Chapter Text
“Better once than never, for never too late."
William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew
Part 1: Carlos
“Carlos.”
“One second.”
“Carlos.”’
“Val, I’ve got twelve things in my hands right now.”
“Twelve?” His younger sister fixes him with a scowl. “You think that’s a little excessive? What’s the word— Hyperbolic?”
“That’s not how you pronounce it,” Carlos sighs, setting down various pieces of tableware. He’s unsure why their mother insists on cooking twelve different dishes and using the fancy cutlery for a simple family dinner. Maria’s fiancé is coming over, but he’s been doing that for the last five years. Carlos doubts Eren is going to get cold feet because he has to use a regular fork.
Carlos’ mother is one of the most kind and generous people he knows, but there are limits. Five different meats, for example, is excessive. Especially when there’s only six of them eating and the refrigerator has just been cleared of the festive season’s leftovers.
Valentina scoffs. “Okay, English major.”
“My major is history, you know that,” Carlos mutters. “And if you could keep your voice down about it—”
Valentina snickers. “History?” she asks, a facetious smile on her face. “I swear that’s known as pre-law.”
Carlos waves her off, unwilling to engage in a discussion about his future. Some of his family members – namely, his father – have strong opinions on it, and he doesn’t have the energy to engage today. “Well, I took the LSAT so—”
“Can you two stop muttering to each other?” a third voice calls, and Carlos turns on his heel to come face to face with his older sister, Maria. Her long, brown hair falls around her shoulders as she brushes it back, and as Carlos opens his mouth to say something, she shushes him with a dark look. “Dad is giving his opinion on the wedding again. Can you come and diffuse the tension between the groom and father-of-the-bride-zilla?”
“Ma told us to set the—”
“Let me do that,” Maria insists, practically wrenching the cutlery from Carlos’ hands. “You’re the best mediator in this family. Go, please. I beg you.”
“What about me?” Valentina cries. “I need Carlos for one second and you’re all up in his grill about—”
“What did you need me for?”
“Nevermind. I’ll ask later.”
“No, seriously, I—”
“I said nevermind!”
Carlos sighs and steps away from the table, heading towards the kitchen. Sometimes, he wonders whether having two sisters has helped him understand the world any better, because he often finds himself completely lost during their conversations. It seems as if half of it happens aloud, and the other half by telepathy.
He locates his mother and father in the kitchen, along with Maria’s husband-to-be, Eren. His mother is finishing up something on the stove, her face flushed from the steam, an errant curl stuck to her forehead. His father is gesturing about something in an animated way, and Eren looks extremely overwhelmed.
Eren has been part of this family for years now, but the impending nuptials – now only five months away – have dredged up a lot of opinions Carlos never knew his parents had. Eren is an only child, raised by a single mother on the outskirts of Austin. His father is Turkish and he has a large extended family abroad, but they’ve been out of contact for years, so the only large family events Eren has ever attended are those he’s been dragged along to by Maria.
Having never been to Turkey or spent much time with his father, Eren regularly insists that he doesn’t mind if there are no Turkish traditions at his wedding. Unsurprisingly, Andrea Reyes has gone to great lengths to understand every Turkish wedding tradition she can, trying to fit them alongside the non-negotiable Catholic ones.
In the end, they’ve agreed to a Catholic ceremony, probably attended by every single person Carlos’ mother and father have ever met, followed by a smaller reception at a local venue. There are Turkish drummers hired for entertainment, a red ribbon to be wrapped around Maria’s waist, and Valentina is insisting that Maria and Eren carry out the tradition of attempting to step on each other’s feet.
“I want to see it,” she insists, once Carlos has shepherded everyone towards the dinner table and diffused whatever passionate argument his father was making about table settings. “I’m still upset y’all didn’t do that thing with the salty coffee.”
“To be honest,” Eren replies, putting his fork down with a soft sound and picking up his water glass, “I don’t even know how to make Turkish coffee.”
“I’m sure we could learn,” Andrea says, looking a little stricken.
Maria scoffs. “Ma, he doesn’t want us to learn. The tradition is that the bride dumps salt in the groom’s coffee to test whether he has the right temperament.”
“Gross,” Valentina adds, fixing Eren with a dangerous smile. “We should do it.”
“It’s an engagement tradition,” Maria points out, taking a sip of wine. “Not a wedding tradition.”
Valentina shrugs. “Who cares. I just want to watch someone drink a salty coffee.”
“Find yourself a Turkish boy then,” Gabriel interjects, slicing a piece of beef.
Carlos looks down at his plate and tries to gather the strength to remain engaged in the conversation. He’s excited for his sister and his future brother-in-law, but every wedding related tangent leaves a strange taste in his mouth. After all, Carlos’ reality doesn’t involve bringing a Turkish boy home to meet his parents, much less his parents being involved in the traditions involved at his own wedding. Whenever Carlos thinks about his future, he thinks it looks a lot like being buried under his own repressed sexuality, smiling sadly at every well-meaning relative when they offer to set him up with a dwindling number of single women. Eventually, he figures he’ll get so depressed by it that he has to avoid family gatherings altogether.
His mother will never get the opportunity to research the wedding traditions of his future spouse, his father will never argue about his table settings, his sisters won’t try to put salt in his fiancé’s coffee. He can’t imagine a future in which he has the confidence to bring someone to Sunday lunch at Tía Lucy’s, let alone sit with his parents for hours and argue about a rapidly expanding guest list like Maria.
He tries to convince himself that he doesn’t want those things, anyway; that he’s happy being single. But the truth of the matter is that Carlos is an incurable romantic and of course he wants those things. More than anything, he wants someone to love him, and someone to let him love them back. He wants someone who will get along with his family and make his mother laugh and his father proud. Someone who will garner fond eye-rolling from Maria and merciless teasing from Valentina. Someone who will slot into the gaps in Carlos’ life and allow him to squeeze into their own, like two puzzle pieces cut out for each other.
It’s a dangerous thought, however. One that he doesn’t often let himself think, predominantly because it makes his reality too painful to bear.
“Carlos,” Valentina calls, breaking him out of his reverie. The two green beans on his plate look lonely in the expanse of white ceramic, and he wonders how long he’s been stuck in his thoughts for.
“Are you unwell, mijo?” his mother asks. “You’ve barely put any food on your plate.”
“Ma, he’s fine,” Valentina says, brushing off her concern. “Carlos, I need you to back me up.”
“Valentina,” Andrea chides. “Your brother cannot change your father’s rules.”
“But the rule is stupid,” Valentina protests. “Elijah and I have been dating for three months now!”
Maria scoffs. “It must be love,” she says derisively. “To put up with you for three whole months—”
“Maria,” Gabriel interjects sharply.
Carlos glances across the table at Eren, who is looking at his steak as if it is the most interesting thing in the world. Carlos doesn’t blame him.
“Mija, your sister already has a very extensive guest list,” his mother explains in a measured tone. “We can’t be adding too many additional people.”
Valentina makes a choking sound before her eyebrows knit together so intensely, Carlos wonders whether they can be unwound. “You invited everyone from your sewing club, Ma,” she points out. “Half of them wouldn’t even know Maria by name, much less Eren.”
“Please don’t take offence to that, Eren,” their father says, ignoring Valentina. “I’m sure Andrea’s friends are extremely grateful for the invitation.”
“None taken, sir,” Eren says hurriedly. Carlos wonders whether he’s going to finally get the invitation to call Gabriel by his real name once he’s married into the family. Then again, Carlos still calls his father ‘sir’ half the time, but he’s not sure whether that’s a rule or simply a reflex.
“Free drinks and food,” Valentina says darkly. “They better be grateful.”
“Valentina, that’s enough,” Andrea adds definitively, arching an eyebrow at her daughter. “Perhaps Elijah can come to the next family wedding. A lot of your cousins are reaching that age.”
Carlos tries not to dwell on his obvious exclusion from that group, even though most of their cousins are only one or two years older than him.
“I bet if Carlos had a boyfriend, he’d be invited,” Valentina snaps, before the entire table falls quiet.
There’s a moment where the silence hangs thick and heavy around the six of them, before Eren’s chair scrapes against the floorboards and he excuses himself softly, heading towards the bathroom. Carlos looks after him forlornly, before redirecting his gaze back down at his plate. He wishes he was quick enough to make a similar escape, but instead, he’s stuck under the gaze of four pairs of eyes, and all of the weight that comes with feeling like the family’s biggest disappointment.
“Well,” Andrea says slowly, her gaze burning a hole into Carlos’ cheek as he stares at the white porcelain and clenches his jaw. Something hot and itchy prickles in his throat, and, with a spark of horror, he realises that he might be on the verge of tears. “I suppose that would depend on how long Carlos had been with—”
“It’s an academic argument,” Maria declares, clearing her throat. “Carlos isn’t seeing anyone, are you?”
Carlos shakes his head and swallows, looking up at her. “No.”
“See?” Maria says, as if this covers up the big gay elephant in the room. “There’s nothing to worry about.”
Carlos wishes she knew how much he worried about it. He worries about it every single day. Sometimes, he thinks his assumptions might be uncharitable, because his parents have never said anything to suggest that they don’t support him. Then again, they’ve never said anything at all since he first came out to them, and he can’t shake the pervasive belief that as long as he doesn’t act gay, look gay, or do anything that would bring attention to his gayness, everyone will be better off for it.
When Carlos chances a glance further down the table, he finds his father staring at him with a pensive look on his face. His stomach flips uncomfortably at the sight.
“You may have a point, Valentina,” Gabriel says seriously, placing his knife and fork back down on his plate and clasping his hands together on the table. “If Carlos were dating someone, I would consider extending an invitation to them.”
Carlos tries to school his expression, so that the abject shock he feels doesn’t appear on his face. “You would?”
His father tilts his head to one side, as if this statement is the most obvious thing in the world, when really it is one of the most confusing things Carlos has ever heard. “Of course, mijo.”
“Yeah, so—” Valentina huffs.
“So,” Gabriel continues, his gaze slipping to his youngest daughter, “if Carlos is intending to bring a date to Maria’s wedding, then I suppose you can bring one as well.”
“But Carlos isn’t bringing anyone!” Valentina protests hotly.
Gabriel shrugs. “Then I suppose you aren’t either.”
It stings, Carlos can’t deny it doesn’t. In some ways, it feels as if his father’s brief allusion to Carlos’ love life feels contrived, like his parents only think about whether Carlos is in love and loved back in return in the context of trying to teach his younger sister a lesson. He knows that, in reality, he’d sooner fling himself off a tall building than have a serious discussion with his father about his dating history, but still. He wishes it were different. He wishes that he could love someone and simply ask to bring them to a family wedding, without any of the additional considerations.
After dinner, he washes the dishes alongside his mother. They don’t talk much, falling into a familiar silence as he plunges his hands into the soapy water and she dries and stacks, the dishtowel getting progressively wetter as they reach the end of the pile. He knows she can tell something is awry – he can see it on her face – which is why as soon as he finishes the last plate and she turns to face him, he mumbles a feeble excuse and walks out of the back door into the winter evening.
He’d prefer to express all of his feelings to the night sky, the twinkling stars and the inky black replacing the dusky pink and orange sunset. His family life feels too complicated right now.
The air is cold, prickling at the hair on his arms and forming gooseflesh on his neck, but he ignores it as he walks towards the stables, biting back the hot tears that threaten to spill past his eyelashes. There’s something cruel about the way that the conversation at dinner hangs in his mind, taunting him with the could-have-beens and the fleeting idea that maybe he could let himself have what everyone else seems to be barreling towards.
Inside the stables, he turns on the light and takes a deep, stabilising breath as he stares into the empty stall usually occupied by his father’s favourite animal. Seabiscuit, a huge dappled grey gelding that looks and acts nothing like his namesake, is meandering around an adjacent paddock, so Carlos lets himself in the gate of the enclosure and sinks down onto the clean hay, leaning against one of the timber walls.
He stays there for a minute, just marinating in self-pity, before he hears someone call his name. For a moment, he considers not answering and instead just allowing himself to hide out in a horse stall and think unflattering thoughts about himself, his parents and his life generally. Unfortunately, he’s no longer twelve and the thought of someone finding him here is a little mortifying.
He stands up and fiddles with the rake at the side of the stall, running it through the clean hay that never needed mucking out in the first place. “In here,” he replies.
“Carlitos,” his mother sighs, leaning against the closed gate as he turns around and props himself up on the rake, as if it’s been in his hand this entire time. “Don’t pretend you know the first thing about mucking out stables,” she says, giving him an annoyingly knowing expression. “You haven’t been down here doing chores like that for years.”
“I live on campus most of the year,” he says in a tired voice, hating how resigned he sounds. “Is that really surprising?”
She flinches a little at his words, and he drops the rake immediately. If anyone is going to be able to make him feel better by their mere presence, it’s his mother. “I’m sorry,” he says, walking towards the gate and letting himself out. “I didn’t mean to sound like that.”
“I’m sorry, mijo,” she says softly, allowing him to scoop her into his arms. He’s almost double her height and weight, and yet the hug still feels like it’s designed to comfort him, and not the other way around. “That conversation wasn’t fair on you.”
He says nothing, wanting to console her and insist that everything is fine, but fighting with himself because it’s not. He’s drowning in a confusing array of emotions, and frustration at himself and his inability to just adapt and deal with it, but it all gets jumbled up and lost in the face of his deeply ingrained need to make everyone else happy.
“You know Valentina didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” his mother continues. “She’s just desperate to invite that boyfriend of hers—”
Carlos is just so tired of it all. His avoidance, his shame, his unwillingness to force them all to make space for him and his feelings.
“It doesn’t matter,” he says, in a gentle lie that sounds foreign in his ears. “I’m not bringing anyone anyway.”
Part 2: TK
“TK?”
“That depends," TK says, pushing the door fully open and leaning against the doorframe. "Who’s asking?”
“Uh—” The guy standing on the other side of TK’s dorm room door winces and snaps his teeth together. “Me?”
“Yeah, I can see that,” TK adds drily. “Who are you?”
“Oh,” the guy exhales noisily and runs a hand through his messy, dark hair. TK can’t help but notice it looks a little like his own, something that makes him feel a little more charitable. He hopes this guy hasn’t come here to ask him to join the wrestling club or something – that fight TK got himself into just before the winter break has somehow made its way around the campus rumour mill, and people are looking at him funny these days. Not that it would matter, he reconciles. If it is the wrestling club, they’ll probably revoke his invitation on the spot once they find out that he’s gay. He’s surprised they don’t already know.
“I’m Elijah Kane.”
“Elijah,” TK repeats sharply. “And what can I do for you, Elijah?”
Elijah looks around furtively and TK fleetingly wonders whether his reputation from NYU has finally caught up with him. He's spent a glorious six months in Austin, free from his reputation as the resident drug addict, and fully sober. Then again, the cynical part of him supposes that, much like all of the other good things in his life, it makes sense that it would come to an end at some point.
"Can we step inside your room for a second?" Elijah asks, under his breath.
TK gives him a blank look. "No."
"TK, don’t be a dick,” a voice calls from the depths of his college dorm, and TK sighs in response, rolls his eyes and gestures for Elijah to follow him in.
“Sorry about him,” Paul says, looking past TK to address Elijah from his spot in the study nook they have shoved into one corner of the room. “He forgot his manners somewhere in New York City.”
“All good, man,” Elijah replies as he leans awkwardly against the bathroom door.
“What do you want?” TK asks, crossing his arms.
“Look, this is going to sound really weird—”
“I don’t sell drugs, if that’s what you’re going to ask,” TK adds defensively. “Although, I think someone down the hall might.”
“Woah— What?” Elijah stammers. “No, dude. I didn’t come for that.”
TK frowns. “You didn’t?”
“No,” Elijah protests. “I came because you’re gay.”
TK swears his eyebrows achieve intergalactic flight as Elijah gives him a panicked look. Paul makes a noise that sounds like he’s choking, but TK doesn’t bother to turn around to check, because it’s Paul’s fault that this idiot is in their dorm room at all. If he asphyxiates on his own tongue, that’s firmly a him-problem.
“I mean— Fuck, that came out really bad,” Elijah continues, appearing as if he’d like to shove all of his own words back down his throat. “Look, you’re going to think this is crazy, but—”
“You don’t need to say anything else,” TK says in a flat tone. “I already think that.”
“I don’t know any other gay kids on campus,” Elijah protests, failing to explain anything at all. “Although I know a few bisexual guys, and Frankie from my sociology unit told me you’re single, so—”
“Frankie Lopez?” TK asks, raising an eyebrow. “Look man, if experimentation is what you’re after, I’m not into that. You should know though, Frankie might be a bisexual, but he’s a terrible kisser. Too much tongue—”
“I have a girlfriend!” Elijah cries, now looking somewhat distressed. “I promise I’m not here for that.”
“Okay,” Paul mutters from behind TK, “no need to get all hetero on us.”
“Paul, you’re straight,” TK says, throwing a smirk over his shoulder. “Shut up.”
Paul gives him a wink and looks back at his laptop. TK can tell the only reason the asshole invited this kid into their room was so he could eavesdrop, which is causing TK physical pain right now. Briefly, he wonders what he did to deserve being one of the only seniors with a roommate. Then, he remembers that they’re both late transfers who are slightly out of the ordinary for college seniors – Paul is technically older than a senior should be and TK is technically a mess. He wishes he never opened the door.
“I need a favour,” Elijah says, clasping his hands together in front of himself. “And I’m willing to pay you for your time.”
“You know there are professionals for that, right?” TK snorts. “I mean I’m good with my mouth, but—”
“What— No— I’m not,” Elijah stammers. “I need you to pretend to date someone.”
“Who?” TK asks, forgetting all about his quest to drive Elijah out of their room by asking provocative questions. “Is it you? If so, I’m gonna have to disrespectfully decline.”
“It’s my girlfriend’s brother,” Elijah replies, bypassing the insult. Whether by ignorance or intention, TK isn’t sure.
TK bites his lip and cocks his head, unsure why he’s even considering something that sounds so ridiculous. Maybe he’s just bored and intrigued and thinks that a boyfriend – even if they’re fake – sounds better than the nothing he’s currently got. “Who’s the brother and why does he need a date?”
“Carlos Reyes,” Elijah replies. “He goes here. He’s a history major. A senior.”
“Well, wouldn’t you know,” Paul chimes in, unhelpfully. “TK is also a senior. Do you know him, Strand?”
“He’s gay?” TK asks, trying to school his expression while his heart thuds traitorously in his chest. Fortunately, TK knows exactly who Carlos Reyes is. Unfortunately, Carlos Reyes is tragically beautiful, something that is easy enough to ignore when TK had the luxury of believing him to be straight, but who is now going to be borderline irresistible.
They have a few classes together this semester – TK is taking a couple of subjects in history and politics to complete the liberal arts component of his double degree – although he’s fairly certain that Carlos has no idea who he is. They’re similar students – turning up to everything they have to, avoiding asking unnecessary questions, and getting out as soon as possible. TK is like that because he doesn’t trust himself to be social at college given what happened in New York. Carlos just seems aloof.
TK has definitely noticed Carlos before, though. The guy puts the gods in Greek mythology to shame.
Elijah frowns. “I don’t think it’s common knowledge.”
“Then why are you telling us, dude?” Paul asks, sounding defensive despite having never met the man in question.
“Because I’m desperate.”
“I’m still a little lost,” TK admits, trying to put the pieces together in his head, but feeling as if he’s missing something vital. “Carlos is a good looking guy. What’s stopping him from finding a date?”
“Well,” Elijah sighs. “He’s not exactly looking. But I need to find him one in the next five months, so that I can finally get in with my girlfriend’s family.”
“You’re that bad at meeting the parents, huh?”
“What?” Elijah squawks. “No! I just…you know—”
“Not really, no.”
“They’re really traditional, kind of strict, apparently. Their dad is a fucking Texas Ranger, and they have some family rule that says they won’t let their kids’ boyfriends come to family weddings unless they’ve been dating for literal years.”
“So?” Paul asks, apparently losing patience with a guy who is willing to out another guy for the sake of schmoozing his girlfriend’s family. TK wholeheartedly supports the anti-Elijah agenda, although this information about Carlos Reyes has both made his year, and cursed him to months of pining.
“Yeah, can’t you just bide your time?” TK asks. “Does your girlfriend even know you’re asking me to do this?”
“No,” Elijah confesses. “I’m transferring to UCLA in the fall. Valentina wants to transfer too, but there’s no way her parents will be supportive of us moving interstate together without meeting me, and she really cares about their approval. Her sister’s getting married in five months – some big wedding in Austin – and I thought that if I could score an invite, it would be a great opportunity to make a good impression. The only problem is, her dad has made some rule that she can’t bring a date unless her brother does as well.”
TK feels like he’s been asked to do a very complicated equation. “You want Carlos to invite me to his sister’s wedding, so you can go to the wedding with his other sister.”
Elijah swallows visibly. “Effectively, yes.”
“Yeah, that was way more complicated than it needed to be,” Paul adds. “You really need to work on your summarising.”
“Okay, well, will you do it?” Elijah asks hopefully, ignoring Paul.
TK shakes his head. “How the fuck am I going to get Carlos Reyes, a guy who – by your own admission – isn’t looking to date anyone, to invite me to his sister’s wedding? Is he even out to his parents? You said they’re very traditional.”
“I think so,” Elijah replies. “Apparently they just don’t talk about it much, but they’re a really nice family. Look, as I said, I can pay you—”
TK’s face must betray something bordering on disgust, because Elijah immediately stops talking. “I don’t need money to flirt with a hot guy in my class,” TK admits. “I’ll consider it, but if something starts to feel off, I’m not pushing it. The guy doesn’t deserve to get played, especially if he’s not even fully out.”
“So…you’ll do it?” Elijah repeats hopefully, his eyes bright. “I never actually thought this would work, but—”
TK resists the urge to groan. Loudly. “I said I’d consider it. No promises. Also, you can leave now.”
“Right, sure.” Elijah nods. “Uh— Just, text me? Oh wait, you don’t have my number.”
“Don’t need it,” TK replies, sliding past Elijah and opening the door, before practically pushing him out into the hallway. “You’re familiar with smoke signals, I assume? Carrier pigeons? Two tin cans with a cord?”
“What—”
TK shuts the door, before turning around to find Paul looking back at him with an infuriating smirk on his face.
“So,” he says slowly. “This Carlos guy must be hot.”
TK sighs. “You have no idea.”
TK doesn’t really intend to help Elijah out.
If he’s honest, he thinks the kid should just get used to the fact that he’s going to have to win his girlfriend’s parents over the hard way. Plus, it’s never a good look to go around talking about someone else’s sexuality, especially when that person’s sexuality isn’t common knowledge. TK has been out for years but he’s no stranger to bigotry, and although the devil-may-care attitude helps him avoid most of it, he won’t deny that it still stings every time prejudice rears its ugly head.
The only problem is, Carlos Reyes is unspeakably attractive. It’s the only way TK – a guy who doesn’t have a clue who ninety percent of the people in his classes are – knows who this specific guy is. To make matters worse, he seems incredibly uninterested in TK’s attention, which only serves to make TK more enthralled.
He’s always been a little screwed up like this – it’s definitely something he should talk to his therapist about – but it’s not about the thrill of the chase. He’s not looking for a bad boy. In some ways, he’s looking for the best person he can find, the diamond in the rough, a man who is going to let TK love him with everything he has under his prickly, spiky exterior, who’s never going to find him too much or not enough and will accept him, flaws and all, just the way he is. That man, TK has convinced himself, is someone he will have to earn. Good things don’t come easy, and they especially don’t come easy to screw ups like TK Strand.
The first opportunity to interact with Carlos is in their Social Revolutions lecture, which is scheduled at the extremely cursed time of nine on a Monday morning. He spots Carlos easily – sitting alone on the far side of the lecture hall – a notepad and large coffee occupying half of his desk, a compact laptop occupying the other half.
“Nine is rough, huh?” TK says by way of introduction, sliding into the seat beside Carlos.
Carlos – all soft-looking curls and adorable brown eyes – gives him a thin smile and hums in a noncommittal way.
TK groans internally. One interaction and he can already tell he’s going to be pining for the entirety of next week. “Strange,” he continues awkwardly, “that you bring a notepad and a laptop.”
Carlos looks up from his laptop. “Strange?” he repeats, and his voice may as well be made of honey, because TK is attracted to it so intensely he wants to do something creepy like record it on his phone and play it back while he lies in bed at night.
TK shrugs, desperately trying to appear nonchalant. “Well, why would you need a notepad if you have a laptop to write with?”
Carlos frowns. “It’s not really any of your business, is it?” he asks, and before TK can collect his thoughts, let alone come up with a witty reply, the lecture starts and he has no choice but to sink into his seat and watch Carlos tuck the notepad into his bag.
They might have started out poorly, TK thinks, but that means things can only get better.
In fact, he is incredibly wrong. Things get worse.
Without thinking, he accidentally insults Carlos by offering up a rebuttal to one of his arguments in their Roman Political Thought seminar. The prof agrees with him, which pleases TK, until he recalls that Carlos was the last person to add to the discussion. It couldn’t be helped, he rationalises. Carlos was sitting there looking like Adonis with his curly hair and his glasses – something TK is apparently very into – chewing his bottom lip like he was trying to send TK into cardiac arrest.
When he tries to apologise outside of class, Carlos brushes him off with a brusque, “don’t worry about it,” and stalks off towards the student accommodation.
His interest is piqued by the fact that Carlos is apparently from Austin – TK swears he heard that fact come out in one of those awkward ‘getting to know you’ games at the start of the academic year – and yet seems to live on campus. He bribes Paul – who works part time in student administration – to tell him which block he can find the object of his affections, but when he loiters around the entrance hall without having first come up with a good excuse, he finds himself coming unstuck.
“What are you doing here?” Carlos asks shrewdly as he comes down the stairs and notices TK lurking by the door. Truthfully, he was just about to leave, and as he clocks the blatant suspicion in Carlos’ voice, he kind of wishes he had.
“Me?” TK asks, pointing at himself in the chest, as if he’s not the only person in the hall at that very moment. “Um, I was visiting a friend.”
Carlos crosses his arms and leans against the wall. “Oh yeah?” he challenges, raising an eyebrow. “Who?”
TK bites his lip. “Uh– A friend, forget about it. Hey, did you happen to get notes on that lecture last week in—”
“You know it’s weird to stalk me to my dorm, right?” Carlos interjects, cutting off whatever half-baked excuse was forming in TK’s mouth.
TK swallows. “Look,” he says. “I felt really bad about that thing the other day in Roman Political Thought, and I just wanted to apologise. Again.”
“You already did that,” Carlos replies drily. “Multiple times. Look, I don’t even know your name, and yet you keep popping up everywhere and I don’t get it—”
“It’s TK,” TK says breathlessly, fixing Carlos with a smile he hopes is endearing, because apparently most other things about him are screaming ‘CREEP’ in big, capital letters. “TK Strand.”
“TK,” Carlos says slowly, as if tasting the consonants on his tongue. TK tries not to spiral about how nice it sounds coming out of Carlos’ mouth. He wants to hear it again, preferably on a high pitched moan, but he won’t be picky.
“Yeah,” he sighs, feeling like a lovestruck Disney princess. “TK.”
“Cool,” Carlos says. “Are you— Are you gonna ask my name? Or are you just going to repeat your own?”
TK shrugs. “I already know your name is Carlos.”
“How?” Carlos asks.
“I heard it in class,” TK says lamely. “Guess I pay more attention than you do.”
“Is that some kind of jab because you successfully rebutted my argument?” Carlos asks, frowning again. “You don’t need to rub it in—”
“No!” TK interjects, feeling a little unhinged. “Not at all. I just mean…well, I find you interesting.”
“Interesting?” Carlos repeats, his frown softening as his eyebrows knit together in confusion. “How much do you already know about me?”
TK grits his teeth. This guy’s father must have taught his son a few tricks from law enforcement because he knows how to run a very effective interrogation. TK finds himself resorting to his forte: flirting.
“Not much,” he says, biting his lip and watching with interest as Carlos’ gaze flickers to his mouth, before shooting back up to his eyes. “But I could?”
Carlos stills. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
TK shrugs. “Whatever you want it to mean,” he replies, laying the coy smile on thick. “I gotta go, but maybe next time you can save me a spot in the lecture hall.”
“I always sit in the same spot,” Carlos points out flatly.
TK smiles. “Maybe I can change that,” he says, running a hand through his hair. When Carlos doesn’t say anything else, TK picks up his bag from the floor and slings it over his shoulder, trying to make an exit at a pace which says calm and confident instead of extremely weird and awkward. Things hadn’t gone badly, but they hadn’t gone well, and his mind is racing with theories about why Carlos Reyes is so closed off.
He wonders if he should try to hunt Elijah down and grill him about things Carlos does and doesn’t like. He’s not sure about a lot of things when it comes to Carlos, and having a little more certainty wouldn’t go astray. Then again, hunting down Elijah means talking to Elijah, which is not an activity high on TK’s bucket list. It also means confirming this thing with Carlos is a thing. Like TK is in on some kind of con.
TK isn’t a con artist. He’s just a sucker for pretty eyes and a nice smile. Plus, stalking Carlos around campus with that degree of intention feels a little…off. If he happens to notice the stamp on Carlos’ coffee cup, however, that’s another thing entirely.
There’s one thing that he knows for sure, however. Carlos is an itch TK needs to scratch, and whether or not it benefits Elijah Kane is becoming very irrelevant very quickly.