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himbothomas · 3 years

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Video Games || 2018 || PT. 1

“Your house is nice.”

Dean says, mostly to be polite but also cause he means it. Levi scoffs, leading him around the cluttered kitchen island towards the basement steps. His older sister, Sabrina, had already stalked upstairs, but she’d smiled when Dean told her she was a good driver, and had let him pick out which Paramore CD to play. She smelled really good, too, but Dean wasn’t about to risk one of the only friendships he had. And, until yesterday when he asked him to hang out after school today, Levi had been strictly a practice and class friend. They usually had to run laps together for dicking around between drills and usually got detention together for dicking around between classes, but this was different. It’s not like Dean was hurting for friends-everyone liked him and he and most of the other 11th graders on the football team hung out together in a big group, but no one has ever invited him over to their house. Just him.

And Levi. Dean really likes Levi. Really likes him. He, Dean notices as they settle on the well worn couch, also smells really good.

Shit. Fuck. Dean stops just short of shaking himself. He-well he wasn’t gay. He likes girls. But he also likes…Levi. It’s stupid and Dean knows it-the best thing that could come out of acting on those sorts of feelings is getting completely ostrichized. He’d be lucky if he didn’t end up hospitalized, for that matter. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t look. Or think about him before he falls asleep. Or purposefully get detention for the third time in a week so they could keep hanging out. Levi settles next to him, and it’s not weird for Dean to look, so he does. Curly black hair and eyes that were green in the right light. A tan that was half freckles and a quarter Puerto Rico and a smile that keeps Dean up at night, one he returns easily.

“Oh.” Levi says, standing again to grab the Xbox controllers. Dean tries not to look at his ass but it’s right there. Maybe he just likes nice asses. That’s not that weird.

Levi hands him the controller and continues to fuck with his Xbox.

“Madden or call of duty?”

Dean scoffs “You think after finally being done with football season, I wanna play football on screen?”

“So you suck at Madden?” Levi responds, booting up the game and laughing when Dean flips him off.

“No I’m just trying to be a good guest-“

“You just flipped me the bird-“

“I don’t think it’s polite to kick your host’s ass within 20 minutes of arrival.”

“Whatever.” Levi says, sitting back on the couch and closer to Dean. It’s just because he has wired controllers and doesn’t want to stretch the cord out. Dean has to stop from physically yelping when their knees touch. He shifts away. Levi, for his part, is texting.

“My mom says you can eat dinner with us if you want.”

The thought of processed food not from the organic grocery store is even more attractive than his friend or his sister.

“Oh cool. Sure, thanks.”

Levi raises an eyebrow. “You’re not even gonna ask your parents?”

“Do they still hold your hand when you cross the street, little boy?”

“Fuck off. “Levi shoves him and Dean laughs

“Nah I don’t have to do shit. My mom doesn’t care about me and Kenny forgets my name once football is over.”

“Oh shut up, sad sack your mom cares about you.” Levi rolls his eyes and picks the Dallas Cowboys as his team. Dean let’s him and picks the Patriots simply because-

“Why the fuck did you pick the worst team to ever fucking exist?”

“I figured if you’re gonna insist that I kick your ass I might as well break your spirit too.”

Levi shoves him again and Dean’s mission is accomplished. “Bastard.”

“Yeah, technically.”

Levi rolls his eyes again and they start to play. When Levi is down 40 points, Dean speaks.

“She really doesn’t care though. My mom. Which is cool most of the time cause I can do whatever I want, but last year she forgot about my birthday until it was 6 weeks later.”

Levi turns his head to look at him. “Oh you’re not kidding, are you?”

“Why do you think she bought me a car before I could drive?”

He’d failed his test twice at this point but that didn’t matter.

“That’s uh…pretty fucked, man.”

Dean shrugs. “It is what it is. I’m just wall decor unless there’s football talk or she needs to prove to someone she was once liberal enough to fuck a black guy.” Levi chokes a little on the Gatorade he's drinking.

“Jesus.”

“Nah, his name is Rodney.”

“Do you see him ever?” Levi asks. Something about the genuine curiosity in his voice is so nice that Dean lets him get a first down.

“Ha!”

“Nah. He took off when I was like…4? 5? And then we lived with my grandparents for a bit, which was cool. My grandpa was fucking awesome. But he died when I was like, 9 and mom was already with Kenny at that point so I never felt like I could ask about my dad.”

“You ever wanna meet him?”

Usually people express some sort of false sympathy for him, but Levi is too focused on making passes Dean is letting slide.

“Oh I did. Last Christmas. We met at Waffle House. He asked me for money.”

“What?!” Levi pauses the game and stares at him. “Whatd you do?”

Dean shrugs. “I had like $50 on me so I uh…gave it to him.”

The tips of his ears burn with shame and he looks away, suddenly uncomfortable.

“Jesus I-I’m sorry I didn’t mean to like-Thats some tough shit, Deanie.”

Levi had been the first to call him that. Dean has been pretending for almost two and a half years that it didn’t make his heart race.

“It’s ok. Really. It sort of…I know now. It sucks but I can’t do a whole lot about it.”

Levi sighs. “Yeah but I shouldn’t have, like, forced you to tell me.”

“You didn’t.” Dean says easily. “It was actually nice to tell someone that.”

“Thomas.”

“Sanchez.”

“You’ve never told anyone that before?” No one’s eyes have any business looking that pretty when they’re sad. Especially Levi’s. Dean shrugs again, his voice a little lower.

“My mom doesn’t even know I met him. She’d just get pissed at me anyway so like…” he shrugs again. He feels Levi’s eyes on him and it makes his stomach tighten. “Do you wanna get back to the game or is therapy Levi still happening?”

“Stop being an asshole. That’s…so much, dude.”

“Yeah, a real winner runs through my DNA. Glad I kept his name.”

Levi groans. “You make me feel like a dick for being unhappy here.”

“You are a dick. Your mom lets you have video games and a whole basement that I’m guessing you decorated unless she’s a Kate Upton fan.”

Levi snorts. “I don’t entirely feel bad for you and your step dad’s fucking fortune and mansion.”

Dean doesn’t say anything because he knows Levi is right. “I dunno man, I’d give it all up for there to be bacon in the house.”

“What?!”

They keep talking as they play the game. Levi asks questions that are direct without prying. Dean tries to ask them back. He is shortly losing by 70 points. When the cowboys win, he does his best to demand a rematch, which, really, means he gets to keep talking to Levi.

“So-“ Levi says. “I think it’s only fair since you told me your secret, I'll tell you one of mine.”

Dean snorts. “This isn’t a friendship based on transactions you weirdo.”

“Right, yeah. Then I’m gonna be super narcissistic and make it about me.” Dean laughs at this and it’s his turn to pause the game.

“You uh, told me all that stuff because why?” Levi’s voice is different. Less confidence. Dean slowly realizes he’s nervous.

“I trust you.” Dean says, realizing he does as he says it.

“You do?”

“Should I not? Are you as shitty at keeping secrets as you are at realizing things?”

When Levi doesn’t laugh, Dean puts his controller down fully and turns to him. “Dude are you ok?”

“Yeah I uh-so what I told you before was a secret isn’t exactly secret it’s just…something I wanna ask about to see if it’s uh, normal.”

Something small and evil like a shred of hope crawls into Dean's stomach.

“Even if it’s not, Levi, I wouldnt you know, treat you differently for it.”

Levi scoffs again and Dean frowns. “What? I mean it. Have you ever known me to like, you know, judge people or whatever?”

Levi considers this and, as he strokes his thumb slowly up and down his index finger, his voice relaxes. “No. I guess I haven’t. You’re even nice to Dan-Danielle Stevens.”

Danielle was openly trans and braver than anyone else Dean knew.

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“We live in Texas.”

“And I’m Black. And from Wisconsin.”

Levi laughs. “Two things I always say about you.”

Dean can’t help himself. “You talk about me a lot?”

He could be mistaken, but some of Levi’s freckles darken. “That’s not-do you want me to tell you the question or not?”

“Ask me the question, Leev.” Dean says, hoping he’s right.

Levi takes a breath. They’re facing each other on the couch now, controllers as abandoned as their math homework.

“I was just uh, you know, wondering if you-or if it’s normal or whatever... to think what it’d be like to you know…kiss another guy or something.”

All the blood leaves Dean’s upper body and rushes south.

“I think that’s normal.” Dean says, hoping he didn’t pause too long or answer too eagerly. “I mean it’s 2018, you know. Like all that gay shit is way more accepted so like, we see it more and maybe it sparks some inspiration or something.”

“Right. Ok. Yeah. Like when you see an ad for something a bunch of times and then you finally buy it. “

Dean laughs. “Yeah. Curiosity isn’t bad unless you’re a cat or like, a guy who defuses bombs.”

Levi laughs and moves a bit closer.

“Can I ask you one more thing?”

“You’re getting really close to your allotted time slot being up but I’ll see what I can do.”

“I hate you.” Levi says, his smile directed just at Dean is too much to handle.

“Have you ever thought about-”

Before Levi finishes, Dean closes the distance between them, stretching out on the couch and very carefully and purposefully placing his lips on Levi’s.

And its right. It’s so right Dean almost feels bad for being so ashamed of all the times he’s thought about it.

Levi pulls away just slightly and when his thumb comes up to trace Dean’s cheekbone, that evil shred of hope doubles in size.

They stay like that for an hour, getting bolder and more confident with each kiss, their hands firmly on each other’s. When his mom comes home with the smell of pizza lingering with her and calls down the stairs, they pull apart. Without speaking, Dean knows they’re not going to talk about it, but he can’t even bring himself to care-everything he’d been fantasizing about was so much better in practice. Even if Levi never wants to see him again-

“You wanna come over again tomorrow?” Levi says, clearing his throat. His hand covers Dean’s on the couch and gives him a squeeze.

Dean’s fate is sealed before he can even finish saying “Sure.”

#drabble #video games #levi

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starshinehemmo · 7 years

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The One in Which You Want to Divorce Him // pt. II // l.h.

(mobile) masterlist

word count: 2.3k+

as requested, here is a continuation to toiwywtdh. it isn’t exactly a direct part two, but rather a sequel. hope you enjoy! (you do not have to have read the first part to understand this one.)

Finlay hugged his wailing baby sister closer to his body, which, in comparison, wasn’t that much bigger than hers. After all, he was just three years her senior, though, nevertheless, his heart pounded and clenched as the urge to shield her rushed through his veins. His parents had taught him the minute she was born to protect her at all costs. And he would and was. It didn’t matter to him who was older, Finlay would protect his baby sister even, if he were to be the baby brother. And that wasn’t because she was a girl (Adelaide was in fact very skilled at biting and scratching), but because he loved her with his whole tiny heart, and Finlay fiercely protected the people and things he loved. Like that one time his mother had tried to throw out an old toy of his, but Finlay had insisted on keeping it. He told her, it held special meaning to him and therefore he loved it and why would one throw away something one loved? To this, his mother had no reply, and so she let him keep his battered unusable toy.

“It’s okay, little sissy,” he whispered against her cheek, as he sat wedged in a corner behind a massive plant in their living room. One of his arms was carefully supporting her head while his other one was wrapped around it, his tiny hand stroking her soft blonde hair. Gently, he rocked his body—first back and forth, then from side to side, desperately trying to calm her down. But his attempts were in vain, as nothing could drown out the screams and shouts in the background. Little Finn had never heard his parents fight this loudly and long, and he feared they would never stop. He couldn’t even remember how long he’d been sitting in his safe corner, cocooning his infant sister. His butt began to hurt with the weight of her.

Some moments later, after a slam of a door upstairs and ear-piercing silence, Finn could feel Adelaide’s tense body relax in his arms. She laid, facing him and snuggled against his body, sucking on her pacifier with her inner arm resting on her tummy while her other one clung to his shirt. The whimpers stopped falling from her lips. Instead her eyes began drooping and fluttering until they kept close. Finlay let sleep pull her deeper under before he dared to stand up—a rather difficult task with a tiny human in his arms, he found. Shielding her body, he stepped out from his hiding place behind the plant and padded towards the couch, where he could see his father’s figure sitting with his head hung in defiance. Walking up to him, Finn felt a tiny stab of fear in his chest as the memory of his raised voice echoed in his head, but just like that, it was gone again.

“Daddy?” he whispered, careful of his sleeping baby sister in his embrace.

His father didn’t turn around right away, though he raised his head and a hand to it. Finn could hear a sniff, and then finally his father faced him. His face held sadness and pain, but he painted it with a shaky smile.

“There you are, buddy,” he said, voice breaking. “Come here,” he said, holding a hand out. Instead of pulling Finlay on the space beside him on the couch, he rather pulled both of them on his lap, one piled on the other—Luke, Finlay and then Adelaide.

His father kissed both of them on the head.

“Daddy, are you okay?” asked Finlay, looking up at his father in worry. He wanted to reach one hand up and trace the harsh lines of his mouth, but he feared he would disturb his little sister with that tiniest bit of movement. So instead he leaned into his broad chest. He felt a touch on his head—a soft flutter, soft and calloused fingertips running through his hair. Then the touch left him and Finlay saw it moving on to his sister’s tiny hand. He watched his father’s fore finger gently trace Adelaide’s arm—from her own fingertips up up up, all the way up to her shoulder. And then down down down again, before he placed his finger into her palm, urging her to hold him. Finlay watched his baby sister’s hand clutch his father’s fore finger in response. Her fingers wrapped around his and then they let go again and then she held him again—all the while pulling him closer.

“See, it’s a reflex,” his father whispered to him. “At the age she’s at, they’ll automatically put anything in their mouth they’ve got in their hands. Even in their sleep.”

Finlay stared up at his father in confusion. “Then why you do that, Daddy? Addy’s gonna eat you! Daddy have to let go,” he said in horror, reaching and trying to unclasp their grip.

His father chuckled. “She’s not gonna eat me, Finn,” he said, pressing a kiss to his head, still laughing softly, though it quickly died down. “I just want her to hold me for a while, you know?” He smiled at him as his free arm came around his shoulders and cuddled him closer to his body. “I just want to cuddle with my two favourite tiny humans for a while, okay?”

Finn nodded against his father’s chest. “Okay, daddy,” he said.

After a moment, Finlay wondered how long a while actually was, because his father had been holding them for a long while and he couldn’t keep his eyes open any more. But he also didn’t want to disturb cuddle time, since he knew how much his father cherished those.

A thought hit him. His father loved cuddle time the most when his mother was included, and right now, she wasn’t. Finlay seemed to forget all about the reason why they were in this situation in the first place, but he’d already decided that maybe his father would cheer up, once they all cuddled together.

“Daddy?” he asked into the silence.

A breath. “Yes, baby?”

“Can you hold Addy for a while?” Finlay lifted his sister’s sleeping form an inch into the air, requesting his father should take over.

“Sure thing, buddy,” he responded, snaking one arm under her head and the other under her bum. Careful not to disturb her sleep, he tilted her form towards his shoulder and leaned back—his neck on the arm rest—so he was lying on the couch with his feet propped over the other arm rest, as he was too long to fit on the entire thing. Adelaide raised her fist above her head, but then stilled just as sudden, breathing softly on her stomach.

Finlay, who was at this point standing beside them, turned on his heels and headed for the stairs.

“Where are you going, little man?” his father’s raspy voice stalled him.

He faced him again and grinned. “It’s a surprise!”

///

Finlay found his mother lying in bed and cuddling the pillow from his father’s side of the bed, which confirmed his theory. If they cuddled each other, they would get all better. Softly, he padded across the floor and climbed the bed. “Mommy,” he whispered, laying his body right next to hers, so they were facing one another.

Just like his father, his mother shot him a shaky smile in reassurance. “Hi, baby boy,” she said back, raising and pulling him with her at the same time. “Where’s your little sissy?” she asked, placing Finlay in her lap.

“She’s downstairs with Daddy. Wanna come?” Finn asked his mother, as he wrapped a strand of her hair around his little finger and then unwrapped it again. He kept his eyes lowered and his bottom lip puckered—a secret trick he’d learned from his father.

A hand smoothed over his head. “Baby, I think it’s best if I stay up here for a while. Daddy and I aren’t playing nice right now, you know?”

Finlay looked at his mother then, big-eyed. “But Daddy is sad right now. Just like you.”

“But that’s just it, Finn. Your daddy and I, we’re making each other sad, which is why it’s best, if we don’t talk to each other for a little while.”

There it was again—that word. A while. His father had said it as well, and Finlay found that a while—no matter how little it might be—was a very long amount of time. The thought of his parents being sad for that long saddened him as well, and he was sure that, should they all be sad at the same time, Adelaide would grow sad as well, and then they would just be one sad family. This conclusion was a very sad one, Finlay felt like. He wasn’t sure what the right approach to stop all of this sadness was. After all, it was always his parents that made him happy again, whenever Finn was sad. They’d make him his favourite sweet treat and then turn an upbeat song on full volume or sometimes they’d sing him one. Maybe that was what his parents needed—for him to sing them a happy song.

///

Finlay was on a mission now.

Grabbing a chair from the dinner table, he dragged it all the way to the stereo machine and climbed on it. He rummaged through his own collection of audio books and CDs and found his favourite. After he inserted it into the slot, he picked up the remote and clambered down again. Finlay’s favourite song began to play throughout the living room, causing his father’s head to turn in his direction. “What are you doing, Finn?”

Finn grinned, running up to his father with his little toddler feet. He grabbed for his hands, urging him to get off the couch. “Daddy, I’m making you and Mommy happy again!”

His father chuckled. “Is that so?”

“Yeah!”

“Alright, alright! Let me just put your sister in her crib,” he said, getting to his feet and carrying Adelaide to her crib. Then he came back and asked, “So, what is your game here, huh?”

Finlay answered, “When I sad, you and Mommy always make me happy again. You play me happy songs and we dance!” He jumped on the spot, excitement rushing through his veins. “Daddy, I wanna dance with you and Mommy and then we all be a happy family again!”

His daddy crouched before him so they were face to face—or at least as best as they could manage. “Yeah? Is that so?” His father smiled at him softly to which Finn grinned back and nodded. “Well, buddy, then we gotta wait for your mommy to show her face or else your brilliant plan won’t unfold as planned.”

They both turned their head to the stairs, watching for a figure to appear. “How long do you think it’ll take her to come and see what’s going on?” asked his father, right the moment as his mother descended.

She stood at the foot of the stairs. Tucking her hair behind her ears, she squinted her eyes at them, as if she could smell the mischief on them. “What are you guys doing?”

Finlay wasted no time and jumped his way to his her. “Mommy come dance with us!” Like with his father, he grabbed for his mother’s hands and pulled her with him.

“Uh, Finn, baby boy, I don’t think—”

“I think you heard the man, darling,” interrupted his father. He stood up from his crouch and instead lowered himself into a bow, extending his hand. “May I have this dance, m’lady?”

Finn saw a tint of red colouring his mother’s cheeks. “Luke…” she sighed.

A silent “please”.

And then they were dancing. Slowly, rather than quick, like the song dictated. They swayed on their feet, arms around each other, his mother’s head on his father’s chest, while his own laid on top of hers.

Finlay made his way to his sister’s crib, and through the bars grabbed for her tiny hand. He held it, watching his parents slow dance to a children’s song about all the animals in the zoo.

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