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Your name is SWISS ELYSI, and this new routine had you a bit out of sorts.
It had happened once or twice before. A quick hug between bros. Brief, lighthearted, easy to move on from. Something that could easily exist outside of any chart, something that didn’t have to disrupt the life you had planned for yourself.
It didn’t stay that way because nothing ever goes your way and just sticks to the plan anymore. Nothing.
Glances of acknowledgement became soft gazes that made you feel funny. Your pats on the back turned into his hand on your shoulder, a quiet assurance that things would be okay. A brief hug between friends turned into you resting your head on his chest.
This guy was good. Too good.
He was tougher than he let on. You knew the less ENLIGHTENED would probably consider him the opposite of tough. They might call him weak, or soft, or one of the million other things that YOU may or may not have thought of him when you first met.
Tavvy Crocker surprised you.
You hate surprises. You cannot emphasize enough how much you hate surprises.
So your newfound fondness for him was yet another thing that had started to piss you off!
How dare he trot his way into your LIFE, trample all over your plans, and start tugging on your heartstrings with those stupid sweaty hands of his?
You should really give him a piece of your mind, stand up right now, and draw a line in the sand. Tell him this weirdly heartfelt bullshit is over, because he’s not a part of your life, and never could be. Not in the way you needed. You’ve had it with his sick mind games! You were done with him. You had to get back on track and-
“Swiss?”
You toss that idea immediately. How could you do that when he was the only person who would ever say your name that way?
Wait. He was saying your name. Pay attention!
“Yeah? What’s up, man?” Cool. You now sound very chill about this whole thing, and have established that this beautiful display of a tender bro embrace has not made you feel emasculated. At all.
“Your horn,,,” He points up, and you’re painfully aware of the fact that one of his hands is no longer on your back. “Its, awfully close to my face,”
Oh shit, it was.
“My bad.” You didn’t really want to poke the guy, so you begrudgingly pushed yourself off of his chest. It was stupid, anyway. The fact that he was holding you. How could you let that happen?
Your hands now rest on his shoulders while one of his arms is still wrapped around your waist. To avoid making both of you topple over, you find yourself leaning back on the couch so he doesn’t fall. This lands you in a new conundrum, however, as you are now the one holding him.
You’re pretty sure you wanted that all along. Not that you minded the other thing, you quite liked the other thing.
Tavvy seems to quite like this change of pace as well, as he’s quick to assume his new position, removing his arm from around your waist and placing his hands on your shoulder as you hold him.
You’re a bit cautious about holding him, wanting to keep him secure without hurting him and making this whole ordeal more nerve-wracking than it already was. If this guy was uprooting your entire social life right before your eyes, you had to make it at least worthwhile.
The suspicion he might know a bit more than you in the romance department seems a lot more possible as his hand sneaks up to hold your face.
“Is this alright?” It’s the third time he’s asked something similar to that.
His voice is just as gentle as his touch, and you silently nod. His thumb brushes across your cheek, curiously feeling along the area where your hair and skin meet. It’s hard to avoid looking at him when the position almost forces you to. In doing so, you can only see the wonder and caution in his expression. Everything he did had this layer of hesitance, as if he was doing something he shouldn’t. Maybe, in that way, you had a mutual understanding.
An understanding that, in every way, this was wrong.
Even with that in mind, he smiled at you.
“Youre soft,” he whispered.
He seems to notice the way your nose scrunches at a statement, quickly stammering to correct himself.
“Physically, i mean,,,” he adds, hand pausing on your skin. “Like a nice blanket,”
You feel your cheeks warm up, a shaky smirk forming on your face. “That’s just part of my COAT, bro. It’s part of what keeps a satyr safe from the COLD. No rain or snow could EVER bring me down.”
“I see,,, you really are like a horse, Swiss!”
You scoff at the very idea. He rolls his eyes.
“Right, not a horse,,, forgot you dont believe in those,”
Observing his frown, you sigh. Ugh, you hated how you kept ruining these moments! What the fuck was wrong with you?
“If you’re comparing them to ME, they must be pretty cool.” As you beam with pride, you hear something unexpected that you’d grown incredibly fond of.
His laugh.
It was a bit stilted, like he wasn’t quite used to the sound escaping him. His eyes darted away from yours, a hand clasping over his mouth as he began to giggle.
“Sorry! Sorry, im not laughing at you,,, I just,”
The way he looks at you.
“I find you incredibly,,, charming,” You see some shame return to his face as he admits this, and a troubling thought enters your mind.
This whole time, you thought that by chance you had accidentally begun courting him. Because who would it be but you? You had never considered that he might have been the one courting you.
“UH.”
It’s a scary thought. That maybe this whole time, he was attempting to drag you into a primitive human romance, lead you away from the path destined for you.
It’s scary to realize he might be smarter than you.
The scariest thing of all is that maybe none of this was true, and you’d fallen without any courting whatsoever.
You hated not knowing things. You hated how he snuck up on you. You hated how good Tavvy was at surprises.
“Did i say something wrong?”
“No! No. It’s obvious you’d be CHARMED. Who WOULDN’T be?”
“Right,” His disappointment does not elude you. The fact that he seems disappointed at all does trouble you, however.
“I do feel there is something i should say,” He bites his lip, pausing.
You think you’re going to be sick.
If you were to recount this tale, you think you’ll leave out the part where you nodded, the part where you leaned in, the part where you responded to his soft “I think ive grown quite fond of you,” with “Me too.”
You think you might never recount this story, because after that, you threw your fucking dignity out the window.
You can’t describe the following events as anything but a total fucking disaster.
The close proximity of your faces was always a danger, but when the line was crossed, you knew it was over for you. You knew you truly hated Tavros Crocker.
Who kissed who first is a difficult question to answer, and soon enough doesn’t matter, as it gets to a point where you’re very much kissing each other, and you hate every second of it.
You hate how gentle he is, helping you through a moment you admittedly did not have much personal experience with. You hate how you pull him closer, you hate how sweetly he leans in, you hate the fact that you have to pull apart for air.
And you despise the way you go back for more.
You would never hate anyone more than you hated him in this moment. You hated how right this felt, you hated all the nice things he said, you hated how he stopped the second he realized you might be crying.
When the hell did you start CRYING?
“Im sorry, Im terribly sorry,,, i must have misread,” He panics.
“NO! You didn’t- This is WRONG. WE can’t do this, it doesn’t make any SENSE.” You want to push him away, but you don’t. You cling to him the second you think he might back up, satisfied that he relaxes when you do so. In this moment, he’s your lifeline. “This isn’t how it’s supposed to HAPPEN!”
You think he might question you, scold you for being contradictory and difficult, but he doesn’t. He just stares at you, a frown on his face, and retrieves a handkerchief from his pocket.
You almost want to question if he always carries that thing around, before you remember, he’s him. Of course he does. That’s just another thing you get to hate.
“I cant say i understand,,, exactly what you mean, Swiss,” He places the small piece of fabric in your hands, gesturing to his own eyes as if instructing you. You knew how to wipe your own tears, but you don’t really feel like taking offense to the gesture right now.
“I dont think most things these days make any sense at all,,, and i feel that may be the case for a while, But i cant help but think that,,, maybe this doesnt have to make sense, for it to be a good thing, If that makes sense,,,?”
It didn’t. It didn’t at all, but you couldn’t say that to the stupidly kind boy in front of you.
You just nod.
You hate everything about him, and you hate the things that you love because they make no sense to you.
You hate him because you love him, and you love him because you hate him. It's a vicious cycle, really.
As you wipe your face, you settle back on his chest, exactly where this whole ordeal started.
“Id like to not make sense for a little longer, if thats alright with you,”
“You’re ALREADY not making sense, Tav.”
“Well, is that alright?”
“... I guess.”
You WILL figure this out. No matter how many hours it takes in front of charts and plans, you will.
But you’ll let yourself have this little… indulgence. For once.
Just this once.
Your name is TAVROS CROCKER, and if the sleeping satyr on your chest is anything to go by, you’d say tonight went better than you expected!
Not that you expected anything at all.
You don’t consider yourself a romantic by any means, and you’re shocked you even managed to spit out what was on your mind without scaring off the first good thing that had happened to you in a while.
He looks a lot more at peace than he did before, and you’re fairly sure you cannot move without disturbing him. It seems today you’ll sleep on the couch.
Which may or may not end up being the best sleep you’ve gotten in years.
Life is just full of surprises!