Work Text:
lars doesn't know the name of the man he hangs out with at the park. margo points that out, across these summer months of shared lunches and exchanged treats, lars never learned your name. he never really thought to ask, or even share his.
then again, it wasn't really a park and you don't really hang out. but there's a bench about half way between that ugly little building lars works in and other ugly little building you work in just down the street, and those thirty minute lunch periods of yours that seem to line up.
lars didn't really go out during his break. not usually. but he noticed that bench one day, and few days later when the weather was a bit nicer and lars needed a break - an escape from kurt's music and keyboards clicking and all the quiet conversations that weren't quiet enough - he went out to the bench for lunch. and you weren't there that first day. first day you hadn't been out all summer, not that lars had any way to know that. not that lars knew who you were. not until the day after, when you were there. your gaze flickered from your book to him and you pulled your lunch and bag closer. giving him room to sit.
he was gone before you noticed. so you left room the day after, figuring you probably should've from the beginning. (in all fairness, you did at first. but it was only ever you out here, figured it didn't matter how much space you took up.) and after a few days of returning back inside upon seeing you out there again, lars joined you on the bench. it was a loud day. every voice carried farther than it should and lingered in his ears. all those little menial sounds; shredders, faxes, keyboards; were projected, like every task was done harsher.
so he stood, a few yards away.
stuck.
he didn't want to go back in, but he didn't really want to talk either. didn't want to introduce himself and do all the little formalities his brother and karin try to push him to do. that they encourage him to get more comfortable with.
but your voice, abrupt as it was, didn't linger. "you can sit. i'm not much of conversationalist, though."
you barely paid any mind to him after that, just left the right side of the bench open for him and occasionally left a snack in his seat for him. it usually got you a short breathy laugh - that's the best way you can think to describe it - and a "thanks." sometimes, you'll get snacks back in the following days. sometimes it's little decorative things lars finds, like bookmarks or pens. and those handful of weeks go by, just like that.
serene and easy.
until he hesitates. doesn't quite make to the bench before, "i don't know your name."
as it does now and then, your attention flits to him. "i don't know yours either."
and he sits, taking that answer with him. those little formalities might've been helpful, he admits it to himself.
he enjoys your company. it's consistent, predictable. there's a reliability to your presence. the only time you didn't turn up you warned lars ahead of time, just before you walked back. it was more of joke than anything. something in the vein if 'i won't be around tomorrow, don't let anyone steal my spot'. something lars didn't really have an answer to. regardless, lars didn't go out the day you weren't there. so margo took the opportunity, asked where he'd disappeared to over lunch recently.
which leads him to now. sitting next the man on the bench, who's name he doesn't know, but would like to.
so he tries again. "lars," there's a short pause. "i'm lars."