Summary: Roman and Remus are both aware that their rooms aren't exactly what people expect from them if anyone visits.
When Patton visits his reaction to mistaking Remus's room for Roman's was something neither of them could have predicted.
Authors Note: I wanted to write something last week and began this with no clue where it was going. Today I finished it and still have no clue where it was going for the entire story. Sorry if it’s bewildering at all. I’m just playing.
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If you live in a room for long enough it becomes a reflection of you in a way people very often won’t understand.
Both Roman and Remus realised this as almost every time a friend came over they’d assume the wrong room was theirs.
Janus visiting was the first time they recognised why it happened. Their remark upon being corrected had been “But you’re so chaotic and have no regard for anything being organised. How on earth can this be your room, Remus?”
Roman was not sticking around to hear the lecture over how organised any important movements were nor how the things Remus hated and rebelled against were conformity and that was never synonymous with organisation. He already had the lecture memorised in case there was ever an instant of a their friends calling while they were out.
“This isn’t quite what I’d expect by a Princes bedroom, Roman. Have you seriously been hiding all the interesting things you love for all this time?” Virgil groused, when he first visited. They’d become friends through a creative writing club and had planned to work on a story together that evening. “Seriously we could have been rocking out together to these bands and you cannot say that you didn’t think I’d like them. Just look at me!”
At least Virgil’s confusion was different to the reactions Roman had gotten before. A few of his friends had gotten very worried over how low some of the snippets left on his desk suggested his self esteem was.
The reaction both brothers were stunned to witness was Patton’s when he first followed Roman home. They’d gotten talking near the end of the work day and it just felt right to invite him over to carry on chatting together and perhaps share some of the creations that he hadn’t shared with the team at work.
Roman had gone to make drinks, giving Patton directions to his room upstairs while he did so when he heard the yell. “Roman your friend isn’t letting me go! What on earth do I do?”
“Let him hug you and then direct him to my room, maybe?” He called back, raising an eyebrow at that reaction. Sure, Patton usually liked to hug everyone in greeting but refusing to let go of Remus was the opposite of how people usually reacted given the unfortunate scent that surrounded him.
“Still not going to free him. This is my new best friend now. He likes kittens!” Patton yelled back before one of his apologetic sounds could be heard, presumably as Remus corrected him to the pronouns for the day.
Once the drinks were finished Roman was finally able to find out what his friend meant. His sibling usually focused on oceanic creatures rather than anything on land so something must have changed.
“I'm drawing catfish, not kittens or cats or anything like that. What's your name anyway?” Remus was explaining, although the picture did currently only have a cats face on it. Patton was hanging off her back, only just letting Roman see the lilac choker that clarified her pronouns.
Entering the room Roman snickered a little, already knowing that from how Patton spoke some of Remus's drawings would probably cause concern. “He's Patton. What's it going to look like when you add the body and colour?”
“It's gonna have mangled limbs of twisted together legs and fins, and a scattered red and yellow mottled pattern mixing fur and scales all over its body. I need to make the eyes bigger though... or smaller, fish have small eyes right?” Remus described already turning to search images of fish so she could decide what size the eyes should be, clearly having decided to ignore Patton hanging onto her.
“Nooo.” Patton whined, reaching clearly with the intent to take the sketch and protect it from Remus's plans. “Pretty kitten.”
Remus still nodded, pushing the drawing out of reach and pulling a folder from beside her desk up. “Yep, it'll be a beautiful kitten, just like these ones.” She insisted, show casing her variety of finished artwork to Patton cheerfully ignoring any upset noises.
Roman was only just close enough to see the pages being turned, but had already seen his sisters art after it was completed enough to know the pages. At the start it would be trips into uncanny valley, all the things Remus saw in robotic attempts to recreate humans or poor game and film CGI designs of people sketched out again as she tried to work out what was so off about them. Then the pages would turn to gore, murder scenes they'd heard described in various books and news broadcasts that she wanted to imagine more vividly. Those ones had Patton almost crying and rushing Remus to move past them without giving any sources or descriptions of her thought process.
After the gore Remus had pages of just normal ocean life as she had wanted to perfect how light works under water before allowing herself more creative attempts. It was her latest project and she'd only moved onto creating her own designs of underwater animals in the last few months.
That was where Roman decided to interrupt again, “So have I lost my friend to you for the evening? I can head back to my room now, if so.”
“Don't be jealous cause I'm more interesting than a Disney fan, Prince Pukey.” Remus immediately countered, raising an eyebrow as she turned. “But you're more than welcome to take your friend back anytime if he'll let go of me.”
“Your friend too, Remus. You are my new kiddo and I need to see everything you've been creating. I love the sharks. They look like puppies, not as terrifying as the movies make them.” Patton tightened his grip, still hugging or clinging to Remus as though she'd run if he let go.
The siblings blink for a moment, Roman stunned that this guy from work essentially has declared Remus as a friend after knowing him an hour and Remus because this guy just walked into her room, seems aghast at any pictures of injuries, war or fighting but has basically just adopted her too. “Where on earth did you find this maniac, Ro, and are there any other I need to prepare to be adopted by?” Remus asks after a moment, folder forgotten in her hands.
“Work. Logan is my main other friend there and they aren't really the adopting type. They will probably criticise any creation scientifically though so I'm trying to avoid inviting him home.” Roman muttered, still taking in what had happened. “Padre, you have literally yelled for hours over anyone suggesting something close to the things Remus has been showing you when we're at work, what...?”
“We make shows for Kids, Roman! That's not an appropriate place for this type of stuff, but there's nothing wrong in Remus exploring such dark subjects as long as she let's people walk away if it gets to be too much.” Patton scolded lightly, grinning as soon as Roman shrugged in response, letting the explanation be left at that.
Patton never did get to see Roman's room on his first visit to their home, but he did make a new friend that he might never have met otherwise.
