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“I dare you to jump in.”
Duke scoffed, smiling and raising an eyebrow at Berenice’s slightly maniacal grin.
“I’ll go if you do, Abeille.”
Lenore rolled her eyes at the two from where she sat at the side of the pool, the light from the quickly- setting sun streaming through the window and onto the deck and the pool chair where she sat.
“Oh, goodie, just what everyone wants to see,” she teased. “Wet Nevermore students sneaking around after classes.”
“Then my clothes will stick to my skin, Lenore. Everyone wants to see that.”
Duke leaned against the railing of the pool, grinning at Lenore before taking in the rest of the room they’d found during a free period- a whole pool, with a deck and everything. Not to mention the aforementioned pool chairs where Lenore sat, a changing room, moth-eaten towels with the Nevermore emblem on them, and, of course, a lifeguarding chair.
Berenice and Duke had been chatting about whether or not there were sea monsters in the pool for the past ten minutes while Morella sat and played cards with Eulalie and Pluto read his book at the top of the lifeguarding chair, curled up slightly like a cat.
Lenore was hunched over a piece of paper at one of the tables by the chairs with a pen, furiously scribbling down some new love song that she wouldn’t let Duke read, no matter how much he bugged her.
It was quite a pleasant moment, and Duke found himself smiling despite himself as he watched Morella grow more and more confused as Eulalie started explaining some new intricate game she’d made up and laughing to himself when Lenore's face scrunched up in the silly way that it did when she got focused on something.
And Pluto. Well.
Duke was very close to climbing up that chair himself and making the smaller boy sit in his lap.
Il est trop mignon, mon minou.
Pluto sniffled and turned the page, pausing to close his eyes and let out a tiny sneeze. Duke felt like something was fluttering around in his stomach. Adorable.
“Alright, then,” Berenice said, making him snap his eyes away from Pluto and towards his friend, who was still smiling mischievously. “I’m going in.”
Duke grimaced. “Ah… See, when I agreed to-”
“No take-backs!”
Berenice pulled off her socks and boots, throwing her cot on the ground behind her before making a running leap into the pool, whooping when she splashed in and making Duke laugh and shout teasing insults at her, grinning again at Lenore when she looked over and beckoning her to join them.
To his surprise, she actually put down her pen and took her coat off, hanging it on her chair, and walked over while hopping slightly as she took her boots off.
“Glad you finally decided to join us, mon amie,” Duke said when she reached them.
“Couldn’t let you have all the fun without me,” Lenore retorted, slipping into the pool to join Berenice, who’d started trying to do flips underwater and failing miserably- although she looked like she was enjoying herself, which Duke supposed was what mattered.
“Don’t worry, I’m not planning on getting in.”
“Duke!” Berenice exclaimed, hair dripping as she swam towards the deck and pulled herself back up. “You made a deal, you flat tire.”
Lenore smirked, untying and tightening her ponytail so it would keep her hair up higher.
“Perhaps he’s scared, Bee.”
Berenice cackled while Duke gasped in offense.
“How dare you?! I’m not afraid of-”
“Anything you can see coming, we know.” Lenore rolled her eyes again.
Duke glared at her affectionately. “I’d prefer to keep this-” He gestured to his curly black hair, perfectly styled, as usual. He had an image to uphold. “-dry, thank you very much. Otherwise- Ack-”
Duke laughed at Berenice’s attempt to shove him in, standing up and putting his arms around her waist so he was carrying her, making her stick her tongue at him while Lenore laughed to herself loudly.
Duke raised an eyebrow at Berenice’s dramatic reaction. “...You done?”
She groaned dramatically. “C’monnnnn. Don’t be chicken.”
Sighing, Duke put her down, and started taking his boots off, making Lenore and Berenice cheer.
“D’accord, you win,” he muttered, acting as though he was very bothered. “Move it, mon amie,” he said to Lenore, dramatically diving in once she did and secretly hoping Pluto was watching.
He hadn't necessarily spent years learning how to swim to impress guys he was attracted to, but it couldn’t hurt, right?
It did attract attention, though not what he was going for. Morella and Eulalie had packed away the cards when they first noticed the three in the water, and Duke received some applause and cheers from the two, to which he climbed out of the pool and took a bow.
Pluto turned another page.
Not that Duke was looking.
“I hope you three don’t catch cold from this,” Morella said anxiously when Duke jumped back in.
“Oh, no, don’t worry!” Eulalie smiled cheerfully from where she’d sat down at the edge of the pool with her feet dipped in the water, her boots and socks beside her. “The water’s pretty warm- I would say maybe seventy-six degrees?”
At her friends’ impressed and amused silence, she reiterated, “That's twenty-four point four degrees celsius for some of you guys. Hehe.”
“Huh…” Morella said, smiling awkwardly but sitting down next to Eulalie all the same, the purple-haired girl immediately resting her head on her shoulder as Morella started asking what everyone had thought of that day’s lesson.
Duke smiled and tuned out his friends, walking up the ladder back onto the deck and using stretching as an excuse to look over his shoulder at Pluto, who he immediately smirked at when he saw the dark-haired boy avert his eyes and try to pretend he hadn’t been staring as well.
Mignon minou, Duke thought to himself smugly as he silently thanked whoever designed the uniforms for giving him a white shirt.
Because if Pluto just so happened to like the view of his muscles showing through it now that it was wet, well, that made Duke feel even better about his decision to go swimming- even if his hair was a bit more mussed up now.
Maybe Pluto will like that, too, non?
While Duke hasn't had a lot of crushes in his life, he’d had a lot of people who had liked him, and he knew what it looked like.
In this case, that was Pluto’s eyes subtly flickering up from his book to look at Duke as his face grew redder and redder and Duke pretended not to notice him. It was obvious he was smitten, which did wonders for Duke’s ego. Perhaps it was time he finally did something to help them get off the ground.
The Frenchman grinned and spun around to walk over to the boy in the lifeguard chair as confidently as he could, smiling even wider when Pluto saw him coming and started staring so hard at his book he looked as though he was burning holes in it.
He’d had a fun evening hanging out with his friends, but this was going to be the best part.
“What are you reading that’s so intriguing you won’t come spend time with us?” Duke called up when he reached the bottom of the chair, receiving a muttered answer from Pluto that he couldn’t hear.
Duke took this as an excuse to start climbing up the ladder, making Pluto squeak in surprise and nearly fall off his chair when he reached the top. Duke pulled himself up onto the top platform and crossed his arms over the top of the lifeguard chair, peering over Pluto’s shoulder as the smaller boy tried to right himself.
“The Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe?” Duke snickered. “See, you are a nerd.”
“It’s interesting!" Pluto exclaimed, snapping the book closed so he could and craning up his neck to look behind him at Duke, his face scrunched up angrily.
It was very cute, Duke decided.
“I’m sure it is,” he said, leaning his head down so it was resting on top of Pluto’s head. He couldn’t see his face, but he imagined the dark-haired boy was blushing. “Read one to me.”
“I- no,” Pluto mumbled, to which Duke smirked and reached over to grab the book from him anyways, making Pluto protest and jump up from the chair to try and snatch it back to no avail, seeing as Duke was holding it too high up for him to reach.
“I’ll read one to you, then, minou,” the Frenchman declared, flipping through the book and ignoring Pluto’s “give it back!”s as he searched for a poem. “Ah, here we go. Serenade.”
“Give me back my-”
“‘Within the valleys dim and brown, and on the spectral mountain's crown, the wearied light is dying down, and earth, and stars, and sea, and sky, are redolent of sleep’-” Duke read dramatically as Pluto jumped up again to try and grab the book.
“‘As I am redolent of thee and thine, enthralling love, my Pluto,’” Duke finished, making Pluto freeze up and flush, looking down.
“That’s- that’s not-”
“Ah, my mistake, minou. I seem to have read that wrong- it says ‘my Adeline’.”
“How did you- that doesn’t even rhyme,” Pluto muttered, snatching the book away from Duke when the Frenchman handed it back to him and going to sit back down in his chair, only for Duke to grin slyly and push him forward a bit gently towards the pool.
“Ack-!” Pluto yelped as he fell forward over the deck of the chair towards the pool.
Duke laughed and went to grasp his hand and pull him back up, getting surprise-attacked by Pluto jumping on him, quivering, after he’d pulled him back up.
“Hey, Pluto, it’s okay,” Duke said, laughing a bit at how his roommate was basically clinging to him like a koala and stepping back from the edge, hoping to alleviate some of Pluto’s stress. “Deep breaths, minou.”
After a few seconds of trying to calm himself, Pluto seemed to realize that his head was resting on Duke’s chest and he had his legs wrapped around him, to which he blushed at again and practically leaped backwards in embarrassment, Duke catching him before he could stumble over the edge again.
“Careful, Pluto,” Duke teased. “I’ve heard cats don’t like water. ‘Would be a shame if you fell in. I’d have to come rescue you.”
Pluto said nothing and went to pick up his book, still shaking slightly even though he was safe.
Duke frowned. “Are you alright?”
“Y-yeh,” Pluto mumbled, gripping his book tightly and decidedly not alright.
“I wouldn’t let you fall in, you know,” Duke assured him, only for the smaller boy to brush past him and start clambering down the ladder. “Hey! Where’re you-!? Merde.”
Duke followed his roommate’s lead and climbed down quickly after him, jogging slightly to catch up with him as already walking across the poolside deck towards the chairs.
“Just- leave me alone, Duke,” Pluto mumbled, visibly shaken.
Duke furrowed his brows. “You didn’t really think I would push you in, non?”
“....”
Duke muttered a curse under his breath, internally berating himself for once again taking a joke too far as an attempt at flirting. “I wasn’t going to! I would never actually-”
“I said leave me alone. Or just- shut up, at least,” Pluto hissed, opening his book once again and leaning against a wall to read.
Duke took a deep breath. He wasn’t great at apologies, nor did he enjoy making them- he preferred to just double down, seeing as he was usually right anyways- but if anyone deserved one from him, it was Pluto.
He’d apologize a hundred times over to Pluto for anything he wanted.
“Look, Pluto, I’m-”
Duke was cut off out of nowhere when Pluto pulled him down by the collar of his shirt to kiss him, pressing his mouth hard against Duke’s before letting him go and going back to his book.
Duke stood dumbfounded for a few seconds, stammering nonsensical French gibberish to himself.
“I told you to be quiet,” Pluto muttered. “You don’t need to apologize. I’m just being dramatic, it- it reminded me… of something.”
He looked up to meet Duke’s gaze, face slightly flushed which made his stern expression a bit less effective.
“Don’t even pretend to do that, though, okay?”
“O-okay,” Duke choked out, a goofy grin slightly forming on his face.
“Sorry,” he tried again, earning another glare from Pluto. “I am!” he exclaimed.
“You’re forgiven,” Pluto said with an eye roll, grabbing Duke’s arm to pull him over so he was leaning on the wall next to him, and Pluto rested his head on the taller man’s shoulder.
“Here, I’ll read you your stupid poem now.”
“Attend, I don’t think I apologized enough,” Duke declared, Pluto tilting his head in confusion and opening his mouth to speak before Duke cut him off with another kiss.
“Are you sure you forgive me?” Duke teased his flustered roommate.
“Uhm- I dunno,” Pluto mumbled, smiling slightly. “Maybe I need another-Mmph!”