He said What?
Who: Christian and Ethan Setting: Their apartment
Ethan woke from his morning after going out with Tris to celebrate Tris being engaged, reaching for Blake. But Blake wasn’t there. He had a slightly blurry memory of Blake kissing him goodbye before he left for work, but that could have been another day. Ethan rolled into Blake’s side of the bed, holding his pillow for a long bit before finally rolling out of bed.
He grabbed something that kind of went together, briefs from the drawer, a shirt off the floor that was too big to be his, his favorite pair of sweats that had been tossed over the chair on one side of their room. He slowed in front of the mirror, pushing at his cheeks, then lifting his shirt to look at his stomach. It wasn’t as flat as it should be, a little rounder than usual, a sign that he’d over indulged as of late and needed to get back in gear. No more eating. Certainly no more drinking champagne. He let the shirt drop with a heavy sigh and padded towards the kitchen.
Christian was running off a little less sleep than he would have liked. Tris had come home drunk, adorable, and falling all over himself, but well after Chris had gone to bed. Which meant he’d woken up with his boyfriend, then stayed up a little while after it for the cuddling and overly affectionate attention. Not that Christian minded. He’d just started the coffee on his own and left a snoozing Tris in bed while he came out to do his homework at the kitchen table.
He looked up when Ethan arrived, looking worse for wear, but probably not as hungover at Tris would be. That was probably one of Ethan’s super powers, being able to drink his body weight and not be hungover the next morning. “There’s coffee,” Christian offered, mostly to let Ethan know he wasn’t alone.
Ethan blinked at the voice, then grinned, going for the pot and grabbing a mug. He made it up black, how he hated it, but he didn’t want the extra calories that came with cream and sugar. So black it was.
“Have fun last night?” Christian asked, definitely not fishing. Okay, maybe fishing a little. He couldn’t quite get a straight answer out of his drunk boyfriend about why he and his best friend had gone on an impromptu boys’ night out, and he was curious.
“Always.” Ethan grinned over his mug then headed over to Christian to look over his shoulder. “Don’t get to celebrate with Tris often, because he’s so weird about celebrating things, so it was great.” He patted Christian’s shoulder a little harder than necessary. “Good on you too.”
Christian winced a touch at the pat, but looked up at Ethan. “On me? Because I let him go out? I’ve never gotten in the way of you two hanging out.” And if he had, he sure as hell didn’t know about it. Tris hadn’t ever mentioned that he’d blown Ethan off for Christian.
Ethan made a face then shook his head, chuckling. “No, for proposing you, goof.” He went back to looking at Christian’s homework, trying to make sense of it. Shit, the kid was smart wasn’t he? “Tris was stupid happy about it, which makes me happy, and it means I get to plan an engagement party and hopefully a wedding. I have to defer to you on the wedding though. How do you feel about peach?” he asked, turning and resting his hip against the table to look at Christian. “And why do you look like you’re about to pass out? You hate peach too?”
Christian had started to talk, to ask what Ethan was talking about, but before he could Ethan had kept talking and he felt the color drain from his face. And he was pretty sure he hadn’t closed his mouth. It took everything in him to swallow, blinking wide-eyed at Ethan. “Wedding?” It was more of a squeak than a word.
Ethan arched a brow, tilting his head to the side ever so slightly. “Yes. Your wedding.”
Christian nodded, slowly, but he looked more like a bobble-head than a person. “My wedding. That I’m having. For...to who?”
That made Ethan set down his mug and look hard at Christian. “To Tris...or did you forget where you asked him? You should have had a ring. I mean, really. I know you’re a poor college student but we could have worked something out. He deserves a ring.”
Christian grabbed Ethan’s arm before he could say more. “I proposed. You’re saying I proposed. You...Tris told you this?” Shit. That was bad. That was not… “Oh shit.” Christian ran his free hand over his face, feeling a little lightheaded.
Ethan hadn’t ever heard Christian swear before. It was kind of a novel thing, the swear word coming out of such a sweet little face, but what he was saying was more important and goading him into saying bad words. “He did. He’s...please tell me you actually proposed.”
Christian shook his head, looking like a deer in headlights. “I didn’t. I mean I told him what I wanted, but I thought...I thought we were agreeing on where we were headed. Not...Oh no. I did it all wrong.”
Ethan had to force himself to close his eyes and count to five. “So you want to get married, but you didn’t actually ask him? Because he thinks you did.” He was not going to smack this kid. He wasn’t. He was the love of Tris’ life and didn’t need Ethan whopping him upside the head, but damn did Ethan want to.
“Yes. No. I mean no I didn’t ask. I would have done a thing with flowers and on one knee and everything else.” Not some off hand comments in bed one morning. That wasn’t a proposal. “How could I have done it so wrong?”
“Wondering the same thing myself,” Ethan said, eyeing his coffee and taking it back to the kitchen. He poured it out, then filled his mug with vodka from the freezer, bringing it back to Christian. “Drink this before you pass out.”
Christian took too big a swig, not thinking about what it might be and wound up coughing, but at least it brought him back to where he was. He pushed the mug back to Ethan and blinked at him. “Tris thinks we’re engaged? He said...yes?”
Ethan rolled his eyes and resisted the urge to smack his palm against his face. “Yes, and yes. Why would he have said no? I can’t believe you of all people...Christ you two are made for each other.” Ethan would have totally been unsurprised if Tris had managed to botch a proposal, but Christian usually had more sense.
“What do I do?” Christian’s voice was higher than it had been moments before, but at least the color had returned to his face. “Do I...tell him I didn’t mean it?”
“No! No, no no.” Ethan shook his head and waved his hands. “You do nothing of the sort. Postpone the wedding until four years from now, but don’t you dare go in there and tell him that you made a mistake. No. No. I will throw you off the balcony.”
Christian’s shoulders sank. “So I just...go with a terrible proposal I didn’t plan or mean at the time?” That was horrible Tris deserved better than that too.
Ethan took a sip of what was left of the vodka, considering that, then nodded. “Yeah, yeah you do. Look, we’ll get a ring, you can give him that at a fancy dinner, and just go with it. You’re not getting married next week. You can wait forever. He seems to think you are. Unless for some reason you don’t actually want to marry him. Then I’m throwing you off the boat too.”
“Of course I want to marry him!” Christian was offended that Ethan would think otherwise. “And...I don’t want to wait. Why does he think we’re going to wait? That’s silly. If we’re engaged we should go on ahead and get married. Soon. I mean, not right away, but like, soon.” The thoughts were already turning over in his head. They could do something on the boat even. Captains should have power to marry them legally. And if they were in the right waters it would be a maritime wedding which was even more romantic considering almost all water was connected. “I need to get him a ring. I didn’t get him a ring.”
“Yeah, I said that part,” Ethan said with a roll of his eyes. “Look, we’ll find something. I can loan you the money for now, you can pay me back, and then we’ll have everything sorted and he doesn’t have to know about any of this for another ten years. Then you can have a laugh and no one will be upset.”
“He’ll still be upset.”
“Then you never tell him. Now, tell me you have something picked out ring wise.” Because if the guy wrote a whole notebook about sex, he had to have a ring picked out.
Christian flushed pink and nodded, reaching for his phone. “It’s not fancy, but I thought I’d be buying it on my own…”
“Tris doesn’t want fancy. I was already given that lecture. Send me a link and I’ll get it paid for. We’ll have it shipped here and you can give it to him in time for the engagement party.” Ethan didn’t want that to happen until after Tris had his ring.
“Just like that?” Christian asked, but he still sent the link to Ethan.
“Just like that.”
Christian looked down at his book, but was pretty sure studying was off the table for a little bit. Maybe he could do something else. “And he’s… you said he told you. That he’s happy about it?” There was hope laced in his voice, like maybe well, maybe he hadn’t screwed everything up.
Ethan snorted a laugh and nodded. “You have no idea. He’s like, get drunk and gush about how happy he is.” Ethan’s grin went a little wicked, because now that Christian seemed to be breathing again it was too easy to tease him. “Happier than he was about that new nickname you gave him for the bedroom, which I’m pretty sure he’s thrilled about.”
Christian turned dark red, stammering a little before shaking his head. “It’s not a nickname - how do you know….oh no.” He’d been that loud hadn’t he? And Ethan’s grin just said yes. He had. Christian swallowed hard and wondered if he’d ever be able to make contact with Ethan ever again. He covered his face in his hands. “I want to die.”
“Not an option. You have to marry my best friend and make him the happiest man ever,” Ethan corrected, matter of fact, even if Christian’s face made him chuckle. He fished his phone out of his pocket and tapped at Christian’s laptop. “Now, come on, tell me everything you’ve already planned for your perfect gay wedding and we’ll get to work.” He pulled up the link and put in the order for the ring, though he did go with a better metal and a slightly larger diamond because this was Tris and he deserved the best.
“I don’t…” Christian hesitated, but Ethan leveled a look at him over where he was tapping on his phone. “Alright fine. I have a plan. But you can’t tell him I’ve been working on this.”
“He knows you have a plan,” Ethan said with a roll of his eyes. “Because he knows you. Hell, I just met you and I know you have a plan.” He set his phone aside and smiled. “Tell me everything. We’ll make it happen.”
Christian wasn’t sure how he felt about the undivided attention from Ethan, but the happiness was starting to bubble up and threatening to take over all of his thoughts. Tris wanted to get married. Now. He didn’t want to wait to talk about it, he wanted it enough that he’d thought Christian had already asked. Sure, it could have gone better, but Tris wanted to marry him. Him. That was more than enough to go on. He bit his lip and opened his laptop, finding the locked folder and turning it towards Ethan. Might as well go all out.