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“Kos!” they called, skidding into the room.
“What?” Koschei responded, their voice dripping with disdain. They usually sounded like that. Their voice dripped with a lot of things.
“So my parents wanted me to come home for the holiday, and I was like ‘No, I can’t, I have plans with my partner’ and they were like ‘just invite them too’ so now I’m getting dragged to my parents’ house but I’m so busyyy,” they whined.
Koschei blinked at them. “But you don’t—you don’t have a partner.”
“I knooowww,” Theta said, grabbing their shoulders. “That’s why I’m even more done for.”
“There’s a pretty straightforward solution to this—” Koschei began.
“Right,” Theta agreed.
“—come clean to your parents.”
“—have you pretend to be my partner!”
“What.”
“What?”
“What?” Koschei demanded.
“Oh come on, it’s a good idea! You can help me keep up with all my studies and I don’t have to tell my parents I lied! It’s great.”
“For you.”
“Oh come ooonnn,” they wheedled. Shit. Koschei looked away. They couldn’t make eye contact. Not now. Theta’s pleading puppy dog eyes would immediately make their resolve crack. “What could possibly be so bad about dating me?” They could practically hear the other Time Lord batting their lashes.
Nothing, their thoughts grumbled. There would be nothing bad about saying Theta. They were funny and kind and so smart yet still always stuck in a daydream and they had pretty eyes and hair and the way they laughed was like the noise that wind chimes made but if it was a laugh, beautiful and tinkling and melodic, and that smile, the way they smiled made them want to press their lips together until they were breathless from giggling.
Maybe the problem of pretending to date Theta might reveal that they didn’t want it to be pretend. They looked up. Theta’s big puppy eyes got them. They always got Theta their way. It was basically bribery. There was one single, fleeting moment where they thought of saying no before their mouth opened and said, “fine.”
“Yay!” they clapped their hands together. Koschei bit their lip, wondering why they had agreed to this.
Hours later, they were still wondering why they had agreed to this. They just had to smile and nod as Theta introduced them as their partner to their parents. They ignored the way they felt their hearts flutter with a little jolt of excitement. Maybe this was just a way to get their hopes up. To have the experience of dating Theta, only for it to end. To have a guaranteed end. Except maybe they didn’t want it to end. Maybe they wanted to actually kiss Theta. To actually be with them. For it to not be pretend.
They just smiled and played the part of Theta’s partner. Method acting, right?
They smiled all throughout dinner, nodding along with polite conversation until they could finally be alone with Theta.
They pulled them into the garden as Theta giggled. “Theta,” they said, hearts pounding in their chess.
“Yeah?” their eyes met theirs.
“I—uhm—shit—I—” they rubbed the back of their head. Theta just stared at them with their big puppy eyes. It was not helping. “I-I-I-I think I’m in love with you!”
Theta just blinked. “Is that it?”
“What?”
“Is that it?”
“What do you mean ‘is that it!?’ I just confessed my love for you!”
“I mean… it was never really a secret. You’re really bad at hiding it, Kos.”
Koschei stared at them, incredulous. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah.” They smiled. “For what it’s worth, I love you too.”
“You love me?”
“Always have. You just seemed like you had trouble figuring out that the feeling was mutual, so I kind of devised this whole,” they just waved a hand.
“You know I really hate you, right?” Koschei said, kissing them on the lips. They were as soft as they’d imagined.
“Mhm,” Theta murmured against their lips.