Chapter Text
“I love you.” The words taste foreign and almost dry on his tongue, and he’s thankful he’s speaking them in practice to his reflection in a mirror and not to his actual boyfriend. “I’m in love with you,” he tries once again with feeling and comes off a little less ham-fisted but no more confident than before. “Kravitz, I think I love you.” Still blunt. Still hard. Still unnatural.
How do people do this? How did Merle do it – how did Magnus do it? How did Carey do it? It’s got to be easier than this, right?
Taako thinks this is the first time he’s loved someone. Like, loved someone. He’s had… flings in the past but they were passion at best – desire borne of necessity.
Kravitz is… Gods, he feels ridiculous trying to articulate this even internally. What is Kravitz? (Besides the Grim fucking Reaper)
Kravitz is… Kravitz is the comfort of darkness, Taako supposes. Kravitz is not a beacon of light on a cliffside and he’s not a bonfire roaring in the evening. Kravitz is the snuffed-out candle, burnt down at both ends. He’s comforting in his formality and finality. He’s a blanket of darkness. The darkness is not frightening – Taako’s always known this, but Kravitz confirms it – the darkness is a shawl wrapped tight around you. The darkness is easy on the eyes (Gods, is Kravitz ever easy on the eyes) and it is the bookend to a day. It’s the kiss goodnight and it’s the deliverance of rest.
Kravitz is all of these things. He is a comfort – he is not burning in exuberance and he is not smouldering with ingenuity or passion. He’s a dolt at times, to be sure, but he’s grateful and gracious and… And Taako loves him? Taako loves him. Fuck.
Fuck!!
It’s been, what, half a year? Yeah, half a year, he guesses, since their first date at the fucking Chug ‘n’ Squeeze. His heart grew fonder and Kravitz’s hands never grew any warmer. Icy boy. Taako’s used to it now, though, and if anything it’s a welcome sensation on nights when Merle has the furnace turned up to blast in their dorm. Taako doesn’t necessarily need to sleep, but he certainly doesn’t mind it when it’s in the arms of a corporeal air conditioning unit.
But, no, no, no – Kravitz is more than that. He doesn’t mean to imply that his boyfriend is just an ice pack. Kravitz the only person save for Merle and Magnus that Taako feels comfortable confiding in. Taako is terrified of coming off as vulnerable – he doesn’t mind others knowing he’s frail or lazy or physically weak but, like – emotional vulnerability? Hell no. He’s a brick wall of emotions, baby. A brick wall surrounding a thin glass sheet balanced precariously against a kitchen counter.
At first he wasn’t sure exactly what it was about Kravitz that lent him such a comfort and a sense of safety in sharing his weaknesses, but now he knows it’s got something to do (everything to do?) with the unassuming recognition he responds with. No leapfrogging to conclusions, no torrent of unnecessary questions. At worst, a verbal acknowledgement of Taako’s bleeding-heart honesty that tends to make the tips of Taako’s ears burn at the credit, but it’s not anything unbearable. Kravitz just… listens. Kravitz sees past the talk and the outlandish constant lying and the jokes and the noncommittal hand gestures and appreciates the honesties that Taako parleys with him. Maybe it’s because Kravitz collects souls for a living. Maybe it’s because Kravitz has stood before necromancers and undead beings who bore their hearts – pulled their ribs apart at the sternum and confessed every detail of their lives. Maybe it’s because Kravitz listens to concessions for a living and has had to become used to them out of necessity.
But he’s certainly not numb to them. He’s certainly not numb to Taako.
He told him about Glamour Springs about four months into their relationship. It was a lot earlier than he tells… well, anyone, to be honest, but it was Kravitz. So he told him.
He told him about the levity and the passion and the joy he felt when he started the show and the feeling of his heart leaping into his throat when the rug was pulled beneath him and he had to run. He told him about the guilt and the gripping self-hate and the desperation for some kind of reconciliation. He told him about the fear of whisks and bowls and kitchen countertops and fucking nightshade and all the while Kravitz watched with an expression that perfectly married concern and acknowledgement. No judgement. Kravitz had seen people deliberately play dollhouse with the corpses of the dead, he said – a confession of manslaughter was, in the grand scheme of things, not nearly as bad. “Still bad, obviously, but like…”
And Taako told him about Sazed. Taako told him what the Chalice showed him and explained the mix of horror and relief. Taako told him about the night terrors that decreased in frequency but changed in content, and Taako told him about the desire to cook again one day.
Silence hung in the air at the conclusion of his admission for a few seconds before Kravitz’s hand covered Taako’s own, skin like ice but still tender. “Thank you for sharing all of that with me,” he said, irises burning yellow and the edges of his eyes soft and loving, “I feel like I understand you better, which is always a good thing.” He smiled that outrageously handsome smile. “That must have been… forgive the work pun, but it must have been hell for you. I’m happy you came through it. I’m happy you’re here with me. I’m sorry that it was such a struggle to get here.”
Taako thinks that might have been the exact instant his feelings clicked over into ‘love’. Actual, legitimate, palpable love and he desperately had wanted to reply to Kravitz’s kindness with “Holy shit, dude, I love you,” but the result was instead a strangled noise not unlike a toad being squeezed.
But he wants to tell him!! He really does. Kravitz is important to him in a way no partner has ever been before. But he’s… well, fuck, he’s afraid. The stakes are really really high on this one! Taako finally feels something for someone who’s not a jealous tool mooching off his success and fame. Kravitz is a guy with his own entire life outside of the time he spends with Taako – granted, that life is spent hunting necromancers and dragging souls back to the astral plane but like… he’s actually employed so that’s dope.
It’s just that Kravitz means a lot to him, basically. Kravitz is something that Taako thought he never deserved – a partner who listens and a partner who genuinely cares about him and who Taako cares about, too. Kravitz makes Taako’s life better just by virtue of being in it and Taako’s not used to that and Taako really does not want to fuck this up.