Nu ser jeg natten i farver

While not a scenario I personally endorse this is 100% Ruben Pallister’s MO, no shadow of a doubt. Had Niall come out to him in the 1980s, we would have seen more of these situations tbh. And all the while no one is openly interrogating WHY Ruben needs to facilitate and witness these intimate moments with Niall but that’s a topic for another day

How does Ruben find out about the wedding in the first place?

Anon this is when I disagree 🥲 I do think he bottoms for Alby on the regular - except when he’s drunk or is coming off his party favours. And most likely also for Butch - that ass slap was a little too familiar. TL;DR Niall Brandon Kennedy bottoms only for dark haired men that tower over him and we all know why that’s his type.

It’s that this man is a bottom. That level of angst, self-loathing, and destructive behaviours are the domain of the bottoms and I said what I said.

We are but the messengers, anon. At least Gus had the good sense not to fall in love with Niall when they’d meet at his sad little bedsit.

At the height of Niall’s public anonymous sex craze when he sees Gus getting fucked in the back of a white van again, it’s 2008. Grindr doesn’t come out for another year and given the fact that Niall visits a male sex worker in 2010, he doesn’t seem to use it.

And if he’s not at the library, what better way to get a quick fix (and vindication) than taking your former bully to pound town?

For something to be toxic, it has to also be intoxicating first.

In the name of the Brother, the Lover, and the Shagger, Amen.

We know that the only thing he’s truly ever felt is his love for Ruben and everything else he does is to numb that need. He loves Alby, but not in the all consuming must-have-at-any-cost way he needs Ruben. I’m not sure Niall has ever named his love for Ruben in those terms, but we see the destructive habits he develops to cope. And while he seemingly has resolved his self loathing for being gay, the other part of the equation, Ruben and his approval, is still missing. Not to mention the whole fatherhood betrayal.

Alby is like Ava, a respectable and appropriate partner, for a now-accomplished author. Even once he’s accepted his sexuality, Niall is still chasing the life the thinks he should have, rather than the one he wants.

The pit of his stomach probably dropped when he felt the all too familiar guilt of stringing someone along he wasn’t fully dedicated to. And friends like Butch wouldn’t necessarily call him out on this. They would keep his secret to continue their own connection, no one else needs to know. He probably got better at masking, being more careful with his partners and anything he took to disassociate, but I don’t believe he stopped cold turkey. But Ruben is far enough away and enough time has passed that he’s found a way to make it work.

That is, until the one person he’s ever felt anything for shows up and he willingly walks with him - risking it all to get his fix from his love/abuser/brother/idol/addiction