notes: spoilers for blue lily, lily blue, takes place after the end of it, so please don't go further if you haven't read it yet, there are a couple of major spoilers in here.
"So," Ronan said on a day that would be unremarkable if they were not at a funeral, "how long have you known?"
The words known what? were on the tip of Adam's tongue, but he caught himself in time because it was impossible, right now, today, any day, to lie to Ronan's face. It had become almost impossible to lie to any of them, the five of them, as twisted and tangled up in each other as they were, but especially Ronan. Especially him. Especially him to Ronan.
Ronan's eyes were flickering like he already knew the answer, anyway.
"You're going to have to specify, Lynch," he said instead, staring straight ahead at the mourners gathered around Jesse Dittley's coffin, his hands folded in front of him, the perfect picture of a distant friend, only here because some relative had asked him. Which was true, in a sense. Blue had asked him, but she wasn't Jesse's relative. But she was Blue. "There's a lot I know, and a lot I don't know."
Ronan made an annoyed grunt in the back of his throat and stalked off through the trees. It was quite a picturesque place for a funeral, Adam noted lazily as his mind warred with itself on whether or not to go after him. Of course, Henrietta itself was a picturesque place if one looked at it like an outsider, which Adam both was and was not. Was, today, at this funeral, awake, and was not, any other day, when he was reminded of who he was and where he came from.
But today, none of that mattered. His gaze flitted to Blue, who was standing quiet and troubled a few feet away, Gansey at her side. She looked terribly tiny against him, and he looked terribly fond as his hand lingered on her arm. Comfort. Understanding. Trust. Blue and Gansey. Gansey and Blue. Blue and –
He went after Ronan.
He was only half-surprised that Ronan wasn't busily peeing in the trees. Instead, he seemed off-kilter, somehow, like someone had taken their usual Ronan, in all his wild, ferocious, dreamlike glory, and twisted him sharply to the side. He was off-beat, the metal of a knife forced out of shape, and it seemed to be annoying him almost as much as it was itching at Adam.
What could pull Ronan Lynch off his chosen drumbeat like that?
Adam had only seen this once before, the way he was today, and that had been when Joseph Kavinsky was alive.
They observed each other for a half a heartbeat, neither able to find anything to say. A million different sentences started their way up Adam's throat and then got lodged in there before they could reach his lips. Ronan stared at him coolly, as if completely knowing of Adam's struggle with words and not caring in the least.
Disinterest. Practiced. Not completed.
Adam broke the swelling silence with the truth. "A while," he said, and it felt more like an admission of guilt than anything else.
Ronan exhaled once, twice, then looked away. It didn't seem like he had anything left to say, but he said anyway, "Great." The words hung dully in the sunset around them. Adam felt something in his stomach somersault, then twist, then explode. The sensations were fleeting, but permanent, all at once and never at all.
Everything he felt about Ronan Lynch was a contradiction in and of itself. He had no idea where to go from here. He knew exactly where he should go from here.
He thought about Blue, thought about Gansey. Thought about Blue again. Looked at Ronan.
Ronan's lip curled. "What do you want?" he demanded, cutting across Adam's thoughts like a sword. Like a battle cry. Like he was wearing armor, carrying a weapon. "You don't have to still be here."
Adam hesitated, ten different lies dancing on his mouth. The sun spilled a beam of vibrant golden-pink straight through the trees, spotlighting the hard set of Ronan's jaw, the twist of his lips, the shadows of his eyes. Adam breathed in, then said, "I wasn't going to say anything," which was not quite what he had intended to come out when he had opened his mouth.
Ronan stepped dangerously closer. Adam felt his stomach jump again, but he didn't step back or let himself tense up. Carelessly, Ronan's gaze swept up and down Adam's ramrod-straight body, lingering in places that Adam wished he wouldn't, like the skin of his collarbone exposed by the one button he hadn't closed, the veins at his wrist where his pulse hummed erratically, and, finally, his eyes, wide and maybe a little terrified. Not so much of Ronan, but of them, alone, together, out under the Henrietta sunset. Of them, and what it meant. Of what Ronan meant.
Of what Ronan meant to him.
"You like girls," Ronan said slowly, tasting the words before rolling them out. Adam imagined they didn't taste good, but Ronan's face indicated no sourness, just simple truth. At least, his truth. Maybe not Adam's truth. "You don't have to pity me, Parrish."
"I don't pity you," said Adam immediately, because the very idea of that was absurd. Ronan Lynch was not a pitiable person. He was mad and terrifying and obnoxious and equal parts stupid and clever, but there was nothing about him to pity. "I just meant – "
"I know what you meant," Ronan interrupted, his voice brutal, his whole being simmering, and this time Adam had to exert a much greater amount of willpower to avoid flinching. Ronan stepped still closer, the tips of his shoes touching Adam's, but there was just enough space between their bodies for the wind to go whistling through. Adam swallowed hard, and he didn't miss Ronan's eyes darting to his neck at the movement. "You like this, don't you?"
Adam paused briefly to think – you are unknowable, but he wasn't, not really, not to Ronan – and then think again about things he really did like or didn't, neither of which seemed of much interest to Ronan, who was surveying him the way a cat would a mouse. Except Adam wasn't a mouse, not any more, not for a long time. So, maybe, it was more like two cats. Or boys. Two boys, a breeze apart, alone, together. Alone.
Ronan continued without any regard for the thoughts jumping around in Adam's brain. "You're enjoying this," and there was a part of his voice, small but not insignificant, that seemed bitter. That seemed hurt. Which was ridiculous, because Adam Parrish did not hold the power to hurt Ronan Lynch.
Unless he did.
"I'm not enjoying – " he began to say, but Ronan didn't let him finish this pointless thought either.
"God, you're still fucking in love with her and she doesn't fucking want you!" Ronan exploded, but not in the loud kind of way, not like Adam's father. More like the anger and the hurt had seeped out of him in the span of a sentence, slipping away on the winds instead of stabbing at Adam. Which was funny, because any other day, those words would have been a dagger to his chest, pointed and calculated and meant to make him bleed.
But Ronan hadn't.
Adam thought of Blue, curled into Gansey. Adam thought of Gansey, his fingers on Blue's skin. He thought of Blue, he thought of Gansey. He thought of both of them, and then neither of them.
Ronan rocketed back on his heels, away, or more away, at least, from Adam, and continued, his voice crackling in flames. "You like being wanted," he shot at him, a sneer caught halfway between his mouth and his eyes but never quite complete. Ronan was never quite complete around him. "And Blue doesn't."
His words settled oddly on Adam's shoulder. And you do, he added in his mind, but refused to say out loud, no matter how much Ronan was taunting him, daring him, his gaze steely and chilled, a battleground murmuring beneath, as he ran it across Adam's body, slipping and sliding until it landed on the goosebumps crawling over his half-bare arms. He'd rolled up his sleeves a while ago, but now he regretted it. It was suddenly very cold, the space between him and Ronan, and Ronan and him, and them.
"You're right," he said carefully, only because it seemed like Ronan was waiting for him to say something, and he watched as Ronan's chest moved with every jumping breath he took. He hadn't said very much, but it felt like he had. "Blue doesn't. I know that."
Ronan rolled his eyes and stalked closer again. The constant shifts in proximity were dizzying, but Adam couldn't figure out how to make him stop. Or how to make himself move. He felt rooted there, anchored to this moment, to this version of Ronan, this boy with a knife in his smile and a look in his eyes that could melt Adam's skin off. He wasn't even sure, at this point, which direction he would move in, if he felt that he could. Not that Ronan seemed to care.
"Parrish," said Ronan, jolting Adam back unceremoniously to the reality of where he was, standing toe-to-toe with Ronan Lynch and not quite knowing how to back down or fight, "do you think I'm going to kiss you?"
There was an amused, deriding lilt to his voice, like the idea was ridiculous, even though not even a few minutes ago, they had been discussing – in circles, yes, but discussing nonetheless – Ronan's feelings for him. Adam felt something inside him burn at the idea that Ronan didn't want to kiss him, that everything spoken before had been meaningless, and it took him a moment to realize the burning was creeping up his neck. Ronan seemed even more amused at this, at watching Adam battle the burning valiantly, with no success.
"No," he said fiercely, then added, a cheap shot straight for the jugular, "do you want to?"
The shot worked. Ronan froze, then swerved back when he regained motion, much more away from Adam than he had been the last time he stepped back, his whole face clouded over. Adam felt guilty, and pleased, and horrified at himself all at once. Feelings aside, Ronan was his friend, and this wasn't how he meant to treat his friends.
"I'm sorry," he began to say, but Ronan was already shaking his head, turning away from him. Adam felt his heart sink and rattle around in his ribcage, his body still unable to move. "Ronan, I didn't mean – "
"No, you did," Ronan interrupted, still not looking at him, and Adam fell quiet, ashamed, because he was right. He did mean it. He meant it in more ways than one. He wished he knew how to say more than what he meant, or maybe less than what he meant. He wished Ronan would look at him. He wished he would kiss him.
The vividness of that wish was enough to startle him into movement, the desire flooding and burning all at once, another contradiction, as it swirled around inside him. He stepped back, off-balance, then forward again, trying to regain his footing. Ronan's head lifted, a curious slant of his eyes back towards Adam. There were no other emotions he could read on his face. Adam wished there were.
"I'll leave," he managed to choke out in the instant their eyes met, unsure of what else to do with the crushing weight of his realization, the wish he hadn't allowed himself to think before, pounding on his shoulders, on his heart. Ronan turned back towards him, eyes glinting in the fading sunlight, like he was studying him. Or judging him, and finding him wanting. Adam swallowed heavily and stepped back now that he could move without falling over.
But Ronan's feet matched him, step for step, and he couldn't find a path to escape behind himself. His back ended up pressed against a tree, his eyes blown wide as he watched Ronan stalk closer, carefully enough to never touch him, never be within breathing distance, or kissing distance.
Which was probably the point, now that he considered it, and the thought settled heavily on top of his still-hammering heart. He didn't want Ronan in kissing distance, he told himself, though he wasn't sure whether that was because he didn't want to kiss him (lie) or because he didn't trust himself not to kiss him (half-truth).
Or whether it was just a lie all over.
"You don't have to leave," Ronan said finally, words measured and biting, and Adam blinked because it took him a moment to recall what he had said before. How long had the silence between them stretched? How long had he been thinking about kissing Ronan? "You didn't say anything I didn't already know."
It still wasn't an answer to Adam's earlier question, but at this point, he wasn't sure if he wanted one. He wasn't sure what he would do if the answer was yes, and he wasn't sure how he would feel if the answer was no. His stomach did a backflip; his heart uneasy as it jumped between his throat and his ribs. The sensation felt uncomfortable and welcome at the same time. A lot like Ronan's stare.
He opened his mouth to apologize, but nothing came out. He looked at Ronan, willing him to do something, to say something, to give him an escape, but Ronan didn't say anything. Adam supposed that was fair. He supposed he kind of deserved it.
For half a heartbeat, Adam considered what would happen if he walked away right now, leaving aside the question of whether he actually could. He would go back to the funeral. He would see Blue. He would see Gansey. He would see Blue and Gansey. Ronan would emerge, and they would all drive back home once Blue was ready. It would be the four of them in a car, and maybe Noah would join them, and it would be like old times.
Except it wouldn't. Except it couldn't. Because every time Ronan's mouth moved, all Adam could think about was his lips.
Ronan's earlier words pounded a sad drumbeat in his mind. You like girls. He liked girls. He liked Blue. Blue didn't like him. But he liked Blue. And he liked girls.
These were not truths, but they were facts. Immovable, steady, and solid. Facts.
Adam looked at Ronan's lips.
Truths could be changed. You like girls. Facts could not.
Ronan didn't move first.
You like girls.
He did like girls. He liked Blue. And he liked the way Ronan tasted as his tongue swept across Adam's lips and into his mouth, smoke and alcohol and adrenaline; he liked the way Ronan's hands felt as they slid down his body, across his chest, up beneath his shirt; he liked the way Ronan looked at him when he pulled back for air, wild-eyed and breathless and wearing a smirk that Adam was quick to reach over and kiss away.
"Fuck, Parrish," Ronan murmured, halfway between unbuttoning Adam's shirt and shrugging off his own, "who wanted to kiss who here, exactly?" His tone carried the irrepressible smugness of a boy who knew exactly how to get under his skin.
"Shut the fuck up, Lynch," Adam said, and then he kissed him again.
a/n: if you've read this far, please leave me a review to let me know what you thought! :)