bit of a mess after the Iseyas had moved in together before the summer—and Walden had somehow, in his own lottery system, drawn the short straw with that firebug Dr. Liu, and Rian had a feeling Walden would be missing an annoyance as minor as paint pots in the sink by the time Liu had set their suite ablaze for the tenth time.
But any guilt vanished under the pure giddy pleasure at getting to stake out a space that was both his and Damon’s after months of flitting in and out of each other’s rooms, frequently stealing underneath Walden’s nose but more often than not holing up in the cozy space of Damon’s suite.
Months of quiet stolen moments. Of kisses between classes. Of slipping off on weekends when they didn’t have RA duty to sneak a film in town, or dinner at the pub, or just driving until they found a place to camp and sleep beneath the stars. Of learning each other; of Rian learning how to draw Damon out of his silences with support and understanding rather than with frustration until Damon started opening up of his own volition, and of Damon learning how to coax Rian out of his anxious need to fix things that didn’t need fixing by sitting him down and talking him through his thoughts until Rian remembered to include Damon in the things he got himself so worked up about.
Of falling deeper and deeper and love.
And feeling more and more like they could rely on each other, as together they watched Chris Northcote get back on his feet.
It hadn’t been easy. Not when deep fatigue left Chris with only limited hours in the day to catch up on his schoolwork or risk falling even further behind—but things had taken an infinitely more positive turn when Chris had shaken the last of his fears of punishment after word got around about Gordon Drew getting dragged out of his own bar in handcuffs and handed over to the county sheriff.
And when Chris’s parents had finally responded, flown into town, and hired a private tutor to work with him in the infirmary until he was ready to return to class on his own terms.
Rian had never known he could feel so proud of another person as he did of Chris.
Or of Damon, when Rian doubted Chris ever would have found his way out of his mess if Damon hadn’t been so persistent in caring for him, and for all the boys in the school.
More than once, Rian caught himself drifting off just thinking of how much he admired Damon—his effortless roguish charm, his blunt honesty, his fiercely kind heart, the strength that was born less of his finely-crafted body and more of his finely-crafted sense of empathy. And Rian realized he was drifting off now, lingering in the fourth-floor hallway just past the stairwell, a box of his books—and several of Damon’s mixed in, their collections intermingling, the Reluctant Royals covers peeking past the half-closed flaps of the box—propped on the windowsill while Rian gazed out the window at the late December snowfall, watching the flakes drift down on the mostly empty campus.
Most of the boys had gone home for Christmas. Damon and Rian had both considered it, but realized that this year...
This year, they’d rather spend it together, nurturing this quiet pocket of warmth they’d built around themselves and taking advantage of the post-semester room shifts to move in together. They could navigate the mess of crashing their families together another year.
And Rian hoped there would be many, many years to come.
Many years together.
“Falling asleep on me already?” came from over his shoulder, rumbling and soft, right before heavy arms slid around his waist, squeezing briefly...right before Damon stole the box from him, lifting it over Rian’s head and away, hefting it easily. “Not fair, Ri. We’ve still got like, fifteen boxes of your art shit to go.”
“It’s not art shit,” Rian spluttered, trying to sound offended and failing; laughing, he turned to trail after Damon, skipping to catch up to him as he treaded down the hall toward the open door of their suite. “It’s art supplies. I was just resting for a second. It’s heavy.” He reached up to tug at the box. “Give it. I can carry it.”
“I already got it.” Damon bent to brush his lips to Rian’s cheek, the spill of his hair washing against Rian’s jaw, before Damon straightened with a rakish grin. “Can’t have you messing up them