especially if it's just before julian does go away, so it's julian going "here's something for you to ruminate on while i'm travelling ;)))" and he winksa bunch of times
because the book is Forster's Maurice
a book that, yes, julian has specifically picked out to flirt with Garak, particularly because it's a mirror in so many ways of the cardassian epic, but it's instead an exploration and a dissection of british class mores and the working man and the war with those expectations versus personal identity
and that it has a happy ending - in that in the end the protagonist rejects those class mores and he runs off into the distance, into bliss, with the inappropriate, forbidden lover!
(and julian might not realise the significance of this specific bit to garak and his family background but. the gardener, no less!)
and julian is so excited bc this is a book he's hype to discuss, one that is genuinely quite meaningful to him, that is embedded a lot in the british queer history that he's kind of excited to then parallel with other texts later, to really get into it with garak, about class and how it's impacted him, especially the ways his father still acts NOW, and how class (esp british ideas of class) intersect with imperialism, intersect with race, and basically to just. shove all of this in front of garak and his bullshit and see what he dares to say
bc he doesn'ttalk about this w a lot of people on DS9, bc he can't, and he wouldn't, but he's been hyping it up in his head to really dig into this as a theme
and so you have julian who's. brimming over with excitement. who's grinning. who's sure he's got such a good fucking book to STUMP the bastard
smirking, because yes, oh, yes, garak, this will give you something to ruminate on. this will give you something to chew on. i'm sure you'll be desperate to get in a room with me to discuss it as soon as i'm back - no!!! don't look at it until i'm gone!
and instead of being faced with em forster's loving prose and the grim introduction to grief and boarding school, garak is looking at a holovid of julian's body with significant lingering over his chest, his navel, his thighs, before it finally dips between his legs
(bonus BONUS if this kind of prurient imagery carries a really heavy sentence back in the cardassian empire and the last time garak saw this sort of smut at home it was when he was looking for significant blackmail material)
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