Chapter Text
It was late in the afternoon, maybe three o'clock if I were to take a wild guess, and I had just woken up. I groaned as I made an almost futile attempt to rub the crust of sleep from my closed eyelids with the heels of my palms, hissing when it felt like I would nearly force my eyes into the back of my skull. I cracked open one of them after I let my hands drop to my bed, squinting at my clock and smirking; fuck yeah, I was right! It was 3:12 in the afternoon, which was setting a new record on my score of times I woke up at.
I made some sort of unintelligible noise in the back of my throat when I forced myself to limply roll out of bed, inching my way over to my rolling desk chair and heaving myself up on top of the cushy seat. I flipped open my laptop's screen, pressing a sleepy finger to the touch pad of the mouse, and swirled it around a bit. The machine came to life shortly after the third swipe of my finger, and I quirked a brow at the screen that was open. Apparently, I hadn't closed out of AO3 last night? Stranger yet was that my account told me that I had been gifted a fanfiction.
I refreshed the page, convinced that it was a fluke, but low and behold beneath the name "kirschFINE" lay the tell-tale "(1)" next to my "Gifts" section. I hurriedly clicked on the link, impatiently waiting for the screen to load. My leg was bouncing quickly beneath the desk, anxiety running through the taught and rapidly moving muscles. Who would gift me? I don't even write on this god forsaken site!
My leg stopped its fervent bouncing, and my eyes grew wide as they took in the username of the person who had gifted me.
"One-Hundred-and-Eight" by jesus-with-freckles.
I clicked the title of the fic, biting my lip as the screen loaded and revealed the summary: "9 x 12 = 108 ways to show your love for someone, and that's just what Nine had in mind." I couldn't believe my eyes! Had jesus-with-freckles really written a gift fic for me?! I scrolled down, reading the authors' note, and my eyes probably almost fell out of my goddamn face.
"This was written for kirchFINE because of his amazing fanart for my more well-known fanfic. I decided that it was so well drawn that it needed it's own fic, so I wrote this around how the art made me feel! I hope you all enjoy the read, especially kirchFINE!!! - Marco Polo."
There was no way that jesus-with-freckles had written this sixty-thousand-word-plus oneshot of my favorite pairing from my favorite anime just for me! No way in hell! I scrolled down and began to read, instantly becoming engrossed in the perfect writing that jesus-with-freckles had to offer. It had started out sweet and unassuming, but as this was a oneshot, I knew it would turn out to be less than innocent.
The build up to the first of the one-hundred-and-eight acts of love was immaculate, giving readers (me) time to figure things out before Twelve could. By the time I had gotten to the fourth act of love, I was apprehensive; Twelve wasn't noticing or reciprocating Nine's feelings at all! At this rate, Lisa would have to help Nine, and that would be awkward, because Lisa had feelings for him. I was swearing up and down, hoping that Lisa wouldn't get involved and fuck things up, and, to my relief, jesus-with-freckles didn't use her. Good job, my man, good job indeed.
I was on the edge of my chair when the fifty-sixth act of love came around, and when the raunchy eightieth act rolled over, my toes were curling against my carpet. Leave it to jesus-with-freckles to know how to get me riled up, yeah?
I was a panting mess as my hooded eyes ran over the content of act number one-hundred-and-seven, squirming in my seat when it was over. I gave myself time to calm down, scrolling through Tumblr for a hot second, checking Facebook, hell, even going as far as to check my Gaia Online situation. When I was sure I'd be okay to read the final act of love from Nine to Twelve, I clicked back to the tab that held "One-Hundred-and-Eight," and let my eyes fall to the beginning of the final act. My eyes flew past the words, eating them up as the sappy "I love you's" and "you mean the world to me's" spewed from Nine's mouth and into Twelve's ears, and tears welled up when Nine dropped to one knee.
I finished the fic, scrolling down and typing up a comment on how beautiful I thought it was, and how thankful and excited I was that he had taken the time to write this for me.
I dragged out my tablet, knowing that after reading something as touching as that, that I needed to draw fanart for it. I set to work on drawing Nine first, starting with his eyes, then his eyebrows and nose and mouth, then his hair, and finally the outline for his kneeling body. I drew Twelve looking down at him, shock and love in eyes, happy tears trailing down to his childish face and gathering at the point of his chin.
I colored in the drawing after cleaning up the line-art, adding the final touches to it before hitting "save." When I looked at the clock, it was seven at night. I snorted to myself at how long I had taken just to read and draw some shit.
I made my way back over to Tumblr, clicking the photo icon and choosing the file I had saved moments prior. I captioned it "one hundred and eight," and tagged it "fanart," "myart," "terror in resonance," "jesus-with-freckles" and "marco polo."
I sat down in my chair once more after a brief snack period, but before I had time to settle down completely, my eyes got the chance to once again bug out of their sockets. There, on my fucking screen, was the notification that I had gotten a message in my inbox on Tumblr. My clumsy fingers scrambled to the touch pad mouse, scrolling shakily to the little red "one" by the envelope and clicked it quickly.
If I had thought that my eyes had bugged out before, then they had exploded now. Sitting there, in my inbox, was an ask from freckles-r-us.
"Hey! This is Marco Polo, the one who you drew that fanart for, and also the guy who wrote that gift-fic for you! I seriously love your art, and I just wanted to personally thank you for all of your hard work! Feel free to message me anytime, you seem pretty cool!"
I opened his page in a separate tab before I hastily typed out a reply, telling him that his fics were the shit, and that being his friend would be more than alright with me. After sending him the answering ask, I went over to his blog, and was stunned to see how nice it looked. Gentle music-box tunes played in the background as I scrolled through his glowy posts for a minute, liking a few, even reblogging some others, before checking out his links and opening a few in new tabs.
The first tab I had opened was his deviantart, and it made me giggle before I deemed it kinda useless and closed it. The next one was his twitter, which I discreetly followed and retweeted from. The last link was his Facebook, which I added before I could chicken out. I returned to his blog afterward, scrolling aimlessly and occasionally reblogging or liking some odd post or another. Just as I was getting bored and was about to leave, the mouse hovered once more over the links menu, and I noticed that I hadn't looked at all of them. God... Was this like, akin to stalking? I sure hoped not.
The final few links in the list consisted of "submit," "fandoms," "my fanfiction," "fan art," "tag list," "pixel family," "faq," "about me," and "my face."
I opened his "my face" page in a second tab before clicking the "about me" link, letting it take me to the section of text that would tell me more about him.
"Hi! My name is Marco, and I'm 22. I'm a Sophomore in College, and I'm studying towards English and Literature! I have two dogs and a cat, and three fish. I write fanfiction for the fandoms I'm in, and appreciate all forms of fanwork in response! I'm currently accepting two request-fics per week, so try and be one of the lucky two first prompts! I rarely do gift fics, so please don't ask. Honorable url mentions are: b00ty-s00t-ymir, kristalight, jaegermeisterisbae, springle-has-sprung, and last but definitely not least, pleasebe-kirsmine!"
Pleasebe-kirsmine? But... that's fucking me! I'm pleasebe-kirsmine! I was sure to open his pixel family next, practically screaming when my eyes landed on a tiny pixel horse waving it's cute little butt back and forth, the hover name reading "pleasebe-kirsmine." I didn't even care that I was put as a horse in a row of normal pixel people, I was just damn happy I was even there.
After spending maybe forty more minutes on Marco's blog, I suddenly remembered I had opened another tab. I dragged my cursor over to the tab and clicked it, nearly choking on my own saliva at the string of selfies I was attacked with.
Freckles. There were freckles everywhere. The first image of Marco had him with his shirt off, and his chest was not only fucking painted with freckles, but it was toned as hell, too. Shit, fuck, he's hot! That's not fair!
I made quick work of liking almost every one of his pictures, saving a few as references to maybe draw later. It only hit me how creepy that could have been when I liked the last (technically first) selfie ever posted by him. Well, too late now, right?
I eventually got off of his blog, going back to my dash only to find that I had two new messages and one new follower. I panned over to my inbox, letting my eyes fall on the chipper words Marco had to say to me. The first message he had sent was
"I can see we will probably be great friends! Your blog is amazing, and your fandoms are the bomb! But I think the best content on your page is definitely your art! I don't really know what to say since I'm assuming you have read/will read my "About Me" page haha :)"
The second read:
"You really like my blog, hmm? ;)"
Almost as soon as I was getting ready to reply, I got a slew of notifications. I opened my activity page in a new tab and went over to it, postponing my response until I checked what had happened. I waited a little impatiently for the page to load, tapping my fingers against the desk repeatedly. When it finally loaded, I had to do a double take.
The first thirty most recent notes were from freckles-r-us, and they were all likes or reblogs of my selfies. Then, after refreshing the page, the next top sixty notes were all reblogs and likes of my art. Freckles-r-us quickly became my number one fan, which was hard to do on a normal day, but giving someone nearly one-hundred notes in the span of a few moments will probably do that.
I quickly returned to my response tab, typing out my reply to Marco.
"i could say the same to you, freckles"
I only had to wait a few minutes before there was a new message in my inbox once more, and it took me a while to realize that it had made me blush a little.
"You have a nice face. What's wrong with that, Jean?"
It took all my willpower not to pass out from holding my breath right there.
After at least a week of back and forth messages to Marco, it became apparent that we both found the other extremely attractive. Like, unnecessarily so. We tried real hard to keep it from reaching the other, but it ended up being a lot like that vine that goes: "Just a pair of guys bein' dudes! Just a pair of dudes bein' bro's! Just a pair of bro's bein' gay's!"
Today was one of the days where I had decided to be on Tumblr for the entirety of the day. I was scrolling mindlessly down, occasionally bringing up a new tab to play some music, when I landed on an original post from freckles-r-us. Skimming it was a mistake, I realized, as I had obviously missed some key knowledge in it.
"To all my Seattle followers, prepare yourselves to feel the divine grace of Freckled Jesus himself! Haha, just kidding. To all of you beautiful people out there in Seattle who just so happen to like my fics or posts enough, I wanted to let you know that I'll be there for a little while, and that you should totally try to hang out with me! It'd be super cool to meet some of you! Send me an ask or some fanmail and let me know when to chill with you! I'll be here for the next 2 months!"
The sound that tried its damnedest to claw it's way out of my throat was garbled and odd, landing somewhere between a groan, a hiss, and a choked scream. My fingers were sending me to Marco's ask box before I had time to realize it, and I had sent him an ask telling him that I lived in Seattle.
Nearly an hour of shaking nervousness later, and I received a new message. I clicked my inbox and read the message that was clearly from Marco.
"Hey, Jean! So far it's been like, maybe six hours and your the only person who said they were here in Seattle, so I was wondering if you wanted to meet up? My number is 524-XXX-XXXX! Text me or call me so we can work out the details! :)"
The amount of speed with which my hands fumbled for my phone was insane, and I nearly dropped it four times.
I need to calm the fuck down.
I somehow managed to type in the number, adding it to my contacts before sending him a text.
To: Freckled Angel
hey this is jean
I waited apprehensively, positively breathing on the screen of my phone as I waited anxiously for the reply to come through.
From: Freckled Angel
Hi, Jean! I arrived in Washington a few hours ago! Mind telling me where to let the taxi driver to go so I can meet up with you? It can be anywhere you're comfortable with. :)
Him and his damn smilies.
I took a moment to think of a place before sending him the address of my favorite bookstore-slash-coffee-shop of all time. I jumped out of my desk chair and practically flew to my closet. My thin fingers found purchase on a well-worn but still nice NBHD t-shirt, my tight-as-sin grey skinny jeans, a pair of deep red combat boots, and a beanie nearly the same color as the boots.
I dressed quickly, rolling on some deodorant and a quick spray of cheap cologne beneath my chin before grabbing my keys and sprinting out of my dorm room. I practically dove into my car as I sped off to the cafe, trying and failing to stay with the speed limit. I finally slowed down when I nearly hit some poor old biddy, who screamed and held a knobby, wrinkly, gnarl of a fist out at me and shook it for good measure.
I had made it to Wall Rose Cappuccino in about seven minutes, when it usually took me around fifteen to twenty. I parked quickly, haphazardly shoving my keys into my pocket after I locked my junky cars' door.
I took a deep breath before I pushed open the frosty glass door to the cozy cafe that lay beyond.