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ax_mainThey have to talk about it. The conversation doesn't exactly go well.
Despite his exhaustion, Teddy barely slept. Part of it was being crammed into the bed next to Billy, feeling the rise and fall of his chest, part of it the rising dread of what he would have to do come morning. They’d have to talk about this. There was no way to keep living together otherwise.
The dawn crept up on him in his fitful doze, the world growing brighter in slow motion. Teddy opened his eyes, his back halfway off the edge of the bed, Billy sprawled half-across him like some aggressively cuddly octopus. It was amazing how something could be both unbearably endearing and soul-crushing all at the same time.
Teddy rolled carefully out from under Billy’s flung arm, the cool of the room a wake-up shock to his system after the warmth of the bed and Billy pressed up against him. If the world was kind... but it wasn’t, and he had to live with the choices that he’d made before he’d even realized what he would be throwing away.
He dressed quickly, and as quietly as he could manage. Maybe, if he slipped out before Billy woke up, he could put off dealing with any of it for another few hours.
Billy hadn't dreamed at all after he had closed his eyes for the second time that night, nothing but hard sleep until he felt his body being moved. He quickly grabbed onto his pillow, pulling it to him as he almost fell asleep again when his sleep fogged brain remembered who exactly he had gone to bed with. He shot up, instantly awake only to find Teddy slipping on his shoes and looking like...he was leaving. "Uhhh...morning?"
Shit. Not fast or quiet enough. Teddy smiled faintly. "Morning. Did I wake you up? I didn't want to disturb you. You looked like you needed the sleep." His pulse was already picking up, his heart a total and utter traitor. Billy still looked like hell, the dark purple ring around his eye starting to go green around the edges, the split in his lip still a hard mark against the pink. And now Teddy was looking at Billy's mouth and remembering what it had felt like to kiss him, and so much for sneaking out unnoticed.
Billy looked around, trying his best not to assume the worst, but Teddy had been trying to sneak out right? His earliest class wasn't until eight and the clock on Billy's nightstand blared six thirty in bright red numbers so what else could it be. "No. No. You didn't wake me up."
God, it was weird. He had made things weird with that stupid kiss and now the awesome friendship he'd built with Teddy was slipping through his fingers cause he was dumb. "Look, Teddy. Seriously, I didn't mean...the kiss was..." His cheeks went hot at just the word kiss, but he had to push through. "It didn't mean anything, okay? I was just...stressed. Because of Limbo, the nightmares and the X-men, I've been all over the place."
He tried to smile, but it didn't hold and he looked down at his lap. "I know I probably freaked you out, a guy kissing you is probably not something you had on your bucket list or any list, but I swear it didn't mean anything and it's not going to be weird or awkward." He was rambling. "I promise, so-please- don't try and sneak out on me."
It was the moment of truth, quite literally, and despite having stared into the darkness for hours trying to figure out how to make things right, Teddy was caught off-guard. He shoved his foot into his shoe and straightened up. (Oh, the irony.)
“It’s not that,” he said, and his mouth promptly went dry. Billy sat there looking up at him, the sheets tangled around his hips and his dark hair sticking up in random directions and all Teddy wanted to do was cross the room, sink his fingers into that hair and kiss him until neither of them could breathe. Teddy looked away.
Time to start telling the truth. Live honestly. Take action, instead of staying in stasis. He was going to regret everything.
“A lot of things happened last night. I crossed a line as well, and—and I don’t regret it.” Teddy said firmly, his heart trying to hammer itself out of his chest. He couldn’t bring himself to make eye contact, fiddling with the sleeve for his phone. “And yeah we have to talk about some of it, but ‘kissing guys’ isn’t the problem. Not in general, anyway.” Kissing Billy? Yeah, that was a much bigger one.
Billy frowned as he tried to piece together what exactly Teddy was talking about, his pulse still skyrocketing, but for a different reason all together now. Kissing guys wasn't the problem Teddy said, so did that mean that Teddy was...?
"Are you bi?" Billy said quietly, feeling a small spark of...what? It felt like irritation, but also something he didn't want to dwell on as he continued to stare at Teddy. Why hadn't he just told Billy that? Billy straight up came out to Teddy their second week of knowing each other, instead he continued to let Billy think...
It was getting harder to talk, the panic making his chest tight, but Teddy had no choice. He had to see this through now, whatever happened next. "No." He dared to look over at Billy on his bed, tried to remember the incredible right-ness of having Billy in his arms. The only way to ever get back there (maybe, someday? he didn't dare think that far ahead) was through. "I'm gay. I- I'm just. Not out. Until right now. Obviously." He stuttered to a halt.
Billy only stared as his ears seemed to block out all sound except for a high pitch ringing that he assumed was the start of a brain aneurysm. It took him a moment to actually form some kind of words, his mouth feeling like it was stuffed with cotton while the irritation moved up into anger. "So...you lied."
Teddy had heard Tessa talk about the essential pointlessness of hope, but that was the moment he thought he might understand why she'd said it. Billy's expression and his clipped words didn't leave a lot of room for hope. Still, he had to try, had to make Billy understand that it hadn't been personal - there was no reason why he shouldn't! He must have gone through a time when he wasn't out to anyone. Surely if Teddy could just find the right words, then Billy would understand.
"I didn't," Teddy said, grasping at that straw to keep his head up. "You assumed and - yeah, I didn't correct you. I should have. But I was scared, Billy. I had no idea what anyone here would do if I said anything."
"Scared?" Billy's face went ugly as a scowl moved onto his face and he pulled the sheets away from him in a violent jerk. He scrambled off his bed, standing up and fixing Teddy with a glare. "I get being scared, Teddy. Almost my whole fucking life has been being scared, but you had so many chances. I mean my god, you don't think I was scared when I came out to you?"
Teddy backpedalled until his thighs bumped up against his dresser, trying to escape from Billy’s fury. He deserved it, that much he knew, and his timing was so badly off as to be almost deliberately awful, but it didn’t make the fallout any easier to take.
“I wanted to tell you, so many times,” he pleaded, his hands up as though his strength would be any good against Billy’s magic. But fuck everything, he wasn’t entirely in the wrong either. And he held on to that thin thread of a chance that he could still break through the hurt. “But it’s not that simple. I wish I had one tenth of your courage. But I don’t. I never meant to hurt you.”
Billy was tired, that's what his mind kept telling him over and over, that right now was not the best time to talk about any of this when he was stressed and emotionally raw. Unfortunately, Billy had never been good at listening to reason and he felt his pride take a blow when Teddy assumed he had hurt him. He felt his thoughts turn dark and his hands started to spark without him even trying, and he took a step forward towards the other.
He wanted to deny that Teddy hurt him, to tell the other that he didn't care and all this anger was because Teddy had been a liar, but he couldn't because it wasn't true. So, instead he sneered and let his hands crackle with loose electricity. "Some x-man you'd be, too much of coward to even come out to your gay roommate."
That was it. Teddy had tried, he’d wound himself into knots over Billy and nothing at all seemed to be making any kind of impact. If he wanted to be cruel, he could be cruel right back. The retort was right there, so easy. I’m not the one who was afraid of the dark.
But Billy’d had good reason, and Teddy still had enough control to not go there. Less than half an hour ago Billy had been asleep in his arms. And there would be no coming back from inflicting that kind of pain.
He’d grown big and spiky without realizing it, and his hands had balled up into fists – fists that could do way too much damage, electricity or no. Teddy tried to focus, bring himself back to his baseline shape, but his anger fought him every step of the way. “You know nothing about my life, Billy. Nothing that matters.”
He hated himself after he had said that to Teddy, feeling sick when he saw the reaction on Teddy's face, but also having a disgusting feeling of satisfaction. He grit his teeth at Teddy's words, the pain digging deep into him and the feeling of needing to hurt him back coming up strong.
"Well, that's good. I probably wouldn't be able to tell what was the truth or a lie anyway." He bit out, almost wishing Teddy would hit him with those giant spiked fists of his because this was terrible. He wanted to cry, but wouldn't dare in front of Teddy.
Grief swamped his anger and Teddy managed – barely – to get his shifting back under control, bring in the claws and the armour and just be him. He couldn’t shift his heart back to being unbroken.
“Nothing I’ve said to you has ever been a lie,” he cried out, despairing. “And you’ve got plenty of secrets of your own. Of all people, Billy, I thought you would at least try to understand.” The room closed in on him, tight and suffocating, all the air sucked out of it and the light gone. Teddy turned toward the door and escape, bile burning hot in his throat.
"What is that supposed to mean?!" He yelled, the sight of Teddy turning his back on him making his heart feel like it was in his throat. He took in a deep shaky breath and the urge to use his magic to make Teddy stay was powerful, but he stamped that down quickly because there would be no going back after that. "You're just going to walk away?!"
Teddy hung his head, his shoulders curling in on themselves. “I’m not going to fight you. I’ve said what I had to say. And I’m sorry.” Hot tears of anger and humiliation burning in his eyes, he grabbed his laptop and his phone off the desk and left the room.
Billy stared at the closed door, all his anger and hurt having no place to go now that Teddy was gone, leaving him stuck on his own with these feelings. He glanced around the room in panic, not sure how to handle this extreme mix of emotions and he let out a scream as his powers let loose.
The whole room was lit up with blue electricity, scorch marks appearing on the walls when the powerful currents brushed against them and fried all of the electronics inside. He pushed his powers further and further until his body felt like it was going to collapse, tears rolled down his cheeks as he let out one last large bolt.
Teddy heard Billy’s howl of rage from halfway down the hall. The lights flickered, buzzed, and went out. The hall was silent for a moment, the usual subsonic electric hum completely gone.
Complaints started from some of the other rooms and Teddy started running. Anyone who saw him there would start asking questions, and he was so not able to answer anything coherently right now. He needed a bolthole, somewhere to hide until he could figure out some way to fix the total steaming mess that his life had so suddenly become.
Despite his exhaustion, Teddy barely slept. Part of it was being crammed into the bed next to Billy, feeling the rise and fall of his chest, part of it the rising dread of what he would have to do come morning. They’d have to talk about this. There was no way to keep living together otherwise.
The dawn crept up on him in his fitful doze, the world growing brighter in slow motion. Teddy opened his eyes, his back halfway off the edge of the bed, Billy sprawled half-across him like some aggressively cuddly octopus. It was amazing how something could be both unbearably endearing and soul-crushing all at the same time.
Teddy rolled carefully out from under Billy’s flung arm, the cool of the room a wake-up shock to his system after the warmth of the bed and Billy pressed up against him. If the world was kind... but it wasn’t, and he had to live with the choices that he’d made before he’d even realized what he would be throwing away.
He dressed quickly, and as quietly as he could manage. Maybe, if he slipped out before Billy woke up, he could put off dealing with any of it for another few hours.
Billy hadn't dreamed at all after he had closed his eyes for the second time that night, nothing but hard sleep until he felt his body being moved. He quickly grabbed onto his pillow, pulling it to him as he almost fell asleep again when his sleep fogged brain remembered who exactly he had gone to bed with. He shot up, instantly awake only to find Teddy slipping on his shoes and looking like...he was leaving. "Uhhh...morning?"
Shit. Not fast or quiet enough. Teddy smiled faintly. "Morning. Did I wake you up? I didn't want to disturb you. You looked like you needed the sleep." His pulse was already picking up, his heart a total and utter traitor. Billy still looked like hell, the dark purple ring around his eye starting to go green around the edges, the split in his lip still a hard mark against the pink. And now Teddy was looking at Billy's mouth and remembering what it had felt like to kiss him, and so much for sneaking out unnoticed.
Billy looked around, trying his best not to assume the worst, but Teddy had been trying to sneak out right? His earliest class wasn't until eight and the clock on Billy's nightstand blared six thirty in bright red numbers so what else could it be. "No. No. You didn't wake me up."
God, it was weird. He had made things weird with that stupid kiss and now the awesome friendship he'd built with Teddy was slipping through his fingers cause he was dumb. "Look, Teddy. Seriously, I didn't mean...the kiss was..." His cheeks went hot at just the word kiss, but he had to push through. "It didn't mean anything, okay? I was just...stressed. Because of Limbo, the nightmares and the X-men, I've been all over the place."
He tried to smile, but it didn't hold and he looked down at his lap. "I know I probably freaked you out, a guy kissing you is probably not something you had on your bucket list or any list, but I swear it didn't mean anything and it's not going to be weird or awkward." He was rambling. "I promise, so-please- don't try and sneak out on me."
It was the moment of truth, quite literally, and despite having stared into the darkness for hours trying to figure out how to make things right, Teddy was caught off-guard. He shoved his foot into his shoe and straightened up. (Oh, the irony.)
“It’s not that,” he said, and his mouth promptly went dry. Billy sat there looking up at him, the sheets tangled around his hips and his dark hair sticking up in random directions and all Teddy wanted to do was cross the room, sink his fingers into that hair and kiss him until neither of them could breathe. Teddy looked away.
Time to start telling the truth. Live honestly. Take action, instead of staying in stasis. He was going to regret everything.
“A lot of things happened last night. I crossed a line as well, and—and I don’t regret it.” Teddy said firmly, his heart trying to hammer itself out of his chest. He couldn’t bring himself to make eye contact, fiddling with the sleeve for his phone. “And yeah we have to talk about some of it, but ‘kissing guys’ isn’t the problem. Not in general, anyway.” Kissing Billy? Yeah, that was a much bigger one.
Billy frowned as he tried to piece together what exactly Teddy was talking about, his pulse still skyrocketing, but for a different reason all together now. Kissing guys wasn't the problem Teddy said, so did that mean that Teddy was...?
"Are you bi?" Billy said quietly, feeling a small spark of...what? It felt like irritation, but also something he didn't want to dwell on as he continued to stare at Teddy. Why hadn't he just told Billy that? Billy straight up came out to Teddy their second week of knowing each other, instead he continued to let Billy think...
It was getting harder to talk, the panic making his chest tight, but Teddy had no choice. He had to see this through now, whatever happened next. "No." He dared to look over at Billy on his bed, tried to remember the incredible right-ness of having Billy in his arms. The only way to ever get back there (maybe, someday? he didn't dare think that far ahead) was through. "I'm gay. I- I'm just. Not out. Until right now. Obviously." He stuttered to a halt.
Billy only stared as his ears seemed to block out all sound except for a high pitch ringing that he assumed was the start of a brain aneurysm. It took him a moment to actually form some kind of words, his mouth feeling like it was stuffed with cotton while the irritation moved up into anger. "So...you lied."
Teddy had heard Tessa talk about the essential pointlessness of hope, but that was the moment he thought he might understand why she'd said it. Billy's expression and his clipped words didn't leave a lot of room for hope. Still, he had to try, had to make Billy understand that it hadn't been personal - there was no reason why he shouldn't! He must have gone through a time when he wasn't out to anyone. Surely if Teddy could just find the right words, then Billy would understand.
"I didn't," Teddy said, grasping at that straw to keep his head up. "You assumed and - yeah, I didn't correct you. I should have. But I was scared, Billy. I had no idea what anyone here would do if I said anything."
"Scared?" Billy's face went ugly as a scowl moved onto his face and he pulled the sheets away from him in a violent jerk. He scrambled off his bed, standing up and fixing Teddy with a glare. "I get being scared, Teddy. Almost my whole fucking life has been being scared, but you had so many chances. I mean my god, you don't think I was scared when I came out to you?"
Teddy backpedalled until his thighs bumped up against his dresser, trying to escape from Billy’s fury. He deserved it, that much he knew, and his timing was so badly off as to be almost deliberately awful, but it didn’t make the fallout any easier to take.
“I wanted to tell you, so many times,” he pleaded, his hands up as though his strength would be any good against Billy’s magic. But fuck everything, he wasn’t entirely in the wrong either. And he held on to that thin thread of a chance that he could still break through the hurt. “But it’s not that simple. I wish I had one tenth of your courage. But I don’t. I never meant to hurt you.”
Billy was tired, that's what his mind kept telling him over and over, that right now was not the best time to talk about any of this when he was stressed and emotionally raw. Unfortunately, Billy had never been good at listening to reason and he felt his pride take a blow when Teddy assumed he had hurt him. He felt his thoughts turn dark and his hands started to spark without him even trying, and he took a step forward towards the other.
He wanted to deny that Teddy hurt him, to tell the other that he didn't care and all this anger was because Teddy had been a liar, but he couldn't because it wasn't true. So, instead he sneered and let his hands crackle with loose electricity. "Some x-man you'd be, too much of coward to even come out to your gay roommate."
That was it. Teddy had tried, he’d wound himself into knots over Billy and nothing at all seemed to be making any kind of impact. If he wanted to be cruel, he could be cruel right back. The retort was right there, so easy. I’m not the one who was afraid of the dark.
But Billy’d had good reason, and Teddy still had enough control to not go there. Less than half an hour ago Billy had been asleep in his arms. And there would be no coming back from inflicting that kind of pain.
He’d grown big and spiky without realizing it, and his hands had balled up into fists – fists that could do way too much damage, electricity or no. Teddy tried to focus, bring himself back to his baseline shape, but his anger fought him every step of the way. “You know nothing about my life, Billy. Nothing that matters.”
He hated himself after he had said that to Teddy, feeling sick when he saw the reaction on Teddy's face, but also having a disgusting feeling of satisfaction. He grit his teeth at Teddy's words, the pain digging deep into him and the feeling of needing to hurt him back coming up strong.
"Well, that's good. I probably wouldn't be able to tell what was the truth or a lie anyway." He bit out, almost wishing Teddy would hit him with those giant spiked fists of his because this was terrible. He wanted to cry, but wouldn't dare in front of Teddy.
Grief swamped his anger and Teddy managed – barely – to get his shifting back under control, bring in the claws and the armour and just be him. He couldn’t shift his heart back to being unbroken.
“Nothing I’ve said to you has ever been a lie,” he cried out, despairing. “And you’ve got plenty of secrets of your own. Of all people, Billy, I thought you would at least try to understand.” The room closed in on him, tight and suffocating, all the air sucked out of it and the light gone. Teddy turned toward the door and escape, bile burning hot in his throat.
"What is that supposed to mean?!" He yelled, the sight of Teddy turning his back on him making his heart feel like it was in his throat. He took in a deep shaky breath and the urge to use his magic to make Teddy stay was powerful, but he stamped that down quickly because there would be no going back after that. "You're just going to walk away?!"
Teddy hung his head, his shoulders curling in on themselves. “I’m not going to fight you. I’ve said what I had to say. And I’m sorry.” Hot tears of anger and humiliation burning in his eyes, he grabbed his laptop and his phone off the desk and left the room.
Billy stared at the closed door, all his anger and hurt having no place to go now that Teddy was gone, leaving him stuck on his own with these feelings. He glanced around the room in panic, not sure how to handle this extreme mix of emotions and he let out a scream as his powers let loose.
The whole room was lit up with blue electricity, scorch marks appearing on the walls when the powerful currents brushed against them and fried all of the electronics inside. He pushed his powers further and further until his body felt like it was going to collapse, tears rolled down his cheeks as he let out one last large bolt.
Teddy heard Billy’s howl of rage from halfway down the hall. The lights flickered, buzzed, and went out. The hall was silent for a moment, the usual subsonic electric hum completely gone.
Complaints started from some of the other rooms and Teddy started running. Anyone who saw him there would start asking questions, and he was so not able to answer anything coherently right now. He needed a bolthole, somewhere to hide until he could figure out some way to fix the total steaming mess that his life had so suddenly become.
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Date: 2017-10-29 12:24 pm (UTC)She would also like to offer Teddy an all expenses paid one way trip to sunny, tropical Limbo.
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Date: 2017-10-31 10:47 pm (UTC)(Though to be fair she mostly wants to knock their heads together.)
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Date: 2017-11-03 05:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-10-31 03:56 pm (UTC)Awesome tho like whoa <333