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Carter knew he needed to get up. It was time for him to get up but he couldn't bring himself to, instead laying in bed staring at the clock like he was in a staring contest with it.
9:02.
He could get up. He needed to get up. It was time for him to get up.
9:03.
The initiates could wait two more minutes for it to be a safe time.
9:04.
Were the minutes longer? Did the minutes feel longer? Why did the minutes feel longer? He needed to get up but he couldn't, one more minute. Just one more minute and then it would be fine.
Someone knocked on his door and he almost screamed. “brother dear, are you coming to breakfast?” Sadie asked through the door but Carter didn't even look at the door as he responded.
“Yeah yeah, I'm- I'm up, I'm getting dressed, I'll be there in a minute.” his eyes stayed blocked on the clock as he responded, a fear that if he looked away the safe time would pass and he would have to wait for another four minutes to get up.
9:05.
He got up and quickly covered it, if he couldn't see the time it couldn't affect him.
He knew this wasn't normal, his mom had apparently suffered the same problems, though his dad never came to him for it, never complained about his weird need for rituals. Sometimes Julius would even say ‘your mom used to do things like that’, those comparisons always made him feel weird.
He wasn't his mom, he was barely ever compared to her, he looked like his dad and because his dad got full custody of him he was referred to as Julius's son sometimes more than he was referred to as Carter Kane.
He loved his dad, it wasn't that he didn't like being considered his dad's son, it was just weird. He was never Ruby Kane's son, never Sadie Kane's brother, always Julius Kane's son.
Or that's how it used to be at least but now his dad was the ruler of the underworld and his mom was, well, she was still dead that had not changed and most of the initiates knew him as Amos’s nephew if they came from the First Nome but most of the time they saw Sadie Kane's brother or the First pharaoh in an absurd amount of generations or just Carter.
He knew his issue with numbers wasn't normal, he knew most people weren't irrationally afraid of numbers, he knew most people didn't need to flick their lights on and off a certain number of times before going to bed, he knew that most people didn't make sure they only started doing things at times that ended with zero or five.
But despite the fact it was abnormal, and most likely a disorder, it was something he had inherited from his mom a fucked up genetic way of saying ‘I'm Ruby Kane son look I even have the same weird problems with time and numbers that she did!’.
Today is going to be a good day he repeated to himself as he got dressed. Today was going to be a good day he was not going to let this weird problem he had inherited from his mother affect him today, well, affect him as much today. It always affected him.
He was going to have a date with Zia and it was going to be fine and great and they were going to have a great time and nothing bad would happen, hopefully.
He was very excited to take his boyfriend out for a date, their first proper date as boyfriends.
Things haven't changed that much in their relationship since Zia came out, they were still Zia, partly because they still kept their name though they weren't sure if that would stay true but mainly because it was Zia. Who they were in the person wasn't going to change because they were using different pronouns or a different name or because they were a different gender.
Carter had never really thought about if he liked boys like that before Zia came out, he honestly had never really thought about his sexuality before meeting Zia, sure he had crushes but most of the time they had been people he had exchanged maybe three sentences with and they would fade within a month, Zia was the first person he had really liked and Gods he really really liked him.
It had been funny when Zia came out he was so afraid, the fear hadn't been funny in the moment but after the fact it was just a bit and it was something Sadie would lovingly tease Zia over because Carter had been obsessed with them for months after meeting and that was a fact Sadie did not hesitate to share upon learning Zia had been afraid to tell Carter who he really was.
Sadie of course had accidentally interrupted the moment they were having when Zia came out and Zia quickly blurted out what was happening to her and then Sadie, Being the wonderful and supportive friend she was, immediately laughed at Zia's obvious panic. “Don't be ridiculous, Carter is mad about you, you being a boy isn't going to change that he's just mad about you in a gay way now,” she said to Zia.
“Sadie!” Carter hissed, he felt his cheeks going hot. She wasn't wrong but he had much more sweet and romantic and elegant ways He was planning on using when telling Zia what Sadie had just said.
“What? Am I wrong brother dear?”
“Shut up! Just go away! Get out of my room!”
“The rule still stands two people on who aren't related on not allowed to be in a room alone together with door closed” Sadie said as if she did not exploit the same loophole Carter had been using of keeping the door ever so slightly cracked so technically it wasn't closed but no one could easily see inside.
“The door wasn't closed.”
“It was mostly closed.”
“But it wasn't fully closed, if you get to use that trick with Walt I get to use that trick with..” Carter paused then turned to Zia, “Name?”
“Still Zia, for now at least.”
“I get to use that trick with Zia.”
“Or I could stand in here- no actually, I couldn't stand in here, well I mean technically I can because I'm your sister and all that but you know,” Sadie said cutting herself off before she could finish the first sentence.
“I thought the limit for ‘can be alone together with the door closed without being related’ was three people” Zia said mildly confused.
“Well it used to be and then I tried to argue that technically Walt could count as two people because him and Anubis kind of like cohabitate in the same body and then Amos got mad at me about that so now it's four people.”
“Why- Nope, actually I don't want to know, I don't want to know what you were doing, Sadie get out of my room” Carter says shaking his head before he can get an answer to that question, Sadie gave him a grin that he was choosing not to interpret in any way, he did not need to know what his little sister did with her boyfriends and he did not want to know.
“Okay have fun” Sadie cooed leaving the room and closing the door almost completely but leaving it cracked so they wouldn't get in trouble. For as much as she teased her brother and his boyfriend she did think they were quite cute together and wanted them to stay together, though she would only ever argue that that was because Carter was insufferable without the Zia so really them staying together was in her benefit.
“Just go” Carter paused for a moment and then turned to Zia “she's right I am still, I still like you even if you're a boy, that doesn’t really changed anything to me I mean unless you want it to change?”
“No! No, no I don't! I don't want this to change, I like this, I like this a lot” Zia said, looking away and fidgeting with his hair, it had gotten longer since their final battle with Apophis it was almost reaching his shoulders now.
“Okay, good ‘cause- ‘cause I do too and I wouldn't have like forced you to stay if you didn't want to or anything, I-I would have been upset though”
“I like this.. oh um and they, he and they, I don’t think I said ‘they’ before, that might change but I-I like them both for me right now.”
“Okay, he and they, got it.” Carter nodded.
“That's it? just ‘okay’?” Zia asked almost hesitant to believe that Carter just accepted it that easily, of course they didn't really know what they would do if Carter had been mean about it but they had expected him to be a little more upset. He loved them they knew that but they were also different now but Carter didn't seem to mind in the slightest, Zia felt their cheeks burning a little bit. This stupid boy and his immediate acceptance of them and his stupid unwavering adoration, they loved him so much.
“I have a boyfriend now cool Sadie's going to call me gay during June because she's a wonderful and supportive sister” Carter said laughing a bit, Sadie was going to tease the hell out of him for this come June but it came from a place of love he knew that. He was partially glad Sadie had found out at the same time he had, her immediate laughter at Zia's panic at the idea that Carter would stopped being obsessed with him just because he was a boy now made the situation feel a little less scary to Carter.
Zia laughed.
Carter couldn't help but smile at the memory as he headed towards the dining room for breakfast. He loved Zia today was going to be great and they were going to go to a museum and it was going to be great.
Breakfast went surprisingly well despite the anxiety that he was trying to quiet, he had messed up some of his odd rituals last night and was terrified of the consequences of that, he knew there wouldn't be consequences, or he hoped anyway, that the silly little rituals he did were not actually as life or death as they felt.
After breakfast and Zia headed to the bus they went to the museum and it was okay they have their tickets they got in just fine nothing bad happened none of the art came to life none of the statues or paintings or anything, because of course it didn't. This wasn't Night at the Museum although sometimes art did come to life but it usually had a reason to and right now it was the middle of the day and there was no reason for any of these things to come to life.
Carter didn't even realize he was picking at his nails until Zia grabbed his hand. “Carter, you’re bleeding” Zia said, his voice full of worry.
“What? Oh! Oh! I didn't even notice that.” Blood was dripping from around his fingernails where he had been picking at the skin, he had ripped open a few hangnails and then some. “Shit I don't have band aids.” Carter's panic immediately worsened, this was the consequences, he fucked up his rituals and now he was going to get blood everywhere and it was going to ruin their date and he was an awful boyfriend and-
“Carter, I have bandages, let's go to the restroom so you can wash your hands” Zia said cutting off his panicked thoughts.
Carter nodded and followed Zia as they pulled him along, he slipped into the bathroom and washed his hands and then washed his hands again and again and again and again, five times because five was a good and safe number, then he dried his hands and came back out.
Zia had been hesitant to go into the men's bathroom, understandably, but seeing that they were still waiting for him right outside the door calmed to his nerves a little bit, he hadn't expected them to just ditch him but at the same time he hadn't not expected them to just ditch him, his anxiety was going wild.
Zia smiled at him then looked at his now clean hands and frowned with concern “Carter, it looks like you scrubbed them raw.”
“I got a little carried away,” He admitted a bit hesitantly they were clean now that was all that mattered but they also hurt from the amount of time he had scrubbed them.
“Do you want to head home?” Zia asked, their voice soft and concerned, Carter knew if he said yes they would immediately agre5e and the two would head home back to Brooklyn House but he didn't want to mess up their date.
“No! No, I-I don't want to mess up our date because I'm freaking out.” He was freaking out and he knew he was being ridiculous, his silly little rituals did not make or break whether or not the world was ending but right now everything felt like it was turned up to eleven; his head hurt, his hands hurt, and Gods yes he did want to go home but he also wanted to stay here with Zia and have a date like they had planned to.
“Carter it's okay,” Zia said softly, he sounded more concerned than upset at their date being ruined which only made Carter feel worse.
“No it isn't! Today was supposed to be fine and-and good and perfect and now my hands are bleeding and I'm freaking out over nothing and-”
“Let me see your hands,” Zia said cutting his panicked rambling off before gently pulling him to a seating area, he disinfected the result of Carter picking at his nails, although he had already rubbed his hands raw washing them five times over, and applied the bandages “See it's okay now, you're not bleeding anymore well you are but these,” they tapped one of the bandages “will keep your hands blood free.”
“I'm sorry I'm freaking out, I wanted today to be good and I feel like I'm messing it all up and-and I'm going to disappoint you and I'm going to ruin our first date as boyfriends, proper actual boyfriends where I know you're my boyfriend and- I'm rambling now, please make me shut up?” He had expected Zia to put their hand over his mouth or gently shut him up in some other way but he had not expected Zia kiss him though he didn't mind even the slightest bit.
“It's okay, I'm having a good time even if you are a little panicky.. being in a museum after what happened in the British Museum and the Texas Nome and a lot of other museums, I can't imagine this isn't at least a little bit stressful for you.”
“Yeah I guess it- I guess it kind of is.. do you like the art?” Carter changed the subject, he had never really thought about how much the night at the British museum or in the Texas Nome or any of the adventures that involved Museum had made being in a museum so stressful. He used to love museums but now they felt ominous and almost scary but Zia being here helped, his presence made Carter feel significantly calmer.
“I do though some of it I don't fully understand I will admit but I like it and I like spending time with you even if some of the art isn't my personal favorite I am enjoying this date.” Zia said leaning against him.
The two boys stayed like that for a little bit, just sitting with each other and enjoying the moment but eventually they got up and continued to wander the museum looking at the art and talking and holding hands upon Zia's insistence, apparently it was to keep Carter from picking up his hands more but Carter had a sneaking suspicion his boyfriend just wanted to hold his hands but he wasn't about to complain.