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Julian really wishes Leslie would stop texting him.
He gets it, he really does--she’s young and misses him, and he misses her too, but she can talk on and on to him about anything. And that’s honestly rough when he’s anxious over something. Or he’s too tired, or he’s working, or he’s studying anatomical charts. But right now, he’s so terrifyingly anxious he feels as if his heart’s about to stop.
The phone buzzes again. Julian looks at it, sitting on the pile of books he’d been planning to read earlier, something about the development of mammals in the first stages of life. Nothing but clean illustrations and pictures of kittens; what could go wrong there? Except now he’s too worried to even open them because that would mean he’d have to move his phone and it’s still going off.
Isaiah’s gone, and he’s grateful for that. He’d be so calm and supportive but Julian doesn’t want that, doesn’t want to feel like he’s a burden to him. So he’s definitely glad he’s gone, out playing baseball or with his other friends, and Julian’s alone in the room with his phone. It’s just--it’s just easier this way.
The room’s comfortable at least, or maybe that’s just because it reminds him of Isaiah. They have their separate sides, but Julian’s is just a bit colder and bit less decorated. There are pictures, sure: of Sydney Morgan book covers, cats, and a few pictures from high school that he tries not to look too hard at. His desk is messy, covered in papers and books and his laptop, but Julian doesn’t mind that much if he can get his stuff done. His bed is warm and practically a pillow fort, with all the pillows he’s collected resting around the edges. It’s not a terribly big space, but it’s his, and it isn’t the worst place he could live--some of the apartments he’d looked into were nearly falling down--and his best friend is only a few feet away, with all his posters and trophies. It was home.
And Leslie was invading it with her texts. She’d sent at least five more in the past minute or two, and the noise was killing him. Julian couldn’t take it anymore, he didn’t want to have to block her number or, worse, hurt her by telling her to stop, so he picks it up and calls her instead.
“You have to go, Julie!” she yells, and he can see her bouncing up and down on her bed with glee. “You just have to! You can meet so many new people and then you can hang out with them,” her voice falls to a whisper, “and you could even date one of them!”
“I’m not going to date anyone, Leslie!” Julian’s voice is shrill and he’s so, so glad no one can hear him. “Even if I go, they’re just going to ignore me! They’ve already been meeting for a few weeks anyways, and I don’t want to intrude.”
Julian knows that somewhere, miles away, Leslie is frowning and would probably hit him with a pillow if she could. “Well, so what? Even if it’s awful, you don’t have to go back! And you could find a different club like knitting or a book club! I just want you to try something new, Julie!”
She’s right, and it’s awful. He should try to find someone new to talk to at college--Isaiah couldn’t be around all the time between classes and practice, and Selby was still in highschool, and he didn’t really have anyone else he was close to. Julian was fine with it, mostly, but at the back of his mind Leslie’s words itched at some forgotten desire to socialize with other people outside of his courses.
He sighs, and speaks again. “Look, Leslie...I’ll guess I’ll go, once , to see if I like it. I’m not going to promise anything more, alright?”
“You’re going to have a great time, Julie! You should go right now, so I’m going to go now, bye!” Leslie hangs up, and he’s left holding his phone, finally silent, to his ear. Julian lowers it a few moments later to check the time: forty minutes before the meeting starts, but he should get there earlier if he wants to actually talk to anyone.
-
It’s cold out, so Julian walks fast. The snow was really pretty, piled neatly beside the sidewalk like blankets. A few people had tried to make snowmen; they watched Julian as he walked past them, staring blankly. The snowmen were almost creepy, but Julian kept his head turned away from them all. They couldn’t think, anyways, and he was more worried about what people would think of him in twenty minutes.
Julian wasn’t ashamed of anything, but he was afraid; afraid of what Isaiah would say, what his parents would say. Leslie knew only because he had to tell someone and she’d picked up on it anyways halfway through senior year. It felt good to get it off his chest, once, but it was only one time. There were always more--professors who said something the wrong way, employers who wanted to know everything about him. It was a frightening prospect, having everyone know. Hopefully, the meeting would help Julian deal with that fear a bit.
Or he’d just embarrass himself.
The building’s meeting place was nondescript, really; an average hall, three floors and brick. It was one of those old-fashioned buildings, the ones that were the first ones built for the university. They reminded Julian a bit of his neighborhood, of the older houses that were deeper within and rested at the center of the suburb. A few people were outside the building, waiting for a bus stop to somewhere away from the campus. Julian felt sympathy for them, looking on at the hands stuffed in pockets and heads down. The cold was getting everyone down, literally, and he couldn’t wait for it to be spring.
Julian enters the building, eyeing the people in the lobby. They didn’t look up at him, instead focused on phones and papers. He moves past them, checking his own phone once for the room number. It was tucked away in some corner of the building, past rooms with frosted glass windows and signs for other activities. Julian had already read over them before, walking to class or just trying to find something to do. They’re not bad clubs, but he wouldn’t feel like he was welcome at any.
The door to the auditorium wasn’t anything special. Julian feels like his heart’s going to burst even if he touches it. He closes his eyes for a moment and breathes in, and then out. Mindfulness. He pulls the door open.
There weren’t any giant flags draped over people, or anything illicit going on (why had he ever expected otherwise?). Just people sitting in the rows, a few talking at the front of the room. Julian closes the door behind him, quietly, and slips into one of the back rows to look better at people. They’re all normal people, they don’t look like they’re anything bad and he lets out a sigh of relief; Julian hasn’t even talked to anyone and he’s anxious.
It takes a few minutes, but the leaders of the club finally start talking. Julian balls his hand into a fist when he hears someone say it outloud for the first time--gay--and no one else does anything at all. It’s like it doesn’t matter, and Julian can’t even fathom that. Maybe it’s just his anxiety eating at him for something so simple, but he still thinks the world could end if anyone outside of this room, or Leslie, said that around him.
Nothing special happens for the first half. The people at the front of the room talk about a meeting, something coming up for the Midwest in the upcoming months. Julian knows he’s not ready to attend anything, so he slides further down into his seat and just listens. No one’s saying anything about how to get through life, or even just talk to your parents about it; the internet had a lot more to say about it, and Julian expected the people here to at least mention it. Maybe they’d covered in a past meeting.
People are laughing now; Julian curls up just a bit more until he realized no one’s looking at him. They’re laughing at someone up front that’s telling jokes about guys in pools, or something. Julian can hardly tell who it is, until the joker turns around to deliver the punchline to the people in the back.
Julian sees him and his heart stops.
It’s only been a year, really two, but his heart’s beating so fast and his breathing’s funny. He wants to look away, look down at his phone or just leave but the person in the front is still turning around and he looks straight at Julian. His mouth closes, and he frowns. Not angry, but Julian can hardly tell, and he just looks like Julian is some strange alien that’s crawled up from the center of the earth.
The leaders start talking again, and Julian watches him turn back around. The rest of the meeting passes in some foggy blur, only fragments of phrases actually making sense. After an hour, people start standing and moving towards the doors. Julian looks up at the windows, high above their heads and stained-glass (the irony, eventually, will make him laugh) and sees the sun has set.
He doesn’t look towards the front again, just the door. Out in the hallways, he can breathe a bit better than earlier. No one was around him, no one to laugh or ask him what was wrong; they’d all walked ahead, probably waiting in the lobby together or walking home. It’s so peaceful, Julian thinks, this one little moment of loneliness.
“Hey,” a voice says. The silence cracks, and Julian turns.
He still looks the same, even after two years. Still tall, angular, red hair short and sharp. He’d taken out his piercings and didn’t look as sleep-deprived as he used to, but there’s nothing really different. Like he’d just stepped out of the photos on Julian’s walls.
“Hi, Landon,” Julian says weakly.
They stand together for a moment, silently, looking at each other. Julian feels so awkward, compared to how they used to act--arms pressed up together, Landon pulling at his cheeks and him pushing him away. That’s what Julian was good at, if anything. But here they were, standing in some dim hallway together and not even talking.
It only takes another moment for Landon to talk again. “You know, it’s been two years. Did it really take you that long to fall for me?”
Julian can’t help it: he reaches forward to push him, gently, and some tense thing that had been present fades away. “More like you’re following me around! I bet it’s your weird godfather thing again.” Landon smiles, and Julian grins back, weakly; he’s ignoring the obvious issue, trying to focus on getting through this conversation without burning up from the raging mix of emotions in his stomach.
“When you’re at college, you’ve got a lot more options to work with,” Landon tells him, winking once as if it were something much more lascivious. Julian realizes it’s a joke--an innuendo --and blushes even more. Maybe he thinks Julian was there for the same reason, which he definitely wasn’t, and he’s hitting on him. Or maybe he’s just being Landon. Julian’s thoughts are moving so quick, bumping into one another, that he doesn’t respond.
Landon reaches for him, putting a hand on his shoulder. “You know it’s a joke, right?” he says, almost gently, and Julian shrugs his hand off and turns to look at the club signs on the walls. “Of course I do!” Because he does, of course, and he hates that now Landon has a new way to mock him, intentionally or not.
There’s silence again. Julian looks back to see Landon pulling out his phone and typing in something slowly. It’s an older model that’s out of fashion, and it’s weird that Landon is out of fashion, but he’s always been weird. After a moment of waiting, Landon passes the phone to him. “Put your number in for me. I’ve missed talking to my princess,” he says.
Julian puffs out his cheeks, but takes the phone. “I still don’t like being called that!” He types in his number, under some contact name that’s just a bunch of crown emojis, and hands it back. “And I don’t like being called Julie, in case you’ve forgot.”
Landon snorts, looks at the number, and puts away his phone. “I know, I know. I’ll text you sometime, alright? I have people to impress,” he says, smirking and patting Julian on the head. “Keep it cute, Juls.”
He walks away, footsteps hitting hard on the tile floor. Like nothing had changed at all, and it was another day before their English class. Julian takes a moment and listens. He can almost hear people talking about calculus tests and the teacher that gave detention to everyone. It’s surreal, almost too much to really handle. He presses one hand to the wall and breathes. Only one or two people walk by him, but they’re too involved with each other to say anything about Julian.
Finally, he takes one step forward, and another. The lobby’s almost empty now, and there are lights outside. A bus, probably, or a car picking someone up. Julian moves past the people in the lobby, out the door, and back onto the snowy streets. The cold doesn’t phase him that badly, not after all the emotions that exhausted his body. He just wants to get home and read through his textbooks, or sleep even. It would pass the time and he can’t help but want Landon to text him something, even if it’s a joke. He needs to talk to him, badly, about everything. Atone himself, at the very least--he owes Landon that.
-
It takes Landon two days to send Julian a text, and he spends the entire time a ball of anxiety. He has classes to take things off his mind, but they only last so long and they chose this week of all to be lax with homework. He could study for finals, sure, but when you’re trying what to plan to say to someone it’s a lot harder to focus on skeletal systems.
Isaiah notices, but he doesn’t say much about it. They go out to buy food the day after the meeting, and Isaiah asks only if he’s okay. Julian’s grateful that he’s not prying, but he tells Isaiah he thinks he’s okay and if not he’ll be the first to know. The subject drops soon after, and they eat junky Chinese food together; Julian’s happy that they’re still close enough to do this sort of thing.
It’s late at night when Julian’s phone starts buzzing. Leslie hasn’t sent him anything, only calling him after the meeting time (and he certainly didn’t mention anything about Landon). His heart skips a beat when he picks it up and sees the phone screen illuminated, three messages already waiting for him.
They’re all just emojis.
Really, Julian laughs when he sees them; did he actually expect anything serious from Landon? They’re eggplants and cats and crowns. Not a single word, nothing asking about the past two years of Julian’s life. Just something so simple and almost annoying.
Julian sends back a simple omg why >__< and curls up in his blankets. By the time he’s comfortable, Landon’s sent something back.
Wanna come over to my apartment 2morrow? ;)
Nothing else. No context to the winky face (which Julian knows is just to mess with him) or even a reason to go. Just an invitation to...hang out? Talk? It could really be anything with Landon.
Julian looks over at Isaiah; he’s already asleep, sprawled out across his bed. Even without waking him up, he knows Isaiah wouldn’t want him to go. How much could a person change, anyways? And Julian managed to bring his grades back up in highschool after Landon. It was much easier to just get through without him messing up his plans.
He reads the message again, and again, until he’s seeing the words imprinted on his eyelids. Julian finally sits up and types out a message.
i guess!!! youre just gonna bug me abt it until i do anyways!!! >___> send me your address and time i need 2 sleep!!!
The message goes through without fail. Julian closes his eyes and burrows into his pillows, ignoring the knot of apprehension deep in his stomach.
-
Of course Landon would live in the apartment building closest to campus. What else would he settle for? Julian doesn’t know, but he’s just the slightest bit jealous that Landon’s room is closer than his to the halls.
It’s a ten minute walk at most; he’s surprised that he’s never bumped into Landon at all, or maybe Landon avoided him and Julian was too oblivious. Whatever. Julian focuses on keeping his fingers from freezing and trying to not catch anyone’s eye. It wasn’t terribly hard, but he likes to make sure no one notices him. Especially if they were Landon’s weird people (or contacts, as he called him in high school) and they want to relay that he’s showed up.
Three flights up one of the halls and one near-death experience with the stairs, Julian stands in front of Landon’s door. It’s nondescript, like everything else on the floor, and looks like it’s one of the suite styles. Julian pities whoever would actually bother to live with Landon. He raises one hand to knock on the door, but it’s already opening.
Landon’s not even in real clothes, and Julian rolls his eyes. Typical. He feels his hand being encompassed by something, and that something turns out to be Landon’s monstrous hands--they’re pulling his own hand to Landon’s chest. Against his heart.
“I’m so glad you love me enough to show up,” Landon says, grinning down at Julian. “I hope you still like naan wraps.” And as quickly as he opened the door, he’s moving into the apartment. Julian follows him into the main room. It’s surprisingly clean, even sparse, with the generic sofa and table in the center. Julian hears footsteps in another room--the kitchen, probably--and moves to join him.
There’s so much color in the kitchen: cookbooks stacked on the counter, creating some weird sculpture in the corners where there’s so many they’re nearly falling over; plates strewn across a smaller dining table, some washed and some set aside with leftover ingredients; and, of course, the naan wraps, green and purple and so delicious looking Julian thinks for a minute they’re fake. Or that Landon bought them from some ridiculously fancy chef downtown. Neither would surprise him.
Julian snaps back into reality. Landon’s resting his head on one hand, propped up on one of the few empty spaces in the kitchen. “You can get one, you know.” He reaches forward to grab one of the naan wraps, moving it to a smaller plate. “And sit down, too. On my lap if you want.”
A low blush rises up Julian’s neck and face. “Like I’d wanna ever be that close to you!” But he does take two of the wraps for himself, moving to sit at the table. There’s hardly space to put his own plate between a bag of lettuce and what he thinks is some sort of unusual quiche. “Doesn’t your roommate mind you having this place so messy?”
Landon hums thoughtfully, taking a bite of his food. “Maybe, if I had one. But I was never assigned one; guess it’s a perk of knowing so many people.” Another bite. “Not like I’d want to room with anyone but you.”
“Don’t be such an idiot!” Julian says. “Does the school even know that you’re living by yourself. I’m pretty sure that’s illegal if there’s like, someone who doesn’t have a room!”
“Yeah, but it’s only illegal if you get caught.” Landon winks at him in the most infuriating way and looks at Julian’s untouched plate. “Aren’t you hungry? Or did you find a better chef than me?”
Julian rolls his eyes, but takes a bite. It’s delicious, and he’s swooning over it before he can help himself. “It’s so good!” Julian says dreamily, taking a larger bite. “It’s even better than when you made them for us when we…,” Julian stops, swallows, and looks down.
“When we…?” He feels Landon move closer, taking the other open seat at the table. “When we were going to do that project together?”
He doesn’t even sound upset at all, like nothing happened to them in high school. It’s a stab to the heart for Julian, and he keeps staring at the chipped edges of his plate. “Yeah,” he says weakly after a minute passes. The anxiety wriggling under his skin is too prominent, too frightening to avoid anymore for Julian; he has to speak.
“I’m sorry I stopped talking to you.”
Landon doesn’t respond, and Julian cautiously looks up after the silence grows a bit too heavy. He sees the redhead, staring at him like he’s some strange creature. But he doesn’t say anything at all.
“It was my dad, he told me to,” Julian begins; he owes Landon the full story, and not some weak apology. “After we got back from the hotel, he told me you were a bad influence. He kept talking about my grades and how it wouldn’t be good for college applications if I spent time with you instead of doing other things like reading about animals or volunteering or getting a job somewhere, and,” there are tears pricking up in his eyes and Julian is so, so ashamed that he’s about to cry, “I’m so sorry I didn’t even tell you why. I really wanted to talk to you about it but every time I saw you my dad was around or I was just too afraid that something would happen and it’d just get worse and I’m sorry .”
Julian can hardly breathe; something’s wrapped around his heart and lungs, a python, and his heart’s beating fast like it’s trying to escape. He shouldn’t have come, if he was just going to go back to ignoring Landon. His dad was right, because he was his dad and he has to keep his grades up for the scholarships he earned and if they drop too low he’ll have to leave or get loans and it’s just so terrifying to deal with--
Something wraps around his shoulders. It’s heavy, pressing weight down. Julian tries to calm down, just enough so he can focus a bit better. It’s Landon’s arm, pulling him into a half-hug. Nothing personal, nothing like resting together on a couch in a hotel. Impersonal. It hurts a bit more than it should, but Julian looks up and sees Landon’s face in a shape of something sad and older for a moment before it slides back into a neutral expression.
“Hey, it’s alright,” Landon says. He doesn’t continue, just stands there with an arm around Julian until he stops shaking. “I know how hard it was for you to stay away from me, but it’s totally fine. At least I have you back now, right? Easy to make up for lost time and stuff.”
It’s something so Landon of him to say that Julian lets out a weak laugh. “Yeah, I guess it is. I still have to keep my grades up, though. And I can’t go out anymore looking for Sydney Morgan every other night.”
The arm around his shoulder moves up, and a hand comes down to pat Julian’s hair. “Yeah, but isn’t that why you hired me? To find her for you?” Landon grins down at him and his hand moves lower, resting on his cheek. “I’ve got at least five new people who could be Sydney Morgan if you want to find out.”
Julian swats the hand away half-heartedly. “I don’t really want to know anymore. I still really like her, but I can’t just give up all my courses and work to go sneaking around. Besides, I don’t even like her newer books as much; she’s selling out too much for her movie fans.”
“Well, I guess we’ll just have to make some fun adventures that don’t involve Sydney. Maybe something between you and me would be better,” Landon’s smirking at him, “and it’d be way more interesting than some books, too.”
“You’re an idiot,” Julian tells him. One of the naan wraps sits below him, untouched, and he prods it with one finger. “I will come back over if you want. Especially if you can make food like this.” And it’s true, he does want to come back and catch up, but he’d do it without the food.
The redhead laughs. “As you wish, your highness,” and reaches for the plate. “You should probably head out though. Got a teacher to win over with a good beef merlot gravy. Unless,” his voice drops to a conspiratorial whisper and Julian is already about to push him away, “you want to wait for me in my bed.”
“Landon!” Julian turns away from him in mock-anger. He’s almost afraid of how easy it was to fall back into the pattern of banter with Landon, and how much he missed it. It’s so different than his sibling rivalry with Leslie, or Isaiah’s friendly teasing. It’s familiar; that’s the only way Julian can describe it. The knot in his stomach begins to unravel, slowly. Julian thinks his father could’ve been wrong about this one thing--would it be so bad if he was?
He turns to see Landon trying his best to balance plates in a hasty way of cleaning. He fails spectacularly, and the plastic falls everywhere, spilling spices and ingredients everywhere. It’s a wreck and Julian laughs at how outrageous the kitchen looks now, how Landon managed to make it even messier than before.
Julian almost chokes with laughter when Landon slips in some slurry of vinaigrettes and has to reach for Julian’s hand to get back up. Yeah, his father was probably wrong on this. Not that he’s going to mention it, though.