#mangosandstuff

It’s probably a good thing, he thinks, eyeing the steadily growing pile of empty pink and red wrappers next to Bart. Bart could probably eat an entire grocery store’s worth of food  in one sitting and not even feel remotely close to full.

“I’m sorry for this,” he begins,

Bart looks up from the teddy bear cookie he’s currently working on and blinks up at him in confusion.

“Sorry for what?” he asks, seemingly genuinely confused.

“Well, you probably don’t care as much but I think you still deserved a better Valentine’s day than this for our first one.”

Bart blinks again and the slow smile that spreads on his lips invokes the urge to smack his hands over his face.

“Ugh, that was embarrassing,” Jaime mutters.

“Kind of.” Bart says, still smiling.

“It’s the painkillers.”

“Mmm nope, I think you’re just a big ol sap.”

“Shut uuup.” Jaime grumbles, turning his face a little into the ice pack and regretting it immediately. When he turns back, wincing as much from the slight pain as the embarrassment of what he just said, Bart is still looking right at him. The smile has grown to a full blown grin now but the way Bart is looking at him is a little different. There’s still amusement there but there’s also something else, something warm and soft that makes something in Jaime’s chest flutter.

“This isn’t so bad,” Bart says, emphasizing the point by reaching into a nearby packet of heart shaped chocolates and setting his teddy cookie on his knee so he could unwrap it. Like Jaime, there’s a cut on his cheek but unlike Jaime, his isn’t and hasn’t been tended to at all. The skin around the cut is pink and irritated but is already looking better than it was an hour ago. By the end of the night, it’ll be barely anything more than a scab, a thought that gives Jaime relief. He watches it as Bart chews, eyes trailing up the cut and continuing on, over Bart’s cheek, the pale curve of his ear and the mess of red hair draped over it. There’s a butterfly bandage there, a small white shape peeking out under the red. Jaime tries not to think of what it implies, of the extent of the damage that Bart with his speedster healing needed a bandage to assist the process.

Other than the bandage and the cut on his cheek, Bart is otherwise unscathed. His bare arms, exposed by the Gotham U shirt he’s wearing, are void of any bruises and if there are any lingering scrapes, well on their way to healing by now most likely, they aren’t immediately visible. Under the shirt, his uniform pants are a little dirty and torn in a few places but the skin under the tears is pale and unmarked.

Jaime is in a more or less similar state, he’d taken a hell of a beating, but the armor had taken most of it. Other than his face and a few nasty bruises that would have him sore for a couple of days, he’s fine.

Idly, he wonders if it’s always like this, if Holidays are always going to be spent away from or worse, right beside your loved ones as you prevented widespread murder and catastrophe. Lord he hopes not, he can’t even imagine the world of trouble he’d be in if he plans a Christmas visit to his family with Bart and then spend their evening in an ER somewhere.

The thought gives him pause, face going slack at the realization that he’s just thought of visiting his family on Christmas with Bart.

He blinks and shakes his head, instantly thankful for the redness of his cheek and how easily it hid any blush that could bloom under his skin. When he comes back to himself, he finds himself staring straight into Bart’s curious gaze, realizing that he’d been staring at him the whole time.

“You okay?”

“Yeah. I think it’s just the painkillers.”

Or just that it’s Valentine’s. Or maybe it’s just the light and the way Bart’s features looked in it, the way his eyes look extraordinarily green in it.

But then again, this is how Bart appears in any kind of light so maybe not.

Bart seems content with his answer and so catches Jaime off guard when instead of going back to decorating sugar cookies like he expected, Bart picks up a plastic container of pink heart cookies and pushes gently at Jaime’s shoulders, unfurling him enough to sit down in his lap.

“What are you doing?” He asks, eyeing the teddy cookie that fell to the floor, abandoned.

“It’s Valentine’s.” Bart says, giving him a look like Jaime is failing to grasp an extremely clear, simple flow of logic.

Jaime, like in most things Bart related, just goes with it. He’s in a simple shirt and sweatpants and the smooth, thick material of Bart’s uniform pants, encasing the warm solid shape of him is not an unpleasant weight on his legs. He’s also tired and despite the date that never was, Bart is happy with the mountain of Valentine’s day candy, he’ll count it as a win.

He goes to wrap an arm around Bart’s waist, and follows immediately with the other when Bart takes the ice pack from his hand and relieves it of his duty holding it to Jaime’s cheek.

“Can you open the cookies for me?” Bart asks.

“My face hurts too much for eating right now.”

“Who said you’re getting any?”

Jaime tries to level Bart with his best unimpressed look with almost half his face obscured by the ice pack. “You’re just going to eat cookies and get crumbs all over me?”

“You bought them for me,” Bart says, green eyes twinkling. Jaime looks at him dourly even as he pries the plastic container open. Bart reaches for a cookie without looking away. Jaime doesn’t envy him at all, just the thought of chewing right now makes him wince and he’d never really liked sugar cookies. He doesn’t hate them though, which is a good thing because when Bart leans over to plant a soft kiss to his mouth, his lips are sugary and thick with the taste of them.

The ice pack is lifted a little and Bart dusts sugar and the taste of frosting against the cool, red skin of his cheek.

“Thank you for the cookies.”

It’s all he says, settling in more comfortably in Jaime’s lap, wriggling closer to slot himself snugly into the cradle of his arms. Bart eats cookies in content silence, tucked against Jaime, warm and happy and Jaime lets him, arms linked securely around him.

Hinata seems to agree. They’d been teaming up on homeworksince midway through their first year, but now that they were in their thirdyear, their study sessions got more and more frequent and more and moreintense. It didn’t matter how good their quick freak was, or how many timesthey got scouted, if they couldn’t pass the entrance exam.

               “Thisis awful,” Hinata whines. He’s currently flopped over Kageyama’s lap asKageyama rests against his headboard and uses Hinata’s back to prop up his ownchemistry book. “Have you figured out number six?”

               Kageyamachews the end of his pencil. “I skipped that one.”

               “Okay,what about seven?”

               Kageyamaflushes. “I skipped that one too.”

               Hinatagrabs a pillow from the end of Kageyama’s bed and smacks him with it. “Whichone’s haven’t you skipped dumbass?”

               “Oi!”Kageyama shoves the pillow away. “Let me check hold on.”

He glances over his chemistry book,which is currently decorated with doodles of volleyballs and diagrams of newplays they could use. There’s a half-assed attempt at the first two equationsbut those were quickly derailed as more interesting ideas sprung to mind.

“Um.” He pulls the book closer tohim which he immediately recognizes as a mistake.

               Hinata,suspicious, climbs over him and peers down at his book. He then reclaims thepillow and smothers Kageyama with it.

               “StupidKageyama! You haven’t done anything!” Hinata yells.

               “Hinata!”Kageyama’s book falls to the floor and Hinata’s worksheet papers are beingcrumpled underneath them. Kageyama arms himself with his own pillow and retaliates.Hinata laughs as he hits his stomach with a burst of feathers.

“I didn’t know pillows really didthat!” Hinata exclaims, as the fluff rains around him.

Kageyama uses this moment ofdistraction to tackle Hinata and that makes them both laugh.

“No fair you’re bigger than me!”Hinata cries, pushing Kageyama away.

As they tumble, eventually Hinatagains the upper hand. He pins Kageyama down, thighs clamping over his stomach.Hinata’s beaming as he leans over him and Kageyama looks away, embarrassed.

               “Gotcha!”Hinata beams.

               It washard to look at him like this. His face pink with the movement and eyes brightwith excitement. It was like trying to look at the sun head on. Kageyama couldn’twithout being overwhelmed.

               Insteadhe looks over the edge of the bed, to where their fallen homework lay.

               “Youmessed up our assignments,” Kageyama says.

               “Ugh.”Hinata slumps and rests his head on Kageyama’s chest. “It doesn’t matter, Iwasn’t doing homework either.”

               Kageyamabarks a laugh and his hands find Hinata’s orange curls. “Dumbass.”

               It wasn’tunusual for their study sessions to end up in cuddles and eventual napping.Kageyama wouldn’t admit it, but it was growing to be his favorite part of theday. Hinata was warm and his hair was soft between his fingers. It felt right,something that was going to happen inevitably. Something that Kageyama was soglad inevitably happened to him.

               “Hey,Kageyama,” Hinata says.

               “Mm?”

               “Do youremember back in our first year? What Takeda said about us and chemistry?”Hinata asks.

               Kageyamafrowns. “Chemistry?”

               “Yeah,like how we met and there was a chemical reaction or something?” Hinata takestops Kageyama’s hand from carding through his hair for a moment and entanglestheir fingers.

               Somevague memory resurfaces itself. Kageyama seems to recall Takeda following theemotional speech with stutters and embarrassed apologies.

               “Yeah Ithink so,” Kageyama says. “Why?”

               Hinataturns his head so his chin his on Kageyama’s chest and their gazes can meet. “Youthink it’s true? That somehow everything changed when we met?”

               Kageyamabriefly remembers meeting Hinata by the boy’s bathroom. How is bright,fearlessness struck him almost as much as his spring and raw energy. Heremembers the first time they pulled of their signature freak quick, and how intune he felt with Hinata. How he felt so close to him it was like they werefused together body and mind. He remembers winning with him, and losing with him,and getting up and trying again with him. And as he remembers this, he realizeshow dull and meaningless all the memories that came before Hinata are.

Kageyama doesn’t have to think aboutit.  

And just like that, Bart’s eyes light up. “Are you really suuuure?Cause it concerns you.”

Jaime gives him a dubious look, part warning and part worry. Bart grins at him and wiggles closer sothat his head was propped up on Jaime’s knee. “Last week, the downstairs guestroom. I was there and you were too, good times?”

The dubious look grows as Jaime’s brows furrow even more andhis eyes narrow further. He opens his mouth but Bart beats him to it. “What,did you really think women would still be the only one’s giving birth 50 yearsinto the future?”

Bart’s grin gets wider as a look of horror momentarily takesover Jaime’s face.  It stays even asJaime suddenly squints at him, leaning forward slightly. He stares at Bartintently for a few seconds.

“You’re lying.”

“Nope. Scientists figured it out in the early 2030’s. Supermanand Batman had a baby boy after 15 years of marriage. They named him John PeterJackson Way- whoops, secret ID’s, right.”

Jaime snorts and reaches down to smother his palm over Bart’sface. Bart just laughs and blindly reaches up to try and do the same, grippingJaime’s shoulder when he leans away to avoid getting poked in the eye. Hegrunts a little when Bart uses his grip as leverage to pull himself upright andmakes a halfhearted noise of protest when Bart shifts so he can lean his backagainst him, pressing his long, super warm torso against Jaime’s side.

“Nghh you’re too warm.” Jaime mutters, voice coming out alittle muffled because Bart, ever the inconsiderate pet no one asked for, justtilted his head back and pushed his thick, stupid hair right into Jaime’s face.

“Maybe it’s the pregnancy hormones kicking in.”

Jaime groans, long and drawn out but he doesn’t push Bartaway or make any move to get up. Bart laughs again before going quiet. They don’tsay anything for a while and just as Jaime begins to wonder if the plan was totake a nap right there on the couch, Bart speaks.

“Would it be so bad though?”

Jaime tilts his head curiously. “What?”

Bart doesn’t turn to face him. “Having a baby.”

There’s something in the way Bart says it that keeps Jaimefrom making a sarcastic comment or turning the whole thing into a joke. Hepauses thoughtfully and smiles a little. Well, it’s been 10 years, 3 since he’shad to go to sleep next to Bart every night and wake up to him every morning.If he managed to put up with him that long, he’d probably be able to handle anactual baby, even one that is as loud and clingy and reckless as Bart. He’scertainly had enough practice from Milagro. If the kid loved him as much asBart does, he’s sure he can handle it.

“Nah. It’ll probably be less annoying and definitely waycuter than you.”

“Probably a bit of both? I’m hilarious and all my potential gets wasted and choked to death 90% of the time. It has to come out sometime. If I have to pretend to laugh at another historical joke made by some old white dude in an expensive suit, I’m going to shrivel up and die.”

Jaime hums noncommittally in answer and Bart smiles, tugging him down for some slow, languid post-coital kissing. And speaking of post-coital, right on cue, the shamed, guilty voice in the back of Jaime’s head makes itself known, kicking at the walls and whacking Jaime in the face viciously with a rolled up newspaper, screaming  Qué chiNGADOS, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?! It only shrieks louder when Bart pulls away with a contented sigh, fingers idly combing through Jaime’s hair. He smiles, slow and warm, looking up at Jaime through lidded eyes.

“Seriously though, that was great.” The smile morphs into a hesitant smirk. “Meet you back here tonight?”

Haha. Very funny. Because he’s supposed to use this very limo tonight to drive Bart to the most expensive restaurant in the country, because as his bodyguard, it’s part of Jaime’s job to make sure he arrives safely  to meet Princess Carol, his Royal fiancée for their date. Jaime swears softly under his breath and disentangles himself from Bart, sliding down to the floor so he could bring his knees to his chest and pinch at the bridge of his nose.

“We can’t keep doing this Bart.”

He mutters, squeezing his eyes shut. He thinks of Ty and it’s all he could do not to want to will himself into non-existence as he remembers his words while sitting curled up naked in the back of a limo with Bart just inches away, equally naked.

Jaime, dude. I can’t even begin to tell you how stupid of an idea this is. You should be dating someone who is not in the closet, not involved with you on a professional basis and not the heir to the throne. Bro, you especially should be dating someone who is not all three.

After several long, moments of tense silence, Jaime hears Bart sit up and sigh quietly.

“Yeah, yeah we can’t.”

Jaime opens his eyes and stares intently at a spot on the carpet, trying to think of what to say next. Before he can, a hand settles tentatively against his shoulder and Bart is saying something. Jaime doesn’t hear what it is, too busy flinching away. He pointedly doesn’t look at Bart as he gathers up his clothes but still, the weight of his insides as they gathered somewhere close to his feet feel as heavy and nauseating as it would had he looked Bart straight in the eye and met his guilty, hurt, gaze head on.

“I’m gonna go.” Jaime says as he quickly slips on his clothes. He still doesn’t look at Bart even as he crouches next to the door and wraps his fingers around the handle. “Wait for a bit before you follow me out, I’ll make sure no one’s around to see you and text you when you can go.”

He doesn’t say he’ll see him tonight, instead, Jaime runs down a list of people under his command that would be willing to take on the task of actually driving the limo as he wrenches the car door open. He slips out quietly and just as he’s about to slam the door shut, a hand catches his, making him pause. He should pull away, he would.

“Yes,I can see that B.”

Jaimestartles a little at how fast Bart makes it down the steps. He turnshis face upward to see him already on the foyer with the three ofthem, holding a bag of popcorn in one hand and stuffing some into hismouth with the other. He’s looking at Jaime with a pleasant butslightly surprised smile. Something in Jaime’s stomach flips becausenot an hour ago,  Garfiled was joking around, saying Alright, goon, shoo, your boy-wife is waiting at home for you.

“Ididn’t even hear you come down.” Jaime says, wrapping his armssecurely around the two little girls in his lap and standing up.

“Yeah,I’ve been honing my Ninja skills.” Bart says with a shrug. “You’reback early.”

“Yeahh, it’s storming upin the mountains. The other teachers and I decided it was a bit toorisky to stay up there so the trip’s cancelled.”

Bart nods with asympathetic frown. “Oh, well that sucks.”

“For the kids maybe.I’ve been mercifully spared from a weekend of moody, screamingchildren. Now I only have to deal with one.” Jaime says, playfullybumping his forehead against Bianca’s.

“Heeeeyyy, papa that’smean.”

Jaime chuckles. “Alright,alright. Two moody, screaming children.” he says, bouncing thegirls once. The blonde little one in his other arm squeals in delightand Bart’s beams at her.

“Hey Mary, do you evenremember who that is?”

Mary looks up at Jaimewith those big green eyes again. Jaime grins down at her, a grin thatshe slowly echoes before patting him on the cheek. “Hayye!” shesays confidently and Bart laughs, stepping forward to take her out ofJaime’s arm.

“Close enough.” hesays, affectionately pinching his niece’s nose and handing her thebag of popcorn so that he could hold her with both arms.

“That’s actually prettygood, that she remembers me, this is only like the 3rdtime I’ve seen her. What’s her full name again?” Jaime asks,nudging his duffel further into the house with his foot while tugginghis suitcase in through the door.

“Mary Lynn,Grayson-West.” Bart says as Jaime closes the door behind him.

“That’s going to be amouthful for her to learn.”

“Naaah, she’s a smartcookie.” Bart says, watching her as she hugs the popcorn bag withone arm and slips her free hand inside to grab herself some.

“Anyway, we werewatching a movie, if you want to come join us.”

Before Jaime can answer,Bianca is piping up excitedly about said movie, going a mile a minuteabout puppets and music and adventure and PAPA THEY’RE MEXICAN,they’re celebrating the day of the dead!! Like you and me andAbuelita did last November! Come watch iiiit. He hardly gets a wordin, just laughs and nods and follows Bart up the stairs to his roomwhere the bigger TV is.

They watch The Book ofLife or rather, the girls watch it while Jaime tries and fails tochat with Bart over their adorable, excited shouts and commentary.Neither of them really mind, Bianca’s enthusiasm alone is highlycontagious and he happily obliges when his little girl grabs his handat the ending and makes him dance with her while Maria and Manolodance and sing during their wedding. In the middle of a twirl, Biancarealizes  “oh gosh, Mary, Mary come here! Isn’t your name justanother kind of Maria??? I’ll be your Manolo, come dance with me!!”and promptly abandons him to drag Mary off Bart’s lap and haul heraround the room. Jaime only acts a little bit bummed.

The girls dance and singthemselves to exhaustion and it is getting late, so by the time thecredits were half finished, Bianca and Mary are more or less passedout on each other on the floor, Mary more so than Bianca. She’sblinking blearily and yawning widely every few seconds so Jaimecoaxes Bianca away from her and helps Bart tuck the girls in. Afterthey’re safely deposited in Bianca’s bedroom, he and Bart head backdownstairs to the kitchen.

Jaime grabs a bottle ofwater from the fridge. “Do you want one?”

“No thanks, I’m good.”Bart says, walking over to the fruit basket and grabbing a Pluot.

“Man, they are quite ahandful.” Jaime says nodding upwards at the ceiling and taking apull out of his water bottle.

Bart laughs and bites intothe fruit in his hand, leaning against the counter as he chews.“Nothing I can’t handle. He says with a grin. Jaime notices theprint on his hoodie. It escaped him earlier because of the lightingin the foyer and the color but in here, the bright fluorescent lightsshine down and clearly highlight the outline of a huge Direwolfstretched out across Bart’s chest, over the words “The NorthRemembers”. He wonders just how many nerdy hoodies Bart has andhides a grin. A lot probably, and that probably shouldn’t be as cuteas he thinks it is.

“Thanks again forcoming, you really didn’t have to, I knew Wally and Dick already leftMary with you.”

“Like I said, it’snothing I can’t handle. Mary and B got on like a house on fire, it’sgood for them. And besides that, I like coming here. B is great andyour house is great and you, well, you’re really great about meeating all your food so,” Bart says with a grin.

Jaime has to tamp down onthe urge to blush and convinces himself to stop thinking that in theshort pause after Bart said youhe might’ve been thinking about saying something else. Because hemight be a grown man with a 4 year old daughter but Bart has thisweird, effective way of reducing him into an awkward teenager withouteven trying.

“Aslong as you don’t touch my stash of chicken whizees in the pantry, Idon’t mind.”

Bart’sjaw drops and his eyes widen comically. “You could’ve said thatbefore you left, now I owe you 2 boxes of them.”

Jaimequirks a brow at him and Bart drops the completely exaggeratedexpression of shock. “I’m just kidding, they’re all still there. Ihave enough at home.” Bart grins at him and gives a little wink.

Jaimeonly hates himself a little bit at how something in his gut jumps atit. He hears Garfield’s voice in his head again. Woah,couldn’t escape fast enough Jaime? We’re not even done calling allthe parents yet. Oh wait, Wally’s cousin is at your place lookingafter your girl again. Riiight. Okay, I only blame you a little bit,he is a pretty one.You should ask him to stay for the rest of the weekend. Who knows?Maybe at some point in that time, you’d somehow find the courage toman up and finally askhim out.

Jaimeaggressively banishes his inner Garfield and shakes his head, noddingat Bart’s hoodie. “You all caught up?”

Bartis still eating his Pluot. He nods at Jaime while chewing. “Youwatch it?” he asks when his mouth is a little less full.

“Tryingto. Haven’t had much time recently but I’m on season 4 and I’m slowlyworking my way through it.”

“Nice,nice.” Bart says, nodding.

Jaimehesitates. “I was planning on watching the rest of it tonight, i-ifyou.” he clears his throat to belatedly cover his stutter. “Ifyou wanted to rewatch it, you could, I mean, as long as you keep yourbig mouth shut. Something tells me you’re not the kind of person whocould help themselves from spewing spoilers.”

Bartblinks then a slow, pleased smile that does things to Jaime’s insidesstretches across his mouth.  He finishes off his Pluot and shoves hishands into his hoodie.

“Thatwould be crash.”

“Crash?”

“It’sthe new cool, you wouldn’t know you’re old.”

“Haha.”Jaime says though a nervous, nagging voice in the back of his headmakes itself known, wondering. “And how old are you again?”

“21.”

Thevoice breathes out a sigh of relief. “You’re only 3 years youngerthan me.”

“Stillyounger.” Bart says, one finger lifted up as if he’s making anexcellent point.

“Whateverloser.”

Hisinitial idea to ask Bart to watch Game of Thrones with him, alreadykind of dubious in it’s status as a good idea, turns out to bespectacularly bad, at least on Jaime’s end. They don’t want to riskwaking the girls up, especially not through copious swearing, soinstead of watching on the TV, they end up squished together on theliving room couch, watching on Jaime’s laptop. Maybe it wouldn’t havebeen so bad, it’s just man…Jaime forgot how much sex happensin this god damn show.

Hetries to pay attention to the plot and succeeds for the most part butevery time more than one person pops up with no clothes on, he has toviciously concentrate on not being aware of Bart right there next tohim and on the fact that they’re both adults and this shouldn’tbe a big deal. Sort of. Eventually, he just tries to completelydissociate the fact that he was watching all this with the fact thatBart is watching right with him. However when the scene with PrinceOberyn and Ellaria Sand having a good time in the brothel with abunch of girls and that one dude pops up, whatever mental barrier washolding Bart’s presence next to him and what was happening on screenfar apart snaps and vanishes completely.

You like them both?Girls and Boys

Jaime’seyes drift to the right, where Bart sat, almost touching his arm andwonders. His brain goes to dangerous territory before he could helpit, thinking back to almost two years ago now, when Bart kissed hischeek mostly to oblige Bianca. He would have thought nothing of itbut Bart doesn’t like me that way, Yes he does! He thinksyou’re cute. He wonders what it was that Bianca heard Bart say,if she just misunderstood or if-

“Youknow you kind of look like Prince Oberyn.”

Bartpipes up, startling Jaime out of his thoughts. He squints at thescreen and raises an eyebrow. “What? No I don’t.”

“Youdo a little bit, like if you grew your chin hair into a fullerbeard,”

“Hmmm…Youlook like Sansa Stark.” Jaime says, thinking fast as said characterpops up on the screen. He stares at Sophie turner for a bit andraises his eyebrows a little, thinking he’s actually not entirelywrong with that. They match in color kind of remarkably well, Bart isalmost as pale as she is, hair is the same shade of red and the eyes.Hers look blue more often than Bart’s do but they both have thatstunning, vivid quality to the iris.

“You’renot wrong. She’s pretty.” Bart says.

“Really.You think you’re pretty?”

Bartbats those stupidly long eyelashes at him. “Am I not?”

Jaimeopens his mouth and…doesn’t say anything for two, three seconds andkeeps saying nothing. Those green eyes looking at him suddenly feellike two ultra bright headlights speeding towards at him at 10 milesan hour. Increasingly aware of very quickly and drastically goingdown in flames, Jaime tries to force something, anything out. Aquiet, slightly wheezing noise escapes that he immediately clampsdown on before it could get any worse.

Bart’ssmile dims ever so slightly and he immediately looks away. And that’swhen his more or less okay evening suddenly turns awful. Bart clearshis throat.

“Well,I mean,”

Someblessed, sensible part of Jaime ‘s brain decides then that enough isenough and smacks the ever living shit out of the rest of his brainwith a rolled up newspaper, shouting. For fuck’s sake, you’re agrown up. Act like it!

“Youare,” Jaime gets out.

Bartpauses, turning to him with wide eyes. Jaime clears his throat andsits up a litle straighter. “-in fact. Bianca’s mentioned once ortwice that she wishes she could be as pretty as you someday.”

Jaimesees Bart absorb that for a few seconds and lets out a breath hehasn’t been aware he’s been holding when Bart slowly smiles. “Idon’t think she has to worry about that. She’s got some good genes.She’ll be gorgeous.”

Jaimehopes that means what he thinks it means.

“Yeah?”he asks.

Theway Bart looks at him as he nods more or less confirms it for him andif that doesn’t, the quick but deliberate once over he gives himwould be hard to interpret as anything else.

“Ohyeah.”

Jaimefeels the corners of his mouth curling upwards and he thinks Alright.Okay. This is a thing that can be. Nice.

“Listen,”he begins, licking his lips. “I know I’m back early but I did askyou to stay until Monday and I think Bianca would be disappointed ifyou had to leave early. I mean, if you want, you and Mary can stay.”

“Really?You want us to?” Bart asks with a tiny teasing smirk.

Jaimeswallows. “Yes. I would, if you choose to, I’d like that very muchactually.”

“DoI get to steal some of your chicken whizees?”

“Aboslutelynot.”

Bartlaughs. “Aww, well okay then, I’m sure you’ll come up with someother way to make it worth my while.”

Withoutwarning, Jaime leans forward, cups the back of Bart’s head and gentlyturns it to meet his. The kiss is chaste, short, a simple press oflips that lasts for only about two seconds. Still, it’s apparentlyenough to stun Bart, who pulls away, lips slightly parted and greeneyes once again wide with surprise.

“Yeah.I’m sure I’ll think of something.” Jaime says, turning back to hislaptop to hide the way his heartrate has doubled.

Bartdoesn’t say anything and Jaime imagines a small smile on his lips ashe settles in to go back to watching Jaime’s laptop, closer to hisside than he was before. After a few minutes,  hand slides into hisand Jaime clutches it back, twining their fingers together.

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