At first, Tahir’s eyes were drawn to the man’s pat down on himself, picking up on the slight implication, but nothing thinking anything of it. With a double blink in his wide eyes, he asked, “Parle un peu français, oui?” What were the chances of bumping into someone who spoke his first language? He smiled to show there was no ill will on his part. “I truly am sorry again for running into you like zat.” He assured the stranger graciously, “Yes, yes.” No fuss, as Tahir’s attitude normally tended to lean. He returned the polite concern. “Are you okay? I hope I didn’t startle you.”
“Un peau.” He was being modest, but what did it matter to be truthful to a man he’d never see again in his life? “No, no, you’re all good. Take it easy, mate,” Elian gave Tahir a clap to the upper arm, a physical gesture to try and redeem his earlier almost not-so-innocent touch. As he began stepping backward and out of Tahir’s way, he rambled on without any clear incentive, “And uh, go get that meal.” He chuckled. “No more running into strangers.”
After a visit to the office belonging to his long-standing best friend, a Mr. Victor Edwards Jr. to be exact, Tahir made swift haste out of the Ministry’s main level with objective to grab a quick bite. Having missed lunch and all, he was getting to be quite hungry - an inevitable occurrence when you put off this part of the day’s routine, just so you can pay a quick chat to your mate on the way from a work errand. Not even realizing the speed and focus in his pace, Tahir clumsily bumped into a passerby. “Oof!” It startled him, stopping him in his tracks. After a second or two of realization, he followed through with a sincere apology dosed in his obvious, wholesome French accent, “Excuse me. My apologies.” His eyes focused now on the person he’d bumped into, he joked. “Miss a meal and a man completely throws out his manners.”
Speed walking through crowds was an old habit of Elian’s. There was a rush in calculating his course the very second before he laid his next step and after 31 years, he’d gotten quite good at weaving effortlessly by. It came as a surprise to run directly into someone on this particular day, namely someone so disoriented by the entire ordeal. Force of habit twitched Elian’s hand toward where the other man might have kept valuables, namely a wallet, as the bump served as the perfect guise- but Elian pedaled his feet back just in time to stop himself.
Smoothing himself out and registering every piece of information around him quickly, he pulled a smile to his lips and chuckled, “Ah, aucun souci.” His French wasn’t perfect, but it was close. He could have moved on, by all means he should have moved on right after his words, but he let the rest of the world keep spinning around him as he bothered to extend a cautious but hopeful, “Are you okay?”
Dex had been the one to leave the backyard gate open. He argued senselessly with Sven about it because that was who he’d become in the weeks following his once fiancé’s passing, but the emotional burden that led to the mishap didn’t change the fact that it was all him. Still, he stuck to his guns because if he didn’t have this and he didn’t have the ability to be a strong father for his daughter at a trying time like this, then what did he have?
His hand was tight and unnaturally damp in Sven’s as he stalled for time, sitting right there in front of the daughter he made every last one of his choices for. “Ly, there’s no easy way to tell you this…” Dex cleared his throat and glanced at Sven once more for a support he knew would be there before he even looked. “But while you were at school…”
Sven spared his husband after the second throat closing pause, “Honey, Koda got out this afternoon.” He gave his daughter a moment to process the information before adding, “We’re lucky though, your dad got him microchipped when he was a puppy and we’ve already called the company so they’ll be able to track him down in no time.”
It wasn’t either dad before her that Sven was referring to and the realization made a five year old Lyla’s expression twist messily. “Koda’s my best friend,” she winced, looking between her only parents for answers as to how this was fair on top of everything else. “I need him. I…”
Dex began to stand, seeing the countdown timer on his child’s temperament plummet. He felt untethered the moment he let go of Sven’s hand, but he had to go to his daughter anyway- he had to. But Lyla felt crowded by his approach and the second he moved too close she let out a shriek turned to a sob.
“We’ll find him, Ly, don’t worry. He’ll be alright-“
“It was your job to protect him!” Lyla blindly aimed her words straight for her father’s chest in the same beat she aimed her fists. Dex’s attempts to gather her into his arms were successful but only by force.
“Lyla-“
“No!” The howl ripped from her small body as she felt the last connection to her blood slip away. “You said we were a family, you promised! You were supposed to protect him!”
Each muscle in Dex’s heart felt inflamed from the sharp accusations and in a moment of weakness he paid the price for loosening his grip. As one of Lyla’s deeply distraught fists came waywardly crashing into his nose, Dex hissed and released her immediately, falling out of his crouch and onto the floor behind him.
He registered his husband moving into their space then but he couldn’t hear a word from either of them, his ears abruptly ringing from either the tension or the blow. He couldn’t tell which it was as he scooted himself back until he could lean back against the sofa. The heat that had been pooled in his stomach from the moment he realized their dog was gone, had now traveled up his chest, drowned his throat and made its way to his eyes, harshening his breath and drawing his palms to his hair.
Feeling a small trickle run under his nose, Dex surrendered the situation as yet another that Sven could bring a solution to where he could not. If he couldn’t be the father that Lyla needed at that very moment and he had also left the gate open, then who was he? And what did he have?
“D-D-Dex!” After a couple seconds, taking a little too long to realize than he cared to admit, Phineas pulled out his hand from Dex’s hold in a jitter. “Wh-What a-are you d-doing??” He was about to give the man a heart attack. Those obviously weren’t his attentions, by all means, but it still didn’t help from making him blush with heavy embarrassment. “Y-Y-You know that’s not- I-” His stuttering worsening after all the progress he thought he’d been doing. He clenched his hand to pinch his nose in reflection. “S-Seriously. Y-You’re going to let the soul l-leave my body one of these days.”
“I-I love you too. A-And I really meant what I said. You two a-are like my real life Cady and Aaron. J-Just be kind to my sanity… I need to m-make it to your wedding day. That’s preferable.” His heart had finally settled down into its steady heartbeat, just as he noticed the offer to say a speech at Dex’s wedding. He was one of Phineas’ best friends - so the chance given to do that would always be an honor. “I-If you really mean, you know I-I would do it! … Not the s-superior couple part though. Y-You two are talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing- but no.”
“I’ll catch your soul if it tries to fly, Phinie, don’t worry,” Dex winked at his friend, grinning ear to ear from how flustered the other man had become. He loved teasing the younger mercilessly, though he always seemed to know just where to draw the line with it all.
“That is truly the sweetest thing you have ever said to me Phin. I’m honored for the reference, this is high praise.” Dex laughed heartily when Phineas refused to blatantly insult others to talk him up at his wedding and gave the man a squeeze to the shoulder. “I do mean it, you’re more than welcome to give a speech at my wedding. You’d be one of my groomsmen when we finally start planning the damn thing anyway so...” He stated for the first time entirely nonchalantly.
“Shhh!” Phineas wasn’t at all bigger or stronger than Dex, but he grabbed the man’s hand that cupped his mouth and pulled down on it anyway. “Q-Quit it. Y-You gotta be the bigger man, Dex.”
“A-Also, that’s a lie.” Phineas threw a soft grin to ease his best friend. “Y-You and Adam are of e-equal quality. You two a-are perfect for each other. A-And so are Christian and Jae.”
“Ooh, Phinie, this is risque, you wanna do this right here?” Dex grinned as Phineas tugged his hand down, turning his own palm to hold the other man’s hand as he teased relentlessly. “Phin, my fiancé, is right there, Phin. For shame, Phin. Oh alright, Phinie, if you insist,” he grinned, leaning in towards the younger with a tilt of his head, but pulling back eventually to enunciate on his merciless jokes.
“Aw, Phin. That’s so sweet of you, stop it. Don’t make me actually cry at this wedding, I’m not so much of a cliché. I love you though. That was beautiful. Give this exact speech again at my wedding, okay? I’m sure Adam will appreciate it, especially if you throw in a little bit about how we’re clearly the superior couple on that list.”
Somehow, Sven was under the impression that as he got older, Christmas mornings would grow quieter. But at this point in his life, an energetic husband, who always riled up his usually mild-mannered son, paired with his chipper daughter-in-law, were now replaced by Dexter D’Angelo. And tame moments with Dex were arbitrary at best.
Now, Sven’s morning started with the sound of his partner singing Stand By Me loudly in the shower. He padded through the house that once belonged to Dex, but now properly, legally, to them both, almost as though he didn’t have a choice but to interrupt the private concert.
“Shut up.” Sven’s chuckle was a rumble as he stepped into the shower, pressing his lips to Dex’s wet shoulder, knowing full well that his partner would simply take his words as an invitation to crowd him against the shower wall and serenade him directly between kisses.
Sven could never help his smiles when he was assaulted with the full force of Dex’s affection in such a way. They were grins and warm touches and bursting fondness and Sven felt more and more grateful for the things that led his life to this every day.
Eventually, they made their way downstairs, though not quite ready for social venturing just yet. At their age, there was a bliss in seeing their grandchildren open presents with reckless abandon, gathered altogether in Lyla and Nils’s house along with the rest of their band of friends. They’d been celebrating together as a family for so long that they had their elaborate secret Santa drawings down to a science. So long that at this point in their friendships, even Bristol and Linus would’ve been invited, had they not already planned a trip to Prague with Hunter for Christmas that year.
But before they joined the noise of grandchildren and a little too much spiked eggnog, Dex and Sven always sat huddled together around their own small, modest tree. They loved to give to one another in more than one way and loved, even more, to steal away moments for their own.
It wasn’t so much about getting each other fancy presents suiting the other’s tastes as it had been with their previous significant others. One year, Dex had wrapped Sven’s favorite coffee mug, which the older hadn’t been able to use in nearly a month thanks to it consistently being dirty from the only other occupant of the house. Needless to say, when it came to them, it was more about those grins and warm touches and bursting fondness than anything else.
This year, Sven picked up the first thing from under the tree that wasn’t a product of his own perfect, detail-oriented wrapping, and of course, there was a card with it. One with Dex’s lovely handwriting covering both halves of the inside and the entire back. Sven wasn’t sure how the younger managed to find new words to express his admiration year after year for several holidays in between and sometimes without the excuse of one, but he never grew tired of it. In fact, he was more and more excited to know how much Dex loved him each time. At first, Sven held the card open in front of his face, brows furrowed in concentration for a few seconds before his face dispelled into childish giggles.
It prompted a look of confusion out of Dex, who was sure his deeply genuine words left little to no room for laughs. But then realization struck him and he deadpanned, “You don’t have your glasses, do you?”
Sven’s chuckles spilled into laughter and unable to make a single word out on the card at his age no matter the distance he held it from his face, he admitted, “I don’t, no.”
Dex rolled his eyes as he chucked a bit of balled up wrapping paper towards his one and only, who barely ducked out of its way. “Listen, I am absolutely sure everything this says is beautiful and will have my whole heart when I make it back upstairs,” Sven beamed as he leaned forward for a kiss, one the younger would never deny. Dex’s smiled upon Sven’s lips and even reached a hand to grip Sven’s collar loosely.
It wasn’t relevant to the conversation at hand, but still, he mumbled between them an amused, “I love you.” Because he did. He was grateful for these moments of quiet and calm between them because they brought him a kind of peace that couldn’t be replicated by a hundred other loved ones.
Especially not when Sven showed signs of clearly spending too much time by his side with his humor, “What, you’re not going to tell me that all you want for Christmas is me?”
“I'll fall for you every single time. No matter what happens, I'll find my way back to you. I swear what I feel for you is real and I will love you whether it's right or wrong, you're the one who has my soul."
[ For the celestially bonded, who go against all odds to be together time and time again, whether they’re given a second chance to do things right earlier in life, spy partners, kings of different lands, a human and android, neurally linked jaeger pilots, a former businessman and a current one, a doctor and a surgeon, two boys who grow into men together, a mobster and a trust fund brat with poor timing, two jaded old men that have only made mistakes, young and capable of accessing visions of all these worlds-
Or just two wizards, living parallel to one another until they realize they’re each other’s one and only, now and forevermore. ]
Evie can’t help but laugh at Dex’s suggestions, genuine youthful joy coming over her teenage face. “I don’t think we should turn his hair green!” She says through a laugh, “It’s his wedding, for Merlin’s sake. Wouldn’t want to ruin all of the fancy photographs.” She ponders, “But charming a dance team of champagne flutes, that’s almost a bit lovely. I think he might even so much as appreciate us, thank us. We’d be doing him a favor, so it’s alright.”
“I bet you he wouldn’t even care,” Dex rolled his eyes, only a little envious of the other man’s ability to simply roll with the punches. “We gotta go bigger.” He grinned when Evie agreed with his coordinated attempt at a prank. “I might need some help if we’re gonna get that whole tower on his tail,” he nudged his own glass in the direction of the impressive champagne tower stacked up by the food tables. “And then we have to be ready to take pictures, of course. Gotta take credit and pride for our handiwork.”
“Dex……………………….. p-please don’t.” Phineas shook his head childishly. “We’re having such a l-lovely time.”
“Phin, he spent at least a month after I proposed to Adam telling me how appalled he was that Adam hadn’t realized yet he was marrying down. And I could say the same for him!” Cupping a hand around his mouth, he shouted over Phineas’s shoulder at no one in particular, “Run while you still can, Jae!”
Dex turned his attention back to Phineas with a grin, “So lets at least dump some salt in his champagne or something.”
“Well I don’t get to use my wand often in the city with Ian, nor do I get to use it anywhere I do my studying. I simply think if you’re going to encourage a bit of mischief tonight, I might as well bring the old gal out for a night on the town, Dexter.”
Dex grinned even further hearing her say his name so matter of factly. “Well, I was thinking of letting a wild animal loose to cause some havoc but if you’re talking about turning the guy’s hair green for the night or charming a train of champagne flutes to follow him around wherever he goes, I’m game.”
“Professor,” She starts, despite no longer being his student, “I’m sorry, come again?” She shakes her head, soft laugh. “Don’t you think a badger is a bit, well, juvenile?” She smirks, speaking lower, “I think we ought to be a little more creative than that.”
The title always made him smile. No matter what the smile from that was different his other smiles. “Oh, I’m sorry, what mature method of mayhem do you have in mind?”
“You wouldn’t happen to be up for an attempt at a daring heist at sneaking a badger through the entrance of this place, would you?” Dex swirled the single malt scotch in his glass around a time or two. “What with the hell Chris gave me when I got engaged, he deserves to have a little chaos on his special day.”
Even if Dex had not followed his ‘I didn’t’ with a motivation speech, Evie would have been satisfied in the sheer honesty of it, though she knew him enough to know he’d have more to say. Her lips pursed into a smile when he said it, face softening as he continued, and the more he spoke the more she realized how much of her life had passed by. She wasn’t old, and she was content with all of the decisions she’s made so far, but having this conversation now with her old professor–and her friend–suddenly gave her a small rush for when she was in Hogwarts. The feeling startled her, and she blinked, not having much to say in response to his advice but being touched by it. “Well, we both know you have favorites.” She teased instead at the end, two fingers slowly flicking in the air as she waved her hand, “So if this is my chance to sneak Maverick into your biases before he arrives, I accept.” she smirked.
The mention of her childhood love made Evie’s eyes widen, unable to control the honest shock considering she had not thought about him in quite a while. She did, from time to time, wonder if he was alive and well and if he was still in love with her. Not because she was in love with him, but because it was nice to be glorified. “What’s-his-face?” she teased after composing herself, “Dare I ask you to be more specific, Dexter. I dated quite a few people in that time.” she smirked, her coffee cup coming to meet her lips leaving only her bright eyes peeking over at him. She wasn’t really asking him to be specific, but it’s a gamble she took for the punchline. Also, it’s just occurred to me that her grandmother could very well be dead, yikes.
Evie smiled when Dex threatened Lyla’s fiancé, lightly rolling her eyes and shaking her head. “I know you’ve probably raised Lyla well enough for her to do that on her own.” While she didn’t love the idea of Dex fighting a potential ex of Lyla’s, she understood it, and she knew the men in her life would feel inclined to say the same when it came to her. She scoffed at his next joke, smile in place, “Oh, don’t be depressing.”
She noticed he seemed nervous, not outright, but she tilted her head slightly when she picked up on the light laughter and lip licking. She didn’t understand what he was saying at the end, why he made a point to mention how they always speak about family. She thought, family had never been that important to her, it was hard when your family only consisted of two people to put that much weight on it as a concept. Family had surprised her much later, coming out of her shell and forming bonds at Hogwarts was one thing, but the turns her life took after leaving was what bound her to the most important people in her life. She didn’t speak, just knit her brows trying to follow his thought process, waiting to see what he planned to say.
Dex couldn’t help the smile that unexpectedly bloomed on his lips when Evie pointed out his propensity for having favorites. “I don’t think he’ll get a better deal than being Art’s favorite, but I’ll take a spot on that ranking wherever.”
He burst into a full on laugh as he was asked to clarify on Evie’s extensive dating history. “Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot you were such a charmer at 14,” he mocked. You take after me, he wanted to say, you’re just as much me inside as you are her outside.
Dex took a deep breath when it was clear he couldn’t hold off any longer. He ran a finger around the rim of his mug once before looking up at her. “There’s no easy way to broach any of this and you need to know before I even begin that you’ll have to forgive me. For a lot of things. I’ve missed one opportunity after the other since before you were born, when you were born, when you went to school. Things have constantly slipped through my fingers and I’ve just let them, somewhere along the line I decided it was easier to mourn a road not taken than to launch myself blindly into the unknown. But not anymore.”
He knew he wasn’t making any sense just yet and ran a hand over his mouth before continuing. “Evie, your grandmother never wanted me to have this conversation with you but I think I may have let the most valuable door in my life close recently and with this one is still in my control to leave open, I have to.
There’s never been a reason for you to know that it wasn’t arbitrary we became friends, that we were so close when you were in school. That I recognized you the second I saw you because you’re a spitting image of your mother. I hadn’t seen her since she-” Dex swallowed, feeling his throat dry painfully. “Since I was 19 but I could still see her in front of my eyes in you.”
“I understand why she didn’t want you to know or why your grandmother didn’t want you to know but that hasn’t made it easier all these years, being the secret that Suddon preferred to take to the grave with her.” He stopped, wondering when was the last time he’d said her name out loud. His eyes glistened against Evie’s but he pulled himself together. He had barely gleaned the surface of what he wanted to say, he couldn’t come unglued so soon.
Dex wondered for a moment if he should’ve asked her to meet him somewhere more private. If this wasn’t a conversation they could handle surrounded by people. “I loved her dearly and I know in her own way she loved me too. Still, she chose you and Julian and your father over me and I learned to respect that the older I got. But it never changed the truth of the matter, kid. You grew up with him because that’s the path that was picked for you but part of you has always been me.”
