#chrisitanity

Dennis Whitaker x OldFlame!Male!Reader

Warnings/Notes: Pt1 of my Was It Casual Series (masterlist), MLM, Exes back to lovers, Homophobia, Angst/Happy Ending, Dennis is a Christian,

Word count: 1089

Dennis never imagined he'd willingly return to this raggedy little town, yet there he stood in the living room of the house he'd grown up in. The wallpaper was still peeling in the corners, the old grandfather clock still ticked a second too slow, and the scent of his mother's cinnamon candles did little to mask the stale grief hanging in the air. His mother was still sniffling despite it being hours after the funeral service, the same service Dennis stared at a man's body that had reminded him everyday till he moved out that God made Adam and Eve, not Adam and Adam. His fingers found the silver cross resting against his chest on instinct. Dennis had worn the same cross since he was twelve when his grandma had given it to him, he only took it off when he wanted to kiss the boy he loved back then. Every time they kissed, Dennis would fumble to take it off to make sure he didn't feel like he had been disobeying some supernatural force, now that he was older? He didn't believe in such things anymore, but the boy he had loved back then never had a digital footprint. Now the boy was a man, and Dennis had no idea if he was even still in town. He hadn’t searched. Hadn’t dared. The digital silence had been easier than facing the possibility that the only person who had ever made him question everything might have simply vanished. A soft knock at the door pulled him out of his thoughts. His mother had already gone upstairs, leaving him alone with the ticking clock and the ghosts. Dennis crossed the room, each step heavier than the last, and opened the door.

By the God above, it was You.

Older, yes, but still unmistakably you. The same eyes that had once looked at him like he was something holy. The same mouth that had taught him how to sin and how to love in the same breath. Dennis’s breath caught in his throat and the cross felt heavier than ever resting on his chest like a weight of a fat cat on your legs . "...You," he whispered, voice cracking around the single word. His hand rose instinctively to the silver pendant, fingers brushing the cool metal as if it could anchor him. "I didn’t think you’d come." The porch light cast long shadows across your face, and for a moment neither of you moved. The years between you stretched like a wound that had never quite healed. Dennis’s chest ached with everything he had never said, everything he had buried beneath scripture and silence and eventually his medical work in Pittsburgh. "Can I come in?" you asked, voice low, careful, like you were afraid he might slam the door in your face. Dennis stepped aside without answering, he closed the door behind you, the click of the latch echoing like a decision he wasn’t ready to make. "I saw the obituary," you said, glancing around the living room like you were cataloging every unchanged detail. "Didn’t know if you’d be here considering….," you gestured to the air, both of you knowing what it meant. Considering how abusive his dad used to be, considering how he used to hide you like a dirty secret. "I almost didn’t come. Almost stayed away if I'm being honest. But... something pulled me back." He looked at you then, really looked, and the years fell away like they had never existed. "You still don’t have any social media? I checked once. A long time ago." Dennis cleared his throat, anxiety making him rub his thumb along the cross. "Yeah, I never saw the point." You shrugged, eyes tracing the man that still had your heart in his hands. "I still remember that night." you chuckled, "The arguement we had before you left that one summer." Right. The argument where Dennis thought he lost you forever.

That night, Dennis had snuck out what he decided would've been his last time seeing you. The making out in the barn, the quiet words he delivered to you after while he held back his own tears. "It's just casual, y/n. Theres nothing between us." and then your deadly response "Oh it's casual? Was it casual that you had to keep taking your grandma's cross off when we kiss so you don't feel like you're disobeying God?" He had hit you then, beat you mostly senseless but that was because you had refused to lay a hand on him. After you had left, he hadn't seen you ever again.

An extraordinary archaeological discovery in eastern Germany has reunited a medieval bronze cross with the mould used to cast it—more than four decades after the mould itself was found. The object, a so-called wheel cross dating to the 10th or 11th century, offers rare and tangible evidence of early Christianisation among the Slavic populations of the region between the Elbe and Oder rivers.