The treehouse is too small for both of them. Caspian's cross-legged, his right knee and left foot squashed up against Edmund's thigh. Edmund dangles his legs off the edge of the platform.
Admittedly, calling the little structure a "treehouse" would be misleading; it has only two walls and half a roof. They both have to lean forward slightly to avoid hitting their heads. It's been years since either of them has been up here, and it's much smaller than they remember. They used to be able to fit three or four, if they squished, or two very comfortably. When it was all five of them Edmund would sit in the forked tree branch just above the platform where the rest of them all sat together, Peter holding little Lucy on his lap.
It's a beautiful day, the first one of the summer, and the first time Edmund has seen Caspian in months. The platform is sun-warm below their legs, rough from years of rain and wind, and the air smells like freshly cut grass. A gentle breeze ruffles their hair.
Lucy comes out of the house bearing the box of popsicles Edmund requested. She walks up to their tree and stands on tiptoes, holding the open box above her head. "Save some for me," she says.
Edmund leans forward to take a pair of popsicles. It's impossible to know what flavour they are without opening the packages, so he crosses his fingers with one hand as he gives Caspian the other popsicle.
"Cheers," Caspian says, tapping his popsicle against Edmund's. They rip open the plastic at the same time.
"Damn," Edmund says. Cherry's his least favourite. "Swap me?"
Caspian twiddles his lime popsicle between his fingers, holding it by the little wooden stick. "What will you give me?"
For no particular reason, the thought suddenly pops into Edmund's head that he'd give Caspian a kiss for his popsicle. Edmund dismisses the thought as a symptom of being gay and half in love with all your friends. He taps his pockets to see if he has anything to give, but they're empty, so he looks around them for swappable goods. "This feather?" he suggests, picking it up and holding it out.
Caspian accepts the feather and tucks it behind his ear, then swaps their popsicles. The feather is a stunning blue against his golden hair. "I wonder what kind of bird that's from."
"Blue jay?" Edmund suggests, speaking around his popsicle. "That's the only blue bird I know."
"You literally just said the phrase blue bird and a blue jay's the only blue bird you can name?" Caspian laughs.
"Oh, fuck you," Edmund says, pulling his popsicle out of his mouth with a pop. "Can you name any other blue birds?"
Caspian taps his popsicle against his lips. "Swallow?" he suggests finally. "They're dark blue."
"...I'm actually impressed," Edmund says.
"Thanks. I'm sure you know that I'm a leading bird expert." Caspian unfolds his legs, careful not to jostle Edmund too much, and stretches them out over the edge of the platform. The warm afternoon light gets caught in the dusting of golden hair on his arms and legs, outlining him in a golden glow. It's the second sort of odd Caspian-related thing Edmund's thought in the past few minutes, and he frowns as he takes another bite of popsicle.
"Ow!"
"What? What's wrong?" Caspian asks.
"Brain...freeze…" Edmund blindly holds out his popsicle, and when Caspian takes it, clutches his head in both hands.
"I don't remember the last time I had a brain freeze. It really is like we're kids again!"
"All very well for you to say when you don't feel like your head's about to split open," Edmund grouses.
"Relax, Ed, you're gonna be fine." Caspian hands him back his popsicle. "Or should I call 911?"
"Yeah, yeah," Edmund grumbles, glaring at his popsicle. When his brain thaws, he takes cautious nibbles, enjoying the limey tang. He looks over at Caspian. He's leaning against a nearby branch, eyes closed, long hair falling across his face. He wears an expression of quiet bliss Edmund doesn't remember seeing on him in quite a while.
Caspian opens his eyes and pushes off the tree branch, sitting upright again. He catches Edmund staring. "Something on my face?"
Edmund blinks. "No. Just zoned out for a second there."
Caspian gently bites down on his popsicle while he ties his hair back with the hair band around his wrist. Edmund focuses on his own popsicle. It's nearly gone, and he wants to avoid brain freeze, so he takes little licks. Each is a burst of bright fruity flavour.
"I wonder if these have real juice in them," Edmund muses.
"They probably have about 5% and then say they have real fruit juice," Caspian says. "This definitely doesn't taste like real cherries."
"Yeah, I know, it tastes like cough syrup and shattered dreams."
"That's such a good simile!"
"Wait, you don't even like cherry?"
"I like real cherries, not cherry popsicles."
"Why'd you trade me, then?"
Caspian shrugs and smiles. "You asked. I think you hate them more than I do."
"Have the rest of mine," Edmund offers, feeling bad, though there's only a quarter of his popsicle left.
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. Take it."
Caspian accepts the popsicle. "What do I do with the cherry one?"
Edmund shrugs. "Throw it down? We can throw out the stick later."
Caspian drops the popsicle over the side and leans over to watch it fall. "I feel like I'm poisoning the grass, or at the very least the ants."
"Come on, they wouldn't be poisonous or they couldn't sell them, right?"
"What isn't poisonous to us isn't always safe for smaller creatures, though," Caspian says wisely. "Like chocolate. And everything else you can't give a dog."
Edmund shrugs.
Caspian looks over at Edmund. "You have something on your face." He leans over the miniscule distance between them and swipes his finger along Edmund's cheek. Caspian pulls his hand away, showing Edmund the smear of green popsicle juice. He absentmindedly puts his finger in his mouth to lick off the juice. His eyes flicker to Edmund.
A shiver goes down Edmund's spine.
He suddenly realises that they're practically sitting in each other's laps, shoulder to shoulder, and their faces aren't far apart.
And they keep staring at each other.
Caspian clears his throat. "Anyway, what was I saying? Dogs. You can't give dogs chocolate. And you probably can't give ants popsicles."
"What if the ants want to have some popsicles?" Edmund asks. He frowns at his knees, trying to work out if he would call whatever this is a crush.
"I guess it's up to personal preference whether you let the ants self-destruct or not," Caspian blathers. "I personally feel kind of bad about dropping the popsicle off the edge, especially because ants probably don't know that they shouldn't eat it, but others would argue that it's a free country and it should be up to the ants to decide. I hate that phrase, don't you? Free country?"
Edmund looks over at Caspian again, saying nothing, just looking.
"Ed-?"
Edmund cups his right hand around the back of Caspian's neck. Caspian swallows but doesn't look away. His eyes are a lovely gray with flickers of gold, and his pupils are blown-
Edmund leans in and presses a kiss to the corner of Caspian's gentle mouth. He pulls away, just a little, because they're already so close together.
A smile stutters its way across Caspian's mouth. "What was that?"
"An experiment," Edmund says archly. "One I would like to repeat. That's how you verify your hypothesis, you know."
"And what was your hypothesis?" Caspian asks, corners of his eyes crinkling.
"You're a smart man. I'm sure you can guess." Edmund leans forward to kiss him again, hands shifting to the back of Caspian's head.
Edmund can't help but laugh against Caspian's lips as he hears a popsicle splat onto the platform. Caspian reaches up to loose his hair from its ponytail, letting it cascade over Edmund's hands, before sliding his newly-free hands around Edmund's waist.
Caspian tastes like lime and cherry, like standing on the edge of the highest diving board, like letting a wave grab you and roll you until you don't know which way is up and all that matters is that you feel the most alive you've ever been. It's something wholly new yet intimately familiar.
The platform's railing digs into Edmund's lower back. He puts his hands on Caspian's chest to gently push him away. "Wanna go to my room?"
"Yes!" Caspian sits up straight, pushing his mussed hair behind his ears. "I can't believe I'm kissing my best friend," he says, gray eyes alight, a grin spreading across his face.
"By a very funny coincidence, so am I!" Edmund replies. He leans forward to give Caspian another kiss, hands cradling his head. "Oh, your feather fell out." Edmund picks the blue feather off his chest and tucks it back behind Caspian's ear.
"Thank you." Caspian smiles the way he has a million times before, his eyes crinkling, and Edmund's heart stutters in his chest.
"My pleasure." Edmund runs his hand down Caspian's arm as he carefully disentangles his legs from Caspian's. Once he's on the ground again, Edmund looks up at Caspian. "Last one in is a rotten egg!"
Edmund takes off running as Caspian scrambles after him, missing a rung and falling the last couple feet to the ground. "Hey, that's not fair!"
"I never said I was fair!" Edmund calls over his shoulder, safe inside the cool, dark house.
Caspian nimbly jumps over the threshold into the house, intentionally bumping into Edmund's shoulder. "Guess I'm a rotten egg."
"But you're my rotten egg." Edmund slings his arm over Caspian's shoulders and tugs him closer.
"Wow, what an enticing pick-up line," Caspian says dryly.
"Only the best for you." Edmund winks.
Caspian rolls his eyes and lets himself be led up the stairs, their popsicles entirely forgotten.