Comin of Age Part V: The End/Beginning There was a knock on Dorian’s door. He was not entirely surprised by the head that poked around when he called ‘come in’. He had been half wondering whether he’d get a visit. After all, he was pretty sure Jean-Loup had something for him. After seeing how easily he had won the griffin for Charlotte, it was hard to believe the misses had been anything but on purpose. He just wasn’t sure why or what it meant. He remained on his window seat, where he’d been reading, as the other boy came in, his own expression a little guarded and wary.
“Hi,” Jean-Loup said, a little awkwardly, as he closed the door behind him and made his way across the room, stopping short of Dorian’s personal space. “I… um…” He fished in his pocket, pulling out the little bowtruckle. It sat on his hand, and waved a little clumsily at Dorian. Dorian looked back at it. The small stuffed bowtruckle had done nothing to hurt his feelings and he didn’t want to hurt its. He wondered if Jean-Loup had read him well enough to know this, and this was part of why he had come thus armed. But it worked. He could not maintain an air of frostiness to a small stuffed toy that had not wronged him in any way. He waved back.
“He’s cute,” he admitted cautiously. He wanted to keep his eyes on the toy so that that could not be misinterpreted, even if it was undeniably true that Jean-Loup was good looking too. But he wasn’t sure it was something he wanted to say to him.
“He’s yours. If you want him,” Jean-Loup replied.
“And what does that mean?” Dorian asked raising his eyebrows. Because that sounded like a very romantic gesture. It sounded like the sort of thing he’d expect a boyfriend to do for him. It almost sounded like an offer. And he didn’t want to make that mistake again.
“It means I missed on purpose because I wanted to get this for you. I don’t know if you remember-“
“I remember,” Dorian cut him off. “What do you mean by offering this to me?” he tried instead, because he wasn’t sure that subtext was a level that Jean-Loup was really operating on here.
“I guess… it means I’m sorry. And I’d like us to… talk?” he suggested.
It was an apology then. Not a relationship. Probably best anyway, because even if Jean-Loup wasn’t great at operating on the level of subtext, Dorian was not sure that making a consolation prize the symbol of anything between them would be the most auspicious start. But he thought the bowtruckle was cute. He took it, letting it settle on his lap and running a finger down its little felt arms. He thought it was nicer than the silly, prancy griffn with its insipid smile. Not really a consolation prize, if they’re looking at his way, just… different. But he wasn’t sure Jean-Loup saw that.
“You want to sit?” he invited. Partly because it was sort of weird having Jean-Loup looming over him, and also because he didn’t hate the idea. Jean-Loup sat. For someone who wanted to talk, he seemed awfully unsure what to say next, so Dorian went first.
“I don’t get why you were allowed to do this and I wasn’t allowed to do what I did,” he said. Because Jean-Loup seemed willing to be every bit as romantic as he had been, and he wasn’t sure why it would be different. Why this was allowed but he somehow crossed a line by caring.
“I guess that’s… kind of why I owe you an apology. I… I just wasn’t expecting it. And I freaked out. And I wanted to make that up to you, because I’m sorry,” he sighed, pulling a slightly battered box from his pocket and holding it out. Dorian opened it, finding two cupcakes with very familiar designs inside.
“Thank you,” Dorian acknowledged.
“I should probably say that to you. You got them for me after all,” Jean-Loup pointed out, watching surprise flicker across Dorian’s face as said this.
“They’re…” he looked down. He had returned to the summer house to find not only Jean-Loup but the sequins, the petals and the cakes all gone. When Jean-Loup had presented the box, he had assumed that he’d tracked down replacements. “I thought you vanished them.”
Jean-Loup shook his head.
“They’re probably kind of stale by now,” he admitted.
The idea of Jean-Loup trekking through every bakery downtown to find replacements had gone quite a long way to shifting Dorian’s perception back to the idea that he was someone who cared. The fact that he had hung onto cupcakes for over week meant he was clearly almost as sentimental as he himself was.
“You’re very sweet. And really romantic,” he said, more gently than Jean-Loup had said it to him.
“I know… I tried not to be,” he sighed, even though he recognised that Dorian meant this as a good thing.
“Why?” Dorian asked.
“I got… kind of used to being disappointed. I guess,” he said hesitantly. Dorian pondered this admission for a moment. It came quite close to touching on something he’d been wondering.
“I’d never kissed anyone before,” Dorian admitted. This, he thought, was not a revelation. But he wanted to see Jean-Loup’s reaction…Jean-Loup did not comment that he knew that, or at least had assumed it, because he was aware that could sound patronising or critical. It had not been, from his point of view, a bad kiss. That was one of the reasons he was so disappointed with how it had gone from there. First kisses were supposed to be nice. Were supposed to be soft and gentle. Being kissed by someone who cared about you in a dimly lit ballroom had felt like all of the romance he’d said he didn’t want, and that he had never had. He had been pretty sure that he and Dorian would become a memory to each other at some point, instead of real people who continued to interact, and he had wanted to be a nice one.
“You have?” Dorian confirmed, reading into the silence, because that was what he really wanted to know. “Who?”
“I don’t think it’s fair to name names,” he stated.
“Names? Plural? How many people like us have you found round here?”
“One. I’ve kissed one guy and three girls.”
“Why would you kiss girls?” Dorian asked, looking both confused and slightly repulsed. It might have been funny, if it wasn’t a question with such a depressing answer.
“To see if I could convince myself that was an option. To try and convince my parents there isn’t anything wrong with me. After they found out about the guy…”
Dorian swore.
“Yeah,” Jean-Loup agreed with his choice of word. It pretty much had been that.
“So. They know…?” he asked. It seemed like a stupid question but he wasn’t sure how to say what he wanted to say. Do they mind? was even dumber. It seemed pretty obvious they did. Dorian though again about the party that had been thrown for Jean-Loup. The control, the insistence that Jean-Loup would play a part and how he was suffocating in it… More than anything, that made him want to reach across the space that was between them.
“I don’t know. They knew. And I don’t know whether they really believe that’s over or if we’re all just pretending those years didn’t happen.”
“You were with him for years?”
“No. There was… That was a rough time period in which a lot of things happened. We only kissed twice.”
Dorian was not sure how to process this. He had a million more questions that he sensed were very bad ideas to ask, and toyed with asking them all anyway, because the thought of Jean-Loup kissing anyone else, and all the implications of lost love or casual passing flings were all like itches he very much wanted to scratch… However, there was another point that needed returning to.
“You do know,” Dorian added, very much wanting to reach out and brush through the soft blond locks in front him, “that there isn’t anything wrong with you, don’t you?” Jean-Loup had always seemed so full of easy confidence – so able to talk to him, so sure of himself - that he was quite sure he would know this already, but it seemed worth making absolutely sure. He was very surprised, therefore, when the answer her received was a half-hearted ‘Mm.’ And then, eyes locked onto his…
“Say it again?”
“There. Is. Nothing. Wrong. With You,” Dorian repeated, with slow, deliberate emphasis. And he watched the jawline that had always, until now, seemed firm set and confident, shake slightly. And he thought again about the fact that it didn’t seem like Jean-Loup had anyone on his side. “Come here,” Dorian invited, holding out his arms, and Jean-Loup - Jean-Loup, first string Beater, who was easily over a hundred and eighty centimetres and who had always seemed like he could slay dragons – somehow collapsed down so small that he could fall into Dorian’s arms, letting his head rest against Dorian’s shoulder, letting his arms close around him.
“Everything’s been really horrible for a really long time,” he admitted, his voice sounding slightly thick. “And you… you seem so sure of everything, and I don’t know how to be like that…”
Dorian almost laughed. He might have, except all of this was so scary and horrible. But he knew that because he’d been there. Because he felt like he was still there. Hearing someone tell him he was the one who seemed clued in was just plain weird. He hesitated slightly. He wanted Jean-Loup to have hope, and he was scared of shattering that. But he also remembered how hard it could be to follow on blind faith, and he also didn’t want the responsibility of being something he wasn’t.
“I’m not,” he admitted, “I’m still so scared of so many parts of this. But I keep making myself believe in the idea of it working out because it feels like the alternative is giving up. And the thing that makes me most sad and most scared is the idea of never being loved.”
Jean-Loup wasn’t sure if he was scared of the same thing exactly. He had believed for so long that he wouldn’t find anyone who would be gentle or kind or willing- he was more afraid he would let Dorian in and that everything would get broken.
“I just… It felt like it would be easier. If I didn’t try,” he admitted. “If this is a thing… You and me… All that other stuff, all the stuff I hate about my life, with Charlotte and my parents pushing me at girls… It means it’s hurting two people instead of one. Didn’t Sunday kill you?” he asked.
“Maybe… A bit. But I think more because I didn’t know what was going on in your head. Maybe it hurts two people, but… we’re both being hurt by all that anyway. Better than going it alone.”
“Maybe,” Jean-Loup agreed.
There was a pause. Dorian wasn’t quite sure whether that was an agreement about where they were going from here or not. Jean-Loup’s arms were tight around him. Dorian stroked his back and his hair. He could feel that magnetic pull again, the way that when they touched each other, even like this, even for comfort, it sparked both of them into wanting more of each other. He wanted them to tangle their arms around each other and he wanted to feel Jean-Loup’s mouth again, and he wasn’t surprised when he found Jean-Loup drawing back. When a slightly tear-stained cheek nuzzled up against him, and he knew what Jean-Loup was looking for. And it was very tempting to just let him, and to sink back into the hot, heady feeling they’d enjoyed in the ballroom. But he wanted more. He pulled back slightly, fixing Jean-Loup with a firm stare. Firm-ish, anyway. It was hard to want to be when the eyes on his were still slightly teary, and looking like they expected the world to come crashing down any minute.
“Do you want to be my boyfriend?” Dorian checked.
Jean-Loup twisted his hand into Dorian’s, thinking about what he had said. That this didn’t have to be anything public. That that didn’t mean it couldn’t mean something. That there was no guarantee it wouldn’t rip big holes in both their hearts along the way. That it was better than having that hole ripped anyway and trying to deal with it all on your own.
“Yes,” he answered, squeezing their hands together and leaning in for a kiss.