Panic! Fic | The Myth of Innocence | Brendon/Spencer | R | ~10,500 words | AU
The Myth of Innocence
Brendon/Spencer | R | ~10,500 words | AU -- set Sometime That Isn't Now
Brendon finds something and comes to Spencer for help. Spencer makes space in his quiet life for Brendon, and finds that he doesn't want him to leave. With a guest appearance from The Young Veins & The Like.
I got a whole lot of encourage while I was writing this, and that is the only reason why I was able to finish. So I'm going to thank a whole bunch of people! Thanks to sunsetmog, sparkfrost, slowlikewine, reni_days, shaggirl, and boweryd for reading this before it was done and sending me their encouragement. Thanks to airgiodslv to listening to me post this out in the first place. And to the awesome people on my flist!
And many thanks to elucreh for looking this over. And finally to octette for working so patiently with me in the rewrite, ♥!
Spencer's on the side porch, whacking a rug to get rid of the dust, when he hears this -- it's this noise like bells, and water running over stones, and long grass being moved by the wind. It's like nothing that Spencer's heard before. He hesitates for a moment, listening as the sound gets louder and louder, and then he drops the rug and retreats into his house. The noise is beautiful and clear and something in it makes him feel hollow inside. He walks into the kitchen, standing alone in the room and feeling very aware that he is by himself. He thinks that maybe he should put the kettle on the fire for tea. He has no idea what could be making that sound and mostly he doesn't want to find out.
He's pulling a mug out of the cupboard when he hears something else -- a noise he recognizes this time: someone tapping on his side door.
He undoes the lock slowly, opening the door only a crack, and then a little wider, until finally he can see a face. It's Brendon, the youngest Urie son, who still lives in his parents' house, many lots and a few winding roads away. Too far to walk, but Spencer didn't hear the clatter of horse hooves announcing Brendon's arrival.
Spencer stares at Brendon for too long without saying anything, but Brendon doesn't look put off, although he does seem nervous.
"Hi," Spencer says, finally.
"I remember from --" Brendon sounds breathless. "-- when everyone gathered last summer to pick blackberries at the ravine, and I came back for iced tea with you and Ryan, that we sat in your yard. It seemed like there might be space."
Space for what? But there was space in Spencer's yard. Room for a stable, though Spencer doesn't have any horses and hasn't been inclined to build one just yet. He thinks that one summer he'll build a stable and get a couple of horses and finish off the second bedroom in the house, and after all that the house will be ready and maybe then he'll find a courtship that works. He'll find whatever was always missing, no matter how hard he tried to make it work with Haley. This summer he's going to finish working the patch of earth closest to his house into a garden -- but next year, maybe.
"There might be," Spencer says. "What's the space for?"
"I found something," Brendon says, his voice catching after found.
"And you need to keep it here?"
"I don't know," Brendon says.
Spencer wishes he had opened the door wider, because now all he can see is Brendon's face, his cheeks flushed and hair curling damply along his hairline. Spencer can't see what it is that Brendon has found, and it would look awkward for him to fling the door open at this point.
"How much space do you need?"
"I don't know," says Brendon. "It seems like -- not a thing to keep. But you were who I thought of -- I thought of your yard, so."
"I want to plant tomatoes," Spencer says. "Can it be stored further back? There are a lot of trees, but --"
"Yes," Brendon says, "with the trees. Close to the ravine."
"Okay," Spencer says. "So, that's all right. Do you need help, then? To move it back there?"
"No," Brendon says. His breath hitches, even though Spencer can tell he's trying to keep quiet. "It's. I found..."
"What?" Spencer asks.
Brendon curls his fingers around the edge of the door. He ducks his head and, looking up at Spencer with dark eyes, says in a low voice, "A unicorn. I found a unicorn." And then he pulls back the door, just a little, just enough that Spencer can lean forward.
He peers outside, and blinks twice against the sudden flare of light, so bright and so white that it hurts his eyes. It fills his whole yard, even though it seems to be coming from the back of the lot. There's a little flicker when it passes behind a tree, and then this moment where the light gets even brighter, like it's turning towards him, and Spencer steps back into his house quickly, scared to look directly at it, jerking his head away. His heart hammers in his chest, and he flattens his sweaty hand across his breastbone.
"Can you see it?" Brendon asks, lingering by the doorway.
"No." Spencer rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. "Just the light."
"Oh," Brendon says, sounding disappointed. "I mean -- yeah, of course."
"You can see it?" Spencer asks.
Brendon's cheeks flush, because they both know what it means for Brendon to be twenty-three and still able to see the unicorn.
"I was walking in the forest. It's hurt, I think. There are scratches along its side. I know where to find aloe. Witch-hazel, maybe. I said I thought I knew of a place that would be safe, and it knelt down so I could climb on its back, and then I whispered where we could go and it carried me here. My legs are still shaking," Brendon says, rubbing absently at the top of his thigh.
Spencer flattens his own hand against his side. Ever since looking out, he feels like his breath has been taken away. There's a dull throbbing in his temple.
"I saw arrows stuck in a tree," Brendon says. "And the unicorn got us to your place but now it's lying down, and I think -- it would be safer in your yard, right?"
"I guess so," Spencer says. Someone doesn't have to be able to see a unicorn to hunt for it.
"I probably shouldn't have let it carry me," Brendon says. "We were just so far away."
"I've got salve," Spencer says. He turns and walks to the shelf running along the side wall of the kitchen that serves as a pantry. "I don't know if it'll help, but you can try." He passes the glass jar over to Brendon. "I'll see what else I can find. Try this for now."
Spencer's mother works with the town's healer, making salves and potions and fixing minor injuries, and Spencer spends his week days helping her find ingredients. He takes things home sometimes: if they made too much or if it didn't work quite right or if there was something that wasn't needed after all. The jar Spencer handed Brendon has bayberry and calendula, to help prevent infections. He knows there's a jar with comfrey ointment somewhere.
"Do you want to come?" Brendon asks. "I don't know anything about healing."
"You know as much as I do," Spencer says. "I just know where to go in the forest to find the right plants, I don't know what to do with them. Just. Do the best you can. Spread it on thickly, I guess."
Spencer turns back to the shelf and stares at the jars until he hears Brendon close the door behind himself. That makes it a little easier, having the door closed. Spencer touches the base of his throat and tries to breathe slowly.
--
"I'm late for dinner already," Brendon says. "I have to leave now if I'm to make it back before dark. I'll come tomorrow?"
"Sure," Spencer says.
"Do you think it'll be okay back there?"
"I don't know. Probably. I don't think anyone every really goes back there, and there's a fence along the very back of the property." Spencer imagines that a unicorn would likely be able to jump over the low wooden fence, but he figures the goal is to keep others out, not to keep the unicorn in.
"So, I'll -- see you," Brendon says. "Thanks, again. You're just, I guess you're the only person I know who has a house."
Certainly not the only person that Brendon knows who has his own house, but perhaps one of the only ones who is close in age to Brendon. Spencer inherited the house from his grandmother when she died, and he really only got it because he'd been well on his way to marrying Haley at the time. But that fell apart before Spencer had even finished moving his things over from his parents' house, and so it's only ever been him. The house was set for an elderly woman living on her own, not a young couple ready to start a family. Not a young man who needs to shelter a unicorn, but anyway. Spencer can make do.
"Should I do anything, do you think?" Spencer asks.
"Maybe put some more water out in a couple of hours."
Spencer's heart thuds and he thinks wildly, I can't, but maybe he can figure out a way.
"I'll see you tomorrow," Brendon says, and takes off, sprinting away from Spencer's house. There's no way he'll be able to run the whole way home, but if he tries, he might be able to make it back before dark.
Spencer closes the door. The sudden silence in his small house is jarring. He walks to the front room and picks up his book off the side table, settling onto his chair. He tries to read, but even before the sun sinks in the sky and the room gets too dark to make out the words on the page, Spencer puts the book down.
He pours water into a big mixing bowl, the one that's chipped along the rim, and carries it awkwardly. Some of the water spills over when he struggles with the door. He keeps his eyes fixed on the bowl as he walks slowly into the backyard. The sun is down and there's just the lingering light of dusk. Spencer walks slowly so he doesn't lose his footing.
"I've got water," Spencer says aloud, keeping his eyes fixed down.
He's hardly past the land he's cleared for a garden -- nowhere near the wooded area further back -- when he sets the bowl down, turns quickly, and dashes back to his house. He feels silly once he's back inside, but it's also a lot easier to breathe when he's on the other side of the door. He's not scared. How could he be scared of something he can't see? He's just. Cautious or something. He's just a little apprehensive.
--
"Mrs. Adles is having migraines," Spencer's mother says when he walks into the office the next morning. She's sitting at her desk, a pile of empty jars in a box on the floor beside her. "We're out of feverfew."
"I'm on it," Spencer says. He drops his coat onto a chair before heading for the door. The sun is bright in the sky, and Spencer can tell that it's going to be warm by noon. He's wearing a thick, long-sleeved shirt, but he goes out by himself, so it doesn't matter if he has to strip down to fewer layers as the day goes on.
"Can you also see if you can find any butterbur? I'm going to put a tea together that'll help prevent the headaches from coming back."
"Sure thing," Spencer says. When Spencer first started, his mother had to go out with him to show him what he was looking for. He used to take books home with him to study the pictures, but now he knows what he's trying to find and where the best places to look are. There's not a lot of money to be made from collecting herbs, but Spencer doesn't need much.
"Take this with you," Spencer's mom says, passing over a small cloth sack.
Spencer looks inside. "Mom," he says, "I'm an adult now. You don't have to keep making me lunch."
"I don't see you packing your own," she says. "And, anyway, there were leftovers."
"One day you're going to remember that you don't have to make as much when you're just cooking for the twins."
"And in the meantime you'll have to forgive an old lady for her poor memory."
"Mom," Spencer says again.
"Get out of here," she says. "We'll talk about when you're going to come over for dinner when you've got your work done."
--
Brendon's there when Spencer gets back, sitting on the second step leading up to the side porch, his forearms resting on his knees.
"How is it?" Spencer asks.
"I don't know. I can't really tell."
"I got some stuff for you," Spencer says, reaching into his satchel and pulling out a couple of bottles and a thick bouquet of herbs, tied together with a string around the stems.
"Come on," he continues, leading Brendon into the house. "I'll show you how to make this into a paste."
*
"You can just go inside, you know," Spencer says. It's Friday and Brendon's sitting on his back steps waiting, just like every other day this week. "The door isn't locked."
"Might as well wait for you," Brendon says.
"How's it doing?" Spencer asks.
"I don't really know," Brendon says, just like every other day, and then he follows Spencer into the house.
While Brendon ducks out back to check on the unicorn, Spencer makes two cups of tea, even though it's a little too warm for it. The sun was bright in the sky today, and the house heated while Spencer was gone. There's dirt under his fingernails from digging up valerian root, and his cheeks and forehead feel grimy after a day spent wiping sweat away with his dirty hands.
He lets the tea steep, but waits until Brendon comes back inside before pouring.
Brendon's cheeks are flushed and his hands hover over the table, shaking a little, like leaves blown by a strong wind.
"Do you want to stay for dinner?" Spencer asks.
Brendon's eyelids close slowly, like he's seeing something that's not right in front of him, but when he snaps back to it, he looks Spencer straight in the eye, and says, "Thank you, but my parents will wonder."
"Sure," Spencer says. He's used to cooking for just himself, but tonight he thinks it might have been nice to have someone else around. Spencer's by himself most of the day and he's by himself when he comes home at night and it's not bad. He spends a lot of time reading and trying to make something of the garden in the backyard. But sometimes he thinks that he'd like to cook for more than one, and now that Ryan's gone, Spencer doesn't have anyone he can invite over.
"Thanks, though," Brendon says again.
"You're doing a good job," Spencer says.
"You don't know that," Brendon says, looking out the window. Spencer keeps his eyes firmly fixed on the table.
"I can just tell," he says. He remembers the time that Brendon played the piano in front of the entire church. Spencer's family didn't go as often as some of the other families, but he was there for that. The song wasn't one that Spencer had heard before, but he knew that Brendon played it well, seated in the centre of the stage, his back a straight line beneath his pressed white shirt.
He pours Brendon another cup of tea when he finishes the first one, and Brendon stays to drink it.
*
Spencer takes his time getting out of bed when it’s the weekend. Today, once he gets up, he heads outside. He doesn't keep track as carefully as he should, but it seems like it's been about two months since the last frost: time to plant the tomatoes.
He walks into the backyard, sticking close to his house, careful not to look too carefully at the woods in the back of his property. The back of his hand brushes against a stray branch from the tree leaning close to the side of his house that died during the winter. He's going to have to clear that away. Dry grass crunches under his feet and Spencer looks down at the ground so that his eyes don't accidentally stray toward the back of his property. It's not that he would actually see anything, but he's still scared to look.
Once he gets to the garden patch, he squints up at the sky. Having determined the spot that seems like it'll get the most sunlight, he squats down. He's been mixing in compost diligently, and the soil is dark and textured.
When he finishes planting, he brushes dirt off the knees of his pants, turns back the house and finds Brendon leaning against the small apple tree, with little green buds just starting to form at the ends of the branches.
"You're here earlier than usual," Spencer says, trying to sound casual about it..
"It's the weekend."
"My mom made me a loaf of bread," Spencer says. "You want to have something to eat?"
"Okay," Brendon says, "thanks."
As Spencer pulls out bread and butter and honey, he asks, "How's the -- you know."
"Okay, I think," Brendon says. "Sometimes it's not there, so I just leave stuff behind this tree it seems to like. So that means it can walk around at least. I think it's still got a limp, though, and usually it's just on the ground sleeping, so that's probably not too good."
"You haven't told anybody?"
"Don't know who I'd tell," Brendon says. "I don't really think anyone would believe me."
"I believed you."
"Then I guess I made the right call," says Brendon, looking Spencer in the eye.
The last time Spencer spent time with Brendon, it was late August of last year. They were out in the Hendersons' cornfield and the sun was so hot in the sky that the air seemed to press down in waves. Brendon was the first to start stripping down, and Spencer remembers debating before he shrugged off his own shirt. Ryan could stand the heat better than the rest of them, and he knew about a party down by the river. He'd said where he was going before he left, and Spencer could have followed after him, but instead he stayed with Brendon, lying back on the ground and watching clouds move across the sky. Spencer could hardly breathe for how hot it was, but he couldn't look away from Brendon, the way sweat slid down his neck and across his collarbones as he pointed out shapes in the sky.
Spencer rubs the back of his neck, turns around and says, "Do you want something to drink? I've got new peppermint leaves."
"If you're having some."
Spencer lights the fire and puts the kettle on the stove. He shakes peppermint leaves into the teapot; now that he's making tea for more than one, he has reason to make a whole pot. He hasn't been living on his own for that long, just a couple of years now, but it's a long time to be alone. It'll be strange when the unicorn's better and things go back to normal. Maybe Spencer will have to make more of an effort to get out of the house. It used to be easier, finding reasons to leave and people to see.
Brendon sits on the side of the table that looks out the window, and he seems to be watching something outside. When Spencer sits down again, on the seat across the table, he looks at Brendon instead, carefully, so that Brendon won't notice.
--
"You're the worst," Brendon says, groaning.
"Come on," says Spencer, "your turn. Three more cards and I win."
Brendon flips over a card from the messy pile in the middle of the low table they've pushed into the centre of the room. "What's this mean?" Brendon asks, holding it up for Spencer to see.
"Hmm," Spencer says. "The mermaid. Do you have any other cards from the sea?"
Brendon looks his large handful, then squints up at Spencer. "I thought I wasn't supposed to tell you what I have."
"It's not my fault you can't remember the rules of the game."
"It's not my fault that you're making things up as we go."
"Hey."
Brendon snorts. He flips over another card and rearranges the ones in his hand.
"When I was a kid I used to imagine that I'd end up marrying a mermaid," Spencer says, discreetly slipping one of the cards out of his hand and back onto the table.
"Really?" Brendon asks.
"'Til I learned that it would mean I'd spend forever in a murky grave."
"Okay, seriously," Brendon says, reaching across the table with extraordinary speed and catching Spencer's wrist just as he's about to drop another card. "I can see you cheating."
"Never," Spencer says as he drops all of his cards at once. "I win!"
"You cheat." Brendon squeezes Spencer's wrist. His hand is hot and steady for a long moment before he lets go.
"Nope," Spencer says. "If you have less than five cards you're allowed to put them all down at once."
"These don't even match," Brendon says, turning over Spencer's cards. "This game is a sham!"
"Better luck next time," Spencer says.
"Humph. Next time I'm picking the game."
Spencer grins, and ignores the way he can see Brendon lower his eyes each times their fingers brush as they work together to clear the cards off the table.
"Shit," Brendon says, glancing at the little clock sitting on Spencer's mantle, "I am so late. I've got to -- shit."
Spencer follows Brendon to the door and waits while Brendon shoves his feet into his shoes and gathers his things.
"Well, thanks," Brendon says, standing up straight and looking quickly at Spencer. The open door is in the way, so their bodies are just a little too close.
"Yeah," Spencer says, "see you." And then Brendon takes off, sprinting down the dusty road while Spencer stands behind his open door.
*
A few days later, Spencer has turned down the covers and is about to crawl into bed when he hears a quiet tapping. He's not really sure what it is -- a branch knocking against the side of the house, most likely -- but he checks the door just in case.
He finds Brendon standing around the side of the house, a little bag that has been stuffed full hanging over one of his shoulders.
"Oh," says Brendon. "I didn't know if you'd be awake."
"Have you come to see the unicorn?" Spencer asks. "I think that everything's all right." Not that he'd have any way to know if there was a problem. He doesn't ever look through the window facing onto the backyard anymore.
"I guess," Brendon says. "I don't really --" He rubs the skin under his eye and then wipes his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Is everything okay?"
"My parents ran into Mr. Valdez at the market and they found out that I hadn't been seeing Shane -- I didn't even tell them that Shane had gotten married, but now they know -- and then they were waiting for me, and they wanted to know where I'd been, but I couldn't tell them. What was I going to say? They're -- they would think there was something wicked in finding a mystical creature, they wouldn't understand.
"So they figured that I've been -- running around. With that girl that I was courting last fall, only nothing happened with her. I thought maybe, later -- but I wasn't ready to be married yet, so we cooled things off. But they didn't believe me and they said that I have to do the right thing and propose, but I can't, and I couldn't tell them why I can't, so they thought I meant that I wouldn't, and now they think I'm terrible and selfish and they said I shouldn't come back until I'd done the right thing, so now I can't go back."
"Why can't you get married?" Spencer asks, at a loss for anything better to say.
"I can't lose the unicorn," Brendon says. "Not yet. I just -- I can't. She still needs me."
"She?"
"I think it's a girl," Brendon says. "I don't know. She feels like -- but I don't know. They might not even have a sex. I just have a feeling."
"Okay," Spencer says, because Brendon would know just as well as anyone else.
"It wouldn't be so bad, getting married. But I can't yet. It would be -- just not yet. I can't lose her yet."
"Okay," Spencer says again. "So, are you going to come in then?"
And Brendon tightens his hold on the small bag and follows him inside.
--
Brendon's sitting in the kitchen when Spencer walks in the next morning. He looks like he's been sitting there for a while.
"Did you sleep?" Spencer asks.
"I don't know."
"Did you lie down? It's usually hard to sleep sitting up."
"I was outside for a bit," Brendon says. "I brought her some sweet peas."
"Where did you get sweet peas?" Spencer asks.
"They're growing along the side of your house," Brendon says, tilting his head toward the east.
"There aren't any sweet peas," Spencer says, but when he opens the window and pokes his head outside, there are indeed flowers growing up the side of his house: white and pink and red and purple and all in bloom. Spencer can't believe he didn't notice the scent before, and he leaves the window open when he walks back to Brendon, sitting at the table.
"I didn't plant any," Spencer says.
Brendon shrugs.
"What does a unicorn need flowers for, anyway?"
"I don't know," Brendon says. "They smell nice."
He pushes his mug over to Spencer when Spencer sits down in the other chair. The tea has cooled, but Spencer takes a sip before pushing back across the table to Brendon.
"I have to run down and check with my mom, but I think I can probably skip work today, and then I can come back and we can try to get the other bedroom into shape."
"No, no," Brendon says. "You don't have to miss work."
"How comfortable was it sleeping on the floor last night?"
"It was fine."
Spencer rolls his eyes. "It looks like it's going to rain, anyway. Who wants to wander around trying to scoop herbs out of the mud in the rain?"
"I can find somewhere else to stay," Brendon says.
"Oh, yeah? Where?"
Spencer lets the silence stretch on, but before it gets cruel he says, "I'm going to check in with my mom, and then I'll come back. There's food in the pantry -- maybe you could make something for lunch."
"Okay," Brendon says in a small voice. He waits until Spencer is out of the chain and nearly at the door to the kitchen before he says, "Thanks, Spence."
"See you soon," Spencer says, and leaves.
--
Brendon sneezes six times in a row, pausing just long enough between each to wipe his watering eyes.
"Sorry, sorry," Spencer says, trying not to shake any more dust in Brendon's direction. "I don't think anyone's been in here since Grandma died. I don't get a lot of company."
Which is odd, Spencer thinks, because when he was growing up, Ryan used to come over all the time, that blanket-stealing ingrate. Now that Spencer's finally got enough room, Ryan's off in the city with Jon doing -- whatever it is people do in the city. Spencer's never left Summerlin, but he's heard stories. Mostly from Ryan, who used to spend hours telling Spencer about what it would be like in the city. All the people and the noise and the excitement. Spencer would listen, make the right noises at the right times, but he never felt the same desperation to leave. He likes the woods and the river and the hills. Likes seeing his mother every day at work and going home for dinner with his family on the weekend. His mother has started teaching him how to make the salves himself, and Spencer knows that if he stays and learns he can eventually take over for her.
When Ryan left, things were just starting to fall apart with Haley and for one brief flash, Spencer thought of what it would be like to follow after him. The noise and the people and the chance to try the things that Spencer would never be able to try if he stayed, but it still didn't seem worth leaving.
Brendon sneezes again.
It takes them all day and into the night, but by bedtime the room is mostly livable.
"Do you need anything?" Spencer asks. Brendon is holding his pile of bedding to his chest. "A glass of water?"
"I'm okay," Brendon says.
"If you want something, just help yourself."
"Okay, but I'm really good. Thanks."
"Yeah," Spencer says. Brendon looks small, folded in on himself as he curls around his armful of blankets. Spencer thinks maybe he could give Brendon a hug, but he doesn't know how to do it without being awkward. It's funny that this is the first time anyone has slept at his house. It's a big house for just one person.
"Goodnight," Spencer says, and then makes himself look away from Brendon and leave the room.
*
"Here," Brendon says, walking in from the back door. He sets a perfect, round tomato on the table in front of Spencer.
The tomato is still firm enough to bite into, though juice is dripping down Spencer's chin before long. He wipes his face with the back of his hand, and thinks sleepily that he's glad it's almost laundry day because his pajama shirt is going to be stained. He takes another bite and makes a low noise of contentment.
"Good, right?" Brendon asks, smiling as he watches Spencer eat.
Spencer nods and stuffs the rest of the fruit into his mouth. He squints up at Brendon as he asks, "Where did you get this?" It's early yet for Brendon to have made it from the market and back.
"Garden," Brendon says, lifting his chin to gesture behind himself.
"What?" Spencer asks. "No. It's only been a few weeks since I planted them."
"I guess you're doing an especially good job," Brendon says, "because they're ripe."
Spencer pushes away from the table and shuffles out the house, holding his hand to his forehead to block the bright morning light. In the garden, the tomato plants are all the way up to his waist, the fruits bright red and separating easily from the stem when Spencer gives a little tug.
He fills his shirt with tomatoes, holding the edge as a makeshift basket, and carries a load back to the house.
"You want to help me cut these up?" Spencer asks, dropping the load of tomatoes onto the counter.
While Brendon manages to squirt tomato seeds from one end of the kitchen to the other, Spencer goes back onto the deck and pinches off basil leaves from the herb garden he's been tending since the snow finally melted for good. The leaves are smaller than coins -- no strange growth there -- and oily in his hand when he carries them back into the kitchen.
Brendon divides the tomatoes between two plates while Spencer tears basil leaves with his fingers, and then covers everything with sweet vinegar.
Brendon says, "C'mon, let's eat outside," when Spencer makes for the kitchen table, and Spencer follows him outside hesitantly. He keeps his eyes down at first, but each time he risks a glance upward, there's no strange light. Nothing that he shouldn't be seeing.
Brendon makes happy noises as he scoops up chunks of tomato using his whole hand, the juices completely covering his fingers. He chases a stray piece of basil and seems to hold it on his tongue for a long while before chewing it up.
In the early morning light, Brendon's face looks soft and happy. Spencer curls his fingers into a fist and thinks about how sticky his skin is and how nice it is to wake up and know Brendon will be there for breakfast and how he doesn't know if Brendon is actively looking for somewhere else to stay, but he doesn't want to ask just in case Brendon is. He doesn't want it to go back to what it was like before, seeing Brendon at the market and waving from a distance because he didn't know how to go over and start up a conversation, even when he caught Brendon looking right back.
"Let's go down to the river later," Spencer says. "At noon, when the sun is the hottest. I want to swim."
--
The river is only deep enough to swim by the big oak tree, back from Mr. Peters's property. It's a long walk, and Spencer's feet hurt from the rocks, but he doesn't regret leaving his shoes at home. The water isn't deep enough to dive into, but Spencer strips down to his cotton shorts and jumps in with as large a splash as he can manage, Brendon whooping loudly and following closely behind. The water is cold and clear and moving fast enough that Spencer has to dig his feet into the earth to avoid being swept away.
"It's freezing," Brendon says, coming up beside Spencer
"This part is in the shade," Spencer says. He looks up at the trees, and once Brendon is looking up as well, he cups his hands full of water and splashes Brendon in the face.
"Hey," Brendon says, sending water back toward Spencer with an open palm and a quick flick of his wrist.
It's warmer when they're moving, dancing around in water than comes up just past their waists. Brendon's faster than Spencer, and Spencer lets himself be pushed under when Brendon pushes down on his shoulders. He lets go a moment later, and Spencer pops back up, right in front of Brendon, shaking water from his hair. Brendon's hands were warm on his shoulders, even with the cold of the water.
Brendon's chest is warm, too, when Spencer flattens his palm across Brendon's collarbone. Warm for a moment, long enough that Spencer can feel Brendon's ribcage expand as he takes a shaky breath, and then Spencer's hand is in the water again as Brendon pushes off, hopping on the balls of his feet to the other side of the river.
"Hey, look," Brendon says, keeping his back turned to Spencer. "There are some flowers over here. Maybe I'll bring some back to the unicorn. You know, mix things up."
Spencer cups his hands and fills them with water, splashing his face and pushing his hair away from his forehead. His cheeks flush hot. He takes a breath and then follows after Brendon.
*
Spencer wakes to someone pounding at his front door. As he staggers to his feet, he thinks fuzzily that Brendon must -- something or another about Brendon, but, no, that's not right, because as he walks down the narrow hallway, Brendon's door opens a crack. He must see Spencer, because then the door opens the rest of the way.
"What is it?" Brendon asks.
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Turns out there are people other than you who come calling in the middle of the night."
Spencer opens the door to find Ryan and Jon, both of whom have grown their hair since Spencer last saw them, and now have identical heads of long, limp curls.
"Hey, Spence," Ryan says. "I'm going to enter the faery realm and I've come to say goodbye before I go."
"I thought you were going to the city to make your fortune," Spencer says. "Last I heard, you were on your way north with Jon."
"And now I am going south. Well, it's not really south. Just to the glen on the other side of the mountain."
"Is Jon going with you?" Spencer asks. "Is Keltie?" He pokes his head further outside. "Is she here?"
"I left her in the city. Well, she left me. But, you're not listening. I've fallen in love."
"With who?" Spencer asks.
"With me," a little voice says, and then a tiny woman crawls out of the pocket of Ryan's coat, climbs up his lapel and settles on his shoulder. She loops one of his stray curls around her arm, holding on for balance.
"This is Z," Ryan says. "Z, Spencer."
"And I'm Tennessee," another tiny woman says, this time with a strange accent. She crawls out of Ryan's other pocket and says, "Now that we're all introduced, are we going into the house or what? It smells terrible in there."
--
Spencer grabs as many wine bottles as he can carry from the cellar, and when he comes back to the kitchen, Ryan has opened his sack and is pouring from a bottle of something else into Spencer's grandma's good set of china tea cups.
Spencer sets the bottles onto the counter and grabs one for himself, not bothering with a glass once he's got it open.
Z is sitting in Ryan's open palm, leaning back against his loosely curled fingertips. Her feet are resting on the chain of Ryan's pocket watch, which he's got wrapped around his wrist, as she drinks whatever Ryan has poured the rest of them out of a thimble
Brendon is standing at the back of the kitchen, tucked into the far counter, looking scandalized. When Spencer turns around, he scurries over, hissing, "Faeries, Spence. Faeries. This is not going to end well."
"Just, um. Don't play any games or make any deals with them and I'm sure we'll be fine. And don't ask them anything. Or ask for anything. Or -- just, you know. Maybe don't talk." Spencer's never met a faery before, has never even known of anyone who's met a faery. Except for Ryan, apparently.
"Whatever they're drinking is much stronger than wine," Brendon says. "Ryan made me try some."
"This isn't the first time you've met Ryan," Spencer reminds him. "You really don't know better than to try anything he gives you?"
"Jon's having it, too," Brendon says, and then rolls his eyes when Spencer gives him a pointed look.
"Here," Spencer says, passing over the bottle. "Have some wine."
Brendon looks around briefly for a glass, but ends up raising the bottle to his mouth and taking a couple of long sips before passing it back.
Spencer tips the bottle back and drinks until he runs out of breath, then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and says, "So you're going where?"
"We're getting married," Ryan says happily, touching the index finger of his free hand to Z's tiny foot. She leans over and leans her head against Ryan's thumb.
"I thought you were already married," Spencer says. "There was an announcement in the paper."
"Oh, no," Ryan says, shaking his head. "That was just a thing. I have to go with Z and cross the Bridge to Nowhere and then I'll be a faery too. And, I don't know, there might be some trials or something, but then we're going to get married!"
"And you're going along with this?" Spencer asks Jon.
"I don't know," Jon says, scratching at the underside of his chin, which is covered by a thick beard. "I'm going along for a bit anyway."
"Alex already went," Ryan says.
"Alex passed the trials and was allowed to enter... wherever he wanted to enter?"
"Alex was going to go Under The Paving Stones, I think," Z says.
"And they let him in?"
"Well, I don't know," Ryan says. "We haven't heard from him in a while. I can only assume that things went as planned." He sighs. "I miss him."
"So you're following him into Faeryland?"
"Also to get married," Ryan says.
"Good luck with that," says Spencer.
"I can be who you wanted me to be," Ryan says, grinning down at Z.
"Well, the size difference was probably going to be a little awkward," Spencer mutters before taking another long sip of wine.
"You want to come?" Jon asks. "I don't know if I'm going to go all the way -- trials sound like maybe not fun, but I'm going to go along for the ride and then maybe I'll go somewhere else."
Spencer cuts a look across the table and meets Brendon's eyes. Brendon stares wide-eyed but the rest of his face is mostly expressionless.
"Thanks, but I've got some stuff to do here," Spencer says. "Send word once you're married. Or if you manage to find Greenwald or whatever."
"We shall write it in a song," Ryan says, and then Jon pulls out a guitar, and, oh god, they're both singing. Ryan taps his hands loudly on the table, just out of beat with what Jon is strumming on the guitar.
Spencer wanders back to the cellar for more wine.
--
Tennessee walks over from where she's perched on a tea saucer. She trips over a fork as she makes her way and catches herself by grabbing the rim of the bowl. When she gets to Spencer, she tugs on the cuff of his sleeve until he leans closer and then she says, "Brendon keeps giving me weird looks."
"His parents are suspicious of mystical creatures," Spencer says in a low voice, even though Brendon has long since switched from Spencer's wine to whatever Ryan brought and is now singing loudly to himself. "Plus, you talk kind of funny."
"What, so everyone in the world grows up in Summerlin?" she asks.
"Everyone we know," Spencer says. "Except for Jon, I guess. And Alex. Maybe that's why Brendon's suspicious."
Tennessee hums, and then starts dancing her way back across the table. Spencer stands as well, comes up behind Brendon as says, "You about ready for bed?"
Brendon looks up at him with squinty eyes and says, "All the wine's gone."
Spencer nods, sadly. He steps backward when Brendon rises off his chair, and ends up stumbling himself. He was drinking as much as the rest of them, and now that he's on his feet it's easier to tell that the wine went straight to his head.
"You can sleep in my bedroom," Spencer tells Ryan, squeezing his bony shoulder as he passes by.
"We have to leave at dawn," Ryan says. "Long day's travel."
"It was good to see you," Spencer says. "It's been a while."
"Come with us," Ryan says. "Just for a while, if you do not want to come the whole way."
"I can't," Spencer says, which is the same thing he said when Ryan left the first time. Now, as then, Spencer really means, I don't want to, but he's glad to see that Ryan's doing well.
Brendon's humming to himself as he moves around the bedroom, hanging a shirt over the back of the little wooden chair.
"Do you mind sharing?" Spencer asks.
Brendon laughs. "It's your house; it's not sharing."
"It's your room," Spencer says.
"Of course I don't mind."
Brendon lies down and then scoots toward the wall, making room for Spencer. They're both still mostly dressed, but maybe that's for the best. It's a small space, and Spencer can feel the heat coming off of Brendon's body. Brendon's thigh is pressed along Spencer's.
Spencer takes a breath, and then turns onto his side, facing Brendon.
"Hey," Brendon says, his voice soft in the darkness. Spencer can hear that Ryan and his friends are still up, but the music has stopped and the low sound of voices fades into the background.
"Ryan said they'll be gone in the morning," Spencer says.
"Okay." Brendon moves a little, twisting his body so that it's easier for him to face Spencer. "Do you think it's weird?" he asks.
"What?"
"That Ryan would go to Faeryland for Z."
"I don't know Z, but if he loves her, it's not weird."
"He'll never be able to come back."
Spencer doesn't know how Ryan would have met Z in the first place; faeries stay far away from human cities.
"I guess he thinks it's worth it," Spencer says. This is probably the only time that it'll be easier for Ryan not to have much of a family: he won't have to explain himself to anyone. Spencer still hasn't figured out how to ask his mom if he can bring Brendon over for dinner, so mostly he's stopped going. Maybe one day he'll be able to find the right way to ask.
Spencer's had too much wine, and it's difficult to be this close to Brendon without doing something stupid. Except that the more time passes, the harder it is to remember why it would be stupid, why he should be holding back. Maybe it's not something they could tell anyone, but they've made it work: living together, the second bedroom set up in case someone were to ask. Spencer had an idea of how settling into this house would go, the process of making it his own, and even though this isn't what he had planned, it's still good. It still feels right.
Spencer presses his lips together and looks at Brendon. This kind of closeness makes Brendon's body seem soft, touchable. Like maybe it would be okay if Spencer set his fingers on the sloping line of Brendon's ribcage so that he could feel him breathe. It feels new to want like this, staring at Brendon in the dark and wishing for more, but it's not new, not really. He liked Haley and he was excited to bring her here and start a home, but he always wondered.
He's been looking at Brendon for too long, but Brendon isn't looking away. Spencer waits for some kind of sign, a reason to move away or to finally push the rest of the way forward. The moment hangs all around them until finally Spencer can't stand it anymore. He dips his head, leaning toward Brendon.
Brendon lets out a soft breath just before Spencer closes the distance and brushes their lips together. In the dark, it's hard to remember why he needs to be careful, why he can't just pull Brendon close and hold on tight and do all of the things that he tries not to think about.
Brendon kisses back, and for a moment it's just as satisfying as Spencer hoped it would be -- and then it's even worse than he could have anticipated when Brendon breaks away, rolling on his other side to face the wall.
"Goodnight," Brendon says after a long minute, where Spencer stares at his back and thinks, Turn around, turn around.
There's a sound from elsewhere in the house. What he wants from Brendon, it's not worse than Ryan and a faery. It's not weirder. Ryan and Z's wedding wouldn't be in a church and maybe other people wouldn't understand, but it would still real for them. Ryan's not afraid to travel somewhere that humans aren't meant to go, but here in the dark, when it's just the two of them and no one would ever know, Brendon still doesn't want this with Spencer. Ryan always wanted more, but Spencer never considered that maybe what they wanted was the same. Ryan was just smart enough to know that he wouldn't be able to find it if he stayed.
"Night," Spencer says. He rolls onto his back and stares up at the ceiling.
--
True to Ryan's word, everyone is gone when Spencer gets up in the morning. He doesn't know how he missed the sounds of them leaving; it was a long time of staring at the ceiling before Spencer finally dropped into sleep. Maybe something of the faery magic after all.
Spencer doesn't know if he wakes before Brendon, but Brendon's still in bed when Spencer cracks his eyes open. Spencer turns his head to the side, tortures himself with another long minute of watching Brendon's back -- in the bright morning sunlight this time -- before he rolls up and leaves the room.
Brendon comes into the kitchen before Spencer has finished clearing the empty bottles away.
"Do you want tea?" Spencer asks.
Brendon nods, then walks himself over to the kettle.
"Last night," Brendon says as they wait for the water to boil.
"Yeah."
Brendon takes a breath and Spencer rubs the skin between his eyebrows.
"I'm sorry," Spencer says. "That was. I guess. I didn't mean to make you... so I won't do it again."
"It's not --" Brendon frowns.
"I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," Spencer says. "You don't have to leave." You don't have to tell anyone.
"I'm not uncomfortable, it's just. I can't."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Yeah, sure, I know. I'm sorry."
Brendon's face crumbles. "It's just -- and with another guy. I'd never be able to see her again, and I can't, I can't lose her, not yet."
Spencer nods.
"This is if the first time I've ever felt like I belonged somewhere, like I wasn't just screwing things up all the time. Everything's better since I found the unicorn -- I can't go back to how things were. You feel it, too," Brendon says, "you know things are better now that she's around."
Spencer knows that everything's better when Brendon's around. But. "Yeah," he says. "I know things are better for you. I don't want you to lose that."
"I'm sorry," Brendon says. He twists his fingers together. "It wouldn't just be -- " Sex, Spencer's brain fills in. "It'd be with another boy, and."
Spencer's family didn't go to church all that often, but Brendon's family did. Brendon played organ and sat beside his brothers and sisters and their wives and husbands and listened tot the minister explain right and wrong.
"Yeah," Spencer says. Then, "The kettle's boiling."
*
It's awkward at first. Brendon goes out more and sometimes Spencer comes back at the end of the day to an empty house. It's a disappointment each time, even though Spencer tries to remind himself that he's come home to an empty house more often than not. It wasn't that difficult to get used to the first time around, and it'll be okay this time, too.
There's no sign of Brendon when Spencer walks inside, so he drops off his things and walks back out again, sitting down on the porch steps. He should probably start something for dinner, but he doesn't feel like eating. Brendon might be out looking for somewhere else to live right at this very moment. Maybe one day when he does come back, it'll just be to pick up his stuff.
When Brendon comes into sight, walking along the stone path leading from the backyard to the side porch, he gives a little wave. Sits down beside Spencer.
"How's the unicorn?" Spencer asks.
"She wasn't there," Brendon says. "I haven't seen her since the day before yesterday."
"Maybe she's better now."
Brendon shrugs, frowning at his knees.
"That'd be good, right?"
"I guess," Brendon says. "I mean, yes, obviously. Maybe she's better, but I don't think that means that she would go. I think she likes it here."
"Where were you all day?"
"Checking out some stuff in town. I, uh." Brendon scratches the back of his neck. "This is just an idea, so don't worry if it sounds bad to you. I was just wondering if -- I talked to Patrick, you know, he owns the music store?"
"Yeah."
"I was seeing if he needed any extra hands, but it's an awfully long way for me to go each day."
This is the part where Brendon says that he's moving. Spencer bites the inside of his cheek and braces himself.
"But he has a piano, and he said that I could take as long as I needed to pay him back, so if you thought it was okay, if there was room, maybe I could keep it here, and then I could give lessons? It would be enough to pay for the piano and then I'd be able to give you rent and stuff."
Spencer blinks a few times, runs Brendon's words through his head again.
"So you'd stay here? And give lessons from home?"
"Only if that's all right," Brendon says quickly. "I can figure out something else. It was just an idea."
"No," Spencer says. "Of course, yeah. That'd be. Yeah. That sounds like a really good idea."
"Really?" Brendon asks. He looks over at Spencer, his face upturned, eyes wide with excitement.
"Really," Spencer says, trying to keep his relief from showing. It's almost like what he hopes for. Close enough, anyway. He asks, "Have you eaten? I'll put something on."
"Okay," Brendon says. "I'm just going to go check on her one more time. I found buttercups." Brendon lifts the cloth covering his satchel so that Spencer can see it's full of flowers.
Spencer is just starting to set the table when Brendon walks back inside, whistling to himself.
He grins at Spencer and takes the plates from him.
"She was there?" Spencer guesses.
"Yeah," Brendon says, beaming. He looks giddy with relief. "I think she liked the flowers."
"That's great," Spencer says. "Food's ready."
"We should go eat strawberries after dinner," Brendon says. "I think it'll still be light out."
"Where did you find strawberries?" Spencer asks.
"By where you planted the zucchinis."
"I didn't plant any zucchinis," Spencer says.
"Oh. You planted the lettuce, right?"
"Yeah."
"They're pretty close to the lettuce."
Spencer shakes his head and puts dinner on the table.
--
They clear the main room together, moving the armchair into Brendon's bedroom and putting the side table onto the porch. It's cramped, but the piano fits.
And then there's a little piano set up in Spencer's living room and a steady stream of small children coming and going between four and seven -- later, usually, because Brendon always gives the kids extra time. He comes into the kitchen and looks surprised each time Spencer lifts the towel off the plate that's been warming on the stove and carries it over to the table for Brendon.
Spencer sits down with him and helps finish the crusty part of Brendon's bread.
"Sounded a little rough today," Spencer says.
Brendon groans, rubbing at his forehead. "I don't know what's the point in taking lessons if you're never going to practice."
Spencer makes a face and nods. He picks up Brendon's dishes and carries them over to the sink. Brendon's still sitting at the table when Spencer turns back around. His arm is draped across the back of the chair and he's watching Spencer put the dishes away.
Spencer stays where he is, like maybe it's safer to stare if there's the distance between them.
"I haven't seen the unicorn in days," Brendon says, breaking the long stretch of silence.
"She was here all last week," Spencer says. "She'll probably be back soon. You said that sometimes she's not there --"
"Sometimes," Brendon says. "Never for this long."
"Maybe that just means she's doing really well," Spencer says.
Brendon shrugs. "Maybe," he says. He takes a long, slow breath and then says, "Maybe I can't see her anymore."
"Why wouldn't you be able to see her?" Spencer asks, his heart thudding loudly in his throat. "Is there --" Someone else? "Did you --"
"Did I what?"
"Did you do something? Have you been. Seeing someone?"
"Seeing someone. No, Spence, I haven't been seeing someone."
"Okay," Spencer says, trying to ignore the hot rush of relief. Trying to ignore the look of quiet fury on Brendon's face. "So, then -- "
"It's your fault," Brendon says.
"What?" Spencer asks. "We've never."
"You make me think about it," Brendon snarls.
"That wouldn't be... that's not enough, Brendon."
"You don't know that," Brendon says, his face twisting in anger. "You don't know that. How would you know? You've never been able to see her."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Okay, okay, I know. I'm sorry."
Brendon stands up, knocking his hand against the table. The chair almost falls over, but Brendon catches it before pushing it away.
Spencer takes a step closer, but stops at the look that Brendon gives him.
"This is your fault," Brendon says. "I'm never going to see her again."
Spencer shakes his head. He opens his mouth, but stays quiet when Brendon starts walking forward, closing the distance between them until he's standing right in front of Spencer, and then he wraps his fingers around the back of Spencer's neck, pulling him down. Brendon rocks up on his toes and kisses Spencer hard, their mouths crashing together. Spencer's nose digs into Brendon's cheek and it hurts. Spencer's heart drums painfully in his chest.
He lifts his hand and cups Brendon's cheek, touching him gently, moving away slowly until their faces are inches apart. He looks at Brendon and then closes his eyes, bending forward and kissing Brendon softly, brushing their lips together again and again until Brendon gasps, his breath catching harshly.
Spencer cups his hand around Brendon's neck, touches their foreheads together and breathes slowly. He lifts his head and kisses Brendon's cheeks, his chin, his mouth.
"It's not enough just to think about it," Spencer says softly. "Maybe she got better and left, but it's not that you can't see her anymore." He kisses Brendon again and then lets his hands drop away. "Nothing happened."
Brendon stares at Spencer, and then slowly his face crumbles. There's this awful pause before he starts wiping furiously at his eyes.
"I know," he says. "I know, but I think she could tell."
"She could tell what?"
Brendon rubs at his eye with the back of his thumb and lets his hand fall away. "That it was just a matter of time." He blinks quickly and then looks up at Spencer.
"Before what?" Spencer asks, his voice catching in the back of his throat.
"Being around her makes me feel like everything's going to be okay. Like I'm exactly where I need to be."
"I know--" Spencer starts.
"But I'd still choose you," Brendon says. "It was just a matter of time before I gave it up for you."
"Brendon. You don't have to."
"I want to," Brendon says. "All the time, I want to. I hate you a little bit for it, but I can't help it."
"You don't have to choose," Spencer says. "We can keep things like they've been, you don't have to make a choice."
"It's not a choice," Brendon says, giving Spencer a tiny smile. "It's just you."
Spencer swallows, blinking hard. "I love you," he says.
"See. It's not a choice." Brendon wipes his eyes again before looking up at Spencer.
Spencer can feel his eyes prickling and he swallows hard.
"Hey, stop it," Brendon says, sliding his fingers through Spencer's hair and wrapping his other arm around Spencer's shoulders so that their bodies press close together. "This is supposed to be the fun part."
It takes them a long time to work their way to the bedroom, and when they finally make it to the bed and Spencer pulls Brendon down on top of him, bare skin everywhere, he has to hide his face in Brendon's neck.
"I didn't know it would feel like this," Brendon says, tightening his fingers on the back of Spencer's head and holding him closer. He keeps touching, sliding his hands, his mouth over Spencer's skin.
Spencer cups the back of Brendon's thigh and rolls their hips together. He lifts his other leg, tucks his heel in the back of Brendon's knee and presses his thigh to Brendon's hip.
When he can feel Brendon starting to shake, Spencer asks, "Are you sure you want to do this?" trying to stop himself from grinding up.
"Yes," Brendon says, gasping sharply. He presses his mouth to Spencer's collarbone. He gasps again, and then Spencer can feel the press of Brendon's teeth.
"Brendon," Spencer whispers, his hips jerking up helplessly.
He reaches his hand between their bodies and Brendon whimpers. "I'm sure," Brendon mumbles. "I'm sure, please don't stop."
--
"Spencer," Brendon whispers.
Spencer cracks his eyes open. His head is tucked into the crook of Brendon's shoulders and his arm is wrapped lightly around Brendon's waist. The sun has risen and is streaming across the bed through the cracks between the curtains.
"Yeah?"
"Do you hear that?" Brendon asks.
Spencer can hear the soft sound of Brendon exhaling. It's hard to focus on anything other than how stupidly happy he feels to be waking up beside Brendon, but as his brain starts to wake up he can hear birds chirping outside. And then. That sound, like tall grass moving in the wind and water trickling over smooth stones and the chiming of bells.
"Oh," Spencer says. The sound is still as strange and beautiful and unnerving as the first time he heard it, only now Brendon's warm in bed beside him and Spencer's chest doesn't feel so empty.
Brendon pulls back the covers and jumps out of bed, pauses only to grab for Spencer, saying, "Come on, come on."
He rushes them out of the house, and Spencer has just enough time to grab the blankets off the bed, passing one to Brendon and using the other to cover himself.
The light fills the backyard, growing brighter as they walk further and further back. Spencer slows, wants to hang back but Brendon keeps pushing him forward, through the trees to the place where the light is brightest. Spencer tries to look away, but the light is everywhere, until finally Brendon leads them around to the other side of the huge oak tree and the light takes form.
"Oh," Spencer says as he and Brendon come to a stop.
"You came back," Brendon says.
The unicorn turns her head, looking right at Brendon. She doesn't make any sound, but something in the way she looks at him makes Brendon smile and nod.
There are flowers everywhere: sweet peas that have grown up the side of the tree, twisting around the trunk. The lilies Brendon picked at the river are spread out around the base of the tree, still fresh and alive after countless days. And daisies and buttercups and marigolds and flowers that Spencer has never seen before.
Brendon and the unicorn stare at each other for a long moment before Brendon turns his head, reaching for Spencer's hand and pulling him closer.
The unicorn turns toward Spencer, watching him with clear blue eyes. Spencer's breath catches and there's this ache, a tightness across his rib cage, like there's not enough room for all this brightness. It's not as frightening this time.
"Look what I brought you today," Brendon says, his fingers tightening in Spencer's.
"Hi," Spencer says.
Brendon/Spencer | R | ~10,500 words | AU -- set Sometime That Isn't Now
Brendon finds something and comes to Spencer for help. Spencer makes space in his quiet life for Brendon, and finds that he doesn't want him to leave. With a guest appearance from The Young Veins & The Like.
I got a whole lot of encourage while I was writing this, and that is the only reason why I was able to finish. So I'm going to thank a whole bunch of people! Thanks to sunsetmog, sparkfrost, slowlikewine, reni_days, shaggirl, and boweryd for reading this before it was done and sending me their encouragement. Thanks to airgiodslv to listening to me post this out in the first place. And to the awesome people on my flist!
And many thanks to elucreh for looking this over. And finally to octette for working so patiently with me in the rewrite, ♥!
Spencer's on the side porch, whacking a rug to get rid of the dust, when he hears this -- it's this noise like bells, and water running over stones, and long grass being moved by the wind. It's like nothing that Spencer's heard before. He hesitates for a moment, listening as the sound gets louder and louder, and then he drops the rug and retreats into his house. The noise is beautiful and clear and something in it makes him feel hollow inside. He walks into the kitchen, standing alone in the room and feeling very aware that he is by himself. He thinks that maybe he should put the kettle on the fire for tea. He has no idea what could be making that sound and mostly he doesn't want to find out.
He's pulling a mug out of the cupboard when he hears something else -- a noise he recognizes this time: someone tapping on his side door.
He undoes the lock slowly, opening the door only a crack, and then a little wider, until finally he can see a face. It's Brendon, the youngest Urie son, who still lives in his parents' house, many lots and a few winding roads away. Too far to walk, but Spencer didn't hear the clatter of horse hooves announcing Brendon's arrival.
Spencer stares at Brendon for too long without saying anything, but Brendon doesn't look put off, although he does seem nervous.
"Hi," Spencer says, finally.
"I remember from --" Brendon sounds breathless. "-- when everyone gathered last summer to pick blackberries at the ravine, and I came back for iced tea with you and Ryan, that we sat in your yard. It seemed like there might be space."
Space for what? But there was space in Spencer's yard. Room for a stable, though Spencer doesn't have any horses and hasn't been inclined to build one just yet. He thinks that one summer he'll build a stable and get a couple of horses and finish off the second bedroom in the house, and after all that the house will be ready and maybe then he'll find a courtship that works. He'll find whatever was always missing, no matter how hard he tried to make it work with Haley. This summer he's going to finish working the patch of earth closest to his house into a garden -- but next year, maybe.
"There might be," Spencer says. "What's the space for?"
"I found something," Brendon says, his voice catching after found.
"And you need to keep it here?"
"I don't know," Brendon says.
Spencer wishes he had opened the door wider, because now all he can see is Brendon's face, his cheeks flushed and hair curling damply along his hairline. Spencer can't see what it is that Brendon has found, and it would look awkward for him to fling the door open at this point.
"How much space do you need?"
"I don't know," says Brendon. "It seems like -- not a thing to keep. But you were who I thought of -- I thought of your yard, so."
"I want to plant tomatoes," Spencer says. "Can it be stored further back? There are a lot of trees, but --"
"Yes," Brendon says, "with the trees. Close to the ravine."
"Okay," Spencer says. "So, that's all right. Do you need help, then? To move it back there?"
"No," Brendon says. His breath hitches, even though Spencer can tell he's trying to keep quiet. "It's. I found..."
"What?" Spencer asks.
Brendon curls his fingers around the edge of the door. He ducks his head and, looking up at Spencer with dark eyes, says in a low voice, "A unicorn. I found a unicorn." And then he pulls back the door, just a little, just enough that Spencer can lean forward.
He peers outside, and blinks twice against the sudden flare of light, so bright and so white that it hurts his eyes. It fills his whole yard, even though it seems to be coming from the back of the lot. There's a little flicker when it passes behind a tree, and then this moment where the light gets even brighter, like it's turning towards him, and Spencer steps back into his house quickly, scared to look directly at it, jerking his head away. His heart hammers in his chest, and he flattens his sweaty hand across his breastbone.
"Can you see it?" Brendon asks, lingering by the doorway.
"No." Spencer rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. "Just the light."
"Oh," Brendon says, sounding disappointed. "I mean -- yeah, of course."
"You can see it?" Spencer asks.
Brendon's cheeks flush, because they both know what it means for Brendon to be twenty-three and still able to see the unicorn.
"I was walking in the forest. It's hurt, I think. There are scratches along its side. I know where to find aloe. Witch-hazel, maybe. I said I thought I knew of a place that would be safe, and it knelt down so I could climb on its back, and then I whispered where we could go and it carried me here. My legs are still shaking," Brendon says, rubbing absently at the top of his thigh.
Spencer flattens his own hand against his side. Ever since looking out, he feels like his breath has been taken away. There's a dull throbbing in his temple.
"I saw arrows stuck in a tree," Brendon says. "And the unicorn got us to your place but now it's lying down, and I think -- it would be safer in your yard, right?"
"I guess so," Spencer says. Someone doesn't have to be able to see a unicorn to hunt for it.
"I probably shouldn't have let it carry me," Brendon says. "We were just so far away."
"I've got salve," Spencer says. He turns and walks to the shelf running along the side wall of the kitchen that serves as a pantry. "I don't know if it'll help, but you can try." He passes the glass jar over to Brendon. "I'll see what else I can find. Try this for now."
Spencer's mother works with the town's healer, making salves and potions and fixing minor injuries, and Spencer spends his week days helping her find ingredients. He takes things home sometimes: if they made too much or if it didn't work quite right or if there was something that wasn't needed after all. The jar Spencer handed Brendon has bayberry and calendula, to help prevent infections. He knows there's a jar with comfrey ointment somewhere.
"Do you want to come?" Brendon asks. "I don't know anything about healing."
"You know as much as I do," Spencer says. "I just know where to go in the forest to find the right plants, I don't know what to do with them. Just. Do the best you can. Spread it on thickly, I guess."
Spencer turns back to the shelf and stares at the jars until he hears Brendon close the door behind himself. That makes it a little easier, having the door closed. Spencer touches the base of his throat and tries to breathe slowly.
--
"I'm late for dinner already," Brendon says. "I have to leave now if I'm to make it back before dark. I'll come tomorrow?"
"Sure," Spencer says.
"Do you think it'll be okay back there?"
"I don't know. Probably. I don't think anyone every really goes back there, and there's a fence along the very back of the property." Spencer imagines that a unicorn would likely be able to jump over the low wooden fence, but he figures the goal is to keep others out, not to keep the unicorn in.
"So, I'll -- see you," Brendon says. "Thanks, again. You're just, I guess you're the only person I know who has a house."
Certainly not the only person that Brendon knows who has his own house, but perhaps one of the only ones who is close in age to Brendon. Spencer inherited the house from his grandmother when she died, and he really only got it because he'd been well on his way to marrying Haley at the time. But that fell apart before Spencer had even finished moving his things over from his parents' house, and so it's only ever been him. The house was set for an elderly woman living on her own, not a young couple ready to start a family. Not a young man who needs to shelter a unicorn, but anyway. Spencer can make do.
"Should I do anything, do you think?" Spencer asks.
"Maybe put some more water out in a couple of hours."
Spencer's heart thuds and he thinks wildly, I can't, but maybe he can figure out a way.
"I'll see you tomorrow," Brendon says, and takes off, sprinting away from Spencer's house. There's no way he'll be able to run the whole way home, but if he tries, he might be able to make it back before dark.
Spencer closes the door. The sudden silence in his small house is jarring. He walks to the front room and picks up his book off the side table, settling onto his chair. He tries to read, but even before the sun sinks in the sky and the room gets too dark to make out the words on the page, Spencer puts the book down.
He pours water into a big mixing bowl, the one that's chipped along the rim, and carries it awkwardly. Some of the water spills over when he struggles with the door. He keeps his eyes fixed on the bowl as he walks slowly into the backyard. The sun is down and there's just the lingering light of dusk. Spencer walks slowly so he doesn't lose his footing.
"I've got water," Spencer says aloud, keeping his eyes fixed down.
He's hardly past the land he's cleared for a garden -- nowhere near the wooded area further back -- when he sets the bowl down, turns quickly, and dashes back to his house. He feels silly once he's back inside, but it's also a lot easier to breathe when he's on the other side of the door. He's not scared. How could he be scared of something he can't see? He's just. Cautious or something. He's just a little apprehensive.
--
"Mrs. Adles is having migraines," Spencer's mother says when he walks into the office the next morning. She's sitting at her desk, a pile of empty jars in a box on the floor beside her. "We're out of feverfew."
"I'm on it," Spencer says. He drops his coat onto a chair before heading for the door. The sun is bright in the sky, and Spencer can tell that it's going to be warm by noon. He's wearing a thick, long-sleeved shirt, but he goes out by himself, so it doesn't matter if he has to strip down to fewer layers as the day goes on.
"Can you also see if you can find any butterbur? I'm going to put a tea together that'll help prevent the headaches from coming back."
"Sure thing," Spencer says. When Spencer first started, his mother had to go out with him to show him what he was looking for. He used to take books home with him to study the pictures, but now he knows what he's trying to find and where the best places to look are. There's not a lot of money to be made from collecting herbs, but Spencer doesn't need much.
"Take this with you," Spencer's mom says, passing over a small cloth sack.
Spencer looks inside. "Mom," he says, "I'm an adult now. You don't have to keep making me lunch."
"I don't see you packing your own," she says. "And, anyway, there were leftovers."
"One day you're going to remember that you don't have to make as much when you're just cooking for the twins."
"And in the meantime you'll have to forgive an old lady for her poor memory."
"Mom," Spencer says again.
"Get out of here," she says. "We'll talk about when you're going to come over for dinner when you've got your work done."
--
Brendon's there when Spencer gets back, sitting on the second step leading up to the side porch, his forearms resting on his knees.
"How is it?" Spencer asks.
"I don't know. I can't really tell."
"I got some stuff for you," Spencer says, reaching into his satchel and pulling out a couple of bottles and a thick bouquet of herbs, tied together with a string around the stems.
"Come on," he continues, leading Brendon into the house. "I'll show you how to make this into a paste."
*
"You can just go inside, you know," Spencer says. It's Friday and Brendon's sitting on his back steps waiting, just like every other day this week. "The door isn't locked."
"Might as well wait for you," Brendon says.
"How's it doing?" Spencer asks.
"I don't really know," Brendon says, just like every other day, and then he follows Spencer into the house.
While Brendon ducks out back to check on the unicorn, Spencer makes two cups of tea, even though it's a little too warm for it. The sun was bright in the sky today, and the house heated while Spencer was gone. There's dirt under his fingernails from digging up valerian root, and his cheeks and forehead feel grimy after a day spent wiping sweat away with his dirty hands.
He lets the tea steep, but waits until Brendon comes back inside before pouring.
Brendon's cheeks are flushed and his hands hover over the table, shaking a little, like leaves blown by a strong wind.
"Do you want to stay for dinner?" Spencer asks.
Brendon's eyelids close slowly, like he's seeing something that's not right in front of him, but when he snaps back to it, he looks Spencer straight in the eye, and says, "Thank you, but my parents will wonder."
"Sure," Spencer says. He's used to cooking for just himself, but tonight he thinks it might have been nice to have someone else around. Spencer's by himself most of the day and he's by himself when he comes home at night and it's not bad. He spends a lot of time reading and trying to make something of the garden in the backyard. But sometimes he thinks that he'd like to cook for more than one, and now that Ryan's gone, Spencer doesn't have anyone he can invite over.
"Thanks, though," Brendon says again.
"You're doing a good job," Spencer says.
"You don't know that," Brendon says, looking out the window. Spencer keeps his eyes firmly fixed on the table.
"I can just tell," he says. He remembers the time that Brendon played the piano in front of the entire church. Spencer's family didn't go as often as some of the other families, but he was there for that. The song wasn't one that Spencer had heard before, but he knew that Brendon played it well, seated in the centre of the stage, his back a straight line beneath his pressed white shirt.
He pours Brendon another cup of tea when he finishes the first one, and Brendon stays to drink it.
*
Spencer takes his time getting out of bed when it’s the weekend. Today, once he gets up, he heads outside. He doesn't keep track as carefully as he should, but it seems like it's been about two months since the last frost: time to plant the tomatoes.
He walks into the backyard, sticking close to his house, careful not to look too carefully at the woods in the back of his property. The back of his hand brushes against a stray branch from the tree leaning close to the side of his house that died during the winter. He's going to have to clear that away. Dry grass crunches under his feet and Spencer looks down at the ground so that his eyes don't accidentally stray toward the back of his property. It's not that he would actually see anything, but he's still scared to look.
Once he gets to the garden patch, he squints up at the sky. Having determined the spot that seems like it'll get the most sunlight, he squats down. He's been mixing in compost diligently, and the soil is dark and textured.
When he finishes planting, he brushes dirt off the knees of his pants, turns back the house and finds Brendon leaning against the small apple tree, with little green buds just starting to form at the ends of the branches.
"You're here earlier than usual," Spencer says, trying to sound casual about it..
"It's the weekend."
"My mom made me a loaf of bread," Spencer says. "You want to have something to eat?"
"Okay," Brendon says, "thanks."
As Spencer pulls out bread and butter and honey, he asks, "How's the -- you know."
"Okay, I think," Brendon says. "Sometimes it's not there, so I just leave stuff behind this tree it seems to like. So that means it can walk around at least. I think it's still got a limp, though, and usually it's just on the ground sleeping, so that's probably not too good."
"You haven't told anybody?"
"Don't know who I'd tell," Brendon says. "I don't really think anyone would believe me."
"I believed you."
"Then I guess I made the right call," says Brendon, looking Spencer in the eye.
The last time Spencer spent time with Brendon, it was late August of last year. They were out in the Hendersons' cornfield and the sun was so hot in the sky that the air seemed to press down in waves. Brendon was the first to start stripping down, and Spencer remembers debating before he shrugged off his own shirt. Ryan could stand the heat better than the rest of them, and he knew about a party down by the river. He'd said where he was going before he left, and Spencer could have followed after him, but instead he stayed with Brendon, lying back on the ground and watching clouds move across the sky. Spencer could hardly breathe for how hot it was, but he couldn't look away from Brendon, the way sweat slid down his neck and across his collarbones as he pointed out shapes in the sky.
Spencer rubs the back of his neck, turns around and says, "Do you want something to drink? I've got new peppermint leaves."
"If you're having some."
Spencer lights the fire and puts the kettle on the stove. He shakes peppermint leaves into the teapot; now that he's making tea for more than one, he has reason to make a whole pot. He hasn't been living on his own for that long, just a couple of years now, but it's a long time to be alone. It'll be strange when the unicorn's better and things go back to normal. Maybe Spencer will have to make more of an effort to get out of the house. It used to be easier, finding reasons to leave and people to see.
Brendon sits on the side of the table that looks out the window, and he seems to be watching something outside. When Spencer sits down again, on the seat across the table, he looks at Brendon instead, carefully, so that Brendon won't notice.
--
"You're the worst," Brendon says, groaning.
"Come on," says Spencer, "your turn. Three more cards and I win."
Brendon flips over a card from the messy pile in the middle of the low table they've pushed into the centre of the room. "What's this mean?" Brendon asks, holding it up for Spencer to see.
"Hmm," Spencer says. "The mermaid. Do you have any other cards from the sea?"
Brendon looks his large handful, then squints up at Spencer. "I thought I wasn't supposed to tell you what I have."
"It's not my fault you can't remember the rules of the game."
"It's not my fault that you're making things up as we go."
"Hey."
Brendon snorts. He flips over another card and rearranges the ones in his hand.
"When I was a kid I used to imagine that I'd end up marrying a mermaid," Spencer says, discreetly slipping one of the cards out of his hand and back onto the table.
"Really?" Brendon asks.
"'Til I learned that it would mean I'd spend forever in a murky grave."
"Okay, seriously," Brendon says, reaching across the table with extraordinary speed and catching Spencer's wrist just as he's about to drop another card. "I can see you cheating."
"Never," Spencer says as he drops all of his cards at once. "I win!"
"You cheat." Brendon squeezes Spencer's wrist. His hand is hot and steady for a long moment before he lets go.
"Nope," Spencer says. "If you have less than five cards you're allowed to put them all down at once."
"These don't even match," Brendon says, turning over Spencer's cards. "This game is a sham!"
"Better luck next time," Spencer says.
"Humph. Next time I'm picking the game."
Spencer grins, and ignores the way he can see Brendon lower his eyes each times their fingers brush as they work together to clear the cards off the table.
"Shit," Brendon says, glancing at the little clock sitting on Spencer's mantle, "I am so late. I've got to -- shit."
Spencer follows Brendon to the door and waits while Brendon shoves his feet into his shoes and gathers his things.
"Well, thanks," Brendon says, standing up straight and looking quickly at Spencer. The open door is in the way, so their bodies are just a little too close.
"Yeah," Spencer says, "see you." And then Brendon takes off, sprinting down the dusty road while Spencer stands behind his open door.
*
A few days later, Spencer has turned down the covers and is about to crawl into bed when he hears a quiet tapping. He's not really sure what it is -- a branch knocking against the side of the house, most likely -- but he checks the door just in case.
He finds Brendon standing around the side of the house, a little bag that has been stuffed full hanging over one of his shoulders.
"Oh," says Brendon. "I didn't know if you'd be awake."
"Have you come to see the unicorn?" Spencer asks. "I think that everything's all right." Not that he'd have any way to know if there was a problem. He doesn't ever look through the window facing onto the backyard anymore.
"I guess," Brendon says. "I don't really --" He rubs the skin under his eye and then wipes his forehead with the back of his hand.
"Is everything okay?"
"My parents ran into Mr. Valdez at the market and they found out that I hadn't been seeing Shane -- I didn't even tell them that Shane had gotten married, but now they know -- and then they were waiting for me, and they wanted to know where I'd been, but I couldn't tell them. What was I going to say? They're -- they would think there was something wicked in finding a mystical creature, they wouldn't understand.
"So they figured that I've been -- running around. With that girl that I was courting last fall, only nothing happened with her. I thought maybe, later -- but I wasn't ready to be married yet, so we cooled things off. But they didn't believe me and they said that I have to do the right thing and propose, but I can't, and I couldn't tell them why I can't, so they thought I meant that I wouldn't, and now they think I'm terrible and selfish and they said I shouldn't come back until I'd done the right thing, so now I can't go back."
"Why can't you get married?" Spencer asks, at a loss for anything better to say.
"I can't lose the unicorn," Brendon says. "Not yet. I just -- I can't. She still needs me."
"She?"
"I think it's a girl," Brendon says. "I don't know. She feels like -- but I don't know. They might not even have a sex. I just have a feeling."
"Okay," Spencer says, because Brendon would know just as well as anyone else.
"It wouldn't be so bad, getting married. But I can't yet. It would be -- just not yet. I can't lose her yet."
"Okay," Spencer says again. "So, are you going to come in then?"
And Brendon tightens his hold on the small bag and follows him inside.
--
Brendon's sitting in the kitchen when Spencer walks in the next morning. He looks like he's been sitting there for a while.
"Did you sleep?" Spencer asks.
"I don't know."
"Did you lie down? It's usually hard to sleep sitting up."
"I was outside for a bit," Brendon says. "I brought her some sweet peas."
"Where did you get sweet peas?" Spencer asks.
"They're growing along the side of your house," Brendon says, tilting his head toward the east.
"There aren't any sweet peas," Spencer says, but when he opens the window and pokes his head outside, there are indeed flowers growing up the side of his house: white and pink and red and purple and all in bloom. Spencer can't believe he didn't notice the scent before, and he leaves the window open when he walks back to Brendon, sitting at the table.
"I didn't plant any," Spencer says.
Brendon shrugs.
"What does a unicorn need flowers for, anyway?"
"I don't know," Brendon says. "They smell nice."
He pushes his mug over to Spencer when Spencer sits down in the other chair. The tea has cooled, but Spencer takes a sip before pushing back across the table to Brendon.
"I have to run down and check with my mom, but I think I can probably skip work today, and then I can come back and we can try to get the other bedroom into shape."
"No, no," Brendon says. "You don't have to miss work."
"How comfortable was it sleeping on the floor last night?"
"It was fine."
Spencer rolls his eyes. "It looks like it's going to rain, anyway. Who wants to wander around trying to scoop herbs out of the mud in the rain?"
"I can find somewhere else to stay," Brendon says.
"Oh, yeah? Where?"
Spencer lets the silence stretch on, but before it gets cruel he says, "I'm going to check in with my mom, and then I'll come back. There's food in the pantry -- maybe you could make something for lunch."
"Okay," Brendon says in a small voice. He waits until Spencer is out of the chain and nearly at the door to the kitchen before he says, "Thanks, Spence."
"See you soon," Spencer says, and leaves.
--
Brendon sneezes six times in a row, pausing just long enough between each to wipe his watering eyes.
"Sorry, sorry," Spencer says, trying not to shake any more dust in Brendon's direction. "I don't think anyone's been in here since Grandma died. I don't get a lot of company."
Which is odd, Spencer thinks, because when he was growing up, Ryan used to come over all the time, that blanket-stealing ingrate. Now that Spencer's finally got enough room, Ryan's off in the city with Jon doing -- whatever it is people do in the city. Spencer's never left Summerlin, but he's heard stories. Mostly from Ryan, who used to spend hours telling Spencer about what it would be like in the city. All the people and the noise and the excitement. Spencer would listen, make the right noises at the right times, but he never felt the same desperation to leave. He likes the woods and the river and the hills. Likes seeing his mother every day at work and going home for dinner with his family on the weekend. His mother has started teaching him how to make the salves himself, and Spencer knows that if he stays and learns he can eventually take over for her.
When Ryan left, things were just starting to fall apart with Haley and for one brief flash, Spencer thought of what it would be like to follow after him. The noise and the people and the chance to try the things that Spencer would never be able to try if he stayed, but it still didn't seem worth leaving.
Brendon sneezes again.
It takes them all day and into the night, but by bedtime the room is mostly livable.
"Do you need anything?" Spencer asks. Brendon is holding his pile of bedding to his chest. "A glass of water?"
"I'm okay," Brendon says.
"If you want something, just help yourself."
"Okay, but I'm really good. Thanks."
"Yeah," Spencer says. Brendon looks small, folded in on himself as he curls around his armful of blankets. Spencer thinks maybe he could give Brendon a hug, but he doesn't know how to do it without being awkward. It's funny that this is the first time anyone has slept at his house. It's a big house for just one person.
"Goodnight," Spencer says, and then makes himself look away from Brendon and leave the room.
*
"Here," Brendon says, walking in from the back door. He sets a perfect, round tomato on the table in front of Spencer.
The tomato is still firm enough to bite into, though juice is dripping down Spencer's chin before long. He wipes his face with the back of his hand, and thinks sleepily that he's glad it's almost laundry day because his pajama shirt is going to be stained. He takes another bite and makes a low noise of contentment.
"Good, right?" Brendon asks, smiling as he watches Spencer eat.
Spencer nods and stuffs the rest of the fruit into his mouth. He squints up at Brendon as he asks, "Where did you get this?" It's early yet for Brendon to have made it from the market and back.
"Garden," Brendon says, lifting his chin to gesture behind himself.
"What?" Spencer asks. "No. It's only been a few weeks since I planted them."
"I guess you're doing an especially good job," Brendon says, "because they're ripe."
Spencer pushes away from the table and shuffles out the house, holding his hand to his forehead to block the bright morning light. In the garden, the tomato plants are all the way up to his waist, the fruits bright red and separating easily from the stem when Spencer gives a little tug.
He fills his shirt with tomatoes, holding the edge as a makeshift basket, and carries a load back to the house.
"You want to help me cut these up?" Spencer asks, dropping the load of tomatoes onto the counter.
While Brendon manages to squirt tomato seeds from one end of the kitchen to the other, Spencer goes back onto the deck and pinches off basil leaves from the herb garden he's been tending since the snow finally melted for good. The leaves are smaller than coins -- no strange growth there -- and oily in his hand when he carries them back into the kitchen.
Brendon divides the tomatoes between two plates while Spencer tears basil leaves with his fingers, and then covers everything with sweet vinegar.
Brendon says, "C'mon, let's eat outside," when Spencer makes for the kitchen table, and Spencer follows him outside hesitantly. He keeps his eyes down at first, but each time he risks a glance upward, there's no strange light. Nothing that he shouldn't be seeing.
Brendon makes happy noises as he scoops up chunks of tomato using his whole hand, the juices completely covering his fingers. He chases a stray piece of basil and seems to hold it on his tongue for a long while before chewing it up.
In the early morning light, Brendon's face looks soft and happy. Spencer curls his fingers into a fist and thinks about how sticky his skin is and how nice it is to wake up and know Brendon will be there for breakfast and how he doesn't know if Brendon is actively looking for somewhere else to stay, but he doesn't want to ask just in case Brendon is. He doesn't want it to go back to what it was like before, seeing Brendon at the market and waving from a distance because he didn't know how to go over and start up a conversation, even when he caught Brendon looking right back.
"Let's go down to the river later," Spencer says. "At noon, when the sun is the hottest. I want to swim."
--
The river is only deep enough to swim by the big oak tree, back from Mr. Peters's property. It's a long walk, and Spencer's feet hurt from the rocks, but he doesn't regret leaving his shoes at home. The water isn't deep enough to dive into, but Spencer strips down to his cotton shorts and jumps in with as large a splash as he can manage, Brendon whooping loudly and following closely behind. The water is cold and clear and moving fast enough that Spencer has to dig his feet into the earth to avoid being swept away.
"It's freezing," Brendon says, coming up beside Spencer
"This part is in the shade," Spencer says. He looks up at the trees, and once Brendon is looking up as well, he cups his hands full of water and splashes Brendon in the face.
"Hey," Brendon says, sending water back toward Spencer with an open palm and a quick flick of his wrist.
It's warmer when they're moving, dancing around in water than comes up just past their waists. Brendon's faster than Spencer, and Spencer lets himself be pushed under when Brendon pushes down on his shoulders. He lets go a moment later, and Spencer pops back up, right in front of Brendon, shaking water from his hair. Brendon's hands were warm on his shoulders, even with the cold of the water.
Brendon's chest is warm, too, when Spencer flattens his palm across Brendon's collarbone. Warm for a moment, long enough that Spencer can feel Brendon's ribcage expand as he takes a shaky breath, and then Spencer's hand is in the water again as Brendon pushes off, hopping on the balls of his feet to the other side of the river.
"Hey, look," Brendon says, keeping his back turned to Spencer. "There are some flowers over here. Maybe I'll bring some back to the unicorn. You know, mix things up."
Spencer cups his hands and fills them with water, splashing his face and pushing his hair away from his forehead. His cheeks flush hot. He takes a breath and then follows after Brendon.
*
Spencer wakes to someone pounding at his front door. As he staggers to his feet, he thinks fuzzily that Brendon must -- something or another about Brendon, but, no, that's not right, because as he walks down the narrow hallway, Brendon's door opens a crack. He must see Spencer, because then the door opens the rest of the way.
"What is it?" Brendon asks.
"I don't know," Spencer says. "Turns out there are people other than you who come calling in the middle of the night."
Spencer opens the door to find Ryan and Jon, both of whom have grown their hair since Spencer last saw them, and now have identical heads of long, limp curls.
"Hey, Spence," Ryan says. "I'm going to enter the faery realm and I've come to say goodbye before I go."
"I thought you were going to the city to make your fortune," Spencer says. "Last I heard, you were on your way north with Jon."
"And now I am going south. Well, it's not really south. Just to the glen on the other side of the mountain."
"Is Jon going with you?" Spencer asks. "Is Keltie?" He pokes his head further outside. "Is she here?"
"I left her in the city. Well, she left me. But, you're not listening. I've fallen in love."
"With who?" Spencer asks.
"With me," a little voice says, and then a tiny woman crawls out of the pocket of Ryan's coat, climbs up his lapel and settles on his shoulder. She loops one of his stray curls around her arm, holding on for balance.
"This is Z," Ryan says. "Z, Spencer."
"And I'm Tennessee," another tiny woman says, this time with a strange accent. She crawls out of Ryan's other pocket and says, "Now that we're all introduced, are we going into the house or what? It smells terrible in there."
--
Spencer grabs as many wine bottles as he can carry from the cellar, and when he comes back to the kitchen, Ryan has opened his sack and is pouring from a bottle of something else into Spencer's grandma's good set of china tea cups.
Spencer sets the bottles onto the counter and grabs one for himself, not bothering with a glass once he's got it open.
Z is sitting in Ryan's open palm, leaning back against his loosely curled fingertips. Her feet are resting on the chain of Ryan's pocket watch, which he's got wrapped around his wrist, as she drinks whatever Ryan has poured the rest of them out of a thimble
Brendon is standing at the back of the kitchen, tucked into the far counter, looking scandalized. When Spencer turns around, he scurries over, hissing, "Faeries, Spence. Faeries. This is not going to end well."
"Just, um. Don't play any games or make any deals with them and I'm sure we'll be fine. And don't ask them anything. Or ask for anything. Or -- just, you know. Maybe don't talk." Spencer's never met a faery before, has never even known of anyone who's met a faery. Except for Ryan, apparently.
"Whatever they're drinking is much stronger than wine," Brendon says. "Ryan made me try some."
"This isn't the first time you've met Ryan," Spencer reminds him. "You really don't know better than to try anything he gives you?"
"Jon's having it, too," Brendon says, and then rolls his eyes when Spencer gives him a pointed look.
"Here," Spencer says, passing over the bottle. "Have some wine."
Brendon looks around briefly for a glass, but ends up raising the bottle to his mouth and taking a couple of long sips before passing it back.
Spencer tips the bottle back and drinks until he runs out of breath, then wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and says, "So you're going where?"
"We're getting married," Ryan says happily, touching the index finger of his free hand to Z's tiny foot. She leans over and leans her head against Ryan's thumb.
"I thought you were already married," Spencer says. "There was an announcement in the paper."
"Oh, no," Ryan says, shaking his head. "That was just a thing. I have to go with Z and cross the Bridge to Nowhere and then I'll be a faery too. And, I don't know, there might be some trials or something, but then we're going to get married!"
"And you're going along with this?" Spencer asks Jon.
"I don't know," Jon says, scratching at the underside of his chin, which is covered by a thick beard. "I'm going along for a bit anyway."
"Alex already went," Ryan says.
"Alex passed the trials and was allowed to enter... wherever he wanted to enter?"
"Alex was going to go Under The Paving Stones, I think," Z says.
"And they let him in?"
"Well, I don't know," Ryan says. "We haven't heard from him in a while. I can only assume that things went as planned." He sighs. "I miss him."
"So you're following him into Faeryland?"
"Also to get married," Ryan says.
"Good luck with that," says Spencer.
"I can be who you wanted me to be," Ryan says, grinning down at Z.
"Well, the size difference was probably going to be a little awkward," Spencer mutters before taking another long sip of wine.
"You want to come?" Jon asks. "I don't know if I'm going to go all the way -- trials sound like maybe not fun, but I'm going to go along for the ride and then maybe I'll go somewhere else."
Spencer cuts a look across the table and meets Brendon's eyes. Brendon stares wide-eyed but the rest of his face is mostly expressionless.
"Thanks, but I've got some stuff to do here," Spencer says. "Send word once you're married. Or if you manage to find Greenwald or whatever."
"We shall write it in a song," Ryan says, and then Jon pulls out a guitar, and, oh god, they're both singing. Ryan taps his hands loudly on the table, just out of beat with what Jon is strumming on the guitar.
Spencer wanders back to the cellar for more wine.
--
Tennessee walks over from where she's perched on a tea saucer. She trips over a fork as she makes her way and catches herself by grabbing the rim of the bowl. When she gets to Spencer, she tugs on the cuff of his sleeve until he leans closer and then she says, "Brendon keeps giving me weird looks."
"His parents are suspicious of mystical creatures," Spencer says in a low voice, even though Brendon has long since switched from Spencer's wine to whatever Ryan brought and is now singing loudly to himself. "Plus, you talk kind of funny."
"What, so everyone in the world grows up in Summerlin?" she asks.
"Everyone we know," Spencer says. "Except for Jon, I guess. And Alex. Maybe that's why Brendon's suspicious."
Tennessee hums, and then starts dancing her way back across the table. Spencer stands as well, comes up behind Brendon as says, "You about ready for bed?"
Brendon looks up at him with squinty eyes and says, "All the wine's gone."
Spencer nods, sadly. He steps backward when Brendon rises off his chair, and ends up stumbling himself. He was drinking as much as the rest of them, and now that he's on his feet it's easier to tell that the wine went straight to his head.
"You can sleep in my bedroom," Spencer tells Ryan, squeezing his bony shoulder as he passes by.
"We have to leave at dawn," Ryan says. "Long day's travel."
"It was good to see you," Spencer says. "It's been a while."
"Come with us," Ryan says. "Just for a while, if you do not want to come the whole way."
"I can't," Spencer says, which is the same thing he said when Ryan left the first time. Now, as then, Spencer really means, I don't want to, but he's glad to see that Ryan's doing well.
Brendon's humming to himself as he moves around the bedroom, hanging a shirt over the back of the little wooden chair.
"Do you mind sharing?" Spencer asks.
Brendon laughs. "It's your house; it's not sharing."
"It's your room," Spencer says.
"Of course I don't mind."
Brendon lies down and then scoots toward the wall, making room for Spencer. They're both still mostly dressed, but maybe that's for the best. It's a small space, and Spencer can feel the heat coming off of Brendon's body. Brendon's thigh is pressed along Spencer's.
Spencer takes a breath, and then turns onto his side, facing Brendon.
"Hey," Brendon says, his voice soft in the darkness. Spencer can hear that Ryan and his friends are still up, but the music has stopped and the low sound of voices fades into the background.
"Ryan said they'll be gone in the morning," Spencer says.
"Okay." Brendon moves a little, twisting his body so that it's easier for him to face Spencer. "Do you think it's weird?" he asks.
"What?"
"That Ryan would go to Faeryland for Z."
"I don't know Z, but if he loves her, it's not weird."
"He'll never be able to come back."
Spencer doesn't know how Ryan would have met Z in the first place; faeries stay far away from human cities.
"I guess he thinks it's worth it," Spencer says. This is probably the only time that it'll be easier for Ryan not to have much of a family: he won't have to explain himself to anyone. Spencer still hasn't figured out how to ask his mom if he can bring Brendon over for dinner, so mostly he's stopped going. Maybe one day he'll be able to find the right way to ask.
Spencer's had too much wine, and it's difficult to be this close to Brendon without doing something stupid. Except that the more time passes, the harder it is to remember why it would be stupid, why he should be holding back. Maybe it's not something they could tell anyone, but they've made it work: living together, the second bedroom set up in case someone were to ask. Spencer had an idea of how settling into this house would go, the process of making it his own, and even though this isn't what he had planned, it's still good. It still feels right.
Spencer presses his lips together and looks at Brendon. This kind of closeness makes Brendon's body seem soft, touchable. Like maybe it would be okay if Spencer set his fingers on the sloping line of Brendon's ribcage so that he could feel him breathe. It feels new to want like this, staring at Brendon in the dark and wishing for more, but it's not new, not really. He liked Haley and he was excited to bring her here and start a home, but he always wondered.
He's been looking at Brendon for too long, but Brendon isn't looking away. Spencer waits for some kind of sign, a reason to move away or to finally push the rest of the way forward. The moment hangs all around them until finally Spencer can't stand it anymore. He dips his head, leaning toward Brendon.
Brendon lets out a soft breath just before Spencer closes the distance and brushes their lips together. In the dark, it's hard to remember why he needs to be careful, why he can't just pull Brendon close and hold on tight and do all of the things that he tries not to think about.
Brendon kisses back, and for a moment it's just as satisfying as Spencer hoped it would be -- and then it's even worse than he could have anticipated when Brendon breaks away, rolling on his other side to face the wall.
"Goodnight," Brendon says after a long minute, where Spencer stares at his back and thinks, Turn around, turn around.
There's a sound from elsewhere in the house. What he wants from Brendon, it's not worse than Ryan and a faery. It's not weirder. Ryan and Z's wedding wouldn't be in a church and maybe other people wouldn't understand, but it would still real for them. Ryan's not afraid to travel somewhere that humans aren't meant to go, but here in the dark, when it's just the two of them and no one would ever know, Brendon still doesn't want this with Spencer. Ryan always wanted more, but Spencer never considered that maybe what they wanted was the same. Ryan was just smart enough to know that he wouldn't be able to find it if he stayed.
"Night," Spencer says. He rolls onto his back and stares up at the ceiling.
--
True to Ryan's word, everyone is gone when Spencer gets up in the morning. He doesn't know how he missed the sounds of them leaving; it was a long time of staring at the ceiling before Spencer finally dropped into sleep. Maybe something of the faery magic after all.
Spencer doesn't know if he wakes before Brendon, but Brendon's still in bed when Spencer cracks his eyes open. Spencer turns his head to the side, tortures himself with another long minute of watching Brendon's back -- in the bright morning sunlight this time -- before he rolls up and leaves the room.
Brendon comes into the kitchen before Spencer has finished clearing the empty bottles away.
"Do you want tea?" Spencer asks.
Brendon nods, then walks himself over to the kettle.
"Last night," Brendon says as they wait for the water to boil.
"Yeah."
Brendon takes a breath and Spencer rubs the skin between his eyebrows.
"I'm sorry," Spencer says. "That was. I guess. I didn't mean to make you... so I won't do it again."
"It's not --" Brendon frowns.
"I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," Spencer says. "You don't have to leave." You don't have to tell anyone.
"I'm not uncomfortable, it's just. I can't."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Yeah, sure, I know. I'm sorry."
Brendon's face crumbles. "It's just -- and with another guy. I'd never be able to see her again, and I can't, I can't lose her, not yet."
Spencer nods.
"This is if the first time I've ever felt like I belonged somewhere, like I wasn't just screwing things up all the time. Everything's better since I found the unicorn -- I can't go back to how things were. You feel it, too," Brendon says, "you know things are better now that she's around."
Spencer knows that everything's better when Brendon's around. But. "Yeah," he says. "I know things are better for you. I don't want you to lose that."
"I'm sorry," Brendon says. He twists his fingers together. "It wouldn't just be -- " Sex, Spencer's brain fills in. "It'd be with another boy, and."
Spencer's family didn't go to church all that often, but Brendon's family did. Brendon played organ and sat beside his brothers and sisters and their wives and husbands and listened tot the minister explain right and wrong.
"Yeah," Spencer says. Then, "The kettle's boiling."
*
It's awkward at first. Brendon goes out more and sometimes Spencer comes back at the end of the day to an empty house. It's a disappointment each time, even though Spencer tries to remind himself that he's come home to an empty house more often than not. It wasn't that difficult to get used to the first time around, and it'll be okay this time, too.
There's no sign of Brendon when Spencer walks inside, so he drops off his things and walks back out again, sitting down on the porch steps. He should probably start something for dinner, but he doesn't feel like eating. Brendon might be out looking for somewhere else to live right at this very moment. Maybe one day when he does come back, it'll just be to pick up his stuff.
When Brendon comes into sight, walking along the stone path leading from the backyard to the side porch, he gives a little wave. Sits down beside Spencer.
"How's the unicorn?" Spencer asks.
"She wasn't there," Brendon says. "I haven't seen her since the day before yesterday."
"Maybe she's better now."
Brendon shrugs, frowning at his knees.
"That'd be good, right?"
"I guess," Brendon says. "I mean, yes, obviously. Maybe she's better, but I don't think that means that she would go. I think she likes it here."
"Where were you all day?"
"Checking out some stuff in town. I, uh." Brendon scratches the back of his neck. "This is just an idea, so don't worry if it sounds bad to you. I was just wondering if -- I talked to Patrick, you know, he owns the music store?"
"Yeah."
"I was seeing if he needed any extra hands, but it's an awfully long way for me to go each day."
This is the part where Brendon says that he's moving. Spencer bites the inside of his cheek and braces himself.
"But he has a piano, and he said that I could take as long as I needed to pay him back, so if you thought it was okay, if there was room, maybe I could keep it here, and then I could give lessons? It would be enough to pay for the piano and then I'd be able to give you rent and stuff."
Spencer blinks a few times, runs Brendon's words through his head again.
"So you'd stay here? And give lessons from home?"
"Only if that's all right," Brendon says quickly. "I can figure out something else. It was just an idea."
"No," Spencer says. "Of course, yeah. That'd be. Yeah. That sounds like a really good idea."
"Really?" Brendon asks. He looks over at Spencer, his face upturned, eyes wide with excitement.
"Really," Spencer says, trying to keep his relief from showing. It's almost like what he hopes for. Close enough, anyway. He asks, "Have you eaten? I'll put something on."
"Okay," Brendon says. "I'm just going to go check on her one more time. I found buttercups." Brendon lifts the cloth covering his satchel so that Spencer can see it's full of flowers.
Spencer is just starting to set the table when Brendon walks back inside, whistling to himself.
He grins at Spencer and takes the plates from him.
"She was there?" Spencer guesses.
"Yeah," Brendon says, beaming. He looks giddy with relief. "I think she liked the flowers."
"That's great," Spencer says. "Food's ready."
"We should go eat strawberries after dinner," Brendon says. "I think it'll still be light out."
"Where did you find strawberries?" Spencer asks.
"By where you planted the zucchinis."
"I didn't plant any zucchinis," Spencer says.
"Oh. You planted the lettuce, right?"
"Yeah."
"They're pretty close to the lettuce."
Spencer shakes his head and puts dinner on the table.
--
They clear the main room together, moving the armchair into Brendon's bedroom and putting the side table onto the porch. It's cramped, but the piano fits.
And then there's a little piano set up in Spencer's living room and a steady stream of small children coming and going between four and seven -- later, usually, because Brendon always gives the kids extra time. He comes into the kitchen and looks surprised each time Spencer lifts the towel off the plate that's been warming on the stove and carries it over to the table for Brendon.
Spencer sits down with him and helps finish the crusty part of Brendon's bread.
"Sounded a little rough today," Spencer says.
Brendon groans, rubbing at his forehead. "I don't know what's the point in taking lessons if you're never going to practice."
Spencer makes a face and nods. He picks up Brendon's dishes and carries them over to the sink. Brendon's still sitting at the table when Spencer turns back around. His arm is draped across the back of the chair and he's watching Spencer put the dishes away.
Spencer stays where he is, like maybe it's safer to stare if there's the distance between them.
"I haven't seen the unicorn in days," Brendon says, breaking the long stretch of silence.
"She was here all last week," Spencer says. "She'll probably be back soon. You said that sometimes she's not there --"
"Sometimes," Brendon says. "Never for this long."
"Maybe that just means she's doing really well," Spencer says.
Brendon shrugs. "Maybe," he says. He takes a long, slow breath and then says, "Maybe I can't see her anymore."
"Why wouldn't you be able to see her?" Spencer asks, his heart thudding loudly in his throat. "Is there --" Someone else? "Did you --"
"Did I what?"
"Did you do something? Have you been. Seeing someone?"
"Seeing someone. No, Spence, I haven't been seeing someone."
"Okay," Spencer says, trying to ignore the hot rush of relief. Trying to ignore the look of quiet fury on Brendon's face. "So, then -- "
"It's your fault," Brendon says.
"What?" Spencer asks. "We've never."
"You make me think about it," Brendon snarls.
"That wouldn't be... that's not enough, Brendon."
"You don't know that," Brendon says, his face twisting in anger. "You don't know that. How would you know? You've never been able to see her."
"Okay," Spencer says. "Okay, okay, I know. I'm sorry."
Brendon stands up, knocking his hand against the table. The chair almost falls over, but Brendon catches it before pushing it away.
Spencer takes a step closer, but stops at the look that Brendon gives him.
"This is your fault," Brendon says. "I'm never going to see her again."
Spencer shakes his head. He opens his mouth, but stays quiet when Brendon starts walking forward, closing the distance between them until he's standing right in front of Spencer, and then he wraps his fingers around the back of Spencer's neck, pulling him down. Brendon rocks up on his toes and kisses Spencer hard, their mouths crashing together. Spencer's nose digs into Brendon's cheek and it hurts. Spencer's heart drums painfully in his chest.
He lifts his hand and cups Brendon's cheek, touching him gently, moving away slowly until their faces are inches apart. He looks at Brendon and then closes his eyes, bending forward and kissing Brendon softly, brushing their lips together again and again until Brendon gasps, his breath catching harshly.
Spencer cups his hand around Brendon's neck, touches their foreheads together and breathes slowly. He lifts his head and kisses Brendon's cheeks, his chin, his mouth.
"It's not enough just to think about it," Spencer says softly. "Maybe she got better and left, but it's not that you can't see her anymore." He kisses Brendon again and then lets his hands drop away. "Nothing happened."
Brendon stares at Spencer, and then slowly his face crumbles. There's this awful pause before he starts wiping furiously at his eyes.
"I know," he says. "I know, but I think she could tell."
"She could tell what?"
Brendon rubs at his eye with the back of his thumb and lets his hand fall away. "That it was just a matter of time." He blinks quickly and then looks up at Spencer.
"Before what?" Spencer asks, his voice catching in the back of his throat.
"Being around her makes me feel like everything's going to be okay. Like I'm exactly where I need to be."
"I know--" Spencer starts.
"But I'd still choose you," Brendon says. "It was just a matter of time before I gave it up for you."
"Brendon. You don't have to."
"I want to," Brendon says. "All the time, I want to. I hate you a little bit for it, but I can't help it."
"You don't have to choose," Spencer says. "We can keep things like they've been, you don't have to make a choice."
"It's not a choice," Brendon says, giving Spencer a tiny smile. "It's just you."
Spencer swallows, blinking hard. "I love you," he says.
"See. It's not a choice." Brendon wipes his eyes again before looking up at Spencer.
Spencer can feel his eyes prickling and he swallows hard.
"Hey, stop it," Brendon says, sliding his fingers through Spencer's hair and wrapping his other arm around Spencer's shoulders so that their bodies press close together. "This is supposed to be the fun part."
It takes them a long time to work their way to the bedroom, and when they finally make it to the bed and Spencer pulls Brendon down on top of him, bare skin everywhere, he has to hide his face in Brendon's neck.
"I didn't know it would feel like this," Brendon says, tightening his fingers on the back of Spencer's head and holding him closer. He keeps touching, sliding his hands, his mouth over Spencer's skin.
Spencer cups the back of Brendon's thigh and rolls their hips together. He lifts his other leg, tucks his heel in the back of Brendon's knee and presses his thigh to Brendon's hip.
When he can feel Brendon starting to shake, Spencer asks, "Are you sure you want to do this?" trying to stop himself from grinding up.
"Yes," Brendon says, gasping sharply. He presses his mouth to Spencer's collarbone. He gasps again, and then Spencer can feel the press of Brendon's teeth.
"Brendon," Spencer whispers, his hips jerking up helplessly.
He reaches his hand between their bodies and Brendon whimpers. "I'm sure," Brendon mumbles. "I'm sure, please don't stop."
--
"Spencer," Brendon whispers.
Spencer cracks his eyes open. His head is tucked into the crook of Brendon's shoulders and his arm is wrapped lightly around Brendon's waist. The sun has risen and is streaming across the bed through the cracks between the curtains.
"Yeah?"
"Do you hear that?" Brendon asks.
Spencer can hear the soft sound of Brendon exhaling. It's hard to focus on anything other than how stupidly happy he feels to be waking up beside Brendon, but as his brain starts to wake up he can hear birds chirping outside. And then. That sound, like tall grass moving in the wind and water trickling over smooth stones and the chiming of bells.
"Oh," Spencer says. The sound is still as strange and beautiful and unnerving as the first time he heard it, only now Brendon's warm in bed beside him and Spencer's chest doesn't feel so empty.
Brendon pulls back the covers and jumps out of bed, pauses only to grab for Spencer, saying, "Come on, come on."
He rushes them out of the house, and Spencer has just enough time to grab the blankets off the bed, passing one to Brendon and using the other to cover himself.
The light fills the backyard, growing brighter as they walk further and further back. Spencer slows, wants to hang back but Brendon keeps pushing him forward, through the trees to the place where the light is brightest. Spencer tries to look away, but the light is everywhere, until finally Brendon leads them around to the other side of the huge oak tree and the light takes form.
"Oh," Spencer says as he and Brendon come to a stop.
"You came back," Brendon says.
The unicorn turns her head, looking right at Brendon. She doesn't make any sound, but something in the way she looks at him makes Brendon smile and nod.
There are flowers everywhere: sweet peas that have grown up the side of the tree, twisting around the trunk. The lilies Brendon picked at the river are spread out around the base of the tree, still fresh and alive after countless days. And daisies and buttercups and marigolds and flowers that Spencer has never seen before.
Brendon and the unicorn stare at each other for a long moment before Brendon turns his head, reaching for Spencer's hand and pulling him closer.
The unicorn turns toward Spencer, watching him with clear blue eyes. Spencer's breath catches and there's this ache, a tightness across his rib cage, like there's not enough room for all this brightness. It's not as frightening this time.
"Look what I brought you today," Brendon says, his fingers tightening in Spencer's.
"Hi," Spencer says.