Leo worried about many things, under his guise of ease and carelessness. He’d learned from his father that life was a game, and one that Duartes played to win at all costs. He wanted to be liked, he wanted to be worshiped, wanted to live so large and so extravagantly that he seemed hardly human.
But he didn’t worry about other people thinking he was an asshole. He didn’t worry about being nice. He knows he’s selfish. He knows he’s shallow. That was part of the game: he got what he wanted from people, because he didn’t want impossible things. The things that he wanted were simple—companionship, usually, the feeling of people next to him or around him or underneath him, so he didn’t have to be alone—and they were easy enough to get, because if he couldn’t get what he wanted from someone, there was always someone else.
Or, at least, that’s how it used to be. Now, he’s still sure that he’s selfish, still sure that he’s shallow, but he’s less sure about what it is that he wants, and less sure that he knows how to get it.
He listens to Louis, one eyebrow slowly ticking upwards, ignoring the way that he feels, almost—smug. If you ignore the fact that, apparently, this girl has no game, when Leo obviously does—Leo was once just like her, thinking that Louis was someone who could be cracked open easily, that he was convenient. But Leo had learned otherwise: he’d been patient in a way that a gambler is, calculating the odds and playing his cards right. And now he knows better, and he knows Louis, when this girl probably won’t get the chance to learn.
“Look,” he says, throwing himself into another chair and stretching his legs out, propping his feet up on the arm of Louis’ chair, since it seems like the only way he can get to him without coming on too fast and too strong, when someone else had already done that tonight. “This girl, she wanted to get laid, and she was too fucking oblivious to notice you weren’t into it before being a pushy asshole and completely embarrassing herself. That says a lot about her, and not a lot about you—she’s kinda pathetic, and you’re fine.”
Louis watched and listened to Leo keenly, genuinely interested in his opinion. Their situation was a different one, Leo had managed to achieve what Kelly hadn’t and in some ways that made his insight more helpful. Even now, Louis didn’t really understand what Leo saw in him that made him want to pursue Louis but unlike the advances he’s experienced tonight, Leo’s had been welcomed. He knew Louis better now, knew more about Louis than most of the people on their team and in situations like this that was something that mattered.
“So...Even if I had accidentally made her think I was interested it wouldn’t have mattered anyway?” Louis asked uncertainly. “Because she would’ve like...tried it anyway? That’s a really dumb thing to do.” And it didn’t make sense to Louis either.
He tried to put himself in her shoes, tried to imagine what kind of confidence someone had to have to just come on to somebody without any indication that the other person was interested. Was it confidence? Or was it delusion? Louis didn’t know, he didn’t understand it, it made him uncomfortable to think that people were just like that. Louis liked girls just as much as he liked guys, girls were great, he loved girls, but that didn’t mean he wanted all of them and definitely not that one.
Louis sighed deeply and reached towards Leo, toying with a straying thread on his pants to distract himself. If he was telling this to Betsy, which he probably would over the next couple of days, she would probably tell him not to over-think it and that he didn’t have to beat himself up over someone else’s actions. Some habits were harder to break than others.
“Maybe you should talk to her, give her a class on how to get in somebody’s pants without being a creep about it,” he joked, trying to cheer himself up, a small smirk crossing his face.
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