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The smell of oatmeal boiling in almond milk mixed up with the smell of fresh daffodils on the windowsill.
It signifies new beginnings, Kris told him one day when he showed up with a bouquet fresh off the farmer’s market. Damon just nodded and kissed him as softly as he could muster, knowing how much it had meant to Kris, being able and allowed to start anew.
It wasn’t even 7am yet, but Damon’s apartment… Their apartment, he had to remind himself; it’s been months since he’s allowed himself to share his safe space with someone, fully, since he realised that for the first time in years he could allow himself to feel vulnerable without it signifying a step back in his recovery, and still he couldn’t fully grasp the meaning of that one simple word:
Theirs.
In the end, it was easy, really. Small moments of unintentional confessions and laughing long into the night without a single thought aimed at something stronger to pick up the atmosphere made it so, so simple to let Kris in. It was never a question of whether he had ulterior motives, of whether he was to be trusted or not.
All it took in the end was one look, one smile, one time he touched Damon then quickly moved his hand, as if unsure he was crossing a line to cement it:
He was it. He was everything.
Their apartment was already brimming with life, and for the first time in years, there was a routine to the life inside it. No sleepless nights and late mornings spent chasing the high of a new muse; not now that he was lucky enough to have one sharing his plates, his living room, his bed at night.
Ever since Kris moved in, there was a routine to it all, but not the boring, been-together-too-long-and-forgot-to-have-fun kind. Evenings were for them and them alone; nights were for sleep and activities that kept them from it; mornings were calm and slow and soft and an introduction to a brand new day in which each will be doing his own job, but with endless support from the other.
Only Kris wasn’t usually up this early; if anything, Damon would usually wake up first, brew them both tea, remembering with fondness how Kris told him ages ago everyone always brewed him coffee in the morning because it was pretty much a given in Slovenia. Damon knew what and who “everyone” was but chose to stay silent, and was rewarded with a grateful:
“They never really asked, you know. You did. And I did always prefer tea.”
Strawberry cinnamon for Kris and black tea for Damon, that was the usual routine, and that’s what Kris would wake up to, his hair sticking in all directions, and all these mornings later, Damon still thought how he could immortalise him in photographs day after day, without so much as looking at anyone else, because how could anyone else ever compare?
And every morning, without fail, Kris would look at that cup of tea like he was in pure shock that someone would care so much as to put a teabag of his favourite taste inside hot water.
Those were the moments Damon knew he wanted, needed to worship him forever, to make up for all the years “everyone” hadn’t.
Sneaking behind his lover, he encircled his waist and was greeted with a startled smile. Soon enough, Kris relaxed in his embrace and moaned softly and appreciatively as Damon kissed his neck.
“You’re up early”, he noticed, and Kris merely shrugged.
He opened his mouth as if to say something, then shook his head.
“It would have been our anniversary today. Umpteenth, given how long I’ve known him.”
Damon thought the head shake from before was the result of Kris wanting to hide it, say he just couldn’t sleep, but thought better of it, trusting Damon to accept Kris’ sadness and nostalgia as a part of his previous life, one he would never erase, but one that simply wasn’t his to live anymore.
He held him tighter as he asked:
“How are you feeling?”
Kris took in a deep breath before responding.
“Oddly calm. At peace. A part of me feels bad about it, too; how could I be feeling so over something… someone who has shaped so much of my life? Who’s known me through my growth spurts and acne and highs and lows, who wrote love songs with me and held me through life for a decade?
Do I even have the right to be over it all so quickly?”, he asked, as if genuinely unsure of the answer.
Damon turned him around gently and took his face inside his hands. Kris leaned into the touch, closing his eyes, and with a pang to his heart, Damon saw a single tear glistening at the corner of his eye.
He didn’t want to wipe it; not quite yet, not before he asked what he needed to ask.
“Do you ever regret it, darling? Leaving it all behind? Not just him, but… all of them? The entire life you’ve known for so long?”
He felt Kris’ body stiffen, then relax, as if he’d finally found enough oxygen to breathe.
“I thought I would. For a while, I cursed myself, had no idea how I’d live without them, without that excitement, without living packed together in miniature spaces and knowing each little part of each others’ lives.
And then instead, I just felt… different. Free. Me.
So, no. I really, really don’t. It’s run its course. We’ve run our course, and I’ve outgrown us, and all of it. It was time for me to be me, not a part of “us” anymore”
he admitted, and Damon knew the “us” meant both the two of them and the five of them, and he was only aware of how hurtful it might sound after he’d said it, as honestly and genuinely as he could:
“I guess I got lucky, then, that he couldn’t give you what you needed in the end.”
He saw Kris’ face drop and was about to fall to his knees and ask for forgiveness for his mindless words when a shy, sad smile curled his lips upward.
“I guess you did. And I guess I did, too. I never knew, until you showed up, what it meant to be loved without looking over your shoulder the entire time, turning every truth into a joke. And the worst thing is, if you hadn’t showed up, I might have kept living like that for a long while, believing I didn’t deserve better after all.”
Damon’s heart fell apart at the words, at the reminder that this gorgeous soul had to hide himself away for so long, believing that’s all that love had in store for him; that he didn’t deserve to be worshipped and kissed where everyone could see and where they simply wouldn’t care.
And not for the first time, he knew he would do anything, everything he could to love and adore Kris every minute of every day.
He leaned in for a kiss, and Kris accepted it readily, sighing into it, holding Damon close, as if to tell him he never wanted to let go.
Damon made a mental note to always make sure there were camellias and hollys aplenty in their home; that Kris would wake up to the smell of love, devotion, adoration, and peace in his own home always.
And in a few short months, when their own first anniversary came to pass, he had a feeling others would fade; an old life, an old flame running its course to give birth to something new and better and richer.
Something real.