that he'd come to the shop enough that he befriended the cashier. Something about the way she said the words ‘another’ and ‘lover’ made Pitts assume that she knew the deal. After Neil explained that no, he wouldn't be getting anything this time, he introduced Gerard and Nicole. She was around their same age, and had a very friendly and kind personality. No wonder the two had formed a casual friendship from the amount of times his friend went there.
He wasn't sure of what to do when he became the topic of conversation. So he only stood awkwardly and nodded while Neil explained the situation and the girl followed along throwing knowing glances at him.
After some time, he finally picked something. He knew Meeks wasn't a fan of ostentatious things, and yes he did know his favorite flower, thank you very much. But local flower shops were a different world. None of the things they offered seemed to match the criteria he'd made up on his mind, and he didn't want to give Steven something that wasn't really coming from him. He ended up going for a simpler arrangement, small, pretty, wrapped in kraft paper. Once he had it in his hands, the nerves started to settle in.
He was going to give Steven flowers. As in boyfriend. As in Valentine's.
After they said goodbye to Nicole, they went out into the cold of the night, it was later than they expected so they headed directly towards the cave for the meeting. It only occurred to Gerard that he was gonna have to walk in late in front of all his friends with the aforementioned item. Oh well.
How did straight couples do this so often, he could never guess.
They both rushed inside the cave, where everyone else was already packing up like sardines as usual. They were met with a flash light on their eyes, and Charlie's reprimands. “And where have you been? We've been waiting ages!”
Pitts tried to be as quiet and fast as he could in such a reduced space, keeping the thing hidden behind his coat and hoping it would go unnoticed, at least until he'd made it to his spot. Squinting, he finally got to the back of the cave, sitting beside Steven. Charlie and Neil continued to argue about the club's policies or whatever.
“Hi!” he greeted him quietly, “Where were you?” Pitts’ heart jumped a little, and his hands trembled slightly behind his back. It was honestly humbling how nervous he was about this. He was grateful they'd been left in the dark at that moment, so no one was paying attention to them.
“I, uh… got you these”
He held the flowers sheepishly in front of him. The paper had crumbled a little, Meeks stared at the small pile of violets and blue iris, not much wider than a hand size. Sprinkles of white here and there, with what he believed was called baby's breath, all put together with a simple twine string. Somehow, everyone collectively agreed to stop talking and pay attention right then.
One infinite second passed, in which Meeks said nothing and Pitts was genuinely about to panic. Fortunately, Meeks seemed to come back to his senses, opened his mouth, closed it, blinked once, then asked, “For me?”
He could've melted at the rare shyness in his tone, expecting a snarky remark of how much of a romantic he was being. Feeling his friends’ eyes and the flashlights trying to discreetly be aimed towards them, he shrugged awkwardly, bringing the flowers closer to Steven, who hesitantly wrapped his fingers around the stems.
“Why?” he asked with a confused expression, but Pitts could see the smile that was playing on his lips. Why? Well, that was a good question.
“You know. Valentine's. Birthdays, the apocalypse, whatever man…” the words came out rushed and unexpectedly soft, winning a couple snorts that failed to be stifled. He couldn't help but look and never stop looking at Steven, the way his gaze went from the flowers in his hands, to Gerard, and back. Like he was trying to figure something out, but the feeling of fluster and affection wouldn't let him think so he just gave up altogether.
“Thanks” Pitts heard him mumble with that giddy smile he saved for the privacy of their dorm. Eyes finding his, Pitts smiled back at him, all of his nerves from before had vanished into warmth, a kind of beating in his chest he only felt when Steven looked at him like that, exactly how he was now.
He could've kissed him.
If it wasn't for the same fucking flashlight that returned to blind them again.
“Charlie, will you stop?”
“I'M SORRY. WHAT?”
The place suddenly burst into laughter and amusement. Todd and Neil were in tears, like they hadn't been allowed to laugh for ages; Knox was dramatically expressing his excitement about watching his ‘children’ fall in love, Cameron was faking a fainting. And Charlie was losing his mind. Pitts was mortified, Meeks didn't seem to be paying much attention to the teasing.
“Wait, is that why you and Neil were acting weird after dinner?” Cameron asked and Pitts didn't even have time to respond when Charlie turned around like spinning top to Neil.
“You knew about this?!”
Neil attempted to defend himself from Charlie's betrayal accusations. “I couldn't include you, okay? It was a last minute conspiracy”. There was something about the way Neil and Todd exchanged looks that didn't sit quite right with Pitts. His suspicion was then confirmed– or more accurately, fed, by his lover's intervention.
“Did you tell him?” he asked, looking at Todd, like he already knew the answer, whatever that was. The acused stopped laughing for a second, then made eye contact with Neil and they both bursted harder than before.
Pitts was confused.
“Tell him what?” Todd was still smiling though now he looked like a kid caught on a lie.
“Todd” Meeks couldn't even act annoyed, but he was definitely trying to reproach him for something. The blonde accepted guilt fast, but he didn't look regretful at all.
“Wh— You said not to tell Pitts, and I didn't tell Pitts, I told Neil!”
Charlie pointed his flashlight to Meeks’ eyes again “Yeah you should've been more specific, Meeks. What is he talking about, by the way?”
“Meeks told Todd that he wanted Pitts to give him flowers” Cameron said like it was obvious.
“Ohhh”
Hold on. Did he? So this whole time, they had unknowingly been the main part of Neil and Todd’s evil plan to get them into valentine’s shenanigans? So you’re telling him he’s been uselessly stressing over messing everything up with Steven by accidentally doing something out of pocket, and no one managed to tell him this particular detail? Why didn’t he tell him either? Meeks looked like he wanted the earth to swallow him whole. Pitts scooted closer and gave him a questioning look, to which Meeks replied by rolling his eyes, whispering “don’t” with a threatening finger just as Pitts was about to say something, so he didn’t. Maybe he should do this more often.
Eventually, they managed to actually start the meeting. Neil took his place at the front and the rest followed. Steven and Gerard remained mostly sat next to each other, the violets carefully resting on Steven's lap the whole time. They listened to their friends recite poetry, banter, they even got Todd to read a small poem he made for Neil, yet another proof of the immensely sweet affection between the two. Neither mentioned it, but Gerard felt unusually giddy about Steven's arm pressing on his own, and how he caught him a couple times looking at the flowers with a certain spark in his face.
When walking back to the building, he decided to get something out of his head.
“Did you really say that to Todd?”
Meeks made a pause, visibly cringing at the memory, “Yeah” he shrugged, then added “I wasn't expecting it, I just thought it would be nice, you know? To do something like that, sometimes.”
“Hm” They had fallen behind the rest, opting to go a bit slower and just enjoy each other's company for a while, while they were still free from the rules and under no one's judgemnet but the trees and nightsky. “Was it nice?” he asked after a moment. Meeks stopped walking besides him and Pitts turned to look at him, finding him already looking back. He barely had time to react when Steven put a hand to his shoulder, going up to place a small kiss on his lips; something they've done many times before, it didn't feel much different, it was as loving as ever. He took a minute to appreciate it; it was a dark night, with a new moon approaching, but there were still a few strings of light that seeped through the thickness of the forest, reflecting on Steven's glasses. Maybe these kind of gestures— flowers, gifts, dates, weren't necessary for their relationship, but maybe they didn't need to be. If it could make his favorite person smile like that, then, Pitts considered he didn't need further purpose.