Emre’s facts: Yanks had their own version of fake-smiles, usually meant to mask pain. The English masked absolute rage with their sunny smirks. Emre was no stranger to employing the pissed smile. And usually, seeing Mik’s chipper toothy grin would please Emre, a vicious pleasure of making someone so pissed, he had to amp the saccharine…usually right before a punch landed.
Mik wouldn’t punch him. Mik might punch him. And Emre would like it too much to put a stop to it. Fucking hell, he couldn’t let it escalate to that, but he’d already cocked up by chatting blithely about Nick.
So Emre tried to recalibrate through - who else? - an Iyaz filter. If some prick started in with the chummy chat about Iyaz…of course Emre would want to throttle them. What was Emre thinking, bring up Nick? Amateur move, unpracticed at this whole…making amends bollocks.
Because that was what he was trying to do, right? After all this bloody time, here was some unnatural, useless attempt to make amends. He’d warned Mik and Nick. He’d told them there was no possible scenario, no way that Emre could ever ever make amends with the pair of them. And they hated him for that truth as much as they hated him for his crimes, it seemed. Fair enough. Fuck him, fuck them too.
Except…not. Bloody Nick. Bloody Vin, changing the game. Leaving Emre out here in the open, to weather Mik’s pretty, enraged smile.
Emre opted to play it straight. No games, if Emre could help it. He felt clumsy and new, but he kept his expression bland and mild. “No, no not missing. North Beach Nick just opted for a lot of alone time is all. You coming here, it’s made him more, erm, social. Not with me.” Definitely with him. They hadn’t converged on North Beach as they had on South Beach, that was certain. Even if it was all arguments and fighting.
Mik’s patronizing was like a gust of hot flames on the side of Emre’s face, and he just sat there and bloody took it. “And he was proper club-kid,” Emre confirmed rather than snarking. This was so fucking new. “Did you get, erm, re-aged too?”
The forge was looking good, from what Emre could tell. He mostly left Tomas to chat with the lads about it, giving Mik wide berth and not bothering Kaz if either were at the forge. Kaz making knives, because of course. And Mik here, handing Emre a ripe opportunity to shank him. He wanted to. All his old, rotted, toxic instincts told him to shove fucking Jacob aside, break Mik’s nose on his knuckles, and then maybe drown Jacob just to make Mik witness it. Slurs danced through Emre’s mind, insults he could scream at Mik as he bashed teeth out of that flawless smile.
Why. Why not. Why, though. The waswasah in his head was gone. Emre had sense and control now. Tamyra knew, so did Maz. And it was okay. He didn’t need to act like the wild animal everyone wanted - needed - him to be. He wasn’t in London, there were no mates watching his every move, hungry for a slip. And Iyaz was gone. No one to protect, no one to reconcile.
Emre met Mik’s sparkling eyes with his own opaque ones. “We’re close,” he said, his mouth so dry Emre could taste salt. He added, injecting as much irreverent drollness into his tone as he could (but there was still a slight shake that Emre hoped Mik wouldn’t pick up on). “Kaz’d likely say different though. You know what bruv’s like.”
Mik expected Emre to needle him some more about Nick, because that was the sort of games he'd come to expect from Emre. Poke and prod until Mik's pissed-off smile ticked over into a scuffle, and then look so pleased about it that it made Mik sick to the stomach. Funnily enough, Emre backed off, or at least sounded like he was backing off. Twisting his comment about North Beach Nick into a compliment of Mik's skill in drawing people out of their shell. Mik's eyes rapidly scanned back and forth, taking in Emre's face as he searched for duplicity, the bite to those pearly white teeth of his. There was nothing there, except mild discomfort, a tinge of sheepishness to the purposefully bland look to his face. Had Mik misread Emre? It wouldn't be the first time, it felt like there wasn't a way to correctly read Emre. "Well, what can I say," Mik said, a humble-brag to even off that conversation. "I bring out the best in people.”
Mik nodded as Emre described Vin as a proper club kid, because they had been. And it had been so glorious, but Mik had been such a shit bag. "Was he now?" Mik asked, still enjoying twisting his words at Emre. "We should have had a party," Mik commented dryly, though not cruelly. "I don't think anyone was able to escape the age-nonsense, do you?" Mik said when Emre asked. "I can't believe I got to have my twenty year old body again without a proper mirror to appreciate it," Mik complained, with a friendly half-chuckle. "I was fit-fit, yeah? High metabolism, practically lived at the gym..." Well, he worked there, and then hung out there after work, so it was nearly true. "What about you? You get to be oldman Emre?" Mik asked.
He'd gained some ideas for the forge from his time aging up, snippets of thoughts he could remember from a distant future. It was a a bit of a prick move to poke Emre at the bullseye that was he and Kaz. Mik's stomach twisted for a moment after he said it. He could see Emre's breath come faster, shorter in his chest. Mik held his ground, staring Emre down as he retested that Jacob's grip was iron strong around his arm. Mik waited for Emre to launch himself, to sneer some horrible thing that would only seal Mik's opinion of him, but it didn't come. Emre cooled visibly in front of him. When he spoke it was careful and measured, carefree with that unmistakable waver of vulnerability that Mik was intimately familiar with. Thoughts raced through Mik's head like a rogue bouncy ball:
Is Emre actually gay? Bi, queer, questioning, whatever.
(You know, it is so cliché of the loud homophobe to be secretly queer... Fuck though, but maybe there is something to it though. Like lesbians U-hauling in a week-)
Wait, did I sort of force Emre to out himself? Does that make me the bad guy?
No, I can't be the bad guy. Emre's the bad guy, he's the big bad villain, he said so, that's how much of a villain he is. All he needs is the catchy and queer Disney song. You know, why do I even care, Emre is a fucking asshole-
-But he's just. Come. Out. To. Me.
Like, what do you even say when the guy you most hate in the world comes out to you? What if I fuck this up and he doubles down on the old homophobia and becomes more of a fucking prick?
"Oh so you are... close..." Mik finally repeated, feeling that that was definitely the wrong thing to say. "Not that it was like... obvious or anything," Mik said, hoping that would reassure Emre's... tender grasp on homosexuality? Not that being close meant that they were like, full on fucking. No, no thoughts of Kaz and Emre fucking in his head, thank you very much. God he had to tell Nick about this- "Kaz is a good man, yeah? He'd probably have about a dozen quips thought up to destroy me and change the subject," Mik offered, giving Emre a hopeful smile.