Chapter Text
The days following that Thursday session were a kind of low-grade torture.
The peace Gustave had found in the amber light of Verso’s apartment didn't vanish, but it was suddenly overlaid with a frantic, buzzing anxiety that had nothing to do with death and everything to do with life.
The intimacy they shared (the careful shoulder massage, the casual knee touch under the table, the profound vow of truth) had fractured the comfortable container labeled "Friendship" and spilled the contents everywhere.
He realized, with a sickening lurch of panic, that he liked Verso. Too much.
Not just as a friend, no: he liked him in a way that made his stomach swoop when he thought about the curve of his mouth; he liked him in a way that made his skin prickle with the memory of a hand resting on his shoulder.
That should have been a normal thing to acknowledge. Something that would put a bit of anxiety for some people, maybe even joy. But Gustave was far from normal, that was obvious.
When he thought about something he obsessed over it.
The distraction became pervasive. When he was at the Guild, trying to focus on material stress tests, his mind would rewind: the time Verso had insisted on taking his coat, the way the light caught the dark wool of Verso's waistcoat, the simple kindness of the tea.
The compliments, the teasing, the near-constant physical proximity. It was all there, clear as glass.
It forced him to re-examine everything. He replayed the last few months like a film reel, frame by frame, looking for the clues he had been too dense to see.
The teasing. The way Verso always sat just a little too close. The coat. The “Yours look kinder.”
It wasn’t just friendly banter. It was flirting.
And god, he had been flirting back.
He had been calling Verso an asshole with a tone of voice that, in retrospect, sounded mortifyingly fond. He had been seeking out his company, leaning into his touch, inviting him into his most private spaces. He had thought it was just… loneliness. Comradeship.
Now he could see it wasn't, like a veil had lifted.
But Gustave had dated women. He had loved women. His romantic history was a neat, uncomplicated column of Her.
So what was this?
Was he gay? Had he always been, and simply been too busy working to notice? Or was this something new, maybe a fracture in his psyche caused by the trauma, a rewiring of his desires?
Or worse, was this Maelle's fault?
He carried the panic into his therapy session like a weight lodged behind his ribs, heavy and impossible to ignore. It dominated the space, pushing everything else into the background. He didn’t sit for long: he paced, restless, circling the room as if movement might shake the thoughts loose from his head.
What surfaced, again and again, was Verso.
He couldn't stop thinking, and talking about him.
He thought about the way Verso looked in the dim light of the kitchen, the way his voice sounded when he wasn't being sarcastic, and the way Gustave had felt when he’d reached out to touch his shoulder. It wasn't the kind of feeling he had for Maelle, or Lune, or any of his friends and family.
This was the same as for Sophie.
"I don't understand it" Gustave said, his voice sounding thin in the quiet office. He didn't look at the therapist, scared that he would find an expression that he wouldn't like; instead he kept his eyes on the floor, following the pattern of the wood grain. "Was I always like this? Back in the city, before the Expedition, I was always so busy. I was working on the Lumina converter. I was preparing for the journey. I didn't have time to think about... this."
He stopped pacing for a second and looked at his prosthetic arm. He wondered if his brain had just short-circuited. Maybe the trauma, losing his arm- ( no, that was before) maybe the deaths he couldn't remember, or the one he did remember, had just rewired him. Maybe he was so broken that his desires had drifted into a shape he didn't recognize.
"Is it just because I'm a mess?" he asked, more to himself than anyone else, not really expecting an answer. "Is it because he's the only one who really knows how bad it is? Maybe I'm just projecting. That's what people do, right? They get hurt and they grab onto the nearest thing they find."
But even as he said it, he knew it wasn't true. It wasn't just about anyone. If it was, he could have fallen for anyone else, even Lune. It was specifically Verso.
He tried to think about other men he knew in Lumière, and he felt nothing. It was only when he pictured Verso that the air felt like it was leaving the room.
He started pacing again. The idea that he might have been gay this whole time, and just never noticed because he was too busy with not dying (which eventually failed, ah) felt like a rewrite of his entire life. It made him feel like he didn't know the man in the mirror.
"I spent years with Sophie" he muttered, the memory of her face feeling distant and flat. He had also talked about her to his therapist so he didn't have to specify her identity. "I thought that was it. I thought I knew who I was. And now... this feels ridicoulous."
He felt a wave of shame, followed immediately by a sharp, biting dread.
"I just want to understand." Gustave said, finally leaning his head against the cool glass of the window. "I want to immediately understand what happens to me. Is that really too much to ask? I used to be more reactive when I encountered problems, now I just crumble to them. I just want to be normal. Function like a normal person, without feeling like even the little things are a chore."
He didn't remember the exact words he used after that, he had been too busy overthinking, but he remembered the therapist’s voice; it echoed in his head now as he walked through the city, calm and irritatingly reasonable.
“Sexuality isn’t always a fixed point, Gustave. It can be fluid. It can evolve.”
She had used words like spectrum and situational attraction; she had talked about how profound safety can sometimes unlock desires that were previously dormant; she had told him that loving a man didn’t invalidate the women he had loved before: it just meant his capacity for connection was wider than he thought.
It all sounded very logical. Very academic.
But it didn’t help the fact that he felt like a teenager going through puberty back again.
He felt foolish. He felt raw. He felt like he had been reading the manual for a completely different machine his entire life.
He knew what bisexuality was. Of course, he wasn't even against it, the concept sounded absolutely unharmful so he had always just accepted its existence as it was.
But this was different, it was different when he was the one involved: it felt wrong even though he couldn't pinpoint the problem in it.
And so for the following three weeks Gustave had been a man living in the rafters of his own mind, looking down at his life with a mixture of confusion and dread. Every interaction with Verso had become a minefield of "what-ifs": when Verso made a sarcastic comment Gustave searched for a hidden meaning; when their hands brushed while passing the teapot, he felt the ghost of a shock and wondered if Verso had felt it, too.
Gustave was hyper-aware of everything: the distance between their knees, the sound of Verso’s breathing, the way the light hit his throat; he often caught himself staring and had to violently force his gaze away. He overthought every sentence, wondering if he sounded too eager, too desperate, too… obvious.
Being around the other man now was both a blessing and an agony.
He was terrified Verso would notice.
Or even worse, that Verso already knew, and was just waiting for Gustave to catch up.
And so another Thursday came again.
Gustave had considered making an excuse this time, but the phantom pain in his arm was flaring up, and the thought of spending the evening alone in his own head was worse than the fear of being found out.
It was going to be fine, that's what he told himself.
He just had to act like he always did.
They were in their usual spots, or rather, the spots they had migrated to over the last two months: the tea was finished, the jar corked, and the amber light of the room had softened into a deep, hazy twilight. Gustave was lying on his back on the rug, his mechanical arm resting heavily on his stomach, staring up at the ceiling where the shadows played. The drug had already taken effect.
Good.
He turned his head to the side; the movement felt slow, liquid.
Verso was sitting on the sofa, one knee drawn up; he wasn't reading, nor he was looking at the window.
He was looking down at Gustave.
Through the haze, Gustave’s filter, the one that usually screamed don’t look, don’t stare, don’t make it weird, was offline; he found himself cataloging details he usually forced himself to ignore.
He noticed the way the light caught the sharp angle of Verso’s cheekbone, softening it; he noticed the way Verso’s linen shirt was unbuttoned at the collar, exposing the hollow of his throat, and the way a small pulse beat there, steady and alive; he noticed the stillness of the man'e hands, hands that could be lethal, that could defeat the strongest of Nevrons in the Continent, now resting open and harmless on his knees. Not that he was ever able to see that in action.
He noticed that his eyes were dark, the pupils blown wide by the drug, swallowing the grey iris. Despite that, they looked terrifyingly soft.
Gustave wasn't sure he liked how he was glaring at him: it wasn't exactly uncomfortable, but it was... intense. It wasn't the usual quick, witty glance, and Gustave felt the weight of it. He watched as Verso’s eyes drifted down to his mouth, lingered there for a heartbeat too long, and then pulled back up to meet his eyes.
That was... difficult to ignore.
Gustave’s heart gave a strange, wet thud against his ribs. It was a physical reaction, a sudden surge of blood that made his fingertips tingle.
I want him.
It was scary to have thought that so quickly, so surely. Like it had always made sense, but he was just now grasping it.
The truth fit like a glove, all the feelings inside his head clicking together into that simple thought, something that he had always felt at the back of his mind, but that he hadn't been able to explain.
He wanted to bridge the small gap between them. He wanted to know what it felt like to actually touch Verso without the excuse of a panic attack or a stupid breakdown.
He thought about Verso’s hands and wondered how they would feel against his skin. He wanted to close the two feet of distance between them and bury his face in the crook of Verso’s neck just to see if he felt as warm as he looked.
Was that weird to think? He was too confused to care honestly.
He felt a bit dizzy, but it was a grounded kind of vertigo. He looked at Verso's mouth, too; he noticed the slight curve of his lips and the way he was breathing, just as unsteady as Gustave was.
He wondered yet again if Verso was waiting for him to do something. The uncertainty was still there, a nagging doubt that maybe he was reading this all wrong because of the drugs; maybe Verso was just staring because he was high, too.
Maybe he had been reading a "flirting" that didn't exist.
But as the man's gaze returned to his lips, Gustave felt the last of his logic crumble.
He felt the heat rise in his cheeks, a flush that had nothing to do with the room’s temperature.
"Is there something on my face?" Verso murmured. His voice was a low rumble, barely vibrating the air.
"No. I just like to look." He countered. His own voice sounded wrecked, breathless. He didn't look away. He didn't want to.
The other smiled, and the younger man swore he felt his heart do a backflip.
That didn't sound like a refusal.
He watched Verso shift, unfolding his legs, sliding down until he was sitting fully on the rug, crossing the invisible line they usually kept.
He was close now.
Close enough that Gustave could feel the heat radiating off him.
"You seem… peaceful" Verso said quietly.
He reached out. The movement was telegraphed, slow enough for Gustave to stop him, to turn away, to make a joke.
He decided to not move.
His fingers brushed against Gustave’s temple, pushing back a stray lock of dark hair that had fallen across his forehead.
The touch seared.
It wasn't painful, but it was intense. It felt intimate, too intimate. Probably because it was. Every nerve ending in Gustave’s scalp lit up, screaming for more; the contrast between the cool air of the room and the warmth of Verso’s skin was shocking.
"Peaceful? That’s a first" he murmured, his voice sounding thicker than he intended. "I usually feel like I have to hold this whole city together."
Usually, this was the moment he would have told him to back off. He would have insisted on keeping his distance, hiding behind some hollow concept of boundaries or discomfort. But now, Gustave understood that it had only ever been his way of refusing to acknowledge his feelings, a shield to stop him from seeing how much he actually craved the other man's touch.
Verso’s eyes crinkled at the corners, his hand lingering near Gustave’s hairline. "Well, tonight you’re doing a very good impression of a calm man. You’re not even twitching. I was starting to think you’d finally run out of things to worry about."
"I have plenty to worry about" the engineer murmured, his gaze drifting to the way the lamplight hit the man's shoulder. "I have responsibilities. Huge ones. I just... think I forgot where I put the list."
"Good" Verso whispered, his thumb tracing a slow, lazy line down the side of his face. "The list is boring anyway. I like you better when you’re not trying to solve the world’s problems."
"I'm an engineer, Verso. Solving things is what I do."
"Then solve this" the other teased, his voice dropping into a low, velvet hum. "Why haven't you already told me to back off?"
Ok, so he had noticed. Gustave tried really hard not to fumble, but it wasn't exactly easy, both because of the other man's closeness and the drug's effect.
"...you are not that close." He managed to say, even though he knew it was a lie.
They were definitely closer than they had ever been.
Gustave’s heart thudded, a heavy, rhythmic pulse that he was sure Verso could feel through the floor. He looked up, and suddenly, the "details" he had been admiring from afar were inches away: he could see the faint gold flecks in Verso’s dark irises and the way his hair fell forward, shielding them from the rest of the room.
As the man leaned closer, the panic didn't take hold; instead, it was washed away by the sheer, radiant heat coming off the other man. There was no rush: Gustave knew that if he wanted he had time to pull away, to make a joke, to put his hand up and create a barrier.
But he didn't. He didn't want to.
Verso stopped when their faces were so close that they were sharing the same air: he could smell the faint, bitter scent of the tea and the earthy musk of the mushroom powder on Verso’s skin. It was the most real thing he had ever felt.
Verso’s gaze dropped to Gustave’s mouth, then flickered back up to his eyes; there was a vulnerability there that Gustave hadn't seen before, a quiet uncertainty that mirrored his own.
"What about now?" He whispered.
It took Guatave everything not to chuckle at that, because no, he thought that Verso was exactly as close as he wanted him to.
Back then, when he had pushed him away, he wasn't aware what their proximity had meant; he hadn't understood his nervousness, mistaking it for anxiety.
But now, as he stared at the other man, all he felt was excitement and wonder.
"No" he breathed, the word barely a sound. "You are not."
Verso didn't wait. He closed the final inch, his lips meeting Gustave’s in a contact that felt like a long-held breath finally being released.
It happened fast, a sudden collision of warmth that stole the air right out of his lungs.
It wasn't like the memories Gustave had of Sophie, those felt like faded photographs: this was vibrant, sharp, and overwhelming. Verso’s lips were warm, tasting faintly of the bitter tea and the sweet, earthy dust of the mushroom.
Gustave’s entire love history was written in soft curves and smooth skin, the yielding, velvet texture of the women he had loved; he was used to a certain kind of give, a certain kind of softness against his face.
This was nothing like that.
The friction of the man's stubble against his own chin was gritty, abrasive. It scraped. Under the influence of the powder, that abrasion felt like sparks, a rough, electric drag that sent shivers down his neck. Verso’s jaw didn’t give way: it was hard angles and solid bone beneath the skin, a resistance that felt unmovable.
It was weird. It was sharper, harder, more solid than anything he had ever tasted. It lacked the delicate perfume he associated with intimacy.
For a heartbeat, Gustave froze, his brain short-circuiting under the sheer impossibility of the moment. Then, the sensation hit his nervous system and the freeze shattered.
He made a small, wrecked sound in his throat and kissed back.
It was clumsy and desperate, but he didn't really care.
Verso didn't pull away, instead he sank into it; he shifted his weight, his hand sliding from Gustave’s jaw to the back of his neck, fingers tangling in the dark hair to tilt his head back, deepening the angle.
Gustave’s hand, the flesh one, shot up, clutching at the front of the other's shirt, pulling him down, needing the friction. The weight of his mechanical arm on his stomach didn't feel heavy anymore; it felt like it was holding him to the earth while the rest of him took flight.
The kiss grew heated, messy. It wasn't just lips anymore; it was breath mixing, noses bumping, the scrape of stubble against skin. Verso groaned low in his throat, a vibration that Gustave felt in his own chest, and the sound acted like an accelerant.
The kiss was nothing like he had imagined, but then, all at once, it was far too much.
The sensory input spiked, and he became acutely aware of everything at once.
The texture of Verso’s lips, the heat of his breath. The weight of his body hovering over Gustave’s.
The way a hand hovered near his waist.
Too fast. Too much. Can't breathe.
The heat of Verso’s body pressing him into the floorboards felt less like an embrace and more like a weight he couldn't lift. The room, which had been gently tilting, began to spin with violent, sickening speed.
The boundaries between them dissolved into a terrifying static. Gustave couldn't tell whose heart was beating so fast; he felt trapped in a loop of sensation that was rapidly bleeding from pleasure into panic.
He gasped, wrenching his mouth away, his head turning sharply to the side. His chest heaved, sucking in air that felt too thin.
"Wait" Gustave choked out, his hand on Verso’s shirt shoving now instead of pulling, weakly, but frantically. "Stop. Wait."
Verso pulled back instantly.
He didn't hesitate, he didn't ask why: he moved with a speed that blurred in Gustave’s vision, putting a solid two feet of distance between them in a second. He sat back on his heels, hands raised slightly, palms open.
But to Gustave, he didn't look right.
Verso was a blur, a smudge of grey linen and pale skin against the dark background of the room. Gustave blinked rapidly, trying to bring him into focus, but the image wouldn't hold. It was like looking at a reflection in disturbed water.
"Gustave?”
The blur's voice was low, careful, and sounded miles away.
Gustave was trembling, vibrating with a frequency that made his teeth ache. He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes, trying to manually force the world to stop spinning.
He felt a slight shift in the air, probably Verso moving. Gustave flinched, his shoulders hiking up to his ears.
“Don't” he choked out, his fingers digging into the locks of hair. “Just—don't touch me. Please.”
“I’m not” he heard the other say, quickly. He sounded steady, though there was a tremor of hurt he couldn't quite hide. "It’s... sensory overload. Probably. The powder amplified the adrenaline. Your brain is just processing too much data at once."
He knew those words should have meant something to him, logical explanations usually helped him to rationalize, but this time it was like he just couldn't grasp them.
"Can't breathe" Gustave wheezed, clawing at his collar with his one hand.
He was usually able to not let the panic get a hold of him this early, at least when he was alone at home, but the lingering confusion left by the drug wasn't helping him concentrate; his thoughts swayed back and forth, like he couldn't focus on something for more than a split second.
"Focus on the floor” Verso’s voice came again, rhythmic and grounding. “Ground yourself, listen to my voice if it helps you. You are going to be fine. You’re just... the input is just hitting you all at once. It’s the powder, Gustave. It’s just the powder."
Gustave obeyed. The spinning slowed slightly behind his eyelids, and his breath came back to him.
It was fine. Everything was fine.
Maybe it was because it wasn't really a panic attack but something different, or maybe because he had gotten better at handling them, but the fear quickly receded, leaving him with a sense of relief creeping back at him.
Mixed with something close to embarrassment.
“I ruined it” Gustave whispered, his voice cracking, shame slowly overtaking the panic. He had wanted that kiss more than his next breath, and then, the moment he had it, he had reacted like he was being attacked. He felt so stupid, like he had just lost a great opportunity and made a mess out of it. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean- it was just too much.”
“Hey” Verso said, his tone softening. “You don't have to apologize, I know. It's fine, you are fine, it's already going away, see?"
Gustave let out a long, shuddering sob that he hadn't known was trapped in his throat; he waited for the room to stop spinning, to stop feeling like it was melting around him.
He was so stupid. He couldn't even give a proper kids without panicking.
And he knew he shouldn't really be blaming himself, he knew that drugs usually didn't help with rationalizing things, but that didn't stop him from feeling like a huge mess.
God, he just wanted to stop thinking and feeling so much.
“Gustave.”
“Yeah yeah, I'm here” Gustave mumbled. His tongue felt thick. “Unfortunately.”
“Tell me three things you can feel” Verso said, ignoring his last comment. It didn't really sound as a suggestion and more of an order.
Gustave huffed a shaky breath: he didn't want to play this game, he didn't need it, he was already calm. He just wanted to forget and dissolve into the floorboards. But he focused, just for the sake of soothing Verso's worries.
“The rug” he whispered. “It’s scratchy.”
Just like Verso's beard.
“Good. What else?”
“My shirt. It’s… tight. At the collar.”
“One more.”
Gustave hesitated. He could feel the phantom pressure of Verso’s hand on his neck, the memory of the kiss burning on his lips, but he couldn't say that.
“My pulse” he whispered. “It’s... still a bit fast.”
“It’s slowing down” Verso corrected gently. “Just keep breathing.”
They sat there for what felt like hours, though it was probably only minutes. When Gustave finally lowered his hands, Verso was sitting cross-legged a few feet away; he was staring intently at him, a worried expression pinched on his face.
“Better?” Verso asked.
“The floor stopped moving, so yeah”
“That's... good” Verso moved slowly, reaching out to help him get up. “Can you move to the sofa? The floor isn’t helping the circulation.”
Gustave nodded. The transition felt momentous, a coordinated effort of limbs that felt heavy and distant, but he managed to drag himself up and sink into the cushions.
Verso watched him for a beat, his expression unreadable in the dim light, before he quietly stood up. Gustave watched the blurred shape of him move across the room toward the small kitchenette. The sound of water splashing into a glass was sharp and crystalline, cutting through the heavy, drug-induced silence of the apartment.
A moment later, Verso was back. He didn't sit too close this time, respecting the invisible boundary Gustave had just thrashed into existence. He simply reached out and offered the glass.
"Drink" Verso said softly.
Gustave took it, his fingers brushing Verso’s for a fleeting second, a spark that made his heart skip, though he forced himself to stay still.
The cool water was a blessing. Gustave held the glass with his left hand, his flesh fingers still trembling slightly against the wool, while his prosthetic provided a steady, unyielding grip; each swallow felt like a tether pulling him back down to earth, washing away the metallic tang of the powder and the overwhelming ghost of Verso’s touch.
The room had stopped spinning, but the silence that replaced the chaos was heavy with everything they hadn't said. Gustave looked down at the water, unable to meet Verso’s eyes. The shame was a cold, hollow weight in his chest.
“I think...” Gustave started, his voice still a bit thin. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I think I need to go home, Verso.”
Verso, who had been leaning against the arm of the sofa a few feet away, straightened up immediately. His brow furrowed, a flash of genuine alarm crossing his face.
“Now?” Verso asked, his voice rising just a fraction. “You’re still swaying. The powder hasn't fully cleared your system yet, and the fog out there is thick enough to swallow a carriage. You shouldn't be wandering the streets alone like this.”
“I’ll be fine” Gustave insisted, though the idea of the long walk felt like climbing a mountain; he stood up and set the glass down on the table a bit further with a small clack. “I’m sober enough. And I know the way. I could walk it blind.”
“Gustave, please." Verso said, his voice tightening with a frustration born of genuine fear. "Just stay on the couch. You don’t have to talk to me, you can sleep. I’ll go to the bedroom.”
Gustave finally looked up, and the sight of Verso nearly broke his resolve; he saw the raw worry in the other man’s eyes, but deeper than that, he saw the ghost of the rejection from minutes ago, the flicker of a man who thought he had finally reached out only to have the door slammed in his face.
The guilt was a physical weight in Gustave’s chest. He realized he couldn’t leave without making one thing absolutely clear.
“Verso, it wasn’t you” Gustave said, his voice dropping to a whisper. He reached out as if to touch Verso’s arm, but stopped himself, his hand hovering in the air before dropping back. “I'm not running away because of it, I swear." He gulped down a joke about him not being Verso, but decided not to tease the other in that moment. "I just...think I need some time alone. It was a lot."
Verso went still. He searched Gustave’s face, looking for any sign of a lie, any sign that Gustave was just being polite before disappearing for good probably. After a long moment, the tension in his shoulders seemed to break and he let out a slow, resigned breath.
“You’re a stubborn man” Verso said, though there was no bite in it. He reached over and grabbed Gustave’s heavy coat from the chair, holding it out for him; he looked absolutely unhappy about it, his eyes dark, but he stepped aside. “But go straight home. Please.”
"I’ll stay on the main roads” Gustave promised, stepping away slowly. His legs felt like lead, but the resolve to be alone was stronger than the exhaustion.
Verso walked him to the door. As Gustave stepped over the threshold into the cool, damp air of the hallway, he turned back; the hallway light was dim, casting long shadows.
“Next Thursday?” Gustave asked, his voice hesitant.
Verso leaned against the doorframe, the familiar mask of cool indifference sliding back into place, though his eyes remained soft. “Next Thursday. No powder next time, maybe. Just tea."
"That's a deal” Gustave said with a weak, tired smile.
He turned toward the stairs, but Verso’s voice stopped him just as he reached the first step. “What about tomorrow? Breakfast, as always?”
Gustave hesitated, his hand gripping the cold iron railing. The thought of facing Verso in the harsh, unforgiving light of morning, stone-cold sober and stripped of the powder's protection, made his stomach drop.
“I’m not sure” he said, his voice trailing off. “I’ll… I’ll let you know. We’ll figure out when to meet soon.”
He left it open, a vague and non-committal answer that felt like a retreat. He didn't wait for Verso to respond; he just started down the stairs, the steady rhythm of his boots echoing through the empty stairwell. Behind him, he heard the soft, final click of Verso’s door closing.
The walk home was freezing and the fog was indeed thick, but the cold didn't reach him, as his cheeks still tingled from the scratch of Verso’s beard against his skin, and his lips still carried the faint, lingering taste of him.
He was so fucked.
It was his day off, a day usually reserved for quiet tinkering or a long breakfast at the boulangerie with Verso; but as the clock ticked past their usual meeting time, Gustave didn't move. He couldn't.
The very idea of sitting across from Verso while they pretended the previous night hadn't happened, or worse, while they tried to talk about it, made Gustave’s heart hammer against his ribs in a way that made him feel sick. He couldn't face the questions, he couldn't face the kindness he knew Verso would offer; most of all, he couldn't face the crushing weight of his own feelings now that they were out in the open.
So he consciously chose stay inside. He listened to the city wake up, the distant hum of the Sector’s machinery, the shouting of vendors below, and he let the hour pass.
He spent the morning pacing his small kitchen, his prosthetic arm feeling heavy and intrusive; he tried to keep himself occupied, to focus on a small clockwork mechanism he had been meaning to clean, but his fingers were too shaky. The silence of his apartment, which usually brought him peace, now felt like a vacuum, sucking the air out of the room.
He was hiding. He knew he was hiding, and the realization only fed the fire of his anxiety.
He also knew that he was a hypocrite to do so, after all that talk with Verso about his tendency to run away from his problems; but still, having to follow your own advice is very hard when there are so many feelings involved.
But he knew he couldn't forever.
He had to at least show up to the day they had settled on.
He checked the calendar on the wall.
Friday.
Thursday was six days away.
That was a long time to psychologically prepare for it, and to settle his raging emotions.
But it was also a long time to obsess over it.
Because he knew that was what he was going to do: think and think and think about it until he had every possible contingency to everything that could go wrong, from a refusal to a whole shouting contest.
Logically he knew that wasn't really going to happen, and that it probably would be...fine? Verso seemed...ok with the idea of kissing him.
Well, maybe more than ok, considering he was the one initiating it. Still, that didn't stop him from having doubts, from not believing it because it just sounded crazy: was something so good and perfect really happening to him? Where was the trap? He didn't trust it.
Yeah, it was obvious that every day until next Thursday was going to be hell.
He sank onto a kitchen chair, burying his face in his hands.
He was in deep, irreversible trouble.
Shouldn't things like these be easier? He had been able to lead an Expedition, for fuck's sake! Even if not for long. Why were feelings so difficult to challenge?
Ok, it was getting ridiculous now. He couldn’t just stay in the apartment, the walls were vibrating with his own anxiety. He needed a second opinion, someone who knew him well enough to see through his bullshit, but who wasn't involved in the mess.
By mid-afternoon, Gustave found himself walking toward the greenhouses, in the suburbs, where he knew he would find the right person to talk to.
The air inside the massive glass structure was thick and humid, usually a nightmare for his prosthetic, but today the warmth felt welcoming, as the scent of damp earth and growing things finally began to dull the sharp edges of his nerves.
He found Sciel in the back section, wrist-deep in soil, repotting a massive fern which looked way heavier than what she made it look with how she handled it.
She looked up when she heard his boots on the gravel; she took one look at his face and wiped her hands on her apron.
“Okay” Sciel said, abandoning the plant. “I would like to think that you were here to say hi because you miss me soooo much, but... that doesn't look like a good news face. ”
“No” Gustave said, pacing a tight circle around a potting bench. “I mean, it's not exactly bad news? I guess? Just...news.”
Sciel leaned back against the bench, crossing her arms as she tried to follow his frantic movements; she looked amused, but her eyes were sharp. “That... doesn't explain a lot. Guess you needed a chat, or you wouldn't have come to the most talkative person in entire Lumiere."
Gustave stopped pacing. He stared at a trailing ivy, unable to look at her.
“Hypothetically” he started, the word tasting like cardboard. “If a person… a man… who has lived his entire life with a certain set of… operational parameters regarding romance. If that man suddenly found himself reacting to a stimulus that was completely outside those parameters…”
Sciel sighed loudly. “Gustave. Please. I am begging you. Speak like a human being.”
He squeezed his eyes shut, dragging a hand down his face.
“I think I like Verso” he blurted out.
The silence in the greenhouse was heavy, broken only by the drip of condensation falling from a leaf.
Gustave braced himself. He waited for the shock, waited for her to ask if he was drunk again. He waited for her to point out his history with women, to tell him he was confused, that he was projecting.
“Okay” Sciel said. Her voice was maddeningly casual.
Gustave opened his eyes. She didn't look surprised; instead she was looking at him with a soft, patient expression.
“Okay?” Gustave repeated, his voice rising in pitch. “That’s it? Just ‘okay’? Sciel, I’m thirty-four years old! I’ve only ever been with women! I have a type, and that type is ‘smart, terrifying women,’ not… not Verso!”
“Verso is smart and terrifying” Sciel pointed out helpfully. “So he fits the criteria.”
“He’s a man!” Gustave hissed, waving his hand as if the gender was a physical obstacle in the room. “I don’t… I don’t do this. I don’t look at men. I don’t notice their hands, or their eyelashes, or how warm they are. I’ve never done that. So why now? Why him?”
He knew he was probably making a fool of himself, spitting out his embarassing thoughts and feelings, and he started pacing again, frantic energy radiating off him.
“Is it the trauma? Did dying rewire my brain? Is this just dependency because he’s the only one who knows about the… the bad stuff? Am I confusing safety with attraction?”
He stopped in front of her, looking desperate.
“Am I broken, Sciel? Or am I just making it up?”
Sciel reached out and grabbed his shoulders, holding him still.
“Gus. Stop for a second.”
He forcefully stopped the instinct to step back and resume his pacing, and he nodded, sucking in a ragged breath.
“You’re not broken” she said firmly. “And you’re not making it up. I’ve seen the way you look at him. I’ve seen it for months. Honestly? I thought you already knew.”
Gustave gaped at her. “You… you knew?”
“I suspected” she admitted. “You act different around him. You’re quieter. You let him into your space in a way you never let anyone else in. You wear his clothes, Gus.” She smiled gently. “That’s not just dependency. That’s intimacy.”
That...made sense, actually. Maybe Gustave shouldn't have been so surprised, considering how Sciel often teased him in the past; still he had taken those as what they thought they were, just jokes. She often acted like that.
She let go of his shoulders, brushing a smudge of dirt off his coat.
“As for the ‘why now’ part…” She shrugged. “Who said you have to have it all figured out by thirty? Maybe you’ve always had the capacity for it, and you just never met a man who made you feel safe enough to look at it. Or maybe it is new. Maybe you changed. People change. It doesn’t mean the past was a lie, it just means the present is different.”
“But what am I?” Gustave whispered, the label feeling like a heavy stone he had to carry. “If I like him… does that mean I was wrong about everything else?”
“It means you like Verso” Sciel said simply. “Start there. You don’t need to fill out a census form today. You just need to figure out whether you want to tell him or not.”
Gustave paused, frowning, trying to find a way to formulate what he was thinking the right way; he looked at a nearby cactus like it had all the answers. "...Well," he started, his voice dropping an octave. "It...may be too late for that."
"...what do you mean?"
"We... might have kissed. Yesterday." he rushed out, the words tumbling over each other in a desperate hurry to be gone. "And I didn't exactly push him away. At least, not at first. So... he probably knows." His lips tightened instinctively, like he could remember exactly how it felt. "Yeah, no, he definitely knows."
The greenhouse went silent, the only sound the rhythmic drip-drip of a leaky hose in the corner. Sciel stared at him, her jaw slowly dropping; she looked like she was about to faint, or perhaps explode. Then, she violently hurled her trowel onto the gravel and threw her hands up toward the glass ceiling.
"Why didn't you start with THAT?" she shrieked, her voice echoing off the flowerpots. "YOU KISSED??"
"I don't know! It was embarrassing!" Gustave exclaimed, waving his hands frantically to get her to lower her volume. "Oh God, Sciel, please don't tell anyone. If Maelle hears about this I’ll have to move to a different sector."
"Oh, I definitely will tell someone. That's not news I can just keep to myself" Sciel laughed, still shaking her head as if trying to rattle the image of Gustave kissing anyone into her brain.
He tried not to pout, but his lower lip betrayed him; when Sciel looked back at him, she had to bite her lip to keep from howling again.
"Oh come on, don't be so dramatic! This is definitely good news!" she cheered, swatting a stray leaf off his shoulder. "You should tell me more about it! Was it romantic? Did he do that thing where he looks all brooding and mysterious first?"
"I don't know if I want to tell you anything anymore." Gustave muttered, crossing his arms and looking pointedly at a shelf of potting soil. "And what's with the brooding and mysterious first?"
"Mhm, nothing to worry about." She looked away for a flicker, then went back to teasing him. Weird. "Come ooon, don't be a baby. You should be happy! Why are you even here panicking?" She poked him in the ribs. "Shouldn't you be spending your free day with the most handsome man in Lumière?"
Gustave scoffed, though his ears went a vibrant shade of pink. "He is not the most handsome man in Lumière." He paused, reflexively wondering if there were any superior candidates, then sighed. "Maybe. Regardless! Why are you so happy? Shouldn't you at least be a bit more shocked? Or confused? Or... I don't know, concerned for my mental stability?"
"Nah ah, I'm feeling pppppeachy!" Sciel chirped, popping the 'p' with annoying enthusiasm; she then leaned in closer, her eyes gleaming with a predatory sort of curiosity. "You have to tell me the details now. It is extremely important. Vital, even. For science."
"What? I'm not describing it to you, you creep," he said, recoiling.
"I'm not a creep! I need it!" She grabbed his sleeve, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "You don't understand, Gustave. I have money riding on this. Well, not money, actual money is useless, but I have a very high-stakes bet with Lune involving three crates of fertilizer and a bottle of good cider."
Gustave froze. "You... what?"
"Lune bet me that Verso would be too 'emotionally stunted' to make a move for at least another six months" Sciel explained, waving a hand dismissively as if gambling on Gustave’s love life was perfectly normal. "I told her you were both reaching the limit. I said someone was going to break before the spring warmth set in. And if you actually kissed? I win the cider!"
Gustave stared at her, horrified. "You bet on us? Just because?"
"Exactly! But that's not the point." She grinned, ignoring his look of utter betrayal. "Now, tell me: did he go for it, or did you finally stop thinking for five seconds and do it yourself? If it was both at once, Lune owes me an extra bottle."
"I am leaving" Gustave announced, turning on his heel with as much dignity as a man in a cold sweat could muster. "I am going home, I am locking my door, and I am never talking to either of you again."
"Gus, Gus, it’s a little late to start feeling embarrassed" Sciel said, setting her shears down. She leaned against the table and crossed her arms. "After all those goo-goo eyes you’ve been sending his way lately, I think the 'secret' part of this secret disappeared a long time ago."
"I don't do that" Gustave snapped, turning back around, though his face was burning, just to be faced with a very much 'you actually do' looking Sciel. He felt a wave of genuine horror wash over him: and he had thought he was being so careful, so guarded. "Oh God. Did everyone know but me?"
"Pretty much" she answered, her tone softening into something more sympathetic but still undeniably amused. "We’ve just been waiting for you to catch up. It’s hard to miss the way the two of you look at each other when you think no one is watching."
Gustave leaned his back against a wooden pillar and slid down until he was sitting on the gravel floor, his head in his hands.
"I thought I was being subtle" he groaned into his palms. "I thought I was just being a good friend."
"You were" Sciel said, stepping around the bench to stand over him. "But even friends don't usually look like they’re memorizing each other's faces every time they share a cup of tea. Don't take it so hard, Gus. It’s actually kind of sweet. In a 'please-just-kiss-already' sort of way. Which you did by the way, so good job."
"Yeah... guess I did." Gustave muttered, wiping a bit of greenhouse dust off his forehead.
"You're a winner, congratulations!" Sciel exclaimed, taking and pointing the shears at him like a sword. "Now, get up. You’re getting gravel on your trousers and it's making me anxious. Go find your 'non-handsome' boyfriend and tell him you're an idiot. He already knows, so it shouldn't be a shock."
"He is not my boyfriend." He muttered, but immediately felt childish. "I'm not even sure he likes me back."
Sciel didn't just laugh this time; she dropped her head back and let out a sound of pure, unadulterated exasperation that probably startled the birds three streets over. Then she looked back at him, eyes wide with disbelief.
"Gustave. My dear, sweet, stubborn idiot" she said, leaning heavily on the table back again. "The man lets you into his house. He lets you touch his things. He spends his precious Thursdays listening to you talk about gear ratios and hydraulic pressure. And then, lest we forget, he pressed his face against your face."
Gustave looked down at his boots. In his head, he blamed the powder: they had both been under the influence, and everything had been blurry and far too intense. It could have just been a mistake caused by the drug, something that never would have happened if they were sober; but he couldn't really tell her about it. He wasn't sure she would approve.
"It could have been a lot of things" he said instead, his voice low. "He was probably just caught up in the moment. It doesn't mean he actually likes me back."
Sciel’s eyes widened, then a triumphant grin spread across her face. "So... it was him!"
Gustave had to internalize that answer for a second, then groaned. "I didn't say that" he protested, but his face was already burning, betraying him.
Sciel just crossed her arms, looking entirely too smug. "You’re a terrible liar, Gustave. Your face is practically glowing. Besides, I've seen the way he watches you when you aren't looking. It's not exactly subtle."
"He’s just... observant" he tried, though the excuse felt thin even to him; he knew he was kinda grasping at straws, that he was trying to make up excuses because of his fear of rejection. "He cares about his friends. That's all it is."
Sciel rolled her eyes so hard it looked painful; she stepped closer, dropping the teasing tone for something a bit more blunt.
"He likes you, Gus. He likes you so much it’s actually a little nauseating to watch from the outside. You’re the only person who makes that man look like he isn't waiting for the world to end." She sighed, giving him a gentle shove toward the door. "Now go. If I have to explain the concept of 'mutual attraction' to you one more time, I’m going to start charging you for therapy, and my rates are much higher than your doctor's."
The engineer finally stood up straight, brushing the last of the gravel from his trousers; he felt significantly better, not because the problem was solved, but because the weight of his own secrecy had been dismantled. He looked at Sciel, her hair messy with dirt and her expression full of that sharp, sisterly affection that always grounded him.
"Thank you, Sciel" he said softly. "I mean it. I think I would have stayed in my room until I grew moss if I hadn't come here."
"I know you would have. You're a very moss-prone individual" she teased, but her smile was warm. "Go on. Get out of here. And for the love of the Paintress, don't panic next time."
Gustave laughed, feeling much lighter.
He really needed this.
But he knew it still wouldn't be easy when the time would come.
A few days passed, bringing with it a deadline Gustave finally felt ready to meet.
He had skipped their usual breakfasts, all of them. Every time the morning of their usual "date" came around, he had stayed in his apartment, watching the clock until the window of time had safely passed.
It wasn't that he didn't want to see Verso: it was that he couldn't stomach the idea of being "normal" in public. The thought of sitting in a crowded bakery, surrounded by people who might overhear them, made his skin crawl; he knew himself well enough to know he couldn't just sit there and pretend nothing had changed.
So yeah, he did skip them, and he had tried really hard not to feel guilty about it: he’d tried to convince himself that he was just taking space, but it felt more like hiding. He hadn't even been able to talk about it to his real therapist, now that their session were only once every two weeks.
It was Tuesday, and he hadn't been able to face the walk to the boulangerie, again, so he’d asked Maelle to stop by on her way over and pick him up a chocolate croissant; he told himself he just wanted the sugar, but the truth was more pathetic: he wanted a report.
When she returned, she set the paper bag on his workbench. Gustave didn't open it. He waited, tinkering with a brass gear, expecting her to mention seeing someone; but Maelle just started organizing his tools, humming to herself: she looked happy to spend some time with him.
"Was it busy?" Gustave asked eventually, his voice a bit too tight.
"Not really. Just the usual morning crowd" she replied without looking up.
Gustave cleared his throat, his heart picking up speed. "Did you... did you run into anyone? Verso, maybe?"
Maelle paused, thinking for a second. "No. I didn't see him... why are you asking?"
Oh. He didn't know what he was expecting, exactly. Had he really thought that Verso would have waited for him every morning, after him skipping so many times? For him to be sitting there, sad and alone like a lost puppy?
In a sense, it was a blow to his ego, but more than that, it was a reality check.
The engineer didn't really know if he felt disappointed or relieved; maybe Verso was giving up on him, or maybe Verso was just as nervous as he was, dreading the moment they would finally have to look at each other. Either way, the empty table made the silence between them feel much larger, a gap that was growing wider every day he didn't fix it.
Noticing he was taking too long to answer, Gustave quickly shook his head and focused on a loose screw on his desk.
"No reason" he said, his voice a bit too rough. "I just... I thought he might have a spare part I needed for the boiler project. It’s not important."
Maelle gave him a long, skeptical look, but she didn’t push him. She had started to give him much more space lately, seemingly trusting him to manage his own secrets. He was grateful for the shift: she used to be so protective, too protective. Still, he was just the same, so he couldn't blame her.
He watched her roam around his workshop, but his mind stayed on that empty table at the bakery; he didn't really touch his croissant either, he didn't even like the chocolate one that much either way. He had spent the last few days rehearsing what he would say, trying to find words that weren't too dramatic but didn't downplay how much he’d panicked; he just hoped that by now, Verso hadn't decided that the silence meant the end of whatever was between them.
He really hoped Verso would understand his reasons.
Because he had needed the distance: to step back from the magnetic pull of Verso’s orbit to see the reality of his own heart without the interference of the powder or the heat of the moment; and when he finally cleared away the excuses and the "it’s just the trauma" theories, the truth was sitting right there, plain and undeniable.
He liked him.
There was no mistaking it.
The way his thoughts constantly drifted back to the shape of Verso's face and those sharp, maddeningly beautiful eyes? Check.
The way he had started picturing the other man in every version of his life, from the next ten minutes to the next ten years? Check too.
The mere fact that he was even able to imagine a future, something beyond the immediate dread of the next bad day, was a shock in itself. For years, Gustave had been a man living in a state of permanent "now", thinking he wouldn't have been able to live for much longer, but Verso had somehow built a bridge to "later."
He couldn't deny it anymore.
In that moment, he decided that he couldn't wait another two days for them to meet.
So as the sun began to dip, painting the sky in bruised purples, Gustave began the walk toward Verso’s district instead than towards his own home; he had already told Maelle that he wouldn't have come back that night, so she wouldn't worry. Again, she hadn't asked anything more, and he really hoped that it was because she had seen conviction in his eyes.
During the walk he noticed the air didn't have that sharp, dry sting anymore; instead, it was heavy with the smell of wet stone and thawing earth. He had to navigate around growing puddles where the ice had given way to slush, and the constant, rhythmic dripping from the overhead gutters replaced the usual silence of the frost: it wasn't warm yet, but the biting edge of the wind had dulled.
He was terrified, yes. His heart was doing a nervous, fluttery thing against his ribs that he deeply resented; but beneath the anxiety, there was a steel rod of determination.
His boots splashed through a shallow pool of meltwater as he turned the corner towards Verso's neighborhood.
The streetlamps were flickering on, their yellow glow reflecting in the wet pavement; usually, the humidity would make his prosthetic joint ache, but today he barely felt it: he was too focused on the pressure in his chest and the rehearsed sentences running through his mind.
He reached the building. The stairs were familiar now, though they were slick with the dampness of the changing season. He took them steadily, listening to the echo of his own footsteps until he reached the door.
He stopped, taking a moment to center himself. He smoothed down the front of his coat, his own coat this time, and took a deep breath; the anxiety spiked, hot and sharp, pinning him to the spot. He couldn't turn around, but he couldn't move forward either.
It was so stupid. He had knocked on this door a hundred times over the last few months. He used to do it without a second thought, eager and impatient, complaining about the cold or the stairs. He missed that version of himself, the one who was too oblivious to realize his own feelings.
Why was he having trouble now? Why did it feel like an impossible challenge?
He knew why. He knew, he knew, he knew. His self doubt was overwhelming, because this couldn't be real, there was no way a happy ending would come out of this. All that joy, all those joyful moments, he wanted to go back when he took them for granted, when they didn't have the same weight as they did now.
Was he actually making a mistake? Was he putting himself into a situation that would only lead to disaster?
The idea of Verso liking him back, it was too good to be true. It felt like a lie. Despite the signs, despite the facts, despite the way his own skin still remembered the touch, his brain just wouldn't accept it.
He knew what he was doing. He was overthinking. He was staying inside his own head, looping the same doubts over and over until they were the only things that felt real.
But he couldn't let himself ruin this too.
Just go in, he told himself. Just look at him. And you’ll know.
He stood there for a long moment, his hand hovering over the wood. Then, before he could talk himself out of it, he knocked.