"I'm leaving school."
The statement had been quite as sudden as his entrance. Truth be told, it was so out of the blue that Aeleus felt the wooden spoon he had been holding to stir the sauce up until that point fall to the floor with a clatter with an untidy splash of tomato red and a barely hidden expletive. He looked up at Ienzo, thinking that this was some sort of stupid joke, some wicked prank to get his attention away from whatever else, like video games, football and girls.
He stared at Ienzo, forgetting to breath for a moment. Ienzo held the gaze, almost bored, his eyes glazed with a guarded expression that made him nigh untouchable.
"What did you-"
"Are you deaf, Aeleus? I said, I'm leaving school. My scholarship has been cut from the budget. I'm no longer a 'necessity' to University. I'm leaving." His nagging voice was so jarringly deadpan, he could have been naming the inadequacies of their school's library, or complaining about how Even talks too much when he's trying to work on his labs.
Normal people would not have seen the twitch in his eye as he looked away, or the tightness of the slender muscles of his neck as he huffed and glared at the television in the living room which was currently showcasing Dilan's latest rampages on Grand Theft Auto, paused mid car explosion as the other man looked, mouth gaping, at the pint-sized prodigy in the doorway. Braig, who was lounging on the love seat was doing much the same thing. Everything seemed to be held suspended but the boy in question.
"Ie, when did they-?"
But apparently, it was too much for Aeleus to expect to finish a sentence, let alone approach the young man. As he reached out, Ienzo backed away, his indifference turning to bitter rage in a breath of a second. "On Monday. I've been speaking with the board members involved, but it's useless, so don't even ask. It doesn't matter. This place of full of imbeciles anyway." He spat, glaring at Dilan as though he had won some sort of prize which he had not even slightly earned. The dreadlocked man simply continued to look rather shocked in response. Apparently, snarky insults didn't quite cover this situation, and thus, he was at a loss with how to deal with the 'little brat', as he would have termed him on any other day.
"But they can't just-"
Yet again, Ienzo plowed onward. "Oh, yes they can. And they did. So, I guess this is it then, hm?" He crossed his slender arms, shooting Aeleus a glare this time around. "You'll be here with your football idiots, and I'll be home, teaching myself and probably doing a damned better job than they would be doing here."
Aeleus was now reaching for Ienzo once again, having completely forgotten the pot of sauce which was now boiling over (no one cared), but the latter was having none of it.
"Forget it, Aeleus. You always had more important things to do anyway." He sneered, but for all his biting comments, he could not hide the quiver in his voice and the careful way he dodged the other man's gaze as he turned and exited as speedily as he had barged in.
The door slammed. The pot bubbled. A hooker on GTA shrieked as she was about to be crushed by a fire truck. The bros present said nothing for a solid minute (that felt like years), looking from one to another in dumbfounded silence.
For once, Aeleus broke it. "OH FUCK." He began to pace in the kitchen.
From the couch, Dilan cut in, "Dude, calm down. This isn't-"
"OH FUCK." He continued, apparently not hearing him, or perhaps thinking this was a legitimately validated response.
Braig decided to respond this time, "Well, I don't see how this is any big loss to-"
"OH FUCK." Aeleus continued until a cushion came careening into his cranium as though he had a target painted on his angular face. The big man went down hard, not having expected the attack, and being quite distracted all on his own. The pot came with him, as though to teach him a lesson for not attending to the necessary precautions of never ignoring a hot stove while cooking. With a roar of pain the sickening squelch of dropped food, Aeleus resurfaced absolutely covered in huge, garish and rather violent splatters of red, he tore his shirt off in a panic to get the hot sauce off from his skin. Panting, he stumbled a bit as he backed away from the mess, turning off the stove with a defeated sigh.
"Oh fuck." He finished in a groan.
"Bro, you look insane." Braig pointed out unnecessarily, quite literally pointing at the other man. Dilan shot him a scathing look that would have put Ienzo to shame. More than insane, the panting, slightly burned, shell shocked man looked devastated.
"Look man, we can handle this." Dilan improvised, knowing that he needed to say something comforting but having absolutely nothing up his sleeve but sheer instinct at this point. The last minute or so had really just flipped everything around.
Aeleus did something in between a nod and shaking his head, which really answered no question at all and did not help in making him look any more sane at that moment. "Didhejustbreakupwithme?" He blurted out before he could entirely stop himself, and not quite knowing if what he had said was even cohesive English or just a confused groan as he gestured with an extraordinarily well built arm to the doorway as though Ienzo were still occupying it and could answer this question.
"No, he's just being a spiteful and bitter little shit. Look, we can fix this! Just calm down. We'll raise money or something! You know, like when the wrestling team needed extra funds because Radiant High's school board was being a douche." Dilan continued as Braig started to chuckle in the background. He shot him another glare only to find that the man had his single eye absolutely locked on to Aeleus' washboard abdominals with a wicked sort of glee, particularly for eying at someone who looked like they were in the midst of a mental breakdown.
"Dude." He snapped at him.
"What?"
"Cut it out."
"Well, if you're so jealous, just take your own shirt off." He said with an eager half grin. Dilan paused, about to shoot back something equally as snarky and more than slightly suggestive when an idea hit him with a force of a pot of sauce and a couch cushion.
"THAT'S IT. I'M FUCKING BRILLIANT." He cried triumphantly.
Instead of being confused, like any normal individual would be, Braig seemed to completely understand "I know, I was thinking the same thing. We should totally threesome."
"No, you idiot." Dilan rolled his eyes. "That's the answer to keeping the brat in school." Aeleus perked slightly from his daze next to the doorway.
People were being ridiculously happy and Ienzo hated it. He absolutely loathed it. If it were up to him, he could outlaw laughing right now. How dare these people mill about, doing nothing, laughing at some stupid posters hung up in the quad, out in the cold, about to catch pneumonia, still laughing stupidly with their stupid fucking faces and their stupid mouths and their stupid voices. He could have thrown something at them, just like he felt like he could have thrown something at the entire world. You know why?
Because it was fucking cold, and he was leaving forever. He might have been able to handle the leaving forever bit, truth be told, if it had not been the Holiday season, where everyone decides that they want to be cheerful, lovely and filled with gratuitous amounts of hoo-ha. It was so cold that he had no idea how they could possibly be so ridiculously happy. He supposed it would have been easier if he had a huge sports jacket to drape over his shoulders, or a rather particular person to fret over him, someone who he had quite easily pushed away about a week ago now. Aeleus was always warm. Ienzo never quite understood the logic of that, but he suppose that he would have to be satisfied with his station in life and it's current perpetually low temperature. He was the one who was leaving, after all.
Yuffie shrieked in a giggling laughter and held up a flyer for Kairi to see. Ienzo twitched in annoyance. The young prodigy finally dragged himself up from his seat, about to tell them both off for being 'an overwhelmingly loud waste of air' when he stopped himself mid-insult upon seeing the paper in question.
A car wash? In the middle of December? His mind scoffed at the possibility of why anyone would ever even consider washing a car in the freezing weather, let along getting one's own car washed when it was just bound to get covered in salt and grime not ten minutes later, when he spotted the full title. A Christmas car wash, sponsored by a very particular sports team...
"That'll be five bucks." Aeleus shifted uncomfortably. The car behind him was most certainly clean, he had done quite a good job polishing it off, making sure that it shined in the glaring sunlight off of the piled snow in the parking lot, but frankly, the ladies before him did not seem too interested in their car. Indeed, they had not even spared it a sidelong glance. They were staring, quite pointedly at his exposed torso.
"Yeah, looks great." Tifa admitted, distractedly, shooting her car a quick once-over, before returning to the fine specimen of man before her. Aeleus could not really complain too much, being that he was only currently wearing his swimming trunks, a red pair of flip flops and a santa's hat. It was like a much more toned down, cheap version of the chip n'dale. He retreated politely with a, "Thank you." before he approached the the men gathered behind him
The entire football team was in the same exact state of undress behind him, a few working on getting a few of their customer's cars squeaky clean, most flinging snow balls at one another and ducking behind wayward trees, shrubs and even cars as they received return fire. Their customers didn't seem to mind, on the contrary, they were watching in unabashed, rapt attention between giggling with one another. He supposed having to deal with Tifa was a bit of a blessing, at least she wasn't giggling at him.
"Looking good, Champ." She grinned at him, a smile playing at her lips before she moved aside to unlock the doors. Off to his right, Braig's rather unimpressively skinny, half naked form (for he couldn't accept being left out of all the fun) flung a rather sizable looking snowball at his face, and of course, the freeshooter hit home. Aeleus shouted a few random expletives before whirling around to grab a bolder sized chunk of snow with his bare hands to hurl back at him when he heard someone clear their throat right in front of him.
Bundled in a scarf, a sweater, a jacket, a hat, a pair of mittens, a fuzzy pair of boots and several more un-namable layers (underarmor, if he knew him well enough) and at least three pairs of pants, Ienzo stood before Aeleus. He looked up at him with that deadpan expression that seemed to pierce the much larger man and make him realize how stupid he must look, because the situation was essentially thus:
He was nearly naked, wearing a santa hat, halfway covered in ice and salt, holding a bolder of snow above his head and stopped mid-lunge to throw it at his bro's current 'nightly-preference'. He dropped his weapon with a decisive and surprisingly hefty thunk.
"I know, I know, I'm an idiot. There's no way this will work, but I'm-" He sputtered. Words always felt so awkward for him. He knew he was being judged anyway, why did he have to speak and end up reaffirming what everyone was suspecting? He was dumb, alright? All brawn, no brain. Whatever, he'd accepted it, but God did he hate being expected to speak to justify it. "...yeah, I'm doing my best here." He finished lamely with a shrug.
He braced himself for a snort of derision, a sarcastic bark of laughter which could only be followed by an entirely encyclopedia of why he should never try to do anything ever. I mean how did he even tie his shoes in the morning. Oh wait, he was wearing flip-flops today, but regardless, he got the point.
He had not been expecting the press of warm cloth against his sternum and the gentle hug of woolen mittens around his torso. A normal person would not have noticed the shudder of emotion which had nothing to do with the cold, the small voice which followed it, hidden under layers and layers of control, repression and thermal underwear. "I love you." A sniffle followed, and then a pause. "And yes, you are an idiot."
"I love you t-" It was almost as if summoned by the sweetness of the situation, another snowball exploded directly on the back of Aeleus' head and he realized that his words had been rather plainly bitten short. He shot a murderous glare at Braig, who pointed innocently at Dilan, who snorted in disbelief and adjusted his own swim-gear before pulling his santa-hat just a tad bit lower on his head, giving his bro a knowing grin.
Ienzo shoved at him, a challenging smile breaking out on his face, quickly masking whatever tears he had let fall with a brave demeanor. "Go get 'em, tiger." And he watched on, his grin exasperated but ultimately satisfied, as his boyfriend sped off to tackle both men into the frozen snowbanks.
It was the most foolish Christmas present he had ever received in his life, and he loved it so much, he almost didn't notice the cold.