#lyxchen

  “How about some coffee first, huh?” he says. He pushes back a little to get Willie to stand up straight again and turns around, holding out a steaming mug for them. Willie lets the sweet scent fill his nose and takes it gratefully. He takes a sip and closes his eyes, nodding.

  “This,” they start, smacking their lips, “is the only reason I keep you around.”

  He hears Alex laugh and they open their eyes again. “I’m pretty sure there’s more reasons.”

  Yeah, there sure are, Willie almost says out loud but can stop himself.

  “Was the vodka that harsh to you yesterday that you forgot all the perks of me being your roommate?” Alex asks as he grabs his laptop from the kitchen table, coffee mug in his other hand, and makes his way over to the couch.

  Willie leans back against the counter and groans. “I didn’t even drink that much.” Alex shoots him a look. “Okay fine, it was a little much. But I can remember everything.”

  “Good,” Alex says, “you deserve to remember all the shit you told me yesterday.” He settles onto the couch, his back leaning against the armrest so he can continue his conversation with Willie over the back cushions.

  “Oh my god, what did I say?” Willie asks immediately, suddenly not so sure if they remember everything. What if he told Alex –

  “Oh, nothing important, you were just ranting about plants and soil types and sun exposure and shit.” Alex laughs at Willie's embarrassed face. “It was fine, I was kinda drunk too, so I was an avid listener.”

  “You always are,” Willie says quietly into his mug.

  “Huh?” Alex asks.

  Willie shakes their head with a soft smile. “Nothing.”

  Alex shrugs. “And then a while later I fell into my ‘I am depressed and everyone hates me’ phase of drunk and you had this whole speech about how much you love me.”

  Willie almost chokes on his coffee. “What?”

  “Hey, don’t regret that, it was really sweet,” Alex says, looking at him. Then he blushes a little and laughs. “You were all like, I make the best coffee and you don’t even mind waking up early if you know that I’m already in the kitchen making breakfast.”

  Willie looks down at the mug in their hands. Then their eyes fall onto the neatly wrapped sandwich and an open and steaming to-go mug filled with coffee, that are sitting next to him on the counter, ready for him to take them to his classes. Willie feels his face grow hot and looks back up to look at Alex. He’s turned to his laptop but there’s still a very noticeable blush sitting on high on his cheeks. A smile tugs at Willie's lips and the warmth blooming in their chest chases away some of the discomfort of the hangover.

  He starts walking over to the couch. “Drunk me was right,” Willie starts, making Alex look up from the screen. They stop when their thighs are touching the back of the couch. “You do make the best coffee.”

  Alex chuckles and turns away. “Shut up.”

  “No, I’m serious!”

  Alex looks back up into Willie's eyes. Then he punches Willie in the hip.

  “Ouch!” they say laughing, walking back into the kitchen to pack their prepacked breakfast into their bag.

  “You love me!” Alex calls from the couch and Willie halts in his movement for a moment but doesn’t respond.

  “Bye, Alex,” he says pointedly as they shoulder their bag on their way to the front door.

  “Hey, wait, your wallet is still here.”

  Willie stops and turns, noticing his wallet Alex is holding up. They pat the small bag at their backpack, checking for his wallet even though he’s looking right at it.

  “Why was it by the couch?” he asks as he walks back over.

  “You were showing people your super old ID pic.”

  “Oh my god, I did,” Willie recalls, shuddering at the memory. They stop next to Alex head, taking the wallet and pulling out their old ID. “The picture is awful.”

  “I agree.”

  “Hey, you don’t get to say that,” Willie says and punches Alex like Alex did earlier. “Only I get to insult myself.”

  Alex holds their eye contact. “Watch me.” 

  Willie leans onto the backrest of the couch and squints slowly until Alex breaks and a laugh bursts out of him. Willie smiles to himself.

  Alex’s eyes flick to the digital clock above the oven before he looks back at Willie and places a hand on their wrist. “You need to leave, it’s almost half past.”

  Willie turns to the clock too. “Ugh. Yeah, you’re right.” They turn back to Alex. “Okay, see you later.” Before they know what’s happening, Willie dips down to press a quick goodbye-kiss onto Alex’s lips. He pulls back and away from the couch as if nothing happened and walks back over to the front door to leave.

  And then it’s as if the hangover has left their body completely and is instead replaced by an instant, full body shock.

  Willie stops dead in his tracks. He’s just kissed Alex. On the mouth. What the fuck.

  He slowly pulls back the hand they’ve reached out for the door handle and turns around, facing the situation. They’re sure their face is bright red.

  Alex is staring back at Willie, his face equally flushed, with his mouth half opened. When their eyes meet, he blinks slowly, then closes his mouth. He carefully places his laptop on the couch in front of him and moves to his feet, never breaking the eye contact. He walks towards Willie in a smooth motion and Willie doesn’t move back, just keeps his eyes locked with Alex’s, anticipating what he’s going to do.

  When Alex stands in front of them, he lifts his hands and gently places them on Willie's cheeks, guiding their face up a little.

  “Willie,” he says quietly, whispers almost.

  “Yeah,” Willie whispers back and resists leaning into the touch.

  “I am going to kiss you now.” It’s a question, even though it’s not phrased like one. Willie nods without a second thought.

  Alex closes the distance between them and presses his lips to Willie's, not longer than a second before he pulls back an inch. Willie's hands fly to Alex’s waist, gripping the worn down fabric of his t-shirt, pulling a little. Alex doesn’t need more instructions before he moves down to kiss Willie again, longer, deeper, and every nerve ending in Willie's body lights up.

  “Oh my god,” they whisper when they separate again.

  Alex huffs a laugh and moves back, looking down at Willie in front of him. “Yeah.”

  Willie smiles up at him. Then his eyes flick to the clock again.

  “My class starts soon,” he tells Alex but doesn’t move yet, instead grips his waist a little tighter. “Pick me up later, I’m taking you out for coffee. We need to talk about this.”

  “Okay,” Alex responds, stroking a thumb over Willie's cheekbone. Now Willie does lean into it. “Okay,” Alex says again.

  Willie pushes up onto their tiptoes to press another kiss onto Alex lips, before taking his hands off their cheeks and squeezing.

There were bowls everywhere, and a dust cloud of flour was mushrooming into the air as Willie poured it from a large bag into the bowl in front of them.  Reggie was off to the side with another bowl, cracking eggs with flourish.  The oven was on behind Willie, and Reggie was in the middle of telling a joke that had Alex’s boyfriend doubled over in laughter.  In short, it was pure chaos, in the most innocent, lighthearted manner, and strangely, perfectly expected from both of the ghosts present.

Still, though, it was chaos.  “Uh… what the hell did I just walk into?” Alex asked, his voice incredulous.  Willie glanced up first, setting down the bag of flour, and Alex was met with the sight of his boyfriend with flour streaked through their hair and a smear of what looked like cake batter across their cheek.  He was smiling brightly, the kind of smile that made him radiate warmth and light that instantly warmed Alex’s heart and nearly made him forget about the strangeness of the situation.

“Oh, hey bro,” Willie said, somehow turning a word Reggie and Luke had used so many times in the past into the most romantically affectionate word Alex had ever heard.  They stepped from behind the island, walking over to him.  “We’re baking!”

“Yup!” Reggie chimed in, from his vantage point.  “Willie and I were kinda bored, y’know?  I thought it’d be nice to make cookies for everyone, especially now that we can!”

Willie smiled sweetly at him and Alex nearly forgot how to stay standing.  “You were out, and Reggie asked so nicely, and I figured, why not?  We made your favourite!”

“I--” Alex started, staring around the room.  “Why is-- what-- the kitchen--”

“Use your words, ‘Lex,” Reggie quipped, chuckling.

“Reggie?” Willie’s soft voice edged into Alex’s thoughts, and he absently heard his friend chirp in response.  “Mind giving us a sec?  I’ll keep an eye on the oatmeal raisin batch.”  A beat passed as footsteps echoed out of the room.

Alex groaned.  Not even the promise of sugar cookies could stop him from pointing out the obvious.  “The kitchen’s a mess.”

“Well, yeah,” Willie said, taking Alex’s hands and stepping backwards, pulling him with them.  They ended up sandwiching themself between him and the island before reaching around, slipping their hands in Alex’s back pockets.  “We didn’t want to just make one type of cookie, so we just kind of made them all, and a couple of cakes, too.  I’m sure Ray won’t mind.”

Alex’s brain had already started to short-circuit the moment Willie’s hands were in his pockets, and their comment didn’t help matters.  He stammered, watching the way Willie’s nose crinkled in amusement, trying desperately to come up with some coherent reason why it was utterly insane that the kitchen looked the way it did.  It was difficult, though, when Willie was looking at him with warm, brown eyes.

Alex blinked, his hands (which had been hovering awkwardly once Willie dropped them) landing on Willie’s waist.

“I missed you,” they murmured, leaning forward and pressing their lips to Alex’s, a brief, fleeting kiss that left his lips tingling as they did every time, always as though it was the first time.  “I wanted to surprise you.”

“It’s, er, definitely a surprise,” Alex replied, slowly lifting a hand and running his finger through the cake batter smear.

Willie raised his eyebrows, tugging him closer.  “I kinda wish I was baking with you, though.  D’you maybe wanna do that sometime?”

“Sure,” Alex replied, finding it hard to focus on anything when Willie was so close, his presence filling Alex’s senses.  “But only if it’s not as messy as this.”

He just barely caught the mischievous look in Willie’s eyes before they twisted away.  “You mean, like this?”

Alex’s brows knit together in confusion and he didn’t have time to react before Willie was flicking a handful of flour in his direction.  He coughed, blinking.

“Dude, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to get it in your face!” Willie blurted, reaching for his waist.

They were too endearing, and Alex couldn’t stay mad at them.  Really, he couldn’t even get mad.  As Willie fussed over him, swiping at his cheek, Alex noticed there was still cake batter on his finger.  He reached out, smearing it on Willie’s nose.  “That’s payback,” he said, letting out a small chuckle.

Willie was stunned for half a second before they reacted, a fond smile on their face.  “You always find some way to surprise me, Alex,” he said, leaning in to kiss him, his arms around Alex’s neck.  Alex slipped his arms around Willie’s waist, holding them close.

Willie pulled away first.  “Wanna try the sugar cookies?”

“Of course,” Alex replied, grinning back at them, following them to the counter.

“Really?”

Willie grins down at Alex.

“I’m just following the instructions, ‘Lex! Don’t tell me you want me to get a bad grade?”

Alex glares and nuzzles his head further into Willie’s lap. They’re sitting on the floor of the music room where the band’s been practicing this year, waiting around for Luke and Julie to finish arguing about a particular line in the song they’ve been working on.

“I know for a fact that the instructions for this assignment didn’t say anything about painting a hotdog.”

“Nope,” Willie turns back to where he’d propped up the canvas he brought, adding a little streak of yellow to the top of the hotdog painted in the bottom corner. “But I am supposed to paint the things I love, so.”

Oh.

Oh.

Alex knows his eyes are wide and his face is red, but for the life of him he can’t seem to get any words out.

“I-- uh,” he finally stutters. Willie isn’t looking at him, but he can see that the other boy still has a shit-eating grin under a light blush. “You shouldn’t trust hotdogs,” Alex settles on saying, trying to ignore the way his voice comes out squeakier than he’d like. “They can be very dangerous.”

Willie snorts and reaches down absentmindedly to swipe a line of yellow across Alex’s nose.

“Sure they can, hotdog.”

Alex really should say something. He really, really should, because they’ve been dating for, like, six months, and he’s pretty sure Willie just said he loves him? But he’s not sure-sure, and if that isn’t what he meant then it would be awkward, and he really doesn’t want to risk messing anything up between them because he does love Willie, but he hasn’t known how to tell him, and this would really be a great opportunity other than the fact that he might be completely wrong and saying something could fuck everything up forever.

But, on the other hand, if that is what Willie meant, then he’s probably waiting for Alex to answer, and if he doesn’t say something - say he loves him back - then that could fuck everything up, too, and--

Willie sighs and gives him a soft smile, dropping his paintbrush onto the plate of paints (yes, Alex knows it has a name. No, he’s never going to use it) and turning all his attention to the boy in his lap.

“You’re freaking out about whether or not I meant that the way you think I did, aren’t you,” he says. He doesn’t even have the decency to make it sound like a question, the jerk.

Alex avoids his eyes.

“C’mon, Alex, look at me.”

Alex looks at him, trying to mimic the puppy eyes Luke always uses on Julie to get out of trouble.

Willie visibly fights back a grin, rolling his eyes playfully, his expression soft. Adoring.

“I meant it that way,” he says, smiling openly now. “I love you, Alex.”

He can feel his face heating, and his mouth splitting into an insanely wide grin, but it doesn’t really matter because Willie loves him. Willie loves him! And--

“I love you too,” and damn that’s nice to say.

They’re both smiling now, and Alex really desperately hopes none of his friends are looking because he’s pretty sure he’s making the exact heart eyes he’s made fun of Luke for, and wouldn’t that be embarrassing, but then Willie leans down and kisses him once, softly, and he forgets all about Luke and Reggie and the band room and everything else except Willie Willie Willie--

They do tease him, later, and they tease Willie for the face he made after he pressed a kiss to Alex’s nose and got still-wet yellow paint in his mouth, and they tease them both for the way Alex couldn’t play right the rest of the day.