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The sun is setting. Warm, orange light illuminates our two heroes as they continue their journey, side by side, with little to no distance between them. Joseph is jolly as per usual, unlike Caesar, whose expression remained blank.
They walked like this in comfortable silence, and though they wouldn't admit it out loud, they were enjoying each other's presence like this. There was always this unspoken tension between the two, one Joseph couldn't quite define, one neither of them mentioned. They expressed it through the tiniest affections, like bumping each other's shoulders once in a while, and Joseph noted how the other looked at him. He loved noticing the small things Caesar did.
He got particularly excited when the road they were taking had sunflower fields on each side.
Because that must've been the first time he saw Caesar smile with such genuinity and passion.
The blond kept looking from one side to the other, grinning broadly, with the innocence of a child in a candy shop. Quite frankly, he was a much more beautiful sight than the fields itself, at least to Joseph. Because this was different from the usual sneer he gave off, no, this was real bliss coming from Caesar. It struck the former with such elation, he simply had to break the silence.
"Look at these! They're beautiful! Do you like sunflowers too, Caesar?"
It was a question he knew the answer to, with the face Caesar had. But he was even more joyful when he received a nod in response. "Yes! Yes, I love them!" When Caesar loved something, he loved it with passion and pride.
There was a short pause while they kept on walking, until he continued, "did you know not all sunflowers are yellow?"
"Really? Is that so!" Joseph asked, eyes glued on the other male, interest piqued.
"Yes! There are red ones. As well as purple! Chianti Hybrid, I think they're called." He kept looking at the fields with glee, talking nonetheless. "Well, their petals are a sort of dark red, like wine, but they can look purple. Oh, but there are about 70 other types of sunflowers - have you ever heard of teddy bears?"
Joseph blinked with curiosity. "Yes, but what do bears have to do with sunflowers?"
To which Caesar laughed, genuinely, for the first time Joseph heard him do so, "no, you fool! There's a type of sunflower called the 'teddy bear sunflower', I got to see it in person! It was very fluffy! I never knew flowers could look so cuddly."
Just as Joseph didn't know Caesar could look so cuddly. But he expressed himself with his hands now, drawing out the shape of a sunflower, then fluttering his fingers as to show that it was, indeed, as fluffy as he said.
And Joseph never thought he'd be so interested in God damn flowers, but he wanted to know more.
"Tell me more, tell me more!" He pleaded. And Caesar happily obliged.
So now Joseph knew that a sunflower's head is made from thousands of smaller flowers, that there are also dwarf sunflowers, that young sunflowers always track the Sun until maturity, when they only face east. He didn't know what he'd need such information for, but when Caesar looked at him like that, smiling from ear to ear, he just wanted to know more and more.
The two kept walking, and Caesar's now cheery gaze followed Joseph every step of the way, tracking him like he was his Sun, and he was a sunflower.