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Niko was sitting in a jacuzzi in the middle of the woods on Christmas Eve with Joonas’ hands stroking his cock when suddenly he couldn’t breathe.
It was as if someone had wrapped a hand around his face, which was impossible, because Joonas’ hands were still wrapped around his dick, and there was no one else with them except for the shopkeeper from Niko’s favourite bookstore who was sitting opposite them, both his hands holding the newspaper he was reading. Niko tried to scream for help, but neither of the men seemed to pay attention to him, one of them being engaged with getting him off, the other studying the share prices of the day. The weight on his mouth and nose was pressuring and Niko realised that if he couldn’t get some air soon, he would pass out.
”Mmmmmppppffffpfpmmpfpfpmmmm! ”
Then there was the faint sound of flushing the toilet, a soft woops, and the pressure from his face was lifted, allowing Niko to gasp his lungs full of sweet, sweet air. As he blinked, he realised he was not in a jacuzzi, it was not Christmas Eve, and Joonas hands were not touching him; instead, he was lying in his bed on a Tuesday morning and Joonas’ hands were gently holding Rommi above Niko’s face.
"Morning, babe," Joonas said sleepily and set Rommi down on the bed in between them before slumping on the mattress himself. Immediately the cat crawled back to Niko’s face, and his hands were not quite as gentle when he shoved Rommi away in an attempt to keep it away from his airways.
”Jesus, you tryna kill me or what?” he mumbled to the cat, but smiled fondly when it pushed its furry forehead against Niko’s cheek and made a low purring noise. His smile widened when he felt warm fingers pet his bare tummy. Then he recalled his ridiculous dream and started shaking from laughter.
“What?” Joonas asked with a hint of confused amusement in his voice.
“Mmmmh, nothing,” Niko smiled as he stretched his arms above his head. He didn’t want to give Joonas any ideas: one time when they were walking home from a dinner date, Niko made the mistake of looking at a long, faux fur coat on the window of a fancy fashion store a little too long (and when he says 'fancy' he means way fancier than either of their B-list YouTuber’s earnings could pay for), and sure enough, on his next birthday he found the very same coat inside an equally luxurious velvety gift box waiting for him on his bedside table. Sure, Niko loved the jacket and wore it even when getting milk from their local grocery store, but he was certain that if he was to as much as mention the jacuzzi, Joonas would make it his personal mission to have one delivered at their door within the next 12 hours, never mind the fact they would have no room for an enormous bathtub in their two-bedroom apartment.
Joonas made a whining noise and Niko turned his head to see the man putting on his best pouting face, which, as ridiculous as it was, had the power to make Niko give in within nanoseconds.
“Just had a fun dream,” he said and sank his hand into Joonas’ shaggy curls.
“Yeah? Was I in it?” The pout changed into a smug smile, because the fucker knew he had a leading role in all of Niko’s fantasies. (What he didn’t know, however, was that he was always the hero in Niko’s nightmares as well, the ones where he was stumbling in the darkness all alone, seemingly moving forward but never getting anywhere, right until Joonas appeared with a lantern and a hand to hold just before the black nothingness cornered him to a dead end. Before Niko knew Joonas, those dreams rarely had a happy ending.)
Niko said nothing, only raised an eyebrow and jerked just in time when Rommi’s paw tried whacking it erratically. Triumphantly Niko stuck his tongue out to mock the cat for its failure, mere millimetres away from having Rommi sink its sharp claws on it before tucking it back in the safety of his mouth with a giggle.
"So. What’s the plan today?" Joonas asked and pinched Niko’s side a little too forcefully for it to be flirtatious. Niko repressed the urge to roll his eyes; over the few years they had been an item, Joonas had gradually accepted the fact he’d have to share Niko’s affection with someone else most of the time, but Niko could tell it sometimes irked Joonas that the ‘someone else’ was a cat . Little did Joonas know that the two loves of Niko’s life had quite a bit in common, actually: the way they squinted grumpily when they were forced to wake up earlier than they’d prefer to, the pleading look in their eyes when they wanted one more kiss to the forehead, how their hairs were the softest things Niko had ever touched in his entire life, and how they both made Niko feel so heart-wrenchingly loved when they laid their heads on Niko’s lap, lying on their worn out divan on Sunday evenings, and dozed off as he petted them absentmindedly, wondering how in hell he ever got so lucky in life that he ended up with not only one but two soulmates.
(And, if Joonas was bendy enough, Niko was certain that he, too, would lick his own balls like Rommi.)
Niko brushed the stray thoughts out of his brain and shrugged.
“Guess we should film that Halloween video,” he sighed. They had made plans to do it the previous week already, but Joonas had had the sniffles and Niko had been occupied with his uni assignments, and then came the weekend, along with helping Niko’s cousin move houses and a double movie date with Olli and Tommi (Joel had been there too, actually, seated on the opposite side of the cinema, as he always did nowadays whenever he accompanied them, claiming he would rather stab his eyes with the straw that came with his large Coke than willingly witness Niko and Joonas getting a little too handsy with each other in the back row again, even though that had happened literally once and, in their defense, the cinema had been basically empty, so really there was no harm done (BUT I WAS THERE RIGHT NEXT TO YOU, Joel had screamed at them afterwards, but that seemed more like Joel's problem than theirs – he could have very easily changed seats if he had wanted to)). Since Mondays were always their days off, because Mondays sucked, the filming of their annual Halloween video, long-awaited by their loyal subscribers, had to be postponed to Tuesday.
“Your channel or mine?” Joonas asked with a yawn and Niko snorted; as if it made a difference these days, considering they rarely made videos individually anymore.
"I don’t know, yours? We did the last challenge on mine," Niko replied and chuckled at the memory of their latest video My Cat Picks Out My Makeup. Although Rommi was litearally a domesticated animal, Niko couldn’t help but wonder if it had known exactly what it was doing when it picked the pinkest shade of blusher for Joonas’ sweet cheeks.
”Alright,” Joonas agreed. His hand was still doing circles on Niko’s stomach, travelling lower and lower with every agonizingly slow movement. The memories of the dream he just had – the moments before he was almost suffocated to death, that is – returned to Niko’s mind, bringing a menacing smile to his lips as they did.
”There’s no rush though,” he said and subtly shifted his pelvis. Joonas’ hand movements immediately became more determined and urgent, his fingers deliberately brushing Niko’s tighs. ”We have the whole day ahead of us, don’t we?” Niko continued and raised an eyebrow.
Thankfully, Joonas had always been good at taking even the most finest of Niko’s hints.
“Meow. ”
Niko glanced at Rommi sitting on the floor next to the kitchen counter, staring at him as he was preparing himself a breakfast.
“What?”
“Meow!” the cat repeated.
“I just filled your bowl, man, what more do you want?”
“Meow!” Rommi answered, a little more insistently.
“You don’t even like coleslaw.”
“Meow.”
Niko sighed.
“Fine. Cheese?”
“Meow!”
“Here you go.” Niko dropped a small slice of cheese on the floor. The cat looked at the offering for a few seconds before looking up at Niko again.
“Meow!!”
“I’m not giving you my hot dog,” he said firmly, which did nothing to stop Rommi from jumping on the kitchen table and giving him the evil eye the whole time he was eating his breakfast, to the point Niko started wondering if he should start sleeping with one eye open at night.
Just when Niko had finished eating, Rommi’s glimmering eyes following his every move, Joonas’ voice called for him from the other side of the apartment.
“Alright, everything’s ready!”
Rommi zoomed to the living room as Niko joined Joonas in their bedroom that doubled as the filming room.
“Take a seat,” Joonas said theatrically and guided Niko to sit on the chair in front of their shared desk, on which there was a big mirror leaning against the wall, with a camera balanced on top of it. The set-up was accident-prone for sure, but before Niko could comment on it, his eyes found the tutorial video Joonas was playing on his laptop. He frowned slightly before speaking.
”It’s not gonna work, bro.”
"Sure it will!”
”There’s no way it will.”
"Shut up or I’ll straighten your cock,” Joonas said and snapped the hair straighteners in his hands in front of Niko’s face.
Niko looked into the camera like he was in an episode of The Office.
They had made Halloween makeover collaborations before and the structure was always the same: first Niko would show how to make a ghostly glow-in-the-dark hair dye, a spider-web braid or some other spooky Halloween hairdo, followed by Joonas and his dramatic eye and nail art or some fancy Halloween costume. Although those videos were always the most anticipated ones among their subscribers, this year they felt like it was high time to spice things up a bit, and so Joonas came up with the idea to do exactly that but to each other this time (on the condition he could still do the nail art himself, which Niko was more than happy to agree to). It had seemed like a fun concept at the time (at half past eleven on a Saturday night), but about three seconds in the tutorial video Joonas was now watching intently as he started working Niko’s hair, Niko was already regretting the whole thing. It was clear that whatever Joonas had chosen for Niko’s makeover was way out of Joonas’ skill-level in hair styling as well as of Niko’s level of having enough hair to pull it off in the first place.
“Seriously, look at her hair! It’s, like, twice as long as mine and a hell of a lot thicker too, devil horn buns are not going to work, believe me, I’ve tried, ” Niko insisted, because he had, in fact, tried devil horn buns once for another Halloween-themed video a few years back and almost ended up shaving his whole goddamn head in frustration, because it was obvious that the texture of his hair was unsuitable for such coiffures. (Instead, he had ended up spelling “fuck this” with hair dye spray across his disheveled locks and called it a day. Incredibly enough, the video was still among his most viewed ones to this day.)
“Oh, ye of little faith! She said I can do it!” Joonas huffed and gestured towards the laptop screen where the tutorial lady was effortlessly whirling her hair on a neat, triangular bun.
"Ah, so you’d rather listen to her than me? I see how it is, go on then, we haven’t used the circus music on our videos in a while.” Niko folded his arms and communicated a silent ‘see what I have to put up with?’ with the camera.
“Besides, I’ve been practicing,” Joonas said smugly as he began combing Niko’s hair in two small sections above his forehead.
Niko snorted, knowing quite well there was no one in their friend group who’d allow Joonas’ hand anywhere near their scalp (at least not while sober), let alone have hair that would be even remotely long enough to be made into two, big horn-shaped buns on top of their head.
Unless...
Niko squinted his eyes.
“He wouldn’t let you,” he said incredulously. Joonas grabbed a red hair tie and smiled his signature crooked smile.
“He did, though.”
"Nuh-uh, the Joel I know would never let you do this to him, so what the hell did you put in his drink and where can I get that stuff too because boy do I need it right now, ” Niko scoffed, still not buying any of it, although he had to admit the mental image of sullen Joel sitting on a chair with two ridiculous-looking cones of hair sticking out of his head did amuse Niko to the extent he almost wished it was true.
“Clearly you underestimate my persuasion skills,” Joonas said and clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “All it took was one small favour and the Dark Lord of the pitch black paradise surrendered to my magic hands.” Then he wiggled his fingers, as if to demonstrate their supernatural qualities.
“Yeah? What kinda favour?” Niko inquired, now a little less amused than a second ago.
“Not that kinda favour, who do you take me for?” Joonas exclaimed, supposedly offended, but the grin still on his face gave him away.
“I take you for exactly who you are: the twerp who was offering to pay his debts with handjobs when we last played Monopoly,” Niko remarked and almost spoke again to inform Joonas that the piggytail on the left side of his head was going to be a lot lower than the one on the right, but decided against it and let Joonas do his thing in peace, if he so insisted. At least it would make a funny video, Niko supposed; he had begun to suspect that half of their subscribers were more invested in their banter and interpersonal communication anyway, rather than their actual content (which didn’t really bother Niko in the slightest – as long as people found their videos entertaining, he wasn’t too interested in why they watched them).
“You’re just sour because you were stuck in jail the whole game,” Joonas shrugged and shook a hair spray bottle. “Okay, I’m gonna make the horns now, and what’s important, dear viewers,” Joonas was now addressing the camera, “is that you make them...horny.”
“Oh, thank god, you finally got that out of your mouth, you’ve been waiting to make that pun the whole video, haven’t you? Is that why we’re doing this?” Niko scorned.
The viewers might not notice anything was off, but the way Joonas’ laugh was a little too short and how his reply came after a half a second’s hesitation had Niko realise his comments may have been a tad too spiteful this time. That realization and the faintest drop of Joonas’ stunning smile almost made Niko jump out of his chair to take the blond in his arms and tell him, show him that regardless of his complaining, they could offer Niko a five billion bucks a day to make any kind of content he ever wanted to, and he would still choose to be right where he was now, with Joonas’ fingers playing with his hair, the deep blue lakes of his eyes looking into Niko’s via the mirror. He didn’t, though, as Joonas chirped back:
“Naww, don’t worry, babe, I can make you horny too when we're finished,” he winked.
Niko rolled his eyes, but it proved his point flawlessly: he wouldn’t change Joonas and his filthy mouth for the world. (He’d make sure to tell him later.)
“Yeah, whatever. You’re gonna need to use way more hairspray than that though,” Niko ordered, receiving only a nonchalant pfffffft in repsonse as Joonas started swirling one of Niko’s pigtails.
Well, at least he tried.
Over the years Niko had known Joonas, he had noticed there were several different versions of the man. Some of them Niko didn’t mind having to share with everyone else, such as the one that cracked the most absurd jokes after one too many beers, or the one that came up with the craziest of schemes to pass the time on a lazy summer afternoon. And then there were the versions Niko hoped to keep only to himself: the Joonas that drew hearts on Niko’s back in the morning when he thought Niko was still asleep, the one that kept slurring adorable nonsense in Niko’s ear when he was sleep-deprived, or the one that had smiled at him almost shyly from the other side of the dining table when he had surprised Niko by cooking him his favourite dinner for their anniversary.
(Or at least there had been a definite effort to cook, which was more than enough in Niko’s eyes.)
Among the latter was the version of Joonas now, looking at Niko via the mirror, admiring the work of his own hands. He was all but beaming with evident pride, his eyes brighter than all the suns in all the galaxies combined, and Niko almost felt like turning off the camera, just so they could have this moment all to themselves.
Because, Niko had to admit, the end result of the makeover wasn’t all too bad. The devil horn buns turned out better than what Niko had feared, even if they were somewhat uneven, one slightly bigger than the other, and the left one just about to fall apart. Joonas had even invested on red hair spray to finish them up, and together with the black lipstick and the smoky eye shadow Joonas had put on him, the look was rather bitching, in fact.
“I call it The Devil Wears Checkered Vans,” Joonas said contently. Niko flipped him the bird but laughed nevertheless.
“Alright, your turn now, blondie.” Niko got up from his seat and turned to look at Joonas who was still radiating the light of a thousand stars.
“What have you got for me?” Joonas tilted his head like a puppy waiting for treats.
The whole world , Niko wanted to reply, but walked over to his backpack instead and took out a plastic bag containing the necessary equipment he had bought.
“Sit down and close your eyes.”
“Do I need to open my mouth too?” Joonas asked but did as he was told, so he didn’t see Niko shaking his head at the camera, rolling his eyes again, all the while smiling fondly.
This guy.
There was a lot of rustling and tearing of the plastic packaging (more than was actually necessary; it was all just to mess with Joonas a little) before Niko finally took out a bottle and gave it a fair shake.
“Keep your eyes closed.”
Then he sprayed Joonas’ hair until it was glowing with sparkly, golden glitter and, to give it the final touch, he clicked two hair clips near Joonas’ temple, with large, glittery bat silhouettes that he had ordered from Etsy weeks ago glued on them.
“Ta-daa,” Niko said in a sing-songy voice and failed horribly at suppressing his laugh when he saw the look on Joonas’ face once the man opened his eyes.
“Wait, that was it?! I was in for a nap, dude– woah,” he cut himself off mid-sentence, eyes the size of bread plates as he inspected his now glittering curls.
“I know right?” Niko said, lips pursed into a smile. It was by no means his most laborious makeover, nor necessarily the most impressive one either, but he had decided Joonas’ lion’s mane was already majestic enough to mess up (besides, Niko still received hate mail every now and then for the last time he did so).
“They’re like...flying in the stars or something…” Joonas touched the bat clip-ons, his eyes glimmering like those of a child on Christmas morning – another version of Joonas Niko would rather not share with anyone else, even though he knew he was being unreasonably greedy.
“Just wait ‘til you see the make-up I’ve planned for you," he said and gently tickled the soft hair at the back of Joonas’ neck before turning to his make-up palette and sitting down next to the man. It was simple enough: the eyeshadow was similar to what Joonas preferred to wear one their special nights out with friends, but from the corner of Joonas’ eye, Niko started drawing a simple silhouette of a bat, almost identical to the ones on the hair clips attached to Joonas’ curls.
“Sit still!” he commanded when Joonas kept trying to glance himself at the mirror to get a sneak-peak of what Niko was doing.
“Make me,” the man whispered and smiled a smile so bold, so alluring, that it made Niko set down the eyeliner pen, grab Joonas’ face with both hands and pull him into a long, lustful kiss.
Never mind he probably smudged eyeliner all over Joonas’ temple and would have to start again.
Never mind Rommi saw its moment and leaped on the makeup table, knocking over several bottles and jars as it walked across it.
Never mind the camera was still rolling, filming every second of the physical display of Niko’s affection towards his lover.
It did the trick, though: Joonas left Niko to finish his work in peace, interrupted only by a swift peck here, another there, so that when Niko was finally done with the little bat figures, both men were almost out of breath, their mouths on each other more than they were apart.
That’s when they actually did pause the recording for a while, both to prevent the video file becoming far too big to process, as well as to have a little break from filming to cuddle on the bed, legs tangled, fingers tickling in places reserved only for the other to touch, noses brushing, lips curving into smiles as they kissed. Niko was desperate to let Joonas know how there was no one he’d rather make silly YouTube videos with, how he wouldn’t want to share his life with anyone else in the world. Sometimes, when Niko flinched away when Joonas got too close to him on camera, Niko couldn’t help but wonder if Joonas thought if it was because Niko didn’t want him to, when in reality it was the only thing he wanted most days. He just wasn’t sure if he was willing to give it away for the public to view, even if everyone and their mother had probably figured it all out by now.
Once they had fed themselves with lingering kisses, eager touches and a few chocolate chip biscuits Niko’s cousin’s wife had made them as a thank you for helping them with the move, they proceeded with filming the final part of video: Joonas’ annual Halloween nail art tutorial. The excitement in Joonas’ eyes was adorably obvious as he set out bottles of nail polish in a wide range of shades on the small coffee table between them.
“Since we’re clearly going for a certain theme here, I’ve decided to try this pretty sick devil’s eye design this year,” he explained to the camera and gestured towards Niko, his devil horns now even more askew than they were before, and Niko smiled, fighting the urge to lean over and kiss him silly again, just because. When Joonas began working on Niko's nails, starting with removing his old nail polish (a cute rainbow pattern Joonas had wanted to test on him first before filming his previous tutorial), Niko’s fingers itched with how much he craved Joonas’ warm touch all over his skin.
After doing the priming, Joonas started adding the colour layers and leaned in closer to Niko’s hand to get a better view of the work. When he moved on to the smaller details and effects, he stuck his tongue out as he concentrated on painting with the tiny brush, careful not to misplace a single line or curve.
It made Niko almost burst with affection.
“You’re really cute, you know,” he said softly, deliberately keeping his volume low in case Joonas was going to keep that part in the final cut; not because Niko was ashamed of saying so, but because there was only one pair of ears meant to hear it.
“I know,” Joonas grinned, and Niko leaned his forehead against Joonas’, laughing quietly.
Of course you would.
“Meow,” Niko then heard, just barely, from somewhere on top of the cabinet behind his back.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re cute too,” he said a little louder, and Rommi responded with a slightly more content meow.
Later in the evening, Niko was lying on the sofa with Rommi on his chest, aimlessly browsing his phone with one hand, stroking the cat with the other, when he heard Joonas shout from the other room:
“Umm, Niko?”
“Yeah?”
There was a pause before Joonas continued.
“So, umm… D’you want me to cut the kiss off the video or..?”
Niko pursed his lips. He was fully aware that if only they possessed the gift of eyesight, each and every one of their mutual subscribers and casual viewers alike knew him and Joonas were a little more than roommates, a little more than friends who made YouTube beauty tutorials together. However, they had never really addressed it to their audience, never confirmed nor denied it; not that they were keen on hiding it (if they were, they wouldn’t have uploaded half of the videos they had on their respective channels of them all but flirting and eye-fucking each other), but because it was no one else’s business. That, and keeping their viewers on the edge about the nature of their relationship was sort of entertaining.
Nonetheless, it was bound to get old sooner or later, was it not?
“What do you reckon, buddy?” Niko asked Rommi who lifted its head and blinked at him lazily. “Should we finally spill it?”
“Meow.”
“You think so?”
“Meow!”
“Well. I guess that settles it.”
Two days later, Niko was on his only physical uni lecture of the week when he received a text from Joonas.
It’s up now.
Niko ignored his professor’s disapproving glare as he took out his phone and headed to Joonas’ YouTube channel. Seeing the title of his latest upload, Niko was filled with an inexplicable feeling, as if someone had rolled a rock off his chest.
MY BOYFRIEND DOES MY HALLOWEEN MAKE-UP, screamed the words on Niko’s phone screen, and he let out a relieved laugh, not caring if his coursemates thought he was a little funny in the head for laughing by himself in the middle of a boring lecture.
The video already had a few comments.
I mean, we been knew but OMG
AAAAAAAAAHHHH FINALLY, CONGRATS GUYS UR SO CUTE
anyone notice how their hair and makeup got all messy after the cut at 6:03? 😳
thank you for trusting us with this, we’re all so happy for you 🌈