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comic-sans-chan · 2 months

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Fic I'll never write where Dukat decides the biennial Cardassian Festival of Whatever the Fuck (it is never actually specified) should be hosted on Deep Space Nine as a way of bridging the gap between the Cardassian and Bajoran peoples. Sisko and Kira are both Ehhhh about it, but Dukat is obnoxiously persistent until finally the Bajoran government and Federation higher ups are like “K”, on the condition that no Cardassian military (or Order) personnel be allowed. All security for the event will be handled by Odo and Starfleet. Dukat is suspiciously cool with this, which puts everyone on alert, but soon Cardassian vendors and decorators start showing up and they turn out to be pretty chill people, so they let it happen.

While the preparations for the festival are underway, another operation has started. A motherfucker from Garak's past is doing typical motherfucker things on the station. One of these things is scouting Garak's quarters, learning the layout, tracking Garak's routine. It becomes clear very quickly that the rapidly increasing number of Cardassians on DS9 is putting Garak on edge, though, because he seems to be fiddling more with his security protocols, so the motherfucker realizes they need to make their move and they need to make it fast.

They succeed. Sort of. With the circumstances as they are, they had to get a little... creative, but it should do the trick.

By early next morning, every PADD, screen, and computer system on the station is streaming seventy-two different poems on a constant loop. Love poems. Ardent, anguished, often utterly indecent love poems, all with the central theme of being about one Doctor Julian Bashir.

Quark is one of the first to notice the problem, being the type of asshole who opens early despite this only increasing his bottom line by a fraction of a fraction. At first, he's furious that his systems have been tampered with, but after reading a few lines of what his normal menu and advertisements have been replaced with, he's laughing, and by the end of the third poem, he's on the floor.

"Odo!" he shouts, banging on the bastard's door twenty minutes later. "Odo, open up! We've got a problem!"

Odo slinks under the door and slips up between it and Quark's pounding fist with a glare. "Quark! I'm not on duty for another hour. What could possibly be so urgent?"

Quark's sharp little rat teeth are splitting his face clean in half as he holds up the PADD. "Take a look."

Odo scrolls through a couple poems, then squints and scrolls through several more. "Erotic love poetry? I didn't peg you for the type."

"To like erotica? Hoo, I thought you paid better attention than that, Constable."

Odo returns the PADD with a dry expression. "To read."

"Oh, you're hilarious." He taps Odo's chest with the PADD. "The whole station is filled with this stuff. My bar, the Replimat, the Celestial Cafe, the promenade. Someone's either desperate to make a statement, or we've been sabatoged."

Dramatic sci-fi music swells and we get a close-up of Odo’s eerily hairless face and nasal cavity.

The next few hours are dedicated to trying and failing to seize back the servers and briefing the bridge staff on the situation.

"Are we sure these are all about Doctor Bashir?" Sisko's voice booms across Ops. He's on his second cup of coffee and a pile of useless PADDs lay beside him.

Julian has remained stoic throughout the discussion and he remains so now, avoiding eye contact with anyone who's smiling a little too wide. Like Jadzia. "Oh, definitely," she says. "He's mentioned by name in three of them, and several others make a point of highlighting the subject's 'golden sand dune skin', 'aristocratic' features, and 'voice that never stops singing.' Sounds like Julian to me."

A few snickers break out, but Sisko is taking the matter seriously. Thank fuck, Julian thinks. It actually looks like it's giving him a headache, which would make two of them if Julian was capable of having headaches. The captain's rubbing his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. "And the source..."

"There's a clear data trail back to Garak's quarters. Whoever did this, they wanted us to know where it came from," Kira reports. A muscle jumps in Julian's cheek.

"I tracked Garak down for his statement on the issue," Odo says, gruff, "and he told me he had nothing to do with the virus. In fact, he denied ever having laid eyes on the poems in his life. He's claiming he's been framed." He rolls his eyes.

"Okay," Jadzia says, "we all agree he's lying, right?"

"But which part..."

"Oh, they're Garak's. I've read enough Lloja of Prim to be familiar with traditional Kardasi meter and syntax, and that isn't even going into all the parallels drawn between our doctor and Prime. Sand, heat, rainforests. Bit of Romulan imagery in there, too, if I'm not mistaken. A lot of flowers and vines. Wasn't Garak a gardener?"

"I see no reason why anyone would want to embarass themselves like this," O'Brien cuts in before Jadzia can make it worse. "Even if he is trying to distract us or something, this seems counterproductive in the long term. Everyone’s watching him now, not just us. The rumor mill is running rampant. Not exactly a spy’s MO."

"He did blow up his shop once."

"Because someone was trying to kill him," Julian pipes up for the first time, looking concerned. "Do you think this might be another cry for help?"

"Oh, it's a cry for something," Jadzia quips, and Julian shuts the fuck up.

"Dax," Sisko snaps, like the good benevolent Wormhole Alien Jesus he is, and Dax shuts the fuck up, too. Sisko gives them all the stink eye. "Constable, you're nearly as familiar with Garak as the doctor is," he says, and holds a hand up before any jokes can be made. "What do you think?"

"I don't think he's behind this, sir. None of the pieces add up, and he seemed genuinely agitated when I spoke to him, in his way. At present, I believe he is as much a victim here as the rest of us."

Sisko sighs. "All right. Do we have any idea who is behind this?"

The room is silent for a time, before Odo reluctantly answers for everyone, "Not yet, sir."

"Find out," Sisko demands, "and Chief, get these damn poems off of my reports. Dismissed."

Julian is out of the room before anyone else has stood up.

The rest of the day is spent ducking in and out of his office, only treating those who ask for him by name and keeping all conversations strictly professional. Any mentions of poetry, the festival, Cardassians, or Garak are firmly sidelined, and on a couple occasions, rewarded with a none-too-gentle hypo. He skips lunch altogether and extends his shift by two hours to avoid the dinner rush.

By the time he's leaving the Infirmary, it's late. Unfortunately for him, not late enough that the halls aren't still speckled with observers to his personal soap opera. With the Festival of Frank’s Hot Dogs less than a week away, DS9 is becoming increasingly crowded with tourists, mostly Cardassian, but a surprising amount Bajoran, too–apparently this festival was a rare bright point during the Occupation, when their oppressors were not only lenient with them for once, but generous with food and drink and freedoms. It doesn't hurt that the only Cardassians on board are civilian rather than military, so the atmosphere is rather more colorful, courteous and conversational rather than cold, dark and aggressive. It would make Julian smile if he wasn't so busy being gawked at.

"I don't see it," one Cardassian man grumbles and Julian's accursed augmented ears pick up. "He's even smoother than a Bajoran."

"Oh, yeah," his companion replies, "just think of how easily he'd slide around."

"Tanett!"

"Oh, hush, Grandpa. You're just xenophobic. He's cute."

"Well, you be careful who hears you say that. That Garak fellow is in the Order, you know. Ears everywhere. You don't want to know what things a man like that is capable of."

"Wasn't he exiled? Hardly intimidating now. Apparently all he's capable of anymore is whimpering over an alien like a pakrela."

Julian covers his ears and walks faster.

But that just brings him within range of a cluster of Bajorans. "Oh, there's the doctor now," one is saying, up on the balcony.

"The one the Cardassian tailor wrote about?"

"That poor fool. He thought they were friends, but here this whole time it was perverse. I can only imagine how much that hurts."

"Happened to my friend once. He thought a glinn was being kind because he was having a crisis of conscience and wanted to help him escape. No, he just wanted to–"

He could go to his quarters, but a flash of memory - Garak's bright eyes at the end of his bed, his figure encased in shadow - sends him in the opposite direction. Before long, he finds himself on an oft-unused Observation deck, since it offers no view of the wormhole or either Bajor or Cardassia's suns. It's blessedly empty, as usual, and Julian settles on a bench and stares into the dark nothingness of space for a long time.

At some point, he finds that his hand has retrieved the PADD from his medical bag, and the screen is lit up automatically with the first poem.

He reads well into the night.

—

The next morning finds Garak with a tall glass of rokassa juice and two eggs, staring intensely into a mysteriously operational PADD at the far end of Quark's bar. Quark pops out of his backroom like a jack-in-the-box.

"Ha! Well, if it isn't the man of the hour himself, gracing my fine establishment so soon after nearly destroying it. Do you know I've had to have menus printed, like we're in the dark ages? Do you have any idea how extensive my menu is? I ought to sue you for damages." He catches a glimpse of the PADD's screen and its decidedly unpoetic contents. "Hey, you fixed it? How?"

"It was just a simple virus. Viruses can be purged," Garak says without looking up. He barely seems aware of Quark's existence.

When no other words are forthcoming, Quark huffs. "Well, can you purge it from the rest of the station, then?"

"I gave the program to the Chief last night."

"And he didn't immediately come here to fix my bar? I'll have to file a complaint.”

Garak offers no reply. Just continues to stare into his PADD.

There are other customers he could be seeing to, but Quark can't pass up this golden opportunity. He's known Garak a long time and known of him even longer, and now that he has the guy's guts all neatly lined up on several dozen isolinear rods, he's never felt closer to the man. He makes a point of knowing things about his customers, but before yesterday, the most he knew about Garak was that he was an assassin, a tailor, a mean, weepy drunk, and friends with Bashir, Odo, and a smattering of other shopkeepers. That was it. But now...

He leans over the counter, closer to Garak's unblinking face. "You know," he says, with a smile rising slow on his cheeks, "if it's humans you like, I have a couple holosuite programs that might be just what you need."

Garak's gaze ascends as if on a motor, smooth and mechanical.

Good. He’s considering the bait. Now he just has to get him to bite. "All completely customizable. Skin, eyes, hair. You like long legs, they've got long legs. Scrawny, they're scrawny. Whatever you want. Although if you're really hung up on the one face, that can also be arranged. For the right price." When Garak just looks at him, Quark switches tactics. "Or maybe it's the uniform that does it for you? I've got 'em, but I'd suggest something out of my lingerie databases. I've still got some little Cardassian numbers filed away that I think even a man with your discerning tastes could appreciate. Just imagine, Doctor Bashir in a–"

He doesn't see the hand coming until it's already crushing his windpipe. Quark claws at it for several long, desperate moments while Garak continues to look.

Leeta scuttling over and yanking him away is what ultimately puts a stop to it, and it's while Quark is gasping in dramatic bursts of air that Leeta says in a rush, "Garak, please! Whatever he said, he didn't mean it!"

"Oh, I meant it," Quark coughs out with a high, strangled laugh, "he just didn't like it."

"Whatever conclusions you've drawn in the last twenty-six hours, allow me to dispel them," Garak says primly, as if he hadn't almost committed murder in broad daylight. "I am not a xenophile and I do not have feelings for Doctor Bashir. There are no less than two-hundred Cardassians currently aboard the station, and I assure you, none of them like me. Those poems were obviously planted."

Oh, but Quark is a little pissed now, unwise as that is. "Please, Garak," he says, "who has time to write that many poems about Julian just to mess with you? Two or three, maybe, but over seventy? If you're going to lie, at least don't insult our intelligence."

Garak's eyes flash and Quark ducks behind Leeta, repentant. Leeta sighs. "Garak, what's so bad about loving Julian?" she asks softly. "I thought the poems were really touching. It’s sweet how much you care for him."

But he's already staring into his PADD again. "I'm sorry, Miss Leeta, but I am a bit busy. Perhaps we can discuss my hypothetical feelings for your paramour another time."

"Julian and I have never been serious," she tries to assure him, but he's engrossed again, or at least pretending to be. Her and Quark share a look and leave him to it. Lesson learned.

"Let the bastard be pent up and miserable, then," Quark grumbles from the other end of the bar as he pours Table 3's drinks. A prickle on his neck has him looking up and there Garak's eyes are again, piercing, and Quark rushes off to deliver the drinks.

The three young Cardassians there are much more friendly. One has their nose stuck in one of the useless poetry PADDs while the other two smile at Quark while he sets out their orders.

"Three Raktajinos, extra bitter," Quark says, and is thanked. Polite. One even praises the drink's exoticness. Klingon coffee, exotic. Heh. "Your food will be out in a few."

Before he can finish turning, though, a hand is touching his arm. "What is the title of this anthology you include at every table?" the young man asks.

"Oh, that's not..." He sighs. "It's new. I can't remember."

"Find out for us, please," he says. "Works like these can be hard to come by on Prime and we make it our business to collect them. Whoever this author is, they're very unique."

"If these aren't banned on Prime already, they will be soon," his friend comments with a giggle.

"No doubt."

"'In my desolation, I am as weeds: Cut my roots and Let the waters take me, To drown and bloom anew, in You,'" the one with her nose in the PADD reads aloud, and shivers. "They'd burn the whole Central Archive down just for this one. It's so explicit."

"Let me see that," the boy demands, as the other one is already surging over to read over the girl's shoulder. Watching them fight over the PADD has Quark thinking back to the isolinear rods in his safe, and he hums thoughtfully, glancing over his shoulder.

Garak isn't looking.

—

Glinn Halon Duvur. Former underling of Gul Dukat. Out of uniform, vacationing on Deep Space Nine with his wife and nine children. Spends his days gambling while his kids play unsupervised in the holosuites and his wife visits old friends.

Beloved uncle sent to trial by the Obsidian Order in 2356 and executed that same day for crimes of attempted sabotage against Cardassia.

Garak watches the man wander down the promenade sans his proud lineage, jingling a fat little bag of gold-pressed latinum and yet-unconverted leks. He wanders out of range, so Garak switches to the next camera and there that unfortunate face is again. He drums his fingers on the desk. It won't be long now.

An alert rings in his ear and he almost initiates the shockfield on impulse, but the flash of smooth, brown skin on a monitor stays his hand. The knocking comes, and that haunting voice calls out, "Garak! Are you there?"

Garak rests his head next to the surveillance screens.

Predictably, the doctor tries to input his override, but the door remains shut. There's a long pause.

"Garak..." Julian sounds irate. Garak hums. "Did you deprogram my override code? Nevermind how illegal that is, that's dangerous! What if you're injured? Or fall ill?"

He says this just after attempting to abuse his station privileges for personal reasons. Infuriating hypocrite.

"Oh, my barging in at random, odd hours is no less than you deserve, Garak," Julian says as if in response to Garak's thoughts. "You set that precedent in our relationship yourself."

Terrible man.

"Fine. I'll give you some more time, since you want it so badly, but I'll be back and when I am, that override had better work. If it doesn’t, I promise there will be hell to pay, my friend."

Beautiful man.

"Goodbye, Mr. Garak."

Goodbye, Doctor.

Glinn Duvur dies two hours later of alcohol poisoning while his wife is in bed with Gul Rilimn's wife.

—

“I just can’t believe it,” Kira is bitching. Jadzia smiles and sips her drink, looking out over the Replimat balcony at all the happy brunchgoers. “A Cardassian writing poetry about something that isn’t conquest or the wonders of dictatorial rule or, at best, the pride of the traditional family nobly bowing and scraping. I’ve never seen it.”

“It would certainly seem to run counter to Cardassian values.”

“And about Julian!” she shrieks in her inside voice, slapping her hands down on the table. “Garak the spy, writing love poetry about Julian. Going on and on about his–his...”

“Ass?” Jadzia offers.

“Eyes. His eyes! Ohhh, I knew he wanted to have sex with him, everyone knew that, but to write about his eyes like... like that? It’s practically Bajoran.”

“That’s true.”

Kira stops long enough in her tirade to eye her, and presses her lips into a thin line. “How are you so calm about this?”

Jadzia takes another sip. “I’m just fascinated,” she says. “I’ll admit, I’ve been looking at this more through Tobin’s eyes than my own. Have I ever told you that he met Lloja of Prim during his exile?”

“He did not.”

“He did, and Lloja flirted with him outrageously. It was embarrassing, looking back. Of course, nothing ever came of it, because Tobin was always hopelessly blind to those sorts of things even without the language barrier, but his children liked to joke that many of Lloja’s poems were about him.”

Kira’s jaw is hanging. “Were they?”

Jadzia grins and shrugs. Kira laughs.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Perhaps,” Jadzia allows, “but I do wonder... Being able to call nervous, asexual Tobin the lover of Lloja of Prim would have been quite the notch in my belt. Think of the stories I could have told! And now here Julian is with the opportunity. I know it’s not the same, I mean, it’s Garak. But, you have to admit, to write about him like that...”

“He must really love him,” Kira finishes for her, stumped. “I just can’t wrap my head around it.”

“I didn’t see it, either,” Jadzia confesses. “I was still wrestling with the idea that they were actually friends. I thought their association was strictly professional and all the books and flirting were just a front.” She cradles her head in her hands suddenly and sighs. “Ugh, but those poems. The poems are so good! Kira...”

“I know,” she moans. “They’re heart-wrenching. Which one are you on now?”

“Thirty-nine. I came back home, but I came back gone.”

“Ouch.”

“I know.”

A shout from below interrupts them and they both shoot out of their seats. Below, a Cardassian man has just had a beam fall on top of him. Jadzia and Kira bound down the stairs to him, Jadzia already slapping a hand on her comm badge.

“Dax to Infirmary, a man has just been crushed, possibly impaled. Send a medical team to Replimat and be ready for emergency beam out.”

“Acknowledged, we’re on our way,” Girani says, but already Kira is looking up at Jadzia helplessly, the man’s wrist laying limp between her hands.

“He’s gone.”

“Shit!” Jadzia hunches over, hands on her knees. “That’s the third one today. Are Cardassians always this accident prone? No wonder you won the war.”

“No,” Kira says. “They’re not. You don’t think...”

“I don’t know,” Jadzia says grimly, and looks around at the crowd that’s formed. All Cardassian, all terrified. “But we need to find out.”

—

A Cardassian is sitting at the bar. This isn’t an unusual sight now, with the Festival of 90s Funk and Beyond coming up, but seeing one so young and looking so hunted is odd. Quark approaches him casually.

“What’ll you have?”

The Cardassian’s eyes dart. “Uh...” He leans over suddenly, cups both hands over his mouth, and whispers, “E. G. Special.”

Christ, these kids are going to kill him. “Coming right up,” he says in a normal person voice, and reaches under the bar for a glass. A little drink-mixing magic later, a beautiful fizzy blue drink is sitting between them, with an isolinear rod tucked neatly in the straw.

The Cardassian takes the drink between both hands excitedly, and Quark snaps his fingers in front of him. “Oh! Right,” the kid stutters, and all but launches the latinum at Quark’s face. “Thank you!” And off he goes, out of the bar with the glass still tight in his grasp.

“Idiot,” Quark mutters to himself, crouching carefully down to pick the latinum up off the floor without dirtying his expensive pants. “You’re supposed to take the straw, not the entire glass. That’s it, I’m switching to plastic. These little rebel brats don’t deserve my ni—Oh, hello, Constable! I didn’t see you there. What can I get you?”

Odo looks as unimpressed as ever. “That’s a funny question since last I checked, I don’t drink.”

“Ah, right, because you’re a liquid. How could I forget. You know, one of these days, I ought to serve you up with a little umbrella, see how people like it. I’d bet you taste bitter.” Odo harrumphs, and Quark makes himself busy with wiping down the counter. “Well, out with it then. What nefarious scheme am I up to now? I love to hear your little stories.”

Four isolinear rods drop onto the counter, right where Quark was just cleaning. “Hey now,” he says, throwing a performative glare at the changeling. “Careful. If you shatter glass in my bar, you’re cleaning it up.”

“I just had the most interesting conversation with the Tokal family,” Odo says, steamrolling right over him. “It seems their four darling children had somehow come into some questionable reading material. They tried searching for it in the Central Archives and yet, despite it being clearly Cardassian in origin, they could not find it. And I don’t need to tell you that when a piece of Cardassian reading material isn’t in the Central Archives...”

Quark, from his plastered position on the floor, stares up into Odo’s face directly horizontal to his and smiles. “What?”

“It’s illegal,” Odo sneers, stretching his body even further over the bar and nearly sending Quark starfishing.

“Okay! Odo! I get it! But what does that have to do with me?”

“Quark!”

“Okay, okay! Whatever it is you think I’ve done, I’ll stop! I’ll stop, okay?”

“I know you’re going to stop, because I am going to confiscate every copy of Garak’s poetry that you have absconded with and destroy them.”

Quark gasps. “Book burning? In this day and age?”

“Garak did not give his permission for you to sell his work! He didn’t even want anyone to see it in the first place! Those poems were stolen. Now, I expect a list of every person you sold a copy to and a full and complete refund to be issued by tomorrow morning. Do I make myself clear?”

Quark glowers. “You’ve made yourself something, all right.”

“Quark...”

“Okay! All right. Consider it done.”

Turora Lumok. Obsidian Order operative and old colleague. Usually in deep cover in the Organian sectre, but has abandoned post to explore the space station. Barren, unattached. Cold. A model agent, if you ignore her unfortunate habit of going rogue and eliminating civilians on a whim.

Recruited into the Order by Enabran Tain’s former right hand, Euluk Bucun, who was assassinated by Elim Garak in 2341 under orders from Enabran Tain for suspicions of treason. Turora Lumok disciplined shortly afterward by Elim Garak for complaining that she had wanted to be the one to kill that bitch.

Garak watches as the woman pretends to touch up her makeup while scouting for cameras. “Oh, Lumok, you always were woefully obvious. Have you been expecting me? I wonder why.”

Satisfied with the positions of the cameras, she puts away her mirror and strolls out of sight.

Garak shakes his head. “Fool. You forget how long I’ve lived on this wretched station. I don’t need to see you every second to know where you are.”

But then, the smell of antiseptic. Starfleet issue soap. Herbal shampoo, unique, robust. Gels. Oils. Sweat.

He’s near.

Forcing calmness with a deep, measured breath, he takes off his eyepiece and slips it into his sleeve. He pays for the food he barely ate. He stands. He turns.

And is promptly thrust into the dark, deep woods of Julian Bashir’s eyes. “There you are, Garak! I’ve been looking all over for you,” the doctor says as if it’s just a regular day on Deep Space Nine. His hot, mammalian body caging him tightly in place against the table betrays the ruse. “Who was it you were talking to?”

Garak tries to step around him. Julian steps with him. “Oh, only ever myself. Forgive me, but you’ve caught me just on my way out. I have a strict appointment at 2.”

There’s Julian’s hand now. On his shoulder. Garak is calm. This is normal. “Well, why don’t I walk you there then.”

“My dear Doctor, I couldn’t rob you of your meal. Clearly you’ve just walked in.”

“Actually, I’ve found I’m craving something a bit different now.”

Garak makes to step around Julian again, and still Julian’s steps match his. It’s like they’re dancing. He doesn’t let this deter him. He’s not sure he’s capable of letting anything deter him now, with his heart trying to pound out of his throat. He keeps stepping doggedly forward, and Julian keeps mirroring, still with that damned hand burning through his tunic. “Well, you only have so much time before you must return to the infirmary, I know. Do not allow me to delay you in securing a table at a different locale.”

“Oh, but you’ve already delayed me so long. What’s a few more minutes?” A peek of teeth, a hint of warning. “Though I will admit... I’m not sure how much longer I can wait.”

“Then don’t.” Finally, Garak manages to elbow past this madness and shoot out of the restaurant. The station is so crowded these days, it’s short work to get lost in it. In a sea of ridges and black hair, Garak slips his eyepiece back on and lets the wave take him.

“Garak!”

Oh, for the Union’s sake—

He does not run. He does not stumble. He walks normally and not desperately, keeping his eye on both the path to the turbolift and Lumok. She’s down the corridor now, pretending to check her makeup again like an imbecile. Just a few paces more. Almost there...

“Garak, you’re the best dressed one here! You are not difficult to spot, you ridiculous dandy! Oh, no offense, Ma’am. Lovely scarf. Excuse me.”

There.

In the reflection of the mirror, Garak makes eye contact with the rogue and taps in the correct sequence on the device sewed into the seam of his pants just as the turbolift doors close behind him.

Like that, Turora Lumok is beamed into space and dies instantly, without a soul to mourn her, and Elim Garak walks back to his quarters with a hand over his mouth and a warmth on his shoulder, without a soul to mourn him, either.

—-

The Festival of Fierce and Fantastic Frogs is two days away and already it is being protested.

Outside Quark’s Bar is a growing army of dissident children with voice amplifiers and holoprojectors shouting to the stars that if they don’t get their porn back, they’ll tear it all down. Signs are projected in the air with essays cycling through them that look to be several pages each, a small holographic fire barely reaching ankle-height is lighting up the length of the promenade, and – perhaps most disturbingly – a comically inaccurate approximation of Odo is rotating at the center of the group, fitted in the typical regalia of the Cardassian military and holding a Klingon bat’leth. It is certainly... something.

“They’re Cardassians,” Quark is saying as he pours out some root beers. “They’ve probably never seen a protest in their lives, they don’t know what they’re doing. The Union puts an end to things like this pretty fast on the surface.”

“Heh,” Jadzia says, “what happens on DS9, stays on DS9.”

“Where’d you hear that?” Kira asks.

“It’s something Julian likes to say. Basically, they figure they can get away with speaking their minds here.”

Kira drums her fingers on the bar, staring into the flailing protestors thoughtfully.

Right then, Odo arrives back on the scene. It looks like he’s trying to get through, respectfully, but the protestors are not making it easy. Jadzia and Kira come to his rescue just as about fifteen Cardassians start forming a blockade around him.

“I walked around as you do, investigating the endless stars,” one young woman is yelling at him while he stands there with big helpless baby eyes, “and in my net, during the night, I woke up naked, the only thing caught, a fish trapped inside the wind!”

“I don’t know what that means,” Odo says consolingly.

“Clearly!”

“Okay, okay, let him through!” Kira wiggles her way between the crowd and Odo, snatching him by the arm like a fish with a hook. “He’s not your enemy here, he was just upholding your laws!”

“The Cardassian government has no jurisdiction on a Bajoran station!”

“He made his choices!”

“Beautiful Julian would be ashamed of you! Repent! Repent!”

Kira and Jadzia manage to reel him most of the way through the protesters and he shapeshifts the rest of the journey. The protestors try to follow, but Quark bustles over to stop them. “No, no demonstrations inside! Remember who your allies are,” he says, and they all cow back. “Thank you.”

Odo ripples his form a couple times to make sure everything’s back in the right place and harrumphs. “Allies, Quark?”

“Yes, allies. It’s terrible what you’ve done to them. You can’t police art, Odo–-this is culture we're talking about here, the very bedrock of society.”

“And I’m sure this virtuous attitude of yours has nothing to do with the incredible profit you made and lost at the expense of our mutual friend.”

“Oh, I did him a favor.” Quark uncaps another bottle of Kanar and gestures back to the entrance, with its swarm of frothing Cardassian children. “Look, he’s got fans!”

“How has Garak been handling all this?” Kira asks Odo, sharing a look with Jadzia. “I haven’t heard a peep out of him since he gave us that antivirus program.”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“Didn’t you have breakfast with him yesterday?”

“Hmmm, that would have been routine. Except he didn’t show. When I made it back to my office, I found a message from him apologizing, telling me he’s so busy with orders he’s lost all track of time.”

“How has he been getting commissions?” Jadzia asks. “His shop’s been closed all week.”

Odo rolls his eyes. “Oh, I’m sure the reality is he’s simply avoiding the issue. Dr. Bashir has informed me he’s been treating him like ‘the black plague’ as well.”

“Julian’s one to talk. He practically pole-vaulted over a vedek the other day to get away from me.”

“Speak of the devil,” Quark says, looking towards the door, and everyone turns just as the commotion starts–or, more accurately, the commotion abruptly stops.

The protestors have all gone quiet, in apparent awe as they part around Julian like the red sea around Moses. He’s smiling stupidly as he stands in the center of them, nodding at something a Cardassian man is exclaiming. It’s an incredibly awkward scene, and Quark starts choking at some of the things his ears are picking up. “They’ve deified him,” he tells them, and Jadzia bursts into giggles at the idea, but Quark isn’t joking. “Really. He might as well be one of the prophets to them. You read the poems. You know.”

Ugh. Kira wrinkles her nose in disgust. The worst kind of blasphemy–horny blasphemy. “What is he even doing here?” she asks.

“Getting his head inflated,” Jadzia says dryly, because now that Quark has mentioned it, it’s pretty clear from the shit-eating grin on Julian’s face that that’s exactly what’s happening.

“Poor Garak.” Quark says it absentmindedly, but the comment gets several eyes turned on him. He’s shaking his head as he watches the scene unfold. “First, he falls for a human… humiliating… but then that love becomes public knowledge and several young beautiful Cardassians decide that he’s onto something, and now that human is going to get more action in a week than he’s seen his entire life. I’ve witnessed the rise and fall of more than a few star-crossed romances, but this might just be the saddest.”

“Julian wouldn’t have an orgy the same week the whole station found out Garak’s in love with him,” Jadzia says, insulted on his behalf.

Quark hefts a tray up onto his shoulder. “He just did,” he says as he leaves to go do his job, and Jadzia whips her head around to see Julian escorting two attractive Cardassians away from the protest. Her jaw drops.

“Bastard,” Kira spits, surprising everyone, herself most of all. Those poems must’ve affected her more than she realized.

Odo clears his throat unnecessarily. “I’m no expert on the behavior of solids, but it seems to me that neither party is handling this situation well.”

“I’ll tell you how the pakrela should be handling this,” an older Cardassian sitting at the far end of the bar cuts in, with a twitch to him that makes it clear he’s more than a few deep. “He should be settling his assets, because he doesn’t have long now. Whatever his human is doing is the least of his worries. Ha. Hehe. Being a traitor wasn’t enough for him. No, now he’s gone and corrupted the next generation with his degeneracy. Exile was too soft a punishment. Uh-huh.”

Kira opens her mouth to tell him to fuck off, but Odo touches her shoulder. “You speak as if you know him,” he notes mildly, because of course, the exact reason for Garak’s exile isn’t public record. It’s barely even private record. The Order doesn’t work that way–or didn’t, as it stands. It is interesting that this man is acting like he has classified information despite being a civilian.

But then, sometimes day drinkers just like to spout speculation as fact.

The man looks into his glass and laughs at his reflection. “Who doesn’t know Garak these days? But that’s temporary. He’ll be forgotten soon enough, just like the Order.” He finishes his drink and gets up. He insincerely mutters some friendly Cardassian farewell and starts to walk past them, but Kira can’t let it go.

“Excuse me, but what’s your name, sir? You’ve been so informative.”

He looks at her for a long moment. “I don’t know,” he says, and elbows past the protesters.

—

“Solt Mebol, left behind a widow and child six years ago when he was tragically killed in a transporter accident. In reality, he accepted an undercover mission which required him to fake his death and have his bond dissolved. A significant sacrifice. Certainly not one many Cardassians could have made.”

The Cardassian stares at Garak sitting on his couch. Turning, he tries to exit his temporary quarters, but the door won’t open.

Garak tuts. “Oh, you know better than that, Mebol.” He taps his disruptor with his forefinger, resting harmlessly against his knee. “The festival isn’t for another couple days, yet here you are. Catching up with old friends before the festivities, I assume? Only I haven’t found you in anyone’s company but your own. You must be lonely. Please, let me alleviate your loneliness for a while.”

The Cardassian sighs at the closed door. “Solt, is it?”

“I can tell you the names of your wife and child as well, if you’d like, and the city they live in. Do you know your wife never rebonded? Unusual behavior for a Romulan. Quite dangerous, as I understand it.”

Solt steps carefully into the small living space and sits in the chair opposite Garak, with the coffee table between them. “As one of the last living members of the Order, I don’t suppose you would consider letting me go?”

Garak smiles pleasantly. “I would be delighted.”

“Would you? I had a deal with Central Command and they’ve been good to me so far. You, however, have been known to…” He eyes the disruptor casually turned in his direction.

“Yes, I imagine I must be something of a mystery these days to my people. I have been… squirrely, is what I suppose a human would say, and I must as well now that I’ve been painted with their brush. Oh, it is an incredible sin, I know. That I should enjoy the company of an attractive alien while in exile.”

Solt snorts. “You expect me to believe those poems were the natural result of a fling?”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything you do not wish to. I only say that it’s convenient that I should be seen as even more traitorous just as a swarm of Cardassians should enter the station.”

“What’s convenient is that you’re still alive. You have friends in high places willing to go to bat for you, in spite of everything you’ve done. It’s a disgrace. You are a selfish disloyal anarchist and no one is holding you accountable, because you just happened to be good at your job once and everyone likes the idea of having you as a potential weapon should the need for one arise. Until then, they’re content to keep you in a cabinet collecting dust and sentiment. You can wave that disruptor all you want, but we both know you make a poor operative now. You’re in love.”

Garak is still smiling, but Solt can see the signs of a grimace. Dusty, indeed. Too passionate. Too human. “I’m hardly so foolish. You know better than I the dangers of such things in our line of work. You’re little better than a puppet now that you’ve had a whiff of the truth, Mebol.”

“You’re right.” Solt attempts to raise one eye ridge, despite it being unfit for such maneuvers, and leans forward towards that disruptor. “Pull my strings, then, and let’s test that grip Bashir has on yours.”

—

Kira crashes into Garak’s quarters and kickflips past all his booby traps like Indiana Jones’ hotter cousin.

“What the fuck, Richard?” is basically what she says, only it’s in character, so it’s more like, “What the fuck, Garak!”

Garak spins around in his maniacal villain chair with a look of surprise. “How did you get in here, Major?” Miles bustles his way in after her with his impractically enormous toolkit, and Garak lets out an, “Ah,” then, sedately, “I suppose Dr. Bashir filed a complaint about my tampering with the door codes. Of course, there’s a perfectly logical explanation. You see, it–”

“This isn’t about door codes, Garak,” Kira yells. “What I want to know is why our best suspect for the sudden influx of murders on the station was just found drowned in his own toilet!”

“Oh my,” Garak says. “What an unfortunate end.”

“Don’t play dumb. Not now. We know what you’re capable of, but we’re good people and we didn’t want to accuse a victim until we had exhausted the rest of our line-up. Only, interestingly enough, they’re all dead, so now…” she marches over with the fury of the Prophets on her heels and stands imposingly over him, her teeth clenched, “here we are.”

“That is interesting.” He runs a hand down a roll of fabric in his lap, smoothing it. “I suppose you must have some of that ironclad evidence that the Federation so treasures.”

Kira glares at him.

Garak feigns looking around. “Oh, but I can’t help but notice the good Constable isn’t here with you. What could that mean? Surely not that you broke into my quarters without due cause or a hint of warning–at your own word, not even to fix my glitching door. For all you knew, I could have been in here writing one of my vaunted Bashir epics.”

Kira’s hands are in fists now. “The evidence we have would be more than enough to have your face plastered on every viewscreen in Cardassia and you know it.”

“The Federation and Bajoran legal processes do seem a tad inefficient in moments like these, don’t they?”

“Okay,” Miles cuts in, because he has Turbo PTSD and is not in the mood for a flare up. “I think I'll just wait in the hallway, then. Holler if you need me. Good luck, Major.”

Kira and Garak spend a few moments watching him waddle out of the room and then go back to staring each other down.

“Look, you ass,” Kira starts, “we couldn’t link every victim to the Cardassian government or some third-party organization, but we were able to link enough of them to recognize that these aren’t just random nobodies having ‘accidents.’ Someone was able to break into your computer and embarrass you and you don’t like that so you’re pitching a fit. I can’t have Odo arrest you – yet – but I can tell you to cut it out. This vigilantism isn’t helping–”

That gets a reaction. “Vigilantism!”

“Well, what would you call it?”

“Self-defense.”

“They attacked you?”

“Possibly.”

“Goddamn you, Garak! Just… don’t do this anymore, okay?”

Garak looks at her with innocent astonishment, like he’s still bewildered by her totally plausible accusations. “Well. You have my word, I suppose,” he says, bemused.

—

Gul Skrain Dukat. Blessed with a wife, seven children, two sets of living parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents, minus one father. Habitually cheats with lower ranked military officials, slaves, and barely legal adults, unbenownst to his family. Father was interrogated by Elim Garak and executed by the Union over live broadcast in the year 2350 for the crime of being a piece of shit.

Elim Garak was shortly thereafter levied with an amateurish execution attempt by Gul Dukat. It failed.

The second attempt will succeed, but at a great cost.

The Festival of Filthy Fucking Foot Fetishists has officially begun, but Garak is struggling to feel any enthusiasm. He is surrounded by his people. The station has been dimmed by 15% to better suit Cardassian eyes and misting stations have been set up in limited locations. Extinct and invented flowers crafted by Cardassian and Bajoran artisans decorate the banisters and doorways. A wash of blue, green, and sparkling gold lights up every direction. There is the smell of freshly prepared Cardassian sweets on the air, a gentle warmth suffuses the atmosphere, and children are laughing on the promenade. It’s the first time the station has felt not just tolerable, but nearly pleasant, in years.

But then, Garak has never felt particularly welcome among his people. As a child, he was an orphan generously cared for by service workers and sponsored by a government official, and as an adult, he was a member of the Order, which granted him more fear and loathing than it did admiration and respect. Companionship, in its truest form, was a rare thing to come by and not something he was encouraged to come by at all.

Perhaps that is why Dr. Bashir blindsided him.

In any case, Garak is delicately balanced on the line between proper misery and numbness. He gave up imbibing around the same time that he gave up the implant—or rather, the implant gave up on him—but he’s on his third cup now, wandering through the festivities with no particular direction in mind. The exact spot of this last operation isn’t important, only the timing.

He finishes his drink while a group play a spirited game of cold moba in front of him. It shouldn't be long now.

All the nearby screens suddenly flicker from the event schedule to Dukat’s sharp grin and Garak hums. There we are. He knew the bitch wouldn’t be able to resist showing his face.

“Welcome everyone to the biennial Festival of–” a baby wails, “generously hosted here on Deep Space Nine by Bajor and the Federation, and of course organized by our own prodigous Detapa Council. Ah, that wormhole… quite the view, isn’t it?”

Garak looks around for another food stall that serves alcohol.

There aren’t any stalls in his immediate vicinity, but there is a young Cardassian couple marching towards him while making dogged eye contact.

Oh no.

Garak starts to make a break for it. Not too fast, it won’t do to cause a stir, but there are a number of very good reasons for him to stay far away from any Cardassians who might recognize him right now. Especially if the source of that recognition is those damn poems he was too stupid and sentimental to destroy.

Before he can make it more than a few steps, however, he looks up to see another few Cardassians working their way towards him, also making eye contact.

No, no, no.

He makes to move towards the stairs then, only for his eyes to land squarely on him.

Him, wearing the silky green outfit he lovingly crafted for him a few months ago. Him, shining in the festival lights, casting him in an even more arresting shade of gold than usual. Him, looking determined and coming straight towards him.

Oh, fuck no.

“Garak,” Julian calls out, likely reading the panic on his face and stance and soul.

“Today, I am not a Gul, though,” Dukat is saying. “I am but a humble representative of the Cardassian Union in its totality, and as such, I would like to thank Colonel Kira Nerys and Captain Benjamin Sisko for their hand in this week’s festivities. They have been nothing if not accommodating these last few weeks while our coordinators ran rampant through their halls.”

He should have accounted for the possibility of this. Thinking of Julian had become excruciating as of late, but that was no excuse. Whatever interaction Julian had been hoping to have with him couldn’t be allowed, not now, and not only for the sake of Garak’s traitorous, disgusting feelings. Even if it would give the sweet man closure, it would not be worth his life.

“Now, it may be a bit unorthodox, but I thought it would be only fitting if the first Reenactment was carried out by our benevolent hosts, and the Lakarian City Acting Troupe were all too happy to take them under their wing.”

More eyes are turning towards the screen now, the laughing and playing and sloshing of cups quieting down. Julian is nearly with him, his approach halted only by the gathering crowd, and Garak can only pretend to be interested in Dukat’s speech while he racks his brain desperately for a solution. Any solution. Anything.

“I trust that the history of Cardassia is in capable hands.”

The screen flickers again and changes to a shot of one of Quark’s holodecks, where a lone Bajoran man stands in a beam of red light.

A hand grabs Garak roughly by the arm, and he nearly cries with relief when he sees that it’s Lumok.

Well, Lumok with the face and attire of a Bajoran, but that ever-present spark of unchecked malice in her eye is quite unmistakable to someone who worked with her for over a decade.

“Surprised, you ugly old regnar?” she asks under the actor’s impassioned opening monologue.

He sucks in a breath as the sharp edge of something presses into his back. “Impossible. They found your body caught on one of the station’s spires.”

“A simple bait and switch,” she purrs, pressing the weapon closer, slicing through his tunic. A pity. This was one of his nicer ones. “You’ve gotten sloppy.”

He manufactures a smile. “A knife, then? A favorite of yours, I recall, but terribly messy for such a public venue. Not to mention if your aim is even an inch off, I’ll be in and out of the infirmary within the day, as if nothing at all had happened.”

“Don’t lecture me,” she growls. “You can’t do that anymore. You’re not anyone to anyone. Your master is dead, and what did you do the second you were off leash for the first time in your life? You went and choked yourself on the first Starfleet sotl you could find. You’re pathetic.”

It took incredible effort to keep his eyes from rolling to the back of his skull. “Oh, just stab me already.”

“I’m not going to stab you. I’ve done a bit of outsourcing, in fact.” She slid the knife from his lower back to his side and looped her arm through his, pinning him in place with a wide smile. “All I had to do was suggest to my new friend that you were infiltrating the Federation. That you were poisoning them against Bajor from the inside, uniting Cardassia and Starfleet in a secret alliance under the guise of wooing the CMO. No, no, you won’t be killed by one of your peers. Your death will be at the hands of a perfect stranger. A pointless death for a pointless man.” She leans in and whispers into his aural ridge, “It always was so easy to make people hate you.”

The next few seconds are a flurry of chaos. One second he’s watching as Human, Bajoran and Cardassian actors alike are all holding hands and reciting ancient poetry and the next he’s on the floor with a searing weight bearing down on him from calf to shoulder. There are screams and footfalls coming from all directions and Odo’s voice is immediately discernible shouting over the commotion. His back is on fire, he can’t breathe, and there’s a slash in his side, but he doesn’t miss the thump of Lumok’s body a few feet away, dead before she hits the ground.

“Garak? Garak?” the weight on him is speaking frantically, pawing at his head and shoulders. The weight shifts and the hands flip him onto his back. Those same hands pat him down, blazing a path down his chest and his stomach and his sides, stopping at the superficial gash near his rib, and Garak knows who this is before he even opens his eyes.

“Garak,” Julian sighs with relief. Garak was meant to be dead by phaser blast right now, but instead Julian Bashir is smiling down at him like he’s important, kneeling beside him, his hands on him, branding him with their incredible heat. It shouldn’t be possible. No one could be that fast.

“Doctor,” he manages on a wheeze. One of his ribs might be broken, actually.

“Dukat,” Sisko growls from the monitor in billowing robes and a long flowing wig, surrounded by flowers.

—

“Explain,” Sisko commands.

Having decided that showing weakness right now can only help his case, Garak is sitting hunched to the side, holding his reeling head in one hand. It’s through a hiss that he replies, “A woman named Turora Lumok was responsible for sabotaging the station with those poems forged with my data signature. The Bajoran woman who was just assassinated–she was no Bajoran, but rather one of the last remaining members of the Obsidian Order. She was hired by Dukat to kill me during the festival under the guise of a hate crime. No doubt because of her indomitable reputation, I’m sure. A number of Cardassian casualties these past several days were at her hands.”

Sisko walks to the viewport to stare out into the stars for a moment, processing this. “All his talk of friendship between Bajor and Cardassia…” he trails off, the ghost of a sneer on his lips as he turns back around. “His goal was just the opposite. He wanted to destroy any hope of cooperation.”

“And get me out of the way in the process,” Garak grumbles.

Sisko hums and wanders over to Garak’s side, looking down at him thoughtfully. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to tell me who assassinated Ms. Lumok?”

Garak stares at the floor through his fingers, his eyes glazed.

“Or who your informant is on Dukat’s involvement?”

“Captain,” Garak mutters, not looking up, “I have sat here concussed after an attempt on my life and shared with you everything that I know, and here you have not even told me who the tailor of your magnificent robe is.” He tugs half-heartedly at a strip of embroidery on the fabric. “I must admit, I am feeling a touch betrayed you didn’t come to me.”

Sisko flicks his eyes up to Julian, who has been standing in the corner with his hands behind his back. “Very well, Mr. Garak. I release you into Dr. Bashir’s care for now, but I expect to continue this conversation soon.” He massages his forehead. “Once I figure out what to do about this damned festival.”

Julian comes over to help Garak out of his chair, but Garak snaps upright and to the door before he can touch him. Sisko takes the opportunity to lean into Julian’s face and whisper, “Get more information out of him.” The doctor nods.

Julian isn’t angry when he steps out of Sisko’s office and sees that Garak is walking in the exact opposite direction of the infirmary, but he is disappointed.

“Mr. Garak,” he says urgently once he’s caught up to the idiot.

Mr. Garak interrupts him in the same tone, “Now, now, my dear doctor, we both know I have a dermal regenerator in my quarters, so we need not extend–”

“And I think we both know this is about much more than a few bumps and bruises. I’m afraid the time for beating around the bush passed quite a while ago.”

“You’re right, Doctor,” Garak says, coming to an abrupt stop and rounding on him with wild eyes. “There is an urgent matter we must discuss.” Julian’s eyebrows raise, and Garak nods severely. “Oh, yes, let us not ‘beat around the bush.’ We should talk about how you threw yourself directly into the line of a lethal phaser blast on the one in a millionth chance that you might save my life. The cost of such an action being almost certainly your own life, and yet, here you stand, and here I stand. Will wonders never cease.” Julian opens his mouth, but Garak raises a finger. “Nevermind that I was in the middle of an altercation with a very dangerous, very volatile woman who would not have hesitated for a second to dispose of you. She had a nasty habit of that. Now I knew that you were naive, Doctor, Doctor! I knew that! What I did not know – what I never could have guessed after all these years – was that you are an idiot.”

Julian stares back into Garak’s hissing face, unimpressed. Garak feels a wave of deja-vu and does not like it. It has no place here. And yet, Julian takes in a breath and smiles, raising his shoulders. “All right, Garak. If it’s really so important to you, we can talk about your suicide attempt.”

“What?” Garak bites out.

“You were going to let yourself get shot, yes?”

“I was n–” Garak starts to lie, disgusted, but is stopped by Julian stepping entirely too close. He stumbles back a step, then another when Julian attempts to crowd him again, and the familiarity of the routine has him shutting his eyes, rueful. They’re dancing again. It’s humiliating, the things this man makes him do, how effortlessly he can gain the upperhand. Most of the time without even having to lift a finger.

“You figured out Dukat’s plan and arranged for Lumok to die if she succeeded, but you expected her to. You didn’t expect to be saved,” the doctor tells his blank, unresponsive face. His eyes are still closed, his hands tense at his sides, but he knows Julian’s stepped closer again by the heat of his livid breath. “Tell me I’m wrong.”

“Very well. I didn’t figure it out. I was informed.”

“So, the captain was right.” He sounds bored, but Garak seizes his chance. His eyes open in a sudden burst of animation.

“Yes, I had an informant. I believe the major was familiar with him, a fellow by the name of Damoc who was recently presumed dead? Though I knew him far better as Mebol. We first met on Romulus, you see. In the event of my death, he had strict instructions to reveal Dukat’s plot in my stead and protect my remaining assets. In return, he was to receive some valuable coordinates, which by now he will have long accessed. I suppose he’s already booked passage off of the station, if he hasn’t already gone.”

“Quick to abandon you,” Julian says, completely off-script. Garak’s carefully measured breathing stutters.

“Surely Captain Sisko would like to have a word with him.”

“I’m sure.”

“Doctor…” Garak says, lost. “There isn’t time to was–”

Suddenly there are two hands slamming into his chest like they’re iron forks and he’s a slab of meat, rocketing him back into the nearest wall with a loud thud. Garak gasps at the strength of it, astounded, but all his attention is quickly monopolized by Julian’s snarling words.

“Stop trying to distract me, Garak! Stop racing away before I can even properly get into the room, stop begging off lunch, stop ignoring my comms, and stop acting like your bloody life is over just because it was found out that you have feelings for me!”

“I–I don’t–”

“Lke hell you don’t! Thirty-seven.”

Garak blinks several times. “What?”

“Thirty-seven. That’s how many direct references to our literary discussions are in your poems. All chronologically concordant with the dates of those discussions, and six of which from that classic Earth album I recommended to you a year ago that you swore up and down sounded like a pack of voles had been crammed into a bucket and shaken around. I knew you were having me on. You love Mitski, and you love me.”

Garak’s face shutters.

Finally, Julian takes a step back. His hands remain on his chest, pinning him in place, but he allows him some oxygen. Exactly twenty seconds pass like this, before the doctor becomes impatient and huffs, “You can’t possibly have nothing to say.”

“What would you have me say, Doctor?”

“I would like you to admit it.”

“Why?”

“Because I’ve heard it from friends and coworkers and strangers and every tourist on this damn station, it feels like, but I haven’t heard it from you.”

Garak is silent for a long time. Finally, he quietly asks, “You would further humiliate me this way? Knowing what you do? My dear friend…” He, carefully, with only the gentlest of pressure, puts a hand over one of Julian’s. “Please. You’ve read everything I could possibly have to say. What more could there be?”

Julian’s hands are unforgiving, but his eyes soften at the simple lowering of the curtain. It’s not the direct confession he was looking for, the I love you completely, traitorously, ruinously that his poems professed and a deep, broken part of Julian desperately wants to hear, but it is, it is. For Garak, this is as explicit as it gets, and Julian can feel his heart trying to catch in his throat.

“Garak,” he starts to say.

Garak isn’t scowling anymore. His eyes are shining as he looks away and sucks in an aggrieved breath. “Oh, please, let us skip this excruciating precursor. I have no intention of remaining on this station.”

Julian goes unnervingly still. “Excuse me?”

“I will need time to pack up my shop and settle my lease, but then I promise, you will never suffer the consequences of my unfortunate… condition again.” When Julian only stares at him with mounting alarm in his lovely eyes, Garak grimaces. “You must know I had no intention of pursuing you.” At least, not after the implant had been shut off and he’d realized what horrors he’d stumbled into with the doctor while under its influence, and by then, it was already too late. He was too weak to stop speaking to him, but he was not a complete monster. “I wouldn’t have. My writing was never about nurturing the emotions, only managing them.” A bit of a lie, but only a bit. He does love to languish and he never could resist a good innuendo. Their friendship had been infinitely precious to him, though, and he couldn’t bear the slow death it would undergo now that everyone knew the truth.

The worsening rumors that would spread. The suffering of Julian’s reputation, career, and love life with the Cardassian spy’s drastic affections hanging over everyone’s heads. The danger it would place them both in, the damage it had already done. The way Julian would know every time Garak flirted now, it was never idle. It had never been and could never be.

It would be a torture hitherto unthinkable. Better to sever the limb before it could rot.

Still, Julian is silent. The pressure on his chest is more a suggestion than a command now.

“Doctor, I…” he swallows back anymore hideous truths. “I apologize. Your rage is understandable, but I swear to you, I have every intention of righting this wrong.”

“Oh,” Julian says then, softly, as if he isn’t speaking to Garak at all, “you don’t know.”

“Doctor?”

He makes a bizarre human gesture, skimming the heel of his hand off his forehead. “My God! Of course. I thought it was pride, or shame, or paranoia. Anything and everything but this, but of course you would be this ridiculous. Well. That’s an easy enough problem to solve.”

“Doctor–?!”

The hands on his chest are gone. Instead, they’re seizing him by the head and pulling him up to connect his mouth to Julian’s.

Oh.

If Julian’s touch was a brand before, this is lava running down his throat, into his stomach and down, down, down to eat through the twenty inch thick duranium floor. Slow, thorough, and final in its devastation. A transformation that cannot be persuaded. He grapples with it, hands scrambling stupidly over and across his doctor’s shoulders. Whether it’s to pull him closer or push him away, he doesn’t know. He’s too busy being brutally altered to give it much thought.

His hands settle for burying themselves in his hair at some point. When doesn’t matter. Time holds no power here. It happens, and then he knows how soft Julian Bashir’s hair feels, and there is no going back.

The loss of control becomes alarming enough that he finally manages to pry himself away, gulping in desperate, anxious breaths of frigid station air. It works. The fire and the madness that followed it calms down and he manages the strength to push Julian back, but the wet smack of their lips disconnecting will echo in his dreams for the foreseeable future, as will the dizzy grin on Julian’s face inches from his own. There’s a hand on his ass keeping him from tumbling through the hole in the floor and a couple unlucky passersby gawking at the gruesome scene and Garak is a different creature entirely, incandescent and strange, forged anew in the curious fires of mutual attachment.

He feels insane.

“Doctor, you cannot truly be this naive.”

Julian looks anything but naive right then. He can’t focus on that, though. He needs to focus on the fact he was nearly assassinated; the fact that the kindest man alive nearly died with him out of some misguided terran idea that all lives are of equal value and importance.

And yet, Julian is leaning in to kiss him again, so Garak puts a hand on his chest and says, “You know what I am.”

Julian’s expression turns complicated and it’s clear he understands. Garak’s roiling emotions can’t settle on being relieved or horrified. How to go on after this? After knowing intimately what he almost had, with the smoke of it still thick in his eyes and his throat and his heart?

A gentle hand on his jaw brings him back to the moment, where Julian’s eyes are serious. “I know,” he murmurs.

Garak sucks in a wet breath.

“The question is,” Julian continues, even quieter, “do you know what I am?”

His head is spinning. “Doctor?”

Julian just smiles sadly, and it's clear that there are some long conversations in their future. But for now… “About that dermal regenerator in your quarters,” Julian begins, and Garak is relieved to find out that whatever stupid, lovely thing he’s become can still appreciate an innuendo.

—

Not long after, in the middle of telling Sisko all about Mebol over Julian’s comm badge while its owner watches expectantly in a state of teasing half-dress, he’s horrified to find that whatever thing he’s become is also rather eager to please.

—

A couple days later, the two of them are picking from a generous cut of flaming taspar in the Replimat.

Or, Garak is picking, anyway. Julian is stuffing his face. Ordinarily, this would mildly scandalize him, but the fact it’s taspar, one of the most traditional delicacies of his homeworld, being shoveled enthusiastically into that pretty face makes it so he can feel only hope.

Rather than giving into that inadvisable feeling, he takes a dainty sip of his tea and tries to look nonsuspect. Cardassians from all sides and angles are staring.

“About Miss Leeta…” Garak begins.

Julian wipes his face with the side of his hand. Disgusting, but oddly compelling. “What about her?”

“When will you be breaking the news to her?”

“Oh.” Julian smiles, bemused. “She knows.”

A tightness in his chest dispels slightly. “Does she?” he says faintly.

“She’s the one who first brought it up. We performed the Rite of Separation days ago. She said it was great timing, what with the festival and all. We didn’t even have to leave the station.”

“So you were together then.”

“Well, in a sense. We weren’t in love, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Garak takes another sip, lowering his eyes. “I wasn’t worried. Only concerned for the young lady’s feelings.”

Julian’s face is incandescent. A Cardassian to his far left is openly gaping. “Of course, of course.” He leans suddenly over the table then, moving a hand forward to rest on his knee. “So, should I take this line of questioning as an indicator that you’re open to a relationship with me?”

Garak shifts a little in his seat, moving his knee further under the table and its shadows, but otherwise doesn’t pull away. “It would be unwise,” he says quietly, without actually saying no.

The hand squeezes. “It isn’t as if people won’t assume anyway.”

“Rumors can be dispelled. Redirected. Altered.” He reaches forward to take a small saucière and pours a bright red sauce over a couple groatcakes. “There would be no coming back from a confirmation.”

Julian’s hand falls away. “Would it be so bad?”

“I don’t know,” Garak says, splitting a cake up into three neat sections. “Would it, Doctor?”

A Bajoran couple walks past their table then, and while one purposely avoids eye contact and seems to be giving them a wide berth, the other throws a meaningful glare Julian’s way. This is the fourth judgemental or pitying look he’s received since they came in for brunch. Julian calmly returns the look, refusing to be the first to look away, until finally the man averts his eyes and Julian looks back to Garak with a stern smile. Garak inclines his head.

“Be careful, Doctor,” Garak goes on. “Rumors can ruin lives. End careers.” He scoops up a bite of his cake, dripping with red sauce, and lifts it to his mouth. “Kill,” he finishes, and eats.

At that, Julian leans back in his seat with his arms crossed tight. Garak gives him his time. It’s a relief to have finally made a dent in Julian’s lovesick, idealistic conviction–and Garak can admit, after the last few days, that it is lovesickness. Julian’s decided he loves him back and there will be no stopping him from pursuing this, but there may yet be some tempering. A small, equally stubborn, sentimental part of Garak despairs at the whole horrid affair, but the behemoth of his good sense squashes this part down with little difficulty.

It’s this moment that a smattering of young Cardassians, accompanied by one Jadzia Dax, arrive at their table. Immediately, Garak recognizes them as the ones that nearly intercepted his meeting with Lumok and his stomach drops. Julian, on the other hand, brightens back up.

“Well, hello there,” he says warmly.

Jadzia responds first, with each elbow leaned on a Cardassian’s shoulder and a knowing sparkle in her blue eyes, “Hello to you.” The Cardassians all echo with similar greetings, some shy, others giddy.

One young woman standing at the front, with her hair in three elaborately plaited braids and little makeup, is looking at Garak with particular interest. “You’re the one who wrote the poems about Julian.”

Garak looks at the girl coolly. “Do you mean Dr. Bashir?”

She goes blue. “Oh, um. Yes. I do.” She tucks an imaginary lock of hair into her perfectly coiffed hair and lowers her head respectfully. “My apologies, Doctor.”

“Hey now,” the doctor scolds with good humor, “none of that. We’re all friends here.”

The girl throws another searching glance Garak’s way. “Friends?”

That’s enough of that. “This is certainly quite the surprise,” Garak says genially, plastering on his most pleasant smile. “Is there something you needed? As Deep Space Nine’s resident Cardassian tailor and reputed troubadour, I’m always happy to be of service.” Julian sends him a sharp look, which he ignores.

Jadzia is looking as foxy as she ever does, with a grin nearly to her spotted ears. “Julian asked me to bring them here,” she says too happily, and Garak has to sit back in his seat to process that. Julian scratches his neck with a guilty smile, obliviously alluring. It cannot be overstated that there are, still, eyes on them from all directions and angles.

“Garak, sir,” the Cardassian woman-child begins again, earnest, “let me start over. My name is Inia Milam. I am the President of the Ivory State Liberation Library. We collect–”

“Madam,” Garak interrupts her quietly, stunned. “This is hardly the time and place.” He blinks, still shocked stupid by her brazenness, and leans towards her, peering into her distressingly young features with beseeching desperation. “And I am hardly the audience.”

Milam doesn’t appear to process his warning at all, though. She just continues to look inquisitive. She has that gleam in her eyes that is common in Cardassian women, calculating and intelligent, but there’s something else there. Something indefinable that he’s seen hundreds of times over an interrogation table, but without the fear to staunch it. Without the hopelessness. It makes his stomach flip. “On the contrary, you are exactly the sort of person we look for.” She bows her head. “Dr. Bashir promised that if we assisted him a few days prior, he would introduce us so that I could formally welcome your book of poems into our shelves. I apologize if this comes as a surprise. I wish only to thank you for your excellent contribution, E. G., and tell you that we hope to welcome many more pieces from you in the future. I’ll be in touch. Dr. Bashir.” She nods to him, returns his gentle smile, and walks confidently away. The rest of the group mirror her, voicing similar words of polite farewell and appreciation, and leave.

Garak forces himself not to track their departure and instead picks up his fork again, as if nothing world-shattering has occurred at all. The cake is tasteless in his mouth.

Julian is concealing nothing of his thoughts, however. He’s staring openly at Garak, as if he’s a bomb and he’s trying to figure out which color wire to cut.

Ultimately, it’s Jadzia that breaks the tension. “Well,” she says, “that is some harem you’ve got there, Julian.”

“Jadzia,” Julian barks. She laughs.

“I’m teasing, I’m teasing.” Uncharacteristically, her impish smile turns regretful. “Now that that’s out of the way, I do have to bring your friend in for questioning,” she says, and that explains that. “I’m sorry, boys. I stalled Ben as long as I could.”

Garak polishes off the last of his meal and takes one last gulp of his tea to wash it down. With that done, he stands with a placid, conciliatory smile.

Julian puts a hand on his shoulder before he can take a step. “I’ll come see you after my shift.” Those lovely, dark, deep eyes search his, pinning him like a moth above his fireplace. “Okay?”

Garak inhales. “Without end,” he murmurs, waits for Julian’s eyes to light in understanding, and then aloud says, “I am at your disposal, Doctor. Good day.” With that and a firm, friendly pat on Julian’s hand, he limps away.

Jadzia rather pointedly watches him limp to the exit for a few long seconds before throwing Julian a rakish grin. “Well, well,” she says largely. Julian pretends not to notice, and Jadzia pivots on her heel after Garak.

“Before we lock you up and throw away the key, could you sign my datarod,” Julian hears Jadzia asking, and he shakes his head, unsuccessfully trying to rub away his smile.

Without end Do I think of you and so Come to me at night. For on the path of dreams at least, There's no one to disapprove! Ono no Komachi

#my posts #garashir #I wanted to post this on April 1st but LONG SIGH it didn't work out #at least it's still april. pranking people on the 1st is so predictable anyway #fics I'll never write #credits to ono no komachi cynthia cruz and pablo neruda #really weird how tumblr just lets you publish blank posts like this one #this entirely blank post with nothing in it at all #very strange

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carmyboobear · 1 month

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ALEXITHYMIA CH 5: detergent, thrifting, and cake

Roommate AU: Carmy Berzatto x Reader

Chapter Rating: T (11k)

ao3 link, ch 1, ch 2, ch 3, ch 4

Chapter Summary: It’s his roommate’s birthday this week, and Carmy doesn’t find out until it’s a couple days away. Once he finds they’re unluckily spending their birthday alone, he makes it his mission to make their lonely day better. It’s the least he can do. Little does he know how much more he has to discover about them and about himself.

Tags: reader having trauma, carmy having trauma, toxic families, domesticity

A/N: It’s time… it’s time. I said last chapter was the longest…just kidding. THIS ONE is the longest, and it was hardest to write so far. The duo gets to have a lot of fun this chapter, though! arguably the most so far! A lot of domestic goodness and good food and shopping! Until… :)

also HUGE shoutout to @justaconsequence on tumblr for being my beta reader for this chapter! she was so kind and so helpful. this behemoth of a fic is too much for me to proofread on my own. anyway, thanks for reading and enjoy! can't wait to hear what y'all think!

Typically, by this time on Monday morning, Carmy's usually three cigarettes deep into paperwork, urgently (and poorly) calculating the sales the restaurant needs to make this week to stay afloat. Because even though it's a Sunday closing activity, he never seems to find the occasion to get around to it, and by 10 pm, he doesn't have the capacity to be crunching numbers.

Not that 8 am is much better. At least he's not dissecting the debt this morning—he's studying detergent prices.

“Why is this one, like, almost 20 dollars?” Carmy stops reading the price tags and glances over at his roommate, who's squinting at products on upper shelves. The lights are always too bright in this place. “And for such a small bottle…”

“Pre-mixed organic sulfate-free 100% vegan bleach,” Carmy reads dully.

“So stupid.” They shake their head. “Does grocery shopping ever depress you?”

“Usually,” he replies dryly. “Inflation is pretty depressing.”

“Don’t even get me started. Capitalism in general depresses me.”

“Hm, yeah. That too.” He sighs through his nose and tries to refocus. He's having a hard time processing all the numbers and letters today. “You see any unscented detergent? Somethin’ mild?”

“Um…” They crane their neck up and down, and then they crouch on the ground. They pick up a white bottle. “How's this? It's like, 8 dollars. It's not name-brand, but…”

“You know I don't care.” He kneels with them, huddling in close. They smell faintly of a sweet, yet musky perfume. He reminds himself to focus on the detergent, not the way they smell (even if it's far more interesting). “Yeah, this looks good. Thank you.”

“For your vintage denim, right?” They stand up to put the detergent in their shopping cart, which is barely separated with his stuff vs. theirs. He doesn't understand why his face grows warm at their comment, but it does.

“Uh, yeah. It is.” If the blush shows on his face, they graciously don't comment. “Although I'll admit I don't get around to washing them as much as I should.”

“You're not supposed to wash jeans that often anyway, right?” They lean their elbows onto the rickety cart as they push it, and he ambles along next to them, matching the slow, relaxed pace of their walk.

“Yeah, but I really…” The implications are clear. They fail in suppressing a laugh, and it makes him smile. “And I’m supposed to hand wash them, so.”

“Oh, so what you're saying is that you never wash them,” they tease.

“That is not at all what I'm saying.” They make an unimpressed face. “I do laundry, it's just…”

“Not often,” they supply helpfully. He tries to come up with something, but he's got nothing. “It's okay, I understand.”

“I promise I wash my clothes,” he mumbles, wilting.

“I know.” There's that new smile he's grown to recognize more clearly. It's this mischievous one they get when they’re teasing him, and it's so cute he doesn't have any room in him to get even a little irritable. “I've seen you do laundry maybe once or twice.”

“Hey,” he says, warning, and they laugh and run ahead of him, the squeaky wheels of the cart giggling alongside them.

After the night he almost burned down their apartment, he had felt different. It was like a switch being flipped, light abruptly filling up a dark room, and he's been squinting, struggling to adjust. But as he walks with them today, grocery shopping lit by blinding white fluorescents, he finds that he can see them rather clearly.

The connection between the two of them is tangible, palpable. It's workable pasta dough that's been kneaded to uniformity. The dough is malleable, clean, and when he touches it, sticky, glutenous residue doesn't cover his palms. When he catches at them peeking over their shoulder to make sure he's still following them, he chases away the urge to pull them into his arms. He throws the desire into boiling water in hopes that enough pressure will change those feelings into something more palatable. He's not sure if it's working.

Something happened when he hugged them that Saturday night. He doesn't dare name what that “something” is, but it's rising from where it's sitting at the bottom of the pot, just about to hit the surface—

“Hey, I gotta get some stuff in this aisle.” Carmy snaps out of it and follows them as they veer the cart to the left. He raises his eyes to read the categories on the sign.

“You bakin’ somethin’?” They both move out of the way for an oncoming cart.

“Yeah, was thinking about it.” They halt to a stop in front of the boxed cake mix and step back to fully peruse the shelves. He stands next to them, and they glance at him out of the corner of their eye. “You’re not judging me for getting box mix, are you?”

“Not at all,” he answers honestly. “Food is always better when made from scratch, but box mix has its uses. Besides, I’m not a baker.”

“That’s true, but I’m sure you still make an insane cake.” Carmy’s aware he can’t make them unsee his flash of a smile, but he still shrugs. “Sure, stay humble.”

“I try. What’s the occasion?”

“Ah, nothing much. It’s just my birthday.”

“Oh, okay.”

…And he's about to move on, just as casually as it came, but then the processing finishes.

“Why’re you lookin’ at me like that?” They ask confusedly.

“Is it your birthday today?”

“No, um, it’s this Thursday.” He exhales in palpable relief.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He hates at how worked up he sounds.

“Um…” Their face is twinged with guilt. “...There was never a good time to bring it up?”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be getting upset.” He sighs, shakes his head. “I just feel like I should’ve known, I guess.”

“No, it’s fine. It’s not your fault. I never brought it up. Um…” Their hands are fiddling with the edges of their sleeves. “I just have complicated feelings about my birthday.”

“Ah, I see. I get that.” That, he can understand. “Is it all the gifts and stuff?”

“Kinda. It’s a part of it.” They lean down to grab a box of devil’s food cake, and that makes him remember that they’re in a grocery store. Not quite the best place for a personal conversation like this. They’re being vague, but he won’t press. Not right now.

“You shouldn’t be baking for yourself on your birthday,” Carmy mutters. They smile at that, but it’s different. It’s heavy with melancholy.

“It’s alright. I’m gonna be celebrating with my friends this weekend, just not on my actual birthday.” His conflicted expression persists. “It’s okay, really. It’s just a day. It’ll be enough of a present to not have to go into work.”

“Put that back,” he blurts out. “I’ll make you a cake.”

“Don’t you work?” Their eyebrows are arched in surprise. “You really don’t—”

“I know I don’t. But I want to. I do work, yeah, but I’ll, I’ll get someone to cover me.” He’s never said those words before in his life, and now that they’re out, he can’t take them back. As a matter of fact, he doesn’t want to take them back. “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

“Of course,” they reply quickly.

“Then let me do this. Please.” He has no idea where this courage is coming from. “I want to. I know I'm always working, but I really…” Their eyes are wide with wonder, yet watchful. It shouldn't make him falter, but it does. His heart stutters and whatever bravado briefly gripped him fades away. “I’m…probably being too pushy right now. Tell me to fuck off?”

“I’m not gonna tell you to fuck off for wanting to bake me a cake,” they laugh, easing his worries like they always do. “C’mon, Carm.”

“So, uh, is that a yes, or…?”

“Just so we’re clear, I’m not trying to ask you to take off of work for my birthday,” they start carefully, “but I wouldn’t object to it. So, yeah. It’s a yes.”

“Okay.” He can’t help his giddy smile. There's someone saying you look stupid like this, but he’s with them, and it makes everything else silent. “Okay, good.”

“You’re…being super sweet about all this.” He doesn’t understand why—maybe it’s the way they say it—but hearing that makes his neck go hot.

“I mean…friends do stuff like this, don’t they?”

“Only the good ones.” They beam beautifully at him. He hasn’t done anything to warrant their affection, he thinks, but the feeling of their smile is so warm. He can’t resist soaking in it.

He's glad that lady luck blessed him just enough to stop their birthday from passing him by. He's been itching for an opportunity to repay them for all the bullshit they've had to take from him as of recent (although he knows if he brought it up, they would say it wasn't anything worth repaying). They deserve something good from him for once, not panic attacks and nightmares.

He just wishes he could figure out why they were going to spend their birthday alone. He knows them a lot better now, but there's still so much left shrouded. He wants to know them inside and out—he wants to learn what makes them tick, what keeps them up at night, what makes them happy. He wants to know all of it in its entirety, to fill in the gaps in the puzzle he doesn't have the pieces for.

He has some of the pieces. He understands that their relationship with their family to his—distant, strained, and difficult. Unfortunately, that’s about it. He doesn’t know any of the specifics. It’s not like he’s talked to them about his family outside of the off-handed bitter remarks, just as they have, but he finds that this fact leaves him dissatisfied.

He just hopes that they'll let him in. He's not sure if they will, but…he's gonna try. He has to. He's sick of not trying.

. . . . .

“You want to take off?” Richie’s staring at Carmy like he’s grown a second head. They're taking a smoke break in the back. “I don’t know what sort of doppelganger bullshit this is, but if you’re trying to pretend to be Carmen, you’re doing a shit job.”

“Very funny, jackass,” Carmy mutters. “I’m being serious. This Thursday.”

“All day?” Carmy grimaces, but he nods. Richie shakes his head. “You’re being weird. Really fuckin’ weird.”

“I know I shouldn’t. It’s a bad idea, but—”

“Cousin, no, that’s not at all what’s goin’ on here,” Richie interrupts, and Carmy’s at a loss for words. “This is the best idea you’ve ever had.”

“What?” Carmy squints at him. “Are you being serious?”

“‘Course I’m serious. I’m always serious.” Carmy decides not to comment on that. “Do you know how many times I’ve tried to get you off this ship for just one fucking second?”

“As the owner of this place, you’ve tried way too many times,” he replies dryly.

“Uh, as the original co-owner of this place, you don’t listen to me enough.” Again, Carmy decides not to elaborate on that one. It’s not worth it. “Take the day off. I was running it fine before, and I’ll keep running it.”

“No, no, we’re not saying that, it was not fine,” Carmy starts, but Richie’s already flipping him off.

“Whatever, I already know, new fucking system and all that. Don’t get anxiety or whatever over it, that’s why you got Syd hustling shit your way, right?”

“Uh.” Carmy didn’t realize that Richie had even been paying attention to the new hierarchy in the restaurant, let alone respecting it in any capacity. “Yeah, she is.”

“Then it’s fine.” Richie blows smoke in his face, and Carmy swats it away with a glare. “It was fine when you came in an hour late today, wasn’t it?”

“You guys knew I wasn’t gonna come in until later,” Carmy argues, defensive (although he’s not sure if there’s actually anything to argue about).

“Exactly.” Richie sighs all of a sudden, a long one that sounds like it’s bone deep. “Carm. Let me be straight with you. You need to do this. Okay? No backing out of this one.”

“Why’re you sayin’ this? What are you sayin’?”

“It’s ‘cause of your roommate, right? This Thursday?”

“...Yeah.” Carmy pales. “How did you—?”

“Fuckin’ knew it,” Richie says, grinning. “It was obvious.”

“No way. I didn’t say shit.”

“You didn’t need to.” Richie flicks the ash off his cigarette. “They’re changin’ you, man. We can all see it.”

“...” Carmy can’t deny that. He doesn't have time to ponder on that right now. “Is it really okay?”

“Yeah, you could stand to have an attitude adjustment.”

“I wasn’t talking about that, asshole. I was talking about Thursday.”

“Yes, for fuck’s sake, it’s completely fine.” Richie claps a hand on his shoulder, solid in its grip. It makes Carmy’s eyes snap to him, mostly in confusion. “So what’s the occasion? Must be important.”

“It’s their birthday. I mean, I could just go home early that day, but—”

“Yo, if you’re gonna take off, don’t halfass it—”

“That’s not what I was gonna say. When I’m here, I can’t seem to find my way out. This place…it just has a way of trapping you in.” He doesn’t expect Richie to nod, but he does. “I know if I don’t take the whole day off, I’ll never get out of here in time. Not until it’s too late.”

For some reason, that makes Richie laugh.

“Yeah. That's it.” Richie shakes his head as smoke trails out of his mouth. “That’s just it, man. You have to make time for the things that’re important. Even the recitals where you have to listen to five year olds play twinkle twinkle little star 20 times. You can’t miss shit like this. Because once you miss it, it’s gone.”

“Rich.” Carmy wants to say something to make that haunted expression leave Richie's face, but he doesn't come up with anything in time.

“Don’t give me that look.” Richie’s hand falls from his shoulder. “I’m just tryin’ to stop you from fucking shit up. They actually seem like a good person.”

“Y’think so?”

“I do. You?”

“Yeah.” Carmy doesn’t bother hiding his smile, even though he can already sense Richie’s teasing coming from a mile away. “They’re a really good friend.”

“Friend. Sure.” Richie snorts.

“Don’t push it,” and for some reason he adds, “they were gonna spend it alone.”

“Huh. Sociable guy like them spending it alone?”

“I know. I didn't ask. Maybe I should've.”

“Maybe. I dunno, cousin. Everyone's got their secrets. Especially the ones that try to act like they don't have any.”

“You're strangely full of wisdom today.”

“Fuck right off,” Richie responds in regular Richie fashion.

“I think they're like me. Like us.” Carmy's not sure why he's saying this on a Monday afternoon at work out of all times, but the truth bursts out of him beyond his will. Richie's expression shifts into something more solemn, something recognizable. “Y'know what I mean.”

“...Yeah.” Richie claps his hand on Carmy's back again. “Shitty parents club.”

As Carmy stands there in the back, feet sore and tobacco in the air, he sees his childhood in flashes. He's five years old again and is following Mike around with scuffed sneakers and untamed hair, although he supposes that unruliness never truly changed with time. There's warm sunlight filtering through green summer leaves. He hears his mother behind him, somewhere, but maybe he doesn't.

He thinks of home, of his bedroom, and it is cold. He has homework he’s failed to complete again. It's sitting on his desk, on top of all of the other shit he can't finish. There's screaming, and he's not listening.

He blinks. He’s 30, and he hasn’t talked to his mom since Michael died.

“Shitty parents club,” Carmy repeats hollowly.

. . . . .

When Thursday morning arrives, Carmy ends up greeting his roommate with flour in his hair and eggs sizzling on the pan.

“Um,” they say, just as Carmy goes “G'morning.” They both freeze, brief awkwardness circling between them before it dissipates with their breathless laugh.

“Good morning. I didn't think you'd actually take off,” they admit.

“I said I would,” he replies quietly, but it's not accusatory. How many times had he said he'd be home for dinner just for him to arrive when they're already asleep? He tries not to make empty promises anymore. Nonetheless, he understands their surprise. “Um, I'm almost done with breakfast. I didn't get to the coffee yet.”

“Am I supposed to be offended?” They laugh. “That's the least I can do, with you doing all of this.” They sluggishly shuffle behind him to reach down into some kitchen cabinets. “It's a special day, so I'll even make us pour overs.”

“That's true. It is special.” He peeks over his shoulder, pausing from basting the eggs in brown butter to see them setting up on the kitchen island. They gently place the hourglass-shaped glass onto the counter with a light clink. He silently switches the button on for the electric gooseneck kettle to his right. “Am I allowed to wish you a happy birthday, or should I not?”

“Hm, I don't mind. Just don't overdo it, which I doubt you will.” They pull out a bag of coarse ground coffee and a filter. As soon as they open the bag, he can smell the sweet scent of the light roast floating towards him.

“Okay. Then, happy birthday,” he says as casually as he can.

“Thanks, Carmy.” He studies their expression, searching for annoyance in their content expression, but he doesn't find any. “That's not even really what I meant by today being special, though.”

“How else did you mean it?” The eggs are done. He reaches over the hot pan to cut the heat.

“Well, y'know. I dunno if we’ve ever had a full day off together.” They're carefully scooping grounds into the filter fitted on top of the glass, creating a small hill. “I think I managed to catch you coming home early on my off days sometimes, but never a full day.”

“Huh.” Carmy has to take a minute to think about that one. “Yeah, I don't know either. I think you're right.”

“Then, like I said. It's special.” They seal up the bag of coffee grounds, and then they frown. “Shit. I forgot to turn on the kettle. Can you—”

“Already did it,” he reports, pleased, and his sense of accomplishment only doubles at their sigh of relief.

“Thank god.” There's the familiar clicking sound of the kettle reaching the perfect temperature. “Just in time, too. Can you hand it to me?”

“Yes, chef,” he says, because it always makes them laugh. Today is no exception. He slides the metallic kettle over to them.

“So what delights did you whip up over there?” They ask. They begin pouring the almost boiling water over their coffee grounds in a slow circle, gradually inching towards the middle. “It smells amazing. I want the full break-down.”

“The full break-down, got it.” On two circular plates, he's carefully placing a fried egg, thick cut bacon, and a slice of toast with jam and butter. “Uh…it's nothin’ special, just stuff we had in the fridge. We've got a, uh, brown-butter fried egg with a little paprika, sage, pepper, salt…”

“Oh, just an egg made with liquid gold, no big deal,” they imitate.

“Cut it out,” he snips back, but he's smiling and they know it. “There's honestly not much to it. This thick-cut bacon was in the back, so I cooked the rest of it. And the toast is just brioche with salted honey butter and blueberry jam.”

“Carmy. C'mon. That's nothing special to you?”

“I mean.” It's not quite nothing, he thinks. “I can make nicer breakfasts, is all.”

“That's what you said when you made me garlic bread, and that fucking blew my mind.” They set the kettle down with a thunk. The glass is full of dark coffee. Prepped next to them is their favorite glass mug alongside Carmy's. He's not sure how they knew that it was his favorite, but he doesn't question it.

“I'm just letting you know that you should wait to be really impressed.”

“Too fucking late, man.” He's turned around and placed the two breakfast platters on the kitchen island, and they gawk openly at it. “Holy fuck.”

“It's ready,” he says, surprisingly meek. He can't comprehend why anxiety's hitting him now of all times. He's served acclaimed food critics, top-security government officials, and celebrities more times than he can count. Before that audience, he never faltered, but in front of his roommate in their crumpled pajamas, his heart stutters.

“Oh, wow…” They regard the food with undeserved softness. Like a punctured balloon, his anxiety immediately begins deflating. They're staring at the food like it's a painting in a museum. “You seriously didn't have to do all of this.”

“I know. I just wanted to.” He feels heat on the back of his neck. “Is…is that okay?”

“It's more than okay.” Suddenly, he notices their eyes are puffy, like they were crying. “Goddamnit, get over here.”

He only registers what's about to happen for one second before they're hugging him. Their palms are on his back, and the top of their head tucks under his chin perfectly. He makes a small, surprised noise.

“I, I'm glad you like it.” He links his arms around them, allows himself to rest his chin on their head. With their face turned to the side, their ear's pressed up against his chest, and he's instantly struck with the paranoia that they're gonna hear his rapid heartbeat.

“I haven't even taken a bite yet, and I love it.” They lean back then, arms still wrapped around him and head craned upwards to look at him. It's far too intimate for what they are, and Carmy hates how his heart beats even harder. “Thank you for doing all this. Seriously. I…”

“The breakfast's just a side thing, I'm, um, still baking you a cake.”

“What? You're doing this and a cake?”

“Um,” Carmy repeats intelligently.

“Carmy. Carmy, Carmy, Carmy.” Their words ooze affection, but surely he's just imagining it. Their hands are crawling up his back. “God, I could just ki—”

“There's the timer,” Carmy blurts out, because his phone's ringing and so are his ears. At the sound, they let him go, and he grabs two towels to retrieve the two circular cake pans from the oven. A toothpick poked through the middle comes out clean, so he sets them on a wire rack to cool.

He needs to focus on the cakes. That's the most important thing.

“Oh my god.” They lean in close to the cake and take a deep breath. “Is this—”

“Devil's food cake, yeah.” The heat searing his face is surely from opening the oven.

“You—how did you—” Their smile is luminous with joy. “You really pay attention to every little thing, don't you?”

“Sometimes. When it counts.” He fidgets awkwardly, nails picking at the sides of his fingers. “Wanna eat by the window, or…?”

“Fuck yeah I do. Can you bring the plates over? I'll have the coffee over in just a second.”

Carmy sets up at their little table first, placing the plates just right across from one another. The morning sun casts a cozy glow through their speckled window, streaking planes of light across the floor. He patiently waits and watches them pace from the fridge to the counter, splashing cream into their mugs. Through the transparent glass, he watches the white fizzle into the dark coffee, blending into a warm brown.

“Just a tiny spoon of sugar for you, right?” They peek over their shoulder, catching his stare, and he nods. He's also not quite sure how they know that, either. They've had coffee in the morning maybe a handful of times before.

He supposes they also pay attention sometimes, when it counts.

“Alright, here we go.” They bring a mug in each hand and set them delicately down on the table. He notes that his coffee is the perfect color. “Oh, thanks for waiting. You didn't have to.”

“I, I guess so, yeah. It's just, uh, you always wait for me, so…”

“That's—that's true.” An odd tension sets in their face, but they laugh it off, and it disappears. “I guess I’m not used to it anymore.”

A part of him wants to ask further by what they meant by that, but they're already taking pictures of his food so dutifully. He doesn't want to ruin it, so he eats.

It's nice to have a solid breakfast for once. He had taken their advice from the other night and had been drinking milk with protein powder. It was nice not to feel like he was teetering the edge by lunch time, but truthfully, it was a bit unsavory. This breakfast platter is much more palatable. It also helps that his stomach pains aren't active today.

Time rolls by slowly this quiet morning, and Carmy recognizes the oddity of it immediately. It's clear to see when by this time, he's usually already done at least ten laps through the restaurant. An irritating signal in his brain is telling him that he needs to get up and do something, not sit around and eat, but for once, he doesn't want to listen.

A memory from roughly two weeks ago (or was it one week?) unearths all of sudden. He was up early, drinking shitty coffee and sinking into dissociation. Mornings were lonely, as he was usually the only one up, but not that day. His roommate came stumbling into the kitchen, awake from a restless night. They chatted before he had to head out, and he remembers wishing he had more time in the morning to spend with them.

He imagined a morning just like this one, with pajamas, food, and messy hair. He daydreamed about having all the time in the world, and he thought about getting to spend it all with them. Now he’s sitting in that moment he imagined, except that it’s real. They're across from him in their wrinkled pajamas and bedhead, contentedly mowing through their food. There's a smear of jam on the corner of their mouth. He takes a sip of his coffee, and it's perfect, just as they made it for him.

This amount of good should scare him, needs to scare him, but he just can't bring himself to care anymore. He wants more than nightmares, cigarettes, and floating just above the budget. He wants this.

He tastes his coffee and reminds himself that he’s still here. The moment hasn’t passed him by.

“Is it good?” He asks quietly. It’s a rhetorical question, it always is, but he can’t help himself. He wants to hear it from them.

“So. Fucking. Good.” They have to finish chewing before they answer. “You always knock it out of the park. If this is the prelude, I don’t know if I can handle what’s next,” they say, gesturing towards the cooling cake.

“It won’t be ready for a while yet. You have time to prepare yourself.” That makes them smile. All according to plan. “Got anything in mind for today?”

“Nothing glamorous. I was just gonna go out for a little. Go thrifting, maybe watch a movie later. Smoke a joint.” They shrug. “Just my usual sort of thing.”

“Mm.” He dusts off crumbs from the toast off his fingers on his pants. “Sounds like a good time. You still wanna go?”

“I do, yeah.” They stare at him for a moment, as if processing his words. Or just him. “Do you…wanna tag along, or…?”

Whenever they ask him if he wants to spend time together (whether it’s grocery shopping, smoking, or watching a show), they usually offer it with an air of nonchalance. Carmy’s assumed it’s been out of politeness, restraining their expression as to not put any pressure onto him. That’s the person he’s used to, not this uneasy anxiety, someone afraid to ask him to spend time with them.

It reminds him of himself in every way.

“I’d love to tag along,” he answers easily, just as they’ve always done for him. “I’ve got the whole day off, after all.”

“Right. ‘Course.” He watches their little smile double in size. “I promise to not make you watch me try on clothes for too long.”

“I wouldn’t mind. I like thrifting, y’know.” And you, he thinks to himself.

“You do? Oh, of course—” They make a contemplative noise to themself. “Vintage denim. I always wondered how you managed to have so many pairs.”

“Once you know where to look, they’re pretty easy to find. I can help you find some, if you want.”

“I’d love that. I realized the other day that I don’t have any dark wash jeans, so—actually, the truth is that I do have a pair, but they’re so fucked up and old that I never wear them anymore. Anyway, I need new jeans. Think you could find some dark wash blue jeans for me?”

“If you’re willing to hit up more than one store, then definitely,” he replies, just a smidge cocky.

“I’m willing to hit up even two more stores.” He pretends to gasp, to which they nod confidently. “Yeah. That’s right. Maybe even three.”

“We won’t need three,” Carmy promises. “I’m better than that. Probably won’t even need two, but…” He shrugs. “We’ll see what they’ve got.”

“Okay, Mr. Confident over here,” they tease. “Let’s see what you’ve got!”

They head out after they both clean the kitchen and freshen up. Carmy gets the flour out of his hair and rewets his hair to revive some of his curls. He silently thanks his past self for showering the night before. With the passage of the morning cold and the rising sun, the afternoon weather’s become brisk and pleasant. However, the weather’s barely a factor in how he’s dressing.

Is this too much? Is this not enough? He’s switching shirts and pants in the mirror like he’s about to go on a date. He knows he’s not, swears to himself that he’s not, but he’s put product in his hair and cologne on his wrists and temples. It’s not a date, but he can’t fucking decide what to wear.

He sucks it up and settles on a gray sweater, light wash blue jeans, and white sneakers. From under his collar and at the bottom of his sweater peeks out a brown button up. It’s probably too much, but this is his sixth outfit change. He’s fed up with it and himself.

After adjusting the gold chain that got hidden under his collar, he steps out.

He finds them already waiting by the door in this thick knit cardigan and fitted plaid pants that makes his heart stutter. When they hear him approaching, their head snaps up from their phone, and their skin sparkles with touches of makeup.

“You look really nice.” He has no idea how he let that slip, but he’s more shocked that he didn’t stutter once.

“Ah, th—thank you,” they stammer, fingers fidgeting with the edge of their sleeve. He’s not sure if it's their makeup or their skin that’s doing the blushing. It’s nice to see them being the one tripping over their words for once. “You look pretty handsome yourself.”

“Oh. Um.” Handsome? It echoes in his head. He instantly feels self conscious. So much for being the more suave one for once. “Thanks, uh…I just didn’t wanna wear my work clothes,” he lies in an attempt to ease his embarrassment.

“I gotcha.” He’s glad they don’t challenge him on it. “Shall we head out?”

“Yeah. Where we headed first?”

They take the metro to their personal favorite shop a little up north. The metro’s surprisingly busy for a Thursday afternoon, but the crowd forces the two of them to be huddled next to each other. They’re both standing close to a pole by the window, each with one hand wrapped around the metal.

As passengers come and go, they step closer to him to move out of the way. Eventually it just gets to a point where they’re standing nearly pressed up against his chest. He tries not to dwell on how that makes him feel, but he can smell the fragrance they put on, and it’s very distracting.

Luckily, the ride is short. Any longer on the train, he might’ve put an arm around their shoulder, god forbid.

“If we can’t find what I’m looking for here, maybe you can show me one of your favorite spots to go thrifting,” they say as they enter the thrift store. The interior is decorated, clean, and lovely, and unlike the metro, it’s not packed to the brim with people. It smells faintly of incense, and there’s local art framed all over the walls for sale. It oozes warmth and excitement, much like them.

“There’s a ton of shit here, so maybe we won’t need to after all.” He finds himself intaking everything at once, eyes flickering from sign to sign. “I’ve never been here before. This is really cool.”

“It’s my favorite place to find new clothes.” They trail down the racks, finger flitting between clothes. “I hope you can find something you like here, too.”

“I’m sure I will.” He’s already walking to their denim section and immediately spots some contenders. “I think I already have.”

He’s not sure if they mean to spend hours in there, but he certainly does. There’s more than just clothes to look at, although that’s what takes up most of his time. There’s dishes, furniture, cds, vinyls, books, even electronics. He goes back and forth with them, clothing articles piling up in his arms as they sit on battered couches together and peruse scratched cds. Everywhere he looks, there’s just more, more, and more.

“Okay, I’ve gotta cut myself off,” they say as they leave the furniture section. They’ve sat on nearly every chair in that place. “I already have so many clothes to try on, and that’s not even including the jeans you’ve picked out for me.”

“If it helps, some of these are mine.” Carmy flips through the layers of hanging jeans that have built up on his forearm. “If you can believe it, I even found some stuff that isn’t denim.”

“I’m not sure if I can, but seeing is believing.” They thumb through some long-sleeves he’s carrying that are seeping out from under the jeans. “I’m just glad you were able to find some stuff for yourself, too. Not that I was that worried.”

He hands them the jeans he’s found for them, all dark wash and in their size. To his surprise, they also hand him an article of clothing for him to try on.

“I thought you’d look good in this. You’ll have to show me when you try it on,” they say, and it’s innocent, completely meaningless, but as soon as Carmy agrees and rushes to hide in the changing room, he views in the mirror and sees his flushed face.

Doesn’t mean anything, he repeats to himself, over and over and over. Stop getting in over your head.

He tries on his items of choice first. The first is a dark green henley that looked better on the rack than it did him, so he puts it in the reject pile. The second is a dark blue long sleeve that fits just right. It’s cheap, too, so it’s an automatic purchase. He presumes the way to word it is that it hugs him in all the right places, but he’s not sure. The rest are jeans, of which only one he decides to buy. A bit pricey, but for the brand and year, it’s worth it (although he basically always uses this reasoning with himself).

Now, for the piece of clothing they picked out for him. It’s a dark brown t-shirt that seems like it’s just the right length. It’s a muted, yet warm brown, a bit rosey in hue. He doesn’t realize it’s a v-neck until he gets it over his head and down his shoulders.

“I’ve never worn a v-neck before,” he calls out to the room next to him.

“Oh, are you trying it on? Do you like it?” Their slightly muffled voice calls back to him.

“Um…I’m not sure,” he admits with a shaky laugh. The collar is lower than he’s used to. It dips below his collarbones, and between them dangles his chain. “Should I show you?”

“Yes! Hold on, lemme get some pants on. …Okay, I’m stepping out!”

He hears their door open alongside his. When they see him, their expression snaps into what he believes is surprise and delight. He’s sure he looks somewhat the same.

They’re wearing one of the vintage jeans he picked out for them—dark blue Levi’s. Although they’re rolled up a couple times at the bottom, it seems to fit them just right. As he stares, he’s reminded of his many pairs of Levi’s, and it’s more or less like seeing them in his clothes, which is. Which is. Uh. Yeah.

“I knew that would suit you,” they say with a grin, to which he realizes he can’t hide his blush.

“It’s not weird?”

“Not at all. It looks good.” They tilt their head to the side as they openly look him over, hip cocked. Something in their gaze is making him hot. “No pressure to buy it, of course.”

“It’s different from what I’m used to, but…” He looks down, smooths the fabric with his palm. “It’s kinda nice, something like this. Um, and what do you think about the jeans?” He needs to direct the attention off him quickly.

“Oh, I love them. The others ended up fitting not quite right on me, but that’s how it goes.” They move from side to side, almost twirling. It’s cute. “I love these, though. Just a little long, but I’m used to it.”

“That’s how it always is. I can hem them for you, if you want. I usually hem mine.”

“And he sews,” they say, seemingly to themself, but they’re looking right at him. Embarrassing. “If you don’t mind, that’d be amazing. Either way, I’m probably getting them.”

“Good. You should. They fit well.”

“Yeah?” They glance back into their fitting room, likely examining themself in the mirror, and then back at him. “Okay, then. Definitely getting them.” With that and a cheeky grin, they go back into their dressing room to try on the rest of their clothes. Carmy follows suit, grateful to hide his embarrassed face.

Carmy heads to check out with the dark blue long sleeve, a pair of jeans, and the brown v-neck. They’ve decided on the pair of jeans they showed him earlier and a little purple tank-top he wishes he got to see on them.

“Will that be all for you today?” The cashier asks him as he checks out first. Even the cashiers here are pretty nice, he finds.

“Oh, their stuff, too.” He nods to them, who’s standing right next to him.

“Carmy.” They glare at him.

“What?” He feels himself smiling.

“You can’t do this to me.”

“C’mon.” He nudges them gently with his elbow. “It’s my present to you.”

“Oh, so the present wasn’t the breakfast? Or the cake? Or helping me pick these out?”

“Why can’t it be all of them?” He decides to stop this in its tracks and takes the clothes out of their hands, sliding it onto the counter. “Just these two, and that’ll be it.”

“Just you wait until your birthday hits,” they mutter darkly, shaking their head. “Just you wait.”

“I haven’t told you my birthday.” He pauses. “Right?”

“I’ll ask Richie.”

“No, you won’t.”

“You’re giving me no choice.”

“You could also just, I don't know, not ask—”

“I wouldn't have to if you didn't force my hand—”

“You guys are cute together,” the cashier comments with a smile, surely a harmless, meaningless thing, but it shuts the both of them up. Carmy can already feel the impact of it on his psyche, and he decides to tuck away the surging emotions to unpack later. At least, he'll try.

“You really didn't have to get those for me,” they tell him when they're exiting the store. “But I guess I should just be saying thank you. So…thank you.”

“Sure. I mean, it would've been better if it was wrapped and stuff, but…” He shrugs. “Had to get you a real present, not just food.”

“Not just food, my ass.” That makes him laugh. “It'll be nice to have something to remind me of this day, though. That's one of the nice parts of getting gifts. Everytime I wear these clothes, I'll think of you.”

“Good. Yeah, that's…good,” he finishes lamely. He nods like their words haven't flustered him, but he's sure they can tell. They laugh, and he can tell it's because of his reaction.

“I'm sorry that the cashier said that,” they say out of nowhere.

“Why're you apologizing? It's not your fault.” Any embarrassment he was feeling before is immediately replaced with a new, more potent sort of embarrassment. He was hoping they wouldn't mention it.

“I guess that's true. I don't know, I just…” They trail off. “Just hope it didn't upset you.”

“Not at all,” he lies, and he prays they believe it.

. . . . .

The metro is less crowded on the way home. They sit comfortably next to each other and watch the city pass them by. A part of Carmy mourns the closeness they had on the way there, but the other part tells him to get it together and keep his distance.

“I'mma take a nap,” they say with a yawn. Their cardigan and bag have been tossed onto the couch. The new clothes have been thrown into the laundry machine, and there's the muffled sound of running water. “Maybe we could smoke and watch a movie later, though.”

“Yeah, that sounds nice.” He peers into the fridge to check on the cake rounds. Just as he left them. “Have a good nap.”

“Thanks, Carm,” they reply sleepily. “Wouldn't be a good day if I didn't get to have a nice nap, after all.” With that, they shuffle into their room and shut the door behind them.

Carmy spends the next two hours flying around the apartment, baking, cooking, cleaning. The sun slowly sets as he goes. He keeps his body and hands moving in hopes that his head doesn't have a chance to catch up, but it manages to keep the pace. It always does.

The crumb coat's fucked up on the left, his first train of thought says. He inspects the surface, eyes following the circumference of the cake. There's a little loose crumb. With the edge of his spatula, he tucks the crumb away.

The faint smell of chocolate wafts up from the cold cake rounds. He's hunched over the kitchen island, hands reaching between dark chocolate frosting and cake. The afternoon sun casts harsh lights onto the cake, and it glistens. He genuinely can't remember the last time he's made a layered cake. He's never been much of a baker, anyhow.

You're going to disappoint them, his second train of thought interrupts, running parallel to the other one at full speed. Who do you think you are? You don't make cakes.

He leans back, inspects his work. The crumb coats are perfect.

Fuck off, he thinks back, triumphant. Look at that shit. He runs his finger along the spatula, picking up congealed crumbs and frosting. He licks it off, and it's delicious. And it tastes good, asshole. So shut the fuck up.

You're being a nuisance, the thoughts continue. Carmy's pops the crumb coats in the freezer for a quick set. They don't actually like any of this. They're just being nice to make you feel better.

They seemed happy to me, he thinks, but he's faltering. He's washing the dishes, and the sensation of the warm water feels distant. They loved the food I made.

Couldn't you tell they were lying? He doesn't understand why these thoughts are rampaging through his head now of all times. It's not unfamiliar, but it's inconvenient. Keep this up, and you'll actually be surprised when they drop you.

Without warning, a memory hits him . As his hands drip with soap, he's reminded of playing with Michael and Sugar in the summer when he was five. Or six, or seven, he's never quite sure. They were outdoors at a local park, and the heat made the metal of the playground searing hot to the touch.

He was blowing bubbles, and the sticky mixture from the bottle was getting all over his hands. In his memory, Carmy watches the way the iridescent bubbles floated away and left little circles on the surface of the plastic slide. He can't remember why he wasn't playing with the others. He can remember the sound of their laughing voices in the distance, gleeful and delighted without him. He thinks he tried to join in, but it didn't work. It often just didn't work, and it was all his fault.

The memory ends, and Carmy's finished washing the dishes.

This is working, he thinks to himself. His hands are dried out from the hot water and soap. I swear to you, it's working. So just stop. Okay?

There's no response. Good enough.

He hears the door opening as soon as he's putting the finishing touches on the cake. With a damp paper towel, he carefully swipes away stray drops of frosting that fell onto the cake stand. He thinks it's best described as if a tiramisu was turned into a devil's food cake. It's not the best cake he's ever made, but it's definitely up there in terms of looks. All the components of the cake tasted good separately, so he hopes it makes sense in his mouth as much as it did in his head.

“Have a nice nap?” He asks before he turns his head. They're standing in the hallway, bed hair hastily tied back.

“Sorta. It was okay.” Their eyes are glued onto the cake as they walk up to the island. “Is this…?”

“This is for you, yeah,” he finishes for them. They take a seat on one of the chairs at the island. “It's a, uh, devil's food cake with vanilla mascarpone cream on the inside. The outside's this coffee buttercream…” He trails off, not knowing what else to say. He could mention the dutch processed cocoa powder, the expensive vanilla bean pods, or the endless sifting, but it feels too gratuitous.

“Wow…” They're still staring, as if it's not quite real to them. “I can't believe this is for me. It almost looks too pretty to eat, but you know I can't wait to tear into this.”

“We could, uh, have it now, if you, if you want,” he says hesitantly.

“I don't know if I could wait.” Their smile grows wider. “You even put candles on it?”

“We don't have to light them or anything if you don't want to,” he adds quickly.

“The candles are the fun part. I don't mind that. The song is…okay I guess, but…” They give him an expectant, excited look. “Were you gonna sing for me?”

“...Only if you wanted to,” he mumbles, suddenly stricken with embarrassment.

“Would that be okay? If I wanted that?”

“I wouldn't mind.” Not if it's you.

“Okay. Then, yeah.” They pull out a lighter from their pocket. “I’d really like that.”

Carmy cuts the overhead lights before taking out his own lighter to help them light the rest of the candles. One by one, the dark room gradually illuminates until it's filled with a warm, orange glow. The flickering flames cast shifting shadows onto their smiling face and reflect into their glossy eyes.

“Ready?” He asks quietly.

“I'm ready,” they whisper.

Carmy doesn't really need to clear his throat, but he does so anyway. He can't recall the last time he sang happy birthday to anyone, let alone by himself. This is the first time he's ever sung in front of an audience, too.

I can do this, he thinks to himself. I can do this.

His voice is awkward and scratchy. He never uses it like this, has never sang for anyone in his life. His ears burn, and he hates the sound of his voice, but he reminds himself to focus on their delighted little smile and warm gaze. The room is far too quiet for his voice, making the words painfully clear.

“Happy birthday to you,” he finishes singing, voice trailing off awkwardly. He's more than ready to finish singing now. “Uh, make a wish…?”

“Right.” The two of them sit in the flickering candle light for a moment longer, the silence thick. Carmy watches their face, their eyes boring into the candles with an expression he can only describe as longing. Then, they blow out the candles with a decisive blow, and the room goes dark.

He moves to switch on the lights. When he turns back to look at them, tears are streaming down their face.

“Hey,” he says softly. He props his elbows on the counter, standing across from them and tilting his head to the side. They're not meeting his gaze, glazed eyes boring into the dripping candles. “What's wrong?”

“I'm sorry,” they whisper with a sniffle, and it sounds like a reflex. Something about them suddenly seems so much smaller. “I shouldn't be crying.”

“It's okay. I don't mind.” That makes them smile, even if it's shaky. “Was the singing too much?”

“No, it wasn't your singing,” they say with a laugh. “Your singing was lovely. It's just—I'm so happy. You made today so special.”

“Yeah?” He fights the urge to reach over and wipe their tears. “I'm glad. I wanted to make it good. I…” He hesitates. “...I didn't like the idea of you spending it alone.”

“I didn't either. And I thought I was going to have to be alone…but then you—then you took off work, and you made me breakfast, you went shopping with me—even got me clothes—and now this—” Another rush of tears gushes from their eyes, and they hastily wipe at it with their shirt.

“You've done way more for me. This is the least I could do.” Before he can stop himself, his hand is brushing hair out of their eyes. They freeze for a split second, eyes finally flickering up towards him. “Sorry,” he mumbles.

“It's okay,” they whisper back. “Um…” They let out a shaky sigh, the sort of trembling sound that happens after crying too much. “I feel like I should explain.”

“You don't have to if you don't want to,” he assures them quickly, “but I…I'd like to know. If that's okay.”

“I want you to know. I, I do.” They open their mouth to keep talking, but shaky breaths continue to stifle them. It's hard to watch.

“Breathe,” he reminds them, quietly. He visibly takes in a deep breath, silently encouraging them to breathe with him. They follow suit, closing their eyes and taking a slow breath. Tears slip silently from their eyes. Gradually, their breathing becomes less of a staccato, evening out into something much more manageable.

“Thank you,” they murmur. He nods. They already sound a lot calmer. “I'm not sure where to start. I…I suppose I'll start with today.” Another deep breath. “I didn’t get a call from my parents today.”

“Ah…” The first missing piece.

“I knew they weren’t going to. But a part of me still hoped…” They stop and shake their head. “It's the first year that it's been like this.”

“What happened?”

“Uh…I went no contact with my family about a year ago.” Another pained, hollow laugh. The second piece. “I didn't even really want to—it was a complicated, shitty situation. My parents were being their usual shitty selves, and I just wanted them to apologize. It was over such a small thing, and, and I just…I don't know. I thought maybe I could fix things.” He's never seen them with such a heavy expression, etched with such weariness. “I just wanted them to apologize to me, Carm. That's all I wanted. And then they cut me off cold.”

Their voice is trembling again, and the tears are falling faster. The collar of their shirt is dark with moisture. Carmy hates that he doesn't know what to say. He hates just staring at them, silent as he tries to find the words.

Suddenly, he thinks of Michael.

“Michael never let me work in the restaurant,” he tells them. “That's why I went to culinary school. A big part of it, anyway. He just cut me off, didn't let me in no matter what I did, and it was…” He makes a vague hand gesture. “I felt insane. I was so fucking angry. I couldn't understand him. And I'm not saying that's anything like what you've been through, but…” He looks into their watchful eyes. “I'm sorry. I think I'm trying to say that I, that I understand. A little.”

“I…I appreciate that.” They give him a small, wobbly smile. He adores their smile, but seeing it through their tears twists something painfully in his chest. “He would've been lucky to have you. You're an excellent chef.”

“I am now, anyway.” He sighs. “Your family's missing out on you, too. You're…” Say it. Just say it. “You're a really wonderful person. I can't imagine…”

I can't imagine anyone looking at you and not loving what they see, he thinks suddenly, and he instantly realizes he can't say it. He can barely even comprehend that he just thought it.

He can't process this right now. This isn't the time.

“I keep trying to wrap my head around it all, wondering what I did wrong, what I could've done better… Sometimes, the conclusion I arrive at is that I must have done something to deserve this. That I just, I don't know, that maybe I'm just this permanent fuck-up, and…” They run a tired hand over their wet face, through their hair. “My parents fucked me up real good, man.”

There's something familiar about their words, and Carmy realizes it's because it sounds like him. He would've never guessed that under their easy-going smiles was a reflection of himself. He recognizes himself in their self-deprecation, the bone-deep pain. There was always a sense of sympathetic connection between the two of them, but he had no idea. He had no idea how far deep the mutual experiences went.

A part of him still can't believe that this is the truth, that this is what lies at their core, but then he remembers. He thinks about the night they were throwing up into the toilet. They were sobbing, crying into his shoulder about how much they hate themself.

“You know you didn't deserve it. Right?” Carmy's not sure when they started leaning in so close to each other. He's looking at their wet eyelashes with startling clarity. “You did all you could.”

“You don't know that.” Their words are so soft-spoken, but it still catches him off guard. “You don't know what happened.”

“You—” Irritation prickles inside him, his instincts itching to snap back, but he doesn't. He sees himself in them, and he holds back. “You're right. I don't know what happened. But I know you.” The shock is on their face as clear as day. “At least, I think I do.”

“I want to think you do, too,” they whisper. “But this—this messy bullshit is also me. I wish it wasn't. I wish you didn't have to see all this. I…don't want you to…think any less of me.”

“I don't think there's anything you could do to make me think less of you.” He doesn't resist dragging his thumb across a stray tear on their cheek. To his surprise, they lean into his touch. “Y'know when I almost burned down the apartment?”

“Oh my god.” They smile, and he feels their grinning cheek against his palm. “Yeah. Is it crazy to say I remember it fondly?”

“A little bit.” They laugh. It's quiet, but it's real. “Remember that talk we had after?”

“I do. Why?”

“You're allowed to mess up on onions,” he says softly. “It won't push me away.”

They stare at him for what feels like a long time. Their eyes refill with tears, but they don't spill. With a clammy hand, they shakily place their hand on top of his hand that's still cradling their wet cheek.

“Fucking onions,” they say finally with a wet laugh. Fresh tears drip onto his thumb, and he wipes them away again. As many times as it takes. “God damnit, Carmy.”

“No one deserves to have shitty parents, let alone ones that walk out on them.” He thumbs away more tears. “You being an imperfect person like everyone else doesn't justify that.”

“There must be something more I could've done,” they whisper. “Something I did wrong.”

“Maybe. But they're your parents, not the other way around. It's not your fault.”

“I know. I know that. I do. There just has to be a reason, because—fuck—the truth would just be too fucked up.”

“...And that is?”

It takes a long, still minute before they can get their words out.

“...It’s—it's that—” Their cries are verging on sobs, increasingly more staggered and uncontrollable. “It's that s-some kids—are just—some kids have parents that will never—never love—”

They can't finish. Their sobs have overtaken their whole body. Their body's hunched over the counter, curled into themself. Carmy can't think of a time where he's ever seen them crying so hard.

Without another word, Carmy pulls them into a hug.

They cry for a long time. Through it all, fleeting condolences pass Carmy by in his head, but they all feel too cheap, too meaningless. So all he does is hold them tight, letting them grab onto his shirt and soak the fabric on his shoulder. It's all he feels he can really do.

After a while, the tide subsides. He feels them wilting in his arms, exhausted from sobbing so violently. He doesn't actually want to let them go, but their sniffling nose sounds like it's completely stopped up.

“I'm gonna get you some tissues, ok?” He says quietly. They make a quiet noise of acknowledgement, and they pull back. He snatches up a box of tissues from the coffee table. He places it in front of them before grabbing them a glass of water.

“Thank you,” they mumble, voice scratchy. Carmy stands and watches as they blow through several tissues. The water gets downed instantaneously.

“Better?”

“Yeah. A lot better.”

“Good.”

“...I think, deep down, I know I didn't deserve what happened. Or just having shitty parents in general.” They sigh. “It's just easier to think that I do. That I deserve it.”

“...Yeah.” That resonates with a part of him he's not quite ready to acknowledge. “You're one of the kindest people I've ever met,” he admits quietly. “If someone like you deserves a shitty hand in life, I'm fucked.”

“Carmy…” Their smile is small, but genuine. “Thank you. I want to be able to genuinely believe that, one day. I'm going to try.”

“I know. I get it.”

“I know you do.”

That makes both of them smile, even if it's bitter.

“Thanks for telling me. About everything.”

“No, thank you for listening. For just being there for me.” They prop their chin in their hands, their elbows resting on the counter. “Y'know, this past year, I've been trying to find a sense of joy in all this mess. Sometimes it just feels so far away, like…like any happiness is just impossible. But I think I've found it. Rather, I've already found it.”

“Yeah?” Carmy looks at them expectantly, but he never expected this—

“I found you,” they tell him.

“...” He immediately fixes his shocked expression. He's at a loss for words.

Me?

“I never found a chance to mention it, but…my parents are the reason I decided to live with you. That's why I wanted to be your roommate, even though we were strangers.” They shrug shyly. “My lease was up on my last place. I was gonna go home, but then all that stuff happened at the last minute, and…yeah. I needed to find a place to live.”

“Seriously?” They just nod. “Damn. Uh…Yeah, that's fucking crazy. I had no idea.”

“At the time, I was miserable. I kept thinking to myself, ‘I can't believe how shitty this situation is!’ Don't get me wrong, it was fucking awful, but…it led me to you, so…it wasn't really all that bad, in the end. I got lucky.”

Fucking hell, he thinks to himself. Fuck.

“If you hadn't roomed with me, I wouldn't have been able to come back home for my brother's restaurant,” he says, mostly because he's so embarrassed that he swears his whole body's red at this point. Don't think about it. Don't think about it. “I think I'm the lucky one.”

“Can't we both be lucky?”

“I guess we can. Just doesn't seem very realistic.”

“Little too late to say that. It's already real.”

“...There's no other shoe?”

“Not that I know of. I think the other shoe's already dropped for us a while ago. Surely there's no other shoes left?”

“I hope not. I don't know if I could take another one.”

“Me neither.”

“...”

“Do you…want to eat your cake now?”

“Fuck, oh my god—I completely forgot! Yes!”

Just as Carmy planned, the flavors go perfectly together. Even though he knew it was going to be delicious, when he takes the first bite of the cake, relief washes over him. They seem to be overjoyed, inhaling the cake at dangerous speeds.

“You're gonna hurt yourself if you eat that fast,” he observes, both amused and concerned.

“Can't talk. Need to eat this.” That makes him laugh so abruptly he nearly gets cake up his nose. “This is the best birthday cake I've ever had, both visually and taste-wise.”

“I'm glad. Like I said, I'm not really a baker, but…I make an alright cake.”

“You make a fantastic cake.” They’ve got a bit of frosting on the corner of their mouth. “It doesn't get much better than this—eating a cake made by you.”

“Because I'm a chef, you mean?”

“No, not that. Not just that, anyway,” they amend with a cheeky grin. “Because you're my best friend.”

You're my best friend.

…

I'm their best friend, he repeats to himself. I'm their best friend.

He thinks about crying. He won't cry, but he thinks about it.

“Oh,” he replies intelligently. “...Really?”

“Y-Yeah. Unless, uh, you don't—”

“You're my best friend too,” he blurts out, and the anxiety on their face fades away into a relieved, beautiful smile.

“Thank god. That would've been pretty awkward if you didn't…” They shake their head.

“I've never been anyone's best friend before,” he confesses.

“Seriously?” They recover from the shock quickly. “Lucky me, then.”

“I thought you established we were both the lucky ones.”

“Oh, right.” They chuckle. “Lucky both of us, then.”

Carmy thought that life would always be the same. He thought that he was fated to a routine of nausea and nightmares, never quite close enough to reach a rest point. He thought that he was okay with it being his fate, because he never knew anything else.

He thought that loneliness, cigarettes, and memories would be enough, because it always stays the same. Nothing ever changes.

Until them.

He thought he had outgrown happiness, that his body had grown accustomed to living without it. That there was no longer space in his heart to withstand the weight of joy. But as he sits here with his roommate, chatting and laughing over a cake he made for them, he finds that's not true.

His capacity for happiness had never left. It had been there all along.

And with that, something in him lets go.

Carmy sees it all at once. It starts from the beginning—he sees the first day he met them, an initially hesitant meeting gone surprisingly well. He sees the first time the two of them smoked together, deliriously laughing through shared smoke. He sees them in the mornings, messy hair and wrinkled t-shirts. He sees them in nothing but an apron. He sees them in tight black clothes that leave little to the imagination. He sees them laughing at a joke that he didn’t think was all that funny.

He sees them in his dreams, red tomato puree bleeding from their gums. He sees them holding his trembling hands in theirs, soothing him back down from the storm in his hand. He sees them comforting him through his tears. He sees them sobbing, hot tears on their cheek and his hand. He sees them heaving into the toilet, whispering that they want to know him. He sees himself, embracing them tightly in his arms.

He sees it all. He knows that he can't avoid it anymore.

Carmy is completely, undeniably in love with them, and there is absolutely nothing that he can do to make that realization disappear.

…Some things, he understands, refuse to stay the same.

@zorrasucia @carmenberzattosgf @carmenbrzatto @thehouseofevangelista

#carmy berzatto #carmen berzatto #carmy berzatto x reader #carmen berzatto x reader #the bear #jeremy allen white #carmen berzatto x you #carmy berzatto x you #the bear fanfiction #carmy berzatto imagines #carmy the bear #the bear fx #my fics #alexithymia fic #GOD. IT'S FINALLY HERE. THIS ONE'S A BEAST.#ch 6 is gonna be the climax..... it's gonna happen yall. it's finally here. hahahaha #anyway this one took so long to write because it was so revealing for me... as i'm sure yall have guessed. sigh.

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