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There was no one on the planet who deserved a break more than his friends, Gansey thought as he drove Blue from 300 Fox Way to Monmouth Manufacturing. The five of them were gathering for a night in to relax and blow off some steam. The plan was to drink and eat junk food and play stupid board games (and maybe some card games, so long as 0 tarot cards were involved), and stay up until the wee hours of the morning, and do absolutely nothing of consequence at all.
When the Pig pulled into Monmouth, Blue noticed that Ronan’s BMW was there, but Adam’s tri-colored vehicle was not. Ronan was on the couch when they got in, Noah wasn’t in sight, but Blue was pretty sure that he was lurking around somewhere.
“I thought you were getting Pizza?” Gansey asked Ronan, grabbing himself a beer before sitting down on the other end of the couch.
“The pizza’s not even ready yet,” Ronan told them. “You were just really quick picking up Blue.”
“I guess that did take less time than I’d expected,” Gansey conceded, shooting a pointed look in Blue’s direction. He hadn’t even knocked on the door yet when Blue had opened it, practically shoving him back down the walk towards the Pig in her haste to get away from 300 Fox Way.
The house had been feeling even more cramped than usual lately. They may have lost Persephone, but she hadn’t really taken up that much space to begin with. Their collective grief over her loss seemed to take up more space than the woman herself had when she was alive. Plus, they’d gained an Artemus; he didn’t really have any place else to go. Mr. Grey was sticking very close to Maura these days, too, which no one could really blame him for—except for Artemus, who got very peevish about Mr. Grey’s continued presence. Calla threatened daily to lock Artemus in the attic and throw away the key. She would have done it, too, but the attic was now the territory of a Welsh princess of very questionable sanity.
Gwenllian wasn’t helping the situation in any manner. Living in a crowded house with loved ones who understood and moved in sync with each other was completely different from living in a crowded house full of people who were at odds with each other and weren’t making any effort to change that. Thus, the moment Blue had heard the distant sound of the Camaro’s approach, she called out a quick goodbye to Maura, saying that she was heading to Monmouth for the evening, before bolting for the door. Maura hadn’t even protested, she understood her daughter’s desire to get out of the overstuffed house.
Blue plopped down on the couch, right next to Gansey, and slipped a flask out of her bag.
“You’re both drinking already?” Ronan protested. “Well now you’re just mocking me, because I still have to go get the pizza.”
“Would you rather I go get the pizza?” Gansey offered. “I’ve only had a couple sips of this.”
“No, no,” Ronan grumbled. “You already did your job.”
“What was your job?” Blue asked Gansey.
“I had Jane duty,” Gansey said with a smile. “Ronan has pizza duty, Noah’s job is snacks, and—”
“And Adam’s job is to get his ass here before the sun’s completely gone,” Ronan interjected.
Noah drifted in from another room just then, where he had apparently been doing something involving snacks.
“Ronan, you should probably head out to get the pizza now,” Noah said.
Ronan grabbed his keys and his jacket and was heading for the door when Blue asked, “Wait, what was my job for tonight, then?”
“Same as it is every night, to not kiss anyone who’s still alive,” Ronan told her before slamming the door behind him.
Blue glanced at Noah who just shrugged before drifting back out of the room. Blue had been playing with the lid on the flask, spinning it back and forth. Now she spun it all the way off and took a swig from it. The flask had been Persephone’s, Blue had found it amongst her aunt’s possessions and asked her mother and Calla if she could have it. Calla had said yes. Blue usually just kept tea in it, but she managed to sneak some tequila into it in preparation for this evening. Blue leaned on Gansey more heavily and put her head on his shoulder. Gansey put his arm around her like they were a couple of normal teenagers on a date at the movie theater. He tried not to be surprised when she didn’t shy away from him.
“So,” Gansey started tentatively, as he raised his thumb to press against his lower lip. “You’ve been a bit more, well, affectionate recently. With me.”
“Yeah,” Blue agreed plainly.
“Any particular reason for that, Jane?” He asked, trying not to sound nervous. It would have been easier to put on his Richard Gansey III voice, had her head not been so close to his heart. He was sure that she could hear it pounding in his chest.
“I—Adam,” she said simply. “I didn’t want to hurt Adam. Not more than I already had, at least.”
Gansey furrowed his brow, not quite understanding. “And you…don’t care about Adam’s feelings anymore? Or do you really believe that it only takes a matter of weeks to get over Blue Sergeant?”
Blue poked him on his cheek, high on his cheek bone next to his temple, giving a short little giggle of a laugh. She’d been doing this a lot lately, it meant ‘This is where I’d kiss you, if I could.’ “You’re so cute when you’re being thick,” she said.
Before Gansey could protest that he still didn’t know what she was talking about, but that he was glad to hear how cute she found him, the door was flung open to reveal Adam. Gansey quickly removed his arm from around Blue’s shoulders, but Blue stayed put, just lifting her head off of his shoulder and asking Adam how his day at work had been.
“Not too bad today,” Adam drawled, trying not to sound too exhausted. “It was work, I fixed a few cars, made a bit of money.”
As far as Gansey could tell, Adam had barely noticed that Blue was practically in his lap on the couch. Adam didn’t even bother to put down his bag or take off his jacket.
“Do you mind if I use your shower real quick, since the pizza isn’t here yet?” Adam asked, already moving towards the bathroom.
“Sure, go for it,” Gansey told him, trying to seem casual. Any time Adam seemed willing to accept anything from him, Gansey would eagerly jump at the chance to provide it.
“Don’t take too long,” Blue called out after him. “We won’t be waiting for you once the pizza gets here. You know how Ronan gets when he’s hungry.”
Adam definitely did not pause or flinch. Not at all.
It wasn’t long ago at all that Adam would have scowled and grumbled and raged at seeing Blue so close to Gansey like that. Now, though? Adam had more pressing concerns, like how he should have brought his own toiletries if he thought he might shower at Monmouth. He’d remembered to bring a fresh set of clothes to put on that didn’t smell quite so much like a garage, but he’d forgotten to bring his own damn soap. The shower had an assortment of high-end products that had Richard Campbell Gansey III written all over them, figuratively if not literally, and a single bar of plain soap you could pick up in any drugstore. Adam reached for the bar of soap and resolutely did not think about who else used this shower, and who that bar of soap did or did not smell like.
Adam needed to focus, he just wanted to wash the grease and grime off of himself as quickly as he could. If he took too long all of the pizza would be gone by the time he got out, and his stomach was painfully empty.
He knew that in his haste he hadn’t done a very good job of drying himself off thoroughly. His reward was that it looked like Ronan has just gotten back; everyone was still on their first slice of pizza. He grabbed a slice from the box and sat directly on the floor with his legs tucked under the coffee table, making sure to position himself so that his friends were mostly on his right, where he could hear them better. Gansey set an unopened bottle of beer in front of Adam on the coffee table. Adam nodded at Gansey in thanks, but he didn’t open it. Not yet.
Adam did not drink, except for that one time when he had, and that night hadn’t ended particularly well. When he finally got out of Henrietta, though, he wanted to be able to blend in with the people he wanted to be his peers. He didn’t want to awkwardly avoid alcohol his whole life, he wanted to be able to partake in moderation. For tonight, Adam has decided that he felt safe enough in his present company to ease up enough to have a drink. Or, at least, part of one. He would open one beer, and then nurse it for the rest of the night. Then, by the end of the night be would be sober enough that he could drive himself back to St. Agnes, and he wouldn’t have to stay at Monmouth. It would be fine, Adam kept telling himself. It would be fine.
“Nice of you to join us, Parrish,” Ronan said between bites.
“Hey, I got back before you did,” Adam retorted, deciding that maybe it was time to open that beer. Ronan was nearly done his first beer, Gansey’s was more than half gone, and who knew what Blue had in that flask of hers, or how much of it.
Ronan reached for a second slice of pizza as he watched Adam open his beer. It hadn’t escaped Ronan’s notice that Adam’s hair was still damp, or that he still had droplets of water on his skin, making his threadbare t-shirt cling to him in places. Ronan responded to this information by tilting back his neck to finish off his first beer. As he got another drink he turned his attention to Blue, who was taking a deck of cards and a box out of her bag.
“This deck has all 52 cards, I checked. It’s just a regular deck of playing cards as far as I can tell,” she explained.
“That’s good to know, I guess,” Gansey said with a nod.
“I also brought Clue,” Blue told them with a smile, holding up the box.
They played three games of Clue, with Gansey insisting that Blue play as Mrs. Peacock. She didn’t protest. The games went pretty quick, Gansey kicked their asses all three times. It looked like Noah might get there first on the last round, but Gansey won in the end.
“Take a drink every time Gansey’s right,” Ronan mumbled at one point. Adam was the only one who laughed, but Adam may have been the only one who heard him. He lift his bottle and drank a small sip anyway, as Ronan took a gulp of his own drink.
After that they switched to card games, with the dealer picking the game. Blue was best at Rummy, and Ronan won 5-card draw. Adam picked go fish and won. Noah picked hearts, but then had to sit out the next round when Gansey picked a game where that was played in teams, each player partnered with the person sitting across from them. Ronan and Gansey lost so badly that they insisted Adam and Blue must be cheating somehow.
“Seriously, do you have some sort of code or something?” Gansey asked.
“No, this is psychic bullshit,” Ronan insisted. “Fucking Magician and the Mirror.”
“Says the greywaren and the resurrected to the ghost,” Noah said. They wanted him to be the impartial judge, but he just wanted to stay out of it. They only played a few more hands of cards after that, then they tried to play Kings, but they quickly became too drunk to keep track of all of the rules.
At some point during the evening, Ronan and Adam started taking a drink every time Blue drew the jack of hearts, which was frequently, so they weren’t in great shape by the time they gave up on Kings and switched to plain old truth or dare.
Later, no one would be able to remember who suggested truth or dare. Everyone would insist that it wasn’t their idea. Not even Noah would know, despite not having drunk a drop in well over 7 years now. Apparently the idea manifested itself out of nowhere, and the game insisted it was to be played.
Blue had burrowed herself deeper and deeper into Gansey’s side the more she drank, leaving a wide space between Blue and Noah on the other end of the couch. Neither Adam nor Ronan were touching that spot on the couch, though. A punishment in Kings had made them squeeze into the armchair together, and now they were both enjoying their ample space on the floor.
Cabeswater was a dull thrum at the back of Adam’s mind tonight. Present, but not overwhelmingly so. Just simmering on the backburner, not strong enough or loud enough to pull focus from what he wanted to be paying attention to. He was used to this now, it was almost comforting, in a way.
Noah got to start the game, when he asked Ronan truth or dare, Ronan went with dare. “Let me drive the BMW around the block?” Noah said.
“How is that a dare?” Ronan asked.
“You have to watch, you don’t even get to be in the car with me,” Noah told him. “Blue will be with me, to make sure I stay around while I’m behind the wheel.”
“I swear Noah, if you fuck up my car—”
“What are you going to do to him?” Blue asked, cutting him off. “He’s already dead.”
“I will dig up your bones and piss on them, Noah Czerny!” They all laughed at Ronan’s futile rage as he handed Noah his keys. “You don’t even have a fucking license,” Ronan grumbled.
They all went outside, Gansey and Adam standing Ronan while Noah and Blue got into the BMW and did a few laps around the parking lot, and then the streets surrounding Monmouth Manufacturing.
When they got back, Noah and Blue laughing while Ronan scowled, Ronan dared Noah to jump out of the window and see how many flips he could do on the way down.
“Can I do it from the roof?” Noah asked. “I can probably get more in from up there.”
“Wait, how do you get up to the roof?” Blue asked.
Noah just shrugged, and suddenly wasn’t there anymore. When they turned back toward the building, he was standing at the edge of the roof. With very little ceremony, he jumped and twisted several times in midair before landing more or less on his feet. He stumbled a bit, almost falling over, before looking back at his friends and raising his arms up, as if to say “Ta-da!”
When they got back up to the apartment, Blue asked Adam to choose truth or dare. When he chose dare, Blue dared Adam to call Orla’s psychic hotline.
“How does this work over the phone?” Adam asked. “What am I supposed to say?”
“Just ask about something vague, and let her figure out the rest,” Blue said with a shrug. “Or you can ask her if her refrigerator’s running, it’s your dare.”
“Here, use my phone,” Ronan said, handing Adam the phone. Adam handed it off to Blue to dial the number, and then she put it on speakerphone and gave it back to him as it started ringing.
When Orla picked up, Adam immediately tried to disguise his voice, and ended up with something that sounded like a weird imitation of Gansey’s accent. He told her that he needed advice about his future, because he had some very important decisions to make soon. Orla tried to tell him that she could see something big on the horizon for his love life, but he cut her off, saying that the advice he needed was about school, and his future ambitions. No matter how hard he tried, Orla kept steering the conversation back to his romantic life. She finally told him that she couldn’t see far enough into the future to answer the questions he was asking, because there were things closer on his horizon that were clouding her vision.
Blue actually rolled her eyes when she said that phrase, clouding her vision.
“How much does that phone line charge, anyway?” Gansey asked after Adam had ended the call. “A dollar per minute?”
“It was for a good cause,” Noah said, smiling as Adam handed the phone back to Ronan.
Adam dared Blue to do an interpretive dance to the first song that came on shuffle on Ronan’s iPod.
“Can you dance, Jane?” Gansey asked, sounding slightly in awe of the glorious creature that was Blue Sargent.
“I can do a lot of things,” Blue replied, cryptically.
Ronan pulled out his iPod and plugged it into Gansey’s speakers as Blue reluctantly got up and stood in an open area near the couch to execute her dare. Ronan hit play, and Blue almost doubled over laughing as she heard the words squash one, squash two. She performed a terrifically weird dance to the entirety of the murder squash song, of all things.
When she was done with her dance Blue collapsed, exhausted, next to Gansey on the couch. The damn leather couch that she still held a grudge against, despite it being unfairly comfy. Perhaps even because it was so unfairly comfortable.
Gansey took his phone out, and Blue could see that he was clearly googling truth or dare suggestions, which she and Noah shamelessly mocked him for. After Ronan chose dare again, he dared Ronan to deliver a 3 minute lecture on “flirting for the modern teenager,” and to include diagrams.
Ronan rolled his eyes before getting up and going into his room. He came back with a notebook to draw his diagrams on, before he proceeded to deliver the entire speech as if he were his brother Declan, and stuffed the whole thing full of crass jokes, mostly at Declan’s expense, that had Noah in particular rolling with laughter.
It took them a few rounds to realize what was happening, as they completed dare after dare after dare. None of them had chosen truth, not once. They were all afraid of their secrets, and they were all afraid of the others finding out the truth. If someone were to ask the exact right question—or, the exact wrong question, as it were, everything could fall apart.
The last proper dare was when Noah dared Adam to see how many marshmallows he could fit in his mouth at once. Which led to Gansey being dared to eat one of the marshmallows that had been in Adam’s mouth, while Blue dared Noah to see how many spoons he could fit into his mouth at once.
Noah shrugged an told her that he didn’t think there was enough silverware in the building to really give that dare a fair shot, which led Ronan to laughingly dare Gansey to go buy a set of silverware, just for the guy who doesn’t eat.
They had all collapsed into fits of laughter, due to one dare or another.
When all of the laughter had finally died down, Gansey asked “Are we drunk enough to bring out Risk yet?”
“No!” Adam and Ronan shouted in protest.
Gansey slouched, deflating a bit. He was still smiling, though, still radiant. He had turned into a Gansey who was rumpled, attainable, and deliciously imperfect. This was not the Gansey that people were drawn to initially, this was the Gansey who kept people around for good. This was the Gansey who people fell in love with,
“Can we play pool?” Noah asked, brightening.
“You are still stunningly terrible at pool,” Blue pointed out.
“I know!” Noah agreed, grinning. “Can we play?”
*
As they reached the wee hours of the morning, everyone still living was getting drunker and sleepier. Adam was in the chair, with Ronan sitting on the floor with his back against the front of the chair, Adam’s legs next to him.
When Gansey noticed that Adam was nodding off in the chair, he was apparently the only one who hadn’t done the math. “Wait,” he said. “We have five people, three beds, and one couch.”
“Don’t worry about it Gansey,” Blue said, patting him on the chest next to where her head is resting. At some point, she had gotten cold and had then acquired one of Gansey’s ridiculous preppy sweaters. “It’ll sort itself out.” She already knew who would end up where, no psychic abilities needed.
“But no one’s sober enough to drive you home,” he protested. “And we don’t have enough beds.”
“But the beds we do have are awfully big,” Blue told him, smiling. “And technically, Noah’s sober enough to drive me home, I just wouldn’t trust him to get back without me sitting next to him.”
“I can take the couch I guess,” Gansey said. “So that you can take my bed, Jane.”
“What a gentleman,” Blue told him.
“I am a gentleman, aren’t I?” Gansey said, suddenly sounding so self-satisfied, that Blue couldn’t help but laugh, loudly, at how drunk he was, and at how amusing drunk-Gansey was.
Her laugh startled Adam awake, and he nearly kicked Ronan in the face. Ronan grabbed his leg and stilled it before standing up.
“Come on,” Ronan said to a very sleepy Adam. “You need to drink some water and go to bed or you’re going to be a wreck in the morning.”
“Naw, I’m fine,” Adam grumbled, as Ronan reached for him to try to help him out of the chair. Between the alcohol and the exhaustion, his Henrietta accent had become extra thick. “No one else is going to bed yet, I’ll be good for a bit longer.”
“No one else worked in a garage all day Adam,” Blue said. “Go on, we’ll be heading to bed soon, too.”
“I can just say here till you’re ready for bed then, and then I can take the couch.”
“Nope, you’re coming with me,” Ronan told him, finally grabbing hold of his forearms and pulling Adam up out of the chair. “Gansey’s called the couch, so that Blue can take his bed.”
“Oh, right. That’s a good plan,” Adam said, allowing himself to be pulled up. He leaned heavily on Ronan as they headed towards Ronan’s room.
“What about you, Jane?” Gansey asked. “You ready to call it a night yet?”
“Nope!” she said, picking up a bottle cap and throwing it at Noah.
“Hey! What was that for?” Noah exclaimed.
“That was me declaring War,” Blue said, grabbing the cards from the table and deftly cutting the deck.
She turned toward him and they played War on the couch cushion between them. Gansey was content to lean his head against Blue’s back for a few minutes, feeling her move as she laid down her cards, then reached and gathered them back to her. Then he decided he wanted to watch the game as well, so he wrapped his arms around her waist from behind and hooked his chin over her shoulder to watch as well. It looked to him like she was winning.
Or at least she had been winning; the tide began to turn a few minutes later. “You’re very distracting, Gansey,” Blue protested, squirming. “You’re making me lose.”
“Sure, blame it on Gansey,” Noah said with a smirk. “Definitely not because you’re drunk and tired, and your opponent neither drinks nor sleeps.”
“Besides, isn’t War mostly luck anyway?” Gansey said.
Both Blue and Noah gasped very dramatically.
“How dare you say that about the most strategical of all games of strategery!” Blue exclaimed in mock outrage. She turned to Noah and said “We should leave him here and continue to strategize in his bed without him.”
“Wait, what was that about Noah in my bed? Noah has his own bed!” Gansey protested.
“But Noah is the perfect snuggle buddy,” Blue said. Then she stage-whispered, “Because I can’t kill him,” she giggled.
Noah sighed, “I miss being able to get drunk.”
“If Noah is in my bed, and I’m out here, then Noah’s bed will be empty,” Gansey realized. “Adam could have slept there. Should we go tell him?” Gansey stood, looking towards the bedroom doors, like he was planning on going over there.
Blue grabbed his hand and pulled him back down to the couch. “Don’t you dare go over there,” Blue told him sternly.
Gansey still looked confused, Noah just rolled his eyes and said “Adam is perfectly fine where he is, don’t worry about him. He doesn’t want to sleep in the dead guy’s bed.”
Blue just nodded in agreement. Noah frequently seemed omniscient. All-seeing, if not all-knowing. This was not a particular ability that came with being dead, he merely had the dual advantages of being very observant and frequently unobserved.
“Yeah, I guess you guys are right, he’ll be fine with Ronan,” Gansey conceded. “Like you said earlier, Ronan’s bed is plenty big. Plus he’s so wiped from work he’s probably out cold by now. We wouldn’t want to wake him.”
Blue laughed again, and started poking him all over his face, saying, “You are so, so oblivious sometimes.”
Gansey retaliated by poking Blue first in the face and then on her sides. The poking turned to tickling, which led to Blue laughing until she was nearly screaming. When they stopped, Noah was nowhere to be seen.
“He probably went to his room,” Blue said quietly. Every noise sounded tremendous in the sudden silence.
“Yeah, you should probably go to bed now, too.”
They leaned their foreheads against each other, feeling like they could stay like that for eternity if they felt so inclined.
They leaned away from each other again, and Gansey put his finger in the center of her warm forehead where his had just been. “This is where I would kiss you goodnight if I could,” he whispered.
Their faces were close enough that she could smell the mint on his breath, still present under all the alcohol. The way he was looking at her, she’d only ever seen that look in his eyes, that look of insatiable wanting, in regards to Glendower. To see it directed at herself was intoxicating. She didn’t want to leave him, but she consoled herself with the thought that she was heading towards Gansey-scented sheets.
“Goodnight,” she said, getting up. “See you tomorrow.”
“See you tomorrow,” Gansey said back, watching her as she went towards his bed, and he had to stay there, without her.
As she’d expected, Noah appeared standing next to Gansey’s bed when Blue got there.
“Are you sure you still want me here?” he asked. “Or would you rather be alone?”
She went over to him and wrapped him in a hug. “Yeah, I still want you here,” she said, and then she leaned over until they toppled over sideways and landed on the bed.
She rolled over so she was facing away from Ronan’s bedroom door. Noah patter her head, and then wrapped an arm over her side, and she held his cold hand.
“I didn’t ask you if you wanted to be here, did I? I don’t want you to feel like a consolation prize or something just because I can’t—because I can’t have—”
“Don’t worry Blue, I know exactly what this is. I’m comforting a lonely friend, because that’s what friends do, isn’t it?”
“You’re the best dead friend a cursed girl could ask for.”
“Shh, go to sleep Blue. We’ll all be here when you wake up.”
*
After Ronan had made sure that Adam drank a full glass of water, and they’d both brushed their teeth and peed one last time, they went back to Ronan’s room, and he closed the door. He went to his dresser to grab something to sleep in, then paused.
“Did you want to borrow something to sleep in?” he asked Adam.
“What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?”
“You’re going to sleep in your jeans?”
Adam looked down at himself and shrugged before unbuttoning his jeans and letting them fall to the floor. “Now I’m good,” he said.
“If that’s how you want to play it, then,” Ronan mumbled before taking off his own jeans so they were both left in their boxers and t-shirts. Adam didn’t even notice, he was too busy flopping face-first onto Ronan’s bed, arms spread wide like he was trying to hug the bed.
“Your bed is so much comfier than mine is. I just want to stay here forever,” he said, voice muffled by the pillow he was speaking into.
“Fine with me, so long as you leave a little space for me,” Ronan said. He didn’t want to lay on top of Adam’s arm, but Adam’s arms spanned the entire bed, so Ronan just lifted Adam’s arm up, crawled into bed underneath of it, and then dropped it back down. Adam just drew the arm tighter around him. He was laying on his stomach, facing away from Adam. It wasn’t as awkward as it could have been, possibly because Adam was still on top of the covers.
Ronan was staring to think that he could probably fall asleep like that, when Chainsaw broke the silence with a loud “Kerah!” from the corner, just to remind everyone that she was still there. He hated her a little bit for a second.
Adam had been half asleep, but he jerked back into full wakefulness when Chainsaw cried out. He was still a bit drunk, since his lack of experience with alcohol meant that he was very much a lightweight. Ronan had definitely had more to drink, but Adam seemed to be more affected. Ronan was more used to being drunk, though. Everyone was more used to Ronan being drunk.
The good news was that Adam was apparently a sleepy, snuggly, happy drunk. If you could even call him drunk, that is. Adam hadn’t actually had that much to drink, especially not by Ronan’s standards. It didn’t seem like Adam had ever actually hit drunk, he had just gone straight from tipsy to drowsy.
“My toes are cold,” he complained quietly.
“Then get under the covers, dipshit,” Ronan grumbled, still facing the opposite direction.
Adam got under the covers and pulled them up until her was covered up to his neck. He was laying on his back now, staring up at the dark ceiling. “Noah doesn’t sleep,” he said, suddenly. He felt the bed shift a little as Ronan turned to face him.
“No, he doesn’t. What does that have to do with anything?”
“I could have slept on the couch, and Blue could have slept in Noah’s bed. Or I could have slept in Noah’s bed if Gansey insisted on the couch, Noah doesn’t need it.
“Did you really want to sleep in the dead guy’s bed?” Ronan asked.
“Hey, Noah’s our friend,” Adam protested, finally turning his head to face Ronan. Ronan just raised his eyebrows at Adam. “Okay, no, I didn’t. It’s a little creepy.”
“Yeah, well neither did Blue,” Ronan said. He swallowed, and took a breath before he finally asked the question that he couldn’t keep down any longer, “Do you not want to be here? You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”
Adam turned his head to the ceiling again. Ronan’s gaze felt very intense in the dim of the room.
“No, I don’t want to go leave,” Adam admitted, softly.
They were quiet for several long moments.
“You’re still drunk,” Adam said.
“Yes, I am,” Ronan confirmed.
“I’m not sober, either,” Adam continued.
“No, you’re not.”
“We should go to sleep now.”
“Probably should,” Ronan agreed.
They didn’t go to sleep.
*
“I can’t fall asleep,” Blue whispered, she could still feel Noah’s cool arms around her, and she knew he was listening.
“I know,” Noah said, his voice right behind her ear. “I was wondering when you’d give up.”
“I just can’t sleep knowing he’s right over there.”
“Makes sense,” Noah agreed.
“But I can’t tell him to come here,” she continued. “Sleeping in his bed with him in his bed feels too…intimate at this point.”
“Seems wise,” Noah agreed. “I guess there’s only one thing left to do.”
Blue sighed heavily, sitting up. “Wish me luck?”
“Good luck,” Noah said, giving her a peck on the cheek.
Blue stood up, taking the blanket with her, wrapped around her shoulders like a cape, and went back over to the couch area.
She didn’t have to say a word. Gansey wasn’t sleeping either, and he opened his eyes when he heard her coming. He started to sit up, but she gestured for him to stay where he was. She shoved him lightly in the center of the chest, and he scooted back into the cushions further to make room for her. He lifted his blanket for her to get under. She was still wrapped in the blanket she’d brought down with her, and wrapped in two layers of blankets she was very cozy. When Gansey wrapped his arm around her and hooked his chin over her shoulder, she immediately felt her breathing slow and match his as they drifted off to sleep together.
*
“Fuck it,” Adam said, turning and pulling Ronan’s face towards his. He hesitated for a fraction of a second, wanting to give Ronan a chance to pull away. Ronan just reached for Adam’s shoulders and pulled him in tighter as their lips finally connected. Adam had no clue what he was doing, but he wasn’t sure Ronan knew much better; their kisses were clumsy, but fierce. Ronan pulled back for a moment, just staring at Adam, before grinning wickedly and rolling them so that he was on top of Adam, kissing him again, kissing along his jaw and down his neck as Adam laughed. His laugh held joy, it held euphoria, and it held relief.
“I swear Ronan Lynch, if I wake up with hickeys tomorrow morning—”
“You’ll what?” Ronan asked tauntingly, sitting up, straddling Adam so that he was sitting on Adam’s lap.
It was Adam’s turn to grin before flipping them, so that he was on top. He nipped at Ronan’s earlobe before kissing his way down Ronan’s neck.
“Shit, Adam,” Ronan swore under his breath. “Here I thought you were new at this.”
“Maybe I’m a quick learner,” Adam murmured into Ronan’s neck, then moved up and whispered into Ronan’s ear, “Or maybe I just have a good teacher.”
*
All they really did that night was make out. It was enough, they would have plenty of time for more. They rolled apart panting and laughing, hearts still racing. Adam sighed contentedly.
“Big spoon or little, Parrish,” Ronan said, only half kidding.
“Either is fine,” Adam answered, eyelids heavy again already. He was too exhausted to care whether Ronan was being sarcastic or not.
Ronan turned toward Adam, and Adam rolled away from him, with his good ear facing up. Ronan put an arm around Adam, pulling him in tight.
“You’ve known,” Ronan said quietly. “You’ve known I like you for a while now.” It wasn’t a question.
“Yeah,” Adam said. “I have.”
“So, why now? Why tonight?” After spending so much time silent, it felt freeing to finally be able to talk about this, to say it out loud.
“I don’t know if you’re going to like the answer to that.”
“Try me.”
“Well, I was thinking about Blue and Gansey,” Ronan groaned and Adam could feel him loosen his grip. He grabbed Ronan’s arm before he could pull away, and held it close to his chest. “No, hear me out,” he protested. “I was thinking about their situation, Blue’s curse and everything, about how it’s so obviously clear that they’re into each other, but they can’t even kiss or Gansey could literally die. It’s like the ultimate ‘What have I got to lose?’ What would happen if I kissed you? Would I die? Would you? No. So, then it’s worth it. The worst that could happen isn’t really the worst, is it?”
“Good answer, Glad that stupid curse was good for something.”
“Shut up, Ronan,” Adam laughed.
*
Gansey was the first to wake the next morning, followed quickly by Blue, since Gansey couldn’t really move without disturbing her. He decided to go out to get doughnuts. Blue decided that she’d stay there to keep Noah company, and suddenly Noah was right there, smirking at them. Noah started a pot of coffee brewing while the waited; he liked to be helpful even if he couldn’t drink it.
“Look, it’s fair trade,” Noah said to Blue, showing her the bag.
“Yeah, I think Gansey may have mentioned something about that once or twice,” Blue said, smiling and rolling her eyes.
The smell of the coffee must have woken Adam, because a few minutes later Adam was coming out, dragging Ronan with him. They both wore sweatpants that they hadn’t been wearing the night before, and Adam’s didn’t quite fit him properly. Blue and Noah shared a knowing look. They took their coffee to the couch to wait for Gansey. Adam and Ronan were sitting close to each other on the couch, and Ronan’s arm was slung across the back of the couch as they sipped their coffee. Blue was sitting in the armchair, and Noah was hovering nearby.
Gansey returned, triumphantly holding the box of doughnuts aloft. Then he paused as he took in the scene; he looked confused for a split second, before he started banging his head against the door jamb.
“Have I mentioned lately that you’re incredibly oblivious?” Blue asked, barely bothering to look at him. She then turned to the boys on the couch, “Oh, and Ronan, you have a little something right here,” she said, gesturing to a point on her neck just below the ear. The corresponding spot on Ronan’s neck was home to a giant purple hickey.
“I hate you all,” Gansey said. “I’m keeping all the doughnuts for myself.”
He didn’t.